"Raleigh, I'm warning you—don't cause any trouble!"
Borsalino's lazy voice cut through the air.
He had noticed that sly, calculating glint flash across Raleigh's face for just a second, and he knew his brother was already up to no good.
Raleigh, who had just slumped back onto the couch, shot him an impatient, almost offended, expression.
"Trouble? Me? Do I look like someone who causes trouble?" He scoffed, spreading his hands wide.
"We just received substantial benefits from those guys. They're not even out of the building yet. You think I'd already be scheming against them? Is that something I, your responsible and hardworking younger brother, would do?"
"Yes," Borsalino stated firmly, without a nanosecond of hesitation.
No one understood Raleigh's tendencies better than Borsalino.
His eyes, usually half-closed, were wide open, filled with a profound, unwavering disbelief.
That single word, and the look that came with it, stung Raleigh's heart.
It was a betrayal!
"Hmph!"
Like a carp leaping from water, he sprang up from the couch, his face a mask of furious indignation.
"Borsalino, what's with that look? How can you think of your brother like this? We're brothers! Where's the trust?"
"What brothers?" Borsalino retorted, taking a lazy sip of his tea. "I found you abandoned in a gutter. We're sworn brothers, at best."
A tiny, triumphant smile flashed in his eyes.
He loved winding Raleigh up.
"You... you old fox! Take this!" Raleigh snatched a heavy, ornate paperweight from the desk and hurled it.
"Foolish little brother," Borsalino sighed, not even moving from his chair. "Have you ever been kicked at the speed of light?"
There was a flash of yellow, a zip as the paperweight passed harmlessly through Borsalino's glittering Logia form, and then...
BOOM!
The enormous, reinforced floor-to-ceiling window of the office exploded outward in a shower of glass and metal framing.
A perfect, circular hole was left behind, as if something had been kicked clean through it.
...
Down on the main thoroughfare, Gion and Tokikake, who had just finished a grueling training session, were walking back to the barracks.
They both flinched as the shockwave washed over them, followed by the sound of the explosion.
"Enemy attack?!" Gion reacted instantly.
With a hiss of steel, her famous blade, Konpira, was in her hand, her gaze fixed on the cloud of dust and debris settling not far away.
Tokikake, for all his usual goofiness, stepped in front of Gion, his expression uncharacteristically grave.
"That came from the office!"
A moment later, a figure stumbled out of the dust cloud, brushing off his uniform with a completely careless expression.
"Raleigh? What happened to you?" Tokikake asked, his serious expression melting into surprise.
"Nothing much," Raleigh said dismissively, patting down his slightly singed hair.
"Just... a friendly sparring session with my bro." He winced, rubbing his shoulder.
Although his brother was laughably lacking in actual hand-to-hand combat skills, his Devil Fruit development was truly, monstrously unfair.
Having come to this world, Raleigh naturally wanted to taste how terrible—and amazing—Devil Fruits really were.
But he had never encountered a suitable one.
All the really good, famous fruits had already been targeted or, more often, consumed by others.
Sure, the Rumble-Rumble Fruit was supposedly chilling on Skypiea, but Raleigh had previously sent people to gather information.
They never found the island, much less an upward sea current.
The Rumble-Rumble Fruit was temporarily out of consideration.
But Raleigh wasn't without backup plans.
After all, he had the system daddy.
He could just draw a fruit from the lottery.
"System daddy," he begged pitifully in his mind, "please, just listen. If you give me a god-tier fruit, like a Logia or something really broken, I'm willing to sacrifice ten years of Borsalino's lifespan. And... and Tokikake's! Ten years from both!"
He mentally checked his status.
He still needed a few hundred more Slacking Points for his next lottery draw.
His face twisted into a chrysanthemum shape of pure annoyance.
"Damn it. Looks like I need to find a way to slack off... harder."
Raleigh walked away angrily, still muttering to himself.
But after just a few meters, he suddenly stopped and turned back, a brilliant idea striking him.
"Gion," he called out, his smile returning. "Borsalino said there's something I need to attend to in the Eryoku Kingdom. It's a bit of a trip. Do you want to come with me?"
He looked at Gion, his expression was open and friendly.
Since their last encounter, his relationship with Gion had been... improving.
Growing closer.
Unfortunately, Tokikake, the human third wheel, was always there, getting in the way like a lovesick barnacle.
Every time Raleigh tried to get closer to Gion, to have a real conversation, he would pop up.
"Should I come too, Raleigh?" Tokikake stepped forward, clapping a heavy hand on Raleigh's shoulder, completely oblivious.
