The black blade writhed like a living tentacle, slithering up Davy Jones' arm. After coiling tightly around it for a moment, it sank into his flesh and disappeared from sight.
Davy Jones stepped into the air, a sharp crack splitting through the sky as he broke the sound barrier. In the blink of an eye, he pierced through the molten landscape and emerged upon a frozen wasteland of ice and frost.
He walked across the brittle surface, listening to the crack-crack-crack beneath his boots without the slightest concern.
As the howling winds swept by, he exhaled his Haki—spreading it like a spider's web in every direction—but he did not sense Kuzan's presence anywhere.
A flicker of surprise crossed his face.
Could it be that Kuzan had broken free of the illusion on his own and escaped Punk Hazard?
As the thought passed through his mind, his Observation Haki caught the approach of his own crew. He turned toward them and began walking, unhurried.
Before long, he saw them—Law, Buggy, Perona, Kid, Bonney, and Drake.
Drake trailed behind the others, solitary and out of place. His eyes were lifeless and pale, his entire being radiating death.
Law had already removed the Ghost Bamboo that had been impaled through his chest.
Now, as one of the undead, Drake's regenerative powers had returned, and the wound across his chest was already sealed over with a dark scar—grim to behold.
Davy Jones needed only a single glance to understand what had happened.
Even so, Law stepped forward to explain:
"Captain, if my guess is right, Drake was an undercover agent sent by Marine Headquarters. He betrayed his oath to you."
"I know," Davy Jones replied, studying Drake calmly. "Even so, his soul belongs to me for the next hundred years. He has no other choice."
Drake showed no reaction. He now followed only the commands of Davy Jones—the Contractor—and whatever remnants of resentment or instinct his soul retained. Beyond that, he barely moved at all.
Hearing this exchange confirmed what the others had already begun to suspect. A chill crept up their spines.
Thank goodness… Buggy thought, rubbing his red nose nervously. I've never done anything that could be called betrayal.
But the newcomers—Kid and Bonney—felt their hearts grow uneasy.
To say they harbored no resentment over being forced into a "contract" with Davy Jones would have been a lie.
They had imagined countless ways to overthrow him, to break the curse—but they had never dared act on those thoughts.
Now, seeing Drake's fate, they understood the price of rebellion.
Think about it? Sure.
But act on it? Never again.
The contract bound both body and soul to DavyJones for a full century—there was no escaping it.
Kid and Bonney weren't afraid of dying. But they were terrified of that kind of death—of becoming walking corpses like Drake, human-shaped weapons of slaughter.
They could almost imagine Drake's will still trapped somewhere inside that body, locked within the prison of his own flesh.
Davy Jones paid their thoughts no mind.
As he often said—most who boarded his ship had once dreamt of killing him. Few began as loyal.
But fear… and time… always wore them down.
He was focused on something else now.
"Did you see 'Aokiji' Kuzan when you arrived?"
"We did," Law answered. "I was just about to report that. When we entered the research facility on Punk Hazard and came back out… we ran into Kuzan."
The sudden appearance of the Marine Admiral had startled them all.
At first, they thought he meant to attack and closed ranks, preparing for battle.
But Kuzan hadn't even looked at them—he had passed right through their midst, his expression crazed, and unleashed freezing air into empty space.
From the frozen plains to the research base, from there all the way to the coast, he had fought something—something only he could see—before finally vanishing across the frozen sea.
In truth, ever since the "Paramount War," Kuzan had been plagued by nightmares that gnawed at his sanity.
His proximity to Davy Jones had only worsened it, driving those nightmares into his waking hours.
Now he was fighting illusions across the ocean, far from Punk Hazard.
Sooner or later, he would awaken on his own—and when he did, he would understand what had truly happened.
And once he understood, he would not return.
Because the moment he came near Davy Jones again, he would be dragged back into the hallucination.
Returning would mean death—or worse, killing his fellow Marines by mistake.
Until he found a way to lift the curse, Kuzan could only stay as far from Davy Jones as possible.
