Not long after the "game" began, Supreme Executive Pica had fallen, and the citizens and Pirates were buzzing with excitement.
The turmoil on the Family's side, by contrast, was enormous. Pica was one of their greatest fighting forces, someone they'd believed to be peerless and invincible even in battles of annihilation against multiple opponents. His defeat was no small thing. Their shock was understandable.
Zoro, having pulled off that feat, was leisurely making his way back to Luffy and the others...
"Hey, Zoro! Where are you going!?"
"Don't go getting lost even at a time like this, you idiot! Over here, over here!"
"Huh? When did you guys move all the way over there?"
"We've been here the whole time!"
...It looked like he was about to fail at making it back, so Luffy and Usopp had to shout themselves hoarse to guide him in.
"Haah... Honestly. God-san, here, this is for you."
"Huh, what... whoa!? Y-you're that Alice person... wait, what is this, you're giving it to me?"
Usopp jumped at Alice, who'd appeared beside him without him noticing. She held out something: a pouch with what looked like several marbles inside. He took it, tilted his head, asked what it was. Alice made a 'lend me your ear' gesture and whispered to him.
"You know Zoro spent the last two years at our place, right? These are signal flares we used whenever Zoro got lost during training. They don't go out for a while even in wind, so if you use them to call him back, he'll probably come back pretty efficiently. Try to make or procure something similar on your own before you run out."
"O-oh, yeah... thanks. ...And, uh, sounds like that guy really put you through the wringer with that habit of his... sorry about the whole two years."
"Not at all, don't mention it. He was the perfect training partner, after all."
Usopp watched Alice walk away with gratitude, though he was also thinking, 'If she was good enough to be Zoro's training partner, she must be seriously strong too...' A little tension crept in as he watched her go.
Truth be told, Usopp already had something similar on hand, but he decided to gratefully accept the gift anyway. If these were signal flares Zoro had been conditioned to respond to over two years, he might come back on reflex. They'd probably be useful for giving directions and preventing him from getting lost in general, too.
And once again, Usopp found himself grateful to Sue, Alice, and their crew for putting up with that terrible habit of his and looking after him for two whole years.
"Zoro, that was amazing! I had no idea you could do stuff like that!"
"Yeah, well... Anyway, now that I've dealt with the biggest pain in the ass getting in our way, from here on out..."
"Yeah! Let's go punch Mingo's face in again!"
"YEAAAAAHHH!!"
Spurred by Luffy's Command, Sai, Cavendish, and the rest of the anti-Doflamingo Pirate Alliance raised a battle cry, along with others who had temporarily joined forces: Kyros, the Tontatta Tribe warriors, and the rest.
Even Bartholomeo, who just moments ago had been weeping like a waterfall over Zoro's magnificent feat of cleaving Pica in two, had switched gears and steeled his expression.
Though he'd probably start crying again if something else impressive happened.
"By the way, Luffy, with all this commotion going on, we haven't been able to find Curly Brows and the others no matter how hard we look... Could they be outside this 'Cage'?"
"Oh, yeah, looks like it. They went off to help Nami and the others a little while ago and haven't come back."
"Nami and the others... so they're on the Sunny?"
"Yes. They were circling the waters around the outer edge of Dressrosa to escape pursuit from the Family and the Marines, but... the Birdcage activated partway through and we lost contact. It seems the threads forming the enclosure block Den Den Mushi signal waves."
"I told them that if push comes to shove, they should head for Zou first. Worst case, we can regroup there. In any event, we need to deal with the Birdcage first."
Law concluded with that and looked upward. The situation Pica had created, reshaping the terrain and lifting the King's Plateau to an enormous height, was still in effect. But at least there was no longer any risk of further terrain manipulation to obstruct them, or of the enemy leapfrogging the front lines to attack the Towns behind them.
All that remained, as Luffy and the others said, was to drag Doflamingo out like a cornered rat, or storm the castle and crush him. Of course, that was far from easy. Two more Supreme Executives, several Executives, and two thousand Family members stood guard, and Doflamingo occupied a position that was extremely difficult to assault from a terrain standpoint. Just reaching him would be no simple task, and the resistance would be fierce.
On top of that, the Birdcage continued to shrink inward from all sides, and the puppets being controlled indiscriminately through Parasite Strings remained a problem. Time was not on their side.
The Alliance broke into a run, intent on taking Doflamingo's head.
Waiting to intercept them on the King's Plateau were the Family's subordinates. And even before those, the so-called Ingrates: Pirates and other villains blinded by Greed, lying in wait, hoping to take down the Criminals and claim the bounty.
