The Seastone Prison.
Located at the very lowest level of the underground research base, this prison was forged entirely from steel mixed with seastone, stretching from the ceiling to the floor, and from the walls to the heavy doors. It was a facility built specifically for holding Devil Fruit users.
However, spanning several square meters and containing over a hundred cells, the sheer scale of the prison drastically diluted the concentration of seastone mixed within its structure. As a result, while it still prevented users from activating their abilities, it was not potent enough to sap them of their strength and leave them bedridden.
Clack-clack-clack-clack... Clack-clack-clack-clack...
The somewhat chaotic sound of footsteps echoed down the silver-gray steel corridor as twelve heavily armed guards escorted Sanji forward.
One of the guards shoved Sanji roughly from behind, barking coldly, "Move it! Stop dawdling!"
"Hurry, hurry... What's the rush, you off to your own funeral?" Sanji retorted with an irritated glare to the side. However, with both his hands and feet locked in restraints, he was in no position to fight back.
Despite his sharp words, he quickened his pace. As they passed, many of the inmates inside the cells pressed their faces against the small iron-grated windows on the doors, eyeing the fresh arrival.
"Looks like another one's here!"
"A Devil Fruit user? Or someone with some rare physique or talent? Maybe a cyborg?"
"I know him! It's that cook from the Straw Hat crew who got caught earlier, what was his name again?!"
"The whole pirate crew got hauled in here? That's insane!"
"..."
The prisoners murmured among themselves, casting curious gazes toward Sanji as if trying to decipher what made him special.
After all, everyone locked up in this prison was either a Devil Fruit user, a member of some rare race, someone blessed with uncommon innate talents, or a specialized existence like a cyborg or a genetically enhanced human.
Deep inside, however, a turbulent storm was brewing in Sanji's mind. Luffy and the others got caught too! Are Nami-san and Robin-san here as well?
Moments later, after walking just a short distance, Sanji spotted a familiar set of faces through the window of a metal door.
"Sanji?!"
"It's Sanji!"
"Sanji got captured too!"
"..."
Instantly, the faces of Luffy, Zoro, Usopp, and the others pressed hard against the small windows of the metal doors lining both sides of the corridor, shouting in astonished delight.
"Luffy, Mosshead, Nami-san... You guys, why are you all down here?!" Sanji asked in disbelief. Though he had already suspected as much, seeing it with his own eyes still felt surreal.
"Move along! You'll have plenty of time to chat later!" An impatient guard shoved Sanji forward.
After a few more steps, Sanji was brought to the door of Cell 76. The guard shoved him inside and slammed the metal door shut with a heavy clank.
The cell was tiny, no more than five meters in length and height, and a mere three meters wide, with a soft carpet laid out on the floor. If a towering giant were to be locked in here, they would barely be able to stretch their legs out while sitting on the ground.
The moment the guards retreated, Sanji lunged at the door, pressing his face directly against the window and shouting at the top of his lungs, "Luffy! Can you hear me?!"
"Sanji! I hear you loud and clear!" Luffy's voice immediately echoed back.
With that, the entire prison erupted into a lively commotion as the rest of the Straw Hat crew chimed in with shouts and hollers. Through the chaotic exchanges, Sanji finally learned how the rest of the crew had ended up captured.
They had first infiltrated the Chris Pirates' munitions factory, intending to launch a subsequent raid on the medicine garden to plunge the Clifford Kingdom into chaos. Their plan was to draw away the guards and officers of the Chris Pirates, and then use the ensuing confusion to locate and rescue Sanji and Robin.
Only, they never expected that the moment they struck the munitions factory, they would walk right into a trap and be completely wiped out, with the entire crew dragged down to this very prison.
"Ha-ha-ha! What a bunch of fools!"
"Great plan, terrible luck!"
"The officers of the Chris Pirates are absolute monsters, every single one of them!"
"Imagine getting cocky over a rookie pirate crew!"
"..."
