Five months ago. The top floor of the Dressrosa royal palace.
The Vivre Cards for Diamante, Buffalo, and Baby 5 went dark at the same moment.
Doflamingo was incandescent.
He knew Law could not have killed three officers alone. Especially Diamante. That kid couldn't pull it off even if he threw his life away.
Something else had happened in the North Blue.
That day, Doflamingo activated every underground intelligence asset the Donquixote Family had in the North Blue. Arms dealers. Black-market brokers. Bounty hunters. The merchant ships that drifted near Germa.
Anyone in the North Blue during that window got turned over, layer by layer. He was going to find out who killed his officers. And he was going to find out where Trafalgar Law had gone.
Four months ago.
The first reports reached Dressrosa. The picture was a mess.
Some said they saw a woman with a great blade and a towering fish-man. Others said Diamante had been hunting Law when it happened.
Then word came out of Germa. Someone in the Vinsmoke family had been badly hurt. A Devil Fruit was stolen. The arms dealers on the scene didn't know which fruit it was, but they remembered the two who took it.
Leona. Shark. Eclipse Pirates.
Inside the palace, Doflamingo stared at those two names for a long time. Then he laughed, low and quiet.
"Fufufufu…"
Trebol stood beside him. His face had shifted too.
"Doffy. That's Portgas D. Ace's people."
Of course Doflamingo knew. The Eclipse Pirates. The Fifth Emperor. That name wasn't something an ordinary crew could measure against anymore. Ace had killed a Celestial Dragon, crossed every line the World Government had, and was still breathing.
More importantly, the World Government hadn't crushed him instantly. What did that tell you? It told you Ace was no longer someone Doflamingo could touch casually.
Doflamingo was arrogant. He wasn't stupid.
He wanted to avenge Diamante. But if Law really had been taken in by the Eclipse, this couldn't be handled like an ordinary family grudge.
Trebol lowered his voice. "Do we keep digging?"
Doflamingo set the intelligence on the table. "Dig."
His fingers tapped the desktop lightly. "I want to know exactly where Law went. If he really boarded Ace's ship…"
Doflamingo's mouth stretched slowly. "Then we don't move against Ace. We move against Law."
Two months ago.
Vergo's Den Den Mushi brought new information. "I found an old thread."
Doflamingo sat in the dim room, a map of the North Blue spread across the table. "Talk."
"The Heart Pirates left the North Blue in a submarine. They didn't build it themselves. Swallow Island. An old man named Wolf. He had contact with Law's group. The submarine most likely came from him."
Swallow Island. Doflamingo looked down at the name on the map. Unremarkable. So unremarkable he never would have noticed it if he hadn't been hunting Law.
But the more unremarkable it was, the more it looked like a loose thread buried in the mud.
A man like Law seemed calm. Seemed capable of cutting things away. But Doflamingo knew better than anyone. Law couldn't forget Corazon. And he wouldn't forget the people who reached out to him when he was at his lowest.
"Where is he now?" Doflamingo asked.
"Still in the North Blue," Vergo answered. "No sign he's in direct contact with Law. No sign the Heart Pirates have gone back to see him recently."
Trebol leaned in. "Young master, should we grab him?"
Doflamingo didn't answer right away. Grabbing him was simple. But if Law really was part of the Eclipse, a rash move might pull Ace straight to Dressrosa. That wasn't the result he wanted.
He wanted Law. Not the whole black ship.
"Just watch him," Doflamingo said.
Trebol blinked. "Only watch?"
"Yes." Doflamingo's finger landed on the map and tapped Wolf's name lightly. "I want to know where he lives, who he sees, whether anything the Heart Pirates left behind is still with him. More importantly…"
His voice dropped. "I want to know if Law moves when he hears that name."
Trebol's mouth split open. "Behehehe… the young master wants to use the old man as bait?"
Doflamingo smiled. "Bait? Not yet. Right now, he's just a loose thread."
Doflamingo raised his hand and closed his fingers slowly. "You pull a thread gently. Yank it too fast, and it snaps."
One month ago.
Dressrosa. The palace.
Word that the Eclipse had reappeared landed on Doflamingo's desk. The black ship that vanished half a year ago was back in the New World. Vague sightings. A dark shape at high altitude. Possibly the Eclipse.
