The darkness of the slave ship's hold was different from the merchant ship. It was heavy. It smelled of rust, unwashed bodies, and despair.
Argentus hit the floor hard, tossed like a sack of grain. The hatch slammed shut, plunging them into pitch blackness.
Chains rattled.
"Another one..." a weak voice whispered from the corner.
Argentus lay on the cold iron floor. His lip was split. His head throbbed. But he didn't cry. He curled his knees to his chest, eyes adjusting to the gloom.
He saw them. Dozens of people—men, women, children—shackled to the walls. Their eyes were dead. They'd already accepted their fate as property.
Argentus sat up. He reached up and touched the iron collar clamped around his neck. It was cold. Heavy.
Property.
The word burned him more than the slap.
He'd gone out to be the Richest. To be the Strongest.
And here he sat in filth, priced and packaged like a piece of meat. The irony tasted like ash.
He gripped the collar's chains. His knuckles turned white. He didn't pull—he knew he wasn't strong enough to break iron yet. Instead, he sat perfectly still, staring at the hatch with eyes that glowed like molten silver in the dark.
He didn't panic. Didn't weep. He started counting the seconds.
Day fourteen. Maybe fifteen.
Argentus had stopped counting hours. He was counting the breaths of the old man chained next to him. They were shallow, rattling sounds—the sound of a candle flickering out.
The ship had been rocking violently minutes ago—a storm brewing. But then, in a heartbeat, the rocking stopped.
Not because the waves had calmed. As if the ocean itself had been commanded to heel.
The wind, which had been howling through hull cracks, vanished. The shouting of slavers on deck—curses, stomping boots, whip cracks—was silenced. Not gradually. Instantly.
Thud. Thud. Thud.
Heavy bodies hitting the deck above echoed through wood. Then, silence. Absolute, suffocating silence.
The slaves in the dark held their breath. Was the ship sinking? Were they dead?
CREAAAK.
The heavy iron hatch, locked from outside, didn't just unlock. The metal groaned in protest. The bolts shrieked.
BOOM.
The hatch wasn't opened—it was blasted off its hinges. The heavy iron door flew upward, spinning into the night sky as if gravity had reversed.
A shaft of pale moonlight cut through the darkness, illuminating dust motes dancing in stagnant air.
And then, he descended.
He didn't use the ladder. He floated down, boots touching floorboards without sound.
He was tall. A dark green cloak, heavy and windswept, draped over broad shoulders. Beneath the hood, wild, spiky black hair framed a face carved from granite. On the left side, a geometric red tattoo marked him as something dangerous. Something other.
He didn't look like a pirate or a Marine.
The other slaves cowered, rattling their chains, pressing backs against damp wood.
Argentus didn't cower. He looked up, silver eyes locking onto the stranger's dark ones.
The man in the green cloak looked around the room, expression unreadable. He saw the filth. The misery. The collar around Argentus's neck.
"The world..." the man spoke, his voice deep and resonant, vibrating in Argentus's chest. "...is a cruel place for those who cannot breathe."
He raised a hand.
He didn't touch the cages. Didn't touch the chains. He simply clenched his fist.
CRACK.
A gust of wind—sharp, precise, impossible—sliced through the hold. It wasn't a breeze. It was a blade of air.
The iron collar around Argentus's neck snapped clean in half. It clattered to the floor.
Around the room, shackles shattered. Cages groaned and bent open. The slaves gasped, weeping, realizing they were free.
The man turned to leave, his job done.
"Wait!"
The voice was small, raspy, but fierce.
Argentus rubbed his raw neck. He stumbled toward the man in the green cloak.
"How can I become the strongest in the world?"
The question hung in the recycled air of the slave hold, desperate and raw.
The man stopped. His boot hovered inches above the floorboards.
A child's question should have been beneath him.
But he didn't keep walking.
He turned slowly, the green cloak swirling around him like a restless thunderhead. He looked down at the boy. Saw the blood on Argentus's lip. The malnutrition in his ribs. But mostly, he saw the eyes.
They weren't the eyes of a victim seeking comfort. They were the eyes of a wolf that had tasted its own blood and decided it wanted to taste the world instead.
The man's expression remained stony, but the air around them grew heavier, charged with unseen pressure.
"Strength..." His voice was low, a rumble of distant tectonic plates. "What do you think is strength?"
He took a step closer, towering over the seven-year-old.
"The weak seek a path. The weak ask how."
He leaned down, his face obscured by the hood, only the red geometric tattoo visible in the gloom.
"The strong do not ask. They take."
Argentus didn't flinch.
"You want to stand above everyone?" The man gestured vaguely to the ceiling, to the ocean, to the Emperors and Admirals waiting in the New World. "Then you must learn that this world owes you nothing. Not justice. Not mercy. Not even a fair fight."
