One unique feature of the sea is the existence of the Five Great Families of the West.
Each of these organizations maintains its base near the heart of a nation, wielding immense wealth and military power. Though they are rival factions, the Five Great Families have undergone countless cycles of growth and decline, with their rankings shifting over time. However, the current Five Great Families had remained stable, and there had been no major conflicts in recent years.
That is, until the Eight Treasure Navy, based in the Flower Country, began rapidly expanding its influence. Ever since a man known as "The Spiked Chinjao" became their leader, the delicate balance had begun to shift.
"Is that all right so far, monk?"
"Yeah, I've heard that part enough to be sick of it."
"I've heard it so many times my ears are bleeding," the young man—Kuro—muttered.
Perhaps because the stove was too close, he was sweating slightly and fanning himself with his collar. Leaning back precariously in his chair, he wobbled unsteadily and urged Georges to continue the story.
Georges wondered if he was really listening, but swallowed his frustration.
"…Fine. So, what happened next?"
Georges slowly pulled out yesterday's newspaper, tossing the neatly folded paper onto Kuro's desk.
"Look."
Kuro caught it and spread it out. The front page was dominated by a story about two of the Five Great Families going to war and destroying each other—causing enormous damage to the country in the process.
In the middle of the battlefield was a massive footprint-like crater. It was a black-and-white photo, so the details were hard to make out, but compared to the size of the surrounding trees, it was enormous.
A giant? he wondered, but no matter how you looked at it, that size was ridiculous.
"This is insane. Two families were wiped out?"
"The high-ranking members are all dead, and the lower-ranking ones are either being absorbed by other families, crushed, or forming new factions—it's total chaos."
"The aftermath might reach us too."
"That's exactly why I'm telling you this. Don't forget you're one of our high-ranking members."
His tendency to slack off was a problem, but he generally did his job properly. That said, he was only considered high-ranking because he was Kanata's direct subordinate, not Georges'. Georges remained the top authority in the organization. Below him was Kanata, and the only other high-ranking members besides Kanata's direct subordinates—Kuro and Junshi—were Scotch and a few others. Georges worried that someone might collapse soon due to their chronic shortage of manpower.
"It's been five years since we started this business, but I still don't understand why Georges is the boss."
"Me neither. But Kanata's too lazy to take on the role, and Junshi's just a bodyguard."
"But he's practically family now, isn't he?"
"Yet he insists he's just an employee. What a pain."
Given how deeply embedded he was in Georges' inner circle, it was odd to think of him as merely a bodyguard. Even if he didn't see it that way, others certainly did.
It's about time we made him decide, Georges muttered to himself.
"…It's going to be rough for a while…"
Kuro muttered as he continued reading the newspaper. The photos looked like a battlefield, as if some natural disaster had struck. They could be giants, or maybe people with special abilities, he mused.
His breath turned white in the cold air. Looking up at the dim sky, he felt like it might start snowing soon.
This island has changed dramatically in the last five years, he thought.
The pier was under construction to accommodate larger ships, and the number of warehouses lining the harbor had multiplied. Most belonged to the Georges family, but many others had sprung up as well. Together, they were transforming the island into a bustling hub of commerce.
Funds had accumulated. More merchants wanted to contract with the Georges family. Even petty thugs hoping for scraps had come to join their ranks.
However, reliable personnel were always in short supply.
Even now, the entire organization was busy unloading cargo. As merchants, trust was paramount—they handled every shipment with the utmost care.
Yet those who tried to steal from them never ceased.
"Lately, there've been more worthless scum around."
Kanata beat down the thieves who had been sneaking around trying to steal cargo, looking down at them contemptuously as they lay groaning on the ground. As they struggled to get up, she spoke with cold indifference.
"They don't seem organized. They don't look like seasoned thieves either. Just common thugs."
"You…! Damn you!!"
One of them pulled a knife from his waist, lowered his stance, and tried to stab Kanata. She didn't panic—instead, she simply grabbed the blade between her fingers and stopped his movement entirely.
"What… why?! Damn it!"
He released the knife, which wouldn't budge an inch, and tried to punch Kanata at close range with his left fist. She struck him in the face with casual ease.
The man flew through the air and finally lost consciousness, collapsing to the ground.
Two others remained, but seeing how easily their companion had been defeated, they seemed to have lost all will to fight. They glared at Kanata with resentment, but she didn't care.
The knife she held froze solid and shattered into pieces.
One of her subordinates, realizing the job was done, brought over the island's authorities. They've got their hands full now,she thought with detached amusement, as if it were none of her business.
"Are you still not finished loading the cargo?"
"Almost, miss. We really need to hire more people. The cargo keeps piling up lately."
"You're right… We'll have to recruit more workers at some point."
However, they were mostly former street thugs. Even if she asked her contacts, they would only bring similar types. Basically, it was manual labor, so as long as the supervisors were properly trained, it should be manageable.
But that would have to wait until they finished their current workload. She made a mental note to mention it to Georges later.
Before she knew it, the cargo was loaded, and she let her subordinates, who had grown cold working in the chilly air, take a break.
"All right, loading's complete. Everything's been checked."
"Go tell Georges we'll set sail in half an hour. The rest of you can take a break."
Kanata sent one of her subordinates on the errand and remained behind to watch the ship. There were many people like the ones they'd encountered earlier, so it wasn't wise to leave the vessel unguarded for too long.
Of course, she couldn't maintain watch constantly, so compromises had to be made somewhere.
She took a deep breath of the crisp, cold air and decided to kill time until departure. I don't feel the cold at all since I ate that Devil Fruit, she mused.
