Waking up in the world of One Piece was NOT, REPEAT NOT, in my plans.
Let us begin again. I had expected the poetical afterlife-clouds, harp, perhaps even Morgan Freeman in a suit the color white. After all, I had tithe, prayed, even fasted once during Advent, none of the wicked "take the coffee away" fasts, either. So yes, I figured Heaven had me bracketed somewhere in the middle, with the saints, with the exuberant youth pastors. So then, then I die—a humorous, silly mortiseallly---when crossing the street with the new One Piece manga clutched in my hand. Car suddenly materializes out of nowhere, and poof. Fade to white.
Not Heaven. Not Hell. And not even the loading screen. Just... a white room. Interminable, silent, sterile. The kind where you'd go to see God, only to get routed to customer service. I wasn't standing, or floating—I simply was, blinking into the vacancy which didn't blink in response. It wasn't spiritual, or tranquil, or even particularly profound. If this constituted the afterlife, it required interior designers.
Then came the sharp turn.
Flash forward and I wasn't five-nine and underwhelming anymore. I was Kaido. Kaido-adjacent. More than twenty-five feet tall, full to the brim with muscle like I was juicing back in the Paleozoic had been the way to live. The "crush a mountain with your pinky toe" look had my new body going. Two gigantic buffalo horns pushed outward from either side of my cranium—green-tipped as nature's little joke—and a black mane swept back from the base of my neck like the shampoo commercial for dragons. My eyes blazed with the kind of unnatural green color which read "final boss energy" from across the map.
I wore loose black pants that shifted with me, and only these. Shirts, as it turned out, are unnecessary when you're imbued with power. It coursed through me, raw, electric, mythic. It hummed in the air when I flexed. I inadvertently triggered something against the arm, and it flowed like molten metal against my skin. Haki. Real, tangible, terrifying. The kind capable of warping narratives and fueling plot holes.
This is not cosplay. This is canon-breaking.
Step in the R.O.B.—Random Omnipotent Bastard. Of course. Every decent isekai needs to have a half-bored, all-powerful commentator to wreak havoc with no HR to report to. It just sort of... appeared, no pyrotechnics, no chorus in the heavens. It just kind of... materialized, like an ad popup in the guise of God.
"You have died" it said bluntly, as if it were getting me my Starbucks, "and as my amusement, I'm dropping you into the world of One Piece. Make some trouble. Entertain me."
If an eldritch game master instructs you to go shatter a universe to have fun, then one can only do one thing.
I nodded.
What was I to do? The existential whiplash had yet to wear off. I'd died. Had been reset as Kaido's taller, green cousin. Now, I'd been thrust back into One Piece with the lone purpose to wreak havoc as a walking spoiler. No instructions. No tutorial. Power, motivation, and a graciously bestowed "good luck."
Honestly,
Could be worse.
"No final words?" it asked.
No pressure whatsoever. Just the inventor of my reincarnation waiting for me to share some wise farewell words as if getting ready to go into spaceship mode. I could have said something profound, something lyrical. But let us be real—I had yet to get used to the reality of now occupying the body of the mythic bouncer with steroids as well as the news that I would be blasted headfirst into the pirate world where physics graciously takes the backseat to flair.
Instead of getting all theoretical, then, I sat down and really thought about the logistics of being twenty-five feet tall all the time. Yeah, sure, it sounds fantastic in theory—King Kaiju strength, bring down skyscrapers with one sneeze—it has a whole lot of fine-print trouble in the package. Such as chairs. Beds. Personal space. Doorframes.
"I'm not opposed to the entire mountain-sized threat idea," I finally said, "but it would be nice to be able to switch in and out, willfully. You know, for daily activities, beach trips, and not frightening children with my mere presence."
This creature didn't twitch. Or breathe. Or exist in such a way as it would be easy to describe, either. It simply... waited. Then, the way one flips the switch in my genes, its light shined on me. It didn't happen suddenly, but all the same. More in the way you'd get used to new surroundings than transform into them.
