Judge gave a low grunt, then turned his head, a look of contempt flashing in his eyes as he looked at Sanji, who was bundled up in his thick cotton coat. He faced his five children and asked, "Children, this is your first time in a real war. Tell your father about your achievements."
There was no sense of hierarchy among the Vinsmoke siblings; strength was everything, which was why Sanji was constantly bullied by his four siblings.
As soon as Judge spoke, the other four rushed to report their numbers, leaving Sanji out of it. "Father, I killed seventeen people!" Niji shouted proudly.
"Me, me, me! I took out twenty! I got more!" Ichiji said with a smug grin.
Yonji retorted indignantly, "I got sixteen! Humph, if Niji hadn't gotten in my way, I would've killed more."
"I got a little less, only fourteen," Reiju said with a slight smile, not looking particularly excited.
"Hmm, achieving such results in an environment like this... you've done well. Your father is proud of you!" Judge laughed and nodded. His gaze then narrowed, falling on the silent, timid Sanji, and his eyes filled with severe dissatisfaction.
"What about you? Sanji, how many did you kill?"
"I... I... that..." Sanji stammered, unable to form a coherent sentence.
"Haha! This guy was so scared his legs were shaking on the battlefield! If I hadn't helped him kill one, he would've been dead already!" Yonji kicked Sanji, who crumpled to the ground.
"We were born on the same day, so how can a useless person like this be in our family?" Niji said with a mocking smile, punching Sanji on the ground.
Soon, the three brothers started kicking and punching Sanji. This was a daily routine, and Reiju just laughed from the sidelines, while Judge merely snorted in disdain.
"Your Highness, are we attacking the Harald Kingdom now?" A subordinate asked Judge.
"How many losses did we sustain?" Judge asked his subordinate, ignoring the scene of Sanji being bullied.
The subordinate replied, "We lost a total of 680 men in this war. With our current forces, our chances of success against the Harald Kingdom are 80%, but we will need some time to rest afterward."
"Is that even a question? Of course, we attack!" Judge waved his hand and declared, "Prepare to march on the Harald Kingdom!"
"Arghhh!"
"Stop, stop! Arghhh!"
No sooner had Judge given the order to march than the soldiers heard bloodcurdling screams in the distance.
"What's wrong?"
Judge frowned, looking toward the source of the screams. Interspersed with the cries were the distinct sounds of gunshots and wild beasts roaring.
"Hmm?"
The three brothers, who had been brutally beating Sanji, stopped and looked toward the commotion.
Sanji, bruised, battered, and with pus-filled lumps on his face, struggled to turn his head. He saw his father's soldiers falling at an unbelievable rate, their blood seeping into the snow.
ROAR!!!
Suddenly, the head of a massive black hound, the size of a warship, appeared. Its gaping maw swallowed over a hundred Vinsmoke soldiers in a single gulp. Some were only partially devoured, their dismembered limbs, hands, and legs scattered on the ground.
"You are..."
Judge squinted, looking at the man who was walking toward him, killing his men as he went, stepping through the sea of blood.
The oversized black hound, Baskerville, stood hunched over Alucard's head, chewing on the hundred-plus soldiers it had just consumed.
Crunch, crunch, crunch...
A sickening, crisp sound filled the air. But mid-chew, the hound's expression changed. As if it had tasted excrement instead of human meat, it spat out the mangled bodies, which splattered onto the ground like a bloody paste.
"Ugh..."
Reiju, the only girl among the siblings, covered her mouth, barely holding back her vomit. "They're not even living beings, are they? No wonder you don't like to eat them."
Alucard looked up at the visibly annoyed Baskerville.
The hound would eat anything with a life force, whether human or beast, and absorb it into the River of Death.
This was the first time it had ever spat something out. There could only be one explanation: these "people" were not truly "living."
Hooooh...
Baskerville unhappily retreated back into the blood pool. Alucard, who had hoped to advance his River of Death with the fight, was slightly disappointed.
What's the point of eight million lives if they're not even real lives? It's like a rich person complaining they have too much money. "That man... is that..."
Standing behind Judge, a short researcher with a thick mouth and vile eyes spoke in a trembling voice. He finally managed to get a full sentence out. "Wh-Why is one of the Three Monsters here...?"
"Alucard... isn't he the most brutal one?!"
"I heard he's from the North Blue. Could he be here to save his home?"
"That makes no sense! He's the devil who killed his own twelve nations! Why would he care?"
The Germa 66 soldiers whispered nervously. During this time, Alucard had already walked within five meters of Vinsmoke Judge.
"Hey, which one of you is the head of the Vinsmoke Family?"
The bespectacled Alucard looked around, as if intentionally ignoring Judge right in front of him. "You all look so alike; how am I supposed to tell?"
Indeed, besides their eight-out-of-ten resemblance, the Germa 66 soldiers all wore the same uniforms. It would be difficult to single out one person from the crowd.
"That would be me," Judge said in a low voice. He had recognized the man in front of him: Alucard, the pirate who had killed more people than anyone else in history.
"You're really ugly."
Alucard turned to Judge. After a few seconds, that was his only response.
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