Raleigh's smile didn't even flicker. "I'm not sure about that, but," he said, tapping his chin thoughtfully.
"Vice Admiral Borsalino did mention something about needing you earlier. Something... something about a kingdom's princess? Yeah, that was it. A princess who was visiting."
"A... princess?" Tokikake's breathing suddenly became heavy.
"Yeah, he said she was asking about... the most charming, eligible bachelors at the base? I think he mentioned your name."
"I'LL GO RIGHT AWAY!"
Tokikake, like a man possessed, was the first person to make Raleigh realize that human eyes could, in fact, turn into literal, sparkling heart-stars.
The lovesick fool's expression was so intense it actually surprised Raleigh.
'Wait, isn't he even trying to hide it in front of Gion anymore?'
Tokikake no longer cared.
He was gone.
His stout, short legs pumped furiously as he charged toward the base office building, leaving a small dust cloud of his own.
The moment he was out of earshot, Gion, who was just sheathing her Konpira sword, felt her smooth, tender little hand suddenly get grasped by Raleigh's.
"Quick, Gion, let's run!"
Before Gion could even prepare herself, her body was pulled along.
The sudden, warm, strong grip sent a jolt up her arm, and she stumbled to keep up as Raleigh broke into a sprint toward the port.
"Hey! Wait a moment! Let me pack my things first!" Gion's face flushed a bright, furious red.
Her small hand being held so tightly made her want to burrow into the ground.
"No time!" Raleigh yelled back, not slowing down. "If we're slow, he'll realize there is no princess and he'll find us!"
"???"
"Were you... were you lying to him just now?"
"Of course!" Raleigh grinned. "What else? Where would I find a kingdom's princess for him on such short notice?"
Though the North Blue base training ground was large, they moved quickly.
While passing the main yard, Raleigh spotted his aide.
"Cleveland! Quickly! Gather the soldiers! We're departing immediately!"
Cleveland, a man of terrifying efficiency, acted swiftly.
By the time Raleigh and Gion had sprinted to the port, the crew was already casting off the lines.
Raleigh, pulling a very flustered Gion along, leaped onto his exclusive office ship in one stride.
He was gasping for breath, but his grin was triumphant.
"Hurry! Hurry, set sail! Destination: the Kingdom of Eryoku!"
Upon receiving the order, the messenger immediately relayed the command to the engine room.
The Marine's Justice Sails unfurled as the ten-thousand-ton warship roared to life, its engines churning the harbor water.
Gion, leaning against the railing and trying to catch her breath, finally wiped the sweat from her forehead.
She looked at Raleigh, who was now lounging sprawled in a deck chair as if he hadn't just sprinted across a base.
"What," she panted, "what in the world do we need to do that was so urgent it required avoiding Tokikake like that?"
Raleigh looked up, his eyes fixed on Gion's pretty, flushed face.
"Maybe, well," he said, his voice casual.
"To go on a date with you."
Gion's face, which had just regained its composure, turned a shade of bright red that would make a tomato jealous.
...
Far away, in the smog-choked, black-dusted hell of the Eryoku Kingdom, Dragon had been busy all day.
He had figured out the mining camp's brutal system.
First, the low-level managers were the overseers, mercenaries and thugs who answered only to the King's Guard.
Each overseer, armed with a steel-tipped whip, managed about eighty miners.
To control this number, every overseer would appoint a "mining team leader"—usually the meanest or strongest of the miners—to help manage the others.
Each team would receive their impossible daily quota from the overseer before the sun even cracked the smog-filled horizon.
Within the specified time, everyone had to work toward this goal.
Only by completing the task could they receive the gray, watery gruel that passed for food. If they failed, they got nothing.
The overseers usually came to the camp with their steel whips before dawn.
Their job was simple: to ensure every breathing soul in the camp went to work.
Here, there was no distinction.
Men, women, the elderly, even children. Healthy or disabled.
As long as they could still breathe, they were forced by the overseers to go into the mines.
In the evening, they would return to distribute the unpalatable food, then leave the camp, locking the massive gates behind them.
Dragon guessed they didn't dare stay within these high walls at night.
They feared the sheer number of people they oppressed.
The area enclosed by these walls was vast, and the Freedom fighter Army members had been separated upon entry.
Dragon had searched all day but hadn't found the others, not knowing where they had been assigned.
However, he wasn't worried.
The Freedom Fighter had its own encrypted communication methods—a specific chalk symbol left on a wall, a code word passed in a whisper.
Dragon believed it wouldn't be long before they gathered together.