"Anything else?" it inquired.
That is where the real fun began.
Because if you're going to be isekai'd into One Piece, you'd better bring something impressive. Devil Fruit, Haki, cyborgs, witches who control the weather—this world is all about creative overkill. So naturally, I thought about what would make the biggest impact without giving me the swim speed of the Titanic.
"Okay, hit me with this," I said, gesturing far too dramatically with no reason behind it. "Give me the power to transform into a five-headed western-style hydra dragon. No Devil Fruit nonsense. I don't want to go into a coma every time I touch a puddle."
There was nothing for an instant—just the same expecting, eerie silence, like an unfinished stage waiting with bated breath for the drop of the spotlight. Then the light returned, bathing me in the smug smile of a game designer who has no concept of balance. The power crept in like fumes of warm, ancient smoke, like my soul had just been inducted into some mystical brotherhood of eldritch monstrosities.
That was it. No further questions. No secondary survey. My wish list, it appeared, had been duly reviewed and stashed under "Approved for Anarchy."
"It is done," the monster declared with the brash finality of one judge bringing down a universal gavel. "You will be deposited in the world of One Piece. After you have created complete havoc, I will send you to another world with another purpose. Succeed, and perhaps I will reward you further. Until then—chao."
No pomp. No flair. Just a blink. One moment, lost in white nothing, the next, standing in the middle of green, birds trilling, sun flashing through the trees. It had been a forest, exactly. My new world had loaded in like a level map, and for the first time since dying, I felt something aside from amazement or bewilderment.
Weight.
Not the emotional kind. The physical kind. Gravity. Resistance. Air which did not fill the space immediately about me but resisted me. I was powerful—terror-inducingly so—but the feeling of invincibility that I'd had in the void had disappeared. Here, everything weighed. Here, boundaries. And if I pushed too forcefully, too persistently. Already, I could sense I would hit them.
I began to walk. Stormed is a better word, really, as with every step the earth shook beneath its breath. No map to work with, no idea where to go, no idea which island I'd ended up on. And it didn't worry me. I had time to reflect. Not the cosmic-awakening kind, exactly, but the "I can shatter the world in two" kind.
Chaos was not my assignment. Chaos was my objective. I was not here for making friends or advancing on some pirate hierarchical scale. I was not here for being the next Luffy, Blackbeard, or some monologue-delivering warlord with a brand identity. No, I was here to ruining lives — not out of some minor entertainment, but for theatrical purposes. I wanted reality itself to groan beneath my arrival.
My idea would be to eliminate the Marines. Destroy the backbone of what they call a "justice" system. Next, remove all the feel-good pirates like Luffy, Law, and all the rest of these favorite merch-giving machinery. Once those dominoes toppled, the system would implode within itself like a black hole of repercussions.
Easy to say. Perhaps harder to do. Or was it?
Luffy was a rubber rookie to an Emperor in two years, and we are using canon time. That's a speedrun no matter how you define it. So, in real life, with my power, my size, and a plan imbued with raw unchecked fury? I might not even need half as long. First, though, I had to know how strong I was — not theoretically, not in concepts — but in as basic a way as possible. Could I exchange blows with Akainu's furniture? Could I destroy a forest on a whim?
Fortunately, nature provided an answer on my behalf.
Trekking through thick, eerily silent trees, I stumbled into a group who seemed to be giant Planet of the Apes extras pilfering armor. I recognized them immediately — humandrills. The hulking, weapon-armed imitators who imitated humankind like we were walking instructional books. So cute.
They halted as soon as they noticed me. No attacks. No chest-thumping. Only staring and... curiously polite confusion. One stepped forward and started grunting at me in a manner more reminiscent of an individual gargling a dictionary than speaking. Took me a moment or two to glean any sense from it. They seemed to think I was one of theirs.
Why?
