"Yes! Lord Ronan!"

His tangled emotions held the sorrow of watching his home destroyed before his eyes, and the relief of finally setting down a boulder that had weighed on his heart for decades.

There was even... a trace of secret excitement he refused to acknowledge, now that his unreasonable mother had finally fallen.

Everything seemed to have unfolded within the future his Observation Haki had shown him, yet it had been far more devastating than he had expected.

"It's over..."

Katakuri slowly closed his eyes. His dry, hoarse voice fell like a heavy hammer on the heart of every Charlotte Family member present:

"BIG MOM... lost."

"That can't be true..."

"That invincible steel balloon, the BIG MOM who ruled over us like a god... was actually defeated?!"

Daifuku, Oven, Smoothie, and the other senior officers instantly erupted in cries of despair, fear, and disbelief.

Many of their weaker younger siblings lost all strength in their legs, collapsing to their knees on the Deserted Island Beach and sobbing uncontrollably.

The fall of one of the Four Emperors meant that Totto Land was now nothing but history.

Yet among the family members drowning in grief and panic, one man stood apart.

The Charlotte Family Eldest Son, Candy Minister Perospero.

He did not cry. There was not even the slightest hint of sorrow on his face.

Instead, his long tongue excitedly licked his cracked lips beneath his heavily made-up, pointed face.

A twisted mirth burned in his eyes, growing wildly like a poisonous vine.

To Perospero, the sunken island and his fallen mother did not represent destruction. They were the perfect stepping stone to escape a lifetime of fear and achieve a complete "rebirth."

As long as he clung tightly to the protection of the group before him—the "Straw Hat Pirates"—he could even see himself