Operation Descent

[The protagonist and all female characters are adults.]

After Babylon successfully landed on the moon and acquired the legacy of Lunar Technology, the entire Sky Island embarked on a sweeping drive toward mechanization.

"Production has stalled-"

Major matters called for small meetings, while minor matters called for large ones. Sephiroth said this in the reception room inside the Temple. The only participants seated around the round marble table were Isabella, Lilith, and the Three Pillars, with Laki and Conis as the only attendants.

Given his standing as the High God and Babylon's geographical location, this reception room served much the same purpose as a conference room.

"Your Majesty, our supplies of every metal except gold have nearly run out. What remains is our emergency reserve..."

Governor Gan Fall helplessly stroked his goatee. In an environment like Sky Island's, metals were almost entirely imported. Although cloud iron offered a substitute with the structural strength of steel... that did not mean it possessed steel's physical properties, let alone its chemical properties.

Under Sephiroth's guidance, Babylon's senior officials had gradually learned to approach problems scientifically.

"High God, perhaps it is time to expand outward."

As Birka's religious leader, Pontiff Nefas Ur supported Sephiroth's every action unconditionally, all the more so since his granddaughter had married the god.

He had originally considered having the god marry into their family and take the surname Nefas. Fortunately, Sephiroth had become a god before that could happen. Otherwise, Ur would have had no idea how to handle such a monumental blunder.

Speaking of surnames, Sephiroth had never particularly cared about having one. But considering that he would eventually descend to the Blue Sea and deal with others, he wanted to avoid any unnecessary condescension.

So he provisionally added a surname-Lucifer Sephiroth.

Although names in the pirate world looked Western, they still placed the surname before the given name.

"Your Majesty, we Shandia are willing to serve as the vanguard."

Setka, the Shandia elder, hurried to declare his support.

Among the Three Pillars, he accepted that he could not compete with Ur, but he still frequently hoped to prove himself. At the very least, he could not lose to Gan Fall. Thanks to the various pieces of evidence brought back from the moon, the Shandia still felt somewhat awkward about it, but the prevailing view now largely accepted that they were all one family.

"Sephi, could we consider suspending production of the Mechanical Servants first?"

Unlike the Three Pillars, who spoke cautiously, Lilith went straight to the heart of the problem. Even phrased tactfully to spare the High God's dignity, such advice was something they would never dare offer.

"Indeed. Halt production for now. I'll arrange for someone to revise the allocation plan based on our current numbers..."

The so-called Mechanical Servants did not refer to the batch of autonomous robots brought back from the moon. The situation... was a little complicated.

Those lunar robots stood around 1.3 meters tall, with bodies only two heads high and little wings resembling those of the Skypieans. They looked like round-headed toy soldiers. Powered by electricity, they could handle most kinds of work.

Since Sephiroth possessed the Rumble-Rumble Fruit's powers, the robot soldiers, previously dormant in a deathlike state, had awakened. Naturally, they acknowledged Sephiroth as their master.

Some testing revealed that their intelligence was roughly equivalent to that of a ten-year-old human. Their personalities were harder to describe...

Gentle, resilient, loyal, and possessed of certain moral standards... in the pirate world, they were practically soldiers who belonged only in children's books.

Sephiroth had originally intended to follow Heavenly Yaksha Doflamingo's example and exploit these robots.

Under Doflamingo's rule, Dressrosa was prosperous, and its citizens enjoyed a high level of happiness. In reality, that had only been achieved by enslaving the Tontatta and the toy people.

Call it hypocrisy or whatever else, but he discovered that these mechanical soldiers did not merely look like something out of a fairy tale-their personalities were just as innocent. How was he supposed to go through with it now...? Psychologically, he could not quite get past that.

He simply made these fairy-tale robot soldiers companions to the Skypieans instead. Each household could voluntarily take one in, and abuse was forbidden, punishable by imprisonment depending on the circumstances.

Robots that no one took in were assigned to various service positions or given support roles in administrative offices.

Their official designation became-Servo Angels.

As for the issue of "manual labor," another solution had to be found.

Fortunately, after deciphering the Lunar Capital's technological legacy, Sephiroth combined it with his own knowledge and used the Rumble-Rumble Fruit to create a type of emotionless artificial stupidity.

This series of robots resembled the Ancient Gear deck from Yu-Gi-Oh! on Blue Star in his previous life.

Their official designation became-Mechanical Servants.

At last, the Skypieans had been freed from physical labor. All they had to do was direct the Mechanical Servants.

Listening to everyone discuss their various duties, Isabella, who had been allowed to sit in, could no longer hold herself back.

"Hmm, Sephi... could you let me do something too...?"

At the time, they were discussing plans to relocate part of the population, primarily from Birka, to the moon as part of the Moon Project, along with the construction of mass-produced spacecraft for travel between the two.

"No, Bella."

Lilith smiled at her close friend and gently poked Bella's puffed-up cheek.

