Chapter 215: Purple Bamboo Island!
New World, Purple Bamboo Island.
This is a beautiful, deeply secluded island famous across the chaotic seas for its one unique, breathtaking specialty.
The island is covered in vast, dense forests of towering bamboo that naturally shimmer with a magnificent, almost magical purple light whenever they are bathed in the afternoon sun.
The purple bamboo harvested here is not ordinary wood; it possesses an incredible durability and a natural, lustrous sheen that requires absolutely no varnish.
Because of these rare qualities, it is the absolute first choice for many top-tier nobles, royal families, and wealthy underground merchants across the globe. They eagerly commission master artisans to create elegant handicrafts, exquisite furniture, and even ornamental weapons from this precious material.
Therefore, although this island is incredibly remote and located far from the major, bustling trade routes of the Grand Line, it can easily be considered quite prosperous and wealthy.
The islanders lived simple, fulfilling lives, their bellies full and their homes well-maintained by the steady influx of merchant gold.
And for the past few decades, the unbroken peace and continued prosperity of Purple Bamboo Island stemmed entirely from the absolute protection of a single, solitary flag.
It was a large, heavy piece of black canvas, weather-beaten and stained by the salt of the sea.
That flag, printed with a hideous, roaring beast head and massive, crossed bone clubs, belonged to the supreme Emperor who once reigned over the entirety of these dark seas.
It was the Jolly Roger of Beast Kaido.
As long as this terrifying flag fluttered high in the wind at the highest point of the island's central clock tower, it acted like an impenetrable, invisible fortress wall.
It was exactly like a heavy, suffocating gaze cast down by a violent, bloodthirsty god.
That mere piece of cloth was more than enough to completely deter any ill-intentioned jackals, greedy pirate rookies, and wild dogs who coveted the island's wealth.
No one dared to steal a single stalk of bamboo. No one dared to harm a single villager. To do so would mean inviting the absolute, apocalyptic wrath of the strongest creature in the world.
The majesty and sheer, overwhelming terror of the Yonko was such an unreasonable, absolute "truth" of the New World.
However, when an established "truth" suddenly and violently collapses, the former, peaceful order instantly turns into the most frantic, brutal bloody feast imaginable.
The shocking, earth-shattering news of Kaido's confirmed death, the total annihilation of his legendary Beasts Pirates, and the sudden, violent change of ownership of Wano Country had spread rapidly.
The news was exactly like a massive block of freezing ice thrown directly into a vat of violently boiling oil.
It caused a massive, uncontrollable stir and a terrifying chain reaction of violence all throughout the darkest corners of the New World.
That legendary beast-head flag, which had silently and effectively protected Purple Bamboo Island for twenty peaceful years, was unceremoniously torn down.
It was set ablaze one bright afternoon by two heavily armed groups of uninvited guests, their faces twisted with greedy, sinister grins as they watched the symbol of the old era turn to ash.
The hot, orange flames licked the dark fabric of the flag, consuming the beast's skull.
And simultaneously, those very same flames also violently ignited the long-suppressed, sickening greed of the opportunistic pirates who had been waiting for this exact moment for decades.
"Roar hahaha! 'Flame Lion' Leo, you fucking smelled the scent of fresh meat and came running too?"
A booming, incredibly harsh voice echoed through the town square, shattering the peaceful ambiance of the island forever.
"Get the hell away from here, you overgrown house cat! This entire island and all its wealth belongs to me, 'Jade Wolf' Garo, now!"
The man shouting was a massive, burly giant of a human with a broad face full of scarred, ugly flesh.
A thick, heavy iron ring hung painfully from his lower chin, and his teeth were filed into sharp, jagged points resembling a wild predator.
He was currently stepping his heavy, spiked boot directly onto the charred, smoking remains of Kaido's flagpole, roaring aggressively at the leader of another, equally massive group of heavily armed pirates.
He was the brutal Captain of the Jade Wolf Pirates, 'Fangs' Garo.
He was an infamous, highly dangerous criminal with a staggering bounty of 810 million Berries on his head.
And the man he was currently glaring at, Leo, whom he had mockingly called 'Flame Lion', was a tall, lean man with a wild, untamed head of fiery red long hair that looked exactly like a burning mane.
