The Calm Belt was exactly what the name suggested.
No wind. No waves. Flat, grey water stretched in every direction, perfectly still in a way that felt unnatural rather than peaceful. The Seastone-lined hull meant the Sea Kings ignored them, but they were still there. Massive, dark shapes moved silently under the surface, occasionally visible when one passed close enough to displace the water above it.
The crew watched them in breathless silence. Even Bonney had stopped talking. She was pressed against the railing, her meat bun entirely forgotten in her hand, watching a shadow the size of a Marine battleship slide past twenty meters below the keel.
"It's huge," she whispered, to nobody in particular.
Light extended his Level 1 Observation Haki toward the shadow out of pure curiosity. The sense found the Sea King easily enough—an enormous, ancient, slow-moving presence.
But there were no numbers. No Green, no Red. Nothing the System registered as relevant. He watched the leviathan disappear into the crushing depths and noted the confirmation: the Karma System exclusively measured human agency. Whatever these beasts had accumulated over centuries of sinking ships and eating sailors, it wasn't something the System cared to judge.
T-Bone appeared beside him at the railing, his skeletal face pale but resolute. "Remarkable creatures," the Captain murmured, watching the wake settle back into glass. "I never quite get used to the sheer scale of them."
"Yeah," Light agreed pleasantly.
They crossed the rest of the Belt in silence. A few hours later, they emerged out the other side into proper Grand Line weather—howling wind, chaotic waves, and a sky that seemed to be doing three different, violent things at once. The Log Pose on the navigation table spun wildly before locking onto their first island.
But Marineford came first.
⬛ ⬛ ⬛
Light had seen it in his inherited memories—the scale of it, the colossal fortress rising from the island at the center of the crescent plaza. The memories had been accurate, but accuracy didn't fully capture the crushing weight of the thing itself.
The warships moored in the harbor dwarfed anything in the South Blue. The walls were built for apocalyptic war in a way that civilian architecture simply couldn't mimic. The entire island had the specific, suffocating gravity of a place that ruled the world and took itself very seriously.
Some time back on the voyage, Bonney had casually mentioned that her father was somewhere in the Grand Line. She had set out to sea to find him. Light hadn't pressed for details. His last fight to the death had solidified his philosophy: in this world, details didn't matter. As long as you had the power to dictate reality, the path would simply open up for you.
Bonney pressed her face against the rail as they pulled into the bay. "It's massive," she breathed.
"Don't wander off," Light said.
"I won't."
"Bonney."
"I won't!" She paused, her eyes darting toward the bustling Marine town behind the fortress. "...Is there food here?"
Light looked at T-Bone, who was trying entirely too hard to suppress a fond, fatherly smile and failing miserably. "She is always exactly like this," Light noted dryly.
"She is a wonderful, spirited child," T-Bone said, entirely sincerely.
Light had absolutely no useful response to that.
⬛ ⬛ ⬛
The central meeting room faced the bay, with long, towering windows and tactical maps papering every wall.
Fleet Admiral Sengoku sat at the head of the heavy mahogany table. Vice Admiral Garp was in the corner, his boots propped up, loudly crunching on a bag of senbei. Admiral Borsalino stood by the window. Admiral Kuzan had his chair turned backward, resting his chin on his arms. Admiral Akainu stood rigidly near the center, a towering wall of crimson.
Light walked in. His left arm was still tightly bound in its sling, his new Major's coat draped over his shoulders like a cape since he couldn't get both arms through the sleeves. He stopped at the end of the long table, kept his posture perfectly correct, and looked at five of the most powerful men in the world.
His eyes swept the space above their heads.
[ Sengoku — Fleet Admiral ] [ Green: 1,450,000 / Red: 215,000 ]
[ Garp — Vice Admiral ] [ Green: 1,280,000 / Red: 8,400 ]
[ Akainu — Admiral ] [ Green: 850,000 / Red: 340,000 ]
[ Kuzan — Admiral ] [ Green: 920,000 / Red: 42,000 ]
[ Borsalino — Admiral ] [ Green: 780,000 / Red: 88,000 ]
Light's breath caught imperceptibly in his throat.
He read them all in the three seconds it took to cross the room. The numbers were staggering. Millions of Green points. Hundreds of thousands of Red.
His genius intellect ran the arithmetic instantly, and the terrifying reality of the System snapped into place. Systemic Karma. Sengoku hadn't personally murdered two hundred thousand people's worth of Red Karma. He had ordered it. And by the same token, he had ordered the salvation of millions. The actions of the subordinates cascaded upward, feeding the Karma of the commander who pulled the strings.
