One Piece: Blue Scale Admiral

Upon hearing the boy's shout, the little girl, who had been curled up and sobbing while hugging her knees, quickly wiped away her tears, got up from the wooden board, and forced a weak smile onto her face.

"Brother, you're back?"

Seeing that the girl was alright, the little boy relaxed, a smile spreading across his dark little face as he held up the fish in his hand.

"Alice! Look, what's this?"

The little girl saw the fish he was holding, couldn't help but lick her lips, swallowed hard, and exclaimed happily, "Brother, did you catch another fish?"

"Yes! I told you I'm really good at catching fish. With me here, Alice, you won't go hungry. Here, I'll grill this fish for you right now."

The little boy, holding a fish in one hand and his sister's hand in the other, walked into the dimly lit room and squatted down on the ground next to the broken wooden plank.

The little boy rubbed his stiff hands and feet, picked up a pile of dry grass he had gathered from beside the wooden board, and then took out two flints from under the board. He quickly started to make a fire.

He wasn't wearing shoes, and his soles were red and swollen from the cold.

A cold wind blew in through the cracks in the window, causing the two children huddled together to shiver.

"Click, click."

Sparks flew from the flint in the little boy's hand, illuminating the expectant faces of the two boys.

The weather wasn't very good today. The leak in the roof made the dry grass we collected a bit damp, and even with sparks from the flint flying onto it, it still wouldn't ignite.

After being hit more than a dozen times, the little boy was panting heavily, his hands so cold they wouldn't obey his commands.

He turned back to his sister with an apologetic look, picked up the fish from the ground, wiped it in his pocket, and handed it to the little girl.

"Alice, you must be starving. The hay is too wet to light. Looks like we'll have to eat raw fish again today."

"Brother, you eat. I've been home all this time, I'm not hungry." The little girl Alice licked her lips and pushed the fish the boy offered back.

“I’ve already eaten. I forgot to tell you, I caught two fish at the beach during the day. I ate the big one, and I’m very full now. You eat, and I’ll try to light the fire again.”

The little boy stuffed the fish into Alice's arms, and before his sister could say anything, he turned around, squatted down, picked up the two cold flints, and began to strike them again.

Behind her, Alice, holding a fish in her hand, hesitated for a moment, swallowed her saliva, and then put the fish to her mouth and took a bite.

Reiju stood outside the house watching quietly. Suddenly, she raised her hand and shot a tiny spark from her fingertip into the withered grass in front of the little boy.

The next moment, black smoke and flames immediately rose from the damp, dry grass.

"It's on fire! Alice, I've lit a fire!"

The little boy saw the dry grass being lit and immediately exclaimed in surprise. He went to the wooden board and got a few more dry branches, which he placed on the burning grass. Then he looked at his sister.

Seeing her younger sister struggling to bite the palm-sized fish, her shrunken body trembling uncontrollably, she quickly pulled her sister down to squat down near the burning fire, saying, "Alice, the fire's lit, so you don't have to eat it raw. I'll help you roast it."

"Okay, here you go." Alice obediently handed the little fish to the little boy.

The little boy picked up a dry twig, stuck it into the fish's mouth, and placed it on the fire.

Two thin bodies pressed close to the fire, watching the small fish being roasted by the flames.

The flickering firelight illuminated their little faces, conveying a sense of warmth.

"Did you see that? A small fish and a simple fire are enough to keep two fragile lives alive. If the Germa army comes, that little fire will be extinguished. Countless people who are already lonely and poor will die one by one. Do you want to stain this already desolate and ruined country with more blood?"

"Vinsmoke, Reiju."

Reiju slowly turned around and saw a woman with a cigarette in her mouth and her chest exposed, walking out of the darkness.

Chapter 432 I Want to Find Someone

The strange woman who emerged from the darkness was dressed very boldly.

She wore a very short skirt on her lower body, and a pair of red boots on her long, fair, and plump legs. On her upper body, she only wore an open red leather armor coat.

