A continuous silver gleam weaved through the chaotic battlefield, moving with the deadly, frictionless grace of a silver ribbon.
Only when this blinding ribbon had completely pierced through the entire Hart Kingdom vanguard did its true form appear—it was York, holding his newly forged Miaodao.
He calmly twirled the three-meter sword with one hand, then flicked his wrist forcefully. The sheer kinetic force shook off all the bloodstains that had inevitably accumulated from cleaving through so many armored men, leaving the bright Damascus steel completely spotless.
York slowly sheathed his sword.
Clack.
The very second the handguard clicked fully into the scabbard, the heads of the dozens of Hart Kingdom soldiers standing behind him belatedly detached and dropped to the ground.
They fell like overripe fruit dropping from a tree. Immediately after, blood gushed from the severed necks like synchronized fountains, creating a crimson drizzle that painted the battlefield red.
York turned his head to look across the plaza.
Douglas Bullet had also finished dealing with his former superior, the supreme commander of this invasion force—General Douglas Gray.
This Gray was merely a pampered nobleman of the old era. He did possess a certain textbook talent for military command, but in terms of actual personal combat power, he was absolute garbage. The only reason he had become a commander was purely due to his family's aristocratic background, not his physical ability.
Therefore, despite being the supreme commander—and theoretically the strongest man in this army—he couldn't even withstand three blows from the eight-year-old Bullet. He had died miserably, his chest caved in and his throat slit by Bullet's combat knife.
"Is this the end?" Bullet asked, panting heavily, wiping Gray's blood from his face.
York smiled, resting his hand on his hilt. "Don't you know how many of your own men deployed for this invasion? And you're asking me?"
Bullet: "..."
"Alright, enough jokes," York chuckled, looking around the devastated port. "The Hart Kingdom invaders have indeed been completely wiped out by us. Now, let's see exactly how much wealth they managed to plunder from the locals!"
It was quite deeply ironic. The people who ultimately eliminated the ruthless invaders actually consisted of a child soldier from the original invading army, and a passing pirate Emperor. The local Clandia Kingdom defenders truly hadn't helped at all.
The Hart Kingdom army had already done the heavy lifting, having almost finished hoarding the wealth they plundered from Yuxiang Town Port. What York and Bullet needed to do was simply gather the massive crates of treasure that were stacked near the docks and assess their value.
"This looks to be... probably around 3 Billion Berries," York stated casually, sweeping his eyes over the gold and jewels. Having recently plundered the entire 300 Billion Berry vault of a kingdom, he could roughly estimate the value of this minor hoard with just a glance.
Bullet sat on a wooden crate nearby, meticulously wiping the blood from his knife with a tattered cloth, completely indifferent to the astronomical number York had just casually mentioned.
Seeing the boy's apathy toward the gold, York smiled. "Half of these treasures are yours."
Bullet's hands stopped. He looked up in sheer astonishment.
"You're giving me... that much?!"
"What's so strange about that?" York grinned, tossing a gold coin at the boy. "We're partners, aren't we?!"
Bullet caught the coin. He closed his mouth, his icy eyes flickering slightly as he stared at the gold in his palm.
'Partners...' Bullet muttered in his heart, a strange, warm feeling blooming in his chest. 'We are partners...'
Afterward, York showed Bullet something even more amazing than a mountain of gold.
York pulled a small mirror from his coat and contacted a beautiful blonde woman named Stussy. A few minutes later, the surface of a large, freestanding mirror in a nearby looted mansion rippled like water. A large squad of men wearing immaculate, matching military uniforms walked directly out of the glass.
Under York's orders, the soldiers began efficiently hauling all 3 Billion Berries of the spoils into the mirror.
Of course, York didn't forget to explicitly emphasize to the transporters that half of this vast treasure belonged exclusively to the eight-year-old boy sitting on the crate.
The soldiers hauling the gold showed absolutely no jealousy or greed upon hearing this; they only showed pure, unadulterated envy.
"What a lucky kid!" one soldier whispered to another.
"With that kind of money and strength, Captain York will probably make him an intern! Man, I want to be an intern too!"
"Dream on! The requirements to become an intern are ridiculously high! Miss Olga, Kuma, and Miss Ginny are all Devil Fruit users! If you want to be an intern, you'd at least have to eat a Devil Fruit first to even qualify!"
Listening to the chatter of these uniformed transporters, Bullet's eyes widened. He realized that York was absolutely not the wandering 'lone wolf' pirate he had initially imagined.
