Cold sea spray battered the sleek hull of the World Government vessel.
Sailing steadily through the choppy waters of the New World, the ship maintained course toward Egghead Island. On the upper deck, the atmosphere remained professional and devoid of warmth.
Standing near the railing, Rob Lucci watched the fog roll across the ocean surface. The CP0 assassin kept his arms crossed, his white suit pristine despite the damp ocean air. Sitting at a small, ornate iron table nearby, Stussy elegantly sipped from a porcelain teacup. Kaku leaned against the mainmast, inspecting the edge of his blade.
A heavy, unnatural silence hung over the group, broken only by the rhythmic crashing of the waves.
Resting in the corner of the deck, a large, imposing figure sat still. S-Bear, the Seraphim model based on the former Warlord Bartholomew Kuma, stared blankly ahead. The artificial weapon did not speak or move, simply waiting for the next command to be issued.
"The target is complex," Kaku noted, breaking the silence. Pushing off the mast, the square-nosed agent walked over to the table, unfurling a blueprint of the island's laboratory.
"Dr. Vegapunk found himself burdened with too much work for a single lifetime," Kaku explained, tapping the parchment. "To solve the issue, the scientist split his own consciousness. He created six separate bodies, referred to as Satellites. They operate independently, but share a single brain."
Stussy set her teacup down gently onto its saucer.
"Shaka, Lilith, Edison, Pythagoras, Atlas, and York," the intelligence agent listed smoothly. "Six distinct personalities. Six targets."
"The mission parameters are simple," Lucci stated, not turning away from the ocean. "We deliver the Seraphim to the island. Once inside, we assassinate all six Satellites and the original body. We are to leave the laboratory equipment, the data banks, and the research facilities intact. Minimal collateral damage is required."
A cynical smirk crossed the assassin's face.
"Wiping out the most valuable asset the World Government possesses," Lucci mused aloud, narrowing his eyes at the distant horizon. "One has to wonder about the timing. Do you think this sudden execution order has anything to do with what happened to the Lulusia Kingdom a few days ago?"
The casual mention of the erased island caused the temperature on the deck to drop noticeably.
Stussy's hand froze over her teapot. Kaku stiffened, casting a quick, wary glance at the surrounding Marine guards to ensure nobody else had heard the question.
"Lucci," Kaku warned, his voice dropping to a harsh, hushed whisper. "Do not ask questions like that out loud. Some inquiries invite a swift execution. We follow orders. We do not question the reasoning of the Five Elders."
Accepting the warning, Lucci returned his gaze to the sea, letting the dangerous topic fade into the crashing waves as the ship sailed ever closer to the island of the future.
At that same moment, deep inside the corridors of Egghead, a quiet conversation took place.
Standing in the dimly lit central monitoring room, Punk-01, designated Shaka, watched the security feeds tracking the approach of the World Government vessel. The logical aspect of Vegapunk wore his metallic, apple-shaped helmet, hiding any expression.
Picking up a encrypted Den Den Mushi, the scientist dialed a secure line.
The snail clicked, connecting across the vast distance of the ocean.
"It is me," Shaka spoke, keeping his tone level.
On the other end of the line, sitting in the command center of a flying Helicarrier, Dragon listened quietly. The Commander of the Revolutionary Army did not offer a casual greeting, sensing the gravity of the call.
"What is the situation, Shaka?" Dragon asked, his deep voice crackling slightly over the encrypted frequency.
"The World Government has dispatched their elite assassins," the scientist reported, watching the blip on the radar screen edge closer to the island's territorial waters. "CP0 is arriving to deliver a Seraphim, but their true objective is clear. I have calculated the probabilities of surviving this encounter."
A brief pause hung over the line.
"I will most likely be dead soon, Dragon," Shaka stated, offering the grim premonition without a single trace of fear or panic.
Sitting in his command chair, the revolutionary leader frowned deeply.
"Do not make jokes like that, Shaka," Dragon warned, his grip tightening on the armrest. "The world still needs your mind."
"It is not a joke," the scientist replied softly, reaching out to cut the connection. "I simply wanted to pass on my final observations. The era is turning rapidly. Ensure you are ready for the dawn."
The snail clicked shut, plunging the monitoring room back into silence as the scientist prepared to meet his inevitable fate.
Far away from the laboratories of the future, the freezing waters surrounding Winner Island churned violently.
Submerged deep beneath the ocean surface, the Polar Tang rocked side to side. The sturdy yellow submarine groaned under attack. Red warning lights flashed across the control room, casting a harsh glow over the panicked crew.
