-Real World-
After the Sky Screen's broadcast concluded, Brook found himself with considerably less to occupy his time. Gecko Moriah had kept his word and returned the shadow that had been implanted in Ryuma's corpse to its rightful owner—the legendary samurai's spirit could finally rest properly. However, regarding the critical matter of how to communicate with the gates of the underworld and summon souls from hell itself, Brook still had no concrete understanding. Despite many days of study and meditation, there had been absolutely no progress.
The skeleton musician felt somewhat discouraged by this lack of advancement, but Moriah—who had taken Brook as a subordinate and invested in his potential—didn't share that pessimistic view. Becoming stronger was always a gradual process, one that required the accumulation of extensive knowledge and tremendous effort through dedicated practice. The Shichibukai simply believed that Brook hadn't yet grasped the fundamental principles involved. As long as the skeleton could identify the key conceptual breakthrough, he would successfully establish communication with the underworld and finally summon souls directly from hell. There was still plenty of time to experiment and learn.
Brook played his violin in the castle as usual today, his skeletal fingers moving across the strings with practiced grace. Perona, the little princess who ruled over the castle's atmosphere and aesthetics, loved music deeply. After spending several days in Brook's company, she had become thoroughly captivated by his artistic abilities—though she remained somewhat disturbed by his unfortunate habit of requesting to see women's underwear at every opportunity.
Despite that significant character flaw, Brook was unquestionably the finest musician Perona had ever encountered in her entire life. The two had met only one day before he composed an original piece specifically for the Gothic-styled girl, a gesture that immediately elevated her favorability toward him to maximum levels.
After that initial connection, Perona had become the skeleton's most loyal and devoted fan. Whenever she had free time, she would persistently seek him out and beg him to continue playing music for her entertainment. Today was another quiet day on the massive ship, perfect for enjoying musical performances as usual.
"Perona, are there flying zombies on this island?" Brook asked casually while adjusting his violin. "I see something in the sky that looks like a dragon."
After questioning her for several moments without receiving any response, Brook glanced toward Perona's usual position. What he saw made his nonexistent heart sink with concern. The Gothic princess's face had been completely replaced by an expression of absolute terror. Her beautiful facial features, which normally fit together in a pleasing arrangement, were now distorted almost beyond recognition. This appeared to be a physical manifestation of extreme, primal fear.
"That's not a zombie at all!" Perona's voice emerged as barely more than a strangled whisper.
Brook had been trapped within the Devil's Triangle for many years—decades, in fact. He possessed virtually no knowledge about recent developments in the outside world. He had never seen what the Four Emperors looked like, didn't know their names or reputations, and certainly couldn't recognize them on sight even if they appeared directly before him.
Perona crossed her arms defensively across her chest, her entire body trembling. The girl stammered out her identification: "It's one of the Four Emperors... It's Kaido... Kaido of the Beasts... Why is he here?!"
The kilometer-long azure dragon flying majestically above the Gothic buildings would not deign to explain its presence to a group of weaklings far beneath its notice. An extremely powerful storm swirled continuously around the serpentine body, and brilliant green light began gathering within the dragon's enormous maw. King, the small Lunarian warrior flying alongside his captain in dragon form, hurriedly dodged backward to avoid being caught in the impending attack.
A tremendous roar erupted from the mouth of the Azure Dragon. A massive volley of compressed, razor-sharp wind blades instantly covered all the buildings directly ahead. Kaido didn't appreciate Gothic-style architecture in the slightest—he found it depressing and unnecessarily ornate—so he felt absolutely no psychological burden about demolishing everything he saw.
Every individual strike of those wind blades was comparable to a full-power slash from a master swordsman. The buildings before them were ruthlessly cut apart, the edges of each slice perfectly smooth as though carved by supernatural precision. Some unfortunate zombies were even bisected cleanly in half, their reanimated bodies collapsing into component pieces. Within mere moments, all the structures in Kaido's immediate path had been reduced to scattered ruins. The Emperor intended to establish his own flag on this vessel, to construct noble buildings that belonged exclusively to him, and he would not tolerate anyone else's claim of ownership over this legendary ship.
Kaido employed his Observation Haki to sense that living humans still survived somewhere within the ruins he'd created. Without the slightest hesitation, he prepared to continue his rampage and completely raze the entire area to bare deck. He didn't care about the lives or deaths of others—such concerns were beneath an Emperor's consideration.
Green light began gathering once more within the dragon's mouth, building toward another devastating barrage. But before the attack could be launched, a man's furious voice rang out from deep within the rubble.
"Kaido, you bastard! Stop this instant! Do you intend to kill my subordinates as well?!"