Leo slowly licked his severely chapped, bleeding lips, a deep, unhinged desire for absolute destruction burning brightly in his manic eyes.
"Garo, you pathetic, mangy wild dog who only knows how to pick up leftover bones to eat from the dirt," Leo sneered, his voice dripping with venomous contempt.
He rested a massive, double-bladed battleaxe effortlessly on his shoulder.
"You actually think you're worthy of fighting me for this food? You think you have the bite to match your annoying bark?"
Leo took a threatening step forward, the heavy wooden planks of the town square groaning under his weight.
"Today, I'm not only taking absolute control of this wealthy island and enslaving its craftsmen, but I'm also going to personally skin that ugly wolf hide of yours and make a bloody rug out of it for my cabin!"
The Captain of the Fire Lion Pirates, Leo, a man boasting a massive bounty of 760 million Berries, let out a boisterous, echoing laugh that sent shivers down the spines of the hiding villagers.
Two incredibly vicious, bloodthirsty pirate crews, both somewhat famous and deeply feared even in the treacherous waters of the New World, had simultaneously set their greedy sights on this undefended piece of fat.
In their arrogant, calculated view, the newly risen Suzaku Pirates were absolutely nothing to worry about right now.
They reasoned that having just gone through a world-shaking, apocalyptic war against two reigning Emperors, the newcomer crew would surely be severely weakened.
Even if they had miraculously won the war, they would undoubtedly be licking their deep wounds, mourning their dead, and desperately trying to consolidate their fragile grip on the massive Wano Country.
And Purple Bamboo Island, geographically located at the very outer edge of the Beasts Pirates' former massive sphere of influence, was completely insignificant in the grand scheme of things.
It was exactly like a tiny, unnoticed breadcrumb that had accidentally fallen from a king's lavish dining table.
How could that high-and-mighty, newly crowned Emperor of the Sea possibly have the time, the energy, or the manpower to pick it up?
This was the absolute perfect, golden opportunity for ambitious "guys" like them to violently carve out their own territories!
The two heavily armed sides faced off intensely at the town entrance.
Hundreds of cutlasses were drawn, reflecting the afternoon sun. Countless heavy flintlock pistols and rifles were cocked, aimed directly at each other's heads.
They were bitter, old rivals who had clashed on the high seas before. They knew each other's combat worth and dirty tricks incredibly well.
Neither captain was absolutely certain they could take the other down unscathed in a direct, all-out war.
But at the exact same time, neither of these greedy, prideful men was willing to take a step back and simply stand by, watching this incredibly lucrative piece of fat in their mouths go to someone else.
Thus, in the tense, explosive stalemate between these two warlords, it was the innocent, defenseless residents of the island who ultimately suffered the horrific consequences.
High above the town, far removed from the unfolding nightmare.
Simon walked briskly and happily along the winding, dirt mountain road leading back down to the town.
He was carrying a massive, heavy bundle of freshly cut purple bamboo securely strapped to his broad back. The freshly severed stalks still emitted a faint, incredibly pleasant, and sweet fragrance that mingled perfectly with the crisp mountain air.
He was a bright-eyed, energetic boy of only seventeen years old.
Despite his youth, his hands were heavily calloused from years of hard work. He was already widely recognized by the elders as the most talented, skilled bamboo craftsman on the entire island.
He had just successfully finished cutting the raw materials for a massive, highly lucrative order from a visiting noble.
As he walked, he happily calculated the incoming Berries in his head. He was eagerly planning to use the extra money to finally buy a beautiful, newly released brand of pink blush from a traveling merchant.
He wanted to give it to the sweet baker's daughter in town, the beautiful girl who always smiled so warmly at him whenever he passed her shop.
His heart fluttered with innocent, youthful excitement.
However, as he happily turned the very last, steep mountain bend that overlooked his home, his world shattered.
The familiar, comforting white wisps that usually represented the peaceful cooking smoke of the villagers' dinners had completely vanished.
Instead, they had been violently replaced by thick, suffocating plumes of terrifying, pitch-black smoke.
The toxic dark clouds were aggressively rising high into the blue sky, completely blotting out the sun and instantly making Simon's racing heart skip a terrible beat.
Simon's heart sank abruptly into the very pit of his stomach.
