"Open fire! Fire the cannons, now!"
"Sink that ship, or we're all dead! Not a single one of us will survive!"
At the port, Nezumi, who had barely managed to recover his senses, screamed incessantly at the stunned Marines.
However, his shouts fell on deaf ears.
Sean's recent actions were simply too far beyond the comprehension of these Marines, who spent their days bullying civilians.
Seeing that no one was moving, Nezumi abandoned all pretense and rushed to one of the cannons. But then, it suddenly hit him...
He had absolutely no idea how to operate the thing.
After all, his rank as a Captain had not been earned through military merit, nor had it been won through strength. In fact, it was likely that Nezumi was the weakest person in the 16th Branch. He was more pathetic than the lowest-ranking Marine under his command.
"Right... right, load the powder first!"
Trying to recall the scenes he had witnessed in passing, Nezumi began to fumble with the equipment. However, he forgot the most crucial first step...
Cleaning the barrel.
A moment later—
BOOM!!
The cannon backfired and exploded instantly, sending Nezumi flying through the air.
This entire spectacle was witnessed by Sean and Ain. Of course, Sengoku saw it too. Since they were now less than two hundred meters away, the scene was crystal clear to anyone with standard eyesight in the world of pirates.
"Ain, do you think Nezumi just committed suicide to avoid facing the consequences?" Sean asked casually.
"Possibly," Ain replied. "After all, even a fresh recruit wouldn't make a mistake like that."
"True. It's impossible for someone who climbed to the rank of Captain to be that incompetent, so it's most likely a suicide driven by guilt."
"Mm, that must be the truth!"
Their deadpan conversation caused Sengoku's face, on the other end of the Den Den Mushi, to grow darker and darker.
Wasn't this blatant sarcasm? They were essentially asking how a man with no strength—someone worse than an average Marine—could possibly have climbed to the rank of Captain, even if it was just a branch in one of the four seas.
Did this mean there was a systemic problem within the Marine? Even for a branch in the four seas, appointing a Branch Chief required Sengoku's signed order.
It was practically like they were pointing their fingers at Sengoku's nose and asking if the old man had been taking bribes.
How could his face not be black?
Soon, the ship docked, and Sean and Ain stepped onto the pier. Aside from a few Marines lying on the ground in unknown states of health and the severely injured Nezumi, the remaining Marines were trembling with fear. None of them dared to resist.
"The Bloody Butcher?"
"The Blue-Haired Witch?"
"Are these the nicknames you wanted to slap on us when you requested our bounties, Captain Nezumi?" Sean asked mockingly as he approached the man.
"No! It wasn't me! It wasn't me!" Nezumi shrieked. "Those nicknames were given to you by Headquarters! It really wasn't me!"
"Then, the one who requested the bounties from Marine Headquarters... that was you, right?"
"No! My adjutant did it! I had no idea!"
"Strange. My moles in the Marine told me that you personally contacted them and made the request."
"This..."
Nezumi was momentarily stunned.
Moles? Sean had moles inside the Marine?
Of course he did! Who else had told Sean that Nezumi had applied for the bounties and the nicknames if not Sengoku?
Technically, it was the truth, but the realization made Nezumi shudder violently. These two had penetrated Marine Headquarters like a sieve—who on earth were these people?
Since begging for mercy wasn't working, he decided to change tactics.
"Sean, you can't kill me! You'll offend some very powerful people!"
"Oh? Powerful people? High-ranking Marine officers?"
"No, no! Even the Fleet Admiral is just a dog! I serve the powerful figures within the World Government!"
"And? You think that means I'll just let you go?"
"Why don't we both take a step back? You let me live, and I'll help you get your bounties revoked. You wouldn't want to spend every day being hunted by the experts of the Marine and the World Government, would you?"
"Sounds like a fair deal. What do you think, old man Sengoku?"
What? Old man Sengoku?
Only then did Nezumi notice that Ain was holding a Den Den Mushi—specifically, a dual-purpose visual model. The face currently being mimicked by the snail was one Nezumi knew all too well.
'Holy crap, isn't that Fleet Admiral Sengoku?!'
Nezumi jolted. Everything he had just said had been heard by Sengoku.
"Nezumi, you've outdone yourself!"
The next moment, Sengoku's voice erupted from the Den Den Mushi, gritting his teeth. It was clear he was beyond furious.
"Sean, Smoker will arrive at your location in three hours. Hand the man over to him, and then you can proceed to rendezvous with Zephyr."
"Old man, I can hand him over to Senior Smoker alive, but you have to promise me one thing."
"What is it?"
"I don't want to see this guy walk free in a few days. I think you understand what I mean."
"Rest assured, he won't escape. I give you my word on that."
"Then that'll do. By the way... I have three hours, right?"
"Sean, what are you planning?"
"Nothing much. I just want to have a friendly chat with Captain Nezumi about the things that happened three and a half years ago."
With that, Sean had Ain hang up the call.
"Sean, interrogation is fine, but please don't kill him. Otherwise, it'll be hard to explain to the Fleet Admiral," Ain said worriedly.
She feared that in his haste to finish the interrogation within three hours, Sean would resort to brutal torture. Nezumi was already heavily injured; one slip-up during torture and he would likely drop dead.
Fleet Admiral Sengoku was waiting for him to be brought back so he could extract information about the web of interests and the people involved. Even if the figures in the World Government were untouchable for now, he could at least purge the Marine's internal corruption.
This was precisely why Sean had agreed not to kill Nezumi.
"Don't worry. I have no interest in those crude methods. Ain, have you ever heard of non-physical torture?"
Recalling a television series from his previous life, Sean produced a pair of chopsticks from somewhere and walked toward Nezumi with a wicked grin.
Ain looked on in confusion. What could a pair of chopsticks possibly do?
But soon, Ain's eyes widened.
Sean had inserted the chopsticks directly into Nezumi's nostrils and began to wiggle them...
Almost immediately, Nezumi began making a series of bizarre noises, his facial expressions shifting rapidly.
In just two minutes, unable to bear it any longer, Nezumi entered a mode of complete honesty, singing like a canary and revealing every secret he possessed.
Even those within the World Government and Marine Headquarters who had facilitated the schemes spilled everything, leaving Ain with over ten pages of notes in her small notebook.
As expected, Nezumi's backing within the World Government was indeed Spandine. Furthermore, the incident involving the Campbell Family from over three years ago...
...was also tied to Spandine.
In the subsequent distribution of the spoils, Spandine had taken the lion's share of the Campbell family's assets, leaving the remainder to be carved up by other accomplices and several nobles from the Zumeida Kingdom.
That was bad enough, but what shocked the two of them most was that within this entire network of corruption, there were more than thirty individuals from Marine Headquarters involved. The ranks started from Lieutenant Commander at the lowest, and the highest reached as far as Vice Admiral—and there were three of them!
This was absurd.
After all, the rank of Vice Admiral represented the elite power of the Marines.
To think that even those at such a level had been corrupted!!
"Ain, keep this list safe. I want to see just how large the discrepancy is between the final official report from Headquarters and the names on this list!"
"Understood!"