“The balance of power in the New World is shifting. It used to be all about Roger, Shiki the Golden Lion, and Whitebeard…until Roger and Shiki dropped out. Big Mom’s always had her own nation, though, even back then,” Thatch explained, his hands on the side railing.
“Now it’s Whitebeard, Big Mom, Kaido, and Red-Hair,” said Ace, listing the names of the Four Emperors.
“Red-Hair’s straight from Roger’s lineage…but he doesn’t have any desire to carry on his old captain’s will and be King of the Pirates. By comparison, Kaido’s much easier to understand. If you ask me, he’s less of a pirate than a hoodlum. Big Mom’s crew is similar to our crew, generationally speaking, but Charlotte Linlin herself is more like a landlubber pirate now.”
She lived in a castle, surrounded by a family of dozens, making her operation closer to a mafia than a pirate crew. The territory she controlled was her own nation.
“All the young folks who go into the Grand Line are just looking for a bit of adventure. But…”
Crak-crak-crakk… !
The mast crumbled downward, sail and all, into a wall of flame.
Thatch continued, “If you get past the route through Fish-Man Island, where 70 percent of ships sink already, the New World beyond that is the haunt of the four Emperors of the Sea, the strongest pirates with their own vast territories. It won’t be easy to bring any of them low. The idiots who fail to understand the rules of this business are the first to paint targets on their backs.”
The battle was over.
A few dozen pirates from some random crew lay at Thatch and Ace’s feet.
“You…you’re Fire Fist! The one who turned down the Warlords…” gasped one of the enemy pirates on the deck, his face grimacing in pain.
These were rookie pirates unaffiliated with any of the Emperors. Back in their homeland and in the “Paradise” of the first half of the Grand Line, they were no doubt big shots who’d made a name for themselves.
But they lasted mere minutes against Ace and Thatch.
Ace never mocked Thatch for “just being a cook,” but in truth, Thatch was more than worthy of the title of Fourth Division leader. He wielded a one-sided blade over three feet long that looked like one of the giant kitchen knives used for dressing large fish and animals.
The division leaders shared ritual cups that placed them on equal footing, none greater than any other. That meant there were at least more people on the crew of similar profile, a mark of the great depth of the Whitebeard Pirates. He claimed that the Fifth Division commander, Vista, was a far better swordsman, however.
“Has that hundred-million rookie already bent the knee to Whitebeard?!” gasped the pirate.
“Hell no. But it’s a complicated situation,” said Ace with irritation. “What did these guys do anyway, Thatch?”
“They messed around in our territory. They ate and drank without paying. Happens all the time.”
“Ah…yeah. That does happen. So I’ve heard.”
“And let me tell you something, Ace. Anyone who eats our food and doesn’t pay up isn’t our guest.”
It was impossible to argue with that.
These division leaders protected the towns flying Whitebeard’s flag. In exchange, the crew received a stipend from those towns in various forms, such as valuables, food and fuel supplies, labor, and so on. If the common people couldn’t get the help of the World Government and Navy, then they’d look to one of the Four Emperors for protection.
“I thought the Navy was like the world’s biggest group of pirates, but in the New World they’re more scarce than ever,” Ace noted. Wouldn’t it be the Navy’s job to settle these issues?
“They have ‘G’ branches in place to protect vital facilities, but that’s about it. Navy Headquarters is just a military force designed to do the bidding of the World Government.”
Their primary mission wasn’t to protect the populace from pirates.
“So I guess there’s no leeway for rookies like me making their way into the New World,” Ace observed.
“That’s right. And it was Red-Hair who actually succeeded at rising to the Emperor level that way.”
Shanks came from the Pirate King’s pedigree. He was dangerous, but he seemed reasonable enough when they met. You didn’t hear any awful rumors about him.
“Our job is to get rid of idiots like these and collect protection money. That raises the profile and power of our flag. And that’s how our territory expands.”
“So the pirate crew gets bigger and bigger all on its own, huh?”
The Whitebeard Pirates controlled the sea with their flag, and backed it up by dispatching their forces here and there.
“We don’t deal with drugs or slaves in our territory. That’s right out the window. Sounds pretty tame for one of the four baddest pirates in the world, eh?”
“Well, I was never one for adventure or finding the One Piece, anyway.”
