Chapter 685: Actually, Caesar Was the Real Star of This Show!
"Arest is finished!"
When he saw the light piercing through the cloud vortex from afar, Katakuri made his judgment.
Everyone felt the meaning behind that sharp edge—it was a power capable of stirring heaven and earth itself!
Sure enough, what followed was a massive tremor across the entire Whole Cake Island. The ground cracked, buildings collapsed. Faced with such a catastrophic scene, the Devil Fruit users of the Big Mom Pirates scrambled everywhere to put out fires and reinforce the island with their abilities, preventing it from sinking entirely.
Among them, Perospero's ability proved the most useful. Countless streams of syrup poured from his body, desperately gluing the fractured ground and structures back together.
In the midst of this chaos, Big Mom burst into loud laughter.
Like Katakuri, Big Mom had confirmed Ian's strength as a Yonko-level fighter during his battle with Arest. Now, she felt that keeping him here and having Pudding modify his memory was an incredibly brilliant move!
Every Yonko was immensely proud. Someone of this caliber would never willingly submit to another. Yet now, thanks to Big Mom's clever scheme, the Big Mom Pirates would henceforth have two Yonko-level combatants. Every time she thought of this wonderful scenario, Big Mom trembled with excitement!
"Mamama! Forget Kaido, forget Whitebeard, forget Red-Hair! From now on, this is the era of Big Mom! I am the next Pirate King!"
The impact of Admiral Arest's death on Whole Cake Island was completely cast aside. Or rather, faced with the leap in strength for the Big Mom Pirates, these problems were no longer problems at all...
Feld and the other guests, along with Capone Bege of the Fire Tank Pirates, listened to Big Mom's bold declaration, their expressions shifting uncertainly as they pondered their own thoughts.
After finishing her laughter, Big Mom looked down. Standing beside her, Smoothie was clutching her cheeks, her entire face flushed with excitement. The massive tremors shaking Whole Cake Island were proof of Ian's strength, weren't they? Thinking that Ian, with such power, was about to become her man, Smoothie nearly let out a moan of ecstasy...
Seeing her like this, Big Mom couldn't help but laugh again and asked, "Smoothie, my dear daughter, isn't Mama good to you? That kid Ian is no ordinary man. His bounty is definitely more than just 1.2 billion..."
"Of course! You're the best, Mama!" Smoothie couldn't resist hugging Big Mom and acting spoiled.
But before she could finish her display of affection, Big Mom suddenly added, "Ah, come to think of it, if Ian were to be my husband, he'd be qualified enough, wouldn't he?"
Hearing this, Smoothie's face instantly darkened!
Even Katakuri and the other children quickly turned away, pretending not to have heard that remark.
As her children, they knew Big Mom's temperament well. Her view on choosing partners could be summed up in one phrase: no discrimination at all!
To date, Big Mom had been married 43 times, meaning she had 43 husbands. While not all were bizarre, many were truly hard to look at. For Big Mom, these so-called husbands were merely tools for bearing children. She married on a whim and kicked them out when the interest faded. Among those 43 husbands, she couldn't even remember how many she had killed herself during her bouts of hunger pangs...
Big Mom herself didn't care about these husbands, so it was easy to imagine how her children viewed them.
They had no idea whether Big Mom's comment was a spur-of-the-moment joke or serious, so no one dared to respond...
Fortunately, just as Smoothie and the others were frozen stiff, Big Mom burst into laughter again and said, "Just kidding, just kidding! Ian is too useful to me. Why would I do that?"
Hearing this, the children breathed a sigh of relief and came back to life...
"But..." Big Mom lowered her head, her face twisted into a fierce expression, and whispered to Smoothie, "Smoothie, you'd better think carefully. Since I've arranged for you to marry Ian, you need to keep his heart tied to you! Otherwise, if Ian gets tired of you and leaves the crew, don't blame me for being harsh!"
Smoothie's cold sweat poured down as she quickly replied, "Yes... yes, I will, Mama!"
They were all too familiar with Big Mom's mood swings, so after agreeing, Smoothie couldn't help but glance over at the Vinsmoke family standing in the distance.
Her gaze locked onto the eldest daughter of the Vinsmoke family.
Reiju! Even though Pudding had modified Ian's memory, Smoothie was still worried. Reiju was a member of the Dragon Hunter Pirates. Who knew if she and Ian had some secret affair?
What if, after marriage, Ian went looking for a mistress?
