Chapter 126: 'The Game' Begins
The Underground Colosseum — Moments Before
Itachi had just confirmed the deaths of the Donquixote soldiers blocking the eastern passage when Diamanti and Trebol regrouped at the SMILE Factory's main gate. The two officers stood shoulder to shoulder—Diamanti's fluttering blade reshaped into a massive barrier of undulating steel, Trebol's mucus-coated body oozing across the entrance in sticky, adhesive waves.
"They're making a stand at the factory entrance." Itachi's Sharingan tracked the enemy positions, calculating angles of approach. "A delaying action. They know they can't win, but they can buy time."
"Time for what?" Bartolomeo had appeared at his elbow, barrier at the ready.
Before Itachi could answer, the earth shook.
Not the localized tremors of a Devil Fruit attack or the structural collapse of the underground chamber. This was deeper. Larger. The entire crust of Dressrosa groaned as if the island itself was being wrenched from its foundations.
And then the SMILE Factory began to rise.
"What—?!" Bartolomeo's barrier flickered as he stumbled backward. "THE FACTORY! IT'S—!"
The massive structure tore free from the earth with a sound like the world ending. Stone and steel screamed. Support beams snapped like dry twigs. And the factory—the entire factory, with its smokestacks and assembly lines and hundreds of tons of machinery—ascended into the sky as if lifted by the hand of an angry god.
The pirates who had been charging toward it skidded to a halt, their weapons dropping, their war cries dying in their throats.
Itachi was already moving. The Wood Black Crow materialized beneath him, its dark flames scattering embers across the rubble. He launched upward, bursting through the colosseum's shattered floor, through the dust and debris, into the open air above Dressrosa.
And he saw it.
The sky was being woven shut.
White threads—countless thousands of them—descended from a central point above the palace. They spread outward in a perfect dome, each strand gleaming like spun glass in the afternoon light. Where they touched the ground, they anchored deep into the earth. Where they intersected, they formed a lattice dense enough to cage the entire kingdom.
A birdcage. Large enough to hold a nation.
"This..."
The threads were already causing chaos. Itachi watched as two strands drifted down toward him—deceptively gentle, almost lazy in their descent. His Sharingan caught the razor gleam along their edges. He snapped a kunai from his belt and slashed upward.
Ting. Ting.
The threads parted. The severed ends whipped away, still deadly, still seeking.
Itachi landed on a rooftop and surveyed the city below. The chaos was spreading. He could see figures in the streets—civilians, Marines, pirates—attacking each other with mindless ferocity. Friends turning on friends. Allies cutting down allies. The threads weren't just forming a cage. They were controlling people. Parasitizing them. Turning the entire population of Dressrosa into Doflamingo's puppets.
"So this is his contingency."
Itachi's voice was cold. Clinical. The tone of a man who had seen tyrants deploy their final weapons before and recognized the pattern.
"When backed into a corner, eliminate all witnesses. Burn the evidence. Start fresh somewhere else."
His hand moved to the Den Den Mushi in his cloak just as it began to ring.
"Itachi-san."
"Fujitora."
Below, in the streets near the Flower Field, the Admiral was holding two Marine soldiers immobile with his gravity. Their eyes were wild, their mouths frothing. Strings protruded from the backs of their necks, twitching with Doflamingo's malevolent will.
"The situation has deteriorated beyond this old man's worst projections." Fujitora's voice was heavy. "Doflamingo has deployed a method of mass slaughter. This old man suspects the 'massacre' the Riku family was blamed for years ago... was caused by this same technique."
"Understood." Itachi's gaze swept across the cage. "He intends to eliminate everything inconvenient and start over. The birdcage is both prison and execution method."
"This old man only knows it's called the Birdcage. The strings are impossibly sharp, self-regenerating, and they block all communication with the outside world. Nothing can pass through them—if a person tries, they'll be cut to pieces."
Fujitora approached the edge of the cage. His staff-sword flashed from its sheath, striking the white threads with full force. The impact rang out across the city. The threads vibrated—and held.
"Even you can't cut through?" Itachi asked.
"This old man can sever individual threads temporarily. But breaking the entire structure..."
Before Fujitora could finish, every screen in Dressrosa flickered to life. The projection Den Den Mushi mounted throughout the city—on building corners, in shop windows, across the colosseum's massive display boards—all activated simultaneously. And on every screen, Doflamingo's face appeared.
The Warlord was smiling.
"Citizens of Dressrosa! Honored guests! Good evening!"
His voice boomed across the kingdom, amplified by a thousand speakers.
"I imagine many of you are feeling rather... upset with me right now. Learning the truth about your beloved kingdom. Discovering that your precious toys were actually your loved ones. It must be quite overwhelming."
The grin widened.
"So I've prepared a little game. A game where you can kill ME!"
He spread his arms wide.
"I'm right here in the palace. Not running. Not hiding. Come find me. Kill me. And the game ends immediately!"
The screens flickered. Doflamingo's expression shifted—mock sympathy curdling into something far more predatory.
"Of course... if killing me seems too difficult... there IS another way to end the game."
His tongue traced across his upper lip.
"You can kill the people I'm about to name instead!"
"Fuffuffu! FUFFUFFU!"
On the rooftop, Itachi's Den Den Mushi was still connected to Fujitora.
"This seems to complicate our plans, Itachi-san."