A profound, suffocating sense of extreme foreboding gripped his chest like an icy, skeletal hand. He couldn't breathe.
Without a single second of hesitation, he dropped the precious bundle of purple bamboo on his back, letting it scatter uselessly across the dirt path.
He rushed down the steep mountain trail toward the town entrance, sprinting like an absolute madman, his feet slipping and sliding on the loose rocks.
The closer he got to the valley, the clearer the horrific sensory details became.
The acrid, choking smell of violently burning wood assaulted his nostrils. It was quickly followed by the heavy, sickening, and unmistakable metallic scent of fresh human blood pooling in the streets.
And worst of all... a certain kind of wild, unrestrained, and deeply sadistic laughter echoed up the valley walls, a sound that belonged only in a living nightmare.
When he finally rushed through the stone archway at the town entrance, he was struck completely motionless, as if hit by a bolt of lightning.
He stood frozen on the spot, his eyes wide with an incomprehensible, absolute horror.
The once peaceful, beautiful, and tranquil cobblestone streets had now completely turned into a literal, waking hell on earth.
Dozens of traditional wooden houses were burning fiercely, the orange flames roaring like hungry beasts.
The loud, crackling sound of heavy wooden support beams snapping and collapsing was constant, sending showers of hot sparks into the smoke-filled air.
The familiar, friendly faces he had known for his entire seventeen years of life were gone.
The kind, elderly grocery store owner who had always sneaked him free sweets when he was a child... the loud but warm neighbor auntie who always naggingly reminded him to find a good wife and get married soon...
They were all now nothing more than cold, mutilated corpses lying awkwardly in massive, spreading pools of their own dark blood.
Terrified women tightly held their crying, traumatized children to their chests, letting out shrill, heart-wrenching cries of absolute despair.
They were only met with brutal violence, being driven forward like worthless livestock by the hideous-looking, laughing pirates.
The invaders were mercilessly using the heavy, steel backs of their cutlass blades and the hard wooden butts of their rifles to brutally herd the weeping survivors toward the central execution square.
The unbridled, sadistic laughter of the invading pirates, the agonizing wailing of the women, the hysterical crying of the children, along with the loud, violent explosions of the burning fires...
All of these horrific elements intertwined flawlessly to create a hellish, moving ukiyo-e painting of absolute human suffering.
Simon's eyes instantly turned a deep, bloodshot red.
Every single ounce of logical reason, fear, and self-preservation he possessed was instantly burned to ash at that exact moment.
He couldn't bother to think about his own utter lack of strength. He couldn't bother to think about the bounties of the monsters before him.
He reached down and tightly grabbed a heavy, razor-sharp steel machete used for cutting tough bamboo stalks from a nearby fallen cart.
He let out a guttural, beast-like roar of pure, unadulterated agony and rage that tore his vocal cords.
He charged forward, sprinting wildly toward the two massive men who were casually facing off in the center of the square, the two monsters who were clearly the bandit leaders responsible for this massacre!
"Bastards!!!"
'Fangs' Garo and 'Flame Lion' Leo were currently busy with their intense, arrogant verbal sparring, completely focused on their territorial dispute.
So, they had naturally noticed this insignificant, reckless young man rushing over toward them from the corner of their eyes long ago.
But neither of the two fearsome Pirate Captains even bothered to move a single muscle. They didn't even turn their heads to look at him.
In their hardened, bloody eyes, an ordinary, weak islander who knew absolutely nothing about the harsh reality of the sea was exactly like a pathetic, crawling ant. He was simply not even worthy of a fraction of their attention.
As expected, the suicidal charge ended before it even truly began.
"Thud!"
A sickening, heavy sound of bone completely shattering echoed in the square.
Simon didn't even manage to rush within ten meters of the two captains before his path was abruptly and violently halted.
A random, grinning pirate lackey stepped casually out from the crowd. With an easy, almost leisurely motion, he delivered a devastating, Haki-infused kick directly into Simon's fragile chest.
Simon was instantly launched backward, his feet leaving the ground entirely as he was violently kicked to the hard cobblestone ground.
His vision went entirely white with blinding agony, and the sharp bamboo machete in his hand flew out of his grip, landing uselessly in the distance with a dull, pathetic metallic clang.
"Cough... cough cough..."
