Ace pointed at the wanted poster photo in his hand and chuckled at the front desk receptionist, "Please tell him I'll wait here for another week. Once the time is up, I'll have to leave. After all, I'm still looking for another pirate. Thanks for the trouble."
"Luffy's brother?"
Nami furrowed her brow and subconsciously turned her head, drawn to the conversation just like Allen.
Hearing her voice, Ace, who was bowing in thanks, also turned to look. His eyes immediately landed on Allen.
"Demon Lion Allen? Ah, no, wait, do you guys know Luffy?"
"That's right! You guys are from the East Blue too, aren't you? I can't believe I didn't think of that back on the resort island."
Suddenly realizing the connection, a flash of excitement appeared in Ace's eyes. He leaned in and familiarly extended his hand with a smile.
"Hello, my name is Ace. I'm Luffy's older brother."
Allen looked at his outstretched hand, then at that warm, smiling face, and fell deep into thought.
*As the saying goes, you don't strike a smiling face.*
*So if he's both reaching out and smiling, do two positives make a negative?*
*Theoretically, no, because...*
*Two positives don't make a negative in the first place.*
...
A moment later.
"Pfft, hahahaha!!"
Bang! Bang! Bang!
Ace slammed his hand against the table, his arm slung over Allen's shoulder as the two of them laughed so hard that tears and snot ran down their faces.
"You're so despicable! Just thinking about the look on Luffy's face when he realized his ship was stolen makes me want to crack up!"
"You should have seen his expression! He was gesturing wildly and viciously cursing me out, just like this!"
"Sink! Hurry up and sink to the bottom of the sea!"
"Pfft, hahaha! That sounds exactly like Luffy, ahahaha!"
Bang! Bang! Bang!
Watching the two of them act like partners in crime, laughing uncontrollably, Nami's eye twitched, dark lines forming on her forehead.
"I really didn't expect that guy Luffy to have an older brother, though. I've never heard him mention it before."
Nami was a bit curious. "So, did you come here specifically to look for him?"
"Well, not exactly. I was pretty surprised when I saw him get a bounty a while back. Originally, I planned to wait for him in the New World."
Ace gradually calmed down and explained with a smile, "But some things happened after that. I came to Paradise for another pirate, and tracking his clues just happened to bring me to these waters."
"I figured Luffy should have entered the Grand Line by now, so I've been leaving messages on the islands I pass by to see if we might bump into each other."
"So that's how it is. It seems you really care about Luffy."
Nami felt relieved, then asked curiously, "By the way, what did you mean just now by the New World and Paradise?"
"The New World refers to the second half of the Grand Line, while Paradise refers to the first half. Just explaining it probably won't help you understand; you'll just have to experience it for yourselves."
Ace took a sip of his drink, set down his glass, and smiled.
"A lot of experts who make a name for themselves in Paradise can suddenly become completely ordinary once they enter the New World. When I challenged Pops back in the day, I got beaten up pretty badly."
Recalling the past, a hint of nostalgia unconsciously appeared on Ace's face.
Allen couldn't help but laugh. "It is Whitebeard, after all. Not getting beaten to death is already like getting a second lease on life, and you even ended up becoming the Second Division Commander."
*If Kid had that kind of luck, he would wake up laughing from his dreams.*
"Pops? Whitebeard... wait a minute!"
Piecing the keywords together one by one, Nami covered her mouth, her pupils shrinking in disbelief.
"You're Fire Fist Ace?!"
"Pfft—!!"
Hearing this, the Nyaban Brothers spat out their salty soda in unison, their eyes nearly popping out of their sockets as they screamed in shock.
"It's the Ace from Fire Fist Ace!!"
A bounty of 550,000,000 Berries! A great pirate whose name was constantly active in the newspapers!
"Ah, let me introduce myself again. My name is Ace, the Second Division Commander of the Whitebeard Pirates."
Ace bowed slightly to introduce himself, then continued, "Speaking of Pops, I saw your fight with Drake on the resort island a few days ago. You're pretty good, man."
Ace turned back to Allen, patted him on the shoulder, and smiled. "How about it? Want to join our pirate crew and serve Pops together?"
"No."
Allen swatted his hand away, rejecting him ruthlessly.
*Crazy. Calling a stranger 'Pops' was just too off-putting.*
"Is that so? I figured I'd get rejected, hahaha!"
Ace threw his head back and laughed aloud, not minding it at all. After all, he was used to it.
Doma, McGuy, Little Oars Jr., and the others were all like this, but they eventually became pirate crews under Whitebeard's banner anyway.
He had expanded the Whitebeard Pirates' forces quite a bit, beating them into submission one by one with his fists.
Ace grinned and looked at him, saying, "Let's have a fight when the time comes, Allen. If you lose, you join the Whitebeard Pirates. How about it? Of course, that's assuming you can make it to the New World."
Allen stared into his eyes, stayed silent for a moment, and said calmly, "Let's talk about that after we enter the New World."
*Anyway, he wasn't the one who wouldn't be able to return to the New World. Poor kid, he still didn't know he already had half a foot in the grave.*
Allen didn't take the matter to heart.
He and Ace were just passing acquaintances; he wasn't going to do anything unnecessary over it.
"Then it's a deal. I should get going. Thanks for the hospitality."
Ace stood up, bowed slightly, and smiled as he rose.
"I'm really glad I got to talk to you guys about Luffy. When you make it to the New World, the drinks are on me. See ya."
"Uh... ah... goodbye."
Nami nodded politely. Only after Ace turned and left did she look at his retreating back and say, "Luffy's brother is so weird."
Allen asked, "Why?"
"How should I put it... he just gives off this vibe of being both reckless and polite at the same time," Nami said with a strange expression.
Hearing this, Allen shrugged and said, "He probably learned it from someone but didn't quite master it."
"Let's go. Sham, go pay the bill."
"Eh? Me?"
"Nonsense, did you expect me to go?"
"Well... alright..."
Sham agreed reluctantly, his face falling.
Just as he got up and walked to the front desk, he bumped into Gin, who was walking through the door with about a dozen men.
"Boss! Gin and the others are here," Sham turned his head and called out toward the inside.
Looking back at Gin's group, Sham noticed that several crew members were injured, and they were dragging two people who had been beaten bloody.
Meanwhile, Gin had a gloomy expression on his face, as if something had just happened to piss him off.
Noticing this scene, Allen furrowed his brow slightly.
"What's going on? Did you guys get into a fight with someone?"
"Captain, there's a problem with our goods."
Arriving at the dining table, Gin lowered his head guiltily and said, "We were attacked during the transaction. It was the rebel army here."
"It was a batch of newly purchased weapons and the ammunition we needed to restock the ship. I led the men to get the weapons back, but the ammunition had already been hauled away."
"They vanished without a trace as soon as they entered the desert. I couldn't catch up to them, but I did bring back two of their captains."
Saying this, Gin waved his hand, signaling the crew members to drag the two half-dead rebels forward.
"..."
Looking at the two miserable figures, Allen was somewhat speechless.
*Could they even speak after being beaten to this state?*
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