Everyone on the Alliance's side assumed they'd have to cut through all of them as quickly as possible to reach the King's Plateau, but...
With a massive tearing sound, a huge fissure ripped across the ground directly in front of Luffy and the others as they charged toward the King's Plateau. "Whoa!?" Everyone skidded to a panicked halt.
Thinking it was an enemy attack, they looked around for the culprit, but the person responsible turned out to be someone unexpected.
"Everyone stop right there! Don't go any further!"
"Law!?"
"Hey, what's the big idea, Trafalgar Law!?"
"Don't tell me you're betraying us too!?"
The one who had sliced through the ground to halt the group's advance was Law. Faced with the confused and irritated Alliance members who couldn't understand his intent, Law raised his voice. Sweat beaded on his brow. His expression looked almost pale.
"Don't waste your time worrying. I've got no hostility or intent to harm you... if anything, I just saved your asses."
"Saved us? What the hell's that supposed to mean!?"
"Is there something up ahead?"
"Something, or rather someone... Just watch. You'll understand soon enough."
Law turned back to face the same direction as the rest of the Alliance. They followed his gaze, brows furrowed, and the anomaly began almost immediately.
'Well, she was already furious to begin with... If anything, it's impressive she held it in this long.'
A deep, grinding rumble shook the earth.
"What the... a-an earthquake!?"
"H-hey, is the ground moving and... rising!?"
"Don't tell me Pica is still..."
"No, this is different..."
Right before Luffy and the others' eyes, the ground ahead of them, where the Family's rank-and-file soldiers and the Ingrate Pirates had been lying in wait, suddenly began to tremble and heave upward.
No. Heave was an understatement.
"Wh-what the hell is this!?"
"The ground... the King's Plateau and all the ground around it, it's floating up into the air!?"
"Even that rock bastard from before couldn't do this! Who the..."
"It's... flying through the Sky... no wait, it's not just the ground floating! Look closely!"
"Aaaaahhhh!?"
"Damn it, what's... what's happening!? M-my body is floating..."
"What is this!? We're falling... falling into the Sky!?"
It wasn't just the Vearth. Rubble, weapons, fallen soldiers... Pirates, Family members... and even Doflamingo and his group at the very top of the King's Plateau. Their bodies rose into the air, falling upward toward the Sky.
In a panic, Doflamingo used his threads to anchor the Family members around him, keeping them from falling away. The other Executives each found their own ways to cling to the ground or buildings, securing themselves to escape the danger.
"Y-Young Master!? What... what is this!?"
"How should I know!? Damn it, what's happening... who could do something like this? Fujitora...!?"
"Issho-san!? What in the world is..."
"Nah, I haven't done a thing... Hmm, I wonder what's going on here...?"
"If it ain't you, then who on earth could do something like this..."
Making rubble and ground float and manipulating them was Admiral Fujitora's specialty, but Fujitora himself was tilting his head in confusion. It clearly wasn't his doing. No one could think of anyone else capable of such a feat, and bewilderment and anxiety spread through the Marine ranks as well, until...
"Wait... could it be... that's it, if it's her!"
Marine Vice Admiral "Shark Cutter" Bastille. Through a certain connection, he was well acquainted with a particular Pirate Crew and its leader, and knew their Powers well. Because of that, he alone arrived at the possibility.
"What is this... everything's falling into the Sky...?"
"Trafalgar! What the hell is happening!? Who's doing this!?"
"Hya-ha... When it comes to the power to make things float, what comes to mind is the Golden Lion's Float-Float Fruit, or Fujitora's Press-Press Fruit... but it's not the Golden Lion. There's no sign of him being here, and besides, he can only float things he touches with his hands, and only non-living objects at that."
"Then it's Fujitora!?"
"No, it's neither of them. The one who did this is..."
"Gravity... Reversal. Everything, all of it... fall into the Sky!"
The one who did it was Alice. A Paramecia Reva-Reva Fruit Reversal Human. She could reverse anything, and that extended not just to physical objects, but even to gravity within a designated area.
Just moments ago, she had learned that Sugar's Powers had stolen her own subordinates from her, erasing their very memories. That revelation had sent Alice into a rage, and now she had finally moved to crush Doflamingo, Family and all, with everything she had.
She reversed gravity across the entire area surrounding the King's Plateau, making everything float. What should normally have been pulled downward, falling toward the ground, now went the opposite way. Everything fell into the Sky. People, buildings, rubble, the Vearth itself. All of it.
