The morning sun broke across the upper atmosphere at ten thousand meters above sea level, casting a brilliant, blinding halo of gold over the newly expanded borders of Merveille.
What had once been an isolated floating archipelago was now a vast, unified airborne continent.
Through the overwhelming gravitational manipulation of the Fuwa Fuwa no Mi, Arthur Pendragon had grafted the ancient jungles of Upper Yard and the pristine cloud-streets of Angel Island directly beneath Merveille’s central bedrock.
The sacred soil of Vearth, fought over for four centuries in endless cycles of bloodshed, now rested peacefully under the shadow of the imperial citadel.
Standing atop the highest belfry of the ruined city of Shandora, Arthur looked out over his domain.
He remained in his human form, his tall, broad-shouldered frame draped in a high-collared black mantle trimmed with crimson.
The twin O Wazamono blades, Oto and Kogarashi, rested securely at his waist.
Yet, his presence had fundamentally shifted.
Before consuming the Goro Goro no Mi, Arthur’s aura had been that of an immovable mountain—a crushing, gravitational weight combined with the scorching, primordial heat of the Imperial Pendragon.
Now, there was a relentless, microscopic vibration humming through his very cells.
He could feel the electromagnetic pulse of the planet.
He could hear the faint static of the atmosphere leagues away.
His nervous system, fundamentally rewritten by the Logia core, transmitted signals with a speed that ordinary biology could never approach.
When he extended his Observation Haki, he no longer merely sensed the intent and presence of living things; he perceived their bio-electric signatures.
He could track the heartbeat of a Skypiean child waking up in Angel Island, the steady pulse of the giant python coiled deep in the jungle, and the shifting magnetic currents of the cloud sea itself.
His three Devil Fruit cores—the Mythical Zoan, the Paramecia, and the Logia—had begun to resonate.
The sheer biological strain of housing three Devil Fruits would have obliterated an ordinary human body.
But the Imperial Pendragon’s near-awakened physiology acted as an indestructible biological vessel, anchoring the continental gravity of the Fuwa Fuwa and the boundless plasma of the Goro Goro into a stable, terrifying singularity.
A soft rustle of movement broke his concentration.
Arthur turned slightly as three figures approached the base of the Golden Bell.
Gan Fall, the former God of Skypiea, walked with a heavy but respectful gait, leaning upon his lance.
Beside him was Wyper, the fiercely proud warrior of Shandora, his torso bound in thick medical bandages, his tribal tattoos stark against his skin.
Following them was Makino, carrying a leather-bound ledger, her composed and gentle demeanor entirely unfazed by the warriors flanking her.
Gan Fall and Wyper stopped ten paces from Arthur.
Without a word of hesitation, the veteran knight and the hardened berserker dropped to a single knee, bowing their heads in absolute submission.
“Rise,” Arthur commanded, his voice carrying a subtle baritone resonance that seemed to vibrate from the very air.
They stood, keeping their eyes respectfully lowered.
Wyper, a man whose entire existence had been defined by a four-hundred-year grudge, looked upon Arthur not with defiance, but with profound, absolute reverence.
He had seen this man take the form of a sixty-meter crimson dragon, obliterate the tyrant Enel with contemptuous ease, and ring the Golden Bell of his ancestors.
“The integration of the civilian populace proceeds smoothly, My Sovereign,” Gan Fall reported, his voice steady.
“The people of Angel Island and the Shandians have ceased all hostilities.
The sheer scale of your floating realm has provided more than enough fertile Vearth for both our peoples to cultivate in perpetuity.
For the first time in four centuries, there is peace in the sky.”
“Peace is not a static condition, Gan Fall,” Arthur replied, walking slowly down the ancient stone steps toward them.
“It is a structure that must be maintained by overwhelming force and unyielding law.
Skypiea and Shandora are no longer isolated tribes warring over dirt.
You are citizens of Merveille.
And Merveille will soon cast its shadow across the entire world.”
Arthur stopped before Wyper, his piercing gaze locking onto the Shandian warrior.
“Wyper,” Arthur said.
“You fought with a Reject Dial, sacrificing your own bones and lifespan for the sake of your ancestors.
You possess rare, suicidal courage.
But courage without absolute strength is merely a delayed execution.”
Wyper clenched his fists, his jaw set hard.
“I know this now, Lord Arthur.
My strength was nothing before Enel.
And it is less than dust before you.
But my life belongs to the man who rang the Bell of Shandora.
Command me.”
“I am establishing the Vanguard of the Heavens,” Arthur declared, his voice ringing with imperial authority.
“A disciplined, elite military division composed of the finest warriors from both the Shandian tribes and the Skypiean guards.
You will no longer fight with scavenged weapons in the mud.