Clinging to the navigation console, Bepo let out a distressed, high-pitched squeak.
"Captain!" the Mink navigator panicked, looking down at his paws. The thick white fur remained, but the underlying bone structure of his body was shifting rapidly, softening and curving in bizarre ways.
Across the room, Shachi and Penguin dropped their tools, staring at their own hands in horror.
The rugged, battle-hardened pirates found their forms altering. Their shoulders narrowed, their waists thinned, and their voices jumped several octaves. Within seconds, a strange disease swept through the enclosed space, turning the tough pirates into terrified women.
"What is happening to my body?!" Shachi shrieked, clutching his newly altered chest.
Leaning against the periscope housing, Trafalgar Law gritted his teeth. The surgeon felt the same unnatural sickness attacking his own cellular structure. His limbs felt strange, and his breathing grew shallow as the feminization disease attempted to overwrite his physical biology.
Recognizing the symptoms immediately, Law did not panic.
Closing his eyes, the surgeon focused his mind.
A strong enough Haki can reject any Devil Fruit affliction.
A sharp, invisible shockwave pulsed from his chest.
The disease shattered like fragile glass. The unnatural cellular shifting reversed instantly, returning his body to its original state.
"Listen to me!" Law ordered, his voice returning to its normal, deep register. "Channel your Haki! Push the sickness out!"
Following their captain's command, the Heart Pirates focused their own willpower. As Law's immense spiritual pressure radiated outward, it acted as a catalyst. The cure spread rapidly across the control room, breaking the lingering effects of the Shiku Shiku no Mi and returning the crew to normal.
"Take us to the surface," Law instructed, drawing his long nodachi. "They are waiting for us."
The yellow submarine breached the freezing water, breaking the surface near the rocky coast of Winner Island.
Thick snow drifted down from the gray sky, settling over the jagged cliffs. Waiting patiently on the shoreline, the ambush party made no attempt to hide their presence.
Sitting atop a sickly, coughing horse, Doc Q laughed weakly.
"My, my," the sickly doctor wheezed, leaning heavily on his massive scythe. "The cure spread so quickly. The Surgeon of Death certainly lives up to his reputation. My beautiful disease didn't last a minute."
Standing a few yards away, Van Augur raised his custom sniper rifle. The calm, expressionless marksman peered through the scope, locking onto the hatch of the surfacing submarine.
"The strong always resist," Augur noted dryly.
Tapping into the power of the Wapu Wapu no Mi, the sniper did not fire a bullet. He focused his ability on a massive figure standing beside him.
In the blink of an eye, Jesus Burgess vanished from the snowy shoreline.
Teleporting instantaneously, the helmsman reappeared high in the air, above the highest peak of Winner Island. Laughing boisterously, Burgess reached down and grabbed the solid rock of the mountain itself.
Activating the Riki Riki no Mi, the sheer, absurd physical strength granted by the fruit allowed the pirate to lift the entire mountain peak off its foundation.
"Wiiihahaha!" Burgess roared, hoisting the colossal chunk of earth and stone over his head.
With a terrifying display of raw power, the pirate hurled the mountain toward the surfacing submarine, intending to crush the Heart Pirates before they could even step foot on the island.
The shadow of the falling mountain eclipsed the yellow hull.
The top hatch of the submarine banged open.
Stepping out onto the metal deck, Law did not look panicked. The surgeon drew Kikoku smoothly from its scabbard.
Stepping lightly onto the deck, Law swung the long blade in a fluid, continuous arc. The steel moved like moonlight reflecting on a calm lake, carrying no wasted energy or muscle resistance.
Applying a faint coating of spatial energy to the edge of the blade, the surgeon met the falling mountain.
The flowing slash parted the air silently.
A wave of cutting force drifted upward, moving with the gentle grace of a falling leaf but carrying the devastating edge of a surgical scalpel. The attack met the falling mountain peak mid-air.
The colossal chunk of stone split perfectly in two.
The two halves of the mountain parted cleanly, falling harmlessly on either side of the submarine and crashing into the freezing ocean, sending massive plumes of water high into the sky.
Sheathing his sword with a soft click, Law glared at the shoreline.
The sky above the island suddenly darkened further.
A suffocating presence descended from the clouds. Marshall D. Teach floated downward, laughing his signature, grating laugh.
"Zehahaha!" Blackbeard roared, spreading his arms wide. "You cut down a mountain, Trafalgar! Very impressive! But let's see how you handle the weight of the whole island!"