Because I was big.
And Black.
Yes.
I wasn't insulted — I was rather amused. Monkey racism was never on my apocalypse bingo card, but I was more than willing to roll with it. As it turned out, I had washed up on Kuraigana Island — Mihawk's own haunted house of a development. And if the king of swords was nearby, then it meant that I'd be stress testing my body, and my mortality, sooner rather than later.
But before I charged into battle, I noticed one thing: my movement was not exactly smooth. I was strong, certainly, but I was moving like a kaiju in an ocean. I needed reach. I needed leverage. I needed a weapon. Something that would enable me to strike people from across the street without leaving my bed.
So I rolled the dice on the humandrills.
"Hey," I replied, extending my hand in a welcoming 'big' gesture. "You got a weapon? Something this big? Big big."
Now, this is One Piece — a world where, essentially, you could teach a pigeon how to be a racist, or a reindeer how to perform surgery — so I waved my hands around, thinking they would get the idea.
They glared at one another, made their peculiar monkey sign language, and disappeared into the woods like a team of extremely enthusiastic interns. They reappeared a minute later. with what can only be considered as the fattest hammer in existence. This monstrosity was as if one had given a skyscraper a handle and simply given up. It wasn't necessarily made for fighting. It was as if it was made for excess. They handled it as if it were some kind of sacred relic. I grabbed it, gave it a quick heft, and sensed the coarse, exhilarating heaviness hum through my arm. Yeah. That would do.
"Thanks," I said, nonchalantly — as if I just inherited the hammer version of a WMD.
They bounced up and down with delight, almost shaking with pleasure.
Guess I then had fans.
I made my way to Mihawk's castle, with each enormous stride making the ground shake beneath me as if I were announcing my arrival with geological pomp. Humandrills followed behind me, with their slouch corrected immediately—as if they were all thinking, "Yup, this giant's ours." Leader energy, I reckon.
I stopped at a decent distance from the castle, as even at a height of twenty-five feet it doesn't always pay off to go all-in on closeness without an introduction. Standing there with his arms crossed, looking like the universe's ultimate bad-ironic fashion statement, was Mihawk himself—aurafarming so intensely a solar flare was jealous.
"Who are you?" he asked, speaking coolly but with interest.
What a great question. Unfortunately—I don't have any. My previous last name? No way. That was part of a life that ended the moment I vanished from that society. To use it here would be equivalent to showing up to a high-stakes poker table with a poker chip a year old. I needed a new name, one with attitude.
"Cassian," I croaked, my voice dry and rough as if I'd chain-smoked too many cigars. Could've been worse. Could've been better. For now, it would have to do.
If I had time to think, I would have chosen something more flashy, but with every passing moment, my aura dwindled more—especially in front of Mihawk. So, I opted for Cassian.
"How on earth did you end up here?" Mihawk asked, an eyebrow raised as if he caught a whiff at something fishy-smelling.
Truthfully? If I explained it to him, told him I died, some cosmic practical joker dumped me here, he would have believed me. One Piece was a place where even the impossible was made possible. But giving Mihawk the truth would be gifting him my cheat codes. To boot, I was certain the enigmatic guy who brought me here would not be pleased with me spilling the secret.
So, I zipped it.
"That's for me to know and for you to find out," I answered, driving home the enormous hammer with a satisfying crunch that rattled the pebbled pavement with a rhythmic clanging.
"I need to know how strong I am," I continued, piercing him with a stare. "And it would seem that involves fighting the Strongest Swordsman." Barring that title was like holding a steak in front of a lion. Bingo. Mihawk's eyes flashed—the glimmer of that mythic glaze I was giving him. He paused, weighing the absurdity of some fly-by-night challenger taunting him as if he had no idea who he was. Then...
"If that is what you want," he replied, a dangerous, slow smile creeping over the edge of his lips. "Then know this—I'll be ruthless. And you… Will you die for it?"
