With Duncan broken and bleeding on the ground, the rest was just cleanup.
No one left at Branch 127 could even slow Steele down.
Thud… thud…
One by one, the last of the marines fell, until the entire training ground was littered with their groaning, unconscious bodies.
Steele kicked the last man aside and finally looked to the docks.
Bell-mère was long gone.
He straightened his cuffs, his face a mask of irritation. "Goddamn lunatics. All of them."
He couldn't understand this... "spirit."
Wasting your life for a comrade? In CP9, comrades were just obstacles, or tools to be used.
You climbed over their corpses to get to CP0.
That was his goal. This... this was just stupid.
He started walking toward the port, confident in his tracking.
A single, injured woman? Easy.
Marine bases were always near ports... for warships... but she was alone... she'd need a small boat.
His eyes widened.
His sailboat.
He'd come alone on a small, fast sailboat for secrecy.
"Damn it!"
He broke into a dead sprint.
As the docks came into view, his blood ran cold.
There, at his mooring, was nothing but a single, cleanly cut rope.
The lightweight, custom-built boat was gone.
Enraged, he grabbed the nearest dockworker. "A short-haired marine. Did she take that boat?"
"Y-yeah!" the man stammered. "Looked like a marine. Bell-mère, I think? Said she was getting something for an official, so she just... took it."
"Bastard, that was my boat!"
SLAP! SLAP!
Steele backhanded the man across the face.
"Hey! You can't just hit people!" the man protested, but one look into Steele's cold, dead eyes made him shrink back.
"S-sorry, sir. My fault. I... I wasn't watching it."
Steele shoved him to the ground and stormed toward a large merchant ship that was loading cargo.
He kicked a crate off the gangplank, sending it crashing onto the dock.
"Hey! That's Great White Shark Company cargo!" A mountain of a man, clearly the ship's muscle, stomped out.
"I'm gonna teach you a lesson, you little punk!"
The massive fist swung.
Steele just watched it come.
'Too slow.'
He caught the punch.
Crack.
The sound of the bone snapping was sickeningly clear.
The big man screamed and Steele didn't even look at him.
He just kicked the man in the chest, sending him flying off the gangplank and into the water with a splash.
The rest of the crew froze, staring in terror.
"Who's the captain?" Steele's voice was ice.
A flustered man in a merchant's coat scrambled forward. "Sir! I'm the captain. How can I help?"
"My ship is... gone. You'll be taking me to the Kingdom of Columbia."
The captain wiped a bead of sweat from his forehead.
"Ah, sir, with all due respect, our current voyage doesn't go anywhere near..."
"Stop wasting my time," Steele cut him off. "Serving the World Government is an honor. Or would you rather I report you for defiance?"
The captain heard the unspoken threat.
Money could be earned another day; his life couldn't.
"Raise the anchor! Set the sails! We're changing course!"
As the ship began to move, Steele stood on the deck, staring out at the empty sea.
"This little game of cat and mouse... it's just getting started, Bell-mère."
....
"Raleigh, what are you doing?"
Gion asked, walking into his office with the others.
They were all still sweating from training.
They were all a bit surprised.
Raleigh, who was normally sprawled on the sofa, was actually sitting at his desk, reading a book.
Belo Betty, who had been panting from exhaustion, immediately forgot her fatigue.
She zipped over to his desk, stood on her tiptoes, and gripped the edge, trying to read along with him.
Raleigh glanced at the small head peeking between his arms, smiled, and gently lifted her onto his lap.
"Rare to see you so studious. What is it?" Gion asked, flopping onto the sofa with Tokikake.
Miles just went to boil a pot of water for tea.
"Just some interesting old rumors from the North Blue," Raleigh said, his eyes still on the page.
"A collection of legends. If you really want to understand a place, you have to start with its stories. Then you go see for yourself if they're true."
Belo Betty, now settled comfortably on his lap, pointed to a specific passage.
"Master, what's this one?"
Raleigh looked at where she was pointing and chuckled, patting her head.
"That," he said, "is a story about a braggart king and his lost city of gold."
"Is that the story of that liar king Noland?"
Gion sat upright on the sofa, holding a translucent grape she was about to put in her mouth.
Hearing Raleigh's words, she chewed the grape slowly as she spoke.
Tokikake also seemed to find the name familiar upon hearing it.
But with his mouth full of food, he wanted to speak but couldn't get the words out.
Raleigh continued from where Gion left off:
"Yes, this story is most widely circulated in the North Blue."
"It's said that four hundred years ago, there was a North Blue explorer named Montblanc Noland who recorded a place overflowing with gold during his travels, which he called Shandora."
The existence of Shandora excited many treasure-seeking adventurers, who set out to sea one after another in search of this place.
Even the king of a North Blue kingdom at the time was deeply intrigued, so he contacted Noland.
Promising him a substantial reward and a Kingdom Medal as incentive for finding Shandora.
However, when Noland set out again with the king's army, they found no trace of the so-called Shandora.
Even the islands that should have existed according to Noland's recorded charts had completely disappeared.
This inevitably made both the army commander and the king suspect that Noland had fabricated the story of Shandora to gain fame.
The furious king felt he had been deceived and ordered Noland's execution in the royal capital.