The ship set sail on schedule.
Since switching to a larger vessel, the difference in speed was remarkable, and the number of days required for journeys had decreased significantly. With lighter cargo loads, they could move even faster.
Additionally, having reinforced the ship's defenses, Kanata rarely had to personally intervene to repel pirates anymore. While cannonballs weren't cheap, she had accepted it as an unavoidable expense.
Compared to other seas, this one had more mafia presence, but many also moonlighted as pirates. Attacks still occurred occasionally.
Right now, such an attack was underway.
As the enemy ship approached, firing cannons, Junshi and Kanata swiftly intercepted anything that seemed likely to hit their vessel. This method of counterattack had become routine lately.
Aiming to finish quickly, Kanata stepped onto the ship's railing and called out to Junshi.
"I think we're fine, but be careful not to let them board."
"Are you planning to board their ship again?"
"I need a little exercise."
She laughed softly and leaped into the freezing winter sea. Normally—given that she had eaten a Devil Fruit—this would be suicide. But she was different.
The moment her feet touched the water, the sea froze instantly, forming a straight path of ice leading directly to the enemy ship. Ignoring the cannon fire raining down around her, she sprinted toward the vessel, leaped up, and boarded it with graceful ease.
"What… what the hell?!"
The pirates were stunned. The captain and his crew aimed their guns at her simultaneously.
Kanata looked at the man who appeared to be the captain, but she didn't recognize him.
"I don't know you. Are you a rookie?"
"What?! You don't know me?! I'm the 'Great Helmet' Marcy, with an 8 million berry bounty on my head!!"
"Never heard of you. You're just small-time."
"...!! Shoot her!!"
Kanata's dismissive words enraged the pirate captain, who barked the order to fire. But she didn't seem concerned in the slightest. Her confidence stemmed from her Observation Haki—she knew there was no one here stronger than herself.
She methodically knocked each of them down one by one, and when the last one was defeated, she tossed him aside as if it required no effort at all.
There had been many of them—understandable, since so many hands were needed to operate a galleon. However, it seemed they had already engaged in battle elsewhere, as there were numerous bound women imprisoned in the ship's cabin.
To be honest, she didn't particularly care what happened to them, but rescuing them might help boost the "Georges family's" reputation. Though she couldn't handle much more work if their reputation grew too much larger.
"…Hmm?"
In the treasure chest where valuables were stored, she discovered something familiar—a fruit with an eerie, swirled pattern. It was a Devil Fruit, the same type that had changed Kanata's life forever.
Since no two fruits of the same kind could exist in the same era, this had to be different from the one she'd eaten. She spun it in her hands, examining it carefully to confirm.
Still, it was an unexpected find.
"To think I'd find one here of all places."
Eating one granted the power of devils, and eating two meant death. She wasn't so greedy as to attempt such a thing, but it was also a troublesome item to handle. While eating it would grant special powers, it was also worth an astronomical sum if sold.
In fact, these pirates hadn't eaten it either, so they must have been planning to sell it somewhere. It was rare and valuable, but not impossible to find if you knew where to look.
She decided to figure out what to do with it later and returned to the ship where Junshi and the others were waiting, taking only the fruit with her. It might be listed in a Devil Fruit encyclopedia somewhere. She could decide what to do with it then.
In the town called Troa—base of the Rash Family, led by Drevan, one of the Five Great Families—Drevan was currently seething with rage.
After receiving a report from one of his subordinates, he flew into such a fury that he attacked the messenger.
"Are you kidding me, you bastard!!"
Though the subordinate lacked any notable presence, Drevan struck him with such force that the man shattered the door and was blown into the hallway, losing consciousness immediately.
Other subordinates hurriedly carried the beaten man away, while Drevan continued drinking, unable to calm his anger. Alcohol was his preferred remedy for irritation.
Everything was going wrong.
The Eight Treasure Navy was growing stronger, but that could wait for now. They were more powerful than Drevan's forces, so he couldn't simply crush them. He didn't intend to lose in terms of raw strength, but he knew there was no point in fighting them at present.
That was manageable. That was fine, but there were other problems.
Two of the Five Great Families had been destroyed. It wasn't uncommon for leaders to go to the front lines, but both leaders dying in battle simultaneously was an extremely troublesome situation. Normally, the victor would handle the cleanup, but since both sides had been annihilated and the country was exhausted, the burden of cleanup had fallen on the remaining organizations.
"Damn it, what the hell is happening…"
In this chaotic situation, events that infuriated Drevan were occurring one after another.
The first was the collapse of two of the Five Great Families, which had triggered a new territorial war that wasn't proceeding smoothly.
The second was the failure to obtain the Devil Fruit from the Wooden Pirates.
The third—and perhaps most concerning—was the appearance of giants and the disruption of established territories.
The second and third issues were particularly unforgivable.
"Giants? Aren't there supposed to be only two of them?"
As reported in the recent newspaper, there was no doubt that giants had been involved in the destruction of the two families. However, the problem was that they had no idea where these crucial giants were now.
There was nowhere to hide beings of such size, yet there had been no sightings other than during occasional raids. This suggested that someone was intentionally concealing them.
An organization capable of hiding members of the giant race—beings with bodies ten times the size of humans—wasn't something you encountered every day.
They were searching every possible location, but the sea was vast. If the giants were hiding on some uninhabited island, finding them would be nearly impossible.
Securing additional reinforcements had become urgent.
That's why it was only natural to turn their attention to the Georges family, who had been gaining prominence lately.