The towering double doors groaned open, revealing the heart of Marineford's inner sanctum — the Grand Conference Hall, a chamber so vast and immaculately constructed it could dwarf most royal courts. Massive columns lined the room, etched with the emblems of justice, and the Marine flag fluttered proudly behind the elevated podium at the far end.
It had been years since such a gathering had taken place. Around a colossal circular table sat the highest-ranking officers of the Marine military might — Fleet Admiral Sengoku the Buddha, flanked by his immediate predecessor, the iron-willed Kong, who now represented the Five Elders of the Holy Land, and to his other side, the legendary Garp the Fist, who — unusually — wore a clean, pressed uniform and sat in disciplined silence.
Even Garp knew today was no ordinary gathering.
The three current Admirals — Akainu, Raylene, and Ginshimo — sat with stern expressions, their coats draped over their shoulders like war banners. Around them were Admiral candidates, Vice Admirals, Rear Admirals, and commanding officers from every major Marine fortress around the globe.
The tension was thick. The air itself seemed to pulse with anticipation. Sengoku stood, the golden tassels on his epaulets glinting under the overhead lights, and addressed the room.
"I believe many of you already understand why I've summoned you here today."
The room quieted instantly. Eyes sharpened, spines straightened.
"What I am about to share is not just a matter of policy… it's a matter of the future of the world."
He paced forward slowly, resting his hands on the table. Even his usual composed demeanor held an edge of weight, as though he bore the world on his shoulders.
"The New World is bleeding. And the infection is spreading."
Gasps and whispers rippled through the room. Sengoku raised a hand — calm, composed — and the murmurs died down.
"Several nations — once loyal members of the World Government coalition — have officially declared secession. They've aligned themselves with pirates, revolutionaries, and worse. And more kingdoms are wavering. The cracks are deepening."
A Rear Admiral spoke. "But Fleet Admiral, with all due respect — we've always known the New World was chaos incarnate. Why reclaim it now? We pulled back from those waters for a reason — the Emperors of the Sea made it a graveyard for Marine fleets."
Sengoku nodded solemnly.
"You're not wrong. When we retreated, it was because the price in blood was too great. But make no mistake — this was never meant to be permanent. The problem isn't just the New World."
He turned, his eyes scanning the ring of solemn faces.
"What do you think happens when word spreads that kingdoms can simply leave the World Government without consequence? That they can throw in with pirates, raise their own flags, and spit on the order of the world we've upheld for centuries?"
A pause.
"They will expand. They will consume. And one day, the flames of rebellion will no longer be contained to that lawless sea of the New World. It will reach the Grand Line. Then the Four Blues. Then your homes."
Vice Admiral Momonga raised his hand. "Sir — do we have any indication that the Yonko are directly orchestrating this?"
Akainu's eyes flared at the question, his voice rumbling like lava.
"Of course they are. Whitebeard, Kaido, Scarlett, and Doflamingo aren't just sitting on their thrones waiting to die. They want kingdoms, not territories. Armies, not just crews."
Vice Admiral Aokiji sighed, arms crossed behind his head. "It's a chain reaction… you topple one kingdom, the rest start to lean."
Sengoku took over again.
"This is not just a military decision. It's a message. We must reestablish our presence in the New World. Not as an occupying force, but as the shield that guards the last remnants of order, because the longer we delay, the more kingdoms will be coerced or strong-armed by these pirates to defect…"
Kong finally spoke, his deep voice like rolling thunder.
"The Five Elders expect swift, decisive action. We've allowed pirates to write the rules for too long. This time, we will rewrite them."
Garp cracked his knuckles, smirking just a little. "Tch. Those old bastards are finally getting serious, huh?"
Sengoku cast him a sideways glance but didn't protest.
"Garp will be accompanying the first wave into the New World. Alongside Vice Admirals Aokiji, Vergo, and a fleet under Admiral Ginshimo's command."
The room stirred. The names alone sent ripples through the ranks.
"This is not a raid. This is a campaign. Long-term presence. We will build marine strongholds. Forge alliances. And if necessary…" he paused, his eyes hardening, "we will wage war."
Another silence. This one heavier. Like the moment before a great tide rolls in.
"Now…" Sengoku adjusted his glasses. "I will open the floor. Speak your mind — today, more than ever, your voice matters. But know this: when we walk out of this room, we march united."
A veteran Vice Admiral, tall with greying temples and a chest lined with medals earned through fire and blood, rose slowly. The room quieted once more as all eyes turned to him. His voice, calm yet resolute, cut through the silence like a blade.
