One Piece: Dungeon Shop. Scamming Garp, Reward: Eight-Tails Jinchuriki-Chapter 323: The Light of Evolution Amidst Despair! The Pitch-Black Demon Dragon’s Shocking Descent!

Chapter 323: Chapter 323: The Light of Evolution Amidst Despair! The Pitch-Black Demon Dragon’s Shocking Descent!

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Chapter 323: The Light of Evolution Amidst Despair! The Pitch-Black Demon Dragon’s Shocking Descent!

"Toss it in the sewer?"

"That proposal... is not bad at all!"

Jessie sneered, her fingers clamped tight around Kaido’s tail. She stepped toward the edge of the hot air balloon’s wicker basket, holding him out over the void. Below, a grimy sewer grate sat like an open, festering wound in the pavement, exhaling a stench of stagnant water and rot. Her expression was one of pure, unadulterated revulsion, as if she weren’t holding a living creature, but a piece of rancid, maggot-ridden meat.

That movement. That look.

It was the final spark that detonated the powder keg of Kaido’s remaining sanity.

[BOOM—!!!]

Within Kaido’s draconic mind, it felt as if a billion tons of high-yield explosives had been triggered at once. The floodgates of his memory—hitherto suppressed by the system’s constraints—burst open, drowning his tiny, fish-like frame in a torrential surge of his former glory.

He remembered Wano Country, the smell of ozone and cherry blossoms when he first clashed with Kozuki Oden.

I am Kaido of the Beasts!

He remembered the iron-fisted arrogance with which he had forged the Beast Pirates, looking down from his throne at King, Queen, and Jack as he laid the foundations for an empire of pure, unbridled power.

Come with me, and let us overturn this boring world!

He remembered the legend of the "Strongest Creature"—the man who had survived a thousand tortures, whose skin shattered the blades of his executioners, and who had fallen ten thousand meters from the sky only to walk away with a headache. He remembered the intoxicating majesty of coiling his Azure Dragon form through the thunderclouds above Onigashima, treating the inhabitants of the world below as mere specks of dust to be crushed underfoot.

He was a Yonko! A living catastrophe! A nightmare incarnate that silenced the bravest warriors with a single glance!

And now... he was being held by a woman in a garish, theatrical uniform with hair like a magenta scythe, prepared to be discarded like a piece of refuse in a common gutter?

"Hrrrgh..."

A sound erupted from the depths of Kaido’s throat—not the bubbly gurgle of a Magikarp, but a guttural, earth-shaking rumble that seemed to vibrate the very air in the balloon’s basket.

Back at the Partys Bar, every pirate and marine felt a chill crawl up their spine.

"This is bad!"

Sengoku bolted upright, his face ashen, his hands trembling as they gripped the edge of the bar.

"That look... Kaido is going berserk!"

The screen didn’t lie. The originally dull, vacant eyes of the fish had been swallowed by a roiling sea of crimson madness. Those were no longer the eyes of a creature intended for a child’s collection. They were the eyes of a demon god that had clawed its way back from the abyss.

"Hmm? This stupid fish still dares to glare at me?"

Jessie felt a prickle of unease, but she masked it with a violent, dismissive jerk of her arm.

"Down you go! You waste!"

She flung him. Kaido sailed through the air in a crimson arc, hurtling toward the darkness of the sewer.

In that instant, the world seemed to grind to a halt.

Falling...

Falling...

In the slow-motion blur of his descent, Kaido saw the sneering faces of the three thieves above, heard the heartbreaking wails of the little girl on the pavement, and felt the cold breath of the sewer rising to meet him. It was the final destination for his dignity.

No!!!

I am...

KAIDO OF THE BEASTS!!!

[Wommmm—!!!]

A heartbeat before he struck the water, a pillar of white light—so intense it seemed to bleach the very world of its color—erupted from his body and pierced the heavens!

The radiance shattered the evening gloom and dispelled the smoke. It carried a weight that was purely, viscerally tyrannical, an absolute will that demanded the world bow or be broken.

