Despite what the numbering suggested, CP-1 wasn't at the top of the Cipher Pol hierarchy. In fact, it was the complete opposite, the higher the number, the more authority you had. CP-1 was basically cannon fodder dressed up in official uniforms, glorified servants who spent their days catering to the whims of Celestial Dragons.
The agent who'd reported the Arabasta situation was learning this lesson the hard way.
He'd thought passing information about the "Miracle Builder" to the Celestial Dragons would be his ticket to promotion. After all, intelligence that came straight from the Dragons themselves carried weight, it was basically a golden opportunity handed to him on a silver platter.
Instead, he'd painted a target on his own back.
Now he had to dump this clusterfuck of a mission onto someone else before it got him killed, and he wasn't optimistic about his chances of surviving the conversation with his boss.
"Guess I've got no choice but to report up the chain," he muttered, trudging toward the organization's office with all the enthusiasm of a man walking to his own execution. "Just hope he doesn't kill me for wasting his time."
When he reached the office door, he heard... sounds. The kind of sounds that made it very clear his superior was currently occupied with activities that had nothing to do with official business.
The agent didn't knock. He just stood outside the door, simultaneously envious and uncomfortable, waiting for the noise to stop.
After what felt like an eternity, a man emerged from the office, adjusting his clothes. Seeing someone waiting outside, he looked momentarily surprised but didn't say anything, just hurried past without making eye contact.
The agent stared after him in shock. That guy worked for CP-5. What the hell was someone from a higher-ranked division doing here?
He knocked twice on the door.
A gravelly old voice answered from inside. "Enter."
The agent kept his eyes down as he entered and delivered his report, not looking directly at his superior. Better to play it safe.
The old man listened. When the agent finished, he chuckled. "I don't know whether to call you stupid or just naive. You actually believed that bullshit about how things work around here? Let me give you some advice, kid. Keep your head down, do your job, and when shit happens, don't try to make decisions above your pay grade. You're background scenery in this organization. Nothing more."
The agent nodded frantically.
"Alright, get out. You don't need to worry about this situation anymore. I'll handle it."
Relieved, the agent practically fled the office.
Once alone, the old man smiled to himself. "Stupid kid. Such a perfect opportunity, and he just hands it to me."
This was intelligence that the Celestial Dragons themselves had shown interest in, that kind of attention could launch careers. The idiot should have gone straight to CP-0, or at least reported to CP-5 or higher. That would've been a massive achievement, probably enough to get him transferred out of CP-1's servant division.
But instead, he'd brought it to his direct superior, who now had the chance to claim all the credit.
The old man picked up his Den Den Mushi and made a call to CP-0. After all, CP-0 was the pinnacle of all Cipher Pol organizations, the elite of the elite. A single word from them could promote anyone from CP-7 or below into a direct CP-0 subordinate position, with the possibility of eventually joining CP-0 itself.
The confident swagger he'd displayed to his subordinate vanished instantly, replaced by obsequious groveling.
"I've got some intelligence that came directly from the Celestial Dragons themselves," he said, gushing as he recounted everything he knew, embellishing wherever possible to make it sound more impressive.
He didn't care if the person on the other end was paying attention, he just kept talking, even asking and answering his own questions, painting the situation in detail.
Just when his mouth was starting to dry out from all the talking, the voice on the other end finally spoke two words: "Not bad."
"So what do you think we should—"
"I'll notify CP-7 to handle it."
"Understood!"
The call ended abruptly, leaving the old man staring at his Den Den Mushi in frustration.
"They didn't take it seriously at all. Shit. If this keeps up, the whole operation could get botched."
He knew the source of this intelligence was CP-8, which meant the people currently operating in Arabasta were combat specialists with field experience. If CP-0 didn't take this seriously and just pawned it off on CP-7, there could be complications.
After some deliberation, he decided to hedge his bets. He pulled out his personal Den Den Mushi, and started making calls.
He contacted the division heads of CP-2, CP-3, CP-4, CP-5, and CP-6, giving each of them the same intelligence separately.
Would this piss off CP-0? Probably. But better to piss them off than to have the mission fail spectacularly. This way, if things went south, he could honestly say he'd done everything in his power. He wasn't acting out of self-interest or trying to steal credit, if anything, he might be making enemies by spreading the information around.
But by sending the intel to everyone individually, one-on-one, he'd covered his ass. If he'd only told two people, that would be playing favorites. Telling everyone meant he was being thorough and professional.
Having completed this insurance policy, he nodded in satisfaction.
