When people opened the newspaper with curiosity and anticipation, the enormous bold headline splashed across the front page struck like a thunderbolt, instantly shattering the peace in every corner of the four seas.
"MARINES MOBILIZE IN FULL FORCE AGAINST THE ETERNAL DIVINE KINGDOM—SUFFER CATASTROPHIC DEFEAT!"
That headline alone was enough to leave the entire world stunned.
But what followed was even more shocking.
"ADMIRALS KIZARU AND FUJITORA CAPTURED! MOMOUSAGI SEVERELY WOUNDED AND TAKEN PRISONER! ONLY AOKIJI AND MAGELLAN ESCAPE, BOTH INJURED!"
Every word carried enormous weight.
Then came another headline—
"FIFTY THOUSAND ELITE MARINES NEARLY ANNIHILATED! MARINE HEADQUARTERS SUFFERS DEVASTATING LOSSES!"
The scale of the defeat was almost impossible to comprehend.
The Marines, whose name had once inspired fear and respect throughout the world, had actually suffered such a crushing blow.
The photographs printed alongside the articles were somewhat blurry, but the scenes within them remained unmistakable.
One captured the astonishing moment when Diamond Jozu seized Kizaru. Jozu stood firm amid the ruins, his expression cold and resolute as he restrained the badly wounded Admiral.
Another showed Katakuri escorting Fujitora away. Katakuri stood tall and solemn while Fujitora walked beside him in restraints, his head lowered beneath the weight of defeat.
Other photographs showed smoke still rolling above the Eternal Divine Kingdom and the sea covered with the wreckage of countless Marine warships, their broken hulls drifting silently across the water like monuments to those who had fallen.
The news exploded across the world like a bomb thrown into boiling oil.
Everywhere it reached, chaos followed.
Shock.
Confusion.
Fear.
Excitement.
Countless emotions swept through ordinary people whose peaceful lives had suddenly been disrupted by the realization that the balance of the world had changed.
Every street, tavern, restaurant, and roadside gathering became filled with discussion of the war.
No one could talk about anything else.
...
Cloudy rum sloshed violently inside a rough wooden mug covered in cracks.
The dark-brown liquid struck against the sides with every movement, splashing over an old, yellowed bounty poster lying on the table.
The pirate depicted on that weathered paper had seemed like a relic of another era.
Now the spilled alcohol blurred the ink across its surface.
A thick-bearded pirate who had been lounging lazily in his chair suddenly shot to his feet.
His huge body blocked the flickering light above him and cast a broad shadow across the table.
His scarred face was filled with excitement and fury, his eyes blazing.
Both hands slammed onto the oak table.
The heavy wood groaned beneath the force.
"Have you seen this?!"
He snatched up the newspaper, still smelling of fresh ink.
The paper shook violently in his grip.
A drunken man sleeping at the neighboring table jolted awake so suddenly that his thunderous snoring stopped at once.
Behind the bar, the owner froze halfway through polishing a glass and looked up at the shouting pirate.
On the old bounty poster below them, the words "MARINES WILL WIN" were slowly dissolving beneath the spreading rum, the ink becoming nothing more than an indistinct stain.
The scarred pirate suddenly threw back his head and laughed.
The sound thundered through the tavern.
Yet beneath the laughter was an unmistakable trace of tears.
He raised one trembling finger and pointed toward the photograph dominating the front page.
"The Marines are finished!"
His voice shook with emotion.
"Completely finished!"
Everyone followed his finger.
There, Kizaru—the once-untouchable Admiral—was trapped helplessly in Diamond Jozu's grasp.
The image seemed almost like a slap across the face of anyone who had believed Marine supremacy could never be challenged.
"And that Ron…"
The pirate's voice suddenly caught.
Something painful seemed to surface from an old memory.
His rough, calloused palm slammed down over the image of the Eternal Divine Kingdom's flag.
His knuckles turned white.
"He did it!"
His voice trembled.
"He actually did it!"
Every word carried a mixture of admiration and disbelief.
In the corner of the tavern, a figure wrapped in a black cloak quietly lowered the brim of his hat.
His face disappeared deeper into the shadows as he cautiously observed everyone around him.
Beneath the bar, hidden inside a concealed compartment, lay a Marine wanted notice.
Somewhere on its surface, the numbers were rapidly changing, ticking upward again and again like a countdown toward an even greater storm.
Outside the window, several News Coo hurried past overhead.
Fresh leaflets fluttered down onto the street below.
Printed prominently across them were two words—
NEW ERA.
The letters shone beneath the morning sunlight as though announcing the beginning of something the world could no longer avoid.
Then—
Crash!
A drinking glass slipped from someone's hand and shattered against the floor.
Fragments scattered everywhere.
No one even looked down.
Every pair of eyes remained fixed on the newspaper.
All of them were thinking about the same thing—
What came next?
...
Elsewhere, shafts of sunlight streamed through the room as though they had taken on lives of their own, slipping through the air and falling across weapon racks coated in thick dust.