Reaching out with both hands, Teach did not summon darkness. He grabbed the empty air itself.
Channeling the power of the levitation fruit, the Emperor pulled upward.
The entire rocky coast of Winner Island groaned in protest. Massive fissures tore through the frozen dirt. Giant chunks of the coastline, boulders the size of warships, and thick patches of forest ripped themselves free from the bedrock, floating upward into the sky to form an artificial asteroid field.
Clenching his fists, Teach reversed the gravity instantly.
The floating debris rained down, slamming into the ocean and the remaining shoreline. The telekinetic crushing pressure shook the island, generating tremors that tossed the yellow submarine wildly in the churning water.
Fighting to keep his footing on the rocking deck, Law realized fighting a long-range battle of attrition against gravity manipulation was a losing strategy.
"R-Room."
A small, concentrated sphere of blue light formed around the blade of his nodachi.
Instead of expanding the sphere across the battlefield, Law threw the spatial bubble forward. The R-Room shot across the gap, attaching itself directly to the sickly horse hovering near the coastline.
Amputate.
A swift, invisible slash of spatial energy passed through the animal.
Stronger whinnied in shock as his body neatly separated into two distinct halves. Because the attack utilized the Ope Ope no Mi, the horse felt no pain and shed no blood, but the sudden bisection ruined its ability to stand.
Collapsing into a pile of separated horse parts, the mount dropped Doc Q heavily onto the snowy ground.
"My poor horse!" the sickly doctor coughed, rolling across the dirt.
Reacting quickly, Doc Q reached into his saddlebags. Pulling out a woven basket filled with bright red, delicious-looking apples, the doctor hurled the fruit directly toward the rocking submarine.
The apples were highly volatile explosives disguised as fruit, carrying enough firepower to blast a hole in the metal hull.
Before the bombs could reach the ship, Shachi leaped onto the railing.
The Heart Pirate took a deep breath of the freezing ocean air, his chest expanded rapidly. Tapping into the unique, aquatic combat techniques of his crew, Shachi forcefully exhaled.
A highly compressed, razor-sharp jet of seawater blasted from his mouth like a fire hose.
The high-pressure water stream intercepted the basket mid-air. The force detonated the explosive apples a safe distance away from the submarine, sending a harmless wave of heat and smoke washing over the deck.
"Nice shot, Shachi!" Penguin cheered, securing the mooring lines.
Standing near the periscope, Bepo's ears twitched violently. The enhanced hearing of the Mink navigator picked up the faint, almost silent click of a rifle hammer engaging amidst the noise of the explosions.
"Captain! Sniper at two o'clock!" Bepo shouted, pointing a furry paw toward a high ridge on the island.
Van Augur had already pulled the trigger.
A armor-piercing round tore through the snowy air, aimed flawlessly at the center of Law's forehead. The bullet moved too fast for standard evasion, utilizing the chaos of the apple bombs as the perfect cover.
A shadow stepped into the bullet's path.
Jean Bart did not flinch. The towering, muscular former slave crossed his arms over his chest, hardening his dense muscles to absorb the impact. The sniper round struck his thick shoulder, burying itself into the flesh but failing to penetrate deeply enough to cause lethal damage.
"I have your back, Captain," Jean Bart grunted, unbothered by the bleeding wound.
"Good work," Law acknowledged, keeping his eyes locked on the hovering Emperor.
The coordinated defense of the Heart Pirates neutralized the initial ambush. The crew was not a collection of dead weight relying on their captain; they were a seasoned, tactical unit capable of holding their own against Emperor commanders.
With the crew securing the submarine, Law went on the offensive.
K-Room.
Coating his nodachi in another concentrated sphere of spatial energy, the sword did not remain a standard length. The blade elongated invisibly, extending far beyond its metal edge.
Utilizing the fluid footwork of his adapted Moon Sword Style, Law did not run in a straight line. He glided across the metal deck, his movements swaying and unpredictable. The rhythmic approach made it impossible for Blackbeard to track his center of mass, hiding the true range of the invisible blade.
Dropping slightly toward the ocean, Teach reached out, attempting to catch the surgeon in a gravity well.
Law slipped through the crushing pressure.
Lunging forward, the surgeon thrust his nodachi. The blade remained yards away, but the invisible spatial extension passed effortlessly through the Emperor's chest, bypassing the thick layers of fat and muscle.
Shock Wille.
A high-voltage electrical charge discharged into Blackbeard's internal organs.
The Emperor screamed in agony. Blood sprayed from his mouth as the internal shockwave scrambled his nervous system and singed his heart. The Fuwa Fuwa no Mi lost its grip on the surrounding debris, allowing the floating boulders to crash back into the sea.
