One Piece: Rise - Whitebeard Pirates Interlude

The Moby Dick was the home to a cacophony of cheers of celebrating and singing. Glasses of ale were clinked together and bawdy tavern songs clashed as the Whitebeard Pirates drank and partied to another victory over a growing New World crew and a bevy of looty!

"Pops!" a voice rang from the end of the ship as one of them ran, well, more staggered with how drunk he was towards the center of the deck to where the towering form of Edward Newgate sat on his special chair.

Marco paused in the motion of lifting a mug of rum to his lips and raised an eyebrow as his crew mate pushed through the throng of Division Commanders and fell to his knees in front of Pops, a newspaper and some other papers gripped tightly in his hands.

It looked like a bunch of bounties

"Bit much to drunk my son?" Whitebeard laughed loudly, slapping his massive knee with one hand, while the other held a bottle of rum as tall as Marco himself was, "Gurararara!

"Not nearly enough!" the man chucked in reply before shaking his head, "Wait that's not important! Pops you gotta see this!" he drunkenly pushed himself up and showed off one of the bounties he held in his hands. And a familiar face at the fore front.

Marco's eyes widened, as did many of the others. Whitebeard sobered in an instant and snatched the bounty and brought it close up to his face, "Red Magnus, one hundred and sixty four million beri..." his powerful, deep voice rumbled, face impassive for a moment before a massive grin spread across his face and his golden yellow eyes gleamed with pride, "Look at that, we haven't hard anything in a while from him and he suddenly pops up with his bounty a hundred million higher. What did he do?"

Marco hopped off the railing he was sitting on, setting his rum on it and gently took the newspaper from his crew mate and opened it up and reading. His eyes progressively grew wider as he read and a whistle left his mouth, "Looks like he's finally broken away from those cat whatever pirates he was with and set out on his own to make his own crew," the phoenix man said aloud for everyone around him to hear, "They've only confirmed one crew mate so far, and they've already given her a bounty because of her association with Magnus. Looks like he straight up took out a big name from East Blue, some guy called El Drago then...holy crap. He attacked Tequila Wolf and took the head of the Vice Admiral stationed there!"

There was a serious of gasps all around from the Commanders. After all, it took someone of their level to take on a Vice Admiral. "Unreal, but should I say not unexpected?" Jozu leaned back on the deck, "He does have pops blood in him after all.

"So Red Magnus really is pops grandkid?" Ace laughed, "Never would have guessed. There's horror stories about that kid back in East Blue. I heard the king of Goa was terrified he was gonna invade and burn the city down, I had a good laugh about that.

"Do they know, though?" Vista frowned, "One hundred and sixty four million beri. That is an absurd amount for East Blue. If I'm not wrong, nobody has ever gotten a bounty that high from that sea before entering the Grand Line.

"They don't, at least not about him being my grandson," Whitebeard frowned, looking off into the distance, "Nobody from outside the crew even knew Alexander was my son, not even he did. But, his mother is common knowledge, no doubt being the grandson of that annoying gluttonous woman is well known to the navy."

"...That might not be a big factor actually," Marco hummed still reading over the newspaper, "Checking out his profile on what they know he can do in a fight. Seems like on top of that absurd speed and strength you'd expect from pops grandkid, they claim he's a master of a two sword style and can fire out flying blades now."

"Hoh?" Vista hummed in interest, "He's fifteen now is he not? And he's capable of that at his age? Impressive, I'd love to test out his skill myself." he himself was a two sword style user as well.

"You think that's impressive, get a load of this," Marco chucked, shaking his head in disbelief, "They think he's Observation Haki!"

"No way!"

"Haki in East Blue!?"

"Insane!"

Then Marco frowned himself, "That's not the biggest thing either," he sighed, turning serious as he looked around at the other assembled Divison Commanders and his towering captain, "He's got a devil fruit now as well. They claim it's a zoan, in the form of a White Tiger."

There was silence between them all before a moment, the only noise from the other partying crew members all over the ship. The silence was interrupted by Teach coughing and spluttering on the cherry pie he was eating. Their resident Devil Fruit expert despite not having one himself, he'd created a catalogue on them from collecting information on the fruit for over twenty years, "The white tiger fruit!" the jolly heavy set man was totally wide eyed and directed a worried gaze at Whitebeard, "Pops! That could be really bad, if it's actually the mythical zoan. Kaido will totally go after him to try and recruit him!

It was no secret that Kaido coveted Zoan devil fruit users. And he had an especially keen interest in the mythical zoan counterparts of his own fruit, the blue dragon. The three counterparts to his own devil fruit were the White Tiger, the Black Turtle and the Vermilion Phoenix, the devil fruit eaten by their own resident first division commander, Marco.

Once upon a time, Kaido had even attacked the Whitebeard pirates in full force to try and take him by force years ago.

The silence this time, was a grim one.