The conversation between the Straw Hats carried clearly down the corridor, drawing mixed reactions from the other inmates, some mocking, some sighing, and others simply indifferent.
"Sanji, where's Robin?" Nami suddenly called out.
"Robin-san isn't here?" Sanji asked, his heart skipping a beat as he hurriedly replied, "Aside from when we were first captured together, we haven't seen each other since!"
Though Sanji held the status of a prince of the Germa Kingdom, in the eyes of Aeridar, he held nowhere near the value of Robin. He would have been handed right over to Judge long ago, though Judge had conveniently ended up tossing him back into the mix this time.
"Robin-san should be fine." Trafalgar Law's voice rang out from across the hall, offering a calm analysis. "That bastard Aeridar has a hoarding problem. Judging by how things look, he's probably collected Poneglyphs and wants Robin-san to translate them, which is why she's being kept in solitary confinement."
"That's a relief!"
Sanji let out a long breath of relief. Since he and Robin had been captured together and separated immediately afterward, he had been harboring deep anxieties about her safety.
"Wait a minute... What kind of place is this? Is it even a prison? Why is it so cramped?"
Suddenly, a realization struck Sanji. For a standard prison, this place was far too small; it barely even looked like cells were meant to hold ordinary inmates. If this wasn't a typical prison, why were all these people locked away here?
"This is the special holding ward for high-profile targets on Alvis Island, the Seastone Prison!"
An inmate from a neighboring cell chimed in to explain, "The entire facility is built from steel laced with Seastone. Not only is it unbelievably sturdy, but it's also the ultimate nemesis of Devil Fruit users. While the users locked in here aren't left physically weak or debilitated, their powers remain completely unusable. Even though it's small and holds only a few dozen prisoners, everyone locked down here possesses immense research value!"
"Research value?!"
Sanji's eyes widened, a sudden, inexplicable chill washing over him.
Picking up where the other inmate left off, Law continued his explanation, "Devil Fruit users, cyborgs whose bodies have undergone mechanical alterations, enhanced humans altered by drugs, or people born with extraordinary innate talents, such as scientists, fortune-tellers capable of reading past and future, humans with physiological anomalies that defy common sense, or members of extremely rare races. All of these existences hold high research value!"
"That's right! They used to keep a winged person in here, the kind with white wings, not a Skypiean, but like a creature straight out of legend, an angel!"
"And a fairy! I heard one came from Dressrosa, though they vanished afterward. Probably experimented on to death!" another inmate interrupted, rattling off several ultra-rare races.
Research value! Are they planning to dissect my body? Sanji muttered to himself, a heavy wave of shock gripping his chest.
If anyone else was in the dark, he certainly wasn't. He was a product of the Germa 66 genetic science program, albeit a defective failure who lacked his brothers' and sister's superhuman physical strength and bulletproof exoskeletons.
More than that, looking at the Straw Hat Pirates as a whole, it seemed the entire crew was comprised of walking specimens primed for research.
Luffy, a simple-minded Devil Fruit user!
Chopper, a reindeer who ate the Human-Human Fruit!
Brook, a living skeleton who had crossed into the underworld and returned.
Franky, a blatant cyborg.
And aside from himself, that essentially left only Zoro and Nami as the sole "ordinary" humans.
As for Law, it went without saying, he was the user of the supernatural Op-Op Fruit, whose legendary "Immortality Operation" was a temptation few in the world could resist.
Suddenly, Law's voice cut through the air with a solemn question, "Sanji-ya, why were you brought down here? Or rather, why did it take them this long to lock you up in this place?"
If Sanji were truly an ordinary human, he wouldn't have been imprisoned here in the first place; but if he weren't an ordinary human, he should have been thrown down here long ago.
Huff…
Sanji drew in a heavy, ragged breath and spoke in a low tone, "We can leave the explanations for later. Right now, I need to share an important piece of news with you all."
"The Yonko... Big Mom... is dead!"