The Eclipse hovered above the forest clearing.
Its boarding ramp lowered slowly.
Ace descended with Sabo, Carina, Riona, and Shark.
Bepo hesitated a beat, then followed.
The moment his feet touched Zou's soil, his steps faltered. The smell of the forest, the moisture in the air, the faint electric charge that clung to every Mink here. It stopped him cold.
It had been too long.
So long he could barely tell memory from imagination anymore.
The shadows ahead stirred.
A canine Mink woman stepped out with her Musketeers. Golden hair, a longsword in hand, gaze sharp with warning.
Wanda.
She studied Ace's group and spoke evenly.
"This is the Mink Tribe's territory."
"Zou does not welcome unidentified outsiders."
Her eyes shifted to Bepo and paused.
"A polar bear Mink?"
Bepo ducked his head on reflex.
"I'm sorry... my name is Bepo."
"I left Zou when I was young."
Another set of footsteps emerged from the deeper forest, steadier than the rest. A one-eyed jaguar Mink strode out of the shadows.
Pedro.
His attention had been on Ace, but at the name "Bepo," his stride hitched.
"Bepo?"
Pedro looked at the white bear Mink. Something unreadable crossed his single eye.
"Zepo's younger brother?"
Bepo's head snapped up.
"You knew my brother?"
Pedro was silent for a moment.
"He was my comrade."
"We sailed together."
Bepo's paws clenched tight.
Shachi and Penguin both glanced at him.
Bepo had left Zou to find his brother Zepo. All these years, he'd never gotten a real answer.
Pedro didn't continue. Not here, not now.
His gaze shifted from Bepo to the blade at Ace's hip, then to Ace's face. Young, and heavy with presence.
"Portgas D. Ace."
His voice dropped.
"You brought Zepo's brother back to Zou. You brought this black ship to the doorstep of the Mink Tribe."
"What do you want here?"
The surrounding Mink warriors tightened their grips on their weapons. Tiny arcs of electricity sparked through the air.
Ace met Pedro's stare and smiled.
"Two things."
He raised one finger.
"First, the red Road Poneglyph."
The tension in the clearing snapped taut.
Wanda's expression shifted.
Pedro's eye went cold.
Ace ignored their reactions and raised a second finger.
"Second, Kaido of Wano."
Pedro didn't answer right away.
The wind through the forest fell very quiet.
Bepo was still watching him, clearly holding back questions about Zepo.
Pedro only murmured:
"Neither of those names are things to be spoken lightly."
Ace said flatly:
"That's why I came in person."
From the direction of the royal city, a heavier presence finally stirred. The Mink warriors among the trees parted to either side.
A tall figure approached from the city, unhurried.
Golden mane, blue cloak, a sword at his hip.
The Ruler of Day, Inuarashi.
He didn't draw his blade like the warriors around him. He showed no open hostility.
But as he drew near, the restless Musketeers and forest scouts stilled.
That was the weight of the Ruler of Day.
Inuarashi's gaze swept over Bepo first.
A polar bear Mink. A child who had left Zou long ago.
Then he looked to Pedro.
Pedro dipped his head.
"Duke Inuarashi."
"He is Zepo's brother."
Inuarashi was silent a moment. His expression shifted, just barely.
Zepo.
That name threaded a brief, complicated thread through the tension in the air.
But soon enough, Inuarashi's attention settled back on Ace.
The dark red coat. The face, far too young. And the ease of a man who stood among armed Mink warriors the way he'd stand at his own ship's prow.
Finally, his eyes landed on the blade at Ace's waist.
Inuarashi's expression changed.
In that instant, he seemed to glimpse sea winds from long ago. Whitebeard's ship. Roger's ship. The man on the Oro Jackson who always laughed like a storm. And that sword.
The Supreme Grade Blade. Ace.
Inuarashi stared at the sword for a long, long time.
No one interrupted him. Even Riona, sharp as a cat, only narrowed her eyes, catching the old turbulence that passed through the Ruler of Day.
At last, Inuarashi spoke.
"Portgas D. Ace."
His voice was steady.
"Do you know what that blade at your hip means?"
Ace glanced down at the hilt and smiled.
"I know a little."
Inuarashi held his gaze.
"That is not something you carry by knowing 'a little.'"
Sabo raised an eyebrow slightly but stayed silent, watching the Ruler of Day.
Inuarashi continued.
"You found Zunesha. You know of the red Road Poneglyph. You've spoken Kaido's name. And now you stand on Zou carrying that sword."
His hand came to rest on his own sword hilt. Not drawing. Just pressing down.
"I need an explanation."
Ace met his eyes. The smile didn't fade.
"The explanation is simple."
"This sword was always meant to be mine."
"I heard Zunesha's voice."
"The red Poneglyph is something I want."
"And Kaido is someone I'm going to fight."
The Mink warriors' breathing sank in near unison.
Wanda's grip on her blade tightened.
Pedro's eye narrowed.
Inuarashi studied Ace for a long moment.
The young face before him was sharper than the Roger he remembered, and younger. But the set of his brow, the unrestrained grin, the gaze that refused to yield before the world's rules. It all pulled Inuarashi back to that man on the Oro Jackson more than twenty years ago.
The Roger he'd known was already middle-aged. But if Roger had ever been young, he might have looked exactly like this.
And hearing Zunesha's voice.
Inuarashi had met others who could do that. Lord Oden could hear it. Roger could hear it. It was something no ordinary strength could touch.
Inuarashi spoke slowly.
"You can hear Zunesha's voice?"
Ace nodded.
"I can."
"It's tired."
Inuarashi's pupils contracted faintly.
Ace lifted his gaze, looking up at the forest canopy that blotted out the sky, and past it, toward something deeper in the great elephant's will.
"It keeps walking."
"Like it's carrying a punishment with no end."
This time, Inuarashi fell completely silent.
That couldn't be faked with intelligence reports. Zunesha's voice had no rumors, no written record. To speak of its exhaustion and loneliness meant this young man had truly heard it.
The way Inuarashi looked at Ace finally changed.
His voice came lower.
"I believe what you've said."
"But that red stone is no ordinary treasure. It's tied to the final island, and to the alliance between Zou and the Kozuki Family that endures to this day."
"So, Portgas D. Ace."
Inuarashi locked eyes with him.
"If you've come to take it by force, then from this moment on, Zou will treat you as an enemy."
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