The creature Caesar Clown had dubbed "Godzilla" finally collapsed after half an hour of unrelenting destruction. Purple radiation still flickered across its scaled hide as the beast's massive chest heaved one final time before going still. The high-energy fuel that had powered its rampage was spent, leaving only smoldering ruins and terrified survivors in its wake.
Punk Hazard's air hung thick with smoke and the acrid stench of melted metal. Fires still raged across nearly half the island's facilities, casting an orange glow against the night sky. Where pristine laboratories had stood mere hours ago, now only twisted steel frameworks remained, skeletal and broken.
The surviving Marine branch forces, bloodied and exhausted, finally had their opening. Despite the catastrophic casualties—dozens of their brothers lay crushed beneath rubble or vaporized by that devastating atomic breath—they pressed forward with grim determination.
"Now! While it's dormant!" A Marine captain barked orders through a cracked voice, his uniform torn and singed.
The battle to capture the unconscious titan proved brutal even in its sleeping state. Chains as thick as a man's torso were hauled into position. Sedatives designed for Sea Kings were injected by the barrel-load into the monster's hide. And when the creature stirred, threatening to wake, its thrashing nearly killed another half-dozen men before they drove more tranquilizer-tipped harpoons into its flesh.
What turned the tide was the unexpected arrival of Trafalgar Law, one of the Shichibukai. The Surgeon of Death emerged from the chaos with his usual lazy confidence, his spotted hat somehow still pristine despite the surrounding devastation.
"Room."
The translucent sphere expanded around the fallen beast. With a series of casual gestures, Law began systematically dismembering Godzilla, his Ope Ope no Mi (Op-Op Fruit) powers separating limbs from torso with surgical precision that no blade could match. The creature never even woke as it was carved apart, its body divided into containable sections.
A minor incident occurred during the dismemberment that no one paid much attention to. Several chunks of severed tissue—including portions of Godzilla's tail and one entire forearm—tumbled into the churning sea during the transfer process. They vanished beneath the dark waves with barely a splash.
Caesar Clown, watching from a safe distance, waved dismissively when someone pointed this out. "Shurororo! It's barely one percent of the total biomass. Completely negligible!" The scientist's eyes gleamed behind his goggles, still marveling at his creation despite the destruction it had wrought. The loss of a few samples meant nothing compared to what he'd accomplished.
None of the exhausted Marines had energy left to fish out the missing pieces. The currents would carry them wherever fate decreed. Whoever encountered those fragments drifting through the ocean would discover exactly how unlucky they were.
As dawn broke over Punk Hazard, the full scope of the disaster became painfully clear. Fires still consumed the western sector. The main production facility lay in complete ruin, its reinforced walls cracked open like eggshells. The casualty reports painted an even grimmer picture—at least five hundred dead, over a thousand injured, many critically. If Godzilla had rampaged for even another hour, the entire island might have sunk beneath the waves.
Inside a secure underground chamber that had miraculously survived the destruction, Caesar Clown stood before a Den Den Mushi with Vergo at his side. The bio-mechanical snail's features slowly morphed, taking on the distinctive appearance of its caller: the sharp sunglasses, the wide grin, the pink feathered coat.
Donquixote Doflamingo's voice crackled through with barely restrained fury.
"I know everything about what happened at Punk Hazard. Everything." Each word dripped with venom. "So tell me, what exactly were you two doing? An accident? You call this an accident?! Do you have any concept of how much money I've poured into that facility beneath your feet?"
Caesar flinched despite himself. Even through the Den Den Mushi, Doflamingo's rage was palpable. The Heavenly Demon wasn't physically present only because other business kept him occupied—otherwise, he'd already be here in person, and the confrontation would be far less pleasant.
Vergo maintained his stoic expression, but mentally calculated the losses. At least two billion Beli in infrastructure and equipment alone. The death toll represented years of recruitment and training. But the worst damage was strategic—the factory district that produced artificial Devil Fruits for Kaido had been devastated.
The implications made Vergo's jaw tighten. The Beast Pirates weren't known for their patience when supply chains failed. Doflamingo would need to personally explain to one of the Yonko why the agreed-upon shipment couldn't be delivered. Kaido wouldn't care about the reasons; he'd only see broken promises and lost revenue.
"The production capacity has been crippled," Vergo reported in his characteristic monotone. "Full recovery will require at least six months. Every day of delay means—"
"Means money bleeding out of my accounts!" Doflamingo's laughter burst through the speaker, high-pitched and manic. "Fufufufu! You think I don't know that? You think I can't count?!"
But beyond the financial devastation, what truly ignited the Shichibukai's rage was the betrayal of trust. Caesar Clown had been conducting unauthorized experiments under his nose, using Doflamingo's funding to pursue his own agenda. The Heavenly Demon had never even heard of a creature called Godzilla until watching it tear through his investment.