It was a geopolitical web of sin and salvation.
Light forced his heart rate to remain steady, kept his face impeccably pleasant, and sat down when Sengoku gestured to the empty chair.
"Major Yagami," Sengoku began, lacing his fingers together over the desk. "We have read your South Blue record thoroughly."
"Reporting for duty, sir. I should have done better."
"It was extraordinary," Sengoku corrected, his tone heavy with implication. "Which is precisely why you are here in person, rather than simply receiving your Grand Line orders by courier. The Roca Island incident in particular." The Fleet Admiral leaned forward. "Four thousand pirates. Two Devil Fruit users. One night. You accomplished this with a fractured arm."
Light said nothing. Sengoku hadn't asked a question yet.
"Four hundred pirate survivors," the ten-foot-tall man in the crimson suit rumbled. Akainu hadn't moved an inch from where he was standing. "I have already made my position clear on that. Leaving survivors in a purge is a half-measure."
"Hmm," Sengoku murmured. He looked back at Light. "The question we have been unable to answer is why. Your adjutant, Lieutenant Haas, is an efficient man, but he isn't very good at covering up anomalies. Our investigation revealed that the survivors weren't random. They weren't the ones who surrendered first, nor the ones who begged loudest. What exactly do you think you are doing, Major?"
"What I want to know," the man with the curly hair and the sleep mask pushed up on his forehead drawled, "is what the criterion is." Kuzan was looking directly at Light. "Care to enlighten us, young man?"
Light looked at Kuzan for a moment. 42,000 Red. Then he looked at the glowing 340,000 Red sitting above Akainu's head like a bloody sun.
He looked at Sengoku.
215,000 Red. More than triple my execution threshold. But sitting next to 1.4 Million Green. Light's mind raced. If I kill a man who saves ten people for every one he murders, am I enforcing justice, or am I damaging the world?
He buried the thought. That was a problem for later.
"Reporting, sir," Light said pleasantly, his voice steady. "A few months ago, when my Observation Haki awakened, it manifested... unusually. I found I am able to assess the 'aura' of anyone I focus on. My intuition tells me if they have taken an innocent life or not."
He saw absolutely no need to hide this variation of the truth. He had guessed that a slight mutation in Haki wouldn't raise too many red flags here. After all, the sea was vast, and Devil Fruits had conditioned these men to accept the bizarre.
"Some men's auras were stained deeply enough to warrant execution," Light smiled, the picture of a diligent, honest soldier. "Some were not. It was a judgment call, sir."
The room absorbed that. A specialized Observation Haki capable of sensing murderous intent. Kuzan's lazy expression didn't change, but something sharp flickered behind his eyes.
"Still, taking absolute justice into your own hands," Sengoku said sternly, "even with results as effective as yours, is not a principle the Navy can officially endorse. You understand that."
"Completely, sir."
Sengoku studied him for a long, heavy moment. Then, suddenly, the Fleet Admiral snapped his head to the side. "OYE, GARP!! You've eaten half a box of MY senbei and said absolutely nothing! Contribute to the briefing, damn it!"
Garp looked up from his cracker bag, his face a mask of profound annoyance. "Sengoku," he grunted, "you're the Fleet Admiral. Brain work is your job." Garp held up a massive rice cracker, shoved it into his mouth, and erupted into booming laughter. "I am providing moral support! BWAHAHAHA!"
Akainu made a sound that was certainly a disgusted humph. Borsalino simply hummed at the window. Kuzan looked briefly up at the ceiling.
Sengoku closed his eyes, massaged his temples, and looked back at Light. "Grand Line posting. Captain T-Bone will remain your attached officer. You will operate under standard Marine authority, with the additional operational latitude your results have apparently earned you." Sengoku pushed the formal, gold-stamped commission across the mahogany table. "Welcome to the Grand Line, Major."
Light picked up the commission with his good hand.
"Thank you, sir," he said with a bright, earnest smile. His dark gaze lingered over their heads for one final second, burning the numbers into his memory.
"You are dismissed."
"Yes, sir!"
Light gave a crisp salute and walked back out of the massive office, the heavy wooden doors clicking shut behind him.
The moment he was alone in the marble corridor, the pleasant smile dropped entirely off his face, replaced by a look of profound, icy disgust.
215,000. 340,000. Criminals, Light thought, his eyes narrowing as he walked toward the docks. Fucking criminals in white coats.
He let out a slow, measured exhale. The Grand Line was going to require a lot of calculation.