"That should cover all my bases."
But then a nagging thought occurred to him. The person who'd answered his CP-0 call had been clearly distracted, probably still thinking about whatever woman he'd been entertaining in his office. Maybe that's why they'd brushed him off so casually.
He needed to push harder, and make sure this got proper attention.
He left his office and started walking through the corridors of Mary Geoise's government district. After a few turns, he spotted someone he recognized, a woman carrying a small designer bag.
It was one of CP-0's veteran agents returning from a mission, someone who was a celebrity within all the Cipher Pol divisions. The female role model that everyone talked about but few actually met.
"Stussy! Please, wait a moment!"
Stussy stopped and turned, looking mildly curious. She didn't recognize the man, but she was patient enough to hear him out.
"It's like this..."
The head of CP-1 hurriedly spilled everything he knew, even adding his own "emotional journey" for dramatic effect, though heavily embellished to make himself look good.
In his version, he was a caring superior who looked out for his subordinates and was willing to clean up their messes, going above and beyond to ensure the mission's success despite personal risk.
After listening to his entire spiel, Stussy nodded thoughtfully. "How credible is the intelligence about Nico Robin being involved?"
"I can't guarantee it with absolute certainty," the man admitted. "But based on how the message was delivered and the details described, there's strong reason to suspect her presence."
Stussy nodded again. "Understood. I'll look into it."
"Thank you so much. I won't keep you any longer." The agent bowed and scurried away, feeling like he'd finally done something right.
Stussy watched him leave. Then she continued on to her office.
CP-0 served as the Celestial Dragons' strongest shield. Right or wrong didn't matter, their duty was to support the Dragons unconditionally. Even if ordered to die, they couldn't refuse. It sounded harsh, but in practice, no Celestial Dragon would ever give such an order directly. Their real chain of command went through the Five Elders.
After organizing her thoughts and cross-referencing the information with other intelligence reports, she made her way to the chamber where the Five Elders conducted their business.
"Mission complete?" Saint Ethanbaron V. Nasjuro asked without looking up from the documents he was reviewing.
"The intelligence has been verified," Stussy replied, pulling several report folders from her bag and distributing them to each of the Five Elders.
Then she continued with her briefing. "The long-missing Nico Robin has indeed appeared in Arabasta. According to confirmed reports, she has already made contact with members of the Revolutionary Army. Furthermore..."
She paused, making sure she had their complete attention before dropping the next bombshell.
"The Kingdom of Arabasta has fallen and been restructured as a republic. However, King Cobra and his daughter Princess Vivi are both still alive and apparently involved in the transition. This upheaval was triggered by the return of Princess Vivi, who had been absent for three years. Upon her return, she began advocating for revolutionary ideals and gathering support among the population..."
She delivered her report, laying out the facts.
The faces of the Five Elders grew progressively darker as she spoke.
Robin making contact with the Revolutionary Army, this was exactly the scenario they'd spent years trying to prevent. They'd been subtly manipulating her movements for over a decade, pulling strings to keep her isolated and vulnerable.
But a few years ago, she'd vanished from their surveillance network completely.
They'd suspected where she might be hiding. She had likely found shelter under one of the Seven Warlords of the Sea, the only places where CP organizations and even the Marines couldn't easily reach her.
By the rules of the Warlord system, they hadn't moved against her. And with Robin placed under Crocodile's control in Arabasta, there had been no fear of her making contact with the Revolutionaries.
The Five Elders had known for years about Crocodile establishing Baroque Works and his so-called "Utopia Plan." Through countless intelligence reports and behavioral analysis, they'd concluded that what he really wanted was simple: money. The whole ideal nation rhetoric was just PR bullshit to rally the troops.
Besides, as a Warlord of the Sea, there was no way he could actually achieve any sort of revolutionary utopia even if he wanted to. The entire Warlord system was designed specifically to prevent that kind of thing.
So they'd simply let the situation play out, content to watch from the sidelines as Crocodile dug himself deeper into his own schemes.
But now, staring at the reports Stussy had just delivered, their comfortable assumptions were rapidly dissolving.
Saint Topman Warcury furrowed his brow as he studied a particular name in the intelligence briefing.
"According to your analysis, the person who originally developed this ideology was... Dalton? That bodyguard from Drum Kingdom?" His tone was skeptical. He didn't believe some random royal guard could think on such a sophisticated level.
The whole concept of revolutionary governance that was spreading through Arabasta showed a level of systematic thinking that didn't match the profile of a simple soldier.