“Oh yeah?”
“But I do feel like I’ve got a better understanding of how it is this sea is ruled. That flag isn’t something Whitebeard planted there through an act of force. It’s something that the residents chose to raise on their own…”
So burning that flag on Fish-Man Island wasn’t just an insult to Whitebeard, it was an insult to all the fish-men who lived there.
“You’ve figured that all out, but you’re still going after Pops’s head?” Thatch said. “You want to be more infamous than the King of the Pirates. But you have no interest in the One Piece. You don’t want to bend your own honor code. So what does your flag of flame actually stand for?”
“I don’t know… Or at least, I thought I did once, but now I don’t.”
Thatch went silent for a bit and smiled. “You’re pretty honest.”
“Mm…”
“Listen, it’s fine. We’ve settled on this duel with Pops. I’m not going back to relitigate that. Now let’s get back to work.”
Thatch gave orders to his division. They would seize all the goods. The ship would be sold on the secondhand market. And the pirates they captured…
“I’m surprised that a division leader like you would get directly involved with this third-rate crew.”
“When someone’s back is to the wall, they’ll easily resort to the stupidest course of action. It’s because they’re third-rate that a higher-up like me has to get involved and make an example of them.”
“Is that how it works?”
“You bet,” said Teach. “Leave it to the lower guys and see what happens. What should have been a simple job turns into—”
Suddenly, the wall of the above-deck cabin broke open, and a man as large as a bear emerged from inside of the ship.
“Zeha ha ha ha! Is that the end of it?”
It was Teech. In his hand was a man wearing a captain’s hat—the enemy leader—gripped around the base of the neck and dangling like a squid hung out to dry.
“Don’t destroy the ship, Teech,” said Thatch, disappointed.
“Oh, right. This rinky-dink little ship for shrimps.”
Teech hurled the enemy captain like a bowling ball. The unfortunate captain of the attempted eat-and-run crew rolled over and over across the deck until he slammed into the mast. He appeared to be breathing—barely.
One of Thatch’s men set up a transponder snail hooked up to a trunk-shaped device. He took a picture of the captain’s face and sent it through the fax machine. After a little while, there was a return communication.
Ace picked up the fax and examined it. A skull symbol was in the sender’s field—so it was Skull the info agent, still performing his job admirably.
“He’s Raccoon the Possum-Player, from the West Blue. A bounty of 75 million berries…”
“Ahh, that’s not a paltry amount. We’ll hand him over to the Navy, in that case,” said Thatch, reading the fax.
“Would they actually pay out a bounty to other pirates?”
“No. There are special brokers you can go through,” he explained. Apparently there were those who passed themselves off as bounty hunters and turned in wanted men, then paid the bounty back to the pirates who caught the target in the first place.
“Teech! Tie that guy up. And as for the others—”
Blam!
Thatch spun around at the sudden sound of a gunshot.
“Oh?” Teech placed a hand to his side. It came away wet and red. At his feet, the dying Captain Raccoon was clutching a pistol.
“Teech!”
“Aieeee! I’ve been shot!” shrieked Teech, shocked by the sight of his own blood.
“Tsk!” Ace was chagrined at the fact that they hadn’t disarmed their target. He pointed a Fire Gun technique at the enemy. There was an awful scream that he never wanted to hear again, like a giant frog being squashed.
“That hurt, you bastard,” said Teech. He had stepped on the enemy captain, whose midsection was now crushed through the wooden deck, his hands and feet jutting upward. He’d overdone it.
“Oh, great. Hey, you alive down there?”
“Zeha ha ha ha!” Teech laughed. Ace wasn’t sure how he was meant to react to all of this.
“You all right?” he asked. “You’ve been shot.”
“Hmm? Oh yeah, zeha ha ha ha! Owwwwww!” He held a hand over his wound and howled, as though he’d just remembered it, and began calling for the ship doctor.
“This guy’s all kinds of sloppy,” muttered Ace. It was just how Marshall D. Teech rolled. And this was the guy whose job was to take care of Ace?
“Thatch! The flames are too strong, we can’t put them out!” someone yelled out. The flames that had picked up when Ace was fighting were now starting to devour the wooden ship. It was going to sink.
This was what Thatch meant when he said that having third-rate guys do the work spelled disaster.