One Piece: The Devil Fruit Collector-Chapter 239: So-Called Family Is the Most Precious Resource!
Chapter 239: So-Called Family Is the Most Precious Resource!
Inside and outside the Corrida Colosseum.
"Hm?"
The citizens, who had been rejoicing only moments ago, had already noticed the changes around them.
"Mom, look—Mr. Chef, he’s..."
The girl Sania and her mother Sarah—saved not long ago by one of Saru’s Body Outside Body clones—had been crying tears of mingled relief and grief. Relief that they were finally safe; grief for the man they had lost. Before Saru’s arrival, the man who had been Sania’s stepfather and Sarah’s husband had already died at the hands of pirates, sacrificing himself so they could escape.
But now, even through their tears, they could see it clearly.
Right before them, the toy chef that had been cut in two was changing.
Its toy body was melting into flesh and blood, reshaping itself into a man with a gentle face. And as the toy shell fell away, the wound that had bisected him began to bleed in earnest, his vitality draining rapidly.
"Ah... ah... ah..."
Mother and daughter stood frozen, eyes wide.
From somewhere deep in their minds, buried memories began to surface.
They suddenly remembered who this man was.
"Fa—Father?!"
"Jello?"
Yes. That was Sania’s real father. Sarah’s former lover.
"I... I..."
The horror that swept through them was beyond words. The memories came flooding back—the beautiful years they had shared with this man. And then, the terrible years after: the inexplicable way his existence had simply vanished from their minds. A daughter had called another man "father." A wife had married again. And Jello had quietly remained in their home, nothing more than a toy chef.
"No... no, Jello..."
"Father!"
Guilt and shame crashed over them like a wave. But more than either of those—
—was sorrow.
Because Jello was dying. They were about to lose a husband and a father for the second time in a single day.
And they were far from alone.
Dressrosa was the Country of Passion and Toys. Toys had always been everywhere—woven into everyday life, present in nearly every home. They had toiled and served and protected, as devoted as any family member.
In the chaos of the recent attacks, many toys had been shattered. Their toy bodies had saved them from death—until now.
VMMM! VMMM! VMMM!
Flashes of light erupted across the city as toys transformed back into their original forms all at once. And in the minds of every citizen, the past came rushing back. They remembered who those toys truly were. They remembered the people who had disappeared from their memories. And they remembered every year that had slipped by in between.
"Mr. Toy, why do you keep protecting me?"
"Because you are my... master."
"Hehe, then let’s play horsey! Come on, before Dad gets home, you play with me!"
"Hey, toy—run those errands and get dinner started. My wife and I are going to rest. Having a toy is so convenient... shame this one’s obedient but useless. We should trade it in for a better one later."
Such careless words had come so easily. But now, knowing those toys had been their closest loved ones—watching those figures return to their true forms only to collapse, only to die—
"No! Don’t—please, don’t!"
The guilt was unbearable. The despair was absolute.
And then—
"Fuffuffuffu..."
Doflamingo’s voice crackled out across Dressrosa’s broadcast system.
"Citizens."
"The precious keepsakes you see before you—quite the surprise, are they not?"
The malice in his voice was unconcealed.
Silence fell across Dressrosa. The entire country went deathly still.
Then—
"DOFLAMINGO!!!"
The Corrida Colosseum erupted. The roar that tore through the crowd was deafening—grief, guilt, joy, despair, all of it fusing in an instant into something white-hot and singular.
Rage. Pure, consuming rage.
It was all Doflamingo’s fault. Every toy. Every vanished memory. Every ruined family. All of it traced back to him.
"You bastard!"
"You turned my mother into a toy—how could you?!"
"I’ll kill you! I’ll kill you, you pirate scum!"
The furious cries of Dressrosa’s citizens were so loud they might have reached the Royal Palace.
"Y-Young Master..."
Baby 5 stood bewildered at Doflamingo’s side. "You’re going to..."
More precisely: since returning to Dressrosa, she hadn’t been able to make sense of a single thing he had done. Slaughtering citizens. Drawing pirates. Betraying Kaido. Provoking The Zodiac. Every move seemed incomprehensible.
When the three God’s Knights had appeared, she thought she’d finally understood. Perhaps Doflamingo planned to use The Zodiac and the Three Disasters as bargaining chips—leverage to reclaim his place in the Holy Land Mary Geoise, to become a Celestial Dragon once more.
But that was over. The three God’s Knights were dead. The plan had failed. They should be evacuating. So why was he doing this now?
Sugar—the Donquixote Family’s most indispensable executive. Her Hobby-Hobby Fruit could transform anyone she touched into a toy, bind their actions, and strip them from the memories of all who knew them. But if she ever lost consciousness, the power would release. Doflamingo knew this better than anyone. And yet he had deliberately provoked the city into a frenzy.
Baby 5 had no illusions: the hatred Dressrosa held for Doflamingo right now had reached the point where they would have torn him apart with their bare hands. Even if the Donquixote Family survived what was coming, there was no world in which Doflamingo continued as the King of Dressrosa.
"Oh, Baby 5."
Diamante’s voice came from beside her, easy and unhurried. "Didn’t Doffy already make it perfectly clear?" He drew the sword from his waist. "He’s going to sit us down at the biggest gambling table in the world and go for everything."
He raised the blade, pointing it at the city beyond the window.
"Do you know what you have to do before you step up to a table like that?"
"...Di... Diamante?"