Caesar Clown swallowed hard, his usual bravado evaporating in the face of his benefactor's wrath. He knew exactly how precarious his position was. Without Doflamingo's intervention years ago, he'd still be rotting in an Impel Down cell.
His mind flashed back to that day. The Marine had finally lost patience with his increasingly dangerous experiments. When his weapon test had caused "acceptable casualties"—his words, not theirs—Fleet Admiral Sengoku himself had ordered his arrest. Caesar could still remember the cold metal of seastone cuffs locking around his wrists, the contemptuous glares from former colleagues, the prison ship's destination: Level Six of Impel Down, reserved for the world's most dangerous criminals.
Only Vergo's inside intelligence had saved him. The Vice Admiral's leaked information about the transport route had allowed Doflamingo to intercept and free him. Without the Heavenly Demon's patronage, Caesar would have spent the rest of his miserable life in an underwater cell, his genius wasted.
And now he'd gambled that goodwill by conducting unsanctioned research.
"Doflamingo, please, let me explain!" Caesar's words tumbled out desperately. "I didn't hide this from you out of malice! You have to understand—if I'd presented the proposal upfront, you never would have approved the funding! You would have called it too theoretical, too risky, too expensive!"
It was true, and all three men knew it. Doflamingo operated on profit margins and calculated risk. Experiments that showed no immediate return on investment were rejected without discussion. His money didn't materialize from thin air, after all. The Heavenly Demon had built his fortune through ruthless pragmatism, not charitable scientific curiosity.
Caesar had recognized this fundamental incompatibility years ago. So he'd done what any ambitious scientist would do—he'd skimmed funds from approved projects, siphoning resources into his secret research. Half a year of careful deception and tireless work had finally yielded results. The Giant God Soldier Plan had progressed from theoretical equations on a whiteboard to a living, breathing weapon of mass destruction.
"Yes, there was an element of... creative accounting," Caesar admitted, spreading his hands in what he hoped was a placating gesture. "But the results speak for themselves! I formally request to present my proposal now—the Giant God Soldier Plan. What you witnessed today, Godzilla's rampage, that was merely a prototype. The first proof of concept. Imagine what we could achieve with proper funding!"
The silence from the Den Den Mushi stretched uncomfortably long.
Caesar's obsession with lethal weaponry ran deeper than most people realized. Throughout his scientific career, he'd pursued only one goal: creating instruments of death powerful enough to surpass even Vegapunk's achievements. Mass-scale explosives, deadly poison gases capable of killing thousands in minutes, experimental laser arrays—he'd researched them all with manic dedication.
Yet despite decades of work, something always felt incomplete. None of his creations had achieved the devastating potential he dreamed of. None had proven that his genius rivaled—no, exceeded—that of his despised former colleague.
Vegapunk. The name alone made Caesar's blood boil. The Marine's chief scientist had looked down on him with barely concealed disdain for years. Treated him like an reckless amateur. Called his methods "unnecessarily cruel" and his ethics "nonexistent." The Navy had ultimately chosen Vegapunk's side in every dispute, validating that genius while condemning Caesar's approach.
They were fools, Caesar thought bitterly. They didn't appreciate true vision. They lacked the courage to do what science demanded. And look where their cowardice got them—Vegapunk creates parlor tricks while I've birthed a living god!
The breakthrough had come during his research into ancient extinct species. Godzilla—the mysterious prehistoric creature whose fossilized remains had somehow ended up in a Marine storage facility—had opened his eyes to new possibilities. The beast's cellular structure contained evolutionary potential unlike anything he'd ever encountered. Its DNA practically screamed unlimited adaptation and growth.
The question crystallized in his mind one sleepless night: Why merely study such a creature when he could recreate it? Engineer it? Weaponize it?
Thus, the Giant God Soldier Plan was born in secrecy.
Today's rampage, as destructive as it had been, represented only a fraction of Godzilla's ultimate capability. That purple atomic breath—capable of melting through reinforced steel and vaporizing organic matter instantly—could theoretically level entire cities. A single mature specimen could devastate a kingdom. A handful could potentially crack the very foundations of the world's power structure.
The implications were intoxicating.
"You've seen the footage, Doflamingo!" Caesar pressed his advantage as the silence continued. "That purple beam, the raw destructive force—Godzilla at full strength could annihilate an island in hours! Now imagine that power multiplied. Controlled. Deployed strategically!"
More silence. Then the Den Den Mushi's expression shifted slightly. The rage hadn't vanished, but calculation now tempered it. Caesar recognized that look—the Heavenly Demon was running numbers in his head, weighing risk against reward.