You will be armed, trained, and forged into a force capable of descending upon the Grand Line and shattering Marine fleets.”
Arthur gestured toward the horizon.
“Wyper.
I appoint you Commander of the Vanguard.
You will select five hundred of your most capable fighters to form its first division.
Kamakiri, Braham, Genbo, and Laki will serve as your lieutenants.
You will train them not to die for a cause, but to conquer for one.”
Wyper slammed his fist across his chest in a fierce salute.
“It will be done, My Sovereign!
We will become your spear!”
“Gan Fall,” Arthur continued, turning to the elder.
“You shall serve alongside Makino as Prime Minister of Domestic Affairs for the Skypiean and Shandian districts.
You know their customs, their agriculture, and their needs.
See that they are fed, housed, and integrated into Merveille’s infrastructure.”
“It is the greatest honor of my twilight years, Sovereign,” Gan Fall bowed deeply.
Arthur turned to Makino, who offered a warm, professional smile.
“Makino.
How proceeds the inventory of the divine treasury?”
“Beyond our highest projections, Arthur,” Makino replied, opening her ledger.
“The ruins of Shandora contain architectural gold reserves that dwarf the treasuries of most sovereign nations in the Blue Sea.
Furthermore, Buggy has located Enel’s primary shipyard on the far side of the island.
He is currently inspecting the vessel known as the Ark Maxim.”
Arthur’s eyes narrowed with cold calculation.
“Take me to him.”
The Ark Maxim was a monument to Enel’s megalomania.
Moored within a cavernous drydock carved into the clouds, the flying vessel was a colossal contraption of solid gold, ancient Skypiean gears, and massive jet dials.
When Arthur arrived, he found Buggy the Clown hovering in mid-air in several segmented pieces, his hands rubbing together frantically as his disembodied head stared at the mountain of precious metal.
“Captain!
Boss!
Your Majesty!” Buggy yelled, zooming toward Arthur with tears of pure greed streaming down his painted face.
“Do you have any idea what this is?!
It’s gold!
All of it!
The gears, the hull, the conductors!
There must be tens of billions of Berries worth of refined gold sitting right here!
We could buy an entire sea!”
“Calm your greed, Buggy,” Arthur said smoothly, stepping onto the massive golden deck.
His boots echoed sharply against the metal.
“The gold is merely a conductive medium.
Enel’s vision was fundamentally narrow.
He possessed the ultimate energy source, yet he squandered it to power a single, fragile ship.”
Arthur placed his bare hand against the central mast.
Instantly, his Observation Haki and electromagnetic perception flooded the ship’s circuitry.
He felt the network of gold wires, the Jet Dials used for propulsion, and the chemical vats intended to generate thunderclouds.
“We are not going to use this ship, Buggy,” Arthur declared.
Buggy’s floating head gasped.
“W-We’re not?!
But Captain, it flies!”
“Merveille already flies,” Arthur stated, turning his gaze toward the vast expanse of his floating continent.
“Through the Fuwa Fuwa no Mi, I carry the earth.
But this gold is the perfect electrical conductor.
We are going to dismantle the Ark Maxim.
Melt down its hull and extract every circuit.”
Arthur raised his right hand, and a brilliant arc of blue plasma crackled across his knuckles.
“We will forge a massive, subterranean conductive grid woven through the bedrock of Merveille and Skypiea.
By routing my plasma into that grid, we establish an electromagnetic current that blankets the entire realm.
It will serve as an impenetrable defense matrix, a colossal power source for our cities, and a weaponized electromagnetic artillery grid capable of launching massive projectiles at speeds no conventional cannon could match.”
Buggy stared at the blue spark, his jaw dropping in sheer awe.
“Y-You want to wire an entire continent…”
“I want you to develop enhanced Muggy Balls that incorporate Dial technology—Impact Dials for stored kinetic force, Breath Dials for propulsion, and Reject Dials for controlled high-output strikes,” Arthur commanded.
“You have the greatest workshop in the world at your disposal, Buggy.
Do not disappoint me.”
Buggy snapped a sharp salute.
“A-Aye, Captain!
I’ll get the engineers on it immediately!”
Leaving the clown to his blueprints, Arthur descended from the drydock and walked toward the deepest sector of the Shandorian ruins: the Great Belfry.
Beneath the colossal Golden Bell, resting in solemn silence, stood an indestructible block of dark blue stone.
The Poneglyph.
Arthur ran his hand over the chiseled, blocky script.
He could not read the ancient language of the Void Century, but his intellect and foreknowledge allowed him to understand exactly what this stone represented.
It contained the historical location of the Ancient Weapon, Poseidon.
