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Mary Geoise. The Holy Land.
Inside the sun-drenched, opulent halls of Pangaea Castle.
"Let Sengoku issue the bounty. 5 billion Berries. Make it official," Saint Shepherd Ju Peter ordered, arms crossed. He flipped to the next page of the report, eyes already shifting to the next crisis.
"Hm? This 'shadow organization' CP0 has been tracking... it's confirmed to be the Revolutionary Army? And its leader is Garp's son? Dragon, the traitor?"
"That damned family!" Saint Ethanbaron V. Nusjuro snarled, the scar on his face twisting with fury. "Will the 'D' never learn to stay down?"
But Saint Jaygarcia Saturn and Saint Topman Warcury simply smiled.
"Let them fight,"
"Dragon, Arthur... two of our greatest problems tearing each other apart. This isn't a crisis. It's an opportunity. Saves us the trouble—and the manpower."
"Indeed. We should encourage such conflicts. Hahahahaha!"
The news hit the seas like a tidal wave.
5 Berries. A sum so absurdly vast it bordered on myth—dwarfing the current bounties of Whitebeard, even Arthur himself. The world erupted into madness.
Anyone with a boat, a map, or just blind hope became a Devil Fruit hunter overnight. Every scrap of rumor was bought, sold, or stolen. The price of all Devil Fruits on the black market doubled instantly.
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One month later. Raijin Island.
On a cliff overlooking the storm-torn sea, Arthur sat cross-legged, perfectly still. His eyes were closed. Every fiber of his being focused on his outstretched palm—on the charge of a single, infinitesimal particle.
He was getting closer...
A full year of this microscopic, agonizing training had achieved something miraculous. He still couldn't control the electron—"God's Domain" remained an impossible horizon—but the sheer act of forcing his power downward, into precision rather than destruction, had paradoxically multiplied its potential.
He was approaching 1 Billion Volts.
It had taken years to go from two hundred million to five hundred. Now, in a single year of focused training, he had doubled it.
"Vegapunk was right," he thought, a thrill running through him. "Knowledge. That's the real shortcut."
But the thought of the stolen scientist hardened into burning resolve.
Progress could only be measured against the unbreakable.
He had hunted down Kaido just two days ago for another "test." This time, the billion-volt charge—refined, concentrated—had actually hurt him.
Not just surface damage. Arthur sensed it: a flicker of internal trauma.
A breakthrough.
The Navy, with all its Admirals and weapons, couldn't scratch Kaido. But he—he finally could.
Kaido, the man whose very biology defied reason, had become the perfect sandbag. The knowledge that the Beast could finally be broken sent Arthur back into training with a new, obsessive drive.
The world, the bounties, the chaos—they faded into background noise. All that mattered was the particle.
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Ten thousand meters beneath the Red Line.
Fish-Man Island.
A cloaked figure swam through the deep-sea currents, keeping far from the main bubble-coated highways. He slipped through the island's barrier and emerged in the shadows of the Coral Forest.
He moved carefully, avoiding rowdy pirate crews and curious eyes, and made his way to the Fish-Man District—the home of Fisher Tiger.
After checking for spies, he entered a hidden shelter and bolted the door.
Moments later, Fisher Tiger emerged, face grim. Together, he and the cloaked figure hurried toward Ryugu Palace.
They were expected.
King Neptune, Queen Otohime, the Left and Right Ministers, and Jinbe—captain of the royal guard—waited in a cleared, secured chamber.
Before the king and queen, the cloaked figure lowered his hood. He was a young fish-man, broad-shouldered, battle-hardened.
Hack.
"Hack!" Jinbe growled, furious. "Are you insane? Coming here now?"
His anger wasn't for the island. It was fear—for his friend. "The world is on fire. Do you have any idea what'll happen if one of the Thunder Emperor's scouts spots you?"
"Don't worry," Hack said gratefully. "I was careful. No one followed me."
He bowed to the throne.
"Your Majesties. I bring a proposal from our leader—Dragon."
"Hack, please," Queen Otohime pleaded, folding her hands. "Say what you must and then go into hiding. We all saw the news. The Thunder Emperor's rage is not something one survives."
"I understand, Your Majesty." Hack nodded, then took a bracing breath.
"To be brief: the Revolutionary Army seeks to build a new world. A world where all races are equal—where slavery does not exist. To that end, our leader wishes to partner with Fish-Man Island... for a joint operation to liberate all slaves from Mary Geoise."
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Perhaps it was Arthur's influence—ripples from his violent upheaval of world events—that twisted fate off its original track.
In the old timeline, Fisher Tiger climbed the Red Line alone, an act of solitary rage. Now, Dragon proposed a grand, unified liberation operation, two years earlier than history intended.
A paradise of equality—that was the Revolutionaries' dream.
To gather allies, they needed a symbol. A global statement. The slave liberation was meant to be their debut—their coming-out strike against the world's greatest evil.
"You want to what??" King Neptune's voice boomed. His trident slipped from his grip and clattered to the polished floor.
The grand hall froze. Ministers and guards stared in disbelief, stunned by the sheer audacity of the proposal.
Mary Geoise...
The Holy Land...
The untouchable home of the Celestial Dragons.
No one trespassed there. Not kings. Not pirates. Not gods.
For eight hundred years, it had stood inviolate.
It wasn't that Fish-Man Island didn't care. Otohime had pleaded at the Reverie itself for the release of their enslaved people.
The response had been a cruel sneer: "Humans enslave their own kind all the time. Why should you be different?"
That memory still haunted her—eyes full of disgust, not just dismissal.
Since then, she had devoted herself to coexistence, to peace—but her idealism was not blindness. If Hack's proposal was discovered, the World Government would not simply punish them.
It would annihilate them.
It was late 1505. Almost six years had passed since the last Buster Call, but the memory of that apocalyptic firestorm lived in every soul beneath the waves.
"We cannot," Neptune said, voice cracking. His heart and crown tore against each other. "A plan like this... it would doom us all."
He was tempted. Deeply. Horribly!!
But he was a king.
"Even if they are your own people?" Hack asked softly, disappointment cutting deep. "You would abandon them?"
But the one who spoke was Fisher Tiger—his voice low, steady, carved by suffering.
He understood Neptune's impossible burden. The kingdom could not bear this risk.
"Then the sin will be mine," Tiger said, eyes burning with resolve. "Hack. When?"
"The leader needs time. Sea Calendar 1506."
"Good. I'll go to Dragon and prepare. Jinbe... you stay. Protect the kingdom."
There was no argument. No debate.
Fisher Tiger had chosen.
He grabbed a pack and, with Hack beside him, strode out of the palace—toward a destiny that would change the world.
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