Beneath the night sky, at Loguetown’s harbor.
The salty sea breeze stirred layer after layer of waves, their rise and fall like a lullaby soaked in moonlight, smoothing away every trace of Loguetown’s noise.
In the darkness, a thin streak of lightning tore through the gloom, flashing past at incredible speed.
In the blink of an eye, every pirate aboard a mid-sized pirate ship had been shocked unconscious.
Seven ended his elementalization, first hooking Mihawk’s small boat onto the deck, then raising the anchor.
After that, he kicked the unconscious pirates onto the shore one by one and skillfully steered the ship out of the harbor.
Originally, he had planned to find Buggy and Shanks for a little reunion, but the moment he remembered Garp was nearby, Seven wished the ship could sail faster.
When it came to the terror of Garp’s iron fists, no one had more right to speak than the Roger Pirates.
In the years since the God Valley Incident, Garp had done only two things.
First, refuse promotion to Admiral.
Second, chase Roger all over the world.
Within the Roger Pirates, from the three main forces of gold, silver, and bronze down to the apprentices Shanks and Buggy, everyone except Seven had been fortunate enough to experience Garp’s iron fist.
Those were a pair of utterly unreasonable, head-locking iron fists wrapped in Conqueror’s Haki.
Seven steered with one hand and watched the compass with the other.
Not far away, Mihawk held a cup of black tea.
“What is the One Piece?”
Seven grinned.
“Want to know?”
“Mihawk, call me Captain, and I’ll take you to Laugh Tale right now.”
With the Great Pirate Era underway, the world would only grow more chaotic.
Due to his identity, the path of joining the Marines was almost entirely closed to Seven.
If he wanted to live well in this turbulent age, there was a limit to what he could do alone.
He had to form his own pirate crew.
Especially now that he had eaten the Rumble-Rumble Fruit, he needed at least a rescue team on board specifically responsible for fishing him out of the sea.
As for crew candidates, the first choice was, of course, the World’s Greatest Swordsman, Hawkeye Mihawk.
Only a fool would pass up that kind of combat power.
He had to recruit him!
Next were Kuma and Jinbe.
Kuma’s life had truly been too miserable.
Seven coveted Kuma’s strength, but he also did not want to see a hero who had saved five hundred civilians at God Valley live such a wretched life.
A hero should not meet that kind of end.
As for Jinbe, who would not want a big blue guy on their crew?
Besides, once he had the big blue guy… Fish-Man Jinbe on board, Seven would never have to worry about falling into the sea again.
Before recruiting any crew, however, his top priority was increasing his own strength.
After all, this was a world where might made right.
The weak had no right to choose.
Mihawk gently set down his teacup, stood, and drew Yoru from his back, placing the black blade against Seven’s neck.
“You seem to have misunderstood something about me.”
The cold edge of Yoru instantly snapped Seven back to his senses, and he hurriedly raised both hands.
“Not scary at all, Mihawk.”
Right.
Mihawk was not some kindly pushover.
His title as Marine Hunter had not come out of nowhere.
Mihawk put Yoru away.
“You’ve been marked by Cipher Pol.
From now on, the World Government and the Marines will hunt you relentlessly.”
“If word gets out that you were a member of the Pirate King’s crew, the pirates won’t let you go either.”
“Even now that you’ve eaten the Rumble-Rumble Fruit, don’t go around telling everyone you were part of the Roger Pirates or that you’ve been to Laugh Tale.”
Seven immediately understood.
Mihawk was worried about him.
Seriously, he could have just said so directly, yet he had to draw his sword instead.
What a hopeless tsundere!
“Mihawk, how do you think I survived all these years?
You’re the only person I’ve been honest with.”
Mihawk picked up his teacup and walked to the cabin entrance.
There, he stopped and asked without turning around, “Why?”
“Idiot.
Because I trust you.”
Crack.
Mihawk crushed the teacup into powder, and the temperature in the air seemed to drop by several degrees.
Seven’s heart began pounding wildly.