The best solution Smoothie could think of was to kill Reiju. Not just Reiju—she'd kill all the pretty women in the Dragon Hunter Pirates. Oh, and that Pirate Empress, Boa Hancock, seemed to have some unclear relationship with Ian too. Kill her as well!
That way, Ian would belong to me alone!
Feeling Smoothie's murderous gaze, Reiju frowned slightly. What was going on? Why was this woman so hostile toward her?
Since Reiju had arrived last, she hadn't heard Big Mom and Ian's discussion about the marriage, nor had she seen Ian's dramatic performance. She was still completely in the dark.
So Reiju began to wonder: was this hostility directed solely at her, or at the entire Vinsmoke family? Should she tell her father about this?...
At that moment, the tremors on the island gradually subsided. From the direction of the wedding venue, no more sounds of battle came. Everyone knew it was over, so Big Mom laughed and said, "Alright, everyone head back! Even though we were interrupted, the tea party must continue! The step of eating the wedding cake cannot be skipped under any circumstances!"
Indeed, for Big Mom, desserts were the most important thing.
So the group began heading back toward the venue. Longarm and the other chefs carefully pushed the massive cake along with them.
Capone Bege, arm in arm with his bride Chiffon, walked over to Vito and the others and asked in a low voice, "Vito, how are you?"
"Boss, I'm not dead yet!" Now that they were far from the battlefield, those who had had their blood drained by Arest had managed to survive. Vito's wounds had been bandaged, but due to excessive blood loss, his face was deathly pale. He said apologetically, "I was careless earlier. I didn't expect that bastard Arest to cut me too..."
"Good, as long as you're okay!" Capone Bege nodded and lowered his voice further, asking, "What about the thing?"
But Vito didn't answer immediately. Instead, he hesitated and said, "Boss, now that Admiral Arest has pulled this stunt, should we still go through with it?"
Capone Bege gritted his teeth and said, "What else can we do? We're already committed! Once they start eating the cake, those bombs will be discovered sooner or later... There's no room to back out now!"
Hearing this, Vito reluctantly reached into his pants pocket to confirm the remote control's presence. But when his hand went in, his face turned even paler!
"It's... it's gone!" Vito said fearfully. "That thing is gone!"
"What!?" The Fire Tank Pirates were shocked, cold sweat breaking out. "How could it be gone!?"
"It... it might have fallen out when I passed out!" Vito racked his brain and could only think of that possibility.
"What do we do!?" The Fire Tank Pirates all looked at Capone Bege.
Capone Bege bit down so hard on his cigar that he snapped it in half. He growled, "Go back and find it!"
Instinctively, the Fire Tank Pirates quickened their pace toward the wedding venue. They had been lagging behind Big Mom and the wedding cake, but now, speeding up, they soon caught up to the cake's vicinity...
Meanwhile, on the other side, Caesar, who had barely escaped the battlefield between Ian and Arest, was grabbing Charlotte Brûlée, the Mirror-Mirror Fruit user, and shouting, "Give me the key to the handcuffs! Haven't we proven it already? It was Arest and that Stussy who caused all this! It has nothing to do with me! Why are you still keeping me cuffed!?"
He was pestering Brûlée because she had already used the mirror space to return to Arest's room once. Although she hadn't found the Poneglyph rubbing, she had found the key to Caesar's Seastone handcuffs.
If he wanted to get the cuffs off, who else could he turn to but Brûlée?
"Stop shaking me!" Brûlée, annoyed by his persistence, finally said, "Fine, I can unlock them for you, but it's only out of respect for Ian. Don't you dare run away! And you have to promise to help us find the stolen rubbing later, got it?"
Since Stussy and Arest, the masterminds, had been exposed, Caesar was cleared of suspicion. Brûlée had the authority to make this decision and unlock his cuffs.
"I promise, I promise!" Caesar nodded frantically.
So Brûlée took out the key and unlocked Caesar's handcuffs.
Regaining his freedom and feeling his Devil Fruit power flow through his body again, Caesar was moved to tears. Even he hadn't expected that coming to this tea party so shamelessly would drag him into so many incidents.
Damn it! I'm never playing with these big shots again. It's not fun at all!
Caesar excitedly flexed his wrists, and then he noticed something tightly clutched in his hand. Opening his palm, he stared in confusion at the object he had picked up from the lawn.
"What is this? Looks like some kind of remote control..." Caesar turned it over and over, piquing Brûlée's curiosity as she leaned in to look.
"Maybe... try pressing it?" Caesar thought, but his body acted before his mind. He reached out his finger and pressed down directly on the red button...