"Uta, how is it? Can you bring them out?" Cain asked Uta.
Uta shook her head and said,
"Not yet. There are too many people, and their original selves are inside too. From this distance, it'll be very difficult for me to bring them out."
"After all, this kind of situation has never happened before. If I lose control and cause some other mess, that would be bad… Right now, there are only two options. Either I wait until I'm more familiar with this ability, or we can only go in and look for them."
…
In Cain's memory, the God Valley Incident from thirty-six years ago had originally been a chaotic event caused when pirates broke into the Celestial Dragons' hunting tournament: the pirates were there to rescue Shakky, while Rocks D. Xebec had come to save his family.
In the end, Garp and Roger joined forces to defeat the key villain of that incident, Rocks D. Xebec.
His pirate crew disbanded afterward, and the island itself was completely destroyed, disappearing from the sea.
The entire matter was then thoroughly hidden by the World Government.
That was how the past should have been.
Yet a few people had barged into it.
Because Uta was gradually mastering her new ability and becoming more skilled with it, the people who fell into the God Valley memory sphere did not lose consciousness. Instead, they dropped straight onto the battlefield.
The first to fall was Gloriosa.
She was holding her snake-headed staff, still complaining nonstop even as she dropped through the air.
If Rayleigh had not failed to finish off Somers quickly enough, allowing him to run over and bind Shakky with thorns, everyone would not have been forced into such a dilemma.
No matter what, Gloriosa had once been Shakky's captain.
So she had kicked Somers down with all her might, and that had led to the current situation.
That's right.
It was Gloriosa's kick that sent Somers into Uta's domain, and she herself fell in along with him.
What she had not expected was that Rayleigh would be so slow.
He had taken forever to cut away the thorns around Shakky, which caused Shakky to fall in as well.
In order to save Shakky, Rayleigh had chased after her and entered too.
As Gloriosa fell through the sky, she instinctively shouted, "RAYLEIGH, YOU HAVE TO BRING SHAKKY BACK!"
Immediately afterward, she froze.
She realized someone had grabbed her.
The other person had caught her by the back of her collar.
Then she heard furious shouting around her.
"WHY ARE YOU ASKING RAYLEIGH TO SAVE HER?"
"WE'RE ALL HERE FOR SHAKKY!"
"WHY SHOULD SHAKKY BE HANDED OVER TO THAT GUY? JUST BECAUSE HE'S MORE HANDSOME THAN ME?!"
Gloriosa opened her eyes in confusion.
When she saw the person in front of her clearly, she froze, and her cheeks flushed red.
'T-This… wasn't this Roger?'
"ROGER! LONG TIME NO SEE! DO YOU KNOW HOW MUCH I'VE MISSED YOU ALL THESE YEARS?!"
In her excitement, Gloriosa directly threw herself onto Roger's face.
Although her body had shrunk, her size happened to be just right for her to cling firmly around Roger's head.
She hugged him tightly and refused to let go, pouring out how much she had missed him.
Seeing this scene, the crew members behind Roger instantly could not hold themselves back and angrily shouted at him.
"HEY, CAPTAIN, YOUR TASTES ARE THAT EXTREME?! YOU'RE FLIRTING WITH AN OLD LADY? AND YOU'RE STILL TRYING TO COMPETE WITH US FOR SHAKKY?"
"SHUT UP! HOW WOULD I KNOW WHERE THIS OLD HAG CAME FROM?!"
Roger peeled Gloriosa off his face.
Then he suddenly dodged, and a massive naginata slashed toward that spot.
Roger hurriedly drew his blade to block it.
With a bang, Conqueror's Haki clashed and intertwined, bursting into violent sparks as sand and stones flew everywhere.
This scene completely stunned Gloriosa!
Only then did she finally see the situation around her.
Good gods.
It was one thing for the entire Roger Pirates to be here, but why were the Rocks Pirates here too?
Roger, however, had no time to deal with that.
He casually tossed Gloriosa to the person in front of him—that is, the young Whitebeard.
"Newgate, I know you value family more than anyone, so I'll give this person to you as a mother! Bye now, I'm going to save Shakky."
Whitebeard stared at the large Gloriosa in his hand for a moment, stunned.
Then he quickly switched hands and grabbed Roger by the collar.
"Why are you handing her to me? Roger, get back here!"
The other members of the Roger Pirates also surged over.
For her own safety, Gloriosa instinctively burrowed onto Whitebeard's hat.
Looking at the chaos, she felt as if she had aged several more decades.
What in the world was going on?!
For a moment, the scene was a complete mess.
Rayleigh, however, had no attention to spare for any of this. He hurried straight toward the place where Shakky was being held.
He had come to keep his promise to Shakky.
He had personally seen the note Shakky left behind, the one that said, "Come get me."
He could not let her wait too long.
He rushed into the cell where Shakky was imprisoned and saw that Shakky's leg had been injured by that bastard Somers.
His anger burned even hotter.
Seeing that the other party was about to attack Shakky again, Rayleigh instantly erupted.
"I'll send you straight to the underworld!"
"Higanbana!"
The young Somers was sent blasting through the wall and flying backward.
Just as Rayleigh was about to sheathe his blade, his Observation Haki suddenly gave a warning.
Then, in the next instant, a figure crashed directly into his lower back, smashing him into the wall as well.
The younger Shakky was clearly startled by this sudden change.
When she looked up, the newcomers were none other than present-day Rayleigh and present-day Shakky!
"Hah… hah… Looks like I really have gotten old. It took me forever to catch up. Sorry, Shakky, I'm late."
Present-day Rayleigh looked toward the Shakky he was supporting and spoke.
"I'm not especially late on my side, but it seems your side has run into some trouble."
Present-day Shakky did not particularly care about the situation.
When she came in, she had already confirmed what was going on here.
This was Uta's ability.
But…
Seeing the scene that had once moved her so deeply recreated before her, she still felt astonished.
The most beautiful moment of her past had actually been ruined by themselves!
That's right.
The one present-day Rayleigh had just knocked flying was Somers from the real world, who had fallen in with them.
But it seemed he had also knocked his younger self through the wall along with him.
Present-day Rayleigh was clearly stunned.
Turning his head, he saw two large holes smashed into the wall of the room.
Young Somers and present-day Somers walked out from the wall at the same time.
Seeing the situation, the two looked at each other and were both shocked.
Then present-day Somers suddenly burst into laughter. He hurried over to the younger Shakky's side and shouted arrogantly.
"HAHAHA! I DON'T KNOW WHAT'S GOING ON, BUT YOU'VE LOST, RAYLEIGH! THERE ARE TWO SHAKKYS AND TWO OF ME NOW. LET'S SEE HOW YOU FIGHT. JUST OBEDIENTLY ADMIT DEFEAT!"
Hearing those words, present-day Rayleigh and present-day Shakky could not help swallow their words.
It was not because they were shocked by what Somers said.
It was because behind the two Somers....
Present-day Rayleigh slowly spoke.
"There are indeed two Shakkys and two of you here. That's true. But did you forget something?"
"There is also more than one Rayleigh here."
The moment his words fell, a fierce gaze like that of a demon had already appeared behind the two Somers.
It was the fury of the Dark King!
"AAAAAAH!"
"AAAAAAH!"
Two identical screams rose one after another, echoing throughout the entire cell.