Totoland, once the shining bastion of terror under the rule of the Yonko Charlotte Linlin, fell into an uneasy silence after her defeat in Wano. Without Big Mom's oppressive presence to hold her vast island empire together, chaos erupted swiftly. Internal factions began fighting for power. Some subordinates deserted, while others tried to rise as the new masters of Whole Cake Island.
However, the fallen empress's children did not allow the situation to worsen and quickly took control — with Katakuri leading the charge.
In less than a month, Totoland pulsed with life once more.
Even so, Big Mom's children remained restless. Their younger sister Pudding had been kidnapped by Blackbeard's crew, and they planned a rescue mission. Taking an elite group with his sister Smoothie at his side, Katakuri set out for Blackbeard's territory — unaware that someone else would soon invade their home.
Inside Whole Cake Island.
Cracker was covered in blood. His biscuit armor was shattered, reduced to crumbs and broken plates, and his battered body could barely stand.
Before him stood a calm-looking young man who watched in silence.
Cracker clenched his teeth, the taste of iron filling his mouth.
"You…" he muttered, spitting blood. "Who the hell… are you?"
Noah didn't respond. He simply watched him with cold eyes.
In his right hand, he held a white Devil Fruit shaped like an egg.
Cracker collapsed with a dull thud, unconscious.
Noah didn't even glance at him. He calmly walked past and began climbing onto the chest of an unconscious giant lying nearby.
When he reached the giant's chest, Noah summoned a Susanoo arm, its claws piercing deep into the giant's torso. With a violent pull, he tore out a formless mass of energy.
The giant's body shuddered before dissolving into clouds of smoke that split into ten adolescent figures with similar appearances.
Noah pulled out a red apple, and the energy shot into it, transforming it into a new Devil Fruit.
He looked at the two fruits in his hands with a faint smile.
The first, resembling a giant hen's egg, was the Tama-Tama no Mi — a Zoan-type fruit that transformed the consumer's body composition into that of an egg. When cracked, the user regenerated and gained a stronger body with increasingly avian traits.
Though it seemed useless at first glance, Noah had his own plans for that fruit.
The second one, however, was far more important.
The Gocha-Gocha no Mi was a Paramecia-type fruit that granted its user the power to merge with one or more people, creating a hybrid individual who shared the traits and strengths of all fused beings.
With this fruit, Noah was certain he could complete his project.
Disappearing from the scene, he embarked on a new journey in search of more Devil Fruits. Once satisfied with his haul, he returned to his laboratory to resume his work.
Months later, while Noah continued his research as usual, something unexpected forced him to stop.
He suddenly fainted without warning.
He had been in the middle of his lab, reviewing a series of data on magical bloodlines, when his body simply collapsed — as if someone had flipped a switch.
What he hadn't realized was that his body had reached the end of its natural developmental stage. His Elder Blood, long dormant, had finally activated on its own, triggering an uncontrollable evolutionary process.
Deep within his chest, his mana core began to compress. Impurities burned away, particles reorganized, and the energy grew denser and more stable. It was the step into the second rank — a significant advancement. But Noah wasn't conscious to feel it.
His mind had been dragged elsewhere.
When he opened his eyes, he was no longer in his laboratory.
Before him stretched a blue sea, flat and motionless. The water did not ripple, yet it wasn't solid either. Noah floated above its surface without sinking.
"This is… my spiritual sea," he muttered, recognizing it instinctively.
Looking up, he saw a dark sky like outer space, speckled with thousands of stars. Some shone faintly, others more brightly. At the center of them all, two stood out clearly.
The first was a massive purple star, ten times larger than the rest, slowly orbiting an even greater one — a white sphere, radiant as a sun, dominating the starry firmament.
Before he could react, his body began to move, floating toward the white star beyond his control.
As he drifted past some of the smaller stars, he instinctively reached out and brushed one with his fingers.
The moment he touched it, a stream of information flooded his mind:
"Universe: Nano Machine."
Noah frowned as the data entered his thoughts.
"Each star… is a universe?"
He quickly grasped the essence of it. This sea represented his sea of consciousness, and the stars were access points — coordinates his Elder Blood could identify, connect to, and use. They weren't merely destinations but references of time and space, each offering the possibility to travel to a specific point in his timeline, guided by his will.
He was still processing this when he drifted near the second largest star, right behind the white one.
The moment he saw it, he knew what it was.
"The Shinobi Universe…"
He didn't need to touch it to confirm — the sense of familiarity was enough.
A second later, he arrived before the white star.