Beside the stone, carved into the golden belfry, was the inscription left by the Roger Pirates: I have come here and will lead this passage to the farthest ends of the world.
A faint, respectful smile touched Arthur’s lips.
Roger had left breadcrumbs for the future, but Arthur was not interested in fulfilling ancient prophecies.
He sought absolute sovereignty.
To achieve that, Ancient Weapons were required not as ideological symbols, but as geopolitical deterrents.
Poseidon sleeps in Fish-Man Island, Arthur thought.
Pluton lies beneath Wano.
Uranus remains the great unknown.
“I cannot read you yet,” Arthur murmured to the stone.
“But the woman capable of reading it is currently operating in Alabasta.
Nico Robin.”
With a subtle flex of his will, the Fuwa Fuwa no Mi engaged.
The air around the massive Poneglyph shimmered with gravitational distortion.
Slowly, the indestructible relic lifted from its ancient pedestal.
Deep beneath Merveille, a sealed chamber of reinforced volcanic stone was prepared to house the relic, ensuring it remained completely hidden from the prying eyes of the World Government.
Arthur levitated the Poneglyph through the air, securing it safely within the vault.
Arthur had no intention of lingering in the upper atmosphere while the world turned below.
It had taken Merveille one week to ascend from the waters outside the Baratie into the White-White Sea.
Forty-eight hours was all he permitted for the initial reorganization of the realm.
During the first twenty-four hours, the structural foundation was established.
Through the Fuwa Fuwa no Mi, the territorial configuration was locked into a majestic, tiered hierarchy.
At the absolute top-center apex stood Merveille—its dark volcanic peaks, pine forests, and stone fortresses reigning supreme like an imperial crown.
Anchored directly beneath and around its central mass in an interlocking, stepped formation were the annexed territories of Upper Yard, Shandora, and Angel Island.
Under Arthur’s direct oversight, the Ark Maxim was stripped clean.
Vast tons of gold were melted down and drawn into thick conduits woven through the bedrock, linking Merveille and Skypiea into a single, cohesive electromagnetic fortress.
The work was crude by Blue Sea engineering standards, but Enel’s existing designs provided the necessary foundation.
In the lower plazas, Kaya established emergency field clinics, utilizing Upper Yard’s medicinal flora to treat the wounded and laying the groundwork for the Round Table Medical Academy.
On the second day, Arthur took to the highest volcanic peak of Merveille to stabilize his newly acquired power.
He did not possess years to slowly nurture the Goro Goro no Mi.
With his Observation Haki pushed to its limits and his near-awakened Imperial Pendragon physiology acting as a near-indestructible vessel for the lightning coursing through his body, Arthur subjected his body to rapid, forced adaptation.
Over twenty-four intensive hours of isolation, lightning struck his flesh thousands of times.
He repeatedly subjected his body to electrical discharges reaching tens of millions of volts, learning to weave azure plasma along his crimson scales and synchronize his electromagnetic Mantra with his Future Sight.
By dusk of the second day, Arthur had achieved a stable foundation in the Goro Goro no Mi—enough to weaponize his accelerated reflexes, plasma armor, and concentrated lightning strikes.
At the dawn of the third day, the Great Hall of Merveille gathered for war.
Carved from dark volcanic stone and accented with seamless veins of Shandorian gold, the throne room was vast, cold, and imposing.
Black banners bearing the crimson dragon emblem hung between towering obsidian pillars.
Arthur sat upon the high throne, his chin resting on his knuckles, his expression calm and absolute.
Before the dais, the Inner Circle stood assembled.
Buggy hovered in mid-air in his segmented form, projecting a glowing three-dimensional map of the Grand Line through a cluster of Light Dials.
Wyper stood at rigid attention in his black Vanguard uniform, his heavy bazooka strapped to his back.
Outside the courtyard, the first five hundred elite aerial troopers stood in disciplined formation.
Beside the throne, Makino, Kaya, and Gan Fall held the finalized administrative ledgers.
“The initial integration is complete, Captain,” Buggy reported, his voice echoing off the vaulted ceiling.
“Two days of non-stop work, and the entire continent is locked tight.
The gold grid through the bedrock is holding, the artillery batteries are reinforced with Breath Dials, and the civilian sectors have accepted the new laws.
We are completely flight-ready.”
“Then our brief stay in the sky is finished,” Arthur said, rising from the throne.
His crimson-lined mantle swept behind him as he descended the marble steps toward the illuminated map.
“The Marines have classified me as ‘The Sky Sovereign’—an unidentified anomaly without a name, a crew, or a fixed base,” Arthur spoke smoothly.
“We will leave them to their blind investigations.
While Sengoku scrambles his scouts across the blue seas, we will take what we need from the Grand Line.”