I nodded automatically. Mihawk wasn't a person who would use his sword on pushovers. If he was willing to take a chance with everything, then this was going to be a fight for the ages. I was ready.
"Let's proceed then."
Mihawk drew his sword with a smooth, practiced ease, as if it were an extension of himself. I grasped my hammer, its solidity reminding me firmly that this was no sparring session.
We charged.
Our weapons slammed into one another with a cataclysmic impact—Haki seething and furiously roiling like a tempest. Mine blazed radiant green, his seared red, filling the air with raw energy. The island shook with the shock waves.
First fight in this form, yet I wasn't even playing chess—I was fighting on a visceral level, relying on instinct, on intuition, on what this body had learned. Each fight was a lesson gained. Each strike, an answered question.
**
I had been on one knee, gasping hard enough to mist the air, bloody streaks on my lower lip like a mark I had not known I was leaving. The fight had continued for what could have been one, possibly two, hours—well, in fight-time, forever. Each moment had been a lesson learned in bruises, in welts. Mihawk was some distance from me, gasping just as harshly, though the man sported exhaustion as a well-tailored cape: sophisticated, understated, still lethal. He had taken some hits, yeah—but not like me.
Instead, I wasn't embarrassed. Far from it. I was... optimistic. Almost smug, even. Because I finally knew. If I had battled him a second time—same day, same conditions—I might've even won overall. The first round was never even a question of winning. Recon. Diagnostic. A chance to run a full systems check on what this body could do, what needed an upgrade.
The island was as if it had been nuked at a kaiju rave. Trees ripped from the earth, trenches cut into soil, patches of flame still devouring land. The only thing not touched—naturally—was Mihawk's castle. Of course. Guy probably stuck a "Do Not Disturb" on it with Conqueror's Haki.
I struggled to sit up. I truly did. Let out a roar of effort as if I was pushing strength back into my limbs. There's a kind of failure, though, where your body relinquishes before your head does. It isn't tired. It isn't a lack of will. It's physics—your muscles have been working overtime as it is and they don't intend on doing it any more.
I stumbled forward with all the grace of a skyscraper in demolition. My hammer clattered on the ground beside me as if it, as well, had reached its limit. Out of the mist, I heard Mihawk sheathe the blade. He turned to someone, his tone low and commanding.
"Girl."
That single word was laden with enough power to move mountains. Perona stepped out from behind a pillar fissured with cracks, parasol raised on high, eyes wide as if she had just witnessed gods being traded.
"I can use your assistance on healing this man," Mihawk said. More a command than a request, cloaked behind a mask of deadpan.
Perona was truly shocked—he wasn't used to Mihawk asking for anything, let alone a favor. She agreed, floating on over. As soon as she did, open-mouthed wonder got the better of her.
"Incredible." she breathed, reaching out a hand to explore just how huge I was.
Can't say I blame her. Giants in One Piece weren't exactly abundant, but I wasn't your average run-of-the-mill Elbaf musclehead. I was different. I was newer. Bigger. Stronger. More... cinematic
Mihawk was tossing me around like a ragdoll made out of tanks onto my back, and I realized I was more liability than patient. So, with a mere flip of a switch, I activated one thing I had almost forgot I had: my size-changing ability. My enormous body shrunk down into a much more reasonable, human size in a flash.
The shift compelled both Perona and Mihawk to stop. That's right—plot twist.
Mihawk grouched, probably filing this display under "mildly annoying" somewhere in there, then dumped me over his shoulder like an irascible firefighter and made his way into the castle. I lay still. I had invested in this nap.
The castle was an ancient cathedral made of stone, a cathedral of silence, with beauty as cold as ice in every hallway. I drank it all in—black marble, candle flame, furnishings that scream "I drink wine with blood in it". I was finally settled into a bed that was almost impossibly comfortable, the kind where you wonder if you even want to cause trouble at all if sheets can be this lovely.