Early morning.
The sun was just beginning to rise.
The massive yellow Golden Lion ship descended into the snowstorm with a thunderous rumble.
"Hey… what in the world happened here?!"
A voice full of shock and disbelief rang out. Golden Lion Shiki stared at the chaotic remains of his palace, completely dumbfounded. He had only stepped out for a short walk—and now his home had been utterly devastated.
puff puff~
The hurried footsteps of someone scrambling through the debris sounded like a flurry of frantic echoes.
"Boss Shiki! You're finally back!"
Dr. Indigo, the eccentric scientist with his clown-like makeup, shouted in excitement.
"Indigo… what happened? Tell me now!"
Shiki's face darkened with seriousness as he spoke majestically, towering over the wreckage.
"It… it's a dragon! Boss Shiki, three days ago, a dragon appeared and completely tore through our base!"
Shiki's pupils contracted sharply. "What? A dragon?!"
His mind raced. Dragons were rare, almost mythical creatures—and in this world, anyone capable of commanding an Eudemons Azure Dragon had to be the former Four Emperors Kaido of the Beasts.
"That bastard… that Kaido kid… he lost his fight, and now he dares to make trouble here?! Does he really think Shiki is easy to bully?"
Shiki's golden eyes blazed with fury.
"Indigo, where is that dragon now?"
"Well… that dragon… probably…" Dr. Indigo hesitated.
"Where exactly is it?!" Shiki demanded, voice deep and commanding.
"Yes! Boss Shiki, it's still on the island. Over the past few days, it's been rampaging through all the islands…"
Dr. Indigo recounted the full extent of the devastation over the last three days.
"What?!"
Shiki's anger erupted. The ferocious beasts he had spent twenty years cultivating had nearly been wiped out in just three days. His carefully laid twenty-year plan was on the verge of collapse!
"How dare anyone do this! I, Shiki, will never forgive it!"
His roar echoed across the islands like a thunderclap.
The pink dragon soared above the flaming clouds, finally settling in the sky with effortless grace.
"Alright, alright… I haven't even come to you yet, and you've already delivered yourself to my doorstep!" Shiki bellowed in a mix of fury and disbelief.
"I haven't seen you in years, and it seems you've forgotten my wrath. Back when Shiki became a legend of the seas, you were nothing but trash, Kaido!"
Even though the dragon's color didn't match his memories, Shiki assumed it was Kaido.
"You idiot! I'm not Kaido!"
Runti's voice rang out sharply, cutting through Shiki's fury.
The Golden Lion froze mid-roar. The words from this sudden female voice had completely thrown him off balance.
"You're not Kaido… then who… no, who are you?!"
Shiki's expression shifted as he sensed other auras atop the dragon.
"Could it really be… another legendary pirate?"
Su Yu—no, Sugisawa Yuuto—and Yamato revealed themselves atop the dragon, appearing before Shiki's stunned crew.
Instantly, panic spread among the pirates.
"Ah… ah ah ah… that man is…"
"He… he's Fairy Tail!"
"The President of Fairy Tail… the Four Emperors Sugisawa Yuuto?!"
"Why is he here?"
"Are we… being targeted by Fairy Tail too?!"
"It's not good… this is really bad!"
Every pirate in the Flying Sky Group trembled. Yuuto's record of directly confronting the Four Emperors made him a terror beyond imagination. Any force that crossed Fairy Tail faced certain doom—even legendary crews like Shiki's.
"Silence!" Shiki roared, his sword aura flaring like lightning from his feet. He ruthlessly struck down any subordinate who dared speak against him.
"Fairy Tail… is that you? The ones who dared wreck my base and sabotage my twenty-year plan?!"
"If you mean the weak beasts on the islands, then yes, that's us," Sugisawa Yuuto replied casually, picking at his ear as though the chaos around him was trivial.
Shiki's golden mane bristled. "Those animals are your twenty-year plan?! You think you can dominate the seas with such ants?! Your so-called legend is a joke!"
Yuuto shook his head, unimpressed.
"You're not qualified to dictate Shiki's plan," he said flatly.
Shiki's fury deepened. Yuuto's words shattered the illusions he had nurtured for twenty years.
Twenty years… he had been away from the world for too long, disconnected from the New World's true terror. He had underestimated the monsters now ruling these seas: Whitebeard, Big Mom, Kaido, and even the newly minted Four Emperors. His era of dominance was over.
"Face reality, Shiki. You are nothing but a dying old lion… a loser with dreams of world conquest!"
Every word struck him like a sword, stripping away his pride and revealing the truth: he was powerless against the New World's rising tide of monsters.
"Shut up! SHUT UP! SHUT UP!"
Shiki's roar filled the skies, but even he knew the bitter truth. The Golden Lion, the legendary pirate of the old era, had finally met an adversary he could not overpower.
...
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