Simon hit the ground hard, tumbling several times before finally coming to a stop.
He violently coughed up a massive, thick mouthful of hot blood mixed with the dirt from the street.
The intense, suffocating pain of his completely shattered ribs almost made him faint right then and there, the edges of his vision darkening rapidly.
But the blazing, uncontrollable fire of hatred and desperation in his heart stubbornly supported his broken body, refusing to let him succumb to the darkness just yet.
He struggled, his bleeding fingers digging desperately into the cracks of the cobblestones.
He painfully raised his heavy head, glaring at the blurry, towering figures of the pirates surrounding him. And then, with absolutely all the remaining strength in his torn lungs, he shouted the ultimate, magical incantation that had flawlessly protected their lives for decades.
"We... our Purple Bamboo Island is firmly under the absolute protection of the Beasts Pirates!"
Simon spat out another mouthful of blood, his voice cracking but filled with a desperate, frantic hope.
"If you dare to mess around here... you will... you will undoubtedly suffer Lord Kaido's apocalyptic wrath! He will slaughter you all!"
In Simon's incredibly simple, isolated understanding of the world, this was the absolute most powerful, terrifying sentence he could possibly think of.
In the past, whenever a rogue pirate ship accidentally landed on their shores, as long as the old mayor confidently said that specific name and pointed to the flag, even the most violent, arrogant pirates would instantly turn pale.
They would apologize profusely and run away back to their ships with their tails tucked firmly between their legs, absolutely terrified of the Yonko's shadow.
However, this time, the reaction he received was completely and utterly wrong.
What he waited for with bated breath was not the familiar look of sudden panic or paralyzing fear on the invaders' faces.
Instead, his desperate declaration was met with a brief, entirely stunned moment of absolute silence.
The pirates simply stared at him, blinking in genuine confusion for a few seconds.
And then, that brief silence was abruptly shattered, followed by even more unrestrained, deafening, and completely mocking bursts of hysterical laughter.
"Hahahahaha!"
"Roar hahahahaha! Oh my god, did you hear this kid?!"
Garo and Leo, the two rival captains who had been ready to kill each other moments ago, now looked at each other in absolute, shared amusement.
They reacted exactly as if they had just heard the absolute funniest, most ridiculous joke of the entire century.
They threw their heads back, laughing so incredibly hard that they were physically doubled over, with real tears of mirth nearly coming out of their cruel eyes.
Simon was completely stunned. His mind went entirely blank.
He lay broken on the ground, his blood pooling around him, and just looked up at the two hysterically laughing bandit leaders.
He looked at the surrounding hundreds of pirate lackeys, who were also currently holding their stomachs, their faces full of absolute, undisguised sarcasm and mockery toward his threat.
A profound, freezing coldness—a feeling far deeper and infinitely more terrifying than mere physical despair—began to slowly spread through the very core of his heart.
"Honestly, isolated islanders are just pathetic islanders," Garo finally managed to gasp, slowly trying to stop his booming laughter.
He wiped a tear from his eye with his massive, scarred thumb. He looked down at the bleeding, broken Simon with a look of profound, mocking pity, exactly as if he were looking at a fascinatingly stupid, primitive human from the stone age.
"Are you still living completely in the last century, boy?" Garo sneered, his jagged teeth glinting in the light of the burning houses.
He stepped forward, his massive shadow completely engulfing Simon's small, trembling body.
"Kid, let me educate you. That legendary Beasts Pirates crew you just mentioned that could supposedly protect you? They have already been completely and utterly wiped out from the face of this sea!"
Garo leaned down, his foul breath washing over Simon's face, his voice carrying the ultimate, crushing truth of the new era.
"Kaido?"
Garo let out one final, dark chuckle.
"The grass on his grave is probably three feet high by now!"
[Akarin Note:
Your Support Keeps This Story Alive!
If you're enjoying this novel, your support means the world to me. Simple actions like leaving a review, power stone, comment, or sharing the story let me know you're out there. It's the greatest motivation for me to keep updating until the very end and ensures this project continues.
For those who wish to support me more directly, you can join my Patreon at [patreon.com/AkarinTL]. As a thank-you, you'll receive access to 50 advanced chapters.
I hope I am still worthy of your support. My life truly depends on this... haha, I know I'm so shameless.]