This incident was later adapted into a fairy tale for North Blue children to read and enjoy.
In this fairy tale, the originally adventurous Noland was transformed into a foolish big liar who stubbornly believed Shandora truly existed.
After Raleigh finished telling the story, Belo Betty lifted her small head and blinked her watery eyes curiously as she said:
"Master, does Shandora really exist?"
"Of course it doesn't. The Marines also heard this rumor and once organized a team to search for it, but they found no trace either."
Finally swallowing the food in his mouth, Tokikake hurriedly chimed in.
These secret anecdotes and interesting stories are often discussed at the Marines headquarters, including the fact that the Marines has also attempted to uncover classified information about this matter.
However, this is nothing new—people have been trying for two or three hundred years.
Even now, there are still those who believe Shandora exists, just hidden away in some unknown corner.
But Raleigh knew the truth.
Shandora was not some illusory tale; it had been recorded by Noland before it was swept into the sky by a Knockup stream.
The reason later generations never discovered it was because the knockup stream erupted at highly irregular intervals.
They might burst forth repeatedly in a short span of time, or not erupt for years or even decades.
Moreover, adventurers and pirates who witnessed such a spectacle would only observe it from a distance, never imagining they could ride that powerful current up into the sky.
They had no idea that the Shandora they sought was, in fact, hovering right above their heads all along.
Raleigh had nothing more to say on the matter.
Until he found a way to get up there, he had no intention of revealing Shandora's location.
What if he ended up being labeled a second Noland?
Raleigh had spent many years in the Marines.
Though his personality was somewhat lazy, his reputation was still quite solid.
He had no desire to tarnish that good reputation.
"When I was a child, I also wondered where Shandora might be if it truly existed."
"This sea is filled with too many unknowns. Perhaps Shandora has always been in the North Blue, but no one has discovered it yet."
Gion elegantly set her teacup down on the table and sighed with emotion.
Raleigh remained silent, contemplating how to search for Shandora.
After all, he knew that there was a Devil Fruit there, one that was no less powerful than his brother Borsalino's Glint-Glint Fruit.
The Rumble-Rumble Fruit, a Logia-type Devil Fruit!
However, Enel was still just a kid at this point.
He wasn't worried about Enel having eaten the Rumble-Rumble Fruit.
Even if he had, Raleigh could always recruit Enel into the Marines.
Either way, it wouldn't be a loss.
"Report!"
A knock sounded at the door, and a messenger loudly announced his presence.
"Enter."
Raleigh straightened up in his seat.
Belo Betty climbed down from his lap and went over to Gion to eat some fruit.
"Rear Admiral, there is a report that requires your attention."
The messenger held out a document, its sender marked as Borsalino.
"Oh? Borsalino actually sent me a report."
"He's even assigning me a task on his own initiative. Interesting. Leave it here."
Raleigh took the report, placed it on the table, and opened it.
"New Mafia Force in the North Blue—The Donquixote Family"
Seeing the title, Raleigh raised an eyebrow.
When he first arrived in the North Blue, Raleigh had actually thought of Doflamingo.
This guy started his rise in the North Blue, but Raleigh had never been able to pinpoint his exact location.
Besides, Raleigh was rather laid-back.
He figured it would be easier to let Doflamingo build up the Donquixote Family's reputation first before tracking them down, rather than exhaust himself searching for their traces.
After all, that guy was no pushover—he possessed Conqueror's Haki and was a former Celestial Dragon.
Moreover, from what Raleigh remembered, Doflamingo didn't face any major setbacks during his early days building his organization.
Except for his younger brother being adopted by Sengoku and sent undercover into the Donquixote Family—that was a real backstab.
Gion and Tokikake watched as the intelligence report was delivered, itching to take a look themselves.
However, being military personnel, they naturally understood the rules.
Since Raleigh didn't call them over, they could only sit obediently on the sofa, watching eagerly as Raleigh flipped through the intelligence report.
The report was brief, and Raleigh finished reading it quickly.
Just as Raleigh had anticipated, Doflamingo, who possessed both Devil Fruit powers and Conqueror's Haki, was practically sweeping through the Mafia like a tidal wave.
Within just one month of emerging in the North Blue, the Donquixote family had already expanded to over a hundred members and seized two islands as their territory.
Although he had lost his status as a Celestial Dragon, the blood of the Celestial Dragons still flowed through his veins.
While the World Government wouldn't actively assist him, they also wouldn't allow anyone to arrest him.
Therefore, the Marines had yet to take action against this newly emerged Mafia force.
When Borsalino delivered the intelligence report, he had specifically circled the part about Doflamingo's former Celestial Dragon status.
He knew Raleigh was smart enough to understand his implication.
But unfortunately, while he knew Raleigh would understand, he had no idea how Raleigh would react.
"Hah... hahaha."
Raleigh's reaction made everyone in the room feel something was off.
"Finally found you, Doflamingo."
The name slipped from Raleigh's lips, but Gion and Tokikake racked their brains without figuring out who this person was.
Actually, it wasn't their fault - Doflamingo operated in circles completely separate from their usual contacts.
Besides, a young boy who had just committed patricide wouldn't attract attention before achieving anything noteworthy.
Even if he was once a Celestial Dragon.