Chapter 156: Doflamingo's Stubborn Mouth
Everyone—whether pirates, marines, nobles of affiliated nations, or the audience watching through the video den den mushi—had the exact same thought surface in their minds.
Unconsciously, all eyes turned to the top of the pitch-black tower.
To the mysterious man who had worn a polite smile from beginning to end.
"Is this a joke?"
"When it comes to mysterious game merchants, it's one thing for a ruthless, unknown rebel to mock the Celestial Dragons—I can accept that."
A pirate trembled all over, waves of inexplicable emotions rising in his chest as he rasped out, "But... the Marines are the dogs raised by the World Government. There's no way they'd dare so brazenly use the Celestial Dragons for scheming."
Especially not someone like Smoker, a Marine Captain from Loguetown, acting under the banner of Fleet Admiral Sengoku.
The possibility of such blatant disrespect being false was nearly zero.
In other words, it was very likely that Buggy the Pirate was truly a Celestial Dragon!
Everyone stared dead-on at the game merchant at the top of the towering black spire, desperately trying to spot any sign of deceit. Could a simple game reward called [Celestial Dragon Bloodline] really rewrite reality?
Could such a power truly come from a Devil Fruit?
Fang Yi looked at the shocked and doubtful crowd with interest and said, "All products in the Samsara Game are absolutely real. There's no such thing as fraud or faulty goods. Players can feel completely assured when purchasing or exchanging items."
[Celestial Dragon Bloodline].
It allowed for direct changes from the source of the river of time—rewriting the past to include Buggy as one of the descendants of the twenty kings who formed the World Government 800 years ago.
Changing history from the future.
Back in the Shinobi World, he had demonstrated this terrifying temporal power to Hiruzen Sarutobi.
And now, he could do it again.
His tone was as casual as that of a shopkeeper selling cheap goods in a city store on just any island.
Boom.
It was like a thunderbolt exploding over the sea.
Everyone was utterly shocked, their complex gazes all focused on Buggy.
Previously, when they heard about the reward [Celestial Dragon Bloodline], they found it laughable.
After all, being a Celestial Dragon wasn't like registering a place of birth. You couldn't just meet a condition or acquire a license to become one. The Celestial Dragons lived in the Holy Land Mary Geoise and had a legacy dating back 800 years. Their existence was supported by countless records and evidence—an unbroken lineage of the creators.
In the artificial Devil Fruit factory,
Doflamingo sat stiffly for several minutes before suddenly erupting into mad laughter.
"Hmph, hmph, hmph..."
"Absolutely impossible. It's fake! A conspiracy! How could a garbage-tier pirate like him possibly become a Celestial Dragon!?"
Blue veins bulged on Doflamingo's forehead, and his sunglasses were askew.
The flamingo-feather cloak he usually cherished had fallen to the ground and been trampled several times by his own feet.
Inside the video den den mushi feed,
footage played showing Marines in the East Blue branch stopping people from attacking Buggy.
When Doflamingo heard Smoker personally declare that Buggy was a Celestial Dragon, and when he saw Smoker raise the banner bearing the authority of Fleet Admiral Sengoku, the last string in his mind finally snapped.
He began venting his rage without regard for appearances.
Trevall, the plum-themed officer of the Donquixote Family, cautiously said, "Doffy, just like you said—how could a trash pirate be a Celestial Dragon? It must be a Marine conspiracy."
But the moment he said it, Trevall realized something felt off. After all, the Donquixote Family were technically pirates now, and Doflamingo longed to return to the Celestial Dragons. Saying this was akin to insulting Doflamingo himself.
However, Doflamingo had never seen himself as a pirate. Deep down, he still believed he was a Celestial Dragon.
So he nodded in agreement, "Exactly. These despicable Marines... how dare they use the name of the Celestial Dragons to plot schemes? Don't the Five Elders do anything about this?"
Despite his words, it was only to comfort himself.
A dark, brooding emotion flickered in his eyes. He knew perfectly well—if the Five Elders hadn't given permission, no matter how bold the Fleet Admiral was, he wouldn't dare risk tarnishing the name of the Celestial Dragons.
Which meant that the unimpressive-looking pirate Buggy was actually a Celestial Dragon!
"Pica, hold down the fort. I'm going out."
Leaving those words behind, Doflamingo hurried out of the artificial Devil Fruit factory. Using his String-String Fruit, he flew rapidly and soon left Dressrosa, heading straight toward the East Blue.
In the Eastern Sea's Trial Tower area,
the crowd's emotions shifted from disbelief to shock, then to confusion, and now to unabashed envy toward the lucky recipient of the fortune from the Lucky Spin.
Clown Buggy.
A low-tier pirate with a Marine bounty had suddenly become a Celestial Dragon—just because he was struck by a Samsara Game reward.
"Everyone, relax."
Fang Yi's smile widened. "That was just an appetizer. Among the many prizes in the Lucky Spin, it doesn't even count as the main course. There will be more chances to spin it in future game events."
Even items that normally required tens of thousands, or even hundreds of thousands of reward points, could be won through the spin.
"How can we spin the Lucky Wheel?"
One of the nobles from an affiliated kingdom couldn't help asking.
As nobles who attended the World Government's Reverie every four years, they understood better than anyone the weight the Celestial Dragons carried.
And yet, such a reward wasn't even considered a "main course" by the mysterious game merchant?
Just what kind of existence was the Samsara Game?
Everyone stared eagerly at the black tower. At the base—like the size of an island—the internal floors were swarming with eerie, terrifying monsters now fully visible.
But those once-horrifying monsters now seemed... oddly agreeable.
"The East Blue Trial Tower has nine floors."
Fang Yi explained to the crowd with a smile, "Players who qualify must hunt corrupted monsters from the outermost edge, slowly working their way to the center. Each floor has a Tower Lord. Whoever kills the Tower Lord will earn a chance to spin the Lucky Wheel."
"The higher the floor, the greater the reward. Whoever defeats the Tower Lord on the ninth floor will get to spin the wheel ten times in a row."
"If your luck's good, those ten spins could be enough to take you from a nobody to someone with the power of a Marine Admiral—or even one of the Four Emperors."
His voice echoed throughout the Trial Tower and was broadcast via video den den mushi to the entire world.
"That kind of thing..."
Tashigi opened her mouth, instinctively wanting to defend the dignity of Marine Admirals—but the words stopped at her lips.
After all, if even Celestial Dragon bloodlines could be given as rewards, the strength of a Yonko or Admiral suddenly didn't seem all that shocking anymore.
All the buildup had now brought the atmosphere to a boiling point.
Even the most paranoid schemers couldn't help but get swept up in fantasies of becoming the lucky one to claim a massive prize.
"The game... begins now."
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