The smoke gradually cleared, leaving only the sound of waves hitting the stone walls of D-Sector Pier.
The waves crashed against the scorched rocks with a dull sound.
The Diamond Queen, once a ship that represented luxury and sin, was now nothing more than a burnt and broken wreck.
It lay half-sunken in the dark seawater, with thin trails of black smoke still rising from it.
Gion stood on the shore and slowly sheathed her sword.
Even though she was the highest-ranking commander in this operation on paper, she did not know when it started, but whenever a final decision had to be made, her body always reacted before her mind.
She turned around and looked at Aiden, who was standing behind her.
It was a strange feeling.
It was not only because of the power Aiden had shown earlier.
It was already a habit carved into her instincts.
It felt as if as long as he was there, she did not need to worry.
"Aiden, what do we do now?"
Gion's voice carried a faint trace of dependence.
Killing a great pirate was one thing, but killing two CP0 agents directly under the World Government was something else entirely.
This was a major incident.
If they did not handle the aftermath properly, they were finished.
"What's the big deal about two CP0 agents?" Aiden looked completely unconcerned.
It was not as if he had never killed World Government agents before.
He glanced at the bodies floating in the sea.
His tone was casual, as if killing them meant nothing to him.
Although it was a bit of a shame that he did not get the Sin Points from those two agents, he was strong enough now that he did not care much about missing that little amount.
"But they were CP0..." Gion frowned.
"Dead men don't talk, Commodore."
Aiden walked over to her side.
He did not look at the corpses in the water. Instead, he stared into the distance.
"Victor is still just a wanted criminal. He has not become a Shichibukai yet."
So there is only one conclusion.
The great pirate Victor attacked G-17 Branch to steal supplies.
Commodore Nelson died a hero's death while defending the base.
We, as inspectors, assisted in putting down the rebellion."
"That sounds reasonable, doesn't it?"
Aiden smiled and pointed at the burning wreckage.
"As for those two CP0 agents, the battlefield was chaotic, and cannons do not have eyes.
Who knows how they died?
Maybe they were hit by a pirate's stray bullet, or maybe they slipped and fell into the water.
Either way, their bodies are soaking in the sea.
There is no evidence."
"Those in high command will want to cover this up."
They will not want the dark truth behind the Shichibukai system exposed, so they will have no choice but to swallow their anger and accept it.
The deed is done.
They cannot exactly execute two Headquarters officers who just performed a great service just because they killed a pirate, right?"
Aiden paused, then turned to look at Gion.
"I think that, given how smart Vice Admiral Tsuru is, she may have already expected something like this to happen."
Instead, she let you continue the inspection as planned."
Hearing this, Gion was stunned.
She remembered the slightly unusual pause Tsuru made during their previous call, along with the arrangement that had seemed a little illogical at the time.
I see. With how smart Vice Admiral Tsuru is, she probably already saw this coming.
Looking at Aiden's confident face, the tension in Gion's heart finally eased.
The worry in her eyes disappeared.
"I suppose so," Gion said, feeling relieved.
"However, these several hundred surrendered soldiers are still a problem."
She turned to look at the hundreds of shivering soldiers on the pier.
They were all Nelson's trusted men and had witnessed everything.
"There are hundreds of them.
We cannot expect the three of us to keep watch over all of them."
"Do not worry, I have a plan," Aiden said confidently.
"You still have a lot of direct subordinates on your ship, right?
Have them come down and take over.
Herd all these men onto the warship and lock them in the lower hold.
Enforce a top-level information blackout.
If things are fine on Tsuru's end, there will be a way to deal with them."
"Understood."
After the two of them settled on the plan, Gion immediately prepared to have her adjutant bring men down to secure the scene.
As for who would keep order in the meantime, that was obviously Smoker's job.
With a Logia user like Smoker standing there, those defeated soldiers would not dare do anything even if they had ten times the courage.
Once the scene was under control, Aiden and Gion headed back toward the fortress.
On the way back, they walked side by side.
Aiden kept his hands in his pockets and asked casually, "By the way, Gion, why was Victor Hugo's bounty so high?
His Haki and physical skills seemed average to me.
He relied almost entirely on his fruit ability."
A bounty of 360 million was a terrifying number in the "Paradise" half of the Grand Line during this era.
Gion did not seem to notice that Aiden had dropped the title of "Rear Admiral."
Or perhaps she had subconsciously accepted this slightly more familiar way of addressing her.
"I do not remember the exact details, but I recall that about a year ago, he attacked a kingdom allied with the World Government."
"A kingdom allied with the World Government?"
"Yes.
It was known for supplying weapons and military equipment to the Government.
It was a powerful country, and it was said to pay a huge annual tribute."
At the mention of that tribute, Gion's brows furrowed slightly, and disgust flashed in her eyes.
As a Marine who had spent years at sea, she knew all too well how many countries had been driven to ruin by that system.
"Victor snuck into the royal palace back then.
He intended to assassinate the king and overthrow the government."
Gion sighed.
"Although he failed in the end, he caused massive destruction.
Attacking a country allied with the World Government is a very serious crime.
That is why his bounty is so high."
"I see."
Aiden nodded thoughtfully.
Attacking a Government-aligned kingdom, assassinating a king, and trying to overthrow a regime.
That sounded a bit like the style of Monkey D. Dragon and the Revolutionary Army.
"However, the Revolutionary Army would never do something as cruel as turning living people into statues and selling them off."
Aiden scoffed inwardly.
He glanced at the system panel showing Victor's information.
Sin Value: 105,000 Points.
One hundred and five thousand.