Stussy nodded seriously, having anticipated this question. "Based on our investigation, Princess Vivi had been hiding within Baroque Works during all those years after she disappeared from public view. Crocodile eventually discovered her true identity. During her escape, she managed to board a pirate crew that had no bounty at the time, the Straw Hat Pirates."
She pulled out a navigation chart marked with their estimated route. "Following the Log Pose, they reached Little Garden. But for some reason, one of their crew members fell seriously ill, so they diverted to Drum Kingdom, which used to be a medical powerhouse before its decline. This was probably information Vivi provided, given her royal education about geography and regional specialties."
"During their time on Drum Island, Marshall D. Teach's pirate crew invaded. The king, Wapol, fled with most of the royal guard. But Dalton chose to stay behind and protect the common people rather than follow his king to safety."
"Later, King Wapol returned, bringing his brother, Musshuru, a Devil Fruit user who'd eaten the Shroom-Shroom Fruit. During that period, Dalton led a popular uprising, killed both the king and his brother, and established a new nation what he called Neverwinter. Considering all these circumstances, he is most likely the original source of this ideology. Princess Vivi witnessed these events firsthand and chose to adopt Dalton's ideas, then modified them to suit Arabasta's specific situation."
The other Five Elders nodded one after another, finding her logic sound.
It made sense when you thought about it. Dalton could have easily followed Wapol into exile. That would've ensured his personal safety and probably strengthened his position within the royal inner circle. He could've continued as captain of the guard, living comfortably off the king's wealth wherever they ended up.
But instead, he'd stayed to protect people who had no power, and wealth, nothing to offer him in return.
A man with that kind of conviction, who truly understood Drum Kingdom's reality and its people's suffering, could very well have developed radical new ideas about governance.
"Not bad. That's a reasonable analysis," Warcury conceded.
Then his eyes caught something else in the report. "I see you've mentioned that Dalton's country now has some... unusual architecture?"
"Not just Drum Kingdom," Stussy clarified. "Similar structures have appeared in Arabasta as well."
She pulled out a thick stack of photographs from the back of her report folder and distributed them among the Five Elders.
They each examined the images, which showed bizarre cube-shaped buildings floating in the sky.
"This looks like the work of the Cube-Cube Fruit," Saint Marcus Mars observed with puzzlement. "But wasn't that fruit in the possession of a shipwright from the World Pirates? The crew that served under Byrnndi World before his capture?"
He flipped through several more photos, comparing the architectural style. "Has the user died?"
Stussy sighed, having anticipated this question as well. "We're not certain. After World was captured by the Marines many years ago, his remaining crew stopped recruiting new members and appeared less frequently in our surveillance reports. We lost track of them about five years ago."
She pulled out another file containing old wanted posters and incident reports. "Based on casualty estimates and the dangerous routes they were known to frequent, the probability of their death exceeds ninety-five percent."
The other Elders looked somewhat dissatisfied with the vague speculation, after all, ninety-five percent wasn't one hundred percent, and in their line of work, that gap mattered. But they quickly lost interest in pursuing that particular thread.
After all, the Cube-Cube Fruit had clearly reappeared, which meant by definition that its previous user had died. It wasn't surprising. The sea was cruel, and most who sailed under the black flag died violent deaths.
"Hmm? The current Cube-Cube Fruit user can already do this much?" Saint Jaygarcia Saturn was the first to notice something odd about the photographs.
The structures in the images weren't falling or unstable, they were clearly meant to float permanently.
The others also sensed something was off. If these were images of structures mid-collapse, the photos would be blurry, capturing motion. But these buildings were crystal clear, suggesting they'd been stationary when photographed.
"What exactly is going on here?" Saturn asked.
Stussy began explaining the situation at Katorea.
"I see... to think the ability could be developed to such an extent. This must be a Devil Fruit awakening, correct?" he speculated, stroking his beard thoughtfully.
Any Devil Fruit, once awakened, underwent an evolution of its powers, allowing the user to transcend the original limitations of their ability and affect their environment in ways that went beyond simple personal transformation.
Making cubes float permanently like this wasn't incomprehensible if you viewed it through the lens of awakening. Still impressive, but within the theoretical bounds of what awakened abilities could achieve.
However, it wasn't necessarily something to fear either. Awakened users were dangerous, certainly, but the World Government had dealt with plenty of them over the centuries.
"Wait... why did you give this man such a high threat rating?" Nusjuro looked confused as he flipped back to the personnel assessment section.
The report showed:
Personality Assessment: Lustful, frequently accompanied by women.