Only after Mihawk entered the cabin did he reach up and wipe the cold sweat from his forehead.
As expected, when it came to training someone, he could not be too impatient.
Still, Mihawk, you won’t escape.
Heh heh heh.
Hurry up and join this captain’s crew!
Seven took an Eternal Pose pointing toward Reverse Mountain from his pocket and browsed the requests on the trading platform while sailing.
[Request: Brothers from Teyvat, 50,000 points.
I only want Third Descender dead.]
Seven specifically glanced at the poster’s world and suddenly understood.
Warhammer…
“No wonder he’s so rich.
Not only did he put bounties on Momonosuke and the Cowardly Marine, even put up a high bounty for Third Descender… A transmigrator who can survive in the Warhammer world can’t be called merely fierce.
That’s practically a god.”
Still, Seven could not help feeling that the Warhammer-world user had deliberately put a high bounty on Third Descender just to create family conflict for that idiot in Teyvat.
Putting away his unrealistic ambitions for the moment, Seven began choosing commissions he could currently complete.
[Request: 9 points for food and water.]
Seven immediately accepted the commission, submitting ten servings of food and water in one go to the brother who had transmigrated into an apocalypse world.
[Ding.
Congratulations, you have completed the commission and received 9 points.
Monthly platform commission limit remaining: 9/10.
Current point balance: 9.]
Although it had used up one commission slot, Seven was not discouraged.
At least he had figured out another rule.
[Request: Any brothers from the One Piece world here?
Long-term bulk purchase of Devil Fruits for 1,000 points each.]
[10 cases of lemon iced tea: 1 point.]
“Lemon iced tea?”
Seven fell into thought.
“If lemon iced tea can be exchanged for points… then the dials from Skypiea should work too, right?”
To better tame Mihawk, Seven endured the pain of spending a massive sum of 1 point to buy ten cases of lemon iced tea, then took one case from his system space and put it in the cold room.
Who told Mihawk to like black tea?
As captain, of course he had to spoil his future crew.
[Ding.
Purchase successful.
Monthly platform purchase limit remaining: 9/10.
Current point balance: 8.]
Seven closed the system interface, now having a rough understanding of the trading platform.
Each month, he could complete ten commissions and make ten purchases.
The system’s direct-sale section, on the other hand, had no limit on the number of purchases.
Also, points were really hard to earn.
He had to reach the City of Gold in Skypiea as soon as possible and use the giant golden pillar there to buy the divine weapon Musou Isshin.
After that, he would occupy Skypiea as his base, eat and drink to his heart’s content for a while, and let his Bottomless Appetite constitution fully take effect to nourish his body.
Then he would list those Skypiean dials, which possessed supernatural powers, on the trading platform in exchange for points, then use those points to strengthen himself.
Seven had a god’s-eye view, so naturally, he knew how this sea would develop.
Shanks would establish the Red Hair Pirates, then go undercover in the God’s Knights to gather intelligence before eventually returning to the sea and becoming the fourth Emperor.
As for Buggy, he would keep hiding out in the East Blue.
According to the World Government’s intelligence, Buggy and Shanks were only apprentices and had never gone to Laugh Tale, so their threat level was far lower than that of the other crew members.
Among the rest of the Roger Pirates, the easiest one to arrest was undoubtedly Beelzebub Seven.
Seven opened a bottle of lemon iced tea, gulped it down, and cursed.
“Damn it!
To think that I, a dignified member of the Pirate King’s crew, would be looked down on by the mere World Government!”
“The weak really have no human rights.”
For more than a month afterward, Seven and Mihawk took turns sailing.
They entered the first half of the Grand Line through Reverse Mountain and headed toward Jaya.
In his spare time, Seven did only three things: sleep, gorge himself, and train like a madman.
Until one day, Seven awkwardly discovered that the ship needed supplies again—but they were out of money.
Just then, a pirate ship flying a skull flag entered Seven’s sight.
“Mihawk, bring us alongside!”