What's astonishing is that she appears to be wearing nothing underneath her open leather armor.

A pair of exaggeratedly full, voluptuous breasts were faintly visible in the darkness, their allure enhanced by the hazy glow of the cigarette dangling from her red lips.

"you are?"

Reiju didn't recognize the person, but her Observation Haki told her that the person in front of her was no ordinary person; a powerful force was hidden within her hot body.

"Let me introduce myself since this is our first meeting. I am Belo Betty, the commander of the Eastern Army of the Revolutionary Army. You can call me Betty."

Betty pulled down her pink glasses, making no attempt to conceal her footsteps or care about the muddy ground beneath her feet. She walked straight to Reiju, brushed past her, and headed towards the room where the children were.

Hearing the sound, the two children who were warming themselves by the fire in the house became nervous.

"Alice! Hide well and don't come out. I'm going to check."

The little boy quickly pulled his sister up, pushed her to the corner of the room, picked up a tattered rag bag from the ground, and covered her with it.

“Brother…” The little girl Alice held half a grilled fish in her hand, her face filled with panic and her voice trembling with tears as she looked at the little boy.

"Don't be afraid, your brother will be back soon. Alice, be good and don't make a sound."

The little boy patted Alice's head and then covered her with the cloth bag.

Hearing footsteps approaching the door, he didn't have time to extinguish the fire. He ran to the door, grabbed a stick, and rushed out.

Despite being less than 1.3 meters tall and having a thin and frail body, the little boy's expression was resolute.

He grabbed a stick and rushed to the doorway, pointing at the approaching footsteps. He shouted in a harsh tone, "I don't care who you are! Don't come any closer! If you're not afraid of dying, then come on over!"

In the dim light of night, a little boy stands alone at the dilapidated doorway, facing the unknown enemy lurking in the darkness.

"Little Rao, it's been a long time. You've become a brave and qualified warrior now."

In the darkness, Betty, with a bright smile on her face, stepped out and walked up to the little boy named Raoh.

When Rao saw the person who had arrived, his face lit up with surprise. He put down the stick he had been raising. "Sister Betty! You're back!"

"Ah."

Betty crouched down, opened her arms, and, ignoring Rao's dirty clothes, picked him up in one go.

Rao's dark little face immediately turned red, and he tried to break free in embarrassment, but Betty held him tightly in her arms.

"Sister Betty, put me down..."

"Hehe, you've learned to be shy now, huh? Looks like you've grown up. But I already said you have to call Betty Mommy." Betty teased him for a while, then put him down.

Lao rushed into the room, lifted the tattered sack covering his sister, and took her hand, exclaiming happily, "Alice, look who's here!"

The little girl held half a grilled fish in her hand and looked timidly towards the doorway of the room.

Upon seeing Betty's appearance, she immediately burst into tears, abandoning the grilled fish in her hand, and ran crying to Betty.

"Mommy Betty, I missed you so much, you're finally back."

"Yes, Betty's mother is back. This time, I'll take you away to a place where you won't go hungry." Betty gently bent down and picked up Alice, lifting her coat and tucking Alice's frostbitten, red and swollen hands and feet into her warm chest.

"Really? Is it going to heaven? Mom and Dad are there too. I heard that heaven is the best place in the world, where you will never go hungry and there will be endless milk and bread."

Alice clung tightly to Betty's neck, as if afraid Betty would suddenly disappear.

"No, we won't go there yet. But the place we're going to is also a beautiful and warm place, like paradise. There are many children like you there, and many kind uncles, aunts, grandpas, and grandmas. We'll all work together to build our home."

Betty, holding Alice and leading Rao, knelt down in front of the dying fire.

Raoh looked at Reiju, who followed Betty in, and said nothing.

Reiju entered the room, picked up a few dry branches from the corner, and placed them on the dying embers of the fire.

"That's not how it works. You have to use dry grass first. Doing it that way will extinguish the fire!" Lao hurriedly reached out to remove the few dry branches pressing down on the fire.