"And what of the G-5 Marines?" Davy Jones asked next.
Law explained everything that had happened after they split up, leaving nothing out—except two details: Vergo's true identity and anything concerning Corazon.
Those were wounds he wasn't ready to expose to the others.
He would tell the captain later, when the time was right.
By now, the surviving G-5 members had likely retreated from the Punk Hazard waters aboard their warship.
Law's group had been delayed by Kuzan and failed to intercept them, so they had returned to find Davy Jones instead.
But all of them felt uneasy.
Before leaving, Davy Jones had ordered them to eliminate everyone on the island.
Vergo, Caesar, Monet, the armored troops, and many of the G-5 Marines—all had fallen by their hands.
Yet they had not achieved total annihilation. They worried whether that failure would anger him.
But when Davy Jones listened to the report, he merely nodded, seemingly pleased. He made no mention of punishment.
The crew let out a collective breath of relief.
Still, questions lingered.
They had uncovered the truth behind the human experiments conducted on the island, but why had Kuzan and the G-5 Marines been here at all?
Surely, they hadn't come to protect Caesar and his twisted research?
Seeing their confusion, Law spoke up for everyone:
"Captain, why were Kuzan and G-5 here in the first place?"
Davy Jones couldn't help but smirk—a cold, mocking smile. The more he thought about it, the more absurd it seemed.
"It's simple," he said. "Marine Headquarters split into two factions—and they chose the most foolish way possible to resolve it.
'Akainu' and 'Aokiji' decided to settle their dispute the old-fashioned way: through battle."
He had heard hints of Marine discord from Jinbe before, and had considered the possibility.
But it had seemed too ridiculous to be true—so he had dismissed it.
And yet, here it was.
Sakazuki and Kuzan had done exactly that.
Even more astonishing, the World Government and Marine HQ had allowed it to happen—posting only the G-5 unit nearby as security.
"The New World is in chaos," Davy Jones continued, "and the strongest forces in the Marines chose to fight each other. Even if one wins, how can the loser remain in Headquarters after that?"
This duel, he explained, didn't just decide who would become Fleet Admiral—it determined which of the two Admirals would stay in the Marines at all.
The thought itself was almost laughable.
The crew finally understood.
The unnatural disasters across Punk Hazard were the aftermath of Akainu and Aokiji's battle for command of the Marines.
They were stunned.
To think that such titans would resolve a political struggle through sheer brute force…
Once, they had held Marine Admirals in awe—towering symbols of power and justice.
But now, that illusion cracked.
They realized Admirals, too, were human—ruled by emotion, ego, and pride.
If a problem could be solved by fists, they would never bother with words.
Then came the next question: they had seen Kuzan's condition…
But what about Sakazuki?
They turned to Davy Jones.
And suddenly, an insane thought surfaced in all their minds.
Buggy, trembling, finally asked,
"C-Captain… you don't mean… that you killed Akainu…?"
Davy Jones began walking toward the Terror Ghost, his tone calm and almost detached.
"I merely helped Marine Headquarters make its decision.
They no longer need to struggle over who should be Fleet Admiral."
The meaning sank in—and everyone froze.
They exchanged glances, swallowed hard, then hurried to follow behind him.
Each step felt light, unreal, as if they were walking on air.
What had just happened seemed impossible—and yet, made perfect sense.
Since the dawn of the Great Pirate Era, countless powerful pirates had risen and fallen—the Four Emperors, the Seven Warlords, Supernovas, legends of the sea.
But never had a pirate accomplished this:
The killing of a Marine Admiral.
From this day forward, everything would change.
The highest-ranking officer ever to fall to pirates had been raised—from Vice Admiral… to Admiral.
The aura of invincibility that had once shrouded the Admirals—the terror they inspired across the seas—was shattered.
The pirates of the world would come to realize:
Even a Marine Admiral… could be slain.
And the fear of Marine Headquarters would begin to fade.
The repercussions of this act…
would rival those of the Paramount War itself.
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