Chapter 198: I Want Roger Dead! Name Your Price
The shift in the New World's landscape was now starkly apparent. Among the apex powerhouses, Harald and Nereus both harbored their own distinct agendas and had long since ceased playing pirate games.
"Red the Aloof," Patrick Redfield, was a lone wolf who never recruited companions and required no followers.
The Roger Pirates were similar, refusing to recruit subordinates on a massive scale.
While the Whitebeard Pirates did recruit, Whitebeard himself possessed no ambition for world domination; he merely sought to continuously gather "family."
Although Kaido was actively recruiting and brimming with ambition, his current reputation and strength were not yet formidable enough, resulting in very few seeking shelter under his banner.
Excluding the pirates who were either locked in Impel Down or had died at sea, the "companies" with the best prospects in the New World were whittled down to three: Ochoku on Hachinosu, Big Mom on Whole Cake Island, and the Golden Lion of the Flying Pirate Armada.
However, Ochoku had recently tightened his screening process and announced a temporary halt to recruiting new members. Big Mom's reputation, compared to the likes of the Golden Lion, relegated her to the second tier.
This left the Golden Lion as the ultimate destination for countless ambitious pirates.
But now, news of the Golden Lion's repeated failures in expansion had spread, leaving many pirates temporarily aimless. In a sense, this further exacerbated the chaos on the seas.
Amidst this state of turmoil, the calendar turned to early Year 1516.
Over the past few years, Fish-man Island had defended its security in the deep sea with immeasurable iron and blood.
Countless shattered pirate ships and floating corpses served as a grim declaration to the world, warning them of exactly what kind of existence ruled the abyss.
Endless battles forged the Neptune Army into a true elite force. However, Nereus hadn't expanded the army over the last two years. He didn't want cannon fodder; he wanted elites.
Maintaining their original size, the Neptune Army's combat experience had increased exponentially.
In the Sea Forest, a few more tombstones had appeared, marking the resting places of soldiers who had fallen in battle over the years.
War was not a child's game; casualties were inevitable. High-intensity training drastically reduced the mortality rate, but it could never eliminate it entirely.
Furthermore, the vast majority of these casualties occurred during surface engagements and landing assaults. Do not fight Fish-man Island underwater. Do not provoke Fish-man Island's rules. This had already become a universal consensus etched into the minds of many.
At this moment, inside the Ryugu Palace, three-year-old Chloe was engaged in some sort of target practice.
A target painted with the cross insignia of the World Government stood fifty meters away. Chloe held a fireball in one hand, carefully taking aim.
"Hyah!"
She hurled the fireball with all her might. However, it arced through the air and struck a completely different target off to the side, leaving the one directly in front of her completely unscathed.
Nanamo raised her hand and casually drew another "X" on Hermes, evidently using the Homie as a scoreboard. Right now, Hermes had a full ten marks on him.
"You missed again, my dear little sister. Ten fireballs, zero hits on the designated target. However, you successfully eliminated ten other enemies. Are you doing this on purpose?"
She truly couldn't understand what was going on with Chloe's aim. She hit a target every single time—just never the one she was actually aiming at.
"Mmph..."
Chloe didn't say a word, but her puffed-up cheeks clearly showed her sheer dissatisfaction. Staring at the target in front of her, Chloe flapped her wings and hovered into mid-air, the flames on her back roaring even more fiercely.
"Flame Phoenix: Chaotic Feathers!"
With a flurry of arm movements, a massive barrage of fireballs rained down from the sky toward the ground. Having failed at precise sniping, she simply abandoned the concept entirely, opting instead for overwhelming carpet bombing to annihilate the target.
Under the ferocious aerial bombardment, the central target was finally reduced to ashes. Chloe dusted off her hands, a satisfied smile blooming on her face.
Glancing at the destruction below, she flapped her wings and slowly descended to the ground.
Chloe had mastered flying and swimming almost simultaneously, and neither was much slower than walking.
"I hit it."
Clap, clap, clap.
"Very good, quite impressive..."
Looking at the completely obliterated shooting range, Nanamo clapped in encouragement. For some reason, she felt that this little sister of hers had a serious violent streak in her genes.
Perhaps it was due to Amphelite. Whenever she was raising the child, she inevitably slipped some "hatred education" into the mix.
The Celestial Dragons are all bastards. The World Government is the greatest evil. In the future, burn them all. This logic had already been deeply ingrained in Chloe's mind.
"Big Sis Nanamo... stop resting... it's time to practice!"
Some of her enunciation wasn't perfectly clear yet, but the sentence was perfectly coherent. Having destroyed all the targets, Chloe tugged on Nanamo's arm, intending to drag her to the sparring grounds.
"Your mother was an absolute workaholic back in the day... Why are you such a workaholic too?! Listen to me, your control over your flames still isn't good enough. You need to learn fine, precise control. This time, no carpet bombing allowed! You must strike with precision!
"Only by mastering precision can you effectively use carpet bombing to achieve precise destruction later on."
Nanamo ordered Hermes to set up the targets again. She was left here to spar with Chloe. Originally, she thought it would be an incredibly relaxing job. After all, what kind of burden could sparring with a three-year-old child possibly be?
That tiny bit of strength couldn't harm Nanamo in the slightest. All she had to do was go through the motions, correcting her posture and power generation techniques.
But the boundless stamina and endurance of the Lunarian race had been perfectly inherited by Chloe. She simply didn't want to rest.
"Mama... likes hard work! Chloe is not tired!"
Chloe swung her arms energetically. The complete absence of sweat on her forehead was proof enough that this level of training truly had no effect on her.
"Nanamo, I asked you to teach her combat, not to slack off on the side."
"Old Man! I've been teaching her for six full hours! I just wanted to rest for a bit. It's Chloe who has way too much energy!"
Hearing Nereus's voice, Nanamo knew she could finally clock out. But she quickly made sure to clarify exactly what had happened beforehand.
Nanamo didn't know if little kids lied on purpose, but she knew for a fact that little kids made things up.
Because their cognitive understanding wasn't fully formed yet, they sometimes described things completely differently than what they actually saw, or presented dreams and thoughts as undeniable facts.
If Chloe were to explain it, she might very well claim Nanamo hadn't done a single thing all day.
However, before Nereus could say anything, the Den Den Mushi on Nanamo's wrist suddenly began to ring.
"Hello? Katakuri? What's the matter?"
"Nanamo... it's me."
"Ma... Mama?!"
Hearing the voice from the Den Den Mushi, Nanamo froze. She only kept in contact with Katakuri and the others in absolute secrecy. According to what they had told her, Charlotte Linlin had strictly forbidden the mention of her name long ago.
For her to suddenly call using Katakuri's Den Den Mushi... this was incredibly abnormal.
"Nanamo... relay a message to Nereus for me. That bastard Roger is heading toward Fish-man Island again. Sink that bastard to the bottom of the sea! My price... is negotiable..."
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