The underground port echoed with the sound of snapping wood, ripping fabric, and expanding metal.
All around the dark, cavernous harbor, hundreds of toy soldiers, plush bears, wooden dolls, and marionettes began to glow with a blinding white light. Within seconds, the toys morphed. Arms lengthened, limbs thickened, and plastic skin turned back into muscle, hair, and sweat.
Hajrudin, the giant mercenary from Elbaf, dropped his wooden carrying crate. He stared down at his massive, flesh-and-blood hands. He raised his arms, flexed his colossal biceps, and let out a roar that shook the stalactites hanging from the cavern ceiling.
"I am... human again!" Hajrudin bellowed, his voice booming through the underground. "The giant of Elbaf has returned!"
Beside him, other legendary fighters from the Colosseum blocks materialized from their toy forms. Dagama, the tactical tactician, rubbed his round belly in disbelief. King Elizabello II stared at his royal fists, realizing his memories and his physical power had returned in a single instant. Blue Gilly stretched his long, muscular legs, testing his joints with a series of lightning-fast practice kicks that sliced the damp air. Suleiman the Decapitator gripped his sword, his dark eyes scanning the room as his mind reassembled ten years of stolen memories.
"Who did this?" Blue Gilly muttered, looking around the chaotic port. "Who broke the curse?"
"I do not care who it was," Hajrudin rumbled, looking toward the exit of the port. "But they have the eternal gratitude of the Elbaf warriors. Let us find our weapons and tear this kingdom down!"
A collective roar of agreement rose from the newly freed gladiators. They did not know who their savior was, but they were ready to spill blood for them.
A hundred yards away, inside the control room, the atmosphere was significantly less heroic and significantly more sticky.
The wall of the medical ward had a massive, jagged hole in it where Franky's steel fist had sent Trebol flying. Outside in the main corridor, Trebol emerged from the rubble, his face twisted in a mixture of rage and confusion. His massive, dripping coat of green, viscous mucus bubbled violently.
"Behehehe! You hit me!" Trebol shrieked, his voice high-pitched and nasal. He hovered above the ground, his body supported by thick, trunk-like tendrils of snot. "You hit an executive! Who are you? How did you get down here?!"
Franky stepped out of the broken room, his mechanical joints whirring. He looked down at his right hand.
During the initial punch, a thick layer of Trebol's green mucus had transferred onto Franky's pristine, metallic knuckles. It was stringy, translucent, and smelled exactly like a wet dumpster behind a fish market.
Franky shook his hand violently. The mucus stretched like warm cheese, refusing to let go of his chrome plating.
"Oh, hell no," Franky said, his voice flat. He looked up at Trebol with disgust. "No. Absolutely not. My paint job is custom. This chrome was polished just yesterday. This is a hygiene violation of the highest order."
"Behehehe! It's sticky, isn't it?!" Trebol laughed, swinging his arms. "You can't get rid of it! My Beta Beta mucus is inescapable! Once it touches you, you belong to me!"
Trebol whipped his arm forward, launching three massive, glowing green spheres of snot directly at Franky's chest. "Beta Beta Launcher!"
Franky didn't even try to dodge by moving forward. "Boogie Pack: Deploy!"
The nanites in Franky's back surged, drawing power directly from the humming Arc Reactor in his chest. In less than a fraction of a second, the metallic plates on his shoulder blades parted, and a pair of high-tech, mechanical jetpack wings extended with a sharp hiss. Twin blue thrusters ignited, launching Franky fifty feet into the air.
The sticky spheres slammed into the stone wall behind him, instantly melting the stone with their corrosive, acidic stickiness.
"Okay," Franky said, hovering near the cavern ceiling. He pointed his right arm downward. The internal venting system of his forearm opened. He funneled a burst of raw thermal energy from the Arc Reactor straight through his hand.
FWOOSH.
A localized blast of intense heat vaporized the mucus on his knuckles, turning it into harmless white ash. Franky sighed in relief. "Much better. Alright, snot-guy. Here is the deal. I have a smack-hand that can hit with the force of a tectonic plate. But there is not a chance in hell I am touching you again. We are doing this from a distance."
"Behehehe! You think flight will save you?!" Trebol roared. He slammed his hands onto the stone floor. "Beta Beta Chain!"
