The storeroom door clicked shut, leaving Kuzan alone in the dim, narrow hallway of the Baratie. He could still hear the muffled, greedy cackles from Caribou inside, and the sound made his stomach turn.
The lazy, detached mask he wore as a shield didn't just vanish; it shattered. What replaced it wasn't just a "cold, hard face," but the bone-deep weariness of a man who understood, better than almost anyone alive, the true weight of this secret.
A child of "Red-Haired" Shanks. A Yonko's only known heir.
It was a lit match held over a global powder keg. If this got out, the resulting war would make Marineford—a conflict that had cost him his friend and his faith—look like a simple tavern brawl.
His promise to Garp, a promise made half in jest and half in grim duty, felt like a lead weight in his gut. Keep his grandsons from getting killed. That task had just become infinitely more complex. This secret wasn't just a danger to Shanks; it was a danger to anyone remotely associated with the Straw Hat crew. And that put Luffy, and by extension Ace, directly in the blast radius.
He had to act. Now.
He turned and walked back into the main dining room. His shoulders regained their characteristic slump, his steps shuffling as if weighted, but his eyes were like chips of glacial ice.
Ace was still locked in a battle of wills with the one-legged chef, his kingly charisma bouncing uselessly off Zeff's granite-like stubbornness.
"For the last time, I'm a chef, not a damn gladiator!" Zeff roared, slamming his peg leg on the floor for emphasis. "I'm not baking a cake for some snot-nosed brat to throw at a Yonko! Now order something or get the hell out of my restaurant!"
Douglas Bullet, sitting at a nearby table with his arms crossed, looked like he was aboutto spontaneously combust from sheer boredom. The air around him practically vibrated with frustrated power.
Kuzan drifted past their table without a word, heading to the bar. He picked up a thick, empty tumbler and placed it on the wooden counter. He stared at it for a long second, his expression unreadable. Then, a faint, frosty mist—colder than the open sea—began to emanate from his hand.
The glass didn't just frost over. It flash-froze. The impossibly rapid temperature change contracted the thick glass until it couldn't hold its own structure.
CRACK!
The sound was sharp, sudden, and shockingly loud in the tense restaurant. The glass didn't just shatter; it exploded into a thousand glittering, frozen shards.
The entire dining room went dead silent. Every eye, from the cooks to the pirates to Zeff himself, snapped to Kuzan.
Ace froze mid-retort. He saw the look on Kuzan's face. The lazy smile was gone. The bored eyes were gone. This was the face of the man who had fought Akainu for ten days. This wasn't a warning. This was a silent, chilling, "Code Red."
"My apologies," Kuzan said to the terrified bartender, his voice that familiar, lazy drawl that was now so terrifyingly out of place. "My hand slipped."
Ace's mind raced, connecting the dots with frantic speed. Kuzan. The sudden tension. The "accident." It meant the threat wasn't coming. It was here. In the restaurant. And it was bad enough to make the former Admiral drop his entire façade.
He had to end this.
Now.
"Fine," Ace said, turning back to Zeff. His voice was sharp, final, and void of its earlier arrogance. "You win. We'll leave."
He turned to his companions. "Let's go. We'll find another way."
Zeff just stared, completely taken aback by the 180-degree turn in the kid's attitude. Bullet, however, looked shocked, then furious. "Leave? After coming all this way?! Are you giving up?"
"I'm a captain who knows when to pick his battles," Ace shot back, his eyes locking with Bullet's. A silent, non-negotiable command passed between them: Not now. Shut up and follow.
Ace started walking towards the exit, not waiting to see if they obeyed. Kuzan, his hands already shoved back in his pockets, fell into step beside him. Bullet, after a moment of fuming that made his muscles twitch, let out a low growl and reluctantly followed.
As they passed the storeroom, Ace's Observation Haki flared, brushing over the area. He finally felt it. The weak, slimy, and utterly terrified presences within. He understood. Kuzan hadn't been eavesdropping; he'd been investigating.
They stepped out onto the wide, fish-shaped deck, the sea breeze a cool, sudden shock.
"What is it?" Ace asked, his voice a low whisper that the wind almost snatched away.
"Caribou," Kuzan replied, his own voice just as quiet, the laziness replaced by a flat, cold monotone. "He knows. About Shanks. About Makino."
Ace's blood ran cold. The secret—this impossible, world-changing secret he had carried for less than a day—was already out. He felt a wave of self-loathing and panic. He'd failed. Already.
"He plans to sell the information," Kuzan continued, his words like hammer blows. "To Teach. To the Government. To anyone who will pay."
Ace's face, pale moments before, became a mask of cold, murderous fury. This... this bottom-feeder. This slimy, bottom-tier fool was about to endanger the lives of a woman he respected and a child who wasn't even born yet, all for a bag of coins.
"Where is he?" Ace's voice was a low growl.
"Still in the storeroom, celebrating with his men."
"Good," Ace said. The single word was laced with deadly promise. He turned to Bullet. "You wanted a fight? I'm giving you one. But it has to be quiet. No 'Demon Heir' transformations. No leveling the building. Can you do that?"
A slow, vicious grin spread across Bullet's face. He cracked his massive knuckles. "I can be... surgical."
The three of them—Ace, Kuzan, and Bullet—slipped back onto the Baratie, their movements silent, shadows with intent. They stood before the storeroom door, the muffled sounds of celebration still trickling out.
"On my mark," Ace whispered. He raised his hand, and a small, controlled flame flickered to life on his fingertip, ready to burn through the lock.
Just as he was about to give the signal, a new voice, filled with a completely different kind of panicked fury, erupted from inside the restaurant.
"YOU BASTARDS! WHAT DID YOU DO TO MY KITCHEN?!"
It was Zeff.
The storeroom door burst open from the inside. Caribou and his brother, faces pale with terror, were trying to flee, but they were too late. Zeff stood in the hallway, his peg leg raised high. His face, usually just grumpy, was a mask of pure, chef-ly rage. In their greed, Caribou's men hadn't just hidden; they had ransacked his sacred kitchen for treasure, spilling ingredients and breaking priceless plates.
"YOU WILL PAY FOR THIS... WITH YOUR LIVES!" Zeff roared, bringing his leg down in a devastating kick.
The chaos Ace had tried so desperately to avoid had just begun, initiated not by a Yonko or an Admiral, but by a very, very angry cook.
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