The mechanical shark that had driven Bege to the brink of madness was, in the end, nothing more than a logistical loose end left behind by Vegapunk.
On the eve of the Summit War, Lilith had temporarily parked it near the Queen Mama Chanter.
Then the situation suddenly changed. Lilith was forced to move, and she had no time to retrieve this Sea Beast Weapon.
And so, the mechanical shark followed Katakuri across the sea all the way back to Totto Land.
Since it had been mechanically modified, it had remained submerged deep underwater the whole time, and because it had not launched any active attacks…
Katakuri only realized, when they reached shore, that an uninvited guest had been trailing beneath his family's main ship.
Originally, Katakuri intended to destroy it.
However, Big Mom showed a strong interest in this futuristic mechanical creation and ordered it to be locked inside a warehouse for the time being.
Unfortunately, plans could never keep up with disaster.
With Big Mom's craving fit breaking out without warning, the guards throughout Whole Cake Chateau fell into complete chaos.
This caused Capone Bege, who was sneaking in to carry out his "secret plan," to accidentally rush straight into the room where the mechanical shark had been imprisoned while trying to avoid a group of panicked guards coming the other way.
In the mechanical shark's extremely simple recognition system, this rumbling "human tank" with a face was clearly much more like its "own kind" than those oddly shaped Homies.
Driven by some beast-like instinct, the mechanical shark instantly became excited and erupted into action.
Rather than saying it broke free from its chains, it was more accurate to say that it used its terrifying bite force to chew through its restraints and demolished half the room while it was at it.
And that was how this absurd scene came to be.
"So, basically, it was locked up for too long and got too depressed. The moment it saw a beauty like you, of course it had to vent on you!"
Law hid inside Bege's body, watching the steel beast chasing them through the observation hole as he teased him.
"Look at it. It has no interest in all the dessert buildings around us. It's dead set on biting your tank-tread ass. That means in its logic, a 'castle tank' like you is its own kind…"
"WHO THE HELL IS THE SAME KIND AS THAT DAMN THING?! I'M A GODFATHER! A PROPER MAFIA BOSS!"
Bege roared furiously.
"AND STOP MAKING SARCASTIC COMMENTS FROM OVER THERE! HURRY UP AND THINK OF A DAMN PLAN!"
"I am thinking. Also, don't you think something about this situation is off?"
Law's eyes darkened as he sharply sensed the abnormality.
"That shark has been making a scene for this long. Even if we wanted to stay hidden, someone should have noticed by now. So why have no guards surrounded us yet…?"
Just then, a strong and powerful shout broke through the chaos.
"FISH-MAN JUJUTSU: WATER STREAM SHOULDER THROW!"
A surging current roared out like a raging dragon, striking the mechanical shark's flank with perfect accuracy.
The powerful impact flipped it hard onto the ground, forcibly cutting off its charge.
"There you are. Good!"
Jinbe's burly figure appeared at the end of the street.
He tossed aside the container he had used to hold water and rushed toward Bege while shouting.
"LEAVE THIS SHARK TO ME! BEGE, CHIFFON IS INSIDE YOU, RIGHT?"
Jinbe met the charging mechanical shark head-on, and with just one punch, he smashed it heavily to the ground.
While the shark struggled to flip itself back over, he told everyone with a grave expression about Big Mom's craving fit.
Chiffon and Pudding were both shocked.
As her family, they knew better than anyone what Mama meant in that state.
"Then stop wasting time!"
Pudding's urgent voice came from inside Bege's body.
"Take us to the cold storage! As long as we take the finished cake from yesterday, there's still a chance to fix everything!"
However, Jinbe's next words were like a basin of ice water dumped over everyone's heads, instantly freezing all hope.
"It's already too late. The banquet cake… has been destroyed!"
"That is also why I hurried to find you."
Jinbe's tone was heavy, his gaze fixed on Bege.
"It is already impossible to recreate the original cake now. I need Chiffon's help. Through the connections on my side, we must reproduce the flavor of Fish-Man Island's desserts as much as possible…"
…
Inside Whole Cake Chateau…
A group of people took advantage of the empty defenses and silently slipped into the depths.
Even though they ran into quite a few guards along the way, these vicious men did not take them seriously at all.
With a few clean strikes, they easily swept aside every obstacle in their path.
"You actually didn't mess things up this time, Captain."
Shiryu slowly slid the famed sword Raiu back into its sheath.
His cold gaze swept toward the dark-red Road Poneglyph stored up above, and for once, his words carried a hint of approval for his captain.
"Zehahahaha! Of course! If I couldn't even pull off something this small, what right would I have to be your captain?"
The man leading them was none other than Blackbeard, Marshall D. Teach.
At this moment, he laughed wildly, his attitude unbelievably arrogant.
But beneath the cover of his messy hair, fine beads of cold sweat could faintly be seen on his forehead.
Teach was walking on thin ice.
Because he had fallen just short during the Summit War and failed to seize the Tremor-Tremor Fruit, he had missed a crucial chance to boost his strength.
After that, when he tried to seize Whitebeard's territories, Kizaru's intervention forced him to give up.
These repeated failures made Blackbeard faintly realize that the vicious criminals he had brought out from Level 6 of Impel Down were gradually beginning to think about slipping out of his control.
Blackbeard desperately needed to accomplish something big enough to shock the entire crew and stabilize morale.
So he set his eyes on the stepping stone to the throne of Pirate King—the Road Poneglyph.
After hiding aboard Whitebeard's ship for decades, Teach had long since learned a great deal about the secrets of these top powers.
He not only knew that Big Mom possessed a Road Poneglyph, but also knew about her weakness: her craving fits.
After his failure to seize Whitebeard's territory, he led his crew to lurk beneath the sea around Totto Land, using coating to avoid detection, while sending Lafitte into the sky to secretly gather information.
When he learned that Totto Land was about to hold an unprecedented grand banquet, and that countless children and chefs were busy preparing an enormous cake, Blackbeard's eyes lit up, and he could not help but laugh out loud.
In his eyes, even heaven was helping him.
He knew very well that trying to take something from an Emperor by force was far too difficult.
His only chance of success was to plunge all of Totto Land into complete chaos.
As long as the situation turned chaotic, he would have a chance to get his hands on that Road Poneglyph.
So he secretly infiltrated and completely destroyed the cake that carried Totto Land's hopes.
If Big Mom's reason had only been thrown into confusion earlier by outside interference, and her craving fit had merely been on the verge of breaking out—meaning there had still been a chance to stabilize her in time—
Then Blackbeard's backstab crushed the last trace of clarity she had left, turning her into a monster driven only by the desire to destroy!
While everyone in Totto Land had their attention dragged away by the chaos caused by the two Emperors, Blackbeard and his crew openly broke into the room where the Road Poneglyph was kept and greedily began making a rubbing.