The silence within the Embrace was absolute. Dracule Marya Zaleska hung limp in the liquid shadow, a marionette with severed strings. Her heart was a still, cold stone in her chest. The Primordial Current – Achlys, the ancient sorrow given sentience – flowed into the vacuum left by her extinguished consciousness. It seeped through her Void-scarred veins like ink through parchment, cold and possessive. Tendrils of liquid darkness, thick with swirling constellations of Soul-Sugar dust and the captured blue witch-fire of Les Guédés, wormed into her mind, her spirit, preparing the vacant vessel for its eternal tenant. Mine, the Current thrummed, a vibration of cosmic hunger. The Mist walks within me now.
Then, a distant thud.
It wasn't sound, but a resonance. A deep, rhythmic pounding transmitted through the very roots of the marsh, echoing down into the abyssal heart. Moxy-Rouge's ritual stomp. Each impact vibrated through the liquid shadow, a counterpoint to the Current's pulse. It struck a chord deep within Marya's dormant Devil Fruit power – the Mist-Mist Fruit, a shard of Achlys' own essence, bound to a mortal soul.
BOOOM…
A sound like the world's largest bell being struck reverberated inside Marya's still chest. Not in her ears, but in her bones, her blood, her very soul. The liquid shadow recoiled as if scalded. Within the silent void of her body, her heart jerked. A single, painful contraction.
BOOOM…
Another toll. Another violent spasm. The cold stone in her chest cracked. The invading Current hissed, its tendrils loosening their grip in surprise. Impossible!
BOOOM… BOOOM… BOOOM…
Each toll was a hammer blow against death's door. Marya's heart, responding to the primal rhythm of the voodoo ritual echoing through the Bayou's soul, began to beat again. Erratically at first, then stronger, fiercer, fueled by the Devil Fruit's awakened resonance. Five. Six. Seven tolls. Life flooded back into frozen pathways. The cold fire in her Void scars blazed anew, not with submission, but with defiance.
BOOOM… BOOOM…
The ninth and final toll crashed through the Embrace like a physical wave. Marya's eyes snapped open. Not the vacant stare of a vessel, but blazing golden orbs, mirrors of her father's fury, now alight with her own rekindled will. Conqueror's Haki, pure and obsidian-black, erupted from her in a shockwave. The liquid shadow surrounding her boiled and recoiled violently. Spectral eels disintegrated. Soul-Sugar constellations shattered like glass.
"NO!" The Primordial Current's voice was a guttural roar of disbelief and rage that shook the foundations of the Embrace. It wasn't a whisper anymore; it was the thunder of a betrayed god. "YOU ARE BUT MORTAL FLESH! THIS IS MY DOMAIN! MY POWER! YOU WILL SUCCUMB!"
The Current coalesced before her, no longer just an ambient presence. It morphed, twisting the liquid shadow, the Soul-Sugar dust, and the captured spirits into a horrific manifestation. A figure began to take shape – Achlys, the Cosmic Chimera of Thresholds. A glimpse of impossible scale: a crown of starlight nebulae ringed with celestial tiers, a torso of floating skeletal ribs inscribed with dead languages, legs of frozen torment and volcanic damnation, all radiating unbearable, paradoxical beauty and horror. Her true form was too vast for the Embrace; this was a focused projection, a mask of divine wrath, her sewn-shut void mouth weeping streams of ambrosia and scorpions simultaneously. "YOU THINK YOU CAN OVERCOME A GOD?!" The voice was a choir of lamentations and hymns, promising infinite despair.
Marya didn't flinch. The analytical mind, sharpened by near-oblivion, saw the god not as an invincible force, but as the ultimate obstacle between her and freedom. Her guarded nature slammed shut against the torrent of divine terror. She raised her right hand. The liquid shadow around her palm parted like smoke, revealing Eternal Eclipse. Its obsidian blade, etched with crimson runes, pulsed with cold Void energy that resonated with her scars and clashed violently with Achlys' presence.
"Gods," Marya stated, her voice a rasp scraped raw from silence, yet chillingly calm, "are just bigger chains." Her golden eyes locked onto the weeping, sewn-shut void that was Achlys' mouth. "And I cut chains."
With a scream that was part Mihawk's inherited fury, part Void-born cold, and wholly her own defiance, Marya brought Eternal Eclipse down in a blinding arc. She didn't just swing the blade; she unleashed everything – the rekindled Conqueror's Haki, the volatile Void power simmering in her veins, the desperate will to live. The slash wasn't aimed at Achlys' projection; it was aimed at the fabric of the Embrace itself.