"Fleet Admiral… reclaiming control over the New World is no small matter. Everyone here is already well aware of the cost we paid during the last prolonged campaign against the so-called Emperors of the Sea…"
His eyes briefly flicked toward Garp, seated stoically beside Sengoku. The Vice Admiral gave a brief, respectful nod — a silent apology for invoking the memory of those blood-soaked battles.
Then he continued.
"Even with the Hero of the Marines leading the charge, we must acknowledge a hard truth: our forces are not yet prepared to confront three Yonko simultaneously. Not Whitebeard, not Bloodsteel Scarlett, and certainly not the Donquixote Pirates."
A murmuring ripple coursed through the table, but Sengoku lifted a hand.
"Your concern is valid. We've already… accounted for some of these obstacles. Whitebeard, for now, has agreed to remain neutral — a diplomatic accord forged through old favors and a temporary understanding. As for Scarlett, Garp himself has volunteered to handle her forces directly. We will construct a G-1 Base, positioned on the fringes of the Holy Land — a new foothold in the New World. From there, we will expand."
Several officers nodded in silent approval, but the Vice Admiral's brow furrowed deeper.
"And Doflamingo?" he asked pointedly. "Whitebeard and Scarlett prefer head-on conflict, but the Donquixote crew—those devils don't blink at using underhanded tactics. Every ambush, every move we made in the last war — they knew before we acted. It's like they were always two steps ahead."
The Vice Admiral's voice carried the weight of bitter experience — he had fought in those shadows and buried men because of it.
Before Sengoku could respond, the silence was shattered.
"Afraid of mere pirate scum?" the voice snarled.
A crack echoed across the marble chamber as Admiral Akainu slammed his lava-scarred fist into the table, splintering part of its edge. Smoke hissed from the stone as molten heat radiated from his frame, fury burning in his eyes.
"Marines like you are a disgrace to the uniform."
The room tensed. Even seasoned officers flinched at the sheer conviction behind his words. But the Vice Admiral didn't back down. He stood straighter, lifting his chin as he met Akainu's fiery glare head-on.
"With all due respect, Admiral… your rank may be higher than mine, but it does not give you the right to question my loyalty or my commitment to the Marines. I am not afraid. I am a soldier who has buried too many brave men to stay silent when I see us repeating the same mistakes."
Akainu's gaze narrowed, his voice dropping into a cold, deadly calm.
"A Marine's duty is to follow orders — not question them. What does it matter if they die? They die doing their duty. That is the cost of justice."
"We are the sword of order. And if that sword must be stained with the blood of every pirate in the New World, so be it. Even if we lose a hundred thousand men — if it means annihilating scums like Doflamingo and his wretched filth — then it is a price worth paying."
"That is the weight of Absolute Justice. If you do not have the will to carry it, step aside and let those of us who do finish the war you were too careful to win."
Gasps and mutters filled the room, but Sengoku swiftly rose to his feet, voice thundering with authority.
"Enough!"
Even Akainu fell silent. Sengoku's gaze flicked between the two men, one burning with uncompromising justice, the other weathered by the scars of war. His voice dropped an octave — measured, powerful.
"We will not descend into infighting — not now. We are not debating if we move into the New World. We are discussing how."
He turned to the Vice Admiral.
"Your concerns are noted and respected — I will personally oversee that countermeasures are in place for the Donquixote Pirates. We have already begun planning a shadow unit to monitor their movements. This time… they will not outmaneuver us."
****
Unnamed Island, East Blue
"Grandpa… why are we staying so far?"
Little Kuina pouted, squirming slightly atop Koushirō's shoulders, her small hands cupped around her eyes like makeshift binoculars. "I can barely even see the island from here!"
Beside them stood the stoic figure of Shimotsuki Kozaburo, the legendary swordsmith and warrior of Wano, his long white hair dancing gently with the wind as he kept his gaze locked far off on the horizon — toward the tiny, barren island where a clash unlike any the world had seen in decades was about to begin.
Next to Kozaburo stood another giant of history, the former Shogun of Wano, Kozuki Sukiyaki, with a very impatient little Zoro perched on his shoulders.
"Yeah, me neither!" Zoro huffed, arms folded tightly across his chest, a vein twitching on his forehead in frustration. "All I see is a dot! Why are we watching from this far away, old man?! What's the point if we can't even see them swing their swords?"
Both children had been bubbling with anticipation for weeks, ever since Zoro finally met Dracule Mihawk, the man he was to learn from, the man he would come to call mentor — and Kuina, already proud to be Rosinante's student, had never let him hear the end of it.