"..Should we go pick him up?" Thatch bit his lip, running a hand through his pompadour, "The kid is strong for his age, really strong, but Kaido's a whole other kettle of fish Pops. He won't stand a chance if Kaido goes after him.

"You think Magnus would be okay with that?" Jozu snorted, "Have you read the kids exploits over the years? They call him Red Magnus because of how often he was dyed red in the blood of marines and other pirates. He's been a pirate since he was six years old and his kingdom was destroyed, he's had to be ruthless to survive. Odds are, one of turns up looking to bring him here and he'll go for our throats."

"And considering they've confirmed he has Observation Haki, he may even have Armament Haki, so even going Logia probably won't be a sure bet," Ace mused, before grinning at Whitebeard, "Pops, your grandson is insane."

Whitebeard snorted lightly, but didn't respond, still looking into the distance, that thoughtful frown on his face.

"We can't just do nothing either," Marco crossed his arms over his chest, "Kaido already killed Oden and we can't do anything about it right now, I refuse to let him get his slimy hands on Pops only blood relative as well!"

"I can go," Ace volunteered, "With my fruit and my cruiser, I can get there quickly alone and back without anyone the wiser, and you guys can hold the fort and make sure Kaido and Big Mom don't try and muscle in on our turf."

"Hell no!" Thatch chopped him in the back of the head, "You're the worst one to send, you'll definitely start a fight with him!"

"Ow!" Ace hissed, rubbing his head, "Did you have to use haki you bastard?!"

"What about his character profile?" Teach piped up, "Anything there we can use to get a good idea on how he'll act?"

"Nah," Marco waved him off, "Beyond having some massive hate boner for the navy, the only thing that really stands out is because it's amusing they even put it down in the first place."

"And what's that?" Vista asked, interested.

"Engaging in underage age sexual relations," Marco laughed, "Kid apparently is a bit of a ladies man and was hitting up prostitutes by time he was twelve!"

That broke the tense atmosphere a bit and everyone started laughing loudly.

"Well that explains his taste in first recruit." Marco chuckled, holding up another bounty poster that was within the newspaper, depicting a curvaceous young woman in skimpy attire, with purple hair an holding a pair of chakram.

Hell-Cat Carina - Wanted Dead Or Alive: 17,000,000 Beri

"She's a real looker," Juzo whistled, "And if she's anything to go by, he has a thing for hot chicks with exotic hair."

Ace smirked and directed his gaze at one of the older members gathered around. A former division commander. "Maybe we should send Whitey?" he suggested, "Maybe if she wiggles her tits at him he'll be be more up for joining."

Much of them erupted into laughter.

He yelped a dodged to the side when the voluptuous blue haired woman clad in a skimpy navel baring top and mini skirt flicked her hand at him and fired a chunk of ice at his head, "Maybe we'll go find that fruit Ivankov and have him turn you into a woman and make you do it," she retorted, a smirk on her plump lips, before shaking her head, "I don't mind taking my crew for a trip back through Paradise to look for him. But I'm not going to try seducing the boy. That's too manipulative and shallow for Pops' grandson, he's family remember you fool." the wielder of the Frost Frost fruit berated the fire man

"I notice you didn't say you wouldn't be against sleeping with him though, Cougar," Marco snorted, "Not that you'd manage much. Didn't you turn forty five a few weeks ago? With that little Hell-Cat girl with him, he probably wouldn't pay you much attention." he teased.

Whitey bounced to her feet, arm frosting over, "You wanna fight pineapple head?" she growled.

Marco grinned and clenched his right fist, blue and gold flames blazing along it, "Bring it on!"

Just as they were about to launch themselves at each other, two massive fists came down and bonked them on the heads and slammed them face first into the deck hard enough to bury their faces through the wood.

"Give it a rest you brats," Whitebeard rolled his eyes, before giving them all a serious look, "We leave Magnus alone for now. Kaido won't be able to make any big moves without us noticing, it's better not to bring even more attention to him. Give him some time to grow in Paradise, odds are, he'll be heading there soon. And with his strength, it won't take him long to reach the New World. Then, we'll approach him and I'll personally explain everything to him and get him to join."

Kaido could have a try at his grandson over his dead body. That foolish lizard was only alive to this day because he very rarely left his territory in Wano. If it weren't for that, and the fact assaulting Wano would result in many of his children losing their lives, he'd have went and claimed his head when he finally heard of what happened to Oden and his family.

Edward Negate's chest throbbed and he clutched at it in pain. But, it wasn't the pain of his health as it was so often these days, but an emotional pain that transcended such meager physical pain.

Oden. Toki. Momonosuke. Hiyori. Alexander. Only one was of his blood, but that did not make any of them any less family of his. A man whom he had taken as a younger brother, but was like a stupid son regardless. The kind and demure woman, yet strong of heart, like a daughter. And the two tykes born from that union that allowed him to feel the love of a grandfather before he truly became one through blood. And the son he had never spoken to, but kept track of and watched in pride as he grew into a man.

He had lost far too much in the recent years.