"Not bad, you've improved. You can already understand the meaning behind words. You're still growing."
"No, foster father, I really don't want to hear this kind of praise... or rather, it's not even praise."
"What it is doesn't matter, Yamato. I'm not too worried about your strength, after all, not many can threaten you anymore.
But your personality is too easily swayed, you might even end up counting money for someone who sold you out at some point.
You're not exactly the slow type, weren't you pretty crafty against Kaidou? It would be great if that could become the norm."
Listening to Arceus's words, Yamato recalled that scene and then shook her head.
"Forget it, foster father. Those mind games with the old man were forced, and I think I'm pretty sharp. It's not that easy to fool me."
"Better hope that's true..."
"But foster father, I do know that ordinary people don't trust pirates, but these New World people... they should have some understanding of Whitebeard's character, right?"
"People never really long for the truth. Faced with evidence that doesn't suit them, they'll walk away. If a fallacy tempts them, they're more willing to worship it.
A pirate is, after all, a pirate. Making everyone believe is impossible."
"But the people of Wano Kuni really believe in us, even those stubborn samurai have changed now."
"What did you expect? These years of effort weren't in vain, but if you want everyone across the whole sea to think like this, that's quite a long journey."
After explaining a few words, Arceus left Yamato alone to ponder.
The "complex" logic resurfaced in Yamato's mind, and she adhered to her usual style. Since it was too troublesome, she simply chose not to think about it for now and decided to discuss it slowly with others when she had time.
Looking around, she suddenly noticed someone was missing on the ship.
"Where did Uncle Queen disappear to again? Was he dragged off for training by father?"
"Ghost Princess-sama, if you're looking for Lord Queen, he's on the ship behind us."
The crew member pointed to the pirate ship behind them. Strictly speaking, it wasn't a Hundred Beasts ship, but belonged to Hawkins's pirate ship.
He hadn't fully joined the Hundred Beasts yet, but Queen had brought him along, intending to throw him onto one of their islands. Meanwhile, it was also the time when Queen utilized Hawkins for divination.
"Hawkins, Big Brother Kaidou has left, so now tell me, has the divination result changed?"
"It hasn't. The chance of your bloody disaster remains 100%, although the timing has been greatly delayed."
Hawkins had never seen such precise fate. No matter how convoluted the process was, it couldn't change the final result of the divination. In a sense, that was a miracle in itself.
"I'm starting to doubt your ability now..."
"But you've already witnessed it, aside from the matters related to that one on the ship, my divination's success rate is quite high."
Mentioning the divination, Hawkins wouldn't back down, breaking Queen's false optimism and forcing him to face reality once again.
[After Big Brother Kaidou left... this thing was delayed, so the root cause should still be with Big Brother Kaidou...
But the one who should suffer first should be Miss Yamato.]
Queen kept stroking his beard, pondering what could cause his misfortune. At that moment, a Dragonite landed on Origin, carrying today's newspaper.
...
"Thanks, you've worked hard today too."
Yamato greeted the Dragonite familiarly, although it wasn't originally the Dragonite's task, but when it appeared with the newspaper, it showed they had arrived in their own territory.
"Let me see the recent news... The new member of the Seven Warlords of the Sea, Star Clown - Buggy? I remember he's really weak, and he can become a Seven Warlord?"
The World Government's actions were gradually unfolding, like beginning to replenish members of the Seven Warlords of the Sea.
Buggy's abilities weren't much, but he became the idol of the prisoners who escaped from Impel Down, gathering a group of dangerous individuals around him. Hence, the World Government wanted to harness that power and decided to recruit Buggy.
To gain the legal right to treasure hunt, Buggy didn't refuse the World Government's invitation, thus becoming a member of the Seven Warlords.
And the World Government also put some effort for Buggy, like pinning a series of titles on him, such as a former crew member of the Pirate King and the brother of Red Hair Shanks.
The purpose was merely to praise Buggy to make those emerging pirates a bit cautious, letting them know they had overwhelmingly powerful enemies on their path.
"Sister Olga should be happy to see this, since her records will become even more impressive."
With Buggy's updated strength, Olga's records were also refreshed, now transforming into a super monster that even the Seven Warlords and the Sea Emperors couldn't defeat.
"Doesn't seem like there's anything interesting."
Yamato then flipped through the pages. News about the Summit War had dwindled considerably. Over the past few days, Morgans had covered whatever could and couldn't be reported, so there were hardly any headlines left.
What could appear in the newspaper were things like a certain Navy's sacrifice, certain prisons being overcrowded, certain islands being attacked by pirates, and so on.
But as the pages continued to turn, Yamato found an even more outrageous article.
"A... pirate interview?! Morgans's guts are growing bigger and bigger...."
[Monkey D. Luffy, interview with the pirate Super Rookie.]
A few large words occupied the newspaper's sub-page, and the content below was even more absurd.
[One of the participants in the Summit War reveals detailed war intricacies....]
[The opinion of the bloodline of sin about his father....]
These seemed like incoherent statements, but in reality, this was the plan Heckler arranged for Luffy.
Luffy wanted to inform his crew to delay the gathering time, but he didn't have the ability to notify everyone, so Heckler came up with an idea.
The Straw Hat crew was scattered to different places by Kuma's paw, and to let them see the contact, there needed to be a world-class intelligence network, Morgans's newspaper being an example.
This was one of the few things sold to every corner of the world. As long as something big was made to appear in the newspaper, the goal could be achieved.
And for how to attract attention, Heckler thought of a more direct method.
He didn't make Luffy do anything outrageous; instead, he directly contacted a reporter from the World Economic News Agency.
When Morgans heard Luffy's self-introduction and his details about the Summit War, he immediately agreed to do the exclusive interview, indirectly allowing Luffy to achieve his aim of delivering the message.