The reports were fragmentary, but they were enough to confirm one thing. Ace was back. And Law had very likely returned to the New World on that ship.
Trebol stood beside the desk, his voice kept low. "Young master, if Law is already on the Eclipse, do we keep going?"
Doflamingo looked down at the report. The black silhouette in the newspaper was blurred. But even a blurred shadow pressed down on the room.
He was silent for a moment, then asked, "Where's Sugar?"
Trebol paused, then answered immediately. "Underground."
"Good." Doflamingo leaned back. "Law's biggest problem isn't the Op-Op Fruit. It's that Ace might be standing behind him."
Trebol said nothing.
Doflamingo went on. "Kill Law, Ace will know. Capture Law, the Eclipse will come. But if Sugar turns him into a toy?"
The room went still for a beat. Trebol's smile turned sticky. "Behehehe…"
Doflamingo smiled too. "The moment Sugar touches him, Law stops being Law. Everyone forgets him. The Eclipse Pirates forget him. Even if he really is one of Ace's men."
He raised his hand. Fine threads trembled at his fingertips. "Once the memory is gone, so-called protection means nothing."
The Op-Op Fruit. The Perennial Youth Operation. The national treasure of Mary Geoise. Everything buried deep in his memory churned up again.
Law alive meant that thread hadn't been cut yet. If he could just pluck Law out of the Eclipse's web. If Sugar got one opening. Everything could still flip.
Vergo's voice came through the Den Den Mushi. "If the Eclipse notices, Dressrosa will be in serious danger."
Doflamingo laughed once. "I know."
Of course he knew. He understood what the Fifth Emperor meant better than Trebol did. That was why he still hadn't touched Wolf. No kidnapping. No threats. He hadn't even let his people in the North Blue get too close.
He just had them watch. Like a thread, hooked lightly into the prey. Waiting for Law to see it himself. Waiting for Law to lose his composure. Waiting for Law to step off Ace's ship on his own.
That was the opening he needed.
"Keep watching," Doflamingo said. "Don't spook Wolf. Don't spook Law. And do not spook the Eclipse."
The Den Den Mushi answered. "Understood."
Doflamingo hung up. He stood and walked to the window.
Outside, Dressrosa's streets were bright. Dancing toys. Laughing citizens. The Corrida Colosseum. The flower fields. The port. The palace. And beneath it all, the underground factories and trade lines.
This country looked like a fairy tale. But what really held it up were lies, fear, and people who had been erased.
"This country was always a web," Doflamingo murmured. "If Ace really comes, he'll have to step into it first."
Now.
Dressrosa. The top floor of the palace.
Doflamingo sat by the window. The North Blue map had been put away. In its place were layouts of Dressrosa's port, the palace, the underground factory, and the defensive positions of his officers.
He still hadn't moved on Wolf. He was still working out how to threaten Law alone without the rest of the Eclipse noticing.
Trebol dragged himself into the room. "Young master."
Doflamingo didn't turn. "What?"
"The black-ship sightings near Zou might be real. The Eclipse has returned to the New World."
Doflamingo's fingers tapped the armrest. Once. Twice. Three times.
He laughed low. "I know."
Trebol hesitated. "Then what about Wolf…"
"Keep watching," Doflamingo said. "As long as Ace isn't alerted, there's still a chance."
He picked up the wine glass on the table.
The order went out from Dressrosa. In the North Blue, inside a room at a black-market outpost, the low-level handler in charge of relaying orders closed the Den Den Mushi and muttered, "Watching one old man with this much caution. What a pain."
He tossed a gold coin onto the table. It had come from an arms dealer a few days earlier. The edges were a little worn. It looked exactly like any other gold coin.
But the moment the handler spoke the words "Wolf," "Swallow Island," and "Trafalgar Law," a ripple, impossibly faint, flickered inside that coin.
No one noticed.
It was a listening anchor Carina had slipped into the black-market trade chain a long time ago.
Doflamingo's thread had just been cast toward the North Blue. But the vibration of that thread had already traveled into the Eclipse's net.
Outside the window, Dressrosa's sunlight was bright. The toys in the streets kept dancing. The people kept laughing.
Doflamingo leaned back in his chair, laughing softly.
He didn't know yet. The loose thread he thought he had just found was already exposed inside a far larger web. And the master of that web had already passed the message to the captain of the black ship.
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