This man has an entire army at his beck and call! With doubts swirling in his mind, and possessing a blunt personality that despised hiding things, Bullet directly asked York.
"Am I considered one of these 'interns' under you now?"
York smiled and replied, "Of course!"
"Why? I mean, why me? Why make me an intern?"
"Because of your monstrous strength and your limitless potential!" York raised his hand, pointing back toward the blood-soaked battlefield where the Hart army lay dead. "An ordinary child wouldn't be able to achieve your kill record on a battlefield like this!"
Bullet opened his mouth, but in the end, couldn't think of a single point to refute the man. It was true; he had never met an opponent among his peers. In fact, most adult soldiers couldn't beat him in a straight fight either. The only reason the adult vanguard had better kill records than him was simply because they had superior firearms and armor.
Once all the treasure was moved into the Mirror World, only York and Bullet were left standing in the ruined port.
Looking at the mirror's surface as it returned to solid, reflective glass, Bullet curiously asked York, "Aren't we going back to your territory together with them?"
"Of course not!"
York picked up the mirror, tucking it away. He then pointed down toward the docks, where a second, sleek purple jet ski sat bobbing in the water—delivered by Stussy's men during the transport.
"Try it out," York smirked. "Once you learn how to ride a Striker, we'll head to the next island."
Bullet tentatively climbed onto the purple jet ski. York quickly taught him how to start the engine and operate the handlebars. As soon as Bullet aggressively twisted the throttle, the jet ski's thrusters erupted, instantly shooting the vessel out more than ten meters across the water, scaring the stoic eight-year-old into yelling loudly in shock.
York threw his head back and burst into booming laughter.
Bullet's face flushed beet red. Suppressing the urge to continue yelling, he gritted his teeth and buried himself in stubbornly learning how to drive the machine.
An hour later, the monstrously talented boy had successfully mastered the art of driving the jet ski, effortlessly weaving left and right through the coastal waters of the Clandia Kingdom, kicking up massive wakes of white foam.
Excited by the sheer speed, Bullet shouted out again, but this time, it was a roar of pure exhilaration. York didn't laugh at him anymore; he merely smiled.
"Did you learn it?!" York called out over the roar of the engines. "If you did, let's head to the next island!!"
"OKAY!!" Bullet responded loudly, a fierce, genuine grin on his face.
Watching York drive his red jet ski ahead, cutting a path through the waves, Bullet twisted his throttle and immediately followed in pursuit.
Looking at York's imposing back, Bullet suddenly felt that being betrayed and shot by his fellow child soldiers today might not have been a bad thing after all.
Marine Headquarters — Marineford.
The horrifying news of the entire Hart Kingdom invasion force being unilaterally annihilated by the pirate Atlas D. York soon appeared on the heavy mahogany desk of Admiral Sengoku.
Looking at the classified intelligence report—which not only contained a new, terrifying photo of York holding a three-meter blade but also a photo of a hulking, eight-year-old child soldier fighting by his side—Sengoku couldn't help but let out a heavy, exhausted sigh.
He didn't care what secrets this young soldier held; he was just a kid who had gained an Emperor's favor through some stroke of twisted luck.
The main, agonizing issue was York himself, who was truly acting more and more recklessly. He had just conquered an entire nation to build an Empire, and now he was wandering the seas slaughtering armies for target practice.
But then again, the Marines didn't dare to launch a direct, full-scale war against him.
The bitter lesson of Water 7 still left Sengoku with profound, lingering fear. It wasn't just the worry of the tragedy of ten thousand Marine soldiers being vaporized recurring. It was the fact that the near-death experience of facing York's 'Solar Impact' had truly, deeply frightened both him and Garp.
"What should we do?" Sengoku muttered, rubbing his temples. "We can't really just sit here and do nothing while he builds an Empire, can we?"
Just as Sengoku was troubled by this geopolitical nightmare, the golden Den Den Mushi on his desk—the secure line exclusively responsible for contacting the Five Elders in the Holy Land of Mary Geoise—suddenly rang.
Purupurupuru... Click.
Sengoku answered the call immediately, listening intently to the new, radical orders issued by the highest-ranking officials of the World Government.
"Yes... I understand. I will begin drafting the candidates immediately," Sengoku said, his tone grave.
Once the call ended and the receiver clicked back into place, Sengoku's tightly furrowed brows relaxed slightly, though a heavy shadow remained over his eyes.
He leaned back in his chair, softly murmuring the name of the new, desperate countermeasure.
"The Seven Warlords of the Sea..."
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