He straightened up, turning his back on the boy once more. Wind began to pick up, swirling violently around his boots, lifting him toward the opening in the deck.
Argentus was about to speak but all the exhaustion finally caught up to him.
He suddenly blanked out and fell forward, but before he could touch the ground, sudden wind picked him up.
When Argentus opened his eyes. He wasn't on the cold iron floor. He was in a hammock, simple but clean. The room swayed gently—a rhythmic, controlled motion that felt nothing like the chaotic lurching of the slave ship.
He sat up, body aching but rested. His silver hair fell over his eyes. He pushed it back, hand brushing his neck. The skin was raw, but someone had applied a cooling salve to the burns.
He swung his legs out and stood. No guards. No locks.
He walked up the stairs, pushing open the heavy wooden door to the deck.
The world outside was grey. Thick, swirling fog surrounded the massive ship, hiding the ocean, hiding the horizon. The ship moved through the mist like a phantom. On deck, dozens of people in cloaks moved with terrifying efficiency. No shouting, no singing, no drunken brawls. Just silent, focused work.
Argentus spotted him immediately.
The man stood at the prow, back turned to the crew, facing the endless grey void ahead. His green cloak snapped in the wind.
Argentus walked up to him. He felt small next to the sheer presence of the man, but he didn't stop until he stood beside him.
"Are you a pirate?" Argentus asked, voice steady despite his size.
The man didn't look down. He kept his eyes on the unseen path forward.
"Monkey D. Dragon," the man replied, voice low and gravelly.
Argentus stared at him. He waited for more. He racked his brain, thinking of the diary he'd stolen, the names of the Emperors, the Warlords, the Admirals.
Dragon?
The name meant nothing to him. It wasn't in the diary. Wasn't in the whispers of drunken sailors in Oakhaven.
Argentus remained silent, brows furrowing in confusion.
Seeing no response, Dragon finally turned his head slightly. A faint, almost imperceptible smirk tugged at the corner of his mouth.
"We are called the Revolutionary Army."
Dragon turned back to the sea, expression hardening again.
"We do not seek treasure. We do not seek the title of King. We exist to burn the rot out of the world's foundation."
He glanced down at Argentus.
"The Pirates you read about plunder the seas. The Marines you respect protect the evil dragons. We..." Dragon raised a gloved hand, and the fog ahead seemed to part at his command, revealing a distant island. "...we break the locks the world is bound in."
The keel of the ship ground against the rocky shore of the Goa Kingdom. It was a secluded cove, hidden from the prying eyes of nobility in High Town and the filth of Gray Terminal.
The gangplank lowered. The cloaked figures of the Revolutionary Army dissolved into the trees like shadows, moving with silent, terrifying purpose.
Soon, only two remained on the beach.
Dragon stood with arms crossed, watching waves lap against his boots. He didn't look at the boy. He simply threw the question out into the wind, testing the weight of the soul standing beside him.
"What do you want, boy?"
Argentus blinked, confused by the suddenness. "Huh?"
Dragon turned his head, dark eyes boring into Argentus.
"Everyone who ventures out onto this sea is chasing something," Dragon said, voice devoid of judgment, stating cold fact. "Pirates chase fame. Marines chase order. Kings chase power. Merchants chase wealth."
He paused, the wind tugging at his cloak.
"You have seen the bottom of this world. You have tasted the mud. Now that the chains are off... what is it that you desire?"
Argentus opened his mouth to answer, but the words died in his throat.
What did he want?
He closed his eyes.
He saw his mother, coughing blood into her hand, smiling as she died for a few coins. He saw the doctor leaving without even trying because he was poor. He saw the foreman kicking him into the dirt. He saw the slave collar snapping around his neck.
Wealth? Wealth runs out. Fame? Fame is just noise. Power? Power can be overthrown.
He realized that as long as someone else owned the island, the ship, or the law, he would always be at risk. Always be a tenant in someone else's hell.
Unless...
Unless he owned it all.
The realization hit him like lightning. It wasn't greed. It was a desperate, clawing need for absolute security—and the only answer to the promise he made to his mother. If he owned everything, no one could ever look down on him again.
Argentus opened his eyes. The silver in his irises seemed to catch the sunlight, burning with terrifying, cold intensity. He didn't look at his feet. Didn't look at the ocean. He looked straight up into the eyes of the World's Most Dangerous Criminal.
He didn't shout. Didn't stutter. He said it with the calm certainty of a judge passing sentence.
"The world."
The wind seemed to stop. The seagulls fell silent. A faint, imperceptible aura started to grow in his body at terrifying speed, just waiting to erupt.
Dragon stared at the seven-year-old. He'd expected "Revenge." He'd expected "To be a Pirate." He'd even expected "To join you."
For the first time since they met, Dragon turned his body fully toward the boy. A slow, dangerous grin spread across his face.
(END OF CHAPTER)
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