Ability Assessment: Dangerous.
Haki Assessment: EXTREMELY DANGEROUS.
If Marcus saw the personality assessment, he'd complain, how could they possibly label him "lustful"?
That "extremely dangerous" Haki evaluation was usually reserved for individuals within the Four Emperors' crews, monsters like the commanders under Whitebeard or the top officers serving under Big Mom. For a rookie who'd only just recently entered the Grand Line, even with impressive Devil Fruit development, such a rating seemed excessive to the point of being alarmist.
Saturn was also curious this.
Stussy began explaining more carefully, knowing this part would be harder to convey. "My ability comes from the Bat-Bat Fruit. It allows me to expand my Observation Haki through echolocation and sound wave manipulation. That's how I can eavesdrop on conversations and gather intelligence from impossible distances."
The Five Elders were aware of her Devil Fruit powers, of course, but nodded for her to continue.
"However, when I attempted to approach within a certain range of this man, my Haki triggered a danger warning."
"Danger?" Nasjuro raised an eyebrow. "How specific was this warning?"
"How close did you get?" Mars added.
"With him at the center... approximately ten kilometers. That's my estimated range for when the warnings begin."
Ten kilometers was a massive detection radius. Most Observation Haki users could barely sense danger from a few dozen meters away, maybe a hundred if they were particularly skilled.
"A natural-born Observation Haki user, hmm." Saturn's expression turned thoughtful.
Throughout the seas, there were always some individuals born with innate Observation Haki already awakened. Depending on their personality, training, and natural inclinations, these abilities developed in different directions.
Some could read minds and emotions with frightening accuracy, peeling back every layer of a person's psyche.
Others could expand their sensory range to cover ridiculous distances, monitoring entire islands.
Some developed "Observation Killing," the ability to blank out their presence so completely that even other Haki users couldn't predict their movements.
And then there was another type, rarer than the rest, warning-type Observation Haki.
This variant could confuse other Observation Haki users' attempts at surveillance, creating blind spots and triggering danger alerts. It was exactly what Stussy had described: that premonition of danger, that feeling of being watched in return.
Only those who'd lived long enough knew about this particular variant. It was exceedingly rare, and users who possessed it were invariably dangerous opponents.
"Anyone capable of attacking from ten kilometers away wouldn't be some nobody," Warcury observed. "We would have heard of them before now."
But seeing the Five Elders dismiss her concerns so casually, she could only sigh internally. She'd already given them the warning.
The truth was more complicated than she'd written in the report. Her Devil Fruit ability didn't just expand her Observation Haki, it also allowed her to perceive things almost like a radar system, detecting shapes and movements through reflected sound waves.
Yet every single time she'd gotten close, her Haki had "shown" her the same terrifying vision: the man looking directly at her. Staring right back through the distances and obstacles that should have made her invisible.
That one look had scared the absolute shit out of her.
Something deep in her instincts screamed that she was being watched, that he knew she was there, that she'd been marked.
Once could be coincidence. Twice could be luck. But she'd attempted surveillance over a dozen times from different angles and distances, and every single time, without fail, her Haki showed her the same thing.
That creeping sense of dread was something few people could endure for long. It felt as though the moment she got close enough, a dangerous predator would lock onto her position and come hunting.
She'd tried emphasizing the threat level of this Marcus in every way she could without sounding paranoid. She'd written "EXTREMELY DANGEROUS" in bold letters.
But the Five Elders clearly didn't care about her concerns. To them, he was just another talented rookie who'd gotten lucky with his Devil Fruit development.
"This man isn't important right now," Warcury declared, setting aside that section of the report. "Your intelligence on Nico Robin's contact with the Revolutionary Army is quite thin. According to this, after the Revolutionary Army's second-in-command left Arabasta, she did not go with them. What happened during that meeting?"
Stussy shook her head. "Because of that man's interference, I couldn't get close enough to eavesdrop properly. But from what I could gather, they failed to reach an agreement because some condition wasn't met."
"That's actually good news for us," Saint Shepherd Ju Peter nodded thoughtfully. "If they didn't reach an agreement, that means she's still vulnerable. We can still control the situation."
"So what was their condition?" Peter continued. "What did the Revolutionary Army want from her?"
Stussy hesitated, knowing how absurd this was going to sound. "It seemed to be... some kind of code phrase. I couldn't fully decipher its meaning from context. But roughly, they said something like: 'Why don't you meet my captain?'"
All five of the Elders looked utterly confused, exchanging glances with each other.