After a round of investigation, Captain Jess's men managed to find several witnesses who claimed that shortly before the explosion, they had seen children running out from the alley where the blast took place.
Someone else also happened to see those beggars tailing a child into that very alley.
All of those statements pointed to the same target.
That clue was important.
Captain Jess did not believe it was a coincidence. Those two children had to be connected somehow.
It was not that he had already concluded they were the killers. It was simply that his instincts told him those two definitely knew something.
Otherwise, he truly could not figure out why anyone would go out of their way to target a few beggars. Even all those useless wretches put together were not worth a single bomb.
So he had his men draw up a few rough wanted posters based on the limited information they had, hoping to find the two children as quickly as possible and question them about what had happened.
At the same time, Captain Jess had no intention of letting go of the recent buyers Old Jack had confessed to selling bombs to. After all, the scene itself had already proven everything. The killer had used explosives. That much was beyond dispute.
So following that lead could not possibly be wrong.
...
At that moment, August, now dressed differently, was trying to gather information about ships so he could take Law and escape this country.
The world was vast, yet it seemed there was no place in it for the two of them.
As he passed by a public notice board, August immediately spotted the two wanted posters. The clothes he had originally been wearing and Law's distinctive spotted hat had both been listed as identifying features.
Clearly, after making such a huge mess, they had drawn the official authorities' attention after all.
Fortunately, those features were not especially obvious, and the clothes he was wearing now had just been borrowed from somebody's yard. Some parts were still damp.
At a glance, he looked no different from any other child his age walking the streets.
In fact, along the way, he had already turned down several little girls who had wanted to play with him.
Just then, two soldiers slowly walked over, the freshly issued wanted posters still in their hands.
August showed no fear at all. He remained perfectly calm.
Sure enough, they merely lowered their heads, gave him a casual glance, and kept walking, never once connecting him to the targets on the posters.
Trying to find someone based on such tiny scraps of identifying detail was simply too difficult.
But there was nothing to be done. That was all the information they had. It was not as if they could just arrest every boy they saw on the street.
And so, August made it all the way to the harbor without incident.
There were quite a few ships docked there, and the place was lively with people coming and going.
Most of them were merchant ships, while passenger ships were somewhat fewer.
He even spotted two pirate ships flying skull-and-crossbones flags, docked there openly as if they were not worried in the slightest about the Marines coming to arrest them.
In truth, that was partly thanks to White Town.
Those lofty, untouchable people had wanted to bury the secret of Flevance, so they had turned a blind eye and allowed the neighboring countries to wage war against it. To make sure things went smoothly, they had even deliberately withdrawn the nearby Marine forces under the excuse of staying out of the conflict.
And if any loose ends remained, pirates could always be used to finish the job.
The plan had been nearly flawless, and Flevance really had been wiped out and burned clean.
So until new Marines arrived, the appearance of pirates on this island was hardly surprising.
Only after wandering around the harbor for quite some time did August finally prepare to head back.
He had discovered that there were only a few ways to get out to sea.
First, he could somehow get a tiny broken boat or build a raft himself, then sail out and leave everything to fate. If one big wave flipped it over, then so be it.
August almost dismissed that option without even thinking.
If that was the only way out, he would rather stay here and keep being hunted.
Second, he could buy tickets and leave directly on a passenger ship.
The advantage was that it would be safer and more stable, but the drawback was the risk of exposing their identities.
And most importantly, they had no money.
That was the tragedy of being broke. You could not move an inch without it.
Third, he could find a way to give himself a new identity, maybe by joining one of those two pirate crews and going out to sea with them naturally.
August did not particularly reject the idea of becoming a pirate, but both he and Law had one glaring problem: their age. Most pirate crews would never take in two little brats.
And once they revealed who they were, it was hard to say whether their status as fugitives would count as a plus, or whether the other side would just sell them out immediately.
August had no illusions that every pirate crew on the sea was like Luffy's, wandering around helping people while shouting about dreams and freedom.
In truth, treachery, cunning, and cruelty were the shared motto of most pirates.
If he and Law, two little lambs, escaped one tiger's jaws only to throw themselves into a wolf den, that would truly be despair with nowhere left to turn.
And just then, another large ship slowly pulled into the harbor.
As August was about to leave, he caught sight of the flag hanging on that ship and suddenly felt it looked strangely familiar.
...
The next day, August did not rush into action. Instead, he continued scouting.
With the help of a few big-mouthed sailors, he finally confirmed which faction that familiar flag belonged to.
It was a smuggling ship from the Donquixote Family.
During the war that destroyed Flevance, at least half of the weapons used by those countries had been purchased from the Donquixote Family.
Now that the war was over and the spoils had all been divided, those countries were drowning in wealth.
And clearly, the Donquixote Family had set its sights on them again.
More precisely, on the wealth in their hands.
After spending so much ammunition and so many weapons, did they not need to restock?
Of course, they could say no.
But the problem was that all the other neighboring countries were buying.
So they could make their own decision.
After all, who knew when another war might break out? And when that happened, the ones suffering would certainly not be the Donquixote Family.
When it came to inciting wars between nations and profiting from them, the Donquixote Family was absolutely professional. In the North Blue, no one could match them.
And so Sodalancia and the surrounding countries could only swallow their resentment and accept it, forced into a fresh round of arms competition.
Because when it came to weapons, you might not use them, but you absolutely could not afford not to have them.
The Donquixote Family had a death grip on those countries' lifelines, and every single time, they earned a fortune.
Hidden in the shadows, August watched as crate after crate of weapons was unloaded from the ship, then turned into crate after crate of money and supplies being loaded back on. A plan gradually began to form in his mind.
And apparently, August was not the only one eyeing the Donquixote Family.
The two pirate crews that had already been docked here for repairs were practically red-eyed with envy by now.
The underground black market business run by Doflamingo was already thriving, yes, but at this point, he was still not the future underworld king of the dark world, nor had he yet obtained the title of Warlord of the Sea.
So even in the North Blue, plenty of people still regarded the Donquixote Family with hostility.
(End of Chapter)
[Check Out My P@treon For +20 Extra Chapters On All My Fanfics!!][[email protected]/euridome]
[+500 Power Stones = +1 Extra Chapter]
[Thank You For Your Support!]