But soon, he was dumbfounded.

Because he saw a dazzling tongue of fire shoot out from Reiju's sleeve, radiating a scorching and warm temperature, instantly igniting the hard-to-light dry branches, which then burned very vigorously.

"What is this? It's amazing." Rao stared enviously at Reiju's sleeve.

If he had something that could breathe fire, he could light a fire every day and wouldn't have to suffer from the cold.

"Want it? Here you go." Reiju took off the flame-breathing device from her wrist and handed it to Raoh. "These three buttons, from left to right, can spray flames in three levels. Level one can be used to start a fire, and level three is the most powerful and can be used to fight enemies."

Raoh looked at the bracelet-like flamethrower in Reiju's hand with interest, hesitated for a moment, and did not immediately take it, but turned to look at Betty.

"Please accept this. This is from Reiju-neechan," Betty said with a smile.

"Thank you, Reiju-neechan." Rao accepted the bracelet, thanked Reiju happily, and played with the fiery red bracelet in his hand with great affection.

He put the bracelet on his right hand.

The bracelet was a bit too big, so Rao used it as an arm protector and put it on his arm.

With this bracelet, he no longer has to worry about not being able to start a fire.

Reiju crouched down by the fire, looking at Betty illuminated by the flickering flames, and the little girl sleeping in her arms, and asked with a complicated expression, "Are they your children?"

“They are my children now.” Betty gently patted Alice, who was sleeping in her arms. “Lao and Alice’s parents both died from lead poisoning. Last year, when we came to the North Sea to buy food to support refugees in the South China Sea, we passed through Frivans and stopped here.”

She sighed, looking at the drafty room, and said with emotion, "That day, I saw a little girl naked, standing on a mountain of garbage, searching for something to eat. She fainted from hunger. Rao, who was fishing on the beach, rescued the little girl and took care of her like his own sister."

Betty reached out and patted Rao's head.

Rao picked up the half-eaten grilled fish that Alice had left on the ground and ate it with relish.

The grilled fish had no seasoning, was undercooked, and the flesh was still bloody; it hadn't even been properly prepared.

But Rao ate with great relish, not even wanting to throw away the fish bones, carefully putting them away in a small bag.

These fish bones can be made into simple fishhooks for fishing.

Although it's quite fragile, it's fine for catching small fish.

“I originally wanted to take them with me. But at that time, our Revolutionary Army was in a bad situation. We had to travel around to provide disaster relief while also fighting off the encirclement and suppression by the World Government. It would only be more difficult if they came with us.”

Betty looked at the silent Reiju. "Reiju, I can see that you are not like your brothers and father. You are not the kind of cruel and bloodthirsty person. Look at the situation here. More than a decade ago, when the lead poisoning outbreak occurred, Flevance had already become a dead country, abandoned and forgotten by the whole world."

"First, because of the struggle for the lucrative platinum and lead mines, the royal family of the Kingdom of Frevans was wiped out by the former Kingdom of Prince and the Kingdom of Lubnilu, who forcibly seized the mines."

"Then came the large-scale outbreak of platinum lead poisoning, and the world government and two member states, under pressure from public opinion, withdrew from here with a large sum of money they had earned."

"What remains is endless desolation and ruin, trampled by war and disease."

“Those who contracted platinum lead poisoning, those young men and women, after dying one after another, left behind elderly people and young children. When the elderly also died, these orphaned and helpless children lived directly in this hellish world.”

“But even so, the cruelty of the world has not spared this place.” Betty’s eyes showed an uncontrollable anger. “Slave traders and organ dealers from all over the world would sail into the Kingdom of Frevans every now and then, roaming around and plundering people.”

"They appear openly and honestly, without needing to deliberately hide their tracks. This is because the world has abandoned this country. The World Government will not care about the life or death of a worthless non-member state, and even pirates will not come here to plant their flags, because there is nothing here."