A massively fat figure nearly seven meters tall rose from the ruins like a dark mountain, shaking off debris and broken wood. Two people were positioned safely beneath his protective bulk—Perona and Brook, both unharmed. Fortunately, at the precise moment when the wind blade barrage had arrived, Gecko Moriah had reacted with impressive speed to shield both individuals beneath his large frame. Otherwise, both subordinates might have faced genuine danger of being killed.
After seeing the true owner of this usurped vessel finally reveal himself, Kaido granted him a modicum of respect and held back his next attack. The dragon stepped upon the auspicious clouds generated beneath his feet and maneuvered his massive azure body to fly closer to this "good friend" from the past.
"It's been quite a long time since we last met, Moriah." Kaido's voice boomed with casual mockery. "You haven't returned to the second half of the Grand Line for many years now, have you? Are you still brooding over what I did to you back then?"
Faced with such close-range taunting from one of the Four Emperors, Gecko Moriah found his teeth grinding together with barely-suppressed hatred. His current decadent appearance and broken spirit were entirely caused by the azure dragon floating before him. He desperately wished he could tear into Kaido's flesh with his bare hands and drink the Emperor's blood. Even if his enemy died of natural causes, Moriah had sworn he would dig up the corpse, reanimate it as a zombie, and humiliate it daily to relieve even a fraction of his burning hatred.
"You slaughtered all my crew members," Moriah growled, his voice thick with venom and grief. "I will never forget that day. Sooner or later, I will make you pay the blood debt you owe for their deaths."
The dragon's head tilted slightly, an almost human gesture of exasperation. Kaido genuinely hadn't expected that Gecko Moriah would remain this stubbornly fixated on ancient history. Even if he had killed the man's subordinates—so what? There were always deaths on the seas. That was the nature of piracy, the inevitable cost of ambition. Moreover, Kaido had once actually hoped that Moriah would join the Beasts Pirates after his crew's destruction. At that time, the Emperor had been genuinely impressed by the younger man's Devil Fruit abilities and tactical potential.
But now, approaching Moriah in his full dragon form and observing him with practiced eyes, Kaido was disappointed to discover that the Shichibukai had apparently not grown stronger in any meaningful way over the intervening years. Apart from gaining considerable weight, Moriah seemed virtually unchanged—and his overall presence felt even weaker than it had been during their last encounter decades ago. This realization left the Four Emperor genuinely disappointed.
Although Gecko Moriah now possessed the prestigious status of one of the Shichibukai and enjoyed the legal right to plunder with explicit permission from the World Government, in Kaido's experienced judgment, the weak remained weak regardless of titles. Once confronted with sufficiently overwhelming violence, they would lose everything they possessed to those stronger than themselves.
Since that was the fundamental reality, Kaido would not waste courtesy on Gecko Moriah. The dragon's mouth opened to pose a direct question: "Do you know who the original owner of this ship was?" He paused for emphasis. "Moriah, with your current pathetic strength, you are completely unworthy of possessing this place. You should surrender such a magnificent treasure ship to me immediately."
Moriah's eyes nearly rolled back in his skull from sheer anger. This uninvited guest had arrived without warning, immediately began demolishing buildings, and now demanded his most valuable possession without even the pretense of negotiation! But something else troubled him as well—how did Kaido know that this location was actually a ship rather than a natural island? Most people who accidentally strayed into the Devil's Triangle assumed they'd discovered a hidden landmass.
Moreover, as a user of the Kage Kage no Mi (Shadow-Shadow Fruit) who specialized in digging up corpses of powerful warriors for reanimation, Moriah often didn't thoroughly research the actual historical background of the bodies he acquired. The origins of most corpses in his collection were completely unknown to him, and frankly, he wasn't particularly interested in learning. He had discovered this massive ship purely by accident after entering the Devil's Triangle years ago, and it had subsequently become his zombie manufacturing base—hidden from outside discovery for well over a decade.
During this tense confrontation between the two powerful individuals, Gecko Moriah's subordinate officers finally arrived at the scene. The massive zombie army he had painstakingly created over years of labor all appeared simultaneously, shambling forth from various hiding places across the ship. Now that he possessed a genuine opportunity to test himself against his old enemy, the Shichibukai certainly would not allow this chance to slip away unused.
However, the overconfident Shichibukai inadvertently stepped directly on one of Kaido's psychological landmines. Within the huge zombie army now assembled before him, the Four Emperor suddenly recognized an impossibly familiar figure—a face he hadn't seen in decades, a comrade he'd believed properly buried.
The drunken Azure Dragon sobered instantly, all traces of alcohol-induced haze vanishing from his mind. His massive brain filled completely with a single emotion: absolute, incandescent fury.