"It was him… it was him who arrested the Pirate King!!!!"
Sabo's words were like an ice spike, stabbing straight into the hearts of Ace and Luffy.
"The Pirate King… was personally captured by him…"Luffy went completely blank. His jaw nearly dropped to the ground, eyes blown wide open.
For the first time, he realized that behind the title Pirate King lay not only glory and dreams.
Especially in this era—The Pirate King did not turn himself in.He was ended by someone else!!!
"Huh—?!!! The Pirate King was caught by that young weird old man?!!"Luffy's voice cracked as he shouted, his face full of childish disbelief.
In his simple worldview, the "weird old man" who treated them to meat and the figure who "arrested the Pirate King" were two images that simply refused to overlap.
But unlike Luffy's straightforward shock—
Ace stood completely frozen.
Sabo's words were like a key, violently unlocking a box in his heart that he had never dared to touch.
Garp's occasional, complicated glances.The vague rumors whispered among the villagers.And the increasingly unmistakable resemblance between his own features and the portrait of that legendary man…
At this moment, Sabo's words connected everything.
"My father… is Gol D. Roger…"
That identity—one he had always resisted, despised, and even felt ashamed of—now surfaced in his mind with brutal clarity.
And the man who had just treated them to food, joked with them, and had even been called a "pretty nice weird old man" by Luffy—
Gern Reginald Sigmar.
He was the one who had personally ended the life—and the era—of the man who gave Ace life, and cursed him at the same time.
The Pirate King.
In an instant, a bone-deep chill surged through Ace's entire body.
Then, Gern's words from inside the bar exploded in his mind once more—
[Strong enough… to beat me.]
Back then, it might have sounded like a joke.
But now—combined with the titles Marine Admiral and the man who captured Roger—
Those words became crushingly heavy, almost suffocating.
He wasn't joking.
He was the mountain standing across the path to the throne of the Pirate King—The largest, most solid, most unavoidable peak of them all!
One of the ultimate walls that every pirate who aimed for the summit would have to face—And surpass!
To become the Pirate King?
To prove his own existence and step out from that man's shadow?
Then Gern—The man who personally ended the previous era—Was destined to be one of the greatest enemies the three of them would one day have to overcome!
Ace bit down hard on his lower lip, so hard it nearly drew blood.
"SABO!!!"
Ace suddenly looked up and roared, his voice packed with emotions he could no longer suppress.
The shout startled both Sabo and Luffy.
"Ace…" Sabo looked at him worriedly.
"Tell me…" Ace slowly turned his head, staring straight at Sabo, asking word by word,"That man… just how strong… is he?!"
Faced with Ace's question, Sabo opened his mouth—But no words came out.
He knew Gern was a Marine Admiral.He knew he was the legendary man who captured the Pirate King.
But how strong that really meant was far beyond the scope of what an East Blue noble boy could comprehend.
Just as Sabo fell silent, a voice tinged with helpless laughter drifted over from beside them.
"Heh… pirates, huh…In the end, they only ever bring trouble and shame to the village."
They turned to see the mayor of Windmill Village, Woop Slap, wearing a fisherman's hat and holding a watering can.
No one knew when he had stepped out from his yard—clearly drawn by the commotion.
"Village Chief!" Luffy immediately shouted when he saw a familiar face.
Woop Slap fondly patted Luffy on the head, then turned his gaze to Ace, whose emotions were clearly off, and smiled.
"So that's what all the noise was about. Gern, that kid, came by, huh?Feels just like back when Garp first brought him to the village. Same chaos, same mess—haha!"
"Village Chief!" Luffy instantly latched onto the key point."So Gern weird old man really came here before? He really is Gramps Garp's friend?!"
Hearing Luffy's innocent question, Woop Slap burst out laughing, the wrinkles on his face stretching wide.
"Friends?" He shook his head, his tone tinged with nostalgia."They're a lot more than just friends, Luffy."