Countless arguments, sparring matches, and shouting contests had followed:
"My master's the strongest!"
"My master's the world's greatest swordsman, dummy!"
Now, at last, their teachers were about to settle the debate in the only way swordsmen knew: with steel and spirit. But Kozaburo, ancient though he was, let out a low chuckle, his voice deep and weathered by time and war.
"Because, little ones… if we stood any closer…You might end up dying."
Little Kuina blinked. Zoro's jaw dropped slightly. They both looked up at their elders — and realized that the adults were not joking.
Koushirō gently placed a hand on Kuina's leg to steady her, then looked to the sea with narrowed eyes. "This is no simple duel, Kuina. These are two masters beyond the realm of monsters… the kind who no longer fight with just swords, but with the will behind them. That little speck out there?" He pointed to the distant, lonely island. "By the time they cross blades, that whole place might not even exist anymore."
Sukiyaki gave a slow nod. "There's a reason they chose that island — empty, remote, desolate. When swords like those clash, the land itself remembers." A deep, silent tension hung in the air.
Even from miles away, the sky above the island had begun to shift — thin streaks of black and red lightning snaked across the clouds, and the wind picked up with an eerie howl, as if the world itself was bracing for impact.
Kozaburo turned his gaze skyward, eyes sharp and ancient.
"Back when I was young, I saw two samurai with supreme swordsmanship clash. When it ended, the ocean was boiling, the sky split open, and one of them never stood again. But this clash seems to be on a different level entirely..."
He looked down, his stern gaze softening slightly.
"But that's why you're here. To witness — even from afar — what true swordsmen are. Not so you can compare, or bicker. But so that one day… you understand what it takes to stand beside them."
Zoro and Kuina fell silent, the weight of his words sinking in.
Out across the sea, the sky cracked again — the heavens roaring not with thunder, but with will. Something primal. Unfathomable. The clash of two destinies on a collision course.
Kuina gripped Koushirō's hairband tighter. "…Who do you think's going to win, Grandpa?"
Kozaburo gave a quiet smile, his voice low and thoughtful.
"That, my dear… depends on which of them wants to lose less."
And far in the distance, on the speck of earth that would soon be scorched into legend, two swordsmen stepped forward — Dracule Mihawk, the eternal hunter of strength, and Donquixote Rosinante, the ghost in white who wielded both blade and mystery.
"It's still not too late for you to step back, Mihawk," I taunted, my tone light but my fingers already curling around the hilt of Shusui, which let out a low, almost eager hum as I unsheathed it. The blade shimmered under the pale sky, dark as the void and restless in my grip — it knew what was coming.
But Mihawk didn't so much as blink. He simply drew Yoru from his back in a single, fluid motion. That enormous black blade, a gothic cross sharpened to deadly perfection, gleamed ominously. His hawk-like eyes locked onto me — not with anger, not with contempt — but with purpose. That same unrelenting, predatory resolve I'd seen the last time we fought.
Back then, he lost. And I knew, without a doubt, that he had bled for years to close the distance between us.
But I didn't come here to crush him. I came here to face him — as equals. No fruit. No tricks. Just steel, spirit, and the language only swords can speak.
"Are you going to keep yapping—" Mihawk growled, voice low like distant thunder, "—or are we finally going to fight?"
Then — it exploded. A tidal wave of Haki burst from Mihawk, rippling through the earth like a shockwave as he took his stance. The air warped and cracked around him, the sky hissed under the pressure. His Conqueror's Haki flooded the landscape, raw and unfiltered — a suffocating, regal storm of willpower that split the island beneath his feet.
And then it manifested. A colossal, spectral shroud began to rise behind him — a monstrous silhouette born of raw spiritual force. Shimmering with darkness and blood-red light, it took the shape of a three-headed Shura, its fanged mouths snarling, its many arms mimicking Mihawk's stance with eerie precision. The ground cratered as the phantom loomed behind him, anchored to his unbreakable will.
My blood boiled. The thrill, the pull of battle, surged through me like a tidal wave. My breath slowed. I responded in kind. From the depths of my core, my own Conqueror's Haki surged forth — and the heavens howled.
It wasn't just an aura. It was a force of death incarnate. Golden and obsidian lightning danced wildly around me, warping space itself, crackling so violently that the very clouds above parted. My shadow stretched unnaturally long behind me — and then took form. A cloaked figure erupted behind me in silence, towering like a god of death.
It was the Shinigami. The embodiment of my spirit. Modeled after the Reaper itself, its face hidden beneath a bone-white mask, jaw locked in a permanent grin. Its skeletal hands gripped a great scythe forged from pure spirit, black lightning licking across its limbs, its cloak made of flickering, golden kanji for "End."
Mihawk flinched.
Just for a heartbeat. But it was enough. His spectral Shura let out a soundless roar — and was pushed back, staggered by the overwhelming pressure of my will. The island trembled beneath us. Mountains cracked. Tides surged backward.
I stepped forward, Shusui trembling in my grasp — not from fear, but from eagerness. My haki poured into it, layer after layer, until the legendary black blade grew heavier, denser, darker — shimmering with a luster no longer just great-grade.
It had long since become worthy of standing among the Supreme Grades.
Because I had tempered it with my soul.
Across from me, Mihawk's grin twitched into place. That rare smirk he only wore when the thrill of battle hit him like a drug.
"I see," he said, voice sharp as steel. "You haven't wasted these years after all. Good."
His grip on Yoru tightened, obsidian light pulsing through the length of the blade as his haki deepened even further.
"I was afraid it would be too easy."
The air between us groaned with invisible pressure. Sparks of black and gold lightning tore through the sky, carving rifts into the very atmosphere. We both took a breath. Then — without a word, without a signal — we moved.
BOOM.
The first clash wasn't just a strike — it was calamity made manifest. The island—no, the very sea around it—shuddered violently as the twin shockwaves from Rosinante and Mihawk's blades collided.
The earth split. Jagged fissures carved through the barren land like ink across parchment. Mountains cracked like eggshells. Even the clouds high above were sliced clean in half, torn asunder by the sheer force of their spirits colliding.
And they were spirits made visible.
Miles away, far across the ocean where safety had been assumed, even that distance was not enough.
Sukiyaki, Kozaburo, and Koushirou stood frozen, their eyes wide and breath stolen as the sky darkened above them and the air itself rumbled with pressure. It wasn't just the power that struck them—but the impossible, undeniable truth of what they were witnessing.
Two figures stood on that distant island… but two gods loomed above them.
Rosinante's spectral Shinigami, cloaked in golden-black lightning, its grinning white mask cutting through the gloom like a crescent moon, stood as tall as mountains—its massive scythe swung once, and clouds fled in terror. Opposite it, Mihawk's three-headed Shura, wrapped in blood-colored lightning, roared silently into the sky, its many arms echoing Mihawk's stance, each one ready to kill.
These weren't mere projections of Haki. These were manifestations of the soul.
And that was a realm of swordsmanship only whispered in legends. Kozaburo staggered a step back, a man who had forged blades worthy of kings, whose hands had etched destinies into steel—shaken to his core.
Koushirou, ever the calm, composed scholar of the sword, now stood pale, blinking in disbelief. "So it's not a myth… not just symbolism..." he whispered. "They've… truly given form to their very souls..."
He had studied swordsmanship all his life—lived it, taught it, passed it on. Yet what he saw now shattered the boundaries of everything he believed. He had once thought the concept of a swordsman's spirit taking shape was romanticized folklore. A metaphor at best.
But now, under this sky, he was humbled. Even the sea beneath them recoiled.
Meanwhile, Little Kuina and Zoro were holding on for dear life, clinging to the shoulders of their grandfathers as the wind howled like a wounded beast. Their small bodies were battered by the aftershocks, their eyes wide with childlike terror—and wonder. They couldn't see the godlike forms. Their observation haki hadn't bloomed yet. But they could feel it.
In their bones. In their hearts. As if the very world was protesting the clash between immortal titans. It was not a fight. It was a declaration of divine dominance.
Then, in a voice that carried the weight of history, Sukiyaki spoke, his hands trembling and eyes misted over as he looked upon the distant island:
"Burn this moment into your hearts, little ones. This… this is a realm beyond monsters."
"This is the realm of gods."
He clenched his fists, overcome not with fear, but with something deeper: reverence.
"And the blood of one such god flows through your veins too."
His voice cracked. Because for the first time in his life—after years of bearing the burden of his fallen kingdom, after watching generations fade into shadows—he understood.
He understood why the people of Wano still whispered the name Ryuma with tears in their eyes. Why they had called him the Sword God. It wasn't merely a title. It wasn't poetic. It wasn't an exaggeration.
Ryuma had once stood in this same realm. And now — so had another. Sukiyaki almost fell to his knees, not in despair, but in peace.
"To witness this in my lifetime... to see that the Sword God's soul still burns in this era..." He smiled through his tears. "This is enough."