Countdown: 65 hours and 20 minutes.
Zou, the back of a giant elephant.
But the sight before them made everyone in the Revolutionary Army and the Mink Tribe's allied forces feel dizzy.
It's not physical dizziness, but rather a cognitive dissonance.
The giant elephant continued its slow gait, the Mink Tribe town on its back remained standing, and Mink Tribe residents could even be seen walking in the streets. But all the movements were repetitive:
--A rabbit furry friend jumped over the fence, and the next second it reappeared behind the fence, repeating the same jumping motion.
--A cat fur rag in the store was wiping the counter when it suddenly reset halfway through, returning to the initial action of picking up the rag.
Even the falling leaves suddenly disappeared in mid-air and then reappeared on the branches.
The entire Zou is like a film set to an infinite loop.
"Time loop..." Sabo removed his top hat, his brow furrowed. "And it's not ordinary time magic, it's 'time lock' at the rule level."
Duke Inuarashi's lion mane moved without wind, and his single eye burned with rage. "It's the third day. Every time the sun rises, everything resets. We've tried everything, but we can't escape the giant elephant's back, nor can we break the cycle."
The Cat Viper Shopkeeper lay on the roof, his tail slapping the tiles in frustration. "The worst part is that with each cycle, everyone forgets the memories of the previous cycle. Only Inuarashi and I, because we're the strongest, can retain some fragments... but even those fragments are gradually disappearing."
Koala examined the notebook in his hand. "According to your description, the cycle is exactly 24 hours. Each reset occurs at the instant the first rays of dawn appear. And the giant elephant's walking speed slows down by 0.1% after each cycle—meaning it is losing its vitality."
"Each cycle consumes one year of lifespan." Sabo looked down—through the town's floor, he could vaguely feel the giant elephant's heart beating slowly and heavily. "At this rate, after fifty more cycles, the giant elephant will die from exhaustion. And Zou will fall from a height of ten thousand meters."
The Mink Tribe warriors gripped their weapons tightly, but their eyes were filled with helplessness.
They are fearless in the face of a visible enemy.
But when confronted with these invisible shackles of rules, they didn't even know where the enemy was.
" The Forgetter, the Old Elephant Who Weaves Time..." Sabo repeated the information Robin had provided, "Its power is not to erase memories, but to make time itself 'forget and move forward,' trapped in an eternal cycle."
Just then, the clock tower in the center of town suddenly rang.
It wasn't the chiming of the hour, but a chaotic chiming—the hour, minute, and second hands spinning wildly, emitting a piercing metallic scraping sound.
As the bell rang, all the Mink Tribe residents who were repeating the same actions stopped at the same time, slowly turned their heads, and looked in the direction of the Allied forces.
Their eyes were vacant, and they wore the same stiff smiles as the Fish-Man Island.
"It's happening again." Inuarashi drew his sword. "Every time the clock tower malfunctions, they turn into this."
Thousands upon thousands of the Mink Tribe marched in orderly formation toward the Allied forces. There were no weapons, no shouts, only a chilling "calm."
Cat Viper leaped down from the roof. "I'll handle this one, Inuarashi, you conserve your energy."
"No," Sabo stopped him, "Let me try."
He stepped forward and, facing the surging tide of controlled residents, did not adopt a fighting stance, but instead raised his right hand.
It's not an attack, it's a demonstration.
A small flame mark appeared in his palm—the symbol of the Flame-Flame Fruit, but at the center of the flame was a wisp of platinum light.
That was a wisp of " Sparks Resonance " that Robin separated from the first fragment before leaving. Although faint, it contained the essence of Allen's Power of Balance.
The moment the flame mark appeared, all the advancing Mink Tribe residents stopped simultaneously.
For the first time, confusion appeared in their empty eyes.
"Do you know what this is?" Sabo's voice amplified through the flames, echoing throughout the town. "This is the flame of 'possibility'."
Time moves forward because every moment is full of infinite possibilities. The next second might bring rain, sunshine, a meeting with a loved one, or danger—it is these uncertainties that make time worth experiencing and memories worth cherishing.
But the time loop took it all away.
Every day is exactly the same, every choice is destined to repeat itself, and every encounter is just a replay.
