What kind of destruction could battles between the strongest fighters cause? Though it was merely a guidance battle between Silas and Newgate, under the Tremor-Tremor Fruit's terrifying, destructive power, after one day and night, over one-third of the island had vanished.
What remained of the island looked like a honeycomb, with huge cavities and rifts everywhere. Seawater continuously poured in from all directions, sealing the island's ultimate fate.
The group watched from ships several thousand meters away. But even across such distance, the Tremor-Tremor Fruit's tremors still stirred seawater, raising towering waves, shocking the rookies on Newgate's ship.
"Is this the battle between Captain Newgate and Captain Silas?"
"So terrifying!"
"I'll become this strong someday!"
Some were terrified, some were in awe, but others felt an unprecedented fighting spirit ignite within them. However, nobody expected that, after such an intense battle, Silas wouldn't even be breathing hard.
Using Geppo to step through the air, single-handedly carrying Newgate, Silas tossed Newgate onto his own ship. "Hey, brats, take care of your captain!"
"O-okay."
"Yes, Captain Silas!"
The group of rookie crew members trembled. Though not all were rookies, before Silas, an old monster active at sea for decades, even great pirates with 100-million-Berry bounties could only be called "brats."
Newgate lay sprawled across the ship's deck, his body exhausted but his spirit soaring. He'd grown stronger again! Unlike Rocks, whose power seemed limitless, Newgate found that as his strength increased, his rate of improvement gradually slowed. Reaching Admiral-level power had taken mere years, but advancing beyond that threshold required exponentially more effort.
And in this world, only Silas willingly gave them unreserved guidance, helping them become stronger.
Rocks, I'll stop you! The more he felt Silas's goodwill, the more Newgate disapproved of Rocks wanting to challenge Silas. Everything they had was given by Silas. Silas never demanded anything from them. Even wanting to leave the White Wolf Pirates and form their own crews, Silas wouldn't refuse.
Such a good captain was practically impossible to find anywhere in these seas. So Newgate was dissatisfied. Rocks had Rocks's ambition; he had his ideals. If Rocks's ambition conflicted with his ideals, then I'll crush your ambition!
Through this guidance from Silas, Newgate gained a deeper understanding of his fruit ability and Haki. Purely competing with Haki, he still wasn't a match for top Haki users like Silas and Rocks. But combining Haki with his fruit ability, even against Conqueror's wrapping, he could contend. Moreover, Conqueror's Haki—he also had that!
"Can I defeat Rocks now?" Newgate recalled his question, and Silas's answer was, "When you can learn Conqueror's wrapping, then incorporate your fruit ability into Conqueror's wrapping, forget Rocks, even I'll look forward to fighting you at full strength!"
Though Silas didn't explicitly say so, his words suggest he still wasn't Rocks's match, but should be very close. "Rocks, I'm catching up to you!"
"Achoo!" In the New World region near North Blue, amid ice and snow, bare-chested Rocks couldn't help sneezing. "Which bastard's thinking about me? Newgate?" Rocks cursed. "That brat has the old man's guidance. Probably almost caught up to me!"
As strength increased, Rocks clearly felt his current strength had nearly stagnated. Besides continuing physical training, this half year's improvement in Haki was basically zero. This wasn't strange. Haki was a power that only improved through fighting strong enemies, possibly breaking through in desperate battles.
And in this world, people who could make him fight with full power were already few. Those making him truly desperate were only a handful: Silas, Imu, Harald! These were the world's three strongest that Rocks knew. The strongest were undoubtedly Silas and Imu.
Since they'd never truly fought, Rocks wasn't sure who was stronger between Silas and Imu, but he'd bet on the old man. By this point, Rocks's perspective had completely changed. He remembered ten years ago, Silas's strength probably wasn't even as good as his current self. But now, two of him might not definitely exceed Silas.
For "monsters" like them, the difficulty was never going from 1 to 90, but from 90 to 100. Unfortunately, Silas's growth didn't stagnate after reaching 90. He'd previously been stuck at 89 for a long time, then like a late bloomer, suddenly surged from 90 to near 100. Or rather, Silas had now touched this world's ceiling.
"Should I admit defeat?" Thinking the ten-year agreement with Silas had already passed halfway, Rocks felt somewhat anxious. Challenging Silas with his current strength, nine out of ten times, he'd get brutally beaten.
Unless he could daily spar with Harald. Though Harald's strength couldn't match Silas and Imu, after eating the Azure Dragon Fruit, Harald's strength improved again. So Rocks recognized him as the third strongest after Silas and Imu. But Harald's relationship with him was ordinary. Willing to spar was entirely seeing Silas's face. Once or twice was fine, but too many times, Rocks himself couldn't bear the embarrassment.
"Overthinking is useless. Never mind that. Do you think we can defeat your former companions?" Besides Rocks, Patrick knew what he was thinking when he saw him daydreaming. He didn't think well of Rocks's unrealistic ambition.
"Shut up!" Patrick not speaking was fine. Speaking made Rocks's headache worse. "That's why I need to recruit new members!"
"So-called recruiting new members means forcibly destroying rookies' ships, making them our crew?" Hearing Rocks's words, Patrick rolled his eyes. "What use are such crew members?"
