"... Dark clouds gather ahead." Linda commented as she looked at the sky.
Leylin, who was sitting next to her at the open lunch area of the ship, looked at the sky and squinted his eyes before asking, "If you would allow me, I don't believe there will be a storm. The sky is quite clear."
Linda shook her head as she looked at the horizon. "My gut never lies. Something will happen soon, something we might not be ready for."
She looked at Leylin with serious eyes. "Leylin. Take the ship and go, stay under the radar while you grow our army"
Leylin's eyes almost bulged out of his sockets, "L-lord madam, what do you mean? What's going on?"
She smiled sadly as she took a paper out of the hidden pocket in her shirt, "I received a report from a spy I sent to a nearby marine base. Apparently, the marines got desperate, and someone you people can't handle volunteered to help."
"But, lord madam, can't we just escape? We can simply hide for a year, wait for the water to cool..." Leylin begged. Linda was the heart of their ship, their strongest and fiercest member, as well as the de facto leader of the ship.
If she was gone, who knows what might happen. Their combined strength was powerful enough to challenge the strongest rival fleets that roamed the East Blue, but with Linda, they stood uncontested. They had already established that after a short meeting with a few other pirate fleets, where Linda had single-handedly beaten all their captains in a few minutes.
"Don't worry. I don't plan on abandoning you all. I only ask you to stay low for a while, because I have a plan. A very risky plan, but I believe the risk is worth it." Linda got up as she walked over to the edge of the ship, watching the deep blue ocean below.
"Have you ever heard of Impel Down?" Linda asked. Hearing this, Leylin became horrified as he recalled what he knew.
"The hell on earth, the world government's ultimate prison, a place where none can escape. Lord madam, you surely don't intend to... to..." He staggered a bit. He, Breaker and a few other advisors were the only ones who knew fully of Linda's powers, as she had explained it to them in great detail.
"Indeed. Although it isn't guaranteed that they won't execute me, I'm confident in being able to hide in that prison. Then, I can slowly start becoming stronger. The level system also works great for me, as it'll allow me to start off easy and then move on to harder prey." Linda slapped Lelin on the chest, pushing a small card on him.
"I got a Vivre card just because of this. As long as it remains, you will know I'm alive. Should it burn out, well... That means you will all be free to go. You can use it as a negotiation card, to remind the other captains that I'm still here. Now go, I can sense that they're near." Linda looked at the horizon as Leylin reluctantly obeyed.
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This was extremely sudden, but not impossible. They had been doing extreme act after act, and it was a wonder why the Marines hadn't responded sooner.
The morning of the next day, the entire ship knew about the event to some extent. Linda patted a small 13-years old boy on the back as he silently looked at her.
"Don't worry, Breaker. I'll be back. For now, focus on maintaining the ship and it's crew, alright?" Linda asked. The Breaker nodded silently as the watchdog shouted.
"4 marine ships at the horizon! Three regular marine ships and a strange... dog ship?" The watchdog sounded confused. The entire crew rushed to look at the encroaching fleet.
"Mhm... We're screwed. That's Marine Hero Garp's ship." Linda sighed. "Damn it all to hell, you guys tuck your tails and run as fast as you can. Full speed ahead!"
Although their ship was faster than the 3 regular marine ships, Garp's ship seemed to be even faster. Soon, it was less than 300 meters away.
Seeing this, Linda snarled as she slammed her hands together. When she reopened them, an almost fiery blue sphere of energy was in between them, pulsing.
"Stupid Marines, meet Shining Death Ball." She roared as she threw the death sphere at the dog ship.
Instead of exploding, however, the sphere was met with another sphere, a cannonball. Although it wasn't damaged, the death sphere deviated it's course, hitting the ocean near the ship instead of the ship itself.
After a few seconds, a tyrannical roar erupted from underwater and a great column rose. Other than that, however, there was no damage to the ship.
Seeing this, Linda jumped down from the water and literally ran on water, abusing her barrier powers to create large enough footholds beneath her in order not to sink as she ran towards the Marine ship.
When she was less than 40 meters from the ship, she could see Garp standing at the edge of the ship, staring at her with arms crossed. He wasn't wearing the usual marine outfit, making him look much fiercer.
She wasn't dumb enough to attack the unknown head-on, and furthermore, her role was not to win but to stop the ship from chasing her crew. Hence, she began to bombard the dog ship as she ran circles around it, tanking all the bullets that the Marines tried to shoot her.
Finally, Garp jumped down from the ship and tried to punch her, but she jumped back and ran off towards the other marine ships, forcing Garp and his ship to give chase.
"Stop running!" He roared out, but Linda completely ignored him while giving him the middle finger. This angered him, and he began swimming alarmingly fast towards her.
"Get me if you can, you male bitch." She laughed. When she reached the other marine ships, she threw herself in one of them, destroying everything in her wake. Shining rays of death constantly came off from her, making loud explosions and ravaging the ship.
In less than 20 seconds, she slaughtered almost 1/3 of the crew and destroyed half of the ship. Before Garp could catch up, she quickly moved on to the other ship.
Instead of destroying it, she turned towards Garp and shouted: "Stop right there, or I'll kill everyone here."
Garp's face twitched but he didn't stop and continued to swim after her. Seeing this, she shot over 100 rays into the ship. This time, the entire ship blew up, killing almost everyone. She then jumped off of that ship and landed on the other ship, facing Garp and smiling cruelly.
This time, Garp stopped as he snarled. "What do you want and why are you doing this?"
Linda lowered her hands as the marines of the ship, although terrified, surrounded her. "I'm willing to surrender under these conditions..."