What's the difference between this kind of 'eternity' and death?
The residents' expressions began to contort. Their "forgetting program" resisted these words, but the Sparks Resonance in Sabo's hand were awakening their repressed " Time Perception."
A young squirrel named Fur suddenly burst into tears. "I... I seem to have had the same dream... so many times..."
His mother hugged him, tears welling in her eyes. "I... I always dream of making you the same breakfast... and then I wake up, and I'm really making the same breakfast..."
A chain reaction began.
One by one, the Mink Tribe inhabitants began to awaken. They clutched their heads, painfully recalling—not the specific events, but the "sense of repetition," the "sense of stagnation."
The disordered chimes from the clock tower grew even sharper!
The clock at the top of the clock tower suddenly exploded! From inside the shattered clock, a giant hand made of gears and springs emerged.
Then comes the second hand.
Then, a massive body "squeezed" out from the clock tower.
It was a colossal elephant made entirely of metal machinery, but its eyes were two rotating gray star vortexes. On its back were not towns, but countless rotating gears and flowing Hourglass of Time.
The Forgetter, " the Old Elephant Who Weaves Time," reveals its true form.
It didn't roar, but simply raised its front hooves and gently stomped its foot.
Thump--
Invisible ripples spread out.
The eyes of all the newly awakened Mink Tribe residents became empty again. Even the memories of tears were forcibly erased.
The Sparks Resonance in Sabo's hand trembled violently, almost going out.
"Rules suppress..." Koala gritted her teeth, "Its authority is higher than ours!"
The mechanical giant raised its hoof again, this time aiming at Sabo.
But the instant it stepped down—
A golden ray of light descended from the sky!
In the light, a slender female figure slowly descended. She wore a simple kimono, her hair was styled in a classic updo, and she held an hourglass in her hands.
The sand in the hourglass is flowing upwards.
" Lady Toki!" Inuarashi and Cat Viper exclaimed simultaneously.
Kozuki Toki —or rather, Kozuki Toki's phantom—raised its head and looked at the mechanical behemoth:
"Long time no see, ' Warden of Time '."
The mechanical giant elephant stopped moving.
Gray Star's swirling eyes turned to the Lady Toki, making a grinding, gear-like sound:
[ Kozuki Toki... Time Stowaway... You should have vanished eight hundred years ago...]
"But I escaped," Lady Toki said calmly. "I stole a wisp of 'possibility' from the time cage you wove and invested it eight hundred years into the future."
[Foolish... The timeline is locked... Your struggle is pointless...]
"Is that so?" Lady Toki smiled slightly. "Then why am I standing here?"
She held up the hourglass in her hand:
"Because this hourglass isn't mine. It was sent to me by the ' Threshold Bearer ' through a time rift just before entering the Gate of the Void."
In the hourglass, platinum Sparks intertwine with dark purple Chaos.
For the first time, the mechanical behemoth displayed emotions—a fluctuation mixed with fear and anger:
[Impossible... The Threshold Bearer is fighting against its master... It's impossible for it to be distracted and interfere with this realm...]
"So the price he paid was the accelerated depletion of his existence." Lady Toki's voice turned low. "Each time he interfered with the timeline, his 'anchor time' within the Gate of the Void shortened by one year. This hourglass consumed at least ten years of his existence."
Sabo and the others gasped for breath.
Ten years... what does that mean for Allen, who is currently fighting against Ithaqua?
"But he still delivered it." Lady Toki looked at Sabo, "Because he trusted you. He believed you could take on the mission he couldn't complete himself."
She handed the hourglass to Sabo:
"This is the ' Seed of Time,' containing a small fragment of 'flowing time.' Planting it in the Heart Clock of the colossus will temporarily break the time loop, allowing you to enter the clock and obtain Balance Field Fragment."
"But only thirty minutes," Lady Toki emphasized. "After thirty minutes, the time loop will be re-established, and it will be even more powerful. If you cannot retrieve the fragment and leave within the time limit, you will be trapped in the loop forever, with no escape even in death."
Sabo took the hourglass; it was heavy, like holding the weight of the entire world's time.
