At dawn, the first ray of sunlight pierced the thin sea fog.
In G–17's central square, several hundred rank-and-file soldiers had gathered.
Last night's terrifying thunderbolt that tore open the sky—and the deafening blast that followed—had kept them awake, but these bottom-tier troops had no idea what actually happened. They only knew that at first light everyone had been ordered here, immediately.
A stifling pressure hung in the air. The soldiers stood in formation, faces numb and confused.
In this fortress, they'd long since gotten used to being treated like cheap security guards—used to watching their superiors eat meat, used to bowing and scraping before pirates. Even if the sky fell, it never seemed to have anything to do with people like them.
Tap. Tap. Tap.
Crisp footsteps rang out.
Rain, wearing a brand-new colonel's coat, walked onto the platform with easy composure.
Gion strode beside him, unmistakably in a "backing him up" posture.
Behind them—
"Hey! I'm telling you, Rain—"
Smoker had two cigars in his mouth and an extremely sour expression. His hands were in his pockets, but thick white smoke extended behind him like several giant arms, hauling a few large crates with obvious effort.
"I'm a Marine lieutenant colonel, not your damn porter!"
"Quit whining, Smoker," Rain said without turning back, tone light. "These boxes contain 'weapons' that can shake people's hearts. I don't trust anyone else with them."
"Tch."
Smoker snorted and used his smoke to slam the crates down onto the platform.
Thud—thud—thud.
The heavy impacts startled the soldiers below. Necks craned. What was that—new weapons? Execution tools?
Rain stepped to the edge of the platform and looked down at the hundreds of numb faces.
He didn't give a speech. He simply walked forward.
BAM!
He lifted his foot and kicked the top crate over.
The lid burst open, and its contents spilled out.
Whoooosh—!!!
Bundles upon bundles of crisp new banknotes poured off the platform like a green waterfall, piling into a mound that reeked of fresh ink—the kind of smell that drives people mad.
The square's dead air shattered.
The soldiers' eyes nearly bulged out of their skulls. Breaths turned harsh and heavy. Throats worked with animal gulps.
"M-money—! That's money!!"
"So much! I've never seen this many beri in my life!!"
Rain watched their eyes ignite with desire, expression cold.
He didn't care about the cash. For him, the fortune he'd stripped from Nelson was just numbers.
But he knew these men—old hands who'd been domesticated by rot for years—didn't respond to ideals. Talk about justice, talk about dreams… none of it meant anything here. If he wanted to take command of this base by force as fast as possible—if he wanted them to obey him even out of pure greed—there was one method that worked every time:
Money.
Dump so much of it on them they stopped believing reality.
Dump so much the dead Nelson became a joke.
Dump so much that in their eyes, only Rain mattered.
"Do you all see this?"
Rain's voice rang across the square, icy and clear.
"This is the money Nelson that fat bastard skimmed from the Golden Route! The blood-and-sweat he pried out from between your teeth!"
He bent down, grabbed two thick bundles, and without even looking, flung them into the crowd.
"Last night your officers wagged their tails at pirates like dogs. They sold out the dignity of the Marines for what? For this trash paper!"
The bricks of cash hit near the front line with dull thuds.
No one dared bend to pick them up—but every body trembled: greed, yes… and fury at years of being bled dry.
Rain dusted his hands off. His voice suddenly rose, arrogant and absolute.
"I didn't come here to fight you for scraps!"
"Pass down my order!"
He pointed at the mountain of money and shouted:
"Starting now, distribute all of it! Pay every soldier the back wages you've been cheated out of for the last three years! For those killed in action, pay their compensation at three times HQ standard! The rest—consider it my greeting gift. Split it equally among everyone!"
"And I'm setting a new rule right here, right now!"
His voice crushed the sea wind, seductive with raw power:
"From today on in G–17, don't expect to get rich on a fixed salary."
"I want you out at sea! Any pirate you capture—besides receiving the full bounty as per HQ regulations—this base will pay you an additional equal amount as hardship bonus!"
He snatched a bundle and slammed it against the rail. Bills burst upward and fluttered like green confetti.
"Want money? Then bring me pirates! The more you catch, the more you take! No cap!!"
BOOM—!!!
The square exploded.
They couldn't believe what they were hearing.
Paying back wages? A greeting bonus? Double bounties for killing pirates?!
This wasn't "being a soldier." This was legalized robbery.
"R-really… all for us? Extra bounty for pirates?!"
"LONG LIVE—!!!"
Someone screamed first, and then the entire square roared like a tidal wave.
