Looking at the battlefield ahead, the Straw Hat Pirates stood frozen, stunned by the overwhelming chaos stretching before them.
"Whoa! This is insane!" Usopp shouted, gripping the edge of Nami's wing. "Is this really the battle between the World Government and Emperor Buggy? It's huge!"
"Huh?" Zoro's eye twitched. "Wait a second… he's here too?"
"Did you just say he?" Sanji raised an eyebrow. "Who's he, moss-head?"
"Yeah, what do you mean 'he's here'?" Nami chimed in.
Zoro nodded toward the horizon. "That guy over there. The one with black wings, holding two swords. He's younger than me… but his swordsmanship is sharp. He's Mihawk's godson."
"Seriously?" Franky blinked. "Looks like a Devil Fruit user to me."
"That ability…" Robin narrowed her eyes. "It feels familiar."
"Wait! Isn't that the ability of Mr. 1 from Baroque Works? I saw him during the Summit War broadcast!" Chopper gasped.
But Nami suddenly pointed ahead, her voice rising with alarm.
"Hold on.. look over there! That guy... there's no mistaking it. Blonde hair, yellow kimono, dragon-headed swords, smoking a cigar… that's the Golden Lion!"
Everyone turned.
"That's Shiki?! But we already beat him, didn't we?" Luffy blinked.
"Hey, hey, hey! There's another one just like him over there!" Usopp shouted.
"No way!" Brook craned his neck. "There are two of them?!"
"What kind of weird ability is this?" Franky asked.
"An illusion?" Robin muttered. "When did it happen?"
"The hell is going on?!" Zoro growled. "This war's a damn mess."
The confusion thickened. But the real shock hadn't even arrived.
"Over there!" Sanji pointed with a trembling hand, the cigarette falling from his mouth. "Am I seeing things? That's Kaido. But... he looks younger. And there's another one right next to him!"
"What?!" Nami's eyes went wide. "And those two with him... aren't those the three disasters?! That's King! But he was executed!"
"They're ghosts! We've stepped into a haunted warzone!" Usopp shouted and whipped out a garland of garlic, spinning it wildly.
Chopper hugged Brook's leg, shaking. "Hey, hey! Did we wander into some kind of graveyard?!"
Brook didn't answer.
Instead, the top of his head popped open like a hatch. A trail of green, skull-shaped souls emerged and slithered down toward Chopper with eerie groans.
"Yeeeees…" the specters whispered in unison.
"Ghosts!!!" Chopper screamed and leapt straight into Franky's arms.
Bang! Bang!
Nami punched Brook and Usopp on the head.
"Quit fooling around already! We're about to enter the battlefield! Do you all have a death wish?!"
"Ahahaha!" Luffy doubled over, laughing. "You guys are hilarious!"
Sanji exhaled slowly, releasing a long smoke ring before finally speaking.
"I think I know what's going on. I just hadn't had the chance to explain it before."
He looked out over the battlefield, serious now.
"It's cloning. That's how there are two Shikis, two Kaidos, two Kings."
The crew turned toward him in disbelief.
"Cloning?" Nami asked.
Sanji nodded. "It's a technology developed by Germa 66, my old family. As long as they have enough biological material and resources, they can replicate a person. The clone is alive. Same body, same face. Nearly indistinguishable."
"The clones are programmed, conditioned from the moment they're 'born' to follow orders without question. No hesitation. No emotion. Just soldiers, built for war."
Nami's eyes narrowed. "You're saying they're using that same tech here?"
Sanji exhaled a long stream of smoke. "Yeah. I never thought I'd see it again, but this is it. I'd bet my life on it."
His tone and words silenced the crew.
For a moment, no one knew what to say. None of them had ever seen Sanji talk like this.
Then Zoro clicked his tongue and crossed his arms. "Tch. We've got no time for sob stories, love-cook. Save the family drama for after we end this war."
He turned to Sanji. "Right now, we need a plan."
Zoro's voice snapped everyone back to focus. They turned their eyes once more toward the battlefield.
Sanji smiled faintly. "Yeah. You're right."
Boom.
A deafening explosion tore through the sky behind Mariejois, the Holy Land that loomed in the distance.
Boom. Boom. Boom.
Waves of sound and pressure rippled across the battlefield. A radiant flash lit up the heavens, brighter than any sun.
Even at tens of kilometers away, the Straw Hats felt the shockwave in their bones.
"What the hell was that?" Usopp yelled, eyes wide.
"Such intense Haki…" Robin muttered.
"If we're getting hit from all the way out here," Franky added, shielding his face from the wind, "I can't imagine what it's like at ground zero."
"That's gotta be it," Nami said, gripping the Pteranodon's reins tight. "That's the final battlefield."
"Buggy's not here," Chopper noted. "And I don't see Shanks or Mihawk either…"
"Or Luffy's dad," Brook added.
"Then what are we waiting for?" Luffy shouted. "Let's go!"
"Wait," Robin cut in, her voice steady. "That fight isn't something we can join directly. Not yet. If we rush in, we'll just get in the way."
"Yeah," Sanji agreed. "We clean up this side. Help Buggy's forces win here and push the line forward."
"Fine by me," Zoro said, already drawing his swords. "Let's thin the herd."
With that, the Straw Hat Pirates leapt into action.
The World Government's forces were already collapsing. Now, with the Straw Hats entering the fight, the tide turned rapidly in Buggy's favor.
