The Remnant Break Fruit worked.
But at what cost?
Kaien carried Ravina through the trench's outer storm wall, her body weightless in his arms, her breath steady — too steady. Like someone asleep too deeply.
Her spark was gone.
The lightning. The pain. The voice that used to crackle between syllables.
Gone.
She opened her eyes once. Blank. Distant.
"Who… are you?" she whispered.
Kaien didn't answer.
Flashback – Kaien's Forge, 8 Months Ago
"Every fruit I forge carries a choice," he said, standing over an unfinished shell. "That's the difference between what I do… and what they fear."
Ravina sat nearby, watching the shell breathe.
"Fear of what?"
Kaien looked up.
"Fear that someone might finally make a power worth giving up."
Now – CP-0 Shadow Drop Site, Irka Outskirts
Kaien emerged from the mist.
Waiting for him: CP-0's full core team — six elite agents in white bone masks, their uniforms cut with arithmotech-laced armor thread.
At the center stood the Commander.
He removed his mask slowly.
Kaien's eyes narrowed.
"…Yuro."
Yuro Veras. Cipher Pol ghost. Presumed dead. Ex-Vegapunk assistant.
They hadn't seen each other in six years.
"I wondered if you'd recognize me," Yuro said.
"You stole half my schematics and tried to bury the rest under Marineford."
"I did," Yuro replied, smiling faintly. "Because you were building options. And the World Government… doesn't like options."
Kaien stayed quiet.
Yuro gestured toward Ravina's unconscious form behind Kaien.
"She doesn't know you anymore, does she?"
Kaien's jaw clenched.
Yuro stepped forward.
"Then let's make this simple."
The Ultimatum
"Turn over the Forge Forge Fruit," Yuro said, "and I will grant you full access to Eltheria Island's Forbidden Archive. No pursuit. No execution."
Kaien scoffed.
"You think I still have it?"
"You're the fruit."
Kaien said nothing.
Yuro's voice sharpened.
"The Godfruit has begun to awaken. Its pulses are syncing with the original fragments. You think you've hidden it. You haven't. The Arithmotech resonance signature is bleeding across the planet."
He stepped closer.
"Soon, even the Sea will feel it."
Godfruit Status: Passive Lock → Transitioning
Deep within Kaien's sealed forge vault…
The Godfruit pulsed once.
A heartbeat.
Its skin shimmered — symbols rearranging, shifting into language.
A name tried to form.
Then it vanished.
Back at the drop site
"You can't control it," Kaien said.
Yuro smiled.
"No. But I can find someone who will."
He snapped his fingers.
A projection activated — a young pirate, unnamed, but marked by an insignia Kaien hadn't seen since the Void Research War.
"They call him 'the Mirrorless.' He can eat any fruit… and reflect none."
Kaien's eyes went cold.
Yuro continued.
"Imagine what the Godfruit could do… in someone with no identity. No past. No echo. Just… potential."
Kaien's Choice
He took one step forward.
"You don't understand what you're playing with," he said.
"I understand enough. You're still forging for people who break. I'm forging for a world that won't remember."
Kaien slowly unhooked a memory vial from his belt.
Ravina's last memory echo.
He held it up.
"If you come for the Godfruit," Kaien said, "I'll give this to her."
Yuro raised an eyebrow. "And?"
Kaien stared him down.
"She'll remember the pain."
"And the lightning comes back."
A pause.
Then Kaien vanished into the fog.
Yuro didn't follow.
Eltheria Island – Dreego's Observatory
The sky shimmered above the floating lab.
Dreego raised a tuning rod, catching the Godfruit pulse mid-shift.
The frequency had changed.
"Kaien's pushing it," he whispered. "He's forcing the Godfruit to react emotionally."
His assistant watched. "What happens now?"
Dreego turned, face lit by resonance glow.
"Now it chooses."
"And whoever it chooses… rewrites everything."