Sea Circle Calendar, Year 1520.
April.
East Blue.
A remote island, forgotten by most sea charts.
Yuuki sat quietly on a rock along the shoreline, a newspaper in his hand—the one just delivered by a News Coo that had flown overhead.
He had not been particularly interested in the headlines.
The moment he saw the bird, however, he had already guessed which world he had arrived in. The contents of the paper merely confirmed it.
As for how he obtained it without a single Beli on him?
A gold coin.
Apparently, gold was even more persuasive than Beli. The News Coo had even thrown in a few wanted posters as a bonus.
Yuuki let the paper and bounty sheets drift aside in the sea breeze, his gaze settling on the endless ocean.
"So… I ended up in this world."
"A world of pirates."
A faintly amused expression crossed his face.
Fragments of his clash with Lucius flashed through his mind.
The reason he had crossed worlds—
It was not coincidence.
After the ascension of his soul, he had begun to sense other worlds—like distant stars shining beyond a veil.
Why this was possible, he still did not fully understand.
Perhaps…
Because he had been a transmigrator to begin with.
Once his soul completed its sublimation, it could finally perceive the boundaries between worlds.
He exhaled slowly.
"There was still a gap."
"Time Magic… truly troublesome. Even Fate Magic cannot completely neutralize it."
More likely—
It was not that Fate was inferior to Time.
It was that he himself was still weaker than Lucius.
Yuuki felt a trace of regret.
He had failed to eliminate Lucius while the latter was at his weakest.
The Dark Triad's devil power had not yet reached full release with the Qliphoth gates unopened. Individually, one or two of them posed little threat.
But together—plus Lucius—
Staying would have meant certain defeat.
Lucius had been more cautious than expected.
Fortunately, Yuuki had reserved a final card of his own.
He turned his eyes back to the ocean.
Two years.
That was how long remained before Lucius's true plan would begin.
During that time, Asta and the others would not be in immediate danger.
Strangely—
Yuuki had a vague sense that time flowed differently between worlds.
The Clover Kingdom's world seemed slower.
If that was true—
Then this interlude was a gift.
A period to refine himself.
Before crossing over, the thought most persistent in his mind had been:
Luck.
How to elevate a three-leaf grimoire.
The concept of fortune.
In this world, three figures immediately surfaced in his thoughts:
The Luck-Luck Fruit user, Baccarat.The man who stumbled his way to Yonko status—Buggy.And the Straw Hat sniper, Usopp.
Among them, Baccarat intrigued him the most.
Buggy and Usopp were lucky—
But the fruit itself represented tangible, measurable probability manipulation.
Yuuki rose from the rock.
"I should leave."
He had been stranded here for three days.
No ships had passed.
The island was more remote than expected.
During those three days, he had not rushed to depart. Instead, he studied how his power functioned in this world.
There was no mana in the air here.
No ambient magical particles.
Thus, large-scale domain effects were inevitably weakened.
But—
Beyond that?
His power remained intact.
Mana consumption could still be replenished from within.
That did not surprise him.
The so-called "godhood" from the ritual was not merely evolution of life.
He had gained a sliver of divinity.
Yuuki lowered his gaze to the colored rings around his wrists and ankles.
Wind.
Fire.
Water.
Earth.
The four foundational elements.
So long as a world contained these—
His power would not diminish.
That was his divinity.
Not necessarily greater destructive force—
But universality.
The One Piece world might not rival the Clover world in upper-tier ceiling—
But its treasures were abundant.
Beyond the Luck-Luck Fruit—
There were time-related fruits: the Time-Time Fruit, the Slow-Slow Fruit, even reversal-type abilities.
The Revive-Revive Fruit.
The Soul-Soul Fruit wielded by one of the Four Emperors.
Each carried fragments of conceptual power that could refine his own.
And beyond Devil Fruits—
There was Haki.
There was Life Return.
The Clover world possessed a higher theoretical ceiling—
But in raw physicality, it lagged behind.
Even the Admirals' combat output surpassed most Magic Knight Captains in pure durability and destructive display.
For Yuuki—
This world was a vault of resources.
He extended his hand.
The Imperial Sword materialized before him.
Its crystal blade reflected a distorted image of his face.
"You may come out for some air," he said lightly.
Silence.
No response.
Yuuki gave a faint smile.
He had been addressing the lingering soul fragment of the Word Devil sealed within the sword.
Unlike the preserved spirits of past Wizard Kings, that devil's remnant still retained a trace of independent awareness.
It was pretending to sleep.
That was fine.
He had patience.
With a flick of his hand, the sword vanished back into subspace.
"Let's go."
Yuuki stepped toward the shoreline.
Behind him—
A tall figure clad in a black cloak appeared silently.
The hood concealed its face.
As a gust of wind lifted the fabric slightly, pale skin and lifeless features were revealed.
Conrad.
Or rather—
Conrad's corpse.
Through Corpse Spirit Magic, Yuuki had reconstructed the body as a controlled vessel. With reinforcement and modification, it could exert roughly sixty percent of its former strength.
Without a soul, however, it could not host additional magic systems.
When Yuuki reached the water's edge—
Splash!
The sea erupted.
A colossal octopus, over ten meters tall, surfaced.
Its massive eyes were filled with fear.
Two thick tentacles extended toward Yuuki and the cloaked corpse—forming a living platform.
Yuuki stepped onto it calmly.
The creature did not dare resist.
After all—
Even the ocean itself seemed to recognize something in him.
Not power alone—
But divinity.