Time, like a silent ocean current, flowed onward.
A few months later, the World Government honored its unspoken deal. All across the world, the bounty posters of the Roger Pirates were quietly removed from public boards overnight. It was as if the legendary crew that had plagued the Marines for decades had simply never existed, erased from history with a quiet, bureaucratic whisper.
In its place, news erupted like a volcano, sending shockwaves across the entire globe.
"Gol D. Roger, the Pirate King, has been captured! He will be publicly executed in his hometown of Loguetown in the East Blue!"
A news bird squawked overhead, dropping a folded newspaper that landed at Kyle's feet. He didn't pick it up right away. He just stood there, quietly watching the paper flutter in the wind. The headline on the front page was printed in the largest, starkest black font he had ever seen. Below it was Roger's grinning face from his old bounty poster.
Kyle slowly bent down and picked up the newspaper. His fingers, gripping the thin paper, turned white from the strain.
The deal was done.
…
The news of the Pirate King's impending execution was like a colossal stone dropped into a calm sea, instantly stirring up monstrous waves that crashed against the shores of every island in the world.
In the New World, on the deck of the Moby Dick, the atmosphere was heavy. Whitebeard, Edward Newgate, sat in his exclusive, massive seat, silently draining a huge bowl of sake. He stared at Roger's wild, laughing face in the newspaper, his own expression unreadable.
"Pops…" Marco, his first commander, looked at him with concern.
"Gurararara…" Whitebeard let out a low, rumbling laugh. It held no joy, only the complex sorrow of one great hero of the era witnessing the end of another. "That fool always did love making a big scene." He raised his head, his gaze traveling far beyond the ship, toward the distant sky. "Roger, I know what you're trying to do… It's just… this way of ending things is a little too boring for my taste."
In the North Blue, on the island of Spider Miles, a young, blond man in a pink feather coat and sunglasses sat with his legs crossed on a high-backed chair. At his feet lay the groaning bodies of several gang members he had just defeated.
"Fufufufu…" Donquixote Doflamingo looked at the newspaper with a defiant smirk. "So, the monsters of the old era are finally retiring? What a dull way to go out."
"Hey, Doffy, Doffy," the sticky man Trebol leaned in beside him. "The Pirate King's era is ending!"
"No, Trebol," Doflamingo's lips curved into an exaggerated, cruel arc, his eyes glinting with madness and ambition. "It's not an end. It's a beginning. A truly chaotic, truly interesting new era—one dominated by us—is about to begin! Fufufufu!"
In a certain underground casino, a young Crocodile leaned back on a plush sofa, a cigar dangling from his lips as smoke swirled around his head. He glanced at the news, a cold, disdainful smile on his face. "Hmph. So-called kings are all the same in the end. A spectacular death is for fools. It's better to hide in the shadows and pull the strings." He flicked the ash from his cigar, his eyes gleaming with a pure thirst for power. "Power is only eternal when you hold it in your own hands."
In the West Blue, on Kuraigana Island, a young man with eyes as sharp as a hawk's was training with a great black sword. The slashes he sent out carved deep ravines in the earth. A passing news bird dropped a paper, and Dracule Mihawk picked it up. He glanced at the headline, then casually tossed it aside. "The Pirate King…" he murmured the title, his eyes showing no reverence or fear, only a pure interest in absolute strength. "The pinnacle of one era? Then who will stand at the pinnacle of the next?" He tightened his grip on his blade, his gaze becoming even sharper.
On the Grand Line, Gekko Moriah laughed his signature "Kishishishi," declaring to his crew that he would be the man to surpass the Pirate King. On an unnamed island, a young man in a green cloak stood silently watching hopeful pirates head out to sea. The newspaper in Monkey D. Dragon's hand rustled in the breeze, his expression solemn. "Igniting the flames of an entire era…" he muttered to himself, staring at the horizon. "Roger, where will this final move of yours lead the world? To rebirth, or to an even deeper chaos?"
And in the New World, in a palace on a sky island, a blond man with a ship's rudder stuck in his head roared with fury. A violent wave of Haki erupted from him, making the entire palace hum. "ROGER! YOU BASTARD!" Golden Lion Shiki crushed the glass in his hand, his eyes filled with rage and disbelief. "Captured by those useless Marines?! What a joke! Even if you were to die, it should have been by my hands! I'm going to find you and ask you what's going on myself!"
Ambitious warlords, powerful schemers, and legendary figures from every corner of the world, on this day, all turned their gaze toward one small town in the weakest of the four seas: Loguetown. They waited, they anticipated, they watched. Some would go to witness the end of a legend, some to mourn a rival, but most of them had eyes that burned with undisguised greed and ambition.
The throne of the king was about to be empty.
…
Kyle crumpled the newspaper in his fist and threw it into the crackling bonfire. The orange-red flames instantly devoured the paper and Roger's smiling face, turning it to ash. He remembered Roger's final request, the "nephew" he had never met, and the casual way Roger had said he was trusting Garp.
But Kyle didn't trust the World Government. He certainly didn't trust the Celestial Dragons. To those monsters, the Pirate King's bloodline was a source of evil that had to be completely and utterly erased. He knew what would happen next. After Roger's death, the Marines' intelligence agencies would scour the world like rabid dogs, searching for any woman or newborn infant who could possibly be connected to him. In the name of their absolute "justice," they would issue the cruelest of orders: Better to kill a thousand innocents than to let one slip through.
Baterilla Island, the place in the South Sea where Rouge was hiding, would be the first target of the bloody purge. He could picture it clearly: Marines and CP agents going door-to-door, interrogating everyone, their cold eyes scrutinizing every pregnant woman's belly, their bloody blades pointed at every newborn baby.
And Garp? The old man was righteous, true, but he was still a Marine Hero. Could he save one person? Ten? How could one man, no matter how strong, stand against the insane, desperate will of the entire World Government? He couldn't stop them. Not alone.
Kyle suddenly stood up. The bonfire crackled, reflecting the flickering, dangerous emotions on his face.
Roger had sacrificed his life to give them freedom. But the freedom Kyle wanted was not the freedom to hide in a corner of the world while Roger's wife and child were slaughtered. He would not stand by and watch that human tragedy unfold.
A fierce, golden light began to burn in Kyle's eyes. Very well. Since the eyes of the entire world were focused on a small town in the East Blue, then the heart of Marine power, their grand headquarters, would surely be emptier than usual.
He would give the World Government and the Marines something else to do. Something big enough to make them panic, something so chaotic they would have no time to worry about a remote island in the South Sea.
Roger chose to use his death to ignite the flames of a new era.
Then he, as the Pirate King's brother, would offer the grandest, most explosive salute for his king's demise at the very dawn of that new age.
Kyle lifted his foot, and the ground beneath him emitted a low hum. The next second, his entire figure transformed into a streak of white light, a living shockwave that ripped through the air and soared into the sky. He shot directly towards the end of the first half of the Grand Line—towards that great maritime fortress known as the symbol of "Absolute Justice."
Marineford.
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