Baby 5’s eyes went wide. A cold, shapeless dread settled in her chest.
RUMBLE!
The floor buckled upward, and Pica’s massive stone-fused form burst through it, snatching Baby 5 off her feet in one swift motion.
"You... you don’t trust me?"
The truth landed like a blow. She had come back. Back to her Family. And they had never trusted her—not truly. Not even once.
"I didn’t betray anyone. I didn’t tell a soul. I swear, I—"
She wanted to fight for it. To make them see.
"Baby 5."
Doflamingo’s voice cut through everything.
"In any gamble worth playing, you put down your stakes before the cards are dealt." He looked at her. "Stakes have to be something precious."
He raised his hand.
"This country is one of the chips I’m laying on the table. But it’s not enough."
He smiled.
"One of..."
She understood.
"I’m one of your chips too."
Beyond the country. Beyond everything else. She was a chip Doflamingo was willing to throw down.
Tears and snot ran freely down her face now. She didn’t bother to hide it.
"But Young Master—aren’t we family?"
"Of course."
His smile widened.
"You are my precious Family. My most valuable treasure."
It was a conviction he had carried since childhood. Family, so-called family—they were a resource. The bonds of loyalty and affection made them trustworthy. The power they wielded was the wealth that would carry him to the top of the world.
He genuinely cherished his family members. He allowed their familiarity, their overstepping. He forgave their failures. He laughed with them, shared glory and power and status. When someone hurt or humiliated one of his own, he erased that person without a second thought. Most of the time, the feeling was real.
He loved his family members.
There was only one thing he could not forgive.
"Betrayal from within the family is the most heartbreaking thing there is."
He met her eyes. "Honestly, I’m ninety percent certain you didn’t betray me. The Zodiac showing up had nothing to do with you. You’re a good child."
"But—"
He shrugged. "That ten percent is enough. Compared to the others, your value has slipped."
Baby 5 laughed—a short, broken sound.
What a joke.
Appraising the value of family members. Deciding one was worth less than the others over a mere possibility. The very fact that such a cold calculation could be made was proof enough—they had never been family at all.
It was only now, at the very end, that she finally understood.
"Doflamingo—you monster. You don’t know the first thing about love!"
"Yes."
He agreed without hesitation. "And I’ve never thought I needed to understand something that weak, Baby 5."
[Tamaito (Bullet Thread)]
White threads coiled in his palm, gathering, compressing into the shape of a bullet.
"Farewell, then."
"My Family."
BANG!
It struck her dead between the eyes.
Buffalo’s face fell. Dellinger’s expression hardened into something feral. Lao G remained utterly still. Every member of the Donquixote Family reacted differently.
But on one point, they were all the same.
Not a single one of them moved to stop it.
They had known. They had all already known what their Young Master would choose.
And they had accepted it.
A gamble this large demanded enough chips. Baby 5 was the sacrifice they had all silently agreed was worth it.
"Alright, Doffy~! The loose end is dealt with. Time to run the plan."
Trebol stepped forward eagerly, flipping open the box in his hands. Inside sat a Den Den Mushi—one bearing the emblem of the World Government, and stamped with a five-pointed star, the number ’5’ carved at its center.
He held it out.
SSLASH!
A slash tore out of nowhere, rising from the floor. Trebol’s legs and torso came apart. Blood sprayed, and he crumpled.
SSLASH! SSLASH! SSLASH! SSLASH!
The cuts kept coming. Each one carried the weight of Conqueror’s Haki and the sharpness of refined Ryuo. The Donquixote Family executives reacted fast—and it made no difference.
In an instant, every one of them was cut down. Even Pica, fused into the stone, screamed as he was sliced free of it.
THUD.
Blood on the floor. The Donquixote Family executives—feared across the seas, counted among the world’s true powerhouses—lay scattered like broken toys.
"Cough... cough..."
They stared upward, disbelieving.
"That power... that ability..."
There was no resisting it. No countering it. And that ability—long since infamous across the seas, unmistakable in its signature.
"It’s him..."
Diamante forced the words out through cracked lips.
"It’s—Nezumi! The Rat!"
SSLASH!
The space ahead split open.
The figure in the Rat Mask stepped through.
Viola followed close behind him, one hand pressed over her mouth, staring at the wreckage of the Donquixote Family spread across the floor around her.
He glanced sideways. "Are you all right?"
THUMP.
At those words, Baby 5’s head—held rigid ever since the bullet struck her brow—finally dropped. She sank to one knee, dragging in ragged breaths.
The pain at the center of her forehead was still there. She reached up to touch it on instinct.
Her fingers found something solid.
A black chess piece.
Doflamingo’s bullet thread had struck it head-on—and the piece had caught it. It was still faintly glowing, as if it had spent the last of itself doing so.
"This is..."
She looked up at Nezumi.
"[Dream Creation: Dream Gomoku]—one of Hitsuji’s. While a game remains unfinished, it does what it can to protect the player from harm. Enough to block a hit of that level, just barely."
He paused.
"By the way—the constellation Kigetsu, who serves under Hitsuji, asked me to pass something along." His gaze dropped to the chess piece still in her hand. "She said she was a little disappointed you didn’t come to the banquet. But she hopes there’ll be a chance to finish that game someday."
He looked at the piece she hadn’t let go of.
"Looks like you feel the same way."
And so—
"..."
The tears in Baby 5’s eyes spilled over again.
☆☆☆
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