"Co on, don't be mad, Crocodile."
Ozz spread his hands and offered a conciliatory smile at her thunderous expression.
"Tch."
"I don't have ti to waste being mad at you."
Arms folded, Crocodile let Ozz talk her around until, by the end of his andering explanation, the culprit for everything sohow beca the Marines.
If those idiots had told her sooner about Ozz and Mihawk, would she have rotted in Impel Down that long?
"Damn Marines…"
She filed the debt away. She would collect with interest.
"Lord Ozz, your iced drinks."
The two young attendants, Little Six and Little Seven, approached with trays, then moved behind Ozz and began kneading his shoulders with almost smoldering devotion. Even Ozz felt a little overwheld and leaned in to whisper a few quick words. Both girls flushed, nodded, and behaved.
"There must have been plenty of strong swordsn down in Impel Down."
On the other side, Hawk Eyes had perked up at Crocodile's stint in the prison. He asked unprompted, purely because every notable swordsman across the seas had already crossed blades with him. If anywhere still hid great blades, it was the place that housed legends.
Level 6. Infinite Hell.
At the ntion, Crocodile's face tightened, but she still humored him.
"Strong swordsn? Hard to tell. Down there most of them had their blades confiscated. There was one man though. An old rival. And he has sothing to do with you…"
She looked at Ozz. He arched a brow, thought a beat, and said what they were all thinking.
"Douglas Bullet?"
If there was anyone in Infinite Hell with a tie to him, it was the Demon Heir who had once sailed under Roger.
"Yeah."
Crocodile described the mont.
"Soone like you ended up here too, Crocodile?"
In a dim corridor a hulking figure sat cross-legged behind bars, pressure rolling off him. Shackled in seastone and being marched past, Crocodile paused and turned her hooded gaze his way.
"Hey. No stopping…"
A guard started to bark, then another, quicker on the uptake, yanked him quiet. Were they insane? This inmate was not like the rest. A connected one. Soday he could walk free. Offend the wrong people and the prison would not lift a finger to save a guard.
So Crocodile stopped. Their eyes t through iron. She recognized him imdiately.
"You."
"Bullet."
She chose the cell beside his. The guards grimaced and locked her in.
A wall apart, two forr heavyweights sat in chains.
"Been a while. How'd you get thrown in?"
"…Attacked the Marines."
Life inside was mind-numbing. Aside from reading the papers, Crocodile had nothing. Bored prisoners talked.
"The guards treat you different," Bullet noted between push-ups, glancing sideways toward her cell.
Crocodile was the sa. She respected him as a foe, and talk ca easily.
"Yeah. I'm getting out soon."
"Huh?"
Bullet paused and looked fully her way.
"You should know the na. Ozz is coming to pull ."
She said it casually, and the na detonated behind Bullet's eyes. His gaze turned razor sharp.
"The Ozz you an is…"
"Dotor Ozz."
At that, images flared in Bullet's mind. A prodigy a few years his junior on the Oro Jackson. The only one who had ever made him feel sothing like anticipation.
"Right. There's only one Ozz on this sea."
She had forgotten how long Bullet had been buried and how thin his news might be. When she realized, she sketched the broad strokes. Ozz's rise. His deeds. The era bending around his wake.
The more she said, the more he grinned.
"Hahaha. I knew it. That brat…"
Potential to rival Roger. World's strongest, is it?
"After Roger, I thought the world would be boring. Guess I was wrong."
For Bullet, no better news existed.
Before he left Roger's crew, he had staked his pride on it. With that talent and will, Ozz would beco one of the next true apex predators. Ti had proved him right.
"I finally have a target again."
Crocodile could only sweat at his bravado through the wall.
He was really that fearless? She herself had been beaten into acceptance by Ozz. The gap was too vast to bridge. But Bullet's fighting spirit burned clean and steady.
Even as she was released, she still could not fathom where his certainty ca from.
Ozz, on the other hand, understood. Understanding did not make it less of a headache.
"Bullet, huh…"
"After all these years, he still rembers . Figures."
Crocodile snorted.
"Wipe that look off your face. It's not like Bullet is getting out of Impel Down. A miracle like Shiki only happens once."
"In this new era, nothing is impossible."
Ozz crossed one leg over the other, smile playing at the corner of his mouth.
"Any day now."
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