"Ugh... hmm... I have had enough of being on standby! I am the regent, you know! This is workplace bullying-"

Muttering, Isabella slumped over the table, her eyes narrowed as she stared resentfully at everyone present. As regent, she had recently even started wearing epaulets bearing the word "Regent" to protest being "excluded."

Where had she learned that phrase now?

Even Isabella's grandfather merely twitched at the corners of his mouth. Faced with such a dangerous subject, the other two members of the Three Pillars lowered their heads and pretended not to see anything.

"Hey... Bella."

Sephiroth approached Isabella step by step, backing her into a corner of the sofa.

-Then he gently poked her...

"-Eek!"

It elicited a rather adorable sound from her.

"Look at the state you're in. You're already five months along. What else are you planning to do-?"

-Letting you sit in was enough, and now you actually dared to ask for work!

"Never mind... I'll leave the rest to you..."

"Ugh... mmm... let go of me-"

The remaining participants watched as the High God ignored Isabella's little fists and carried her away.

-That night.

After coaxing Isabella to sleep.

Sephiroth went over to Lilith's room.

"Have you changed your mind?"

Upon hearing Sephiroth's question.

Lilith, who had just been keeping her eyes tightly shut, secretly peeked at him and playfully stuck out her tongue.

"Can't I?"

...Lilith had originally said she had no plans for that just yet.

There had been no particular rush. The issue was that this also carried certain religious implications.

So the two had agreed to let nature take its course, leaving things to chance without deliberately taking precautions.

Lilith had originally not wanted a child just yet, either. But seeing Bella's situation had stirred a certain competitive streak in her.

"Hmm..."

After seeing the expectation sparkling in the young woman's ruby-like eyes.

Amid Lilith's playful struggling, Sephiroth.

Playfully rolled her up into the shape of a spring roll.

"If you genuinely want one, I certainly won't object. But if this is just an impulse, I'd advise you to think it over again."

Once everything had been tidied up, the room finally fell completely quiet.

-February, Sea Calendar Year 1515.

Jaya Island... this island, shaped like a skull missing a corner, held a rather peculiar position in the first half of the Grand Line, even without considering the legend of the Golden Country—that joke about a great liar known throughout the Four Seas.

Geographically, Water 7 was the last major island before entering the triangular Gate of Justice region formed by Marine Headquarters at Marineford, Enies Lobby, and the great prison of Impel Down.

And Jaya Island was the nearest major island to Water 7.

Furthermore, neither Jaya Island's natural resources nor its specialty products warranted much attention from the World Government, and there were no other nations nearby.

All these factors had gradually turned Jaya Island into a lawless pirate haven, as well as a transit hub for the illicit businesses of certain New World powers.

Some pirates also called Jaya Island "Turnback Island," because sailing any farther along the route meant entering the waters with the greatest concentration of Marine forces: the three major institutions, plus the holy land of Mary Geoise.

The pirates gathered on Jaya Island therefore fell into two broad categories. One was resting and building up strength, preparing to break through the Marine blockade. The other consisted of failures or quitters, content with the status quo and settled there for the long term.

To pirates from the New World, the first half of the Grand Line was known as Paradise, and Jaya Island was essentially a place that sold mindless gratification.

For ordinary people, however, Jaya Island was notorious, especially its best-known port town, Mock Town. The wealthiest town on Jaya Island, it primarily catered to pirates and had highly developed gray-market and criminal industries.

This was a gathering place for crime, a paradise for villains. There was no order here, no law. Only Beli and fists commanded respect.

Mock Town's harbor-

The sky was clear and the sea breeze pleasant, no different from usual. But today was destined to be anything but an ordinary day in Mock Town.

"Huh? What's that-?!"

A dockworker standing on the pier waiting for a job watched a cluster of black specks on the horizon grow steadily larger and could not help asking.

"Did you drink too much...? Isn't that just a flock of birds?"

"No, that's not right."

The dockworker who had first noticed something amiss finally made out the "cluster" descending from the sky, and terror made him stammer.

"Th-those are-ships-!"

"What?!"

"No way!"

"Could it be the Golden Lion-?!"

The pier fell into chaos. A few experienced old pirates felt that it did not look like the Flying Pirates.

As the ships drew closer, their telescopes revealed that the strange vessels flew no pirate flags. In their place was a hollow cross formed by an arrangement of four slender red diamonds.

Indeed, ordinary pirates of the Blue Sea had never seen anything in this style.

The warship was almost entirely metal, with a very rugged design. Coils crackling with electricity and pipes churning with steam covered it.

This was the Splendid Ash, an atmospheric airship based on the Ark Maxim and remodeled in a steampunk style. It sacrificed spaceflight capabilities to vastly enhance its combat performance within the atmosphere.

As the pirates stared in stunned disbelief, the massive steampunk warship opened fire.

The attack took a form they had never seen before. Several dazzling orange-red flashes streaked out, and only after numerous pirate ships in the harbor had been blasted in half and sunk did the deafening roar of the air being torn apart reach their ears.

As though announcing its arrival, the eerie howl of a great steam whistle rang out from high above, echoing throughout Mock Town.