"No." Itachi's Sharingan spun slowly, the tomoe rotating as his mind worked through the implications. "This might be exactly what we needed. An opportunity."
"An opportunity?"
"First, I'll handle the thing you're most concerned about. The thing you couldn't do yourself."
Fujitora was silent.
"Our plan proceeds as arranged. But the critical piece..." Itachi turned toward the palace, visible in the distance atop its plateau. "Is Doflamingo."
"This old man could—"
"No. If you move against him directly, the entire purpose of your plan collapses. You know this."
Fujitora's silence was confirmation enough.
"Leave Doflamingo to us." Itachi's voice was steady. Certain. "Leave him to Straw Hat Luffy. My captain is already on his way to the palace. My crewmates will handle what needs to be handled."
"The Straw Hat...?" Fujitora hesitated. "You would trust something so critical to a single pirate?"
"I've seen his journey. Every step. Every battle. Every time the odds said he should fall, and every time he refused." Itachi's tone did not waver. "I trust his determination. And I trust that he will do what must be done."
A long pause.
"Then this old man will place his faith in your captain, Itachi-san. The Straw Hat will defeat Doflamingo... or all of this is for nothing."
Itachi hung up.
On the screens throughout Dressrosa, Doflamingo's game was being announced in full.
"Every person in this Birdcage is now a bounty hunter! Your targets? The thirteen individuals I'm about to name! Each of them has stars above their heads—visible to everyone, impossible to hide! One star means one hundred million berries for the person who brings me their head!"
A roar went up from the crowd. Some in terror. Some in savage anticipation. The parasitic strings had already begun their work—twisting minds, amplifying greed, drowning reason in a flood of manipulated emotion.
"ONE HUNDRED MILLION?!"
Some of the pirates who had been weeping at Usopp's feet moments ago now raised their heads. Their eyes gleamed with something feral.
Doflamingo began to list the names.
"ONE STAR! The 'Prisoner Gladiator'! The 'Legacy of the Former Generation'—Rebecca! The 'Son of the Devil' of the Straw Hats—Nico Robin! The Wano Samurai—'Foxfire' Kin'emon! Princess Viola of Dressrosa! The Straw Hat Crew's 'Iron Man'—Franky!"
Their faces appeared on the screens. Their locations, roughly triangulated by the birdcage's parasitic awareness, flashed across the map.
"TWO STARS! Former Commander of the Dressrosa Royal Army—Cyrus! The Straw Hat Pirates' 'Pirate Hunter'—Roronoa Zoro!"
The crowd's roar intensified.
"AND NOW! THE MAIN COURSE! THREE STARS EACH!"
Doflamingo's laughter rose to a shriek.
"Chief of Staff of the Revolutionary Army—Sabo! The Straw Hat Pirates' Captain—'Straw Hat' Luffy! The 'Surgeon of Death'—Trafalgar Law! Former King of Dressrosa—Riku Dold the Third!"
A pause for dramatic effect. The screens flickered.
"And the Straw Hats' 'Hellfire'—Uchiha Itachi!"
Itachi stood motionless on the rooftop, his masked face turned toward the nearest screen. His bounty poster appeared—the crimson skull blazing against the dark background, the epithet that had followed him since Punk Hazard burning beneath his name.
"I've been listed as well."
The Wood Black Crow's flames flickered with what might have been dark amusement. He had already catalogued the threads descending from the cage's apex—irregular strands that didn't match the dome's geometric pattern. Parasite threads. The same strings Doflamingo was using to control the population.
"Oho! Itachi's on the bounty list too!" Luffy's voice echoed through the palace corridors, bright with excitement despite the chaos. "Look, look! They used his cool picture!"
Zoro's sword hilt connected with the back of Luffy's head. "IS BEING A WANTED CRIMINAL SUPPOSED TO BE A GOOD THING?!"
At the edge of the Birdcage, Sabo stared up at his own face on the projection screens. "They got me too, huh." He turned to Kerla. "This complicates the extraction."
Behind them, the gleam of greedy eyes was already gathering in the shadows.
Usopp, still collapsed on the ground where his "followers" had been worshipping him, squinted at the screens through swollen eyes. His face was a ruin of blood and bruises. His body screamed for rest. But as the names were listed—one star, two stars, three stars—he noticed something.
"Wait... I'm not... I'm not on the list...?"
A broken laugh escaped his lips.
"I'm NOT on the list! HAHA! It's fine! I'm completely safe! Nobody's after—"
"AND NOW!" Doflamingo's voice thundered across the kingdom. "The FINAL target! The one who ANNOYS me the MOST! The one who STARTED all of this! Without HIM, none of you would be in this situation!"
The screens flashed crimson.
"Also of the Straw Hat Pirates! The man who destroyed my SMILE operation! The man who turned your precious toys back into humans and threw this entire country into chaos!"
"GOD! USOPP!!!"
Usopp's face appeared on every screen in Dressrosa.
His bounty poster displayed five gleaming stars.
"FIVE STARS! FIVE HUNDRED MILLION BERRIES!"
Doflamingo's laughter reached a fever pitch.
"THE HIGHEST BOUNTY IN THE GAME! BRING ME GOD USOPP'S HEAD!"
Usopp's broken laugh died in his throat.
"...Eh?"
His eyes rolled back.
"EEEEEEEEEEH?! FIVE STAAAAAARS?!"
(End of Chapter)
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