The King's Judgment
The eyes of the entire world converged on the line of golden text on the Sky Screen. Billions of people held their breath.
[Subject of punishment: Imu, master of the Empty Throne]
[Reason for punishment: As the King of the World, Imu has remained hidden in the shadows for eight hundred years, manipulating the Five Elders and the World Government to impose totalitarian rule across the globe. Treating wars as experiments, nations as chess pieces, and human lives as data, Imu is the ultimate source of all injustice in this world.]
The reason for punishment hung in the sky, every word seemingly cast in molten iron.
The three thousand soldiers in Marine Plaza stared at the words. Many of their lips trembled, not from fear, but because they had suddenly discovered that such a thing stood behind the flag they had served all their lives.
Akainu stood in the shadows of the corridor, dark crimson flame marks flickering on both arms. The whispers of the dead echoed ceaselessly in his ears, but his eyes remained fixed on the Sky Screen.
"Imu."
He rolled the name around on his tongue.
"The true master of the World Government."
"So the justice I carried out was never my own."
"It was the will of that thing sitting in the shadows."
His Magma-Magma Fruit churned inside him, the heat so intense that even the corridor walls began to run with molten stone.
But he still didn't move an inch.
At some point, Kizaru had appeared at the other end of the corridor, his eyes half-lidded behind his sunglasses.
"Akainu, are you angry?"
"None of your business."
"You look pretty angry."
Kizaru's tone was as leisurely as ever.
"But that's only natural. Who knew you'd been someone's dog for decades, and your master wasn't even who you thought it was?"
Akainu whipped his head around, the heat of his magma distorting the air between them.
Kizaru raised both hands in surrender.
"Just kidding. Don't take it so seriously."
With that, he turned and walked away, his steps light, as though he were treading on rays of light.
But after he left, his ever-present, carefree expression vanished for an instant.
Just an instant.
Then it returned.
The punishments began to appear on the Sky Screen.
[Punishment one: The existence of the Empty Throne and Imu's identity shall be forcibly disclosed. From this day forward, they shall no longer be secrets. Every person in the world shall know that the World Government's supreme ruler is an individual named Imu.]
[This punishment has already been carried out automatically.]
This was an official stamp on what had already happened. From this moment on, Imu's name was etched into the minds of billions around the world, never to be erased.
[Punishment two: The Tyrant's Shadow mark shall be applied. From this judgment onward, any order issued by the World Government in Imu's name shall automatically carry this mark as it is transmitted, ensuring that all recipients know its true source is Imu, not the Five Elders or the Marines.]
At this, the faces of the Five Elders in the Holy Land Mary Geoise all changed.
"It's cutting off our chain of command."
The blond Elder's voice changed.
"From now on, when we pass on Lord Imu's orders, everyone will know they came from Imu."
"In other words, we can no longer issue orders in the name of the Five Elders or the World Government."
"Every order will expose Lord Imu's existence."
The Elder with the long sword gripped the First Generation Kitetsu so tightly that his hand had turned white.
"This is worse than killing us."
"It's shattering the entire power structure we've built over eight hundred years."
The bald Elder sat in his chair, fingers interlaced on his knees, watching the golden light filtering through a gap in the curtains.
"Calm down."
His voice was the steadiest of the five.
"It only attaches a mark to the orders. It doesn't render them invalid."
"As long as the people receiving the orders still choose to carry them out, our power remains."
"The question is, will they still carry them out?"
The Elder with curly hair voiced the sharpest question of all.
"The Marines know Imu exists now. They know the orders they've been following came from a tyrant who has hidden for eight hundred years."
"Will they still obey willingly?"
The five fell silent.
They all knew the answer.
No.
At the very least, they would no longer obey as unreservedly as before.
The third punishment appeared on the Sky Screen.
[Punishment three: As compensation to the D. Clan, the system shall gradually disclose the history between Imu and the D. Clan in future question-and-answer sessions, including but not limited to the true meaning of the title "Natural Enemy of God."]
[This punishment is a delayed-execution type and shall be revealed gradually in subsequent question-and-answer sessions.]
The D. Clan.
The Natural Enemy of God.
When those two terms appeared, everyone in the world with D. in their name felt something pulse deep in their blood.
In a cell deep within Impel Down, the Undying Flame Seed in Ace's chest flickered.
In the Sabaody Archipelago, Luffy unconsciously clenched his fists.
