Davy Jones paid no mind to Perona's trembling despair. Instead, his gaze shifted with curiosity toward the massive giant seated calmly on the sofa.
"Since you're both Shichibukai, are you really just going to sit there and watch me kill Moria, without lifting a finger?"
Kuma pressed his lips together, his expression solemn.
"Moria and I are neither long-time friends, nor allies, nor do we share any direct interest. Even among the Seven Warlords, conflict is common. I have no reason to help him. What's more, he's twice rejected my offers of assistance."
Davy Jones locked eyes with Kuma for a long moment—then suddenly laughed, shaking his head.
Turning away, he lost all interest in the Tyrant's presence.
He walked straight toward the wall, and before Perona's horrified eyes, his body melted into it. Passing through as though it were water, he emerged on the other side, then shot forward into the distance.
Kuma's brows furrowed. Another piece of information about Davy Jones's ability revealed itself—but it only deepened the mystery. What exactly was the source of his power?
Once outside the mansion and into the dense forest beyond, Davy Jones suddenly dropped from the sky.
BOOM!
The impact shook the ground, a cloud of dust erupting on his landing.
Crocodile, Kuro, Alvida, and Hachi were not far away. Their heads snapped up in shock—because the giant Oars, whose head had been severed, was slowly, impossibly rising to his feet.
Hearing the crash of Davy Jones's landing, they turned. Relief swept over them as they saw their captain and nodded in salute.
Davy Jones's gaze fell upon the headless crimson giant.
The creature's stomach had split open, revealing a cockpit within—and seated there, Moonlight Moria himself, blood still at the corner of his lips, hands gripping controls. His eyes burned with bitter hatred as they locked on Davy Jones.
From Oars's hands, countless shards of shadow gathered, coalescing into a long, dark blade.
Headless Oars, under Moria's control, raised the weapon in a style eerily reminiscent of its shadow's original master—Law.
Seizing the moment, Alvida spoke up with the intelligence she had gathered:
"Captain, Law's shadow is trapped inside the giant. Unless Moria willingly dissolves the contract, it won't return to him."
Davy Jones nodded faintly. He had already learned this from Perona.
"It doesn't matter. If we flood him with seawater, the result will be the same."
But inside the cockpit, Moria clearly sensed their plotting. He clenched his teeth.
No! Absolutely not! I cannot lose Oars! He's my last hope of returning to the New World!
He knew better than anyone that he had rotted away for more than twenty years. His prime was long gone. His chances of reclaiming the seas of the New World were nearly nonexistent. And yet, his pride could not let go—he had to gamble everything.
Controlling headless Oars, Moria swung the massive black blade down at Davy Jones!
From within his black cloak, Davy Jones drew a dark staff. He raised it high—
and met the colossal strike head-on.
BOOM!
The ground split open, the forest shuddered as trees toppled in waves, gravestones cracked and sank into the mud, corpses swallowed again and again.
CRACK!
The black blade shattered.
Moria barely registered the break before his eyes went wide—because that same staff shot forward like a meteor, piercing through Oars's stomach and lunging straight at him!
So fast!
Shocked, Moria acted on instinct. With a flicker, he switched places with his shadow outside Oars's body.
The staff tore through the shadow instead, bursting out of Oars's back.
But Moria had no time to gloat. Just as he emerged into the graveyard, ready to sneer in triumph, his vision warped—Davy Jones was already there.
Teleportation. Again!
I have to swap with my shadow again—!
But the thought hadn't even finished forming before Davy Jones's leg whipped up and smashed into his face.
BAM!
Moria's jaw twisted grotesquely as his massive body was hurled backward. He plowed through gravestones, then through the trees, before finally crashing to the earth.
He coughed blood, spitting teeth, beaten and pitiful.
"Damn you… damn you… damn you!"
Do you take me for weak, just because I held back my wrath?!
I am Moonlight Moria!
He flung his arms to the ground, bellowing. A vast invisible force rippled outward, pulling furiously at everything around.
The shadows he had stolen—Law's among them—ripped free of the zombies they inhabited and streaked across the ground, converging at his feet, merging into his body.
His frame swelled monstrously. Power and aura surged until his form loomed even larger and more terrible than Oars.
Crocodile looked on, sneering.
"Fool. He thinks sheer size means victory? Yes, the Yonko, the Warlords, even the Admirals, many grow massive when their strength increases.
But size without control? Without the ability to command your own body? In front of Davy Jones, it's nothing but suicide."
Moria didn't care. Like a drowning man clinging to driftwood, he pressed his hands against his mouth to keep the shadows from spilling back out. Even when the numbers exceeded his capacity, tearing at him from the inside, he refused to release them.
"This is your answer, Moria?" Crocodile shook his head, removing his cigar and exhaling smoke.
"Losing your reason completely. That's nothing but despair."
BOOM!
A thunderous impact exploded from within Moria's stomach.
Though Moria couldn't even see it, Davy Jones had already struck, his fist smashing into him. One blow—and agony ripped through him, overwhelming all control.
The shadows burst from his mouth and body in a screaming torrent, fleeing.
His massive form shriveled like a punctured balloon, shrinking rapidly.
And in the next breath, Davy Jones appeared before him once more.
With a gesture, his black staff flew back into his hand, humming with power.
He raised it—and drove it straight into the stitches at Moria's neck, ripping open his old wound.
The staff speared through him. Blood poured freely.
Moria's bulging eyes froze in terror—then slowly softened. A strange calm settled over him, as though a nightmare twenty years long had at last ended tonight.
I have failed. A complete, irredeemable failure.
But at least… I can finally rest.
"Lord of the Deep Sea… if you devour me, then go to the New World. See for yourself the monsters swarming there.
Especially Kaido of the Beasts."
At the moment of death, Moria found at last a shred of dignity worthy of a Warlord.
He released all the shadows he had stolen, setting them free.
Ordinarily, if he had clung on stubbornly, even death would not have freed them. Shadows would remain trapped, only to be reclaimed through salt, seawater, or force.
But now—he wanted the Davy Jones Pirates to face Kaido. To clash, to bleed. So he let go.
Law's shadow, too, returned to its rightful master.
Davy Jones drew back his staff and let it sink once more into his body.
Crocodile, already sand, arrived first at the scene. He looked down at Moria's fallen form, surprised.
"You don't intend to take him as a prisoner as well?"
He remembered his own ordeal—captured twice, released twice, each time brutalized.
"He's not the same as you," Davy Jones said.
Crocodile raised a brow, half-expecting praise for his cunning or strength. But instead, the captain's words nearly made him choke on smoke.
"Moria's far too massive. Stuffing him onto the Terror Ghost would crowd the ship. And he's not like a sea beast I can chain beneath the hull. So I'm discarding him."
Crocodile's mouth hung open. He stood there speechless, puffing silently on his cigar, reevaluating life itself.
By now, Kuro and the others had arrived as well. Hearing their captain's words, they shivered at the implications.
A Warlord of the Sea—cast aside like garbage, simply because he was too big to fit on the ship?
If word of this reached the seas, the world would tremble. In Davy Jones's eyes, even the Shichibukai held no value.
Then Davy Jones finished his thought.
"Besides… I've already found a much more fitting prisoner. Her ability… is far too perfect for the Terror Ghost."
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