OnePiece-Strongest ice Dragon Chapter 28 28: A Late-Night Talk Between Master and Student,

After Loya stood at the front of the line, Zephyr continued.

"Now, I've decided: to avoid any further 'accidents,' Loya is disqualified from tomorrow's assessnt." Zephyr paused, a gleam of sadistic excitent on his aged face. "However, in the interest of fairness, he must accept a challenge from every single remaining recruit. He can only join the Elite Camp if he wins! Do you understand?"

"...Understood!"

In that instant, the lowest-ranking recruits of the Headquarters and the legendary forr Admiral Zephyr reached a silent, mutual consensus. You think you're so tough, huh? Co on then, let's have a gang fight. A whole group of us against you one-on-one—what are you afraid of?

Feeling the malicious glares converging on him from all directions, Loya thought: I have a few choice words I'd like to use, but I probably shouldn't.

This is your idea of "fairness"? he thought. You dare say this isn't an abuse of power and a deliberate act of vengeance? Just because Aldo stole two boxes of your cigars... is it really worth all this?

Night fell. Loya leaned against the outer wall of his ice hut, tending to a campfire.

Sizzle.

A drop of fat hit the wood, throwing up a small spark. Loya sniffed the air, scrambled up, and grabbed a mysterious sea fish he'd been roasting. He sprinkled a pinch of salt and chili over it, inhaling the aroma greedily. "Perfect! Just the right amount of char."

The warship had plenty of food, but this was a live-fire assessnt. Survival in the wild was part of the test—in other words, "we aren't feeding you." If the recruits wanted to eat, they had to handle it themselves. Otherwise, why would they only give them one day's worth of dried rations for a three-day test?

The moon cast a hazy glow over the ocean, the light dancing with the waves. The sea breeze brushed against his face, washing away the exhaustion of the day. On the beach and in the thickets, recruits sat in small groups around their fires, preparing dinner in silence.

Loya's small ice hut drew many envious looks. On a windswept, desolate island, having a shelter that blocked the cold was heavenly. But rembering the events of the day, everyone was too furious to suck up to him. Loya was happy to be left alone; otherwise, the giant bear he had frozen outside wouldn't be enough to feed everyone anyway.

That, after all, was his own midnight snack.

Just as Loya was eating his fish, a towering figure approached. Without a word, Kuzan's hand, hot as a kitchen knife through butter, sliced effortlessly into the ice, cutting off a large chunk of the wall. Kuzan tossed the ice into the sea and looked at Loya, who was staring back with dead, fishy eyes.

"What? Surprised to see ?"

"No," Loya shook his head. "I'm just feeling sorrow. Breaking into soone's house without even saying hello—tell , Kuzan-sensei, did you work for a demolition crew before this?"

Kuzan: "..."

The sll of the roasted fish was tantalizing. Loya, feeling a pinch in his heart, pulled out a wooden skewer and offered it to Kuzan. "Try so, Kuzan-sensei. It's a secret recipe!"

If it were anyone else, Kuzan would have taken it, but with Loya, he hesitated. "You... you didn't put laxatives in this, did you?"

Loya felt his blood pressure rise. He whipped the skewer back, finished the fish in one bite until only the spine remained, and huffed. "Forget it! Let's be reasonable, Kuzan-sensei: do I look like the kind of shaless person who would do that?"

Kuzan: "...It's hard to say. The last ti, you put laxatives in the water tank and made the entire recruit camp suffer for a whole day. Your reason was that the laxatives in the infirmary were about to expire and you didn't want to waste them."

Loya: "..."

So people just didn't know how to carry a conversation.

After finishing the fish, Loya chipped a piece of ice off his hut to quench his thirst. "So, Kuzan-sensei, why are you here?"

"Nothing major..." Kuzan leaned against the ice wall, staring out at the sea, his eyes deep and lingering. "It's just that today, I realized... Zephyr-sensei is truly old."

