One Piece: Buggy the Clown Who Fell From Grace

On the somewhat filthy deck, several unrecognizable corpses lay scattered about.

There are men and women.

These were all spoils of their looting.

The stinking pirates indulged in wine and meat, rewarding themselves for slaughtering several unarmed civilians and burning a village that only knew how to beg for mercy to ashes.

The wine, meat, and cheers of one's companions can suppress all unnecessary emotions.

All that's left is pleasure.

Someone asked impatiently, "Captain, when are we going to the next village?"

"You son of a bitch, you've only been at sea a short while and you're already thinking about the next village?!"

The captain licked the bottle opening and then casually tossed it aside.

The ornate wine bottle crashed onto the deck and shattered instantly.

Just you wait!

"I'd rather take a longer route than miss that foggy sea area."

"Are we going to the Sabaody Archipelago? I heard it's in a lot of trouble there right now."

"Go to hell!" The pirate captain, having snatched another bottle of wine from one of his men, staggered unsteadily.

"I go to sea for money and women, why would I bother fighting those monsters for it!"

"You think I'm some kind of madman like the Joker?"

"Yes, women and money!"

"And wine and meat!"

"Hahahaha!"

The crew members kept echoing this.

The unrestrained laughter instantly heated up the atmosphere on the ship.

The pirate captain took another swig; the taste was nothing like the bottle of tequila.

But he enjoyed this half-drunk, half-awake feeling.

My gaze fell upon the crimson moonlight, where a thin white mist concealed the surging sea.

"Compared to those monsters, I'd rather bump into a ghost, hehehe."

The pirate captain couldn't help but laugh at his own thoughts.

The smile didn't fade.

A surging wave crashed against the ship under the cover of white mist.

The violent shaking and the increasingly dense fog instantly brought the pirate crew, who had been wandering in the Paradise area, back to their senses.

"...What is it?!"

There's something moving underwater!

"Fuck your mother's fart!"

The pirate captain, refusing to believe it, threw the bottle aside and drew his sword, pointing it at the white mist.

"I'm the sea—"

The pirate captain suddenly paused in his speech.

He saw it.

Suddenly, a terrifying gecko head, comparable in size to a sea monster, emerged from the white mist.

Then another surging ocean current crashed in.

The gecko, dragging its frog-like paws, swooped down and slid over.

The pirate captain could see it more clearly now.

But this scene is even clearer.

The courage he had been fueled by the strong liquor vanished in an instant!

This is a giant gecko that has been dead for an unknown period of time but is still swimming on the sea.

Half of its head was covered in rotten flesh.

The other half of his face looked terribly swollen, as if it had been soaking in water for who knows how many years.

Even their skin was deathly pale.

The occasional, solitary movement of the eyeballs is even more chilling.

"Sail, there's a sail!"

The crew pointed tremblingly at the night sky.

A completely black skull sail emerged from the white mist, with a ring of flickering dark flames on either side of the white skull head.

Beneath the black sail lies an island standing on the back of a dead gecko.

The pirate captain seemed to remember something, staring at the black sail as he murmured:

"Moonlight Moria."

Former Shichibukai

After more than a decade of silence, people have forgotten this terrifying ghost ship, a former Shichibukai that only sails at night, and which once stirred up countless horrific legends on the sea.

The gecko's terrifying head swam slowly past their pirate ship.

The last remaining pale pupil seemed not to even glance at them.

The geckos move very gently; if it weren't for the surging currents beneath the fog, they wouldn't have noticed so early.

It let us go!

The pirate captain almost burst into tears, and the heart that had been in his throat suddenly relaxed.

Thank goodness, we're just insignificant little pirates.

He turned his back, his once flushed face now deathly pale.

"Leave here"

Before the pirate captain could finish speaking, he felt a chill run down his spine from his tailbone to the top of his head.

The gecko quietly turned its head away.

With its mouth open, the long, rotting tongue rolled up the entire pirate ship.

There was a bang.

They swallowed the pirate ship whole.

Standing atop the black sail, Bucky took in everything.

He had been wondering for a while what powered Moria's ship.

The answer to the question is now clear.

A dead gecko, or rather, a gecko-shaped sea monster that has been dead for a long time.

His skin was similar to Moria's pale white, with a faint layer of smooth mucous membrane on it.

This method is probably to avoid the weakness of Moria's shadow manipulation, which would fail when it encounters seawater.

As for why this gecko can float on the sea surface and even support the weight of an island, that remains to be seen.

Bucky remembered the stench that emanated from the intestines of a gecko when it opened its mouth.

This is similar to why the dead float.

The giant gecko's body had long since decomposed, and the various gases produced by this process actually supported its enormous size.

Moria, on the other hand, controls the gecko through shadow manipulation.

However, Bucky was unsure whether the gecko's corpse came first, and Moria built the island on its back, or whether the gecko had already carried the island on its back long before.

After all, building an island is far more difficult than building a pirate ship.

Hehehehe!

"Forward, Thriller Bark! I will make the World Government know how terrifying Moria is!"

Not far away.

Moria, unusually, picked up his longsword again, pointing it at the deserted night sky and shouting incessantly.

Perhaps because he had lost too much blood, Moria's size had shrunk by two sizes, but the long sword he used in his youth still looked rather small in his hand.

He looked very enthusiastic and passionate.

It seems I left too much black.

Bucky stroked his chin and bit the corner of his mouth.

He thought of an even more interesting question.

I wonder if this gecko can climb onto the red soil continent?

After all, the fact that they appeared on the Grand Line means they successfully overcame the Reverse Mountain obstacle...

(End of this chapter)

Chapter 43 Mini-Games

"Mr. Jacques."

"Even if Major Yaro's body is never found, we will certainly carry on Lord Yaro's legacy!"

In front of Major Yaro's cenotaph.

Swan's little face was full of determination.

After this period of training, she has completely transformed from a kidnapped young lady into someone who can hold the head of the slave-catching team by the hammer.