Tumbling backward, Teach clutched his chest, gasping for air. The pain inflicted by the awakened ability was staggering, amplified further by the inherent weakness of his original Darkness fruit, which forced him to feel pain more acutely than normal men.
"Captain!" Van Augur called out.
Activating the Wapu Wapu no Mi, the sniper teleported Blackbeard instantly. Snatching the injured Emperor out of the air, Augur moved him safely back to the snowy shoreline, out of range of the invisible blade.
Coughing up another mouthful of blood, Teach leaned heavily against a pine tree.
"Zehahaha," the Emperor wheezed, wiping his chin. "That hurt, Trafalgar! You have gotten a lot more dangerous!"
Recovering his breath, the Emperor pushed himself off the tree. The initial ambush had failed, and the tactical skirmish had resulted in heavy damage. The time for games had passed.
"Put me back in, Augur," Teach commanded, black smoke beginning to billow from his hands alongside the gravitational warping.
The sniper nodded, shifting the Emperor's location once more.
Teleporting to the rocky outcropping nearest the submarine, Blackbeard materialized right in front of the surgeon. The pirate raised a fist, combining the crushing, telekinetic weight of the levitation fruit with the light-devouring void of his darkness.
Meeting the charge, Law did not retreat.
The heavy nodachi clashed against the gravity-infused fist. The impact shook the very air, sending violent ripples across the surface of the freezing ocean. The two captains locked in struggle, the spatial slicing of the Ope Ope no Mi fighting against the crushing void of the Emperor.
While the captains battled on the surface, the Heart Pirates executed the second phase of their combat doctrine.
"Dive! Dive! Dive!" Shachi yelled, leading the charge.
Penguin and a dozen other crew members followed, diving cleanly off the deck of the submarine and into the freezing, dark waters of the New World.
The Heart Pirates were not a traditional boarding crew. Their strength lay beneath the waves. Swimming with the speed and agility of aquatic predators, the pirates bypassed the shoreline battle, heading straight for the log-raft ship of the Blackbeard Pirates anchored a short distance away.
Reaching the wooden hull, the underwater crew went to work. Utilizing heavy explosives, specialized cutting tools, and localized water-pressure strikes, the pirates began systematically dismantling the underside of the enemy vessel.
They intended to sink the Emperor's fleet before the battle even concluded, trapping the Devil Fruit users on the freezing island with no avenue of escape.
Thousands of miles away, inside the highest office of Marine Headquarters, the atmosphere remained volatile.
Fleet Admiral Sakazuki stood behind his desk, glaring out the large glass window overlooking the vast courtyard of New Marineford. The stump of his cigar burned brightly, matching the simmering rage boiling in his chest.
A communications officer stood rigidly near the doorway, holding a stack of freshly decoded reports.
"The intelligence is confirmed, sir," the officer read aloud, his voice trembling slightly under the crushing pressure radiating from the Fleet Admiral. "The Blackbeard Pirates have engaged the Heart Pirates off the coast of Winner Island. We are receiving massive seismic readings and gravitational anomalies from the sector."
"And Egghead?" Sakazuki growled, not turning around.
"CP0 has arrived at the laboratory, sir," the officer continued. "However, unconfirmed reports indicate the Straw Hat fleet has also made landfall on the island. The situation is escalating rapidly."
The cigar snapped in half between the Fleet Admiral's teeth.
The two most volatile, dangerous pirate crews in the world were currently engaged in conflict simultaneously, restructuring the balance of power across the New World.
Yet, the Navy could do nothing.
The fallout from the abolishment of the Warlords had scattered their forces. Hunting down Mihawk, Hancock, and Weevil required immense manpower. The unexpected defeat of Admiral Ryokugyu in Wano had demoralized the upper ranks and left them short a crucial military asset.
Deploying another fleet to Winner Island or Egghead would leave Marine Headquarters vulnerable to a counterattack from the Cross Guild or the Revolutionary Army.
"We sit here," Sakazuki muttered. "The world tears itself apart, and we are forced to sit behind desks and wait for the dust to settle."
Turning away from the window, the Fleet Admiral crushed the ruined cigar in his ashtray.
The era of absolute justice felt fragile. The new generation of pirates refused to play by the rules, forcing the Marines into a reactionary, defensive posture. Until the full might of the World Government could be consolidated, Sakazuki could only watch the reports roll in, praying the pirates destroyed each other before they turned their sights on the throne itself.