Pirate: Hades! ( One Piece)

Chapter 313: Changes in the World Government

For the World Government, the overall environment of the Great Sea was relatively peaceful.

The World Conference began in the later stages of the Sword Tournament.

Perhaps thanks to the influence of the Sword Tournament, which gathered many Great Pirate on Paros Island, there wasn't much loss of Heavenly Tribute.

In the Grand Line, two Pirate Crew separately targeted a portion of the Heavenly Tribute and managed to plunder it.

However, the Marines quickly reacted and recovered it.

In that sense, the World Government should even thank the Kronos Kingdom.

Nevertheless, many Pirate caused trouble during the Sword Tournament.

With the end of the Sword Tournament, the Great Sea, which had been somewhat calm, would definitely become lively again.

The Four Seas were self-explanatory.

Thanks to the efforts of the Marines, order had been restored in some areas of the Four Seas.

This significantly reduced the pressure on the Marines, but it was still not enough to satisfy the Member Nation.

At least it gave the Member Nation an explanation.

Based on his merit in suppressing a Sea Area, Zephyr, at the age of thirty-eight, was officially promoted to Marine Admiral after the World Conference and Sword Tournament concluded.

With the deliberate propaganda by the World Government and the Marines, this news quickly spread throughout the entire World.

Adding one more Marine Admiral, even though the overall strength of the Marines hadn't changed, their deterrence had indeed increased.

If Garp hadn't once again refused the promotion to Admiral, the Marines would have had four Admiral.

Currently, there is still one Admiral, Shikai, who will retire in two years.

As for the New World, due to the unprecedented peace brought by the Sword Tournament, no one dared to invade the Territory of the Great Pirate who went to Paros Island.

To be honest, the World Peace Organization should award Hades a World Peace Prize.

Small-scale conflicts were constant, but large-scale conflicts, aside from the Byrnndi Pirates and the Marines, were practically non-existent.

Byrnndi World could be said to have caused the World Government a great deal of trouble.

The objective of the Byrnndi Pirates was something everyone was curious about.

The conflict between the Marines and the Byrnndi Pirates had always been under observation.

Two months before the Sword Tournament began, Byrnndi World finally left the area of the New World's First Half where he had been entrenched for over half a year.

It seemed he hadn't found what he was looking for and retreated reluctantly.

However, two of the World Government's Secret Research Base were exposed and suffered heavy damage.

This was clearly a significant loss for the World Government.

These two Secret Base definitely couldn't be kept; they had to be abandoned and rebuilt, and selecting a new location would also require considerable effort.

They couldn't do it before the Marines returned to the New World, as the possibility of exposure was too great, or they could directly transfer the Research Base to the First Half of the Grand Line.

The news of the World Conference was overshadowed by the Sword Tournament.

After all, the World Conference happens every four years.

The Sword Tournament, however, was an unprecedented first.

Nevertheless, Hades had been keeping a close watch on the relevant information from the World Conference.

It was the same old topic: increasing the share of Heavenly Tribute.

Due to the downfall of the Rocks Pirates, the amount of Heavenly Tribute from a single Member Nation had increased from the original 3 billion Beli to 5 billion Beli.

Currently, the World Government still has 128 Member Nation, sixteen of which, due to being re-established, need time to recover and develop and are temporarily not required to pay Heavenly Tribute.

Looking at it this way, the total amount of Heavenly Tribute the World Government could receive would reach 560 billion Beli.

In essence, the value of Heavenly Tribute hasn't changed, because the Beli is undergoing devaluation.

This is something the World Government brought upon themselves, and it's a necessary burden for them to bear.

However, with a large sum of funds injected, the World Government will be much better off and will invest more funds into the Marines.

The military budget of the Marines accounts for approximately 12% of the total Heavenly Tribute, an increase of two percentage points compared to the previous 10%, approaching 70 billion Beli.

It's worth noting that in the past, the Marines' military budget only accounted for 4-5% of the Heavenly Tribute amount.

At that time, the World Government had over 200 Member Nation; now, only half remain.

With more military budget, the Marines can expand their military.

According to the plan of Marine Headquarters, they aim to expand the military force to 650,000 within ten years.

This is roughly the number of Marines before the war between the Marines and the Rocks Pirates, when Hades first joined the Rocks Pirates.

Currently, the number of Marines is only 450,000.

One can imagine how many Marine Soldier the Marines have lost, considering that during the war, the Marines were constantly recruiting.

However, the Army suffered the heaviest losses.

The World Government hopes to further increase the Heavenly Tribute amount in four years, a demand that naturally met with unanimous opposition from the Member Nation.

In recent years, the economy of various Member Nation has not been good, and they have invested a large amount of funds in their own military.

Their dependence on the Marines has decreased; they can handle some Pirate themselves.

Increasing the Heavenly Tribute is unnecessary for them.

The World Government's reason is also simple.

Currently, there are many Remnants of Rocks in the New World, and perhaps another Rocks will appear.

They all need the World Government and the Marines to deal with them, so increasing the Heavenly Tribute is necessary.

Furthermore, the Sword Tournament has already showed the strength of many Monster, which are definitely a great threat.

Many King of the participating Member Nation were also somewhat swayed.

Ultimately, under the strong promotion of the World Government, many Member Nation agreed to the proposal to increase the Heavenly Tribute amount at the next World Conference.

The specific increase would depend on the situation.

Second, they proposed building a trade chain centered around Holy Land Mariejois, connecting the Four Seas and the New World.

The World Government hopes to use this method to get all Member Nation involved and gain interests from it.

And more Kingdom would be attracted to join and become Member Nation.

Many Member Nation are aware of the World Government's intentions.

They hope to gain interests from this; at the very least, the number of Merchant Ships circulating in Red Port will greatly increase.

And the World Government will be able to collect more customs duty.

This is an open scheme, but for their own interests, these Member Nation will not refuse.

Of course, the specific details still need to be carefully discussed; it won't be easy to start.

At the very least, the Marines need to establish a safe Sea Route.

"Truly impressive!"

Hades couldn't help but sigh with emotion.

The strength of the World Government is recovering, that's for sure, but it's a matter of whether the recovery is fast or slow.

To recover to their peak period, it will take at least several decades.

Several Holy Knight and Holy Knight candidate have died, and other Faction of the World Government, including CP0 Agent and Agent, have suffered heavy losses.

Who knows how much foundation has been consumed?

If they hadn't been constantly depleting their foundation and obtaining money from the Treasury or World Noble to maintain themselves, the World Government would have had to make painful cuts long ago.

(end of chapter)