Dozens of thick, sticky tendrils erupted from the ground, stretching upward like hungry tentacles, reaching for Franky's ankles.
Franky's eyes scanned the oncoming tentacles. His HUD highlighted every single projectile in bright red.
"Sonic Cannon: Mode Active," Franky announced.
His left hand retracted into his forearm. The metal reshaped itself, expanding into a massive, blue-glowing sonic emitter. He aimed it downward.
"Booyah," Franky muttered.
BOOOOOOM.
A concentrated wave of high-frequency white noise erupted from the cannon. The sheer force of the sound wave did not just push the air; it vibrated the molecular structure of the oncoming mucus. The sticky tendrils instantly lost their cohesive surface tension, shattering into liquid mist before they could even get within ten feet of Franky. The shockwave hit the stone floor, blowing a massive crater into the ground and sending Trebol sliding backward.
Trebol coughed, his sticky coat rippling violently to absorb the kinetic energy. "Sound waves?! What kind of cyborg are you?!"
"The super kind," Franky grinned.
Hovering in place, Franky's shoulder plates slid open. Dozens of small, cylindrical hatches popped up, revealing rows of miniature, red-and-gold smart missiles.
"Micro-Missiles: Fire."
Puff-puff-puff-puff-puff!
Thirty tiny missiles launched from Franky's shoulders, tracing chaotic, looping smoke trails through the cavern air. They did not fly in a straight line; they moved with intelligent, evasive maneuvers, bypassing the stalactites.
Trebol panicked. He waved his arms wildly, creating a massive dome of mucus around himself. "Beta Beta Dome!"
The micro-missiles struck the dome simultaneously.
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
A rapid-fire chain of explosions lit up the underground port. The heat from the explosions was intense, evaporating the outer layers of Trebol's mucus shield. But the mucus was incredibly thick. As soon as one layer vaporized, Trebol secretes more, maintaining his defense.
"Behehehe! Explosions won't work either!" Trebol yelled from inside the smoke. "My mucus is flammable, but I can control the ignition! If you set me on fire, I'll just launch the burning snot at you!"
"I don't need to set you on fire," Franky said, his flight wings banking him left as he circled the chamber. "I just need to find where you're hiding in that oversized blanket."
Franky activated his built-in X-ray and thermal scanner. His vision shifted to a digital blue grid. He scanned the massive, bulbous shape of Trebol's snot-coat.
Sure enough, Franky's HUD revealed the truth.
Trebol was not a giant, bulbous snot-monster. He was an incredibly skinny, almost skeletal man who walked bent over, suspended inside a massive, hollow shell of mucus to make himself look imposing.
"Wow," Franky said, landing on a high crane overlooking the port. His Boogie Pack folded back into his spine. "You are literally just a stick figure wearing a mucus duvet. That is incredibly pathetic."
"Shut up!" Trebol screamed, his secret exposed. He gathered a massive pool of mucus beneath him, forming a colossal wave of green sludge. "I will drown you in this! Beta Beta Flytrap!"
The massive wave of mucus launched toward the crane, threatening to submerge the entire metal structure.
Franky stood his ground. He didn't run. He didn't fly.
His right arm transformed again. The nanites shifted, creating a massive, blocky cannon with a wide, industrial intake vent on the side. He aimed the cannon at the stone wall to his right.
"Slam Cannon: Load," Franky commanded.
The cannon generated a localized vacuum field, ripping a massive three-ton chunk of solid bedrock right out of the cavern wall and sucking it into the barrel. The nanites instantly reinforced the stone, wrapping it in high-energy casing.
Franky swung the heavy cannon toward the oncoming wave of mucus.
"Fire."
CRA-CHOW!
The three-ton block of stone launched from the cannon at supersonic speed. The energy was so immense that the air pressure pushed the mucus wave aside, splitting it down the middle. The massive stone projectile flew straight through the snot-wave and slammed directly into the hollow chest of Trebol's mucus suit.
BOOM.
The impact was devastating. Trebol's snot-suit exploded outward in a shower of sticky green rain. The skinny man inside was launched backward, tumbling across the stone floor of the port like a dry leaf in a windstorm. He hit a stone pillar, his glasses shattering as he slumped to the ground, completely unconscious and stripped of his sticky defense.