"Wha—what is this?!"

James and Jessie shielded their eyes, screaming as the balloon was buffeted by the sheer force of the expanding light.

Inside the bar, Garp’s laughter died in his throat. He stared at the screen, his mouth agape, his weathered eyes wide with a mixture of shock and grim recognition.

"The... [Light of Evolution]?!"

The Special Camera in Yasopp’s hand slipped from his numb fingers, clattering onto the floor. No one moved to pick it up. Every soul in the building was transfixed by the transformation unfolding before them.

Within the blinding cocoon of light, the "weakest" body in the world was being torn apart and remade. Scales shattered like glass only to be replaced by overlapping plates of obsidian armor. Bone snapped and extended with the sound of cracking timber as his frame was violently stretched and elongated. The vacant mouth widened into a cavernous maw lined with rows of serrated, steel-rending teeth. The fragile fins calcified into jagged, obsidian spurs that hummed with latent power.

A massive, terrifying silhouette began to solidify within the glow—a shape that promised nothing but ruin.

Crack... crackle...

The light ebbed away, leaving a colossus suspended in the air.

It was a nightmare of scales and fury—a giant dragon as black as a moonless night. Its body, over ten meters of coiled muscle and impenetrable armor, dominated the sky. Its dorsal fins were a vivid, bleeding red, resembling rows of frozen flames. Its eyes, two burning pits of crimson, held no mercy, no recognition—only the ancient, cold brutality of a predator that had never known a master.

The pressure was suffocating. Even through the broadcast, the pirates in the bar felt a weight settle on their chests, making it difficult to breathe.

[Ding!]

The system’s cold, mechanical voice resonated like a funeral bell.

[Magikarp has successfully evolved—Gyarados (Variant: Pitch-Black Demon Dragon)!]

Silence gripped the bar.

"Is that... is that really... the salted fish from before?"

One pirate struck himself across the face, certain he was dreaming.

Gulp.

Garp swallowed hard, the sweat beading on his forehead.

"A monster..."

"That is a true... monster!"

In the Beast Pirates’ corner, King, Queen, and Jack were on their feet, their eyes red with unshed tears of relief and fervor.

"Captain..."

"It’s the Captain’s aura! He’s back!"

In Pewter City, the Team Rocket trio stared up at the black demon that blotted out the sun, their minds completely failing them.

"Meow... Meowth?" The cat’s whiskers twitched in a frantic, rhythmic dance of terror. "Is this... is this really... that fish?"

James was trembling so violently his knees were knocking together. Jessie was a statue of pale horror, her voice stolen by the sheer, crushing presence of the beast.

Slowly, the pitch-black dragon lowered its head. Its crimson gaze locked onto the three ants in the balloon’s basket with the precision of a guillotine.

"ROAARR—!!!"

The roar was a physical force, shattering the windows of the nearby buildings and sending a shockwave through the streets of Pewter City.

Kaido—now the Gyarados—unhinged his massive jaw. A sphere of blinding, unstable energy began to coalesce within his mouth, pulling in the surrounding air with a hungry roar.

Vrrr—vrrr—vrrr—!

The air warped and buckled under the strain of the building power.

"This is bad! Run!"

The trio scrambled for the controls of the balloon, but it was like trying to outrun a lightning bolt in a paper boat.

"Erase yourselves... from this world!!!"

[BOOM—!!!!]

A massive, world-cleansing beam of pure destruction erupted from the dragon’s maw.

[Hyper Beam]!

The beam struck the balloon with the weight of a falling star. There was no explosion, only a sudden, violent expansion of light that disintegrated the wicker, the fabric, and the machinery in an instant.

"What is this situation—!"

"We’re blasting off again—!"

Two iconic screams trailed off into the atmosphere as the Team Rocket trio was propelled into the stratosphere by the shockwave. In the far distance, a tiny, brilliant ding echoed across the sky as they vanished, leaving behind only a single, twinkling star.

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