The gravity it emitted was absolute. Noah tried to resist, to stop or turn away, but his spiritual body was pulled in without resistance. In the next instant, the star swallowed him whole.
His vision turned white.
When he opened his eyes again, he was no longer in the sea of stars.
He now floated in a silent void, facing a universe that defied conventional logic — a colossal wheel-shaped structure, suspended in the emptiness, slowly spinning.
Each section of the wheel contained entire galaxies — weaves of light and energy interlacing like an ancient, living mechanism.
Noah stared in silence. There was no doubt: this was something far greater than an ordinary universe.
Then he noticed something strange.
A massive black mist, lodged within one of the wheel's segments. It didn't move, but it pulsed slowly, as if breathing. Its form was unstable — at times a storm, at others a tentacled shadow, sometimes a simple void.
Though it occupied only a fraction — perhaps ten percent — of the entire ring, it visually dominated everything around it.
The moment Noah focused on it, his spiritual body tensed.
What he felt wasn't fear — at least not in the normal sense. It was something more primal, more visceral.
Disgust. Rejection. A deep, instinctive repulsion.
It was hard even to look directly at that thing. He felt his thoughts become tainted merely by being near it, as if that black mass represented the denial of all life, order, and meaning.
Then, suddenly, a hand touched his shoulder.
Noah flinched. The contact was gentle, but in that place, any unexpected stimulus was alarming.
He turned instantly — and what he saw left him speechless.
A woman.
She stood right behind him — though the concept of "up" or "down" meant little there. Her presence seemed to ignore the rules of the environment. She didn't float; she simply was. The space itself seemed to bend to support her.
Noah couldn't find words.
His mind — logical, analytical, nearly mechanical when assessing others — failed to form any judgment. He didn't think of beauty, power, or danger. Only one word echoed in overwhelming clarity:
Perfection.
It wasn't exaggeration or flattery. That figure embodied something beyond physical allure — an ideal of balance, form, and essence. As if she were a Platonic ideal that shouldn't exist in reality.
The woman gazed at him expressionlessly, though her eyes held a depth that made every sage and god seem shallow.
Noah swallowed hard. This was the first time something had been so utterly beyond his control.
"Who are you?" he asked, though part of him already knew the answer wouldn't be simple.
The woman smiled instead of replying.
Her gaze shifted toward the black mass, and for a brief instant, her perfect face twisted with utter disgust. She didn't try to hide it. It was a natural reaction — like witnessing something that should never have existed.
Then she looked back at Noah, her calm composure restored.
"You must have many questions," she said softly, her voice serene and unhurried.
Noah nodded.
"This is still your spiritual sea. I, this place — all of it is a projection. An echo left within your ancestral blood."
Noah frowned slightly. Inside, his mind was already connecting the pieces. His Elder Blood — a power not born with him, but bestowed. Until now, he had considered it an exceptional tool, an arcane blessing of immeasurable depth, yet one with a supposedly known origin.
The woman saw his reaction and smiled faintly.
"Yes. That blood was given to you by the Will of the Primordial Earth, wasn't it?"
Noah wasn't surprised by her words. Judging by the situation, his Elder Blood was clearly the cause of all this.
The real question was how this woman had managed to leave a fragment of her consciousness within it.
"I am part of that legacy," she said. "I, too, was once a human of the Primordial Earth, like you. After my death, I was given the chance to reincarnate… and I chose the universe then known as Dungeons & Dragons. After hundreds of millions of years, I became an Empyrean — a being that transcended not only its universe but multiple levels of existence. Beyond the planes, the gods, even the superuniverses that contain them."
After a few seconds of silence, Noah asked,
"What exactly is a superuniverse?"
"Superuniverses are the highest level of reality a universe can reach," she replied, turning slightly toward him.
"An Empyrean can destroy one of those superuniverses with a single palm strike."
Noah raised an eyebrow and kept listening.
"Every Empyrean born from the Primordial Earth can eventually return to it, leaving behind certain resources for future generations."
Noah narrowed his eyes.
"Like my Elder Blood?"
"Exactly. Your Elder Blood was modified by me. The original Elder Blood has no direction — it's raw power. I infused it with the metaphysical coordinates of thousands of lesser universes. Worlds you can visit, absorb, study, or conquer."
Noah had partly suspected this, but hearing it stated so plainly left him momentarily speechless.
"Those worlds are designed to help you grow. If you exploit them to their fullest, you could reach the universal level — a limit few ever attain. But that is also the ceiling of what these powers can grant you. Beyond that… you'll need something more than lesser worlds."