Arthur extended a gloved finger, pressing against the illuminated coordinates of an isolated, prehistoric island situated along the first leg of the Paradise route.
“This is our immediate destination,” Arthur commanded.
“Little Garden.”
Buggy leaned in, his eyes widening as he recognized the data stripped from Enel’s navigational archives.
“Little Garden?!
Boss, that island is trapped millions of years in the past!
The magnetic field takes a whole year to set, and the jungle is infested with colossal dinosaurs and ancient apex predators!”
“Precisely,” Arthur replied, a cold, calculating smirk touching his lips.
“Little Garden holds a pristine reservoir of prehistoric beasts.
We will capture and introduce those ancient predators into the lower forest reserves of Merveille.
It will enrich our ecosystem and serve as a lethal training ground for the Vanguard.”
Arthur shifted his gaze toward Wyper.
“Furthermore, the island is the dueling arena of two living relics of an older age.
The dual captains of the Giant Warrior Pirates who once terrorized the world: Dorry the Blue Ogre and Brogy the Red Ogre.”
Wyper’s sharp eyes narrowed, his hand tightening on the grip of his weapon.
“Giants…
If even half the tales of Elbaf are true, five hundred men may not be enough.”
Arthur looked down at him, his gaze unyielding.
“They will be.”
Arthur turned from the map and raised his hand.
BOOOOM!
A deep, tectonic vibration surged through the bedrock of the entire continent.
At the top-center apex, Merveille surged with boundless gravitational power as the Fuwa Fuwa no Mi seized the enormous landmass.
Blue arcs of plasma danced through the subterranean golden grid, and slowly, impossibly, the unified continent rose into the heavens.
Anchored beneath Merveille, Upper Yard, Shandora, and Angel Island held their rigid aerodynamic formation.
Thick, artificial clouds surged from the lower vents, wrapping the flying continent in a dense veil of artificial thunderclouds that rendered the floating realm nearly invisible from below.
“Set the heading,” Arthur ordered, his voice carrying through the communication dials across every district of the realm.
“Lower altitude to four thousand meters.
Maintain full cloud-cloaking.
We march for Little Garden.”
With a silent, terrifying grace, the massive aerial continent began its advance through the high skies of the Grand Line, descending toward the prehistoric island below.
[Status Panel]
Name: Arthur Pendragon
Age: 20 (Year 1520)
Height: 2.00m (Human Form) / 6m (Hybrid Form) / 60m (Full Beast Form)
Classification: Great Swordsman / Sovereign of Merveille
Overall Combat Tier: High Admiral Class
Devil Fruit Cores (Vessel Integrity: 3/3 Occupied):
Core 1 (Mythical Zoan): Ryu Ryu no Mi, Model: Imperial PendragonMastery: 95% (Near-Awakened; Complete physiological integration, crimson armor scales, immense physical endurance, draconic thermal authority, 60m Full Beast Form fully unlocked)Core 2 (Paramecia): Fuwa Fuwa no MiMastery: 62% (Continental Levitation, Advanced Vector Control, Atmospheric Stabilization)Core 3 (Logia): Goro Goro no MiMastery: 25% (Acquired; Bio-electric synaptic acceleration, atmospheric electromagnetic perception, raw concentrated plasma discharge, hyper-vibrating plasma armor)
Haki:
Observation Haki (Kenbunshoku): Advanced (Future Sight: 3–4 seconds; integrated with electromagnetic Mantra resonance)Armament Haki (Busoshoku): Advanced (Internal Destruction / Emission / Hardening)Conqueror’s Haki (Haoshoku): Advanced (Haoshoku Infusion / Sky-Splitting Class; resonance with bio-electric plasma)
Swordsmanship:
Rank: Daikengou (Grandmaster Swordsman)Equipped Blades: Twin Meito Oto and Kogarashi (O Wazamono Grade)
Assets & Territory:
Flagship / Realm: Unified Aerial Continent of Merveille (Merveille at Top-Center Apex; Upper Yard, Shandora, and Angel Island anchored beneath)Military Force: The Vanguard of the Heavens (500 Elite Dial-equipped Aerial Troopers, 1st Division Commanded by Wyper)Treasury: Shandorian Gold Reserves / Shandora Poneglyph — secured in Central VaultWorld Government Designation: “The Sky Sovereign”Bounty: None — identity unconfirmedRound Table Seats & Retinue:1st Seat: Open (Reserved for Dracule Mihawk)12th Seat: “The Jester” Buggy (Artillery, Dial Munitions & Micro-Segmentation Tactics)Inner Circle Retinue: Makino (Prime Minister of Domestic Affairs), Kaya (Chief Medical Officer), Merry, Gan Fall, Wyper (Vanguard Commander)