" Lady Toki, and what about you?" Koala asked.
"Me?" Lady Toki looked at the mechanical behemoth, a relieved smile on her face. "I am stolen time, and it is only right that I return it."
Her body began to become transparent:
"Eight hundred years ago, the Kozuki Clan made a pact with the Weavers Civilization. In exchange for guarding the secrets of the ' Pillar of Time,' we gained the chance to survive in history."
"But we failed. The Reapers of Ithaqua destroyed the Pact, corrupted the Pillar of Time, and imprisoned the Zou Giant."
"Now is the time to fulfill our final promise."
She walked towards the mechanical behemoth, her body transforming into countless points of light, merging into the gears and springs.
The mechanical behemoth roared in agony! Its body began to disintegrate, and the gray vortex became unstable.
[ Kozuki Toki! How dare you use your last 'existence' to pollute my core!]
"It's not pollution," Lady Toki's voice came from inside the giant elephant, growing weaker and weaker, "It's 'awakening'."
"O colossus... have you forgotten who you are?"
"You are not the guardian of Ithaqua... you are the ' Time Recorder ' of the Weavers Civilization..."
"Your mission is not to Time Stasis... but to protect the flow of time..."
The roar of the mechanical behemoth turned into a whimper.
The gray star pattern began to fade, revealing the golden gear texture underneath.
It remembered.
Millions of years ago, the Weavers Civilization created it, making it carry the " Pillar of Time "—not the town itself, but the clock universe buried in its heart—to travel through the river of time, recording the rise and fall of every civilization.
But Ithaqua seized it, transformed it, and turned it into a prison of time.
"I'm sorry..." the mechanical behemoth—or rather, the Time Recorder —said in the rumble of rusty gears, "I forgot... for too long..."
Its body completely disintegrated, but not in destruction, but in liberation.
Countless gears and springs transformed into golden specks of light, merging into the body of the Zou giant elephant.
The giant elephant let out a long, resounding bellow that echoed through the sky.
In that cry, eight hundred years of weariness and pain were finally released.
"Now!" Sabo charged toward the town center. "To the heart of the giant!"
The group followed Sabo and rushed toward the spine of the Zou giant elephant—the legendary entrance to the " Heart Clock."
Along the way, the Mink Tribe residents made way for them. They hadn't fully recovered their memories, but their instincts told them that these people had come to save their home.
Deep within the spine, a massive stone door slowly opened.
Behind the door was not flesh and blood, but a universe made of clocks.
Countless gears of varying sizes floated and meshed in the air, springs wound like vines, and pendulums swung like stars. At the center of this space floated a giant heart—but that heart was transparent, revealing intricate mechanical structures inside, as well as a beam of light piercing through it.
Platinum-colored ordered energy and dark purple Chaos energy intertwine in a spiral, like the Pillar of Life of Fish-Man Island.
This is the " Pillar of Time ".
At the center of the beam of light, a second Balance Field Fragment floats.
" The Seed of Time can only last for thirty minutes." Sabo held up the hourglass. "We must—"
Before the words were even finished, the entire clock universe suddenly trembled violently!
Spacetime around the pillar of light began to distort, and countless time ghosts appeared.
Those were souls trapped in a time loop, unable to escape, and were transformed into guardians by Ithaqua. They have no physical form, but anything they touch will instantly age or rejuvenate.
"I'll clear the way!" Inuarashi transformed into his Sulong form, his silver-white fur shimmering in the clockwork universe. " Mink Tribe, protect our Revolutionary Army comrades!"
" Cat Viper is here to help too, meow!" Cat Viper also transformed into Sulong and charged towards the Time Ghost alongside Inuarashi.
The battle erupted in the Clock Universe.
The Time Ghost's attacks are unpredictable:
A ghost passed through the body of a Revolutionary Army, instantly transforming him from a young man into a white-haired old man, then back into an infant in the next second, before finally collapsing into the dust of time.
--Another ghost touched the gear, causing it to rust and break instantly, resulting in cracks in the spacetime structure of the entire area.
"We can't fight them head-on!" Koala shouted. "They are products of time; we can only fight them with time!"
Sabo looked at the hourglass in his hand.