A chasm of pure annihilation tore open. Not a crack in water, but a rip in reality. It was blacker than the Void, a tear through which starlight from another universe briefly bled, howling with cosmic wind. The force hit Achlys' manifestation. The celestial nebulae crown flickered. The skeletal ribs screamed in a thousand dead tongues. The projection recoiled, not just in pain, but in profound shock. "MORTAL! YOU DARE—?!"
But Marya was already moving. She didn't wait to see the damage. She dove into the chasm she had carved, not away from the god, but through the wound in the Bayou's heart. Eternal Eclipse blazed ahead of her, a beacon of obliteration cutting a path through the impossible. Liquid shadow, Soul-Sugar dust, and the echoes of Achlys' roar were sucked into the void behind her as she erupted upwards, following the fading resonance of Moxy's stomps, clawing her way back from the abyss not as a victim, but as a blade forged in its darkest fire. The tomb was breached. The vessel had become the weapon.
*****
The silence in La Place des Masques was absolute, thick with the weight of spectral judgment. Les Guédés hovered above the churning black pool, their bone instruments silent, blue witch-fire eyes fixed on Shanks and Mihawk. Shanks stepped forward, Gryphon held loosely but radiating latent power. "Spirit Judges," he began, his voice cutting through the unnatural quiet, "We seek—"
The ground exploded.
Not a tremor, but a violent upheaval. The bubble-stone plaza buckled like eggshells. The cracked obsidian statue of Le Roi Soleil shattered from within, shards of gold-plated stone and weeping black oil raining down. The three Guédés scattered like startled crows, their forms dissolving into wisps of cold blue flame. From the heart of the destruction, two figures erupted in a geyser of liquid shadow and searing light.
Marya Zaleska landed in a crouch, but she was unrecognizable. Her long black hair had dissolved into a swirling nebula of starlight, ash-gray tendrils, and screaming soul-smoke that froze the air around her. A tripartite halo – gold Kabbalah Tree, silver Bifrost bridge, obsidian Inferno rings – pulsed above her head. Funeral shroud robes, stitched with Mihawk's feather motifs, flowed over skin cracked with glowing void-veins mapping Styx, Phlegethon, and Lethe. Her left eye blazed with the serene Elysian Fields; her right eye was a window to the burning damned of Naraka. Eternal Eclipse had become the Key of Thresholds – a tri-split blade radiating light, mirrored steel, and decay. Mihawk's pendant glowed like a captured star on her chest.
Above her, blotting out the fractured moon and blood-red sun, Achlys manifested. Fifty meters of cosmic horror, her form a living cathedral of afterlife: a faceless starlight nebula head ringed with celestial tiers, ten feathered-Garuda wings spanning the plaza, a torso of 49 skeletal ribs inscribed with dead languages, legs of frozen Cocytus torment and volcanic Kumbhipaka damnation, dragon-claw feet planted on a maw to Chaos. Her sewn-shut void mouth wept streams of ambrosia and scorpions. Her shadow and the mist rolling off her form swallowed the Floating Quarter whole, plunging it into twilight. Her voice wasn't sound; it was a choir of lamentations and hymns vibrating in their bones: "YOU DARE DEFY ME, MORTAL SHELL? YOU THINK YOU CAN WIELD A GOD'S POWER?"
Marya rose slowly, the Key of Thresholds humming in her grip. She didn't look at the monstrous goddess looming over her. Her gaze, one eye paradise, one eye hellfire, swept the scattered, terrified revelers, then locked onto Mihawk and Shanks. A flicker of her old, sardonic calm touched her lips, warped by the cosmic power thrumming through her. "Well, that just happened," she called, her voice layered with echoes of the Void. "Turns out, I have a new admirer. Be warned, she's got a flair for the theatrics."
Mihawk's rigid stance didn't change, but the obsidian glacier of his fury cracked. A smirk, fierce and proud, touched his lips. "Defying gods now, are we?" Yoru slid silently from its sheath, its black blade drinking the fractured light. "About time you embraced the family legacy."
"Don't worry," she added, tilting her head towards the shrieking Achlys, "I'm about to make her a dead goddess."