Able to hear others' inner voices, Patrick clearly knew those crew members forced aboard by Rocks were filled with resentment. Such crew members, forget fighting side-by-side, they'd need to be guarded against backstabbing.
"Then what do you suggest?"
"How about learning from your old captain, training rookies?"
"Training now is too late!" Some veteran crew on Rocks's ship were trained from scratch using methods learned from Silas. After training so far, the strongest, Patrick, already had top-tier pirate strength. Weaker crew members also basically possessed great pirate-level strength. But this process took a full three years!
The stronger one became, the harder the improvement was. For many crew members, great pirate was their talent limit. To progress further, they could only eat Devil Fruits to further stimulate their potential. With five years remaining, Rocks's goals were to progress further and help Patrick achieve his current strength. As for others on the ship, ideally, producing several more Admiral-level fighters.
However, this was probably wishful thinking. Besides Patrick hopefully reaching his current level, others reaching top-tier great pirate strength would be good enough.
And Silas's side? Just two people with talent and strength comparable to his. Plus Shiki remained. Reportedly now stronger than Patrick, already approaching Admiral-level.
So no matter how Rocks thought, training rookies from scratch now probably couldn't catch up before his battle against Silas. This was why he was stealing people. Pirates entering the New World from the Grand Line's first half had some strength. Could skip basic training, starting directly with Haki.
As long as basic qualities were passable, learning Haki meant half a foot into great pirate ranks. After several life-death battles, perhaps learning advanced Haki usage. In the New World, they'd be renowned top-tier pirates. However, this approach ultimately didn't win hearts.
So Rocks was considering simply challenging Silas one-on-one after five years? These crew members were unreliable. Rocks glanced at his crew. One was drunk as mud, one gathered gambling, then cheated after losing, another kept muttering about reaching a new island, already missing girls' warm embrace.
Honestly, he missed it too. Rocks couldn't help recalling days of drinking and clubbing with Newgate. Unfortunately, those days were gone forever. That bastard was utterly loyal to Silas. His biggest obstacle to challenging Silas was his once-closest companion.
"We're almost at Baldimore, right? Reports said that Roger bastard is hiding on this island!" Rocks cursed. Though he'd recently intercepted some rookies just entering the New World, wanting to recruit them as subordinates, after Patrick's persuasion, he ultimately abandoned this approach.
Having set sail and stayed in the White Wolf Pirates with excellent team atmosphere from the start, even Rocks himself didn't realize he now instinctively protected his crew. For those destined unable to integrate, only disrupting team stability, however strong, Rocks would tell them to scram.
As for why they'd encountered the Roger Pirates, goddammit, while Rocks was sleeping, the Roger Pirates' idiots, excited about finally reaching the New World, fired celebratory cannons. Then, due to heavy fog at sea, not noticing Rocks's pirate ship, the fired cannonball directly broke Rocks's ship's mast.
If he could tolerate that, he wouldn't be called Rocks D. Xebec. So Rocks directly returned fire. With one sword swing, he cut the Roger Pirates' ship in half. Originally thought matters ended there. Later, when they landed to relax, the Roger Pirates people sneakily came over and burned their ship. Thus, grudges were completely formed.
After several battles, the Roger Pirates' overall strength was considerably inferior, so they fell at a disadvantage in combat. Even crew members were captured by them, but the crew's main fighters escaped, including Captain Roger and his right-hand men, Rayleigh and Gaban.
Now, Rocks had become interested in the Roger Pirates. His Rocks Pirates weren't these seas' strongest pirate crew, because the strongest was called the White Wolf Pirates. But besides the White Wolf Pirates, possessing top-tier fighter Rocks plus secondary-tier fighter Patrick, the Rocks Pirates could already be called a future Emperor crew.
After encountering the Rocks Pirates several times without being completely crushed, this was enough to attract Rocks's attention, even making Rocks consider absorbing the Roger Pirates crew members into his team. However, thoughts remained thoughts. Anyway, he'd found Roger's trail. If encountering him, beat him first, then ask about joining his pirate crew. Won't join? Then die!
Rocks wasn't any saint. He wouldn't be indifferent to the Roger Pirates' provocations, especially since the Roger Pirates started the trouble first. However, when Rocks reached Mechanical Island Baldimore, he discovered something was wrong.
"Too quiet!" Rocks frowned, having everyone stay on alert. "Patrick, can you 'see' anyone?"
"No." Though often in contradiction with Rocks, at critical moments, Patrick was always reliable. His Observation Haki revealed that absolutely nobody was on this island.
Mechanical Island Baldimore was a nation at the forefront of the New World, most famous for technology far more advanced than that of other nations. Many new technologies spread from Baldimore. Rocks knew Baldimore, though a government-aligned nation, had Silas continuously wanting them to withdraw from the government alliance, becoming White Wolf Alliance forces.
To this, the World Government definitely couldn't tolerate. Just Baldimore was in the New World. If the World Government had major moves against Baldimore, the White Wolf Pirates couldn't possibly know anything. Unless it was small-scale elite action.
"Holy Knights?" Rocks didn't know what the World Government had done. When reaching Baldimore's town, he saw only ruins. Rocks saw across the entire town, or rather, the entire island. Empty! Everyone had vanished.