After listening to Valthior ramble on for a long while, Shiki finally recovered.
He quickly said, "You bastard, what do you take me for? You want me to deliver an island for you? If word gets out, where am I supposed to put my face? Besides, Merveille suffered heavy damage too. We are rebuilding right now. Even the armory was blown up by that bastard John. Where would I find the time to help you?"
"You owe me a very big favor, Shiki. Favors have to be repaid," Valthior said with a laugh.
"A favor?" Shiki frowned and thought for a moment. "I do not remember owing you anything!"
"That little guy in your crew—what was his name? Marshall D. Teach. His real name is Davy, right? He is Rocks's son, correct?" Valthior suddenly said.
Shiki's expression darkened, and his gaze grew slightly serious.
"How do you know that?"
He did not deny it.
At Valthior's level, the moment he said it, it meant he already knew. Denying it would be meaningless.
And Shiki was indeed curious.
After all, he had only mentioned this matter to Whitebeard. At the same time, in order to protect Teach, he had not restored Teach's real name and still let him use the name "Marshall."
"I know far more than you think. Do not forget what identity I had when I appeared in God Valley back then," Valthior said with a smile. Then he added, "Among my people, there is a young man named Bartholomew Kuma. He is quite good. You should have an impression of him, right?"
As one of the opponents Shiki valued, the Valthior Pirates' personnel had naturally been studied by him countless times.
He did know of Bartholomew Kuma's existence.
"Back then, he was the one who sent Teach and his mother out of God Valley. Otherwise, those two would have died there long ago. That is a life-saving debt. You can go ask Teach to confirm it. I doubt he has forgotten what his savior looked like," Valthior said with a smile.
"That really happened?" Shiki froze and asked in great surprise.
Although his tone was doubtful, he had already believed most of it in his mind. After all, Valthior had no need to lie about something like this.
"Rocks was a man worthy of respect. I have no reason to lie about this," Valthior said without hesitation.
After a short pause, Valthior smiled again.
"But the fact that you are also a Davy really surprised me. Why did I never hear you mention it before?"
"Jihahahahaha! You must know the past glory of our Davy clan. Strictly speaking, we and you Celestial Dragons are mortal enemies. Why would I casually hang that identity from my mouth? Even Rocks hid his origins, didn't he? This is our way of living," Shiki laughed in a grand, fake manner.
As if I'd ever tell you that I didn't even know I was a Davy myself until recently!
After they chatted nonsense like this for a while, Shiki finally sighed softly.
"Fine. Since my nephew Teach owes you his life, I, as his uncle, will repay it for him. And do not say that helping you deliver an island will settle this debt. Our Davy clan is not shameless to that degree. I will choose an island that fits your requirements and send it to Frost Island. After that, count it as me owing you one favor. If there is some major matter you need help with in the future, I will consider making a move once."
"As expected of the bloodline of the former Kings of the World. Boss Shiki, you are truly generous!" Valthior's eyes lit up, and he immediately praised him.
Spencer and the others were also quite shocked as they listened from the side.
Damn it. Since when did Shiki become so easy to talk to?
In the past, if Shiki owed a debt, he would want to scatter the creditor's ashes. Now he was actually taking the initiative to say he owed a favor?
Valthior also found it strange, but after thinking carefully, perhaps it was because Shiki's identity had changed.
Before, Shiki had not revealed his identity as a member of the Davy clan. Whatever he did only affected his own image, and he did not care about his image.
But now it was different.
He was Davy D. Shiki.
He could not embarrass the Davy clan, right?
People really were burdened by reputation.
"When it comes to generosity, I still have to learn from Lord Valthior," Shiki clicked his tongue and said.
Indeed, ever since he learned that he was a blood descendant of the Davy clan—the so-called Kings of the World—Shiki, who had originally taken pride in being cunning and vicious, had started learning how to carry himself like a king.
He had begun paying attention to his image in every aspect.
And among all the people he knew, the one with the greatest noble and kingly bearing was undoubtedly Valthior, who had been born in Mary Geoise as a noble son of one of the Five Elders' families.
Therefore, Shiki would sometimes subconsciously compare his own way of doing things with Valthior's and learn from it.
"By the way, I heard you say your armory was blown up?" Valthior suddenly brought this up again.
This actually exposed a bit of internal weakness, but Shiki really did not seem to intend to hide it. He gritted his teeth and said, "John's ability is the Magnet-Magnet Fruit. He can control all metal. The moment he snuck into Merveille, he hit me with a big one and ruined a lot of the weapons I had stored. Guns, ammunition, blades, hammers, giant cannons—he damaged plenty of them…"
"He really deserved to die!" Valthior said, though the smile on his face was almost impossible to hide.
