Just as Bardock had predicted, after they departed Foosha Village, Garp surprisingly honored their ceasefire and completely ceased his pursuit. A short while later, Fleet Admiral Sengoku officially recalled the Marine Hero back to the Grand Line.
The primary reason for Garp's recall wasn't simply a matter of giving up on the White Dragon crew. It was because the Red Hair Pirates had officially set sail into the treacherous waters of the New World, and their sheer, disruptive presence was beginning to violently destabilize the established global power dynamic.
While the general public remained largely ignorant of the deep political nuances, Sengoku and Garp were acutely aware of the historical context. 'Red-Haired' Shanks wasn't just a powerful pirate; he was a former apprentice of the late Pirate King, Gol D. Roger.
Given the choice between hunting down Bardock—a rogue element who primarily minded his own business—and tracking down Shanks—a man directly inheriting Roger's terrifying legacy—Garp heavily preferred the latter. Both professionally and personally, Garp possessed a burning desire to violently beat Shanks into a bloody pulp and permanently lock him inside Impel Down.
With the suffocating pressure of Garp's pursuit finally lifted, the White Dragon significantly slowed its pace. The crew transitioned from tactical evasion to genuine, relaxed tourism.
The East Blue was actually teeming with fascinating islands. Beyond the few famous locations destined to produce the future core members of the Straw Hat crew, there were countless other islands well worth exploring.
They leisurely visited iconic locations like Shells Town, Orange Town, Goat Island, and the Island of Rare Animals.
However, because they were currently sailing a full decade before the canonical start of the original story, many of the dramatic, defining events associated with these islands hadn't even begun to take shape yet.
In Shells Town, the future tyrant 'Axe-Hand' Morgan was still a young, incredibly passionate, and genuinely righteous Marine enlisted man. He was completely unrecognizable from the corrupt, megalomaniacal Captain he would eventually become after being mentally broken and hypnotized by Captain Kuro.
In Orange Town, the Buggy Pirates were absolutely nowhere to be seen, likely still drifting aimlessly through some remote corner of the sea. Consequently, the town was incredibly peaceful, and the local citizens were highly hospitable and welcoming to travelers.
Goat Island was completely uninhabited. Alvida and her crew hadn't established a base there yet, so it was merely a quiet, rocky island with a dense forest.
Eventually, they arrived at the Island of Rare Animals, a bizarre ecosystem populated entirely by strange, chimera-like hybrid beasts. Here, Bardock finally encountered another familiar face from the original timeline: Gaimon, the man permanently stuck inside a treasure chest.
Over a decade ago, Gaimon had accidentally fallen into an empty treasure chest while exploring the island. When he awoke, he found himself permanently trapped, abandoned by his cowardly crewmates who had fled the island without him. For ten long years, he had lived alone among the strange beasts, surviving on wild fruit and raw determination. Despite his tragic circumstances, he harbored one single, consuming obsession: discovering exactly what was inside the massive treasure chests resting atop the towering, inaccessible rock spire in the center of the island.
Given his severe physical limitations—being literally confined to a wooden box with only his head and limbs protruding—it was physically impossible for him to scale the sheer cliff face. He was cursed to spend his life staring up at a treasure he could never reach.
Taking pity on the eccentric man, Bardock utilized his flight capabilities to effortlessly carry Gaimon to the top of the spire and directly open the legendary chests.
They were completely, utterly empty.
Seeing the barren wooden interiors, Gaimon froze. A profound, heavy silence settled over him as he stared at the hollow chests. But then, to the crew's surprise, a gentle smile slowly spread across his face, and he let out a long, shuddering sigh of profound relief.
Deep down, after a decade of agonizing obsession, he had already subconsciously suspected the truth. Seeing it with his own eyes finally laid his demons to rest. The treasure had long since been plundered.
When Gaimon passionately declared that he would permanently remain on the island to fiercely protect his beloved animal friends from poachers, Bardock nodded respectfully and gestured for Mansherry to step forward.
Gaimon's body had been violently compressed inside the wooden chest for over ten years. His internal organs, skeletal structure, and musculature had grotesquely adapted to the confined space. If they had simply shattered the wooden box right then and there, the sudden, violent decompression and structural failure of his body would have killed him instantly.
Fortunately, the miraculous power of the Heal-Heal Fruit defied logic.
With a few glowing tears, Mansherry completely, painlessly restored Gaimon's body to its healthy, original state, allowing him to finally step out of the wooden prison and stretch his legs for the first time in a decade. However, even after regaining his physical freedom, Gaimon remained true to his word. He chose to stay behind on the island, officially becoming the guardian of the rare beasts.
After bidding Gaimon a fond farewell, the White Dragon continued its leisurely voyage.
And just like that, the Sea Circle Year 1510 quietly faded into the annals of history, transitioning smoothly into the Sea Circle Year 1511.
The White Dragon crew celebrated New Year's Eve on the open ocean. It was a massive, incredibly lively, and chaotic banquet. The entire crew drank, feasted, and partied well into the early hours of the morning.
The following day, Bardock spent several hours sitting in his Captain's quarters, answering a constant stream of Den Den Mushi calls. He received warm New Year's greetings from his diverse network of allies: the Dandelion Merchant Guild rapidly expanding in the West Blue; the leaders of the Skypiean, Bilkan, and Shandian factions in the Sky Islands; and various other political and commercial partners he had established over the past year.
A few days later, a massive, globally distributed headline in the World Economy News Paper sparked intense, highly polarized discussions across every ocean:
"Jinbe, 'Knight of the Sea', Officially Appointed as the Newest Warlord of the Sea!"
In terms of pure, raw combat strength, absolutely no one in the New World disputed Jinbe's qualifications for the position. The intense global controversy stemmed entirely from deeply entrenched, systemic racial prejudice against Fish-Men.
The vast majority of humans living on the surface only vaguely knew of the existence of Fish-Man Island through terrifying rumors and sailor myths. Their understanding of Fish-Men and Merfolk was profoundly twisted by ignorance. In fact, many highly uneducated citizens truly believed that Fish-Men weren't actually an intelligent humanoid species, but merely a bizarre, violent subspecies of literal fish.
The World Government had highly complex, deeply political motives for elevating a Fish-Man to such a prestigious global position, primarily aimed at appeasing racial tensions and fostering a superficial alliance with Fish-Man Island.
Bardock casually skimmed the political analysis in the newspaper, completely unbothered by the global debate. The only detail he genuinely cared about was the immediate consequence of Jinbe's promotion.
As a direct condition of Jinbe accepting the Warlord title, the World Government had officially granted a full pardon to all captured members of the Sun Pirates. This meant that Arlong had officially been released from the hellish depths of Impel Down and had returned to Fish-Man Island.
If the timeline held true, Arlong would immediately break away from Jinbe, aggressively recruit his old loyalists, and begin his voyage back to the East Blue to establish his brutal, racist empire.
Bardock folded the newspaper and smiled coldly. He had already struck a highly lucrative intelligence deal with Morgans. The absolute microsecond the Arlong Pirates entered the East Blue, the bird-man would immediately contact him with their exact coordinates.
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