He looked at the three boys and dropped an even more shocking piece of information.
"That kid Gern—he's basically your grandpa Garp's disciple."
Then, as if recalling something amusing, the old mayor gestured animatedly.
"Back then, Garp dragged the young lad around Windmill Village like he was showing off some rare animal.Round and round he went, telling everyone, 'Look! This is my disciple! Amazing, right?! One slash sent Golden Lion flying!'That proud look on his face—hah! You couldn't forget it even if you tried!"
"So then how strong is he?!" Ace pressed again, practically grinding his teeth.
Luffy and Sabo held their breath as well, staring at the mayor with burning curiosity.
Seeing the boys' eager gazes, Woop Slap chuckled—but didn't answer directly.
Instead, he turned toward his small house and motioned for them to follow.
"Come inside, kids."
The three brothers exchanged glances and immediately followed him in.
Inside the cozy, lived-in house, Woop Slap stopped at an old wooden desk. He pulled open a drawer and rummaged through it carefully.
A moment later, he took out an old newspaper—its pages yellowed with age, yet remarkably well preserved—and gently spread it across the tabletop.
"Here. Take a look," the mayor said, his voice carrying the distant echo of past events."This was the report from when Gern first truly made his name across the seas.
"Back then, it shook the entire Grand Line!That was the battle that made the name 'Heavenquake' resound across the world!
"The East Blue might've been peaceful at the time—but out there, among monsters and legends, there was no one who didn't know it."
As the mayor spoke, the three boys felt their hearts pounding faster and faster.
They leaned in eagerly, eyes locking onto the newspaper that carried history itself.
Across the yellowed front page, printed in bold letters that seemed to still carry the impact of fresh ink—
[World Economy News — Front Page]
"A Heaven-Shaking Slash! The Marines 'Shatter the Sky'!!'Heavenquake' Gern Gravely Injures the Captain of the Flying Pirates—Pirate Admiral Golden Lion Shiki!The Curtain Rises on a New Era!"
Subheadline: "The once-untouchable skies are shattered—The Flying Admiral bleeds across the heavens!"
But what seized their attention most was the massive photograph occupying nearly half the page.
In the image—
A young Gern—his face still slightly youthful, yet with the same sharp eyes and cold curve to his lips as today—gripped a pitch-black long blade with both hands, swinging it upward with unstoppable momentum!
Where the blade pointed, the sky itself looked torn apart, splitting into countless spiderweb-like white fractures. Dark violet Conqueror's lightning coiled around the blade like raging dragons, radiating an aura of pure destruction!
And his opponent—
The man known as "Golden Lion" Shiki, with his iconic mane of golden hair, was caught at the exact moment of impact.
His eyes rolled back, his face frozen in disbelief and agony. A horrifying wound tore across his chest, blood spraying violently as his body looked on the verge of being split in two!
Beneath the photo, a single bold line of text hammered into the boys' hearts like a war drum—
"This slash will change the world."
Silence.
Deathly silence filled the small house.
Ace.Luffy.Sabo.
All three stood there, eyes wide, staring at the image and the article, their breathing nearly stopped.
Splitting the sky…Gravely wounding a legendary pirate on par with Roger and Whitebeard…A slash that changed the world…
The frozen image on the newspaper seemed to erupt into deafening thunder, branding the unimaginable power of "Heavenquake" Gern deep into their young souls.
Luffy's mouth hung open. After a long moment, he muttered,
"So… so awesome…"
Cold sweat beaded at Sabo's temples.
And Ace—
Ace clenched his fists tightly, his body trembling with excitement and an indescribable shiver.
"I will definitely defeat him."
At that moment, the image of the "weird old man" who had treated them to meat completely overlapped with the heaven-splitting figure of "Heavenquake" on the newspaper.
And it perfectly proved one simple truth—
If you never set sail, you see him like a frog at the bottom of a well gazing at the moon.But once you sail the seas, you realize—before him, you are but a mayfly glimpsing the open sky.