Chapter 45: The Promise and the Nemesis

The towering, impassable crimson rock of the Red Line finally loomed on the horizon, stretching infinitely up into the clouds and down into the ocean depths.

It was the physical wall that divided the world, marking the starting point of the Grand Line.

We had spent the last few days traveling backward through Paradise, charting a straight course to the Twin Cape Lighthouse.

The Glacial-Inferno Sovereign pulled our metal carriage smoothly up to the rocky shore, the ice crackling beneath its hooves.

As we stepped out of the carriage, an elderly man in a flower-patterned shirt and glasses stepped out of the lighthouse, looking thoroughly annoyed.

“Who the hell are you?” Crocus grumbled, glaring at the frozen ocean.

“And what kind of devil fruit freezes my bay?”

Before I could answer, the water in the bay began to violently recede.

A shadow the size of an island rose from the depths.

The ocean roared as Laboon broke the surface, the colossal Island Whale towering over the lighthouse.

The front of his massive head was covered in thick, jagged scars, the heartbreaking result of spending fifty years slamming his skull against the Red Line, trying to break through to find his missing family.

Laboon let out a deep, mournful bellow that shook the very air in our lungs.

From the carriage door, a skeletal boot stepped out onto the ice.

Brook didn’t say a word.

There was no “Yohoho.” There were no skull jokes.

His tall, bony frame was physically trembling, the sheer weight of half a century of isolation, profound grief, and absolute failure crashing down onto his shoulders all at once.

He slowly walked across the ice, stopping at the edge of the water, looking up at the colossal, scarred creature.

Brook reached into his coat with shaking hands.

He pulled out his violin and rested it against his collarbone.

He drew the bow across the strings, the first few, fragile notes of Binks’ Sake drifting into the cold ocean air.

Laboon froze.

The giant whale stopped thrashing.

He slowly lowered his massive head, bringing his giant, dinner-plate-sized eye level with the shore.

He looked at the afro-sporting skeleton playing the song he hadn’t heard in fifty years.

He looked at the soul that remained beneath the bones.

Laboon’s eye widened.

The whale let out a massive, earth-shaking cry, not of sorrow, but of pure, unadulterated joy.

Waterfalls of tears erupted from the creature’s eyes, crashing down into the bay like a monsoon.

Brook couldn’t hold it in anymore.

The violin slipped from his grasp, clattering onto the ice.

The towering skeleton dropped to his knees, burying his face in his bony hands.

He broke down completely, weeping with an intensity that defied his lack of eyes.

He leaned his forehead against Laboon’s massive, scarred snout as the whale gently nudged him.

“I’m sorry!” Brook sobbed, his voice breaking into a ragged, heart-wrenching wail.

“I’m so sorry, Laboon!

Yorki…

the crew…

they’re all gone!

I am the only one left!

I am sorry I died, and I am sorry it took me fifty years…

but I kept my promise!

I came back!”

I stood by the carriage, watching quietly.

Beside me, Perona was openly bawling into a handkerchief.

Gammamon was wiping tears from his big green eyes, and Robin just smiled softly, a profound warmth in her gaze as she watched the musician weep.

She had finally found a crew whose loyalty was so absolute, it literally transcended death.

We spent the rest of the day and deep into the night celebrating on the shore, a massive bonfire lighting up the Twin Capes as Brook played every song he knew for the overjoyed whale.

Later in the evening, I sat down on a piece of driftwood next to Crocus, handing the Pirate King’s former doctor a fresh bottle of rum.

“You’re a strange crew, Beastmaster,” Crocus noted, taking a swig.

“But you brought the boy back.

You have my thanks.”

“Don’t mention it,” I smiled.

I looked up at the stars, taking a sip from my own bottle.

“Say, Crocus.

I have a question.

You knew Portgas D.

Ace was Gol D.

Roger’s son, right?”

Crocus choked on his rum, coughing violently.

He stared at me, his eyes wide with absolute shock that I knew the most highly classified secret in the world.

He composed himself, wiping his mouth, his expression turning serious.

“Yes,” Crocus admitted quietly.

“I knew.

But the Roger Pirates believed that every man should live freely and forge his own destiny.

We let Ace make his own decisions, even if it meant burying his father’s name and following Whitebeard.

And honestly, Newgate is not a bad man to follow.”

“I figured as much,” I nodded in agreement, staring into the fire.

“Yeah, Uncle Roger would probably agree.”

The entire beach ground to a screeching, catastrophic halt.

“Y-Y-Yohoho…?” Brook stammered, his jaw literally unhinging and dropping onto his collarbone.

“Did my auditory receptors, which I don’t have, because I am a skeleton, just malfunction?”

“Uncle?!” Perona shrieked, floating high into the air, her eyes bugging out of her skull.

“You’re related to the Pirate King?!

The Marines are going to execute us just for breathing near you!

I demand to be dropped off!”

