The gavel slams down.
The sound cracks through the Roseate Auction House like a thunderclap—sharp, final, echoing off the pink-veined stone walls and the crimson velvet drapes. The auctioneer—a thin man with a waxed mustache and eyes that dart like frightened fish—sweeps his arm toward the stage.
"Sold! To the gentleman in the eastern box for seven hundred million!"
The crowd murmurs. Paddles lower. A curtain of heavy crimson velvet slides across the stage, obscuring the Empty Throne from view. The throne—Imu's throne—disappears behind the fabric, swallowed by shadow.
The auctioneer clears his throat. He adjusts his collar. He glances at the crowd—masked faces, gleaming eyes, the hunger of collectors who have come for something rare.
"For our next item," he announces, his voice rising with theatrical flourish, "we have something truly extraordinary."
The curtain slides open.
The auctioneer sweeps his arm back. His voice booms across the theater.
"For our next item, we have the sleeping diva, UTA!"
The crowd gasps.
In the center of the stage, bathed in a beam of amber light, stands a cylinder.
It rises from the floor like a tomb—ten feet tall, three feet wide, its surface etched with ancient symbols that pulse with a faint, sickly green glow. The symbols are not from any known language. They twist and spiral, shifting when observed directly, always moving at the edge of vision.
And inside—
Inside, floating in a suspension of clear, viscous fluid, is Uta.
Her hair drifts around her head like seaweed in a slow current—red and white, the colors of dawn and ash. Her eyes are closed. Her face is peaceful. Too peaceful. The peace of someone who has been asleep for a very long time. The peace of someone who has been preserved.
She wears a simple white dress. Her feet are bare. Her hands float at her sides. She does not breathe. She does not move.
She floats.
The cylinder's glow pulses—a slow, rhythmic beat that matches the rhythm of a sleeping heart. The symbols on its surface shift and spiral, and the fluid around Uta shimmers with the quality of something that exists between worlds.
The crowd stares.
The silence stretches.
---
In the back of the theater, Marya, Jannali, Eliane, Aurélie, Luffy, Law, Shanks, and Beckman stand frozen.
Luffy's eyes bulge.
His jaw drops. His hands curl into fists at his sides. The straw hat on his head suddenly seems too small, too fragile, too wrong for the expression on his face.
"UTA."
Her name leaves him as a breath scraped raw by disbelief—the sound of an old wound remembering how to bleed.
Law mutters, "No way."
His spotted hat shadows his face, but his eyes—dark, calculating—are fixed on the cylinder. His fingers twitch near Kikoku's sheath. His jaw tightens.
Jannali curses. Her accent thickens the words, makes them sharp.
"Bloody hell. It looks like she's having a nana nap."
Marya's eyes narrow.
Her arms are crossed over her chest, her leather jacket creaking as she tightens her hold on herself. Her golden-ringed eyes sweep across the cylinder—cataloging, calculating, searching for something that might explain what she is seeing.
Nisshoku pulses against her back. A slow, hungry rhythm.
Beckman blows out a plume of smoke.
"How is that—"
He pauses.
His eyes land on Shanks.
Marya looks over her shoulder.
Shanks stands apart from the group. His single arm hangs at his side. His long black cloak stirs in a breeze that no one else feels. The old ease has vanished from his scarred face; grief draws every line taut, remaking him into something raw and unrecognizable.
His aura bleeds out.
It spreads across the theater like oil on water—dark, heavy, suffocating. The temperature drops. The air grows thick. The candles along the walls flicker and dim.
His eyes blaze.
Not with Haki. Not with power. With something older. Something deeper. Something that has been locked away for years, buried beneath grief and denial and the desperate need to believe that the past is the past.
Shanks takes a step forward.
The floorboards creak beneath his boots.
Marya steps aside. She moves out of his way. Her face is unreadable, but her eyes—golden rings within rings—follow him.
---
The auctioneer calls out, "Starting bids at—"
He stops.
His eyes land on the figure walking down the center aisle.
Shanks moves like a storm front. Slow. Deliberate. Inevitable. Each step carries the weight of an Emperor—the weight of a man who has stood at the apex of the world and found it wanting. His single arm swings at his side. His cloak billows behind him. His eyes—blazing, burning, consuming—are fixed on the cylinder.
The crowd falls silent.
A masked merchant in the front row shrinks back. Her paddle clatters to the floor. She does not pick it up.
A broker in the second row—a heavy man with a golden mask—scrambles backward, his chair toppling, his coins spilling across the stone.
A Cinder Knight near the stage reaches for his axe. His hand freezes on the hilt. His porcelain mask tilts. Behind it, his eyes widen.
Shanks walks.
His aura spreads.
