Chapter 166: Back To Water 7

We had been sailing for a week straight soon after.

I made Ken eat the Rumble-Rumble fruit as soon as I got back on the ship, now all he was doing was training non-stop so that he could get more accustomed to his new powers.

I had to admit, at first, Ken was on top of the World. The way he had kept flexing his powers around and about made the other crewmembers quite envious of him. However, a thorough beating from Stussy had straightened him out quite a bit.

This was great news to me, because the last thing I needed on my ship was a god-complex.

Now all he did was train himself to wield his lightning a little bit better compared to how he did yesterday. He did all of this while making sure that the crew was smoothly directing the ship back to Water 7. The navigators claimed that we would be reaching there before the end of tommorow.

It had been a month since I received news about the happenings of the world. So I was currently reading a newspaper that the bird had dropped earlier and trying to catch up with all the happenings lately.

There wasn't much that I had to keep in mind, the Big Mom Pirates and The Golden Lion Pirates were still at war with each other. Roger was spotted sailing through the New World, and Kaido was still busy picking fights with Marines. There wasn't any news concerning Whitebeard, but there was news about some Whitebeard Pirates fighting off Marine forces on Latten island. However, that much was going to be expected from them.

Passing the newspaper to Stussy, I sat down before lighting another cigarette. The world was getting more and more chaotic the more Roger sailed closer to finding the One Piece, but it wasn't much for me to be fazed by so far.

Soon, we arrived on Water 7. I immediately rushed over towards the port where Tom and his crew normally worked. Only to find him surrounded by countless World Government agents and Marines as well.

"There is no doubt that you were responsible for making their ships. It's either you co-operate with our investigation, or we can simply arrest you right here and now," a World Government agent commented as he pulled out a notebook as he turned the pages.

"I make ships for all who can afford it, it is not a sin to monetize my talents," Tom responded calmly while shielding his disciples with his wide body.

"It is a sin to make ships for the enemy of the World Government," another World Government agent replied, "and now you're going to have to face the consequences of your actions."

"I don't think so," I replied calmly behind them.

I could literally hear their muscles stiffen as they froze in place, nobody dared to look bact to face me. It was almost hilarious, almost.

"I have business I need to do with Tom here, get lost."

They didn't move for a while, I guess they needed a bit of motivation. So I leaked out a little bit of my killing intent. That instantly snapped them out of their shock and had them rushing towards the ships. The Marines didn't do anything on the contrary, they remained standing their unwaveringly as they all looked at me with fear stricken eyes.

"I don't remember asking you guys to stay either," I remarked casually.

"That's because they are under my orders, brat," an older but aggressive voice sounded out behind me.

"Hm? Shouldn't you be chasing Roger down?" I asked the Marine Vice-Admiral.

"Those assholes at the World Government want me to 'aid' them in oppressing that man over there," Garp responded as he pointed his finger at Tom.

"Then why did they run?"

"They knew I wasn't going to help them, this is the most that I'm doing for now, what are you doing here?"

"Nothing much, just commissioning a new ship."

I didn't have that much animosity towards Vice-Admiral Garp. He always struck me as someone who followed his own justice, and rarely allowed the World Government or the higher-ups of the Marines to interfere with his justice.

"You know, I could arrest you right here and now," Garp commented while smirking.

"I heard that the Marines were ordered to pull back whenever you saw me," I retorted calmly.

"What's with the children of this era? Always so talkative!" Garp complained while picking his nose.

"I feel like you should be focusing your attention towards the New World, old man," I replied.

Garp looked like he wanted to bash my head in, but he refrained from doing so. Instead, he walked away with his Marine crew while saying:

"Don't let me catch you out here again! I'll crush your skull in the next time I see you!!!"

I ignored his comment had turned to face Tom, his face was grim as he kept staring at the back of the marine Vice-Admiral.

"Something on your mind?" I asked curiously.

"Oh, nothing much really.....just.....contemplating," Tom replied hesitatingly.

"What happened for someone like you to stumble into their radar?"

He tossed a piece of newspaper towards me, and let me read through its contents.

"The World Economic News is proud to announce that we will soon be announcing the top four of the most notorious pirate groups that impact the World. It will be unbiased, and based on all the content and context that we know of! Stay tuned."

"The fuck?" I muttered as I stared at the paper.

The Four Emperors of the sea were an entity that had been regarded even before the official plot of One Piece had begun. However there was always a certain scrutiny that had gone on within it to promote some biases against them.

The part that had caught me off-guard was the fact that they were already beginning to announce them. It would have made more sense to announce it after Roger's death, but it seems like something else had come up within the month that we were gone to Skypiea.

"Did something major happen while we were gone?" I asked Tom curiously.

"You haven't heard? The Golden Lion Pirates have finally made a treaty with the Big Mom Pirates," Tom replied plainly.

"That doesn't make any sense, I just read a newspaper saying that they were still at war," I replied confused.

"Ever since the World Economic News got a new President, there are some Portions of the news that they give us that is altered quite plainly, you know?" Tom replied, "Sometimes they hide important information, whereas other times they air out some vital information that will affect the World to their advantage."

"That makes sense, but it doesn't justify why they're hiding information like this on purpose. Besides, how'd you know?"

"One of the crewmembers that you had left here came to me one day informing me that they had to go back to the New World to help your captain out. He also told me to tell you to call your captain as soon as you got the message."

"What the-" I was about to cuss when my transponder snail, which had no signal for the duration I was on Skypiea, started ringing.

I immediately picked up the call and listened to whoever was at the other end of the line.

"Boris? Thank goodness! We thought we lost you!!" Marco's voice echoed through the call.

"Marco, what's this about a war going on?" I asked immediately.

"Well, shit hit the fan, the World Government had called Pops earlier and told him that they were calling off the non-aggression pact that they had established with us earlier," Marco reported, "It's also the reason why they attacked Latten island earlier and tried to reclaim the Seastone mines."

"What, do they want another war?"

"Actually, that's because when Roger made his way to the New World, Whitebeard offered to help him fight off Shiki."

"Why in the hell would he do that?!"

"If I recall right, one of our islands had been destroyed when Shiki and Big Mom were still fighting each other. Pops didn't really like that, so he decided to insert himself within the conflict."

"Please tell me that you tried to convince him not to?"

"No, in fact, we supported it. We were really drunk when this happened, and Whitebeard was in no mood to hear anything other than yes."

I sighed as I took in all that was happening at the moment. It was now beginning to make sense as to why they had sent Garp all the way over here to press Tom. It seemed that they were done stalling for time, and now were fully confident that they could retaliate against the Whitebeard Pirates.

Moreover, because of the union between The Golden Lion Pirates and the Big Mom Pirates, they saw an oppurtunity to aid in the destruction of both the Roger Pirates and the Whitebeard Pirates. Effectively neutralizing the four groups, and establishing some form of control within the New World.

It was like they were playing us like a fiddle, and we were actively walking right into their trap. However, I had way more questions about what was happening than answers.