...
Above God Valley, Garp's laughter rolled like thunder across every corner.
"Guhahahaha! My grandson's bones are just that tough!"
Seeing that Luffy hadn't died, Garp instantly regained his usual expression. With his hands on his hips, he laughed so hard he could barely breathe. The tears squeezed from the corners of his eyes shimmered in the sunlight…
Sengoku held his forehead. The veins at his temples throbbed violently. "Garp, can't you act a little more properly…"
"Properly? What properly?"
Garp wiped his face and laughed even more unrestrainedly. "Right now, I'm Luffy's grandfather! A grandfather being happy for his grandson is only natural!"
Zephyr silently turned his face away, unable to bear watching his old colleague's "loss of composure."
Tsuru let out a sigh and shook her head without saying a word.
Kong stood with his arms crossed, looking at the figure being rescued on the light screen. The corner of his mouth, however, unconsciously curled upward slightly.
Garp was just that kind of person.
All his joy, anger, sorrow, and happiness were written plainly on his face. He never hid them. He never dressed them up.
When he was happy, he laughed loudly. When he was sad, he fell silent. When he was angry, he threw punches.
This straightforwardness made him the most uncontrollable fighting force in the Marines, and also made him an existence that countless juniors both respected and feared.
At this moment, he was simply an old man whose grandson had narrowly escaped death.
This joy didn't need any "dignity" to whitewash it.
However, not everyone could share in this post-disaster joy.
On the Five Elders' side, the air had almost solidified into a tangible form.
Saint Marcus Mars's cold sweat slid down his aged skin, glimmering with an eerie light.
His breathing was chaotic and rapid.
"This brat… what the hell is going on…"
His voice was hoarse, as if he were asking his colleagues present, and also as if he were asking that boy who transcended time and simply wouldn't die no matter what.
"This still doesn't kill him?!"
Saint Shepherd Ju Peter's face had already turned completely black.
"Animal-type users do have tenacious vitality,"
His voice sounded like it was being squeezed out from between his teeth. "Especially Mythical Zoan types. But this is…"
Saint Shepherd Ju Peter didn't finish his sentence, but everyone understood what he left unsaid.
This was too exaggerated…
Falling from the peak of Onigashima into the deep sea — a certain-death situation for Devil Fruit users — and with injuries severe enough to kill an ordinary powerhouse ten times over…
He had actually survived again!
"Could it be that this brat…" Saint Shepherd Ju Peter's voice was terrifyingly low. "Is truly unkillable?"
No one answered, because no one knew the answer.
Saint Ethanbaron V. Nusjuro pushed up his glasses. The cold light reflected on the lenses hid the sinister look in his eyes.
His tone still maintained the dignity and composure befitting one of the Five Elders, but the words that came out had already completely torn off the so-called "dignified" mask.
"I really wish Kaido had just smashed his head in back then."
He paused. His voice was as cold as ice blocks pulled from ten thousand meters deep in the sea.
"I'd like to see — if his head was smashed, how would he still get back up…"
For these words to come from one of the highest authorities in the world was nothing short of undignified — and vicious.
But at this moment, no one cared about dignity. They only cared about whether that boy lived or died.
Because every time he "came back from the dead," it shook the order they had spent a hundred years building.
Every "miracle" of the Straw Hat brat made them tremble with fear…
On the light screen, the battle situation was still changing rapidly.
Kaido's attention shifted away from the fallen Luffy and turned toward the samurai in the banquet hall who were still putting up a desperate resistance.
His gaze was cold, like a "god" looking down on ants. The kanabo in his hand slowly rotated, with purple-black arcs of electricity hissing.
Just as he was about to swing down that iron club to end everything, a figure stepped in front of him.
The person was also holding a kanabo.
White hair flew wildly in the wind. Two horns sat atop her head. Her expression was stern.
It was Kaido's daughter… Yamato.
"Move aside, Yamato!"
Kaido's voice had no emotional fluctuation whatsoever, as if the person standing in front of him wasn't his blood-related daughter, but merely a rock blocking his path.
Yamato didn't move.