It fills the theater like water filling a drowning vessel. It presses against the walls, against the ceiling, against the lungs of every person in the room. It is not Conqueror's Haki—not the raw, explosive force that knocks men unconscious. It is something worse. Something slower. Something that makes the air itself feel like a physical weight.
The auctioneer stammers.
"I—I—the b-bidding—"
Shanks keeps walking.
His boots click against the stone floor. Each step echoes. Each step is a countdown.
The auctioneer swallows hard. His gavel shakes in his hand. Sweat pearls across his blanched skin; terror hollows his features as the last of his confidence slips beneath him.
Shanks reaches the bottom of the stage.
He stops.
He glares up at the auctioneer.
His voice—when it comes—is not loud. It does not need to be. It carries the weight of absolute authority. In its quiet rests the command of fleets, the defiance of Emperors, and the cold certainty of battles survived by choice rather than chance.
"Get away from my daughter."
The auctioneer squeaks.
It's not a word—not a coherent sound. It's a noise of pure terror. He stumbles backward. His foot catches on the edge of the stage. He falls.
The gavel clatters to the floor.
The auctioneer lands on his back, his legs splayed, his eyes wide. He stares up at Shanks—at the Emperor, at the father, at the force of nature that has just walked into his auction house—and he whispers:
"The Red Hair Emperor."
Shanks glares over his shoulder at the crowd.
"LEAVE."
The word cracks through the theater like a whip.
The crowd screeches.
Masked patrons scramble from their seats. They trip over each other. They claw at the doors. They abandon paddles, coins, dignity—everything—in their desperation to escape. The velvet drapes tear. The stone floor shakes beneath the stampede.
Within seconds, the theater is empty.
The Roseate Auction House stands silent.
And Shanks—the Red Hair Emperor, the father, the man who has spent years believing his daughter was dead—turns back to the cylinder.
To Uta.
---
Marya, Jannali, Eliane, Aurélie, Luffy, Law, and Beckman remain in the back, watching.
Jannali asks, "Should we—"
Marya shakes her head. "That would not be wise."
She looks over her shoulder at the group. Her golden-ringed eyes are distant. Her voice is quiet.
"There is only one other time I have seen him like this."
Beckman blows out a stream of smoke. His fingers flicking the ash. "Get ready to move."
Luffy's eyes glare out from under the brim of his hat. He punches a hand into an open palm. His voice is low. Dangerous.
"I am not waiting!"
Eliane looks over her shoulder. Her blue eyes are wide. Her silver ponytail swings as she turns.
"Why is she still inside that thing? Why doesn't she just wake up like last time?"
Marya holds her chin. Her brow furrows. She mutters—half to herself, half to the group.
"That is a clone. They were able to transport it off the island with it still being unconscious..."
Jannali interrupts.
"Nah, mate."
Everyone looks at her.
Jannali jerks her head toward the stage. Her afro bounces with the movement. Her brown eyes are distant, focused on something beyond the physical.
"She was screaming out for her dad. Reckon she could just feel him coming toward her."
Marya's head snaps around. Her eyes narrow.
"There is still a connection, then."
Aurélie adds, "Perhaps there is something about the container that is keeping the entity from seeping out."
Marya narrows her eyes at Aurélie.
Aurélie continues, "It is ancient technology. We have seen similar equipment."
Marya smirks. "You are right."
Law asks, "What are you saying?"
Marya scans the group. Her voice is steady. "We might be able to talk to Uta through that thing."
Beckman's eye narrows. "How is that?"
Marya looks to Law. "Think you can—"
Law nods. He pulls his hat down. "I get it. Yeah. I think I can."
Jannali adds, "If I can get on the same wavelength, we might be—"
---
Everyone's head snaps up.
Shanks stands at the bottom of the stage.
He glares up at the auctioneer—still sprawled on the floor, still trembling, still clutching the fallen gavel like a talisman.
Shanks' aura radiates.
It is not Haki. It is not power. It is fury. The fury of a father who has spent years believing his daughter was dead. The fury of a man who has just discovered that her body—her vessel—has been put on display like a curiosity, like an artifact, like a thing to be bought and sold.
His body is tense. His muscles coil beneath his cloak. His single eye burns.
He grounds out the words.
"Get away from my daughter."
The auctioneer squeaks. He stumbles backward. He drops the gavel. He falls to the floor.
"The Red Hair Emperor," he mutters. "The Red Hair Emperor."
Shanks glares over his shoulder at the crowd.
"LEAVE."
The crowd screeches.
They scramble. They fall over each other. They rush out of the auction house—masked faces twisted with terror, fine clothes torn, Ash Coins scattered across the floor like forgotten dreams.
Within seconds, the Roseate Auction House stands empty.
Silent.
And Shanks—the Red Hair Emperor, the father, the man who has spent years believing his daughter was dead—turns back to the cylinder.
To Uta.
He takes a step toward the stage.