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Chapter 55: Dragon Finally Appears
Blake yawned.
He slowly sat up from his lounge chair, stretched, and his bones let out a satisfying series of pop-pop sounds.
"Hoo..."
"These kids... they really don't give you a moment's peace."
He rubbed his sleepy eyes and looked up toward Goa Kingdom's High Town.
Even from this distance, the oppressive atmosphere was palpable.
The scent of kerosene, faint but present, drifted on the air.
And with it, the despair and anger of countless people from the lowest rungs of society, simmering to a boiling point.
"Well, then again."
A playful smile touched Blake's lips.
"If they were peaceful, it'd be boring."
Just then.
He slowly looked up, his gaze locking precisely on a streak of color in the night sky.
A cyan stream of light tore through the ink-black night, rushing toward the port with no turning back.
It was incredibly fast, carrying a desperate resolve to break free from all worldly shackles.
"Tsk. That kid. He really just charged in, head-first."
Blake propped his chin on his hand, observing with great interest.
He knew, of course, who that stream of light was.
Sabo.
The boy who was supposed to be blasted into the sea by a Celestial Dragon's cannon during this fire, to be picked up by a certain man, and to lose his memory.
"The script... is completely messed up."
Blake muttered to himself, the amusement in his eyes deepening.
He could clearly feel it.
Ever since he had granted the power of wind to Sabo, the threads of "fate" surrounding the boy had become blurred.
The once-clear, heavy path of destiny leading to the Chief of Staff of the Revolutionary Army was now fractured with countless diverging cracks.
And now, this little guy was using the wings he himself had provided to fly head-on into the first, and most critical, turning point of that destiny.
"How interesting."
Blake settled comfortably back into his lounge chair and closed his eyes.
He didn't need to use his eyes to see.
Ever since clearing the "Song of Wind and Poem of the Dragon" dungeon and obtaining the "Authority of the Wind God," the world's "wind" had become his eyes and ears.
The wind... was whispering to him.
He "heard" it.
Ace's and Luffy's flames, one large, one small, but both equally scorching, had already stormed into the Outlook mansion.
No doubt their "family business" there would be handled in a spectacular fashion.
He could also "hear" it.
Throughout the Gray Terminal, the countless currents of terror, anger, and despair were converging into a hurricane, suppressed to its limit, just about to explode.
And the most interesting part...
Blake's consciousness followed that cyan stream of light, all the way to the waters near Goa Kingdom.
He "saw" an incredibly luxurious, massive ship. Its bow was carved with the Celestial Dragon symbol, the "Hoof of the Soaring Dragon." It was slowly approaching the port.
Blake could even "hear" some fat-headed fool on the ship complaining in his stupid, arrogant voice about how filthy the East Blue's air was.
However...
Blake's attention wasn't on the Celestial Dragon at all.
His senses passed over the massive ship, reaching further, into the deeper darkness of the night sea.
There... was a third wind.
It was different from the oppression and despair of Goa Kingdom.
It was also different from Sabo's burning desperation.
This wind... was deep, cold, and frighteningly still.
It didn't roar, and it didn't whimper.
It was like a breath from the abyss: heavy, steady, and carrying a will that could freeze all things.
"Oh?"
For the first time, a genuine look of surprise lifted Blake's brow.
His body, lazing in the chair, sat up slightly.
He "saw" a ship.
About twenty nautical miles from the Celestial Dragon's massive vessel.
A ship, jet-black, flying no flag, with an ancient and menacing design. It cut through the waves like a ghost, silent, but racing toward the same destination: the port of Goa Kingdom.
Compared to the Celestial Dragon's stupidly luxurious ship, this black ship was plain, even simple.
But the cold, murderous aura it emitted was a thousand times stronger.
It was as if it weren't sailing on the sea, but traversing the River Styx.
And on the bow of that ship.
A man stood quietly.
He wore a dark green, hooded cloak. The sea wind whipped it about, revealing a well-tailored black suit underneath.
The man's figure was not burly, but it was as immovable as a mountain. His mere presence made the air over the sea feel heavy.
He wasn't wearing his hood. A well-defined, naturally imposing face was exposed to the moonlight.
The most striking feature... was the diamond-shaped, dark-red, mysterious tattoo on his left cheek. It was like an ancient totem, adding a strange, solemn majesty.
His gaze was also locked on the distant coastline of Goa Kingdom.
There was no emotion in his eyes.
No pity, no anger. Only a bottomless, frozen darkness.
It was the look of a man who saw the entire world as his enemy, and who had taken the mission of subverting it upon himself.
The revolutionary, Dragon!
The World Government's Most-Wanted Criminal!
Known as the "World's Worst Criminal"!
On the ghost ship of the Revolutionary Army.
The salty sea wind whipped at everyone's clothes.
A transvestite, with a disproportionately large head, exaggerated purple eyeshadow and lipstick, and a giant afro, sashayed over to Dragon's side.
He flicked his wrist, put a finger to his lips, and made his signature "M-hm!" sound.
"Dragon-boy~"
"Up ahead... that's your homeland, ya-know! Hiii-haa!"
The Revolutionary Army commander, "King of Okama," Emporio Ivankov, broke the silence on deck with his unique, androgynous voice.
Dragon didn't turn.
His shockingly sharp gaze remained fixed, piercing the deep night, locked on that familiar, yet alien, coastline.
Goa Kingdom.
The "most beautiful" country in the East Blue.
And the place he was born... and had resolutely fled.
"Correct."
Dragon's lips barely moved.
The two words were forced from deep in his throat. They were low, hoarse, and impossibly heavy.
Ivankov's giant head leaned in. He batted his exaggerated false eyelashes, following Dragon's line of sight.
"Tsk, tsk, tsk. Unbelievable."
"A Celestial Dragon is coming to visit, so they're going to burn an entire trash heap for a 'grand cleaning'. Only those hypocritical nobles could pull something like that."
His voice was filled with undisguised contempt and disgust.
"They're ten thousand times worse than the criminals in Impel Down! Hiii-haa!"
"This... is the 'truth' of this world."
Dragon finally spoke. His tone held no anger, no pity, only a cold statement of fact.
"Under the rule of the World Government, in the shadow of the Celestial Dragons, this 'truth' plays out every day, every second, in some corner of the world."
"And that's why we fight, isn't it?"
Ivankov dropped his flamboyant attitude. He looked at Dragon's profile. That resolute face was like carved stone in the moonlight.
"To completely... overturn... this rotten, twisted, inhuman world!"
Dragon did not respond.
But that silence... was the most resolute answer.
They had come to the East Blue, to the Goa Kingdom, precisely because they had received intelligence that a Celestial Dragon was visiting.
Dragon wanted to see it with his own eyes.
To see how this homeland he had forsaken... would show its ugliest, most depraved side... just to please that trash that called themselves "gods."
He would record this sin.
And then... use it as more fuel... to ignite the fires of rebellion across the world.