Loya's chewing slowed down. Kuzan's words stirred his mories. Zephyr's life was a tragedy in three acts. He had worshipped heroes since childhood, joined the Navy, and fought countless pirates without ever killing a single one—earning the title "Black Arm" and "The Forr Admiral Who Doesn't Kill."

Yet, a good man like that was retaliated against by vicious pirates. His wife and son were murdered. That was why he beca a drill instructor; heartbroken, he had stayed in the Navy only because of Sengoku's pleas.

Twenty years later, disaster struck again. The training ship he commanded was attacked by Edward Weevil. Only two students survived, and Zephyr himself lost his arm. He couldn't save his beloved students. Loya didn't know how Zephyr had endured that, but perhaps it was fueled by hatred.

The cruel reality had changed the old man. The current Zephyr was no longer the person he had once been. When Zephyr received his chanical crusher arm, he set out on a path of vengeance. He ford the "Marine Guerrilla" to hunt pirates, breaking his vow of "non-killing." Later, when Edward Weevil joined the Shichibukai, Zephyr's disillusionnt beca absolute. He defected, ford the "NEO Navy," and dedicated his life to annihilating all pirates in the world.

Finally, at 74, Zephyr died at the hands of his own student, Kizaru, and was buried by Kuzan on the island where he fell.

Wait!

A chill ran down Loya's spine, a flash of insight striking like Sherlock Hols. The current year was 1516 of the Sea Circle Calendar. If Zephyr died two years after the Summit War (1512 2 = 1514), and he was 74 then, he was currently 68!

Zephyr had ford the Guerrilla unit at 70—that was only two years away!

Zephyr had spent these years teaching recruits faithfully. So, why would he change so drastically in two years? Why wait two years to seek revenge? Was the crusher arm not finished yet? That might be part of it, but Loya had a bold thought: Zephyr's desperate need to form a guerrilla force was likely because the current batches of recruits were useless. They left him with a suffocating feeling of hopelessness.

He decided to go out himself, hoping to get his revenge before he truly turned into an old man.

Think about it, Loya mused. Zephyr trained three Admirals and several Vice Admirals! If he had to rely on the current crop of recruits—the "diocre middle-strength"—to take down soone like Edward Weevil, he was dreaming.

Loya swallowed the ice, leaned against the other side of the wall like Kuzan, and asked casually, "Yeah, Admiral Zephyr is 68 this year, right? Tell , Kuzan-sensei, do you think Admiral Zephyr will go after that pirate for revenge in the future?"

Loya had feigned curiosity about Zephyr's prosthetic arm over the past month, so Kuzan wasn't surprised by the question. Kuzan looked at Loya out of the corner of his eye, his voice dropping low. "Listen, Loya. Whatever Zephyr-sensei chooses to do, that is his choice. No one can interfere."

Loya felt his scalp tingle. He pulled himself together. "Understood, Kuzan-sensei..."

The chilling killing intent vanished as quickly as it had appeared. Loya was a smart man, and so was Kuzan. Laziness was not stupidity; both were cunning, and they had reached a silent understanding in the blink of an eye.

As expected, Loya sighed internally. Kuzan had sensed sothing; he's warning not to get involved in this ss. But if that's the case, Kuzan-sensei, why don't you stop him?

They remained silent for a long ti. Finally, Kuzan stood up. "By the way, kid. After the assessnt, the recruits will have a week off. That's when you'll face the entire camp. Prepare well. I'm heading to the East Blue; don't slack off on your training."

"Yes! Kuzan-sensei!"

Loya waved goodbye. Seeing Kuzan retreat into the distance, he suddenly widened his eyes and shouted, "Hey! Admiral Aokiji! You demolished my house, couldn't you at least consider compensation? Even if you don't compensate , you could at least fix it!"

Kuzan: "...Ice Age!"

WHOOSH!

Frost flew through the air. Loya's house was fixed—it just happened to be made of solid, unbreakable ice.

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