One Piece: New Order

Chapter 403 403: The Casualties

New World, Marine Frontline Command Headquarters.

Early morning.

Inside the meeting room, Tsuru and Morris had also stayed awake the entire night while directing the battlefield operations.

On the large screen, the Marines' encirclement continued shrinking. The results were obvious, but the sacrifices were just as clear...

A staff member below reported the results and casualties from the overnight battle.

"As of 6:43 this morning, the pirate suppression lines advancing toward Whole Cake Island and Wano Country have overall progressed by one-fourth. The defensive line has now stabilized.

"As for casualties... Vice Admirals Doberman, Bonier, Meredith, Strawberry... a total of thirteen Vice Admirals have been confirmed dead.

"All fleets under their command carried out suicidal collision attacks. None of the intercepted pirates managed to break through the defensive line."

Once the report ended, silence filled the meeting room.

A moment later, Morris took a deep breath and waved his hand. "You may leave."

The staff member lowered his head. "Yes, sir."

Sitting at the head seat, Tsuru frowned deeply. "The casualties are too severe. Thirteen Vice Admirals lost in a single night..."

Morris shook his head. "There was no other choice. We didn't have the time to deal with them slowly."

The New World battlefront had stretched far too long. This was not a matter of surrounding one or two islands. They were maintaining an encirclement over dozens of islands.

The massive scale and enormous range had already pushed their available Vice Admirals and troops to the limit.

Although the Four Emperors were dead and most of their officers had been eliminated, that only applied to the Emperors' crews themselves. Among the tens of thousands of pirates trapped inside the encirclement, there were still many powerful rogue fighters.

Before the pirates could fully react, they had to shrink the massive encirclement to a certain extent. Only by concentrating their forces together could they completely lock them down.

Morris stared at the battle map on the screen, where the encirclement had shrunk by one-fourth.

"But this still isn't enough..."

The current defensive line had only barely closed together. The distance between fleets had shortened somewhat, but it was still far from sufficient.

To completely seal the defensive perimeter, the current line would need to shrink by at least another half. Only then could they guarantee that not a single pirate would escape.

Tsuru crossed her hands beneath her chin and closed her eyes in thought for a while before speaking, "Have the Admiral candidates and elite Vice Admirals carry out independent breakthroughs."

Morris pondered for a moment. "Open paths for the fleets..."

It really was a possible solution. Under the current situation, with the Four Emperors dead and most of their officers wiped out, the strongest remaining pirates were merely at the level of Yonko commanders.

The Admiral candidates and elite Vice Admirals could completely retreat safely after charging through alone.

Of course, that wasn't absolute. If they encountered large pirate fleets during a solo breakthrough and became entangled, there was still a risk of death.

But wars were never fought without casualties...

Morris narrowed his eyes while staring at the battlefield display.

"Transmit the order. Notify Gion, Tokikake, Onigumo, Dalmatian, Bastille, Law, and Drake to prepare for independent breakthrough operations. Await further orders."

The messenger behind them quickly hurried off to relay the orders.

Meanwhile, Morris walked over to the large screen and pulled up the positions of the seven individuals.

Looking at the enormous map and the shrinking encirclement, he raised the command baton in his hand and pointed it toward one of the marked locations. A red line immediately stretched across the encirclement.

Then another.

And another.

One after another, he marked and divided the battlefield.

On the giant screen, the massive encirclement looked like a huge pizza being sliced apart by the baton in Morris' hand...

* * *

Early morning, Holy Land of Mariejois.

Inside the enormous white palace, the Five Elders wore grim expressions as they listened to the report from their subordinate.

Mars spoke in a low voice. "Forty-seven islands, yet not a single one showed any abnormalities. Damn it..."

Those islands had all been re-screened after the Revolutionary Army headquarters was erased last time. Yet now every single one of them had turned out to be fake...

Warcury took a deep breath. "If it comes down to it, we'll deal with the Marines first."

Thinking about the news that had spread across the world in barely half a day, he could not help cursing.

"A bunch of useless trash."

Those pirates had been Four Emperors who ruled the seas for decades. Yet within only a day and a half, every last one of them had been cleaned up by Sakazuki. Their heads were even hanging in Marine Headquarters for public display.

If that wasn't useless, then what was?

Of course, they also knew the blame did not entirely fall on the Four Emperors being incompetent.

A day and a half was far too short to investigate everything, but they already had a guess about how Sakazuki managed to pull it off.

Those Emperors had been scattered all across the New World. To reach every one of their locations and wipe them out within a day and a half was practically impossible.

After excluding battle time, there was almost no time left for travel.

The only explanation was teleportation.

And the moment they thought of teleportation, the Five Elders' expressions darkened even further.

The previous user of the Warp-Warp Fruit had been a government agent who died nearly twenty years ago.

Before that agent died, they had personally sent him to Vegapunk to see whether the Warp-Warp Fruit could somehow be recovered.

Now it seemed that Vegapunk had already colluded with Sakazuki back then...

Nusjuro rubbed his forehead with a headache. "Teleportation..."

Right now, nobody knew when the Marines might suddenly attack. The troublesome part about the Warp-Warp Fruit was exactly this. In an instant, it could gather all of the Marines' top combat forces directly at Mariejois.

If a war truly broke out, whether they survived or not was one thing, but Mariejois itself definitely would not survive...

The combined high-end combat power of the Marines and World Government now probably surpassed even the great Sgri Sea War from several years ago.

That battle between the pirates and Marines had completely erased every island across an entire sea region.

Mariejois was only this large. It would absolutely collapse.

And once that happened, the thing hidden beneath it would no longer stay hidden...

Saturn gripped his cane tightly and spoke in a deep voice. "Call Kong here. It's time to choose a side.

"As long as we win the next battle, that will be enough. The remaining Revolutionary Army are nothing more than ants.

"The foolish pigs have already been purged. There's no need to care about them anymore.

"This world is finally ready to welcome a true king…"

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