And now, up in the Sky...
"H-hey, if those guys keep flying... no, 'falling' like that..."
"Up in the Sky... there are threads up there too..."
"N-nooo, s-stop, help me..."
"Falling, falling... this is bad, the threads... the Birdcage!"
"Young Master! P-please release the Birdcage! At this rate... GYAAAAAAH!!"
"I-it hurts!? They're stabbing me! Cutting me!"
"Stop, stop it, stop stop stop... AAAAAGH!?"
"N-no, nooo, GYAAAAAAH!!"
"S-somebody help me, AAAAAAH!!"
The Family members and Pirates who had fallen into the open Sky slammed into the still-deployed threads of the Birdcage, sliced to ribbons. Then, as if in pursuit, massive amounts of rubble came hurtling after them, crushing them further. The blood that flowed also dripped upward, falling into the Sky.
Of all times, The Surface was currently littered with enormous amounts of ammunition: the remains of the stone colossus that had crumbled when Pica was defeated. All of it became falling rocks, raining down upon the Family, the Pirates, and even Doflamingo's group on the King's Plateau.
Doflamingo and his people used threads to anchor the King's Plateau, stopping it from falling any higher, and each of them fought to intercept and deflect the massive barrage of falling rubble. But debris that slipped through kept striking home one after another, chipping and shattering the very Vearth beneath them. Family soldiers they couldn't protect were crushed under rubble, or tumbled from the crumbling ground and fell into the Sky, caught between threads and debris, sliced apart.
Because all of this was happening at such an extreme altitude, the scene, which could only be called a massacre, was almost entirely invisible to those on the ground below. That, at least, was a small mercy. Viola, the one person whose Powers could have let her witness it, was using her abilities for another purpose at the time, and so she too was spared the sight.
After every last piece of rubble within range had fallen into the Sky, and it seemed the slaughter might finally be over... the next instant:
"Reversal... release!"
Alice's power was undone, and the reversed gravity returned to normal.
And then... what happened?
"UWAAAAAAAH!?"
"N-now we're falling toward the ground... falling...!"
"I-I can't take any more! Somebody help meeeee!!"
Everything that had been falling toward the Sky now plummeted back toward the ground at tremendous speed. People, rubble, everything. Even the King's Plateau, which Doflamingo had barely managed to hold in place.
And on top of that, the massive amounts of rubble that had earlier rained upward, been sliced to pieces passing through the Birdcage's threads, and fallen into the Sky now came raining back down, shredded once more as they passed through the threads, becoming shotgun blasts of debris that assailed everything below.
"You... you've got to be KIDDING MEEEEE!!"
A scream that was equal parts rage and despair erupted from Doflamingo as the countless tons of dirt and rubble that had once been Pica's stone colossus came crashing down upon him. This second time, the King's Plateau could no longer endure. It slammed into the ground along with every Family member on it, and a torrential rain of rubble poured down with enough force to bury it all.
The sight was nothing short of a carpet bombing of rubble and earth.
The place where, just minutes ago, a multi-tiered plateau resembling a Wedding Cake of stone had surely stood. Now there was nothing but a mountain range of debris.
"Remaining voices are around two to three percent. Pretty much cleaned up. But Doflamingo and the Executive Class are tough enough to survive, and... looks like a few lucky ones made it through too. I could hunt them down myself, but..."
On a hill some distance away, floating in the air above it, Alice had watched the entire massacre unfold.
Her gaze flicked briefly to the side. There, she could see Luffy and the others breaking into a run once more. Even after witnessing this devastation, they showed no fear. Their momentum practically screamed that they would be the ones to take down Doflamingo, that they refused to let Alice steal all the glory. They'd steeled themselves anew and were charging forward.
Watching them, Alice found it amusing in spite of herself, and let out a soft laugh.
"Bit late to say this, but I suppose it'd be rude to get in the way of boys who've got their fighting spirit up. Well, I feel a lot better now anyway... I'll let Luffy and the others have the rest. If things look bad, I can always just kill everyone myself."
"...That aside, Lady Alice?"
"Oh, Tantal. Lupupu too. Good work. What's up?"
"Um... the Donquixote Family is pretty much wiped out and all, but... you destroyed the Royal Palace and everything along with them, didn't you? All the supplies that were supposed to be inside... is that okay?"
"After Doflamingo is defeated, the real King and his people won't have anywhere to live..."
"...Oh no."
"W-wait, Lady Alice!"
To be continued...