She gripped her kanabo tightly. In her eyes burned a flame that Kaido had never understood.
"My name is Kozuki Oden."
Yamato spoke. Her voice was clear and firm. Upon hearing this name, Kaido's brows finally moved.
But it was the precursor to anger.
"Kozuki Oden…"
Kaido muttered the name at the corner of his mouth, chewing on it as if tasting something that made him nauseous. "A dead failure. Even now, you're still having this boring dream."
"It's not a dream." Yamato's voice didn't waver.
"It's a choice!"
Father and daughter stood facing each other. Between their kanabos lay more than ten years of silence, misunderstandings, and paths that had grown further and further apart.
Time rewound more than ten years.
Back then, Yamato was still a little girl, imprisoned deep within Onigashima by her father with chains.
She didn't know what she had done wrong. She only knew that her father never came to see her, and that the pirates on the island looked at her with both reverence and distance.
Hunger, cold, loneliness…
Those were her entire childhood memories.
One day, she found an old, worn diary.
Half of the cover was burned. The pages had been soaked in seawater and then dried. The handwriting was somewhat blurry, but still legible.
It was Kozuki Oden's diary.
It was something he had written, stroke by stroke, using the last of his strength in the final moments of his life.
Yamato didn't fully understand the prophecies about "Joy Boy" and the "dawn" written in the diary.
But she understood other things…
She understood that man's love for Wano Country, his pursuit of freedom, and his stubbornness that never bowed to fate.
She understood that a "samurai" wasn't merely someone who swung a sword, but someone who was willing to burn their life to protect what they cherished.
She understood that even in the deepest darkness, one could still believe that dawn would eventually come.
That diary became the only light during Yamato's years of imprisonment.
And then Yamato began calling herself "Kozuki Oden."
Later, a boy wearing an orange cowboy hat arrived on Onigashima.
His name was Ace.
He was the first "outsider" Yamato had ever met besides her father and his subordinates.
During those few days, Yamato interacted with Ace.
Yamato asked Ace what the outside world was like.
Ace thought for a moment, then grinned.
"It's huge and free! There are comrades, enemies, and meat that you can never finish eating no matter how much you eat."
Ace paused and looked at the chains on Yamato's wrists.
"And if you want to become someone… you can start anytime."
That was the first time Yamato learned that "choice" didn't require anyone's approval. Ace also told Yamato many stories — many interesting experiences he had gone through, as well as stories about his little brother, Luffy…
After Ace left, Yamato made a Vivre Card for him and then watched him leave Wano Country…
Yamato had been full of anticipation about meeting Ace again, but what she ultimately received was tragedy!
In the year of the Summit War, Yamato clutched Ace's Vivre Card and quietly watched it disappear. When a Vivre Card disappeared, it meant that person had died!
Yamato broke down at that time. Within the maximum radius allowed by her chains, she knelt facing the direction of the sea for a long time.
Because Ace had once smiled and said to her: "If you want to become someone, you can start anytime."
So she couldn't turn back.
…
"You are my daughter!"
Kaido's roar pulled Yamato back from her memories to reality.
His dragon-man form had been fully revealed. Conqueror's Haki swept across the surroundings like a storm. The rubble in the banquet hall trembled.
"Blood from my veins flows in you, yet you keep calling yourself that shameful failure… What the hell are you thinking?!"
Yamato raised her head.
She didn't avoid her father's Conqueror's Haki pressure. She didn't even take a single step back.
"The person I want to become isn't determined by bloodline."
Her voice was terrifyingly calm. "It's determined by me."
Kaido's pupils suddenly contracted.
The next moment, Yamato's body began to change.
It wasn't a transformation… It was more like Yamato was releasing this power.
A cold mist rose around her body. It wasn't an ordinary cold wave, but some kind of more ancient, more sacred power.
The mist condensed and took shape behind her, outlining the silhouette of a giant beast…
A massive mouth filled with sharp fangs. A body covered in silver-white fur.
Majestic. Fierce. Untouchable.
Inu Inu no Mi, Model: Okuchi no Makami — Human-Beast Form, activated!