After a brief pause, Valthior continued, "Then you have even more reason to come here. I recently started dealing in weapons. Frost Island still has a large stockpile, all top-quality goods on the market. Considering the relationship between us, I can make the decision and give you a twenty percent discount!"
"Weapons business?" Shiki sounded slightly surprised.
"That is right! Just come over. I guarantee you will not be disappointed!" Valthior said confidently.
Shiki was a major customer.
There were countless pirate crews in the New World, but the Flying Pirates were the largest. With so many subordinates under his command, Shiki's demand for weapons was bound to be enormous. If Valthior could turn him into a long-term customer, it would be a steady source of income.
Shiki could plunder to his heart's content, then spend the spoils buying weapons from Valthior.
When you thought about it that way, wasn't Shiki practically working for Valthior?
And it wasn't just the Flying Pirates. Valthior also intended to find a way to sell weapons to Totto Land and the Whitebeard Pirates.
Totto Land, at least, shouldn't be difficult. After all, he had spared both Charlotte Linlin and Kaido. Asking them to buy their weapons from him wasn't exactly an unreasonable request.
The Whitebeard Pirates, however, would be a little more troublesome.
Valthior and Whitebeard were essentially strangers.
For the time being, though, that matter could wait. After agreeing to meet on Frost Island in the near future, Valthior and Shiki ended the call.
Shiki looked at the Den Den Mushi in his hand for a moment before saying, "The weapons trade has potential. Kyo, do you think we can get in on it?"
"Small-scale, yes. Large-scale, probably impossible to compete with Valthior. He would crush us, so there is no need," Silver Axe thought for a moment, then shook his head.
"Why? What makes him able to crush us in the weapons business?" Shiki asked, unconvinced.
Dr. Indigo was Shiki's chief scientist, but that did not mean Shiki only had Indigo as a research talent. In fact, Shiki had an entire related team under him. Doing some weapons research along the way should not be a problem.
It was just that Shiki had never thought in that direction before.
Now that he heard Valthior was doing it, he suddenly felt tempted.
"Valthior can sell weapons to the World Government, the Marines, and the member nations. With low margins and high sales volume, he can drive countless competitors out of business through price wars alone. Who can we sell to? If we can't open up the market, the more we invest, the faster we'll go under," Silver Axe said without hesitation.
Shiki blinked, scratched his head, and muttered a curse. "Damn Celestial Dragon bastards!"
Realizing that Silver Axe was completely right, Shiki gave up on the idea of competing with Valthior in the weapons business.
After all, at best, he could only find customers in the New World.
Valthior, on the other hand, could use a single Den Den Mushi call to establish weapons distribution channels across the world.
There was simply no competing with that.
...
On the other side, Valthior also put away the Den Den Mushi and said happily, "Good. The materials for our flagship should be ready soon. Tell Master Tom to prepare for construction."
After settling that matter, Valthior opened the next document. After reading for a moment, he raised a brow.
"Pleasure District… Tsk. Who is in charge of this now?"
"It is a CP0 agent named Stussy," Lincoln immediately said.
This document said that the Pleasure District also intended to enter Onigashima and had submitted an application, asking whether Valthior's side approved.
Other underworld forces usually just came directly and did not report in advance. After all, Valthior was not the boss of the underworld, and he had not set any entry threshold.
But the Pleasure District had still taken the initiative to report.
The reason was simple.
The background of the Pleasure District was very special. Most people believed it was an old underworld power that had existed for hundreds of years.
From a historical perspective, that was indeed true.
But in reality, from the very beginning several hundred years ago, the Pleasure District had been controlled from behind the scenes by the World Government.
Every generation of its leaders had been top agents of the World Government.
They rooted themselves in the underworld, handled the World Government's various activities and businesses there, assisted the World Government in its affairs, and controlled a massive intelligence network.
As an organization under the World Government, with leaders in every generation who were CP agents—and with CP itself loyal to the Celestial Dragons—while Valthior happened to be a Celestial Dragon, the Pleasure District had to take the initiative to report to Valthior if it wanted to open a branch on Onigashima.
"Stussy…" Valthior rubbed his chin and muttered.
He did not know exactly when Stussy had entered the World Government. Perhaps after MADS disbanded? After Vegapunk joined the Science Unit?
In any case, Stussy was a double agent.
Her true loyalty belonged to Vegapunk, the person who had given her life.
And she was the clone of former Rocks Pirates member and Whitebeard's rumored lover—Buckingham Stussy.
After considering it for a moment, Valthior asked, "Where is she?"
"She is in the New World. If you want to see her, we can summon her here. She can arrive in a month and a half at most," Lincoln immediately replied.
"Then have her come here," Valthior said after a moment of thought.
Considering Vegapunk's importance, he could use Stussy to establish a hidden channel unknown to others and maintain contact with Dr. Vegapunk.
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