That number did not lie.
Back at the fortress, Gion immediately got busy.
She first arranged for her adjutant to take men to the pier and deal with the prisoners, then immediately contacted Vice Admiral Tsuru through an encrypted Den Den Mushi.
Aiden sat on the sofa outside and poured himself a glass of water.
Gion would explain everything clearly, focusing on the pirates' cruelty and Nelson's heroic sacrifice.
As for the truth, it no longer mattered.
The rest would be a political game among the Marine high command.
They would not execute two living officers who had just performed a great deed for the sake of two dead CP0 agents and a corrupt official, right?
Moreover, Aiden had just shown enough terrifying power to suppress an entire sea.
Combined with his youth, even if it was only to win over a future top-tier fighter, the Marine high command would know what choice to make as long as they were not fools.
With nothing else to do, Aiden sank his consciousness into the system space.
"Let me see what rewards this Duke dropped for me."
He opened Victor's reward interface.
There were five [Options] in total.
[Option 1: Physical Enhancement]Description: [High-level] physique.
[Option 2: Haki Enhancement - Armament]Description: [High-level] Armament Haki.
[Option 3: Haki Enhancement - Observation]Description: [High-level] Observation Haki.
[Option 4: Skill Enhancement - Carving]Description: [Master-level] carving.
[Option 5: Skill Enhancement - Noble Etiquette]Description: [Master-level] noble etiquette.
Aiden: "..."
He went through the list three times, his brow furrowing slightly.
"As expected, there is no Devil Fruit."
He had already noticed during the fight that even though Victor had an S-Grade evaluation, his actual physical strength was fairly average.
Looking at it now, his physique and Haki were only High-level, which was far below Aiden's current stats.
The reason he had been rated S-Grade in the system's overall evaluation was entirely because of how well he used his fruit ability.
That Crystal World move from earlier, which created massive amounts of crystal out of thin air and changed the environment, was definitely a sign of a Paramecia awakening.
"What a waste," Aiden sighed.
"He is dead, so the fruit has probably already been reborn somewhere out at sea.
The system cannot just steal fruit abilities out of thin air."
If he could have inherited the insight behind the development of the Crystal-Crystal Fruit, he might have been able to help his own Rumble-Rumble Fruit reach the threshold of awakening.
Since there were no fruit-related abilities, the remaining options felt a little underwhelming.
His physique and Haki were only High-level, which would barely improve Aiden at this point.
As for Carving...
"What would I even do with that? Make figurines?" Aiden shook his head, speechless.
Finally, his eyes landed on the fifth option.
"Noble etiquette?"
Aiden could not help mocking it.
"A pirate actually has [Master-level] noble etiquette?
That is... ridiculous."
But on second thought, this old man had to pretend to be a Duke to win over the Celestial Dragons.
He spent all day holding a wine glass and acting refined, so it made sense that he had put a lot of effort into that.
"Too bad that top-tier etiquette did not save his life."
At first, Aiden planned to simply choose High-level Physique and be done with it.
After all, even a tiny improvement was still an improvement, and stacking attributes was never a bad choice.
However, right before confirming, his mind suddenly changed.
"Having more skills is never a bad thing."
His current identity was a Marine.
As his strength grew, he would definitely deal with royal families all over the world in the future.
Knowing only how to kill would not be enough.
Having Master-level noble etiquette might be useful in certain situations.
Since the physique was only High-level, there was not much to regret anyway.
"I will take that one."
[Obtained Skill: Noble Etiquette (Master-level)]
A massive flow of knowledge poured into his brain.
In that instant, Aiden felt his temperament change in a subtle way.
After sorting out the rewards, Aiden was about to close the panel when his gaze was suddenly drawn to a special icon lighting up at the bottom.
[Last Wish List]: (Can be activated)
"Just how obsessed was this old man with the Shichibukai title?
He is still thinking about it even after death."
Aiden was a little surprised.
With a trace of curiosity, he chose to activate it.
[Victor's Regret: Obsession of Protection]
[Description: "The Roka Kingdom... that is a land abandoned by the world. The barren land cannot support the tribute demanded by the World Government, so we were shut out. Every year, enemy forces trample my homeland, and my people cry out in despair. I had to obtain the title of Shichibukai. Only then could I gain the protection of the World Government!"]
[Mission Objective: Protect the "Roka Kingdom" and save it from invasion.]
Looking at those lines of text, Aiden froze.
"I see."
Aiden leaned back on the sofa and stayed silent for a long time.
All the clues were finally connected.
The reason Victor had been so obsessed with the Shichibukai title was because he wanted to use that status to turn his poor homeland, which could not join the World Government because it could not pay the required tribute, into his own pirate territory.
By doing that, he would indirectly gain the protection given to a World Government member nation and use it to shelter a country the world had abandoned.
Even a powerful enemy nation would not dare attack a country protected by a Shichibukai so casually.
It was just like how Boa Hancock later used her Shichibukai status to protect Amazon Lily from outside threats.
"To save his country, he did not hesitate to turn himself into a man-eating demon..."
Aiden's mood was complicated.
"What is this? Evil born from tragedy?"
Had he somehow become the villain who crushed someone else's dream of saving his country?
But then he thought of the crystal statues in the basement that would never wake up again, and the despair of those innocent people.
If Victor had succeeded and the Roka Kingdom had been saved, he would have been a hero to them.
But to the innocent people he turned into statues, he was a complete monster.
Aiden shook his head and pushed those messy thoughts aside.
This world was sick.
Victor tried to cure it in the worst possible way, and in the end, he became a monster himself.