Agony consumed Shun Kaien.
The Seventh Gate took its toll without mercy.
His body, forged only in flesh and blood, not chakra-enhanced like the shinobi legends, collapsed under the impossible strain.Every breath was ragged fire, every heartbeat a spike through his veins.
He fell to the floor of Infinite Hell, his vision blurring as the steam hissed from his battered frame.
Above him, Douglas Bullet loomed.
The Devil's Heir.
A man erased from history, a name children feared but the new era forgot.
"What's wrong with you?" Bullet's voice carried no concern. Only curiosity, like a predator examining a wounded rival.
Shun's lips curled into a thin, blood-smeared smile.
"Aftereffects." He spat the lie between clenched teeth. "I'll live."
A bluff.
In truth, any one of these predators still breathing in Level 6 could have ended him now with a simple stomp.
But Shun did not grovel.
He tossed Bullet the keys.
Calculated.
Measured.
Bullet was no ordinary pirate. He was a relic of an old world where strength was currency, and honor, however twisted, was part of the deal.
And the gamble paid off.
Bullet unlocked his shackles, flexing fingers numb from years of cold steel, and the roar that followed was an earthquake that shook the prison's rotten bones.
Without ceremony, Bullet slung Shun's battered body over his back.
"Rest." His voice was calm. "I'll handle the rest."
Shun's vision faded, but his lips curled into a whisper only he heard.
"Good enough."
How long he slept, he did not know.
But when his eyes opened, the world had changed.
Sunlight stabbed his pupils like knives.
The scent of salt, old wood, and distant gunpowder filled his lungs.
He pushed himself up, his body hollow, brittle, screaming with every motion.
He stumbled onto the deck of a battered vessel, its sails patched, its deck empty save for a figure standing like a monolith at the bow.
Douglas Bullet.
Shun blinked.
"Captain," Bullet said flatly.
The word hung heavy.
Men like Bullet did not speak that title lightly.
Shun processed it carefully.
"Where are we?" His voice cracked, laced with the weight of his ravaged body.
"East Blue. We took the long way."
Bullet's arms were folded, his gaze locked on the horizon, where the sea stretched like an endless grave.
"We encountered Navy reinforcements. Garp. Aokiji."
The names chilled Shun more than the ocean air.
Monkey D. Garp. The Hero of the Navy.A man whose legend stretched beyond his rank, whose fists had once shaken the Pirate King himself.
Aokiji. The Blue Pheasant.An Admiral of the Navy's Three Great Powers. A man who could freeze oceans.
Even Bullet, the Devil's Heir, had refused the fight.
"Smart," Shun whispered.
"Survival is survival," Bullet replied with no shame.
They had space now. But the world would soon close its jaws.
Inside Impel Down, the air was thicker than Magellan's poison.
The fortress stank of blood, bile, and humiliation.
Garp sat in Magellan's shattered office, the warden and his officers lined like ghosts before him.
Magellan's head was bowed, his body wrapped in heavy bandages. His pride dripped from him like his sweat.
"Level 6 secure?" Garp's voice was low, but it pressed on them like a tide.
"Confirmed," Magellan rasped hoarsely. "Casualties... Vasco Shot is dead. The rest are accounted for."
His throat caught.
"But... Bullet escaped. With the prisoner."
Garp's fist shattered the table into splinters.
Even the arrogant Hannyabal, known for deflecting blame, stood frozen, trembling, his face pale as ash.
At Marine Headquarters, the war council gathered.
The world's military elite stood tense beneath the imposing banners of justice.
Fleet Admiral Sengoku slammed his fist on the conference table, the sound reverberating like a cannon blast.
"Who the hell is Shun Kaien?How did a Level 1 prisoner tear apart the world's most secure prison?"
Silence.
The room full of Vice Admirals and Admirals remained mute.
No files.
No reports.
Not even a known bounty.
He was a ghost.
Admiral Sakazuki (Akainu), expression carved from iron, exhaled smoke.
"No matter.Pirates are pirates. I will crush them."
"Sakazuki," Kizaru (Borsalino) spoke lazily from across the table, his golden suit shimmering. "That kid beat Magellan and Shiryu. Not even you should underestimate him."
"And now," Vice Admiral Tsuru added coolly, "he has Douglas Bullet at his side. That... changes everything."
Sakazuki's lip curled in disdain.
"Old monsters are still just pirates. This is the Navy's strongest era. We'll crush them like all the others."
Tsuru's gaze narrowed.
"You weren't there when we fought Bullet the first time, Sakazuki. Men like him… they don't break. They wait. And when they move, they leave graveyards."
Sakazuki scoffed.
"Let the old woman lecture if she wants. It changes nothing."
Sengoku snapped.
"Enough. Sakazuki, you wanted the mission? Take it. Lead the fleet to East Blue. I want them eliminated."
Akainu stood, saluting.
"Consider it done."
But Sengoku's glare shifted to Garp, sitting silent, his eyes half-closed, as if asleep.
The weight of his decisions, his refusal to chase, lingered like a poison in the air.
But Sengoku, despite his fury, said nothing.
He couldn't touch the old lion.
Not yet.
Outside, the world reeled.
Newspapers screamed of the Impel Down catastrophe.
The Navy's banners rose over every sea.
In the shadows, pirates whispered of Shun Kaien, the name of a ghost.
In the underworld, the whispers turned into prayers of fear.
The world had shifted.
And the hunt had begun.