“What’s going on?! What is this thing?! How can there be such a massive whirlpool in these waters?!”
The weather in the New World was unpredictable to an incomprehensible degree. Sailing here meant facing not only extreme weather, but also bizarre phenomena beyond ordinary people’s understanding.
Knives falling from the sky, candy raining down—things that sounded like literary exaggerations or fantasy were often real in the New World.
The only way to deal with such weather was to rely on the ship’s Navigator to make on-the-spot judgments. The possibility of obtaining a weather forecast days in advance, as one would in normal seas, is infinitely close to zero.
Unlike the weather, however, some knowledge of the seas themselves could still be accumulated through years of navigation.
Which islands had fresh water for resupply, which areas were prone to grounding, where the sea currents were especially complicated; all of it would be recorded on sea charts.
For routes frequently traveled by ships, this kind of information was openly sold.
For example, the giant whirlpool seas outside Wano Country were well documented. Since these pirates had come in force to attack Fish-Man Island, they had naturally researched this route beforehand.
But a whirlpool on this scale was completely unheard of.
“Forget where the whirlpool came from! Figure out a way to break out first! Watch the current flow! Hard to port!!”
If they sailed against the whirlpool’s rotation, or charged straight into its center, the odds of the ship being swallowed or capsizing would increase dramatically.
Only by turning the bow in the same direction as the whirlpool’s rotation could they use the water’s momentum to slide along the edge of the vortex.
Once the direction was adjusted, they had to accelerate with all their might and charge perpendicular to the outer edge of the whirlpool to have even the slightest chance of escaping.
And that possibility only existed for paddle-wheel ships. Vessels with extra propulsion could still struggle against such a force. As for wind-powered sailing ships, resisting this kind of power depended entirely on people rowing the oars.
Having crossed the Four Seas, survived the first half of the Grand Line, and sailed through the New World for some time, these pirates were experienced enough. When danger struck, their response was fairly quick.
The problem was that this wasn’t a natural phenomenon. Rather, it was a man-made trap.
While the pirates focused on escaping the whirlpool, no one noticed a group of transparent figures already approaching their ships from underwater.
Beneath the towering waves was the playground of Fish-Men and Merfolk. To them, the whirlpool wasn’t dangerous at all, just an oversized treadmill.
Swimming against the current inside it consumed more stamina, but nothing serious.
“Put your backs into it! Row with everything you’ve got! If we get dragged in, we’re finished!”
Inside the somewhat stifling cabin, a group of pirates desperately pulled on the massive oars. Even the usual slackers were exerting every ounce of strength they had.
At a time like this, slacking off meant gambling with their own lives.
But right then, heavy thudding sounds began echoing from beneath the cabin floor.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
The muffled impacts sounded even harsher within the enclosed cabin. After all, these Neptune Army soldiers were not royal guards personally trained by Nereus. They hadn’t reached the level where every member was superhuman.
Against the ship’s thick hull, breaching it still took time.
“There’s something underwater!! It’s those Fish-Men! They’re trying to scuttle the ship! Hurry and stop them!!”
Among the group, there were naturally a few quick-witted people. Considering the target of their voyage, it was obvious what was lurking beneath the water.
But realizing that didn’t help them resolve the crisis. Instead, the repeated thuds became the death knell ringing in their ears.
Within the churning whirlpool, they had no way to deal with the Fish-Men hiding underwater.
Boom!
Boundless fear began spreading through the pirates’ hearts. But that fear did not last long. The ships were ultimately made of wood, not some indestructible barrier.
Under the relentless assault, it didn’t take long for a large hole to be smashed open.
Violent sea currents surged in through the breach, quickly tearing the fist-sized opening wider and allowing even more seawater to flood into the cabin.
“The bottom of the ship’s been breached!!”
“We’re taking on water! Activate the watertight compartments!”
“It’s useless! The bow’s been smashed open too! Hurry and find a way to seal the breach!”
With their multiple independent compartments, watertight bulkheads could effectively prevent ships from sinking after running aground. If there were only one or two breaches, it wouldn’t be much danger to a large vessel.
But when the holes increased from one to four or five, seven or eight, even the largest ships couldn’t withstand that kind of destruction.
The pirates aboard frantically tried to salvage the situation, but there was nothing they could do except watch as their ship slowly sank.
And it wasn’t just a single pirate ship being destroyed. Every vessel caught in the whirlpool suffered the same fate.
Their original formation had been tightly packed. As seawater flooded into the cabins and the ships gradually lost power, many pirate ships were directly smashed into one another by the whirlpool’s turbulence, triggering a chain explosion in their ammunition holds.
Boom! Boom!
Amid the chain of explosions, several pirate ships were blown into pieces. The shattered wreckage caused further chain reactions, smashing new holes into the ships that were still holding on.
As the ships sank, they created new sinking whirlpools that dragged nearby struggling pirates down into the deep sea.
Up to this point, they hadn’t even seen the enemy’s faces, yet this pirate fleet had already lost more than half its forces.
Although plenty of the sinking pirates were still struggling to survive thanks to the average physique of people in this world, this whirlpool had already become the Neptune Army’s hunting ground.
“Stay back! You monsters, stay away from me!”
One pirate wildly slashed his blade across the sea surface. Even some companions swept close to him by the currents were accidentally cut by him.
Ever since falling into the water, the “monsters” beneath the sea had never stopped attacking them—dragging them underwater or suddenly piercing through their bodies out of nowhere.
Though they knew it was probably Fish-Man Island’s forces attacking them, from beginning to end, they never once saw their enemies clearly.
In an environment like this, the unknown enemy only deepened the invisible fear in their hearts.
This was also what made the First Corps so unique. Beyond their standard naval combat methods, the special abilities of Fish-Types gave every company its own combat style.
Abilities like invisibility, color-changing, and mimicry turned the Third Company led by Sebastian into invisible assassins, carrying out their slaughter atop the whirlpool.
And Sebastian himself was mixed among the chaos, carrying out targeted eliminations against the more dangerous pirate captains.
“Get to the island! Leave these waters! Otherwise we’re all going to die here!”
Not far away was an island. Some pirates near the outer edge of the whirlpool managed to gain a brief chance to breathe thanks to their comrades’ deaths.
The Neptune Army still ultimately lacked real combat experience on the sea surface, allowing some pirates to break through the whirlpool’s encirclement and recklessly charge toward land.
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