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The Seastone chain was locked tight around his neck.

The steel boat was moving at impossible speed. Kaido had no time, no leverage to break the chain.

He was being dragged through the ocean like a dog on a leash.

For a man who was one of the great emperors of the sea, a man who held the power of life and death over countless others, a man who had rampaged across the world as he pleased—the humiliation was unbearable.

"THUNDER EMPEROR! STOP THIS DAMN BOAT!" The rage burning in his chest was a furnace, a volcano on the verge of eruption. His face twisted, the veins on his neck bulging as he roared.

"Keep barking, dog," Arthur said, his voice a low, indifferent drawl. "When I find the Op-Op Fruit, I will come and put you down myself."

The grudge for Constance and the God's Guard could not be set aside. Yet for now, he could not break through Kaido's defenses. He had to suppress his desire to kill him and focus on the larger plan.

He stopped eating and lay back, sipping his wine, closing his eyes to rest.

Even if he had strength to spare after his ten-day battle, he still needed to recover. A man was not a perpetual motion machine.

"THUNDER EMPEROR! HAVE THE GUTS TO LET ME GO AND FIGHT ME ONE-ON-ONE!"

"ARE YOU AFRAID YOU WILL LOSE, YOU BASTARD?"

Kaido's furious roars echoed across the sea, yet they received no answer, swallowed by the endless waves.

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On the warship near Jaya, Kizaru and the other Vice Admirals frowned, trying to make sense of what they had just witnessed.

It was obvious to anyone with eyes that Arthur was helpless against the nigh-invincible Kaido, and that he despised the man. So why, when he could have simply escaped, had he chosen to take Kaido with him?

"Is he trying to keep him from being captured by us? Or is this some kind of scheme?" Kizaru mused, rubbing his chin. "After them. Now."

The five warships pushed their engines to the limit, racing after the steel boat.

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A week later.

The steel boat, still dragging Kaido, had passed Long Ring Long Land and Water 7 and was now approaching the great whirlpool that marked the location of Enies Lobby, Impel Down, and Marineford.

The Gates of Justice were in sight.

In the past few days, Arthur and Shiryu had made no attempt to hide their movements. Countless people had seen them—and the monstrous beast they were dragging behind them.

Their destination was clear. They were headed straight for Marine Headquarters.

The five warships following them had immediately relayed this information to Sengoku.

'Has the Thunder Emperor gone mad? Is he planning to personally deliver Kaido to us? Or is he so arrogant that he thinks he can attack Marineford with only one man at his side?'

It was not just Sengoku and the other Marines thinking this. Every intelligence agency in the world entertained the same thought.

A man like Arthur, when driven to madness, was capable of anything. The emperors of the New World were all fickle, unpredictable creatures.

Arthur was the most arrogant of them all. He had always faced his enemies alone. It was not entirely out of the question that he would try to take on Marineford by himself.

Besides, the grudge from three years ago still lingered. Garp's life-burning punch had cost him three years of his life. Now that he was healed, how could he not seek revenge?

Once again, the eyes of the world were on Arthur. The challenges of the Supernovas were forgotten. Everyone wanted to see how the Marines would respond.

There was no live broadcast this time, yet the news was spreading like wildfire, thanks to the tireless efforts of Big News Morgans.

With no clear understanding of Arthur's true intentions, he was fanning the flames, hyping him up as the first great pirate to ever dare invade Marineford itself.

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At this very moment, on the great plaza of Marineford.

Tens of thousands of Marines were assembled in perfect formation. Not just the common soldiers, but every officer who was not on a critical mission had been recalled.

Fleet Admiral Sengoku. Admirals Akainu and Aokiji. The near-retired Garp and Zephyr. Vice Admiral and Chief of Staff Tsuru, and the Admiral candidates, Momousagi and Chaton.

All of the Navy's greatest powers were gathered.

Kizaru was still on his way back from Water 7. The other Admiral candidate, Monkey D. Dragon, had been officially declared a traitor and had vanished without a trace.

Yet almost everyone who could be there was there.

Among the ranks of the officers, a woman with a longsword at her hip stood, her face a mixture of excitement, anticipation, and worry.

It was Jessica!!

It had been seven or eight years since they had last seen each other, since the day Arthur had first landed on Sabaody. After all this time, they were finally going to be reunited.

She kept her head lowered, two strands of golden hair falling over her eyes, hiding her expression from the other officers.

She was taller now, a full meter eighty, her golden hair tied back in a ponytail. Her Justice coat fluttered in the gentle breeze. She was a picture of confidence and heroic spirit.

The rank on her shoulder showed that in the years since they had parted, she had become a Marine Commander.

She could not stop Arthur from growing stronger. All she could do was become stronger herself, to try and catch up to him.

She would never forget. From the day she was born until the day she met him, she had always lived for others.

She had diligently learned the culinary arts passed down through her family, completed the tasks her parents had given her, all in preparation for a future of feeding the Marines. She had never been willful, had never complained. The education she had received had made it impossible for her to refuse.

She had grown up amidst the praise of the other chefs and the men she fed, a mixture of pride and numbness.

Perhaps one day, she would have become the head chef of Marine Headquarters, married a Marine officer, and lived out the rest of her life in quiet, unremarkable peace.

Before she met that lawless pirate, that was the meaning of her life. A pale, powerless existence, as if everything had already been decided.

She had never even thought to ask if there was another way to live.

Until that year, at the cooking competition in the Gourmet City. She had met a pirate who lived by his own rules, a man who belonged to the class she had been taught to despise.

He had thrown a judge for being hungry, had declared her the winner after a single bite, had given an old man a heart attack, and then, when she had refused his invitation, had abducted her in broad daylight.

His actions were tyrannical, done without asking her permission, as if it were his natural right.

She had spent days on that stolen ship, at first resentful, then slowly, something had changed. They had bickered, had gotten on each other's nerves. Yet then, the day before they reached Sabaody, he had told her of his dream—a life of thrill and excitement, a life lived without regret.

She had never met anyone like him. In those few short days, she had felt something she had never felt before. It was as if she were a bird freed from its cage. It was something she could never have found at Marineford.

It was freedom.

Today, when she had heard the news that he was coming to Marineford, she had rushed back from her mission, ready at a moment's notice to betray the Navy, even if it meant her own death.

Once you have tasted freedom, that unrestrained, uninhibited exhilaration of roaming the seas—not even death can put you back in a cage.

'Arthur...' Jessica thought, her hand clenching into a fist. She looked up at the sky, the sun glinting off her fair skin, a single strand of golden hair falling across her lips. 'I am strong enough now. I will not hold you back.'

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