How much time had passed?

Alvida glanced at her wristwatch, then lifted her gaze toward the crew resting inside the palace. It had taken them about twenty minutes to fight off and shake free of the city’s swarm of monsters.

To hide their tracks and carve out a place to rest, they had entered a palace that looked long abandoned. Kuro and Hachi worked together to shut the massive front doors.

“Search around,” Captain Davy Jones ordered. “Find a way to get some light in here.”

The palace was pitch-black, but Alvida managed to find an old fire pit. She gathered dry scraps, tossed them in, and had Hachi light it with the lighter he carried. Soon the chamber glowed with firelight.

Kuro sat cross-legged against one of the great stone pillars, eyes closed in feigned sleep.

The nonstop running and fighting earlier had taken a heavy toll on him.

Had the captain not unleashed his Conqueror’s Haki to drive the monsters back, their ending might have been too grim to imagine.

The display deepened Kuro’s understanding of Haki.

If my Cat Claws, sharpened with Haki… the result would be obvious.

The rest of the crew either sat or sprawled out, savoring the rare silence.

The bonfire crackled. After about fifteen minutes, their energy had mostly returned, and they began to explore the palace.

They found all sorts of things—empty potion bottles, broken quills, and even a book left on a shelf deep within the palace.

“Let me see what this says,” Alvida said, taking the book from Hachi.

She carried it back to the fire, sat down, and quietly began flipping through its pages.

It seemed to record the martial arts of the four Spire disciplines, divided into red, green, blue, and purple sections. Unfortunately, the text remained unreadable, so she had to rely on the illustrations to guess at their abilities.

The hawk-mask warrior in red armor, the one who once wielded Hachi’s scythefand, appeared again and again with fierce offense and unshakable defense.

The green-robed figure with a ram’s skull carried a snake-like dagger in one hand, and in the other a potion bottle bubbling with venom.

A blue automaton was drawn with four orbs orbiting it, each representing a different element. And a masked woman in a violet kimono appeared often against backdrops split between serene blue and explosive red.

But no matter how developed their arts had become, no matter how strong their factions grew, none had ever breached the Spire.

In the end, their lives must have been smothered by the environment within. The Spirefolk had gone extinct.

Alvida’s speculation wasn’t groundless. After all, they had already reached the second layer—yet not a single living Spire dweller had appeared.

“How pitiful…” she murmured. “To slaughter monsters beneath the sea, where survival itself is the greatest luxury—freedom doesn’t even enter the question.”

And freedom without fear or chains—that was exactly the future Captain Davy Jones pursued. The crew was beginning to see this truth more clearly with each step.

If he really reaches that future… won’t we, as his followers, share in that prize as well?

Alvida flipped another page. She found lists of strange tools and relics—among them even a smaller version of the Goblin’s Horn.

It seemed to be a kind of catalog, much like the Devil Fruit encyclopedia, recording treasures the Spire people had identified as possessing unusual powers.

Some were artifacts left behind by the first generation who built the Spire, some were harvested from monsters, and some were forged later by Spire descendants.

But since the Spirefolk were likely long extinct, all of these now counted as relics.

Each held strange, wondrous effects—but who could say how many of those recorded here still existed?

“Bah, why should I worry on their behalf? Under the captain’s lead, we may well fulfill their wish ourselves.”

As Alvida turned the page, a muffled sound echoed from deeper within the palace. Listening carefully, it was clearly the tread of massive footsteps.

The crew all turned toward the darkness—only Davy Jones remained seated by the fire.

“What was that noise?”

“What now?”

The pounding thud, thud, thud drew nearer. A golden greatsword and a heavy triangular shield came into view first—then the colossal figure clad in armor. His towering helmet nearly scraped the ceiling.

“A giant?!” Buggy yelped. “And even for a giant—he’s massive!”

It turned out not all who built the Spire had perished fighting monsters. One giant warrior had chosen instead to embrace utter madness.

This armored giant was the ruler of the second layer.

“Raaahhh!”

With a roar, he swung his greatsword. Golden light erupted, and the explosive shockwave shattered the palace floor, toppling several stone pillars at once!

With a thunderous crash, the upper ceiling collapsed, spilling in the glow of luminous stones that paved the city’s dome above.

The armored giant, wearing even a golden crown, charged forward with murderous intent.

“Back!”

“Watch out!”

The crew scattered—while at last, Davy Jones rose slowly from beside the fire.

His writhing tentacles spread wide. From his back unfurled a pair of fleshy wings. A black staff materialized in his hand.

“I’ve said it many times before—don’t panic.”

He didn’t need to finish. The crew already understood what he meant.

They looked on, half-stunned. Their captain’s calm, unshaken composure, even before a collapsing palace and a charging giant, steadied their own hearts.

From the East Blue, to Reverse Mountain, to Arabasta, and now the abyssal Spire—Captain Davy Jones had never once shown fear.

When a strong foe blocked the path—he simply broke through.

A fever of loyalty surged within the crew. For a moment, it was as if they themselves were the ones standing proud before the giant warrior.

“Do you fear death?” Davy Jones asked, turning to them.

Every head shook.

“Good. If you’d changed since the day I chose you, I’d think I’d chosen the wrong men.”

Their captain’s words steadied them further. Fear ebbed. Even their excitement was checked, transformed into cold resolve.

With the captain here, what was there to fear? Hadn’t they always known—so long as he led, nothing could crush them?

The armored giant muttered something in a tongue none could understand, then loosed a deafening roar. He hurled his bulk into the air, bringing the greatsword crashing down toward Davy Jones.

BOOM!

The ground, already fractured, split apart once more beneath the strike. But Davy Jones was no longer there.

As the giant searched for the tentacled man, a golden shield suddenly slammed against his helmet.

With a hiss, every reserve of poison gas within the shield vented straight into the seams of the giant’s helm.

But for a creature of such scale, the dosage was far too little. The poison had no immediate effect.

With a furious swing, the giant’s blade cleaved Buggy in half.

But slashing was the least of Buggy’s fears. His Chop-Chop powers let his body split and rejoin instantly.

The problem was—his bombs, bullets, and poisons were all spent.

The giant warrior seemed puzzled why Buggy hadn’t died. Raising his sword to try again, he suddenly felt a piercing pain in his knee.

Looking down, he saw it—Davy Jones had driven his black staff, clad in Armament Haki, straight through the armor and flesh of his left knee.

For the first time, the crew heard the giant scream—a sound that was both rage and agony.

He staggered, swinging wildly, but his sword struck only air, as if trying to blast a sparrow with a cannon.

And now, with his defense broken, the crew pounced.

Kuro slashed, Alvida struck, Hachi stabbed, Mikita stomped. Blow after blow hammered the crippled joint.

In moments, the armored giant lost a leg—his vast body toppled forward, crashing to the ground with an earthshaking rumble.

This time, his roar sounded like a wail of despair.

Without realizing it, the crew no longer saw him as a terrifying monster lord.

He was simply one more Spire beast—felled by their hands.

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Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep