"Do whatever you want!"
Roy glanced at him and said, "As long as you don't go so far that it affects our departure, the rest is up to you."
"Wihahahaha! That's amazing, Captain! I like it!"
The next few days were naturally calm and uneventful…
Not a chance!
Putting aside the fact that Roy's pirate ship was being eyed by countless pirates, Burgess alone, relying on his title as Champion, stirred up one brawl after another throughout Loguetown.
And so, amid those chaotic days, the others arrived one after another.
Yasopp and Gin also reached the town within the next few days.
…
"Phew!"
Yasopp blew lightly over the muzzle of his gun, once again taking down a sniper who had come to challenge him.
"Wihahahaha! You really are a sharpshooter, Yasopp!" Burgess clapped and cheered for him.
"Yohoho, as expected of the first person Captain chose to invite aboard. You really are impressive!" Laffitte adjusted his hat and said with a smile.
Beside them, Gin wiped down his iron-ball tonfas without saying anything.
After Yasopp arrived in Loguetown, he received Burgess's "warm welcome."
In Burgess's words, he wanted to test the strength of someone who was going to be his crewmate.
But Yasopp had awakened Observation Haki and had also received the complete version of the Six Powers and rare marksmanship techniques from Roy. Even against Burgess, who came from the New World, Yasopp still did not fall behind.
After Yasopp's strength was acknowledged by everyone, Gin also reached Loguetown.
After that, Burgess directly challenged Gin as well. As a result, under Burgess's astonished gaze, Gin transformed into a dire wolf, and the two sides staged a brutal hand-to-hand fight, every punch landing hard.
After all, it was not a life-or-death battle, so Burgess did not use the power of the Boil-Boil Fruit.
The two fought to their hearts' content, and in the end, Roy had to step in to stop them.
After that, the group waited there for Tiger and the others, who had yet to arrive.
While dealing with the small fry who coveted their pirate ship, they also handled all kinds of challengers and recruiters.
Due to Burgess's rampage over the past two days, the group's reputation had already spread throughout Loguetown.
People coming to challenge or recruit them arrived in an endless stream, but they were all beaten back by the group.
If the challenger was a fighter, Gin and Burgess would teach them a lesson in minutes. If it was a swordsmanship contest, then Daz and Laffitte would make their opponent understand that the blade in their hand might as well be made of paper. As for marksmanship, Yasopp would make sure the challenger remembered it for the rest of their life.
As for how they got along, Gin and Daz's loyalty, Burgess's rule-breaking and thoughtless nature, and Laffitte's rare reliability among them were all the most distinct traits of pirates. This made Yasopp extremely satisfied with his crewmates. To him, this was exactly the pirate crew he had imagined.
"Hm? A ship is coming."
Yasopp was the first to notice it. His hearing was the sharpest.
A rather battered-looking ship was sailing toward them.
"There are quite a few people on board, and compared to the pirates we've met before, they're much stronger!"
Judging from the aura spreading from the ship, it was obvious that they were completely different from the group of East Blue pirates who were just playing around.
"Have they arrived?"
At that moment, Roy returned to the dock with Daz.
He had already split off a clone and sent it across the world with the Devil Fruit Radar to continue searching for Devil Fruits.
"Captain, do you know that ship?" Burgess asked.
"If nothing unexpected happens, those people should also be our companions, right?"
Laffitte twirled his cane and whistled.
"Yes. They are companions I recruited earlier on the Grand Line. They are like-minded friends who escaped from the Holy Land Mary Geoise."
Once Roy said that, the others all showed looks of understanding.
Those who had escaped from the Holy Land Mary Geoise—who else could they be?
However, everyone present was the kind of person who did not care about convention. They did not mind Tiger and the others' former status as slaves at all.
As the ship gradually approached, someone on board had already spotted Roy and the others and began shouting excitedly.
"Roy-aniki!"
Tiger's group shouted loudly enough to shake the sky.
Aside from Roy and the others hearing them, even some reconnaissance Marines and passersby who were observing the situation from far away heard them clearly.
"Yeah, and look at those people. They look so strange, like fish."
"Idiot. I read about them in a book. They're called fish-men."
"Fish-men? Why would fish-men appear in the East Blue?"
"Wait! Fish-men? Roy? I think I know who they are!"
…
On the dock, Roy looked at the weathered expressions on Tiger and the others' faces. It was obvious they had suffered quite a bit on their way from the Grand Line to the East Blue.
While Roy was looking at Tiger and the others, Jinbe, Arlong, and the others behind Tiger were also secretly sizing Roy up.
They were extremely curious about this hero of freedom whom they had only heard about but never seen.
They had thought this hero of freedom would be a grand, larger-than-life figure. At the very least, he should have been a muscular strongman.
They had imagined many possibilities, but they had never expected that the person standing before them, the one Boss Fisher Tiger respected and called aniki, would only be a young man who seemed to be around twenty.
When Roy had first arrived in the Hunter world, he had been sixteen years old. Then he participated in the Hunter Exam once as an examinee and once as an examiner, growing two years older and reaching eighteen.
After that, he came to the One Piece world in the year 1502. Now it was already the end of 1504, so Roy was already twenty years old and would soon be twenty-one.
However, young or not, Jinbe did not show the slightest strange look.
After all, although Roy was young, his achievements were far more spectacular than those of veteran figures who had spent decades at sea.
He had single-handedly attacked the Holy Land Mary Geoise, freed the slaves, and broken through the guard forces and the army. Whether it was his righteous character or his personal strength, both were worthy of Jinbe's respect.
However, most fish-men were impulsive. Sharp-minded ones like Jinbe were ultimately the minority.
When Arlong, Kuroobi, and Chew saw Roy's excessively young face, and considering that they were extreme racial supremacists to begin with, they subconsciously felt contempt in their hearts.
(End of Chapter)
[200 Power Stones = 1 Extra Chapter]
[Check out my Patreon to read 20+ chapters ahead]
[[email protected]/Zukooo]
[Thanks for your support!]