Vice Admirals began to fall back, many with despair in their eyes. Bitter exhaustion overtook their ranks. They had already suffered massive losses. Now the infamous Straw Hat Pirates had arrived. The end was close.
The so-called "God's Punishment Army," a legion of emotionless clones created by the World Government, fought on with blind tenacity. They charged into battle without care for life or strategy, cutting down vines, trees, and anything in their path.
But they did not understand the nature of the battlefield.
They did not know that the massive forest around them, which Buggy called the Nativity of Tree World, could not be cut down. The more they attacked, the more it regenerated. For every soldier who entered the woods, the forest siphoned energy and grew stronger.
It would outlast them all.
Without leadership, the clone army was nothing but a storm of blades.
Now, with the arrival of Luffy and his crew, the collapse accelerated. No one had expected the Straw Hats to arrive. Not even Buggy's inner circle.
"Luffy!!!"
From across the battlefield, two voices rose above the clash.
Sabo and Ace, already in the thick of combat, spotted their brother soaring overhead. Their eyes lit up.
"Let's go!" Luffy shouted, and the three brothers charged together.
Their reunion sent a ripple through the war itself. Their combined momentum overwhelmed the front lines.
Akainu, who had already been struggling to handle Ace and Marco together, now found himself completely overwhelmed.
His defense faltered under the relentless assault.
Elsewhere, Kizaru remained locked in a high-speed clash with Enel. Light and lightning clashed in bursts that tore apart the sky. No matter how he tried, Kizaru couldn't shake him. Their battle had turned into a deadlock, one that would not be settled in a single day.
The same held true for Aokiji and Crocodile. Their duel raged across a frozen wasteland, sandstorms and glaciers colliding again and again. Neither yielded an inch.
And then there was the sky.
Gabban and Fujitora clashed above the clouds in a battle that looked more like a contest of raw elemental power than anything human. Meteorites rained down once more. Cyclones swept the battlefield. Massive chunks of earth rose from the ground, formed into spears, and launched skyward.
Each time, Fujitora countered with a quiet force. But anyone who looked closely might have noticed it.
The rhythm of their fight. The strange predictability. The way Fujitora never struck a killing blow.
At another time, someone might have questioned it. Might have called it suspicious. But no one had the time to notice.
Meanwhile, Aokiji and Crocodile were still clashing at full strength. Even if some suspected the battle was for show, nothing about their fight gave it away. To any outside observer, it was a true struggle between titans.
The real disaster was unfolding on Akainu's side.
He was caught between two awakened powers. Ace, wielding the fully awakened Mera Mera no Mi, had become a force of nature. The flames he summoned were no longer just fire. They were white-hot, radiant, and immune to the oppressive heat of Akainu's magma. The old logic of elemental superiority no longer applied. Fire did not fear magma anymore.
Beside him, Marco was relentless. His healing allowed him to fight with reckless precision, always recovering, always pressing forward. Akainu's stamina was draining fast. His body, bruised and burned, showed signs of wear that no admiral should ever display.
Anyone with eyes could see it. His defeat was no longer a matter of possibility. It was a matter of time.
The situation worsened. The clone soldiers—the so-called God's Punishment Army—had no awareness. They charged headfirst, without tactics or coordination. Not one of them came to reinforce Akainu. Surrounded and overwhelmed, he was fighting a war alone.
Grinding his teeth, Akainu took a moment to sweep the battlefield with Observation Haki.
What he sensed made his heart sink.
Half of the entire Punishment Army was gone. Fifty thousand soldiers were erased in a short span of time. Explosions, meteors, lightning strikes from above, their ranks were being shredded without pause.
Then it happened.
A pulse tore through the air. A soundless roar of pure will.
A wave of Conqueror's Haki surged across the battlefield, crushing thousands of clones in an instant. They dropped like wheat before a blade.
"Conqueror's Haki?!"
"Who was that?"
Eyes turned as one, drawn by the overwhelming presence. Then they saw him.
Floating in the sky was a young man clad in white, arms crossed, his aura flaring like wildfire. A white current of energy whipped around him, and the grin on his face left no doubt who it was.
Laughter echoed.
"Hahahaha!" The battlefield recognized him at once.
"Monkey D. Luffy!"
"The Fifth Emperor!"
"He came!"
"Hah! The World Government's finished now!"
"Didn't he call Buggy his uncle once?"
"Who cares? He just leveled the field!"
The Buggy Pirates shouted with joy. Some pounded their weapons into the dirt. Others raised their fists. Luffy's arrival sent hope rippling through every allied camp.
"Hahahaha!"
Another laugh rose. It was older, rougher, and more composed.
A voice followed, filled with experience and power.
"Luffy... So you came too. Looks like the fall of this regime is unstoppable now."
All eyes turned toward the new voice.
At the peak of a massive flowering vine stood a man with long white hair. A cloak hung over his shoulders. Ten western-style swords were sheathed at his waist, glinting under the fractured sunlight.
There was no need to say his name.
"Silvers Rayleigh..."
"The Dark King!"
"Roger's right hand!"
"He came too?!"
"This is the end... They're all here."
Excitement pulsed through the ranks as soldiers recognized one of the most legendary men in pirate history.
Rayleigh looked down at the battlefield with a small smile. His voice rang out again, clear and calm.
"Seems we're not the only ones who came to witness the end of the World Government. It's crowded today. What a lively farewell party."
...
Enjoyed the chapter? You can read 40k words ahead at P*treon.c*m/Marioni!