The Sparks in the hourglass is slowly fading away.
He gritted his teeth and raised the hourglass high:
" Seed of Time, bloom!"
The hourglass shattered!
Platinum and dark purple light bloomed like flowers, forming a "normal time field" with a diameter of 100 meters. Within the field, the flow of time returned to normal, and time ghosts could not enter.
"Hurry! Only fifteen minutes left!" Sabo rushed towards the pillar of light.
But just as he was about to touch the beam of light—
Inside the pillar of light, a figure emerged.
That was Kozuki Oden.
Or rather, it is a lingering echo of Oden's timeline.
The afterimage wielded twin swords, his eyes swirling with gray starlight.
[The maintainer of the time loop... do not touch the Pillar of Time...]
" Oden..." Inuarashi and Cat Viper stopped at the same time, their eyes filled with pain.
This was their most respected lord, who had now become a puppet of the enemy.
" Oden is dead," Sabo said calmly. "This is just a corrupted memory. The real Oden would not allow Time Stasis."
[What do you know!] The afterimage roared, [Stagnation is eternity! Moving forward only brings pain! Look at Wano Country! Look at my family! If only time could stand still in moments of joy!]
"But that's not the truth!" Sabo roared. " Oden chose to open the country not to dwell in the past, but to move towards the future! Even if that future is full of hardships, even if he dies, he will pave the way for future generations!"
"This is the Kozuki Oden! This is the man Inuarashi and Cat Viper would follow to the death!"
The afterimage's body began to tremble.
Cracks appeared in the gray star-shaped vortex.
Oden's memories—his true memories—are fighting against Ithaqua's control:
He recalled his adventures with Whitebeard and Roger.
He recalled his determination to open the gates of Wano Country.
He recalled the exhilarating laughter he had felt while being boiled alive.
He recalled the trust he had placed in Nine Scabbards to give his future.
"Ah..." The afterimage clutched its head, collapsing to its knees in agony. "What... what am I doing..."
" Oden!" Inuarashi and Cat Viper rushed over, but were blocked by the Time Domain.
The afterimage raised its head, the star vortex shattered completely, revealing Oden's originally resolute gaze:
" Inuarashi... Cat Viper... it's you guys..."
"I'm sorry... I almost... became a prisoner of time..."
He looked at Sabo: "Young man... you're right... time must move forward... no matter how painful..."
So, take the fragment.
"Let time... start flowing again."
The afterimage reached into its own chest and dug out the Balance Field Fragment from its heart.
The moment the fragment left his body, the afterimage began to dissipate.
" Oden!" Inuarashi and Cat Viper cried, tears streaming down their faces.
"Don't cry." Oden revealed his familiar, hearty smile. "I'm just... a memory."
"The real me completed my own time twenty years ago."
"Now, it's your turn."
"Let Zou... let Wano Country... let this world..."
"Keep moving forward."
The afterimage completely vanished.
Sabo caught the falling debris.
The second Key is obtained.
At the same time, the entire clock universe began to collapse.
The light of the Pillar of Time became unstable, and countless Time Ghosts let out their final wails before turning into specks of light and disappearing.
"Run!" Koala shouted, "The Time Realm is collapsing!"
The group burst out of the Heart Clock and returned to the back of the giant elephant.
Behind him, the stone door closed, then the entire door merged into his spine and disappeared.
The Zou giant elephant let out a loud bellow, its steps regaining their strength. In the town on its back, all the Mink Tribe residents raised their heads at the same time, the emptiness in their eyes completely disappearing.
The time loop has been broken.
Inuarashi and Cat Viper knelt on the ground, bowing deeply to the sky—towards the direction Oden had vanished.
Sabo gripped the shard in his hand tightly and looked eastward—towards Wano Country:
"Three more stops..."
Countdown update: 59 hours and 10 minutes.
Time begins to flow again.
But the price was the eternal disappearance of a hero's lingering image.
And, Allen's accelerated consumption of "existence time".
And behind the Gate of the Void--
Amidst the flames interwoven with platinum and dark purple, Allen's figure became slightly more transparent than before.
He opened his eyes, looked in a certain direction, and whispered:
"Thank you... Oden..."