At the Revolutionary Army Headquarters, Dragon's pupils contracted slightly.
On an unknown island in the New World, Trafalgar D. Water Law looked up from his operating table, stared at the words on the Sky Screen, and adjusted the brim of his hat.
"The D. Clan is the Natural Enemy of God."
"I've heard that since I was a child."
"But no one ever told me who the god in that saying was."
He looked down at the patient on the operating table, the corners of his mouth curving ever so slightly.
"Now I know."
"God is Imu."
"And we of the D. Clan are his natural enemies."
All three punishments on the Sky Screen had been announced. Three pillars of light in different colors descended from the sky: the first fell toward the Holy Land Mary Geoise, the second broke into countless tiny points of light that seeped into the World Government's communications network, and the third became a dark golden nebula hovering above the Sky Screen, like a time bomb waiting to go off at some future moment.
The world watched the three pillars of light descend and erupted in a sound too complex to classify.
Some people cheered.
Some wept.
Some smashed things in anger.
Some knelt on the ground and kowtowed to the Sky Screen.
The most extreme reaction came from the Celestial Dragons' enclave.
In the Celestial Dragons' district of the Holy Land Mary Geoise, the World Nobles who were usually so arrogant had all retreated into their palaces, their curtains drawn tight and their servants kneeling all over the floor.
"Who is this Imu? How come I've never heard of him?"
Saint Charlos huddled in the corner of his sofa, clutching his bear gun, the air wheezing inside his bubble helmet.
"The Five Elders are the highest, aren't they? How can there be someone above them?"
"I'm a Celestial Dragon, a descendant of the world's creators! How can anyone be above us?"
His servants knelt on the floor, not daring to say a word.
For the images on the Sky Screen had made everything perfectly clear: the Celestial Dragons were a flock of sheep being tended, the Five Elders were sheepdogs, and Imu was the shepherd.
There had never been any equal rule shared by the descendants of the world's creators.
From beginning to end, there had only been one king.
Lin Qi watched the data on the Sky Screen showing reactions around the world after the three pillars of light descended, and his mouth spread into a grin.
"Yes, that feels so good."
He slapped the table, nearly sending his beer can jumping.
"Dragging Imu out into the open has to be the biggest climax in the whole game."
"Look at that global shock value. It's gone right off the charts. The Akainu and Five Elders rounds combined didn't even come close."
He excitedly swiped through the data panels on the screen, like an overworked office drone who had just finished his biggest project of the year.
"All right, the Ten Great War Criminals countdown is complete. From Teach at number ten to Imu at number one, they're all done."
He leaned back in his chair and stretched at length.
"Time for a summary and the final rewards, right?"
A new system notification appeared on the screen.
[The Ten Great War Criminals countdown is complete. The system is calculating the overall impact and rewards.]
[Please wait, question master.]
Lin Qi waited a few seconds as the progress bar on the screen reached one hundred percent.
Then a passage of text he hadn't expected appeared.
[Overall impact assessment complete.]
[Because the magnitude of the changes to the world order caused by this countdown exceeded the expected value by 370 percent, the system has detected irreversible deviations in several key timelines.]
[Largest deviation: the Paramount War—the course of the war in the original timeline has been completely rewritten. The Paramount War on the current world line will unfold in an entirely different manner.]
Lin Qi blinked at the text.
"Timeline deviation?"
"What does that mean?"
"This game has a timeline system too?"
He scrolled down and saw further details.
[System recommendation: Before the Paramount War officially begins, the question master may use a new question-and-answer series to further empower key participants with information or weaken them, ensuring that the deviated timeline does not lead to an uncontrollable, chaotic outcome.]
[Recommended new series: Countdown of the Ten Great Regrets of the Paramount War.]
Lin Qi stared at the last line for three seconds.
"Ten Great Regrets?"
His eyes lit up.
The golden text on the Sky Screen slowly faded in the aftermath of the war criminals countdown. But just as everyone thought today's broadcast was finally coming to an end, a new line began to take shape on the Sky Screen.
[The Ten Great War Criminals countdown is complete.]
[New series preview.]
The breath the whole world had just released caught in its throat again.
[Next series: Countdown of the Ten Great Regrets of the Paramount War.]
[The first regret will be revealed shortly.]
[Hint: This regret concerns a soul that could have been saved, and a bond of brotherhood swallowed by the sea.]