Two days later.
Golden Lion Defeated by Marine Headquarters Fleet Admiral Kong; Alucard Attacks Government and Escapes
These headlines swept across the world. Since this was an official newspaper released by the Marines and the Government, other newspapers naturally had a variety of other content, but none of them sold as many copies as this one.
In a town in the West Blue, at an outdoor cafe by an arch bridge, countless people were holding the newspaper, speaking in fear or with awe about the contents.
"The great pirate Golden Lion, who was once on par with the Pirate King Roger, has been imprisoned for the second time. I wonder if he can escape again."
"Idiot, didn't you see the picture in the newspaper showing a chain around his neck? The Marines aren't stupid. There's no way he can escape."
"The most terrifying part is this Alucard. He managed to get away after attacking the Government alone."
"Monster! He's a true monster! Alucard..."
"Shiki's last words are causing pirates to riot again..." a man said, gritting his teeth. "Damn it, what is this world going to become?"
Suddenly, a pirate on the street shouted, "I heard Nico Robin is in this town! I just saw her!"
"Nico Robin!?"
"That child with a bounty of 79,000,000 Berries, the highest in the West Blue?"
"Hurry up and find her!"
At this time, under the arch bridge, a little girl in a brown dress was hiding and trembling. Only after the sound of footsteps faded away did she dare to come out again.
Three days later.
The new bounty posters came out.
The bounty for one of the Three Monsters, Alucard, had exceeded 1.3 billion Berries, making him the one with the highest bounty among the three!
While the entire world was in shock over Alucard's bounty and furious at him, and everyone wanted to find him, not a single piece of news about his whereabouts came out. Even the intelligence-gathering organization CP, which was capable of gathering information on everything, couldn't find a single clue, let alone find the person himself.
A pirate like this should have immediately gone into the New World, but several days had passed, and there was still no news of Alucard, who had once caused a storm in the New World.
On the other hand, in Mariejois, the Celestial Dragons didn't care at all about how the world had changed. They only cared about when the slave colosseum, performance hall, and other slave entertainment facilities that had been destroyed by the Titan user would be rebuilt.
Fisher Tiger had once freed slaves, and the situation this time felt somewhat similar, but the nature of the two events was completely different.
Tiger had freed the slaves, while Alucard had killed all the slaves in one go. No, to be more precise, the Titan's huge body had caused the basement where the slaves were kept to collapse, burying countless slaves.
In a magnificent room, a gentle knock was heard at the door, and a respectful voice came from outside, "Aptheim-sei, Mjosgard-sei has returned with a collection of new slaves. He has something for you and hopes you will come and pick one out."
"Oh... Is he trying to curry favor?"
Since there were no visual Den Den Mushi watching in the room, Alucard always used his true appearance here. When he heard the guard's voice outside the door, the Blacklight Virus, under Alucard's conscious control, changed his appearance in just a few seconds. He also changed his clothes to the special clothing for Celestial Dragons.
When he walked out, Alucard had completely transformed into the "Saint Aptheim" that everyone in Mariejois knew.
Saint Mjosgard was not trying to win him over because of the "life-saving grace" from before. It was because he had just taken over as the head of one of the twenty Celestial Dragon families. He was a lone wolf and needed to win over other forces.
There were also different positions and political views among the Celestial Dragons. Not to mention that they weren't on good terms, some were even mortal enemies. So, it was not strange for Saint Mjosgard to try and win over another Celestial Dragon family head like him.
"Heh, for someone who looks like that, he's got a bit of a brain." Thinking of Saint Mjosgard's face with the snot that could never be wiped off, Alucard sneered, opened the door, and walked toward the inner garden of the palace.
....
"Come, come, my friend!"
In the inner garden, Saint Mjosgard was still calling out to Alucard in his very broken English. After the two sat down facing each other, Saint Mjosgard said with a look of disgust, "They said the slave colosseum would take another two weeks to rebuild. Seriously, that means another two weeks of boredom, doesn't it?"
To be honest, for something that had been destroyed to such an extent, rebuilding it in just two weeks was impressive. But to a Celestial Dragon, if it was something they wanted, they wouldn't even wait for two minutes, let alone two weeks.
"Then why did you call me here? To... watch your new prey?" Alucard asked with half-lidded eyes. He knew that Saint Mjosgard, like his deceased father, had a habit of collecting fish-men and mermaids.
"Sigh, fish-men and mermaids are rare items after all. It's a shame I didn't get any this time. I plan to double my bounty so I can get my hands on some." After sighing, Saint Mjosgard became excited again. "But this time, I unexpectedly found something you might like, my friend! I bought it for you at a high price."
After saying that, Saint Mjosgard turned and shouted at the servants behind him, "Hey! Hurry up! Bring the new slaves over!"
After giving the order, Saint Mjosgard turned back and smiled. "They're said to be slaves from a pirate crew. They're not bad. I haven't even branded them with our Celestial Dragon's mark yet. I'm just giving them to you."
The Celestial Dragon's mark was the Hoof of the Soaring Dragon. It was something that was branded onto slaves of the Celestial Dragons. Some Celestial Dragons had a strange obsession with their slaves and insisted on branding them themselves, so to prevent this from happening, Saint Mjosgard, who had bought them, didn't brand them.
Clank clank clank~
Just then, the sound of chains was heard. Saint Mjosgard's face lit up with joy. "Oh, they're here, they're here."
With that, surrounded by more than a dozen bodyguards, three figures whose hands and feet were bound in chains and who looked dispirited were brought over.
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