"Caesar..." Doflamingo's voice came quieter now, dangerously thoughtful. "Are you absolutely certain that creature can be controlled? Because I watched it nearly destroy everything I've built on that island. That's not a weapon—that's a bomb with a faulty timer. And I don't keep bombs in my arsenal that might explode in my own face."
Caesar's mind raced. The truth was uncomfortable—the Giant God Soldier Plan existed mostly in theoretical form. His calculations suggested controllability was achievable, but he'd need years of additional research to develop reliable restraint systems. The prototype Godzilla had been a proof of concept for the creature's potential, not its tactical reliability.
But admitting that now would mean the end of funding. The end of his research. The end of his dream to surpass Vegapunk.
So Caesar Clown did what he'd always done best—he lied with absolute confidence.
"Completely controllable!" He slapped his chest emphatically, the sound echoing in the underground chamber. "Shurororo! Give me adequate funding and a few years, and I'll not only replicate today's success—I'll perfect it! Mass production of Godzilla-class bioweapons, each one loyal and responsive to commands. Imagine deploying them at a critical moment in your operations. The tactical advantage would be insurmountable!"
Vergo's eyes flickered toward Caesar, but the Vice Admiral said nothing. They both understood the game being played.
Doflamingo's laughter filtered through the speaker, but it lacked its usual manic edge. The Heavenly Demon was genuinely uncertain, a rare state for him. Caesar could almost hear the internal debate—throwing good money after bad, or investing in what could be a revolutionary weapon?
"You're trying to manipulate me, Caesar," Doflamingo said at last. "I've poured millions into Punk Hazard already. The facilities, the equipment, the personnel, the artificial Devil Fruit development—all of it represents enormous capital investment. Now you emerge from the shadows with a new project that will undoubtedly cost millions more. Tell me why I shouldn't just cut my losses and shut this entire operation down?"
The threat hung in the air like a blade. Caesar felt sweat beading on his forehead despite the chamber's cool temperature.
Because they all knew what "shut down" really meant in Doflamingo's vocabulary. It meant eliminating loose ends. Ensuring that expensive secrets didn't walk away freely. And Caesar Clown, with all his knowledge of the Shichibukai's illegal operations, was the definition of a loose end.
"Because the potential return dwarfs the investment," Caesar answered, keeping his voice steady. "Because in a few years, you'll need every advantage you can get. Because when your 'major operation' commences—whatever it is—having even one or two Giant God Soldiers could mean the difference between success and failure."
He paused, then played his final card.
"And because Vegapunk will never create something like this. The Marines would never approve it. But you and I? We aren't bound by their weak ethics. We have the vision to do what others won't. That's always been our advantage, Joker."
The Den Den Mushi's expression remained unreadable. Somewhere in the distance, an explosion echoed as another damaged building finally collapsed. The fires of Punk Hazard continued to burn, a testament to both the destruction and the terrible potential Caesar promised to harness.
Finally, Doflamingo's voice emerged, cold and calculated.
"Fufufufu... you're a terrible liar, Caesar. You know that?" The Heavenly Demon's laugh held dark amusement. "But you're right about one thing—the potential is undeniable. I'll consider your Giant God Soldier Plan. However..."
The temperature in the room seemed to drop.
"...the next time something like this happens without my knowledge, there won't be a conversation. There won't be explanations. There will only be Vergo collecting what remains. Am I perfectly clear?"
Caesar nodded frantically, even though Doflamingo couldn't see him. "Crystal clear! Absolutely! Shurororo, you won't regret this!"
"I already regret it," Doflamingo muttered. "I'll have the capital accountants calculate how much additional funding your project can receive without bankrupting our other operations. Expect significant restrictions and mandatory progress reports. No more surprises."
The Den Den Mushi's eyes slowly closed as the connection terminated, leaving Caesar and Vergo alone in the underground chamber.
Caesar released a breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding, his entire body sagging with relief. He'd talked his way out of execution—for now. The Giant God Soldier Plan would continue, even if under much tighter supervision.
Vergo adjusted his sunglasses, his expression unreadable as always. "You're playing a dangerous game, Caesar. If you can't deliver on these promises..."
"I will deliver!" Caesar snapped, his confidence already rebounding now that immediate danger had passed. "In a few years, you'll all see! The Giant God Soldiers will reshape everything! And Vegapunk will finally understand who the superior scientist truly is!"
As the two men exited the chamber to survey the still-burning ruins of Punk Hazard, neither noticed the tides pulling fragments of Godzilla's flesh further out to sea. The creature's severed limbs drifted on the currents, their cells already beginning the hibernation process that would preserve them until they found new energy sources.
Somewhere in the dark ocean, pieces of a living weapon floated toward unknown destinations, carrying with them the potential for devastation that Caesar Clown had only begun to unleash upon the world.
The Giant God Soldier Plan had claimed its first casualties. It would not be the last.