Soldiers flung their arms up, faces flushed, eyes blazing. In this world, you had to follow someone anyway—so why not follow the boss who pays? At that point, selling your life felt worth it.
Gion stood to the side watching, eyes complicated. It felt… bandit-like. But she couldn't deny it: in a place this rotten, it worked better than any political education speech ever would.
But Rain wasn't finished.
When the cheers dipped, he raised a hand and forced the noise down.
Then he turned and pointed at the white-walled, gold-topped palace of a base behind him, disgust unmistakable.
"I gave you the money. Your lives are mine now."
He spoke coldly.
"Now I'm giving you your first task."
"I'm sick of looking at this cake-frosting building. It's soft. It reeks of perfume. It doesn't match my troops."
He issued a bizarre order:
"I want metal. Lots of metal."
"Go drag out every rusty, moldy old rifle, every scrapped cannon, every useless hunk of junk! Tear down the iron fences and decorative bronze statues around this 'palace'—rip them all out!"
"If it's metal, pile it in the open ground in front of the fortress!"
Over the next three days, G–17 entered a frenzy of demolition.
The soldiers had been paid. Their energy was insane. A "metal garbage mountain"—scrapped firearms, busted cannons, iron railings, bronze statues—rose higher and higher in the square until it nearly matched the fortress itself.
"What the hell is he planning?"
Smoker chewed on his cigar, staring at the mountain, brow knitted.
"Is he switching careers to scrap collecting?"
Gion didn't answer. She only watched Rain on the platform. Her instincts told her the real spectacle hadn't arrived yet.
The soldiers were full of drive, but still baffled. No one understood what their young base commander was actually doing.
At dawn, with the sea wind cool and sharp—
Rain stood atop the highest watchtower with Gion, Smoker, and a pale, bewildered Colonel Moore behind him.
He didn't look at the scrap mountain. He turned and faced the still-shiny white fortress.
"What do you think of this base?" Rain asked suddenly.
"It's… very… beautiful?" Moore offered cautiously. "After all, it cost a fortune—"
He almost said Nelson's name and stopped himself.
"Beautiful my ass."
Rain cut him off.
He stepped forward and slapped the wall. With a little pressure, a layer of white paint flaked off, revealing loose, crumbly brickwork beneath.
"Too much vanity. Not enough substance."
He shook his head, disgusted.
"A cake-frosting building like this can't guard the Golden Route."
"So… you mean we tear it down and rebuild?" Moore asked carefully. "But that would take—"
"No need."
Rain let go of the wall, walked to the edge of the tower, and looked out over the scrap mountain and the base below.
He took a breath and slowly spread his arms, as if embracing the sky.
"If it isn't hard enough…"
"…then we harden it."
The moment he finished—
RUMBLE—!
The clear sky dimmed.
Everyone looked up in horror as a thick, suffocating black storm cloud gathered over the base—so low it felt like it could crush the fortress.
ZZZZZT—!!!
A terrifying electric howl erupted from Rain's body.
He stopped hiding his power.
He rose into the air, lightning coiling around him like dragons. His eyes turned pure white, as if a god had taken residence behind them.
"UP."
Rain spread his fingers and clenched them toward the harbor.
GROOOOAN—!!!
The earth seemed to scream.
In the soldiers' stunned gaze, the scrap mountain—under the pull of a monstrous magnetic field—began to warp and shriek… and then tore itself free of the ground.
Countless steel fragments floated into the sky, blotting out the sun like a black metal ceiling.
"Lightning Metallurgy—Grand Refinement."
Rain brought his palms together.
CRACK—BOOM!!!
The storm exploded.
Thousands of lightning bolts struck at once, hammering the floating steel.
Instant heat liquefied metal into rivers of glowing red iron.
And under Rain's electromagnetic control, that molten flood surged down onto the white fortress, crawling, filling, fusing—swallowing weak brick, consuming useless decoration, armoring the entire structure like a living machine.
Steam erupted.
The whole base vanished behind white fog.
When the lightning faded and the wind tore the steam away—
The "white palace" was gone.
In its place stood a black, steel fortress—cold, brutal, heavy with war.
Armor plates layered the walls. Spiked metal protrusions jutted like fangs. Cannon mouths gleamed with a predatory sheen.
No one spoke.
Some soldiers dropped to their knees without realizing it.
This wasn't human work.
This was a miracle—or a nightmare.
Rain descended to the top of the newly forged battlements, the last arcs of lightning fading around his shoulders.
He rested a hand on the still-warm steel, satisfied.
Then he turned to face the sea of men below and spoke calmly—his voice carrying like thunder:
"Welcome…"
"…to my G–17."