One Piece: Surrounded at Marineford? Just kidding!

Chapter 331: The Dragon Slayer is Not the Dragon.

Deep underground in Baltimore, in the core conference room.

The air was deathly still.

The old fan overhead stopped working; it creaked and then shut down.

Zefa's fountain pen was almost out of ink. He took off his sunglasses, his bloodshot eyes fixed on the man across the long table.

Monkey D. Dragon.

He was waiting for an answer.

"The dragon slayer becomes the dragon."

This is Chen Ye's problem. A knife hangs over the heads of all revolutionaries.

The dragon fell silent.

ten seconds.

The wind outside the window stopped. The entire White Earth Island held its breath.

Long raised his head, his eyes, hidden in the shadows of his cloak, were frighteningly bright. He looked at Chen Ye, his voice low.

"There's no answer to your question, is there?"

Chen Ye leaned back lazily, tapping his fingers on the table idly.

"Oh? A rhetorical question as an opening, that's interesting. Don't tell me you're trying to fool me with a fairy tale about 'believing in human nature'."

No, the human heart is the most unreliable thing.

Long Meng stood up.

The movement was so forceful that the dark green cloak was billowed by the air currents. An aura of leadership instantly filled the entire room.

He walked up to the world map on the wall.

His finger traced across the seas and across the Grand Line, finally landing heavily on the cross.

Red Earth, Mary Geoise.

"It's an idea!"

The dragon's voice sounded like metal clashing, cold and hard.

"Systems can be corrupted, laws can be exploited, and people can be bought off, intimidated, or consumed by desire. Only ideas cannot be killed."

The dragon turned around, its gaze like a red-hot branding iron, burning into Chen Ye and Ze Fa.

"The World Government is rotten to the core, rotten in its 'bloodline'. The Celestial Dragons believe they were born gods, and this mindset of treating power as private property has destined them to regard all things as worthless."

"I want to instill in the revolutionary army and the new world an idea called 'public service'."

The dragon's chest heaved.

"What we want to build is not my own dynasty, Monkey D. Dragon's. It is a contractual society where power is 'publicly owned and subject to the people.' We need the strictest oversight, but more importantly, we need to enlighten the people."

"As long as the idea of ​​'the world belongs to all' is passed down and planted in the minds of every civilian and every soldier, even if I, Monkey D. Dragon, die, even if a future leader wants to fall into corruption, the awakened people will pull him down from his horse!"

"Those who come after will not become dragons. For the people are no longer sheep, but hunters who set their sights on dragons!"

The meeting room was deathly silent.

Snapped.

Zefa's pen fell onto the table.

The old soldier, who had spent his entire life confused about "justice," had tears welling up in his eyes. He thought of his dead students and the betrayal by the naval high command. Dragon's words were too idealistic, yet they struck at the heart of the matter.

Snapped.

A round of applause rang out.

Chen Ye clapped his hands, making no attempt to hide the admiration in his eyes.

"Unexpected, but very satisfying. This is indeed the only way out of a dead end. Enlighten the people, let their thoughts be the defense line... Dragon, your vision is worthy of this sea."

Long's tense shoulders relaxed a little. He sat back in his chair, picked up his now-cold coffee, and took a sip.

"but……"

Chen Ye abruptly changed the subject, his serious expression instantly crumbling, replaced by a playful look.

He rested his elbows on the table, leaning forward, looking like someone about to eavesdrop.

"No wonder you're the epitome of the Monkey family's intelligence; your theories are so well-developed. I just wonder, how did that old bastard Garp manage to have such a high-IQ son like you?"

puff.

Zefa almost spat out his water, quickly grabbed the documents to cover his face, his shoulders shaking like a leaf.

The dragon's lips twitched violently.

The leader's aura shattered instantly.

He put down his cup, looking helpless, seemingly unwilling to comment on his father, yet unable to refute him.

"The old man... all his wisdom comes from his fists." After a long pause, Long finally managed to utter a polite remark.

"Come on," Chen Ye waved his hand dismissively. "That old bastard Garp, besides eating senbei, sleeping, and punching people, he's all one-dimensional. The fact that you look like this is definitely a genetic mutation. Or maybe your mother's genes were too strong, managing to save the Monkey family's intellectual trough."

Zefa finally couldn't hold it in any longer and put down the documents, bursting into laughter.

"Hahaha! Chenye, if Garp heard you say that, he'd definitely chase after you and throw cannonballs at you! But seriously, Ryu has always been different from Garp since he was little. Garp is really... cough, bold. Ryu has always been ahead of his time in his thinking, in my opinion."

Chen Ye continued to press for answers, and the flame of gossip burned brighter and brighter.

"Here's the question. Garp gave birth to you, which was a genetic improvement. But how did you... give birth to Luffy, that single-celled organism?"

When Luffy was mentioned, Dragon's eyes softened a bit, but his expression became even stranger.

Chen Ye clicked his tongue in disapproval.

"I've met Luffy. To put it nicely, he's wise beyond his years; to put it bluntly, he only has fighting instincts and relies entirely on instinct. This genetic mutation is too outrageous; it's practically atavism. He skipped over you and inherited all of Garp's weaknesses, while also lowering his intelligence by another level."

Dragon Head rubbed his temples, wincing in pain, and leaned back. This topic was more tiring for him than overthrowing the world government.

"My father was weighed down too heavily by the word 'justice.' He seemed reckless, but he was actually suffering a lot inside. As for Luffy..."

Long paused.

"His personality probably comes from his mother. That kind of...willful, even willful, personality that's willing to do anything for freedom."

"Oh?"

Chen Ye instantly grasped the key word and almost moved his whole body close to the dragon's face.

"Luffy's mother? That's the number one of the top ten unsolved mysteries in the world of One Piece! Some say she's a Celestial Dragon, some say she's a high-ranking Marine, and some even say she's a Mythical Zoan..."

Zefa also pricked up his ears.

Even as Garp's old comrade-in-arms, he had never met him. Back then, Dragon disappeared after leaving the Navy, and when he reappeared, he was the leader of the Revolutionary Army. Luffy was suddenly brought back to Windmill Village by Garp.

The dragon's eyes darkened.

It felt like touching the deepest wound.

A hint of sadness and guilt appeared on that iron-faced man.

The air in the meeting room grew cold.

Chen Ye put away his playful expression, sat up straight, and waited.

He knew there was a story behind this.

Long lowered his head, looking at his hands that had stirred up the times, his voice hoarse.

"She... is the woman I will never forgive in my life."

He exhaled, as if he were releasing decades of pent-up frustration.

Her name is Torch Lotus.

"The previous Pirate Empress, the former emperor of Amazon Lily."

"What?!"

Zefa bounced off the chair as if his butt was on a spring, and his sunglasses almost fell off.

"The emperor of Amazon Lily? That warrior race made entirely of women?"

Chen Ye was also taken aback.

Although he knows many secrets, the identity of Luffy's mother wasn't mentioned in the original work. This is definitely a bombshell.

next second.

Chen Ye's mind began to race.