Shanks let out a bark of laughter, genuine surprise cutting through the awe. He grinned, Gryphon gleaming as he stepped beside Mihawk, facing the impossible horror. "Well, that's one way to make an entrance! New look's a bit… dramatic, but hey, slaying a god? That's a party!" His tone was flippant, but his eyes burned with fierce, protective pride.
"SILENCE, INSECTS!" Achlys's roar shook the remaining buildings. Her molten silver arms raised, scales of Ma'at and lotus of purity in one set of hands, flaming Cherubim sword and mirror of Yomi in the other. "YOU CLAIM POWER? I SHALL SHOW YOU COSMIC DESPAIR! I AM THE THRESHOLD! I AM ETERNITY!"
Mihawk's golden eyes narrowed, Yoru humming with annihilating intent. Shanks' grin turned razor-sharp, Gryphon radiating Conqueror's Haki that pushed back against the godly aura. They didn't speak. They didn't need to. The world's greatest swordsman and the freest Emperor stood shoulder-to-shoulder before the cosmic abyss, ready to carve a path through divinity itself. For Marya. For the island. For the sheer, audacious challenge of slaying a god.
Moxy-Rouge, half-buried in rubble near her glowing Petit Roi doll, could only stare, her clairvoyant eyes wide with ancestral terror and dawning, impossible recognition. "La Déesse..." she breathed, the words lost in the god's shattering roar. "Achlys..." The dance with the dead was over. The battle against eternity had begun.
*****
The eruption of Le Roi Soleil sent shockwaves far beyond La Place des Masques. Across the Floating Quarter, Benn Beckman had been coordinating with Yasopp and Limejuice near a canal junction when the ground buckled. Buildings groaned. Gaslights shattered, raining glass. Then, rising above the mist like a blasphemous mountain, Achlys manifested. Her shadow swallowed entire blocks, her starlight nebula head casting an eerie, paradoxical glow, her volcanic leg dripping lava that hissed in the canals, her frozen leg frosting nearby rooftops. Her choir-of-damnation roar vibrated in their bones.
"Chief's location! Now!" Benn barked, already sprinting towards the Plaza, rifle in hand. Yasopp didn't need orders; he was a blur scaling crumbling facades, sniping vantage points already forming in his mind. Limejuice adjusted his cracked sunglasses, his staff a silver streak as he vaulted a sinking rowboat.
Near the bustling market, Lucky Roux dropped a crate of stolen spices. "Aw, biscuits!" he groaned, staring up at the cosmic horror blotting out the blood moon. He abandoned his haul, drawing twin cleavers, his bulk surprisingly agile as he charged through panicked crowds, beignet crumbs still dusting his chin. "Comin' through! Emperor-sized emergency!"
On the Red Force, Building Snake had been meticulously welding a fracture in Marya's sub hull when the quake hit. Tools clattered. Through the porthole, he saw Achlys's impossible form. Without a word, he dropped his torch, amber eyes narrowing. He charged down the gangplank, moving with silent purpose towards the chaos. Below deck, Gadget snored peacefully amidst sparking wires, his Subconscious Sustainer Helmet humming, utterly oblivious to the god shaking the island.
Hongo and Gab, carrying medical supplies from the ship, froze mid-step. "By all the drunken stars..." Hongo whispered, his usual pragmatism drowned in awe. Gab simply drew his knives, eyes hard. They ran.
Bonk Punch and Monster, hauling ammunition crates near the docks, exchanged a single grunt. They dropped the crates with earth-shaking thuds, drawing their weapons – a spiked cestus for Bonk Punch, a battle-axe for Monster – and charged, their heavy footsteps cracking the bubble-stone.
Jelly Squish, who'd been bouncing nervously near a gumbo stall, let out a terrified "BLOOP!" and morphed into a wobbly, high-speed wheel, rolling erratically but determinedly towards the Plaza, leaving glowing trails. "Scary sky-lady! Not good! Must find stabby friends!"
They converged on La Place des Masques from different vectors, a wave of seasoned pirates crashing into a scene of apocalyptic grandeur. The sight that greeted them was surreal: the shattered statue, the churning pool of black oil, the spectral remnants of Les Guédés fleeing Achlys's presence, Moxy-Rouge half-buried in rubble clutching her glowing doll, and at the center – Shanks and Mihawk standing defiant before the god, flanking Marya in her terrifying, awakened glory.
Lucky Roux skidded to a halt, cleavers raised. "Whoa, Marya! Did ya swallow a nebula? New 'do's a bit... sparkly!" He grinned, trying to cut the tension.