Franky stood on the crane. He looked down at the puddle of mucus surrounding the fallen executive. He checked his suit.
Not a single drop of snot had landed on him.
Franky struck his signature pose, spreading his arms wide as the Arc Reactor in his chest flared bright blue. "SUPER! Pure hygiene victory!"
Meanwhile, back up in the sunlit commercial district of Dressrosa, the atmosphere was entirely different.
The town square was filled with the sound of weeping, laughter, and clinking glasses.
At a colorful wooden concession stand decorated with red tiles, Tony Tony Chopper and Jewelry Bonney were currently sitting on tall stools, completely ignoring the historical events unfolding around them.
"More! Bring me more of that seafood rice!" Bonney demanded, banging her fork on the wooden counter.
The chef, sweating profusely, handed her another massive, steaming pan of paella. Bonney grabbed the pan with both hands, ignored the spoon entirely, and began shoveling the rice into her mouth at a speed that defied human anatomy.
Beside her, Chopper was holding a stick of blue cotton candy that was literally four times his size. He took a massive bite, his face covered in sticky blue sugar. "This is the best island ever! The sugar here is so sweet!"
"I know, right?!" Bonney mumbled around a mouthful of shrimp. "And the meat has this weird spice that makes you want to eat forever!"
They were so focused on their food that they didn't notice the sudden shift in the crowd.
All around the plaza, toys were turning back into humans.
A tin soldier standing near a flower shop suddenly expanded, turning into a young man with a green cap. A woman who had been walking a toy poodle dropped to her knees, screaming in tears as the poodle turned into her long-lost husband. They hugged tightly in the middle of the street, weeping so loudly that it attracted the attention of the nearby tourists.
Chopper paused, a piece of cotton candy hanging from his mouth. He looked over his shoulder. "Huh? Why is that lady hugging her dog? Wait, that dog has legs now. And a face."
"Maybe it's a new fashion trend," Bonney muttered, not looking up from her paella. She grabbed a giant chicken leg and bit it in half, bone and all. "People in the New World do weird stuff."
"No, Bonney, look!" Chopper pointed his hoof. "All the toys are turning into people! Look at that teddy bear! It's a pirate now!"
"Whatever it is, it's distracting me from my rice," Bonney grumbled, reaching for a plate of churros.
Suddenly, the ground beneath their stools began to vibrate.
It wasn't a minor tremor. The cobblestone streets began to ripple like water. The sound of grinding, crushing stone echoed from deep beneath the city foundations.
"An earthquake?!" Chopper squeaked, his blue nose twitching in fear. "We need to save the food!"
"Forget the food, look at the street!" Bonney yelled, dropping her churro.
The cobblestones directly beneath their concession stand cracked open. A massive, jagged fissure split the plaza in two. From the gap, the grey stone of the street began to rise, shifting and morphing with terrifying speed.
It didn't just rise; it took shape.
The stone coalesced into five massive, building-sized fingers. In less than three seconds, the entire street beneath the food stand transformed into a colossal, mountain-sized hand made of solid granite.
The colossal stone hand began to close, its massive fingers casting a shadow that plunged the entire plaza into darkness. The weight of the descending stone fingers threatened to crush Chopper, Bonney, and the entire concession stand into a pile of fine grey dust.
"AAAHHH! WE'RE GONNA GET SQUISHED!" Chopper screamed, his eyes popping out of his head.
"Not on my watch!" Bonney roared.
Bonney grabbed Chopper by the collar of his hat. She kicked the wooden counter with immense force, launching herself and the reindeer backward off the stools just as the massive stone fingers slammed together.
BOOOOOOM.
The impact shattered the concession stand into millions of splinters. The stone hand clamped shut with a force that sent a massive shockwave of dust and debris flying through the plaza, obscuring the sky in a thick cloud of grey stone dust.
Out of the dust cloud, Bonney and Chopper tumbled onto the far side of the street, sliding across the cobblestones but completely unharmed.
They looked back at the massive stone hand resting in the center of the ruined square.
The giant fingers slowly opened, revealing nothing but crushed wood and ruined paella pans inside.
"My rice..." Bonney whispered, her face turning pale.
"We almost died!" Chopper shrieked, clutching his head.
The giant stone hand began to sink back into the ground, its fingers merging with the street once more as the ground rumbled, preparing for its next attack.