The light cut long diagonal patterns across the forgotten weapons.
Those pale streaks shifted faintly with the passing moments, illuminating relics that seemed to carry the weight of years gone by.
...
This old weapons shop in the heart of Loguetown had carried countless memories through the years.
A distinctive scent of age lingered inside, while weapons of every kind lined the walls and shelves, from razor-sharp swords to old-fashioned flintlock pistols.
Behind the polished oak counter sat the owner, Ben Hawk, just as he had on countless ordinary days.
Years of use had worn the counter smooth enough to reflect his weathered face.
Beside him sat a cup of tea that had long since gone cold, the leaves drifting lazily near the bottom.
Ben reached out at an unhurried pace, picked up the newspaper that had just been delivered, and slowly unfolded it.
At first, his expression remained as calm as ever, carrying the steady composure of a merchant who had spent most of his life in business.
There was even a faint glimmer of calculation in his eyes.
The seas had become increasingly unstable lately, and pirate activity had risen sharply.
Experience told him that whenever things became dangerous, business usually improved.
Swords.
Firearms.
Gunpowder.
Ordinary civilians wanted weapons for protection, while smaller merchant crews stocked up in case they encountered trouble at sea.
The thought brought the faintest smile to his lips.
Then his gaze drifted across the front page.
And stopped.
Ben's entire body stiffened.
The fingers holding the newspaper tightened unconsciously until his rough knuckles turned white.
His eyes widened behind his glasses.
The calm expression vanished from his face.
"MARINES MOBILIZE IN FULL FORCE AGAINST THE ETERNAL DIVINE KINGDOM—SUFFER EPIC DEFEAT!"
The headline struck him like a hammer.
Ben instinctively pushed his reading glasses back up his nose and leaned forward until his face was almost buried in the newspaper.
His eyes moved slowly down the page.
"ADMIRALS KIZARU AND FUJITORA CAPTURED…"
"MOMOUSAGI SEVERELY WOUNDED AND TAKEN PRISONER…"
"FIFTY THOUSAND ELITE MARINES NEARLY WIPED OUT…"
Every line felt harder to believe than the last.
His breathing gradually became heavier.
Fine beads of sweat appeared across his forehead.
For a long moment, the entire shop seemed unnaturally quiet.
Only Ben's increasingly rough breaths echoed through the cramped room, sounding almost like an old bellows struggling to work.
Rows of carefully maintained swords and flintlocks hung along the walls.
Their blades normally gleamed with a cold, dangerous edge, yet beneath the oppressive silence they somehow seemed less threatening than before.
The polished black barrels of the firearms appeared equally subdued, as though even the weapons themselves had been affected by what the newspaper contained.
Ben slowly raised his head.
His gaze passed over the worn counter and settled on the broad square outside the window.
That place carried more history than almost anywhere else in the East Blue.
Loguetown—
The town where Pirate King Gol D. Roger had been born.
And the place where he had ultimately been publicly executed.
More than twenty years had passed since then.
Roger's death had been like a stone dropped into still water, sending waves across the entire world and igniting the Great Pirate Era.
Ever since, the Marines had stood like an enormous mountain over that chaotic age.
No matter how many pirates emerged, Marine Headquarters had remained one of the great powers keeping the seas under control.
A force few dared challenge directly.
But now...
Something had changed.
The newspaper slipped from Ben's trembling fingers and fluttered onto the counter.
As it unfolded, the photograph of Jozu capturing Kizaru stared back at him from the front page.
The image seemed almost unreal.
One of the Marines' supposedly untouchable Admirals, restrained by an enemy before the eyes of the world.
Ben sank back into his chair as though all the strength had suddenly left his body.
His cloudy eyes lost focus.
He stared blankly at the dust drifting through the shafts of sunlight inside the shop.
His lips moved faintly.
"Is the world... really about to change?"
The words were little more than a whisper.
Yet within the suffocating silence of the shop, they seemed impossibly heavy.
Images flashed through Ben's mind.
The East Blue—
Long regarded as the weakest of the four seas.
Its normally peaceful waters swallowed beneath waves created by a victory fought far away.
A mysterious power capable of defeating the full might of Marine Headquarters head-on.
And the man at its center—
Ron.
The Eternal Divine Kingdom and its ruler were spreading through the world like a fire no one knew how to extinguish.
What would the seas look like after this?
Ben remained silent for a long time, thoughts churning endlessly through his mind.
Eventually, he rose from his chair.
His steps were slow and heavy as he walked toward the entrance of the shop.
Then he reached out and turned over the wooden sign hanging beside the door.
On it were the words:
WEAPONS SOLD OUT — RESTOCKING TOMORROW
It was an ordinary gesture.
But as Ben looked out over Loguetown, he could not shake the feeling that the world was already moving toward something far larger.
A more turbulent era.
A more uncertain era.
And perhaps an era filled with possibilities no one could yet imagine.
Like an enormous tide rolling in from beyond the horizon, it was already approaching.
...