One Piece: Surrounded at Marineford? Just kidding!

Chapter 299: Outrageous Speculation!

Thousands of eyes—the elites of the Red-Haired Pirates, the drunkards of the Whitebeard Pirates—were all drawn to the woman in the light at the end of the shadows.

"Smack."

A crisp cracking sound.

The huge wooden goblet in Shanks' hand slipped and smashed at his feet, splashing wine everywhere and wetting his trouser leg, but he didn't move.

He stared intently at the woman in front of him.

A different feeling exploded from the depths of his soul.

This was a feeling he had never experienced before.

His pupils shrank to the size of pinpoints.

Breathing stopped.

That's so weird.

A complete stranger.

They are younger than me.

but.

The blood in my body is boiling, roaring, and cheering.

A deep connection in the blood.

That indelible mark.

An instinct that transcends reason and memory.

Chen Ye leaned back in the chair in the main seat.

He casually picked up a grape from the plate, tossed it high into the air, and then caught it precisely with his mouth.

"Pfft."

The sound of grapes being crushed was exceptionally clear at the scene.

Chen Ye wore a standard "watching the show" expression, his eyes sweeping over Shanks' shocked face, a hint of triumphant pleasure in his eyes.

Beside him, Edward Newgate, the white-bearded man, held a huge gourd of liquor but didn't drink from it.

He looked at Shanks's stunned expression and chuckled softly.

"Gurala la la..."

The laughter was muffled, accompanied by a tremor in the chest.

The white-bearded man's face was full of mockery, his eyes looking like those of someone watching their foolish son finally see his mother, a mixture of elder's affection and the mischievousness of an old rogue who loved to watch the drama unfold.

Marco crossed his arms and leaned against the railing of the gangway.

His pineapple-shaped blond hair fluttered in the wind, his dead fish eyes were full of anticipation, and his gaze swept over the faces of the Red-Haired Pirates.

"Hey...am I drunk?"

Finally, someone in the Red-Haired Pirates' group came to their senses.

Yasopp rubbed his eyes hard, then pinched his thigh, wincing in pain before letting out a cry.

"This woman...she looks so much like our boss! They're practically identical!"

Same red hair.

The same facial features.

Even their expressions are the same.

If Shanks shaved off his beard and dressed as a woman... well, I really don't want to look at it, but it really does look like him.

Lucky Rue forgot to gnaw on the huge piece of meat with bones in his hand; he opened his mouth wide and mumbled his reply.

"Could it be... the boss's illegitimate daughter who's been living away from home? This is huge news! When did the boss have a daughter? This is incredible!"

"Idiot, how could it be a daughter!"

Someone nearby objected.

"The boss is only in his forties, but this woman looks like she's in her mid-twenties. Did the boss have a child when he was a teenager?"

"Where...is that my sister?"

"Or perhaps it's my long-lost sister?"

The Red-Haired Gang instantly erupted in chaos, with all sorts of outrageous speculations flying around, and the tense atmosphere was instantly disrupted by this group of goofballs.

"Shut up, all of you."

A cold voice extinguished the commotion.

Ben Beckman exhaled a thick smoke ring, his brows furrowed into a deep frown.

He didn't join in the commotion; instead, he stared intently at the red-haired woman with a chillingly calm gaze.

"Don't talk nonsense, look carefully."

Beckman's gaze was sharp as he spoke in a low voice to the core executives around him.

"Look at her bone age, her skin condition, and the look in her eyes."

"Although this woman is very weak and her life force is severely depleted, her biological age is definitely no more than 27 years old."

Beckman threw the cigarette butt on the ground and stomped it out.

"Our boss is almost fifty years old. How could he possibly be a daughter? It doesn't make sense in terms of age."

Yasopp scratched his filthy braid, looking completely bewildered.

"Well... could it be the boss's new lover? Or another one? After all, our boss is very charming..."

"Even more impossible."

Beckman shook his head resolutely, his expression extremely solemn.

He turned to look at Shanks, who was standing frozen, and lowered his voice.

"You've been with the boss for so many years, when have you ever seen him react like this?"

Everyone was taken aback and looked at Shanks.

The usually carefree and easygoing Red-Haired Emperor was now like a child who had lost his soul.

His hands were shaking.

Uncontrollable shaking.

Even the domineering Conqueror's Haki was thrown into chaos, spreading outwards in waves like an out-of-control tide, distorting the surrounding air.

"The pulse of blood doesn't lie."

Beckman lit another cigarette, his hand trembling slightly.

"Didn't you guys notice? The boss's breathing is all jumbled up. That's not the reaction of seeing a lover, it's the reaction of seeing... a blood relative."

Yasopp and Raki Luke exchanged a glance, their eyes filled with shock.

The two of them asked together.

"Beckman, what do you think? It can't be her sister, can it? If it were her sister, why would the boss be looking at her like that?"

Beckman did not answer immediately.

He took a drag of his cigarette, forcing himself to calm down.

His gaze swept past the crowd and landed on Chen Ye, who was calmly eating grapes high up.

The man's expression was so composed.

He seemed completely at ease, as if it were all part of his script.

"The Time-Space Emperor... Chen Ye..."

Beckman muttered to himself.

All the information about Chen Ye flashed through his mind.

Summoning figures from the past.

Manipulate the timeline.

Retrieving people from the long river of history.

Fragments rapidly pieced together in his mind, ultimately pointing to an absurd yet logically unique truth.

"I have an extremely bold, even outrageous, conjecture."

Beckman exhaled smoke, his voice somewhat hoarse.

The crowd immediately gathered around.

Beckman lowered his voice, pointed at the red-haired woman, and then at Shanks.

"Considering this woman's appearance, that undeniable sense of bloodline resonance, and the abilities of Chen Ye, nicknamed 'The Emperor of Time and Space'..."

He paused, as if to bolster his courage, and then spoke slowly and deliberately.

"My gut feeling tells me that this woman... could be Shanks' mother."

Dead silence.

Yasopp and the others' eyes nearly popped out of their sockets, and their jaws almost hit their feet.

"What?!"

A few seconds later, Yasopp let out a strange cry and almost jumped up.

"Beckman, are you crazy? Did a donkey kick your brain? How could the boss's mother be younger than the boss! This woman is only in her twenties, and the boss is almost fifty! This doesn't make sense!"

Raki Lu shook his head like a rattle-drum.

"Yeah, Benkman, this is outrageous! You'd be more like the boss time-traveled!"

"Time travel..."

Beckman seized on the word, pointing at Chen Ye with eyes as sharp as knives.

"Don't forget what that man's title is."

"Time and Space Emperor"

"Don't forget the intelligence we obtained about the Marineford War. Chenye can summon figures from the past, and even people from the future can briefly appear. What if... he brought people from the past to the present?"

Beckman's voice grew softer, but his logic became clearer, sending chills down one's spine.

"If Chen Ye went back to when he was born decades ago, when that woman was still young, and brought her to this era."

"So, a mother in her twenties, facing a forty-year-old son..."

"This paradox is perfectly valid in the face of the 'Time-Space Emperor's' abilities."