Robin, the most brilliant, composed historical mind on the planet, completely short-circuited.

She stared blankly into the fire, muttering to herself, “The bloodline ended at Baterilla…

the cipher…

unless there was a hidden sibling…”

Only Gammamon continued happily eating a roasted fish on a stick, entirely unbothered because I had already told him months ago.

“U-Uncle?!” Crocus shouted, jumping to his feet.

“Why did you just call him UNCLE?!”

I blinked, looking at the paralyzed crew innocently, as if I had just commented on the weather.

“What?” I asked.

“Portgas D.

Rouge was my aunt from my maternal side.

Which makes Ace my cousin.

And since Roger was his father, that makes him my uncle.”

Total, unadulterated chaos ensued.

Crocus let out a faint wheeze, falling backward into the sand as he passed out cold.

Perona started hyperventilating, Brook frantically tried to reattach his jaw, and Robin simply rubbed her temples, trying to recalculate the geopolitical landscape of the entire world.

By the next morning, the crew had mostly recovered from the psychological damage of my family tree.

I checked my pocket watch, a sturdy silver piece I’d picked up from a clockmaker back in Water 7 before we left on our road trip.

The six-week deadline requested by Iceburg was officially up.

It was time to return to the shipyards and claim our new flying fortress.

Brook stood at the edge of the water, resting his hand on Laboon’s nose.

“Wait for me just a little longer, my friend.

Once my Captain conquers this sea, I will return, and we will sail together.”

Laboon gave a happy, booming rumble of agreement.

We boarded the carriage, and the Sovereign turned back toward the ocean, preparing for a high-speed, straight-shot sprint back.

Just as the carriage lurched forward, a heavy, specialized ringing echoed from my coat pocket.

Bacha-cha-cha.

Bacha-cha-cha.

I pulled out the encrypted Den Den Mushi.

I picked up the receiver.

“Victor,” Koala’s voice came through the speaker.

She didn’t sound panicked, she was a Revolutionary Army Commander, accustomed to navigating disaster, but her tone was razor-sharp, laced with intense urgency.

“We have a situation.

I was running the intelligence network on Trafalgar Law as requested.”

“What did you find?” I asked, the casual atmosphere in the carriage instantly vanishing.

Robin and Brook looked over, sensing the shift in my demeanor.

“The Heart Pirates were ambushed in the North Blue,” Koala reported briskly.

“Law was defeated and formally arrested.”

My eyes narrowed.

“Arrested?

He’s a rookie.

They’ll just toss him in a local Grand Line holding facility.

We can intercept the convoy.”

“That’s the anomaly,” Koala replied, her voice tightening.

“We intercepted the transfer orders.

They bypassed standard protocol entirely.

He isn’t going to a local facility.

He is being transferred directly to Impel Down.”

I froze.

The blood ran cold in my veins.

“Impel Down?”

The sheer impossibility of the statement hit me like a physical blow.

The underwater hell was reserved for world-ending threats.

“For an eleven-million-Berri rookie?

That makes no sense.

They don’t waste cells in the great prison for supernovas, let alone rookies.”

“I know,” Koala agreed grimly.

“Someone is pulling massive strings within Marine Headquarters.

They are treating him like a Warlord-level threat.”

I gripped the receiver tighter.

“Who made the arrest?

Give me the name of the commanding officer.”

I could hear Koala shuffling a ciphered document on her end.

“He’s a rapid-ascension transfer from Marineford.

A newly promoted Commodore named Alister D.

Silva.”

The name dropped like an anvil.

The temperature in the carriage plummeted, not from the Sovereign, but from the sheer, suffocating wave of killing intent that inadvertently leaked from my pores.

Gammamon stopped eating, his ears pinning back in alarm.

Alister.

My distant cousin from the old world.

My absolute, unforgiving arch-enemy.

He hadn’t become a pirate; he had embedded himself in the Marines, and he was already abusing their infinite resources to bend the rules.

Sending a North Blue rookie to Impel Down wasn’t justice, it was a message.

A calculated anomaly designed to make waves.

He was laying the groundwork for something massive, and he was daring me to step into the crossfire.

“Does Jasmine know?” I asked, my voice deadly quiet.

“No,” Koala answered.

“She’s currently on a deep-cover mission in the South Blue.

Communications are dark.”

“Keep it that way,” I ordered immediately.

“If she finds out Alister made a move like this, she’ll abandon her post and storm the Marine convoy herself to get to him.

She’ll get herself killed.

Make sure she doesn’t go after him.”

“Understood,” Koala said professionally.

“But they’re moving him fast, Victor.

What should we do?”

I looked out the window toward the horizon, where Water 7 awaited us.

And then I looked down at the snail.

My nemesis was finally making his move, and he held a major piece of the board in his hands.

“Keep tracking the convoy,” I told Koala, my eyes burning with lethal intent.

“I have to make a few calls.”

Word Count: 1713

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