Yasopp landed lightly beside Benn, rifle trained not on Achlys, but scanning the perimeter. "Lookin' good, Mist-girl! Though the weepin' scorpions are a bit much," he called, nodding at the streams from Achlys's mouth.
Marya didn't turn, her Key of Thresholds humming, her dual-pupil gaze fixed on the goddess. A flicker of her old sarcasm touched her voice, amplified by cosmic power. "Took your time, Lucky. Save the fashion critique for after we kill a god."
Before anyone could retort, the ground vibrated with a new, rhythmic thudding. From the mist-choked streets surrounding the plaza, they emerged. Husk Soldiers.
They were walking nightmares. Patchwork horrors of rotting flesh fused with dull, Pacifista-like plating. Exposed circuitry snaked through decaying muscle and glistening bone. Some had scales of Fish-Men, others bore tattered Revolutionary Army tattoos. Their movements were jerky, puppet-like, fighting their own mechanics. Sickly gold eyes glowed with vacant malice. The air around them grew colder, a palpable drain on energy – Haki Devourers. A low, discordant whisper rose from them, a chorus of fragmented agony: "Asses... Haki Potential... High... Devour...Objective Established…"
Behind them, ranks of Marines in Bayou's Reckoning uniforms fanned out, rifles leveled, faces pale but determined beneath the shadow of the goddess and the biomechanical abominations.
"What the hell is that?!" Bonk Punch roared, hefting his axe, staring at a Husk Soldier whose jaw hung loose, wires sparking where muscle should be.
Ben Beckman didn't flinch. His sharp eyes took in the battlefield: the god, the titans preparing to fight her, the encroaching wave of undead machines and Marines. He stepped beside Shanks, his voice a low, steady rasp cutting through the Husk Soldiers' whispers and Achlys's ambient choir. "Orders, Chief?"
Achlys chose that moment to roar again. The sound wasn't just loud; it was a physical wave of cosmic insult. Ambrosia and scorpions rained harder. "YOU DARE IGNORE ETERNITY? YOU DARE TREAT MY WRATH AS BACKGROUND NOISE?!" Her molten silver arms trembled, scales and sword and mirror flaring with power.
Shanks didn't even glance back. His grin was fierce, Gryphon gleaming in the fractured light as he locked eyes with Mihawk, then Marya. "Bit busy, Ben!" he called, his voice booming with defiant cheer. "Got a goddess to slay! Handle the trash, will ya? Those... things look like they need recycling!"
Ben nodded once, a sharp, decisive movement. He turned to the assembled might of the Red Hair Pirates – Lucky Roux, Yasopp, Limejuice, Bonk Punch, Monster, Building Snake, Hongo, Gab, and the wobbling, determined form of Jelly Squish. His voice cracked like a whip, commanding and clear:
"Crew! Battle stations! Roux, Monster – Frontline smashers! Punch holes in their lines! Yasopp, Limejuice – High ground, priority on the Husk eyes and Marine commanders! Hongo, Gab – Flank defense, keep those Marines pinned! Snake – Disable their mechanics, shred the wiring! Bonk – Anchor the center, hold the line! Jelly – Disrupt their formations, be unpredictable!" He raised his rifle, its barrel already shimmering with Armament Haki. "They drain Haki? Don't let them touch you. They whisper? Make them scream. For Nouvèl Orléon! For Marya! RED HAIR PIRATES – ENGAGE!"
The response was instantaneous. A chorus of fierce shouts and weapon roars answered him. Lucky Roux bellowed, charging headlong with cleavers spinning. Monster's axe cleaved the air with a sonic boom. Yasopp vanished onto a crumbling balcony, his rifle cracking. Limejuice's staff became a silver whirlwind. Building Snake moved low and fast, fists aimed at sparking joints. Hongo and Gab moved as one, knives flashing like surgical steel. Bonk Punch slammed his cestus together, a challenge ringing out. Jelly morphed into a giant, sticky trampoline, bouncing a cluster of Marines into a wall. "Bounce time! Bloop!"
As the crew surged forward, meeting the Husk Soldiers and Marines in a thunderous clash of steel, Haki, and grotesque biology, Ben Beckman raised his rifle. His first shot wasn't at a Husk or a Marine. It was a precise, Haki-infused round aimed at the glowing gold eye of the lead Husk Soldier, whispering, God's be dammed. The battle for the mortal realm had begun at the feet of gods.