Chapter 1124

The broadcast Dr. Vegapunk delivered to the planet leaves Morgans elated, since the resulting dread can be amplified by the one outlet everyone depends on for news. He hears Vivi object, because in her view the speech carried a message of hope rather than doom. He answers her protest with a threat to print where she is hiding, and although Wapol begs her to avoid provoking the man they rely on, she will not yield. Listing the headlines he could run, the editor floats a duel between Blackbeard and Law, a feud between Shanks and Kid, and the false claim that Luffy slew the scientist, a story Vivi knows is a lie.

Far away on Egghead, Sakazuki struggles to raise anyone by snail while a fleeing Sentomaru takes to open water in a small boat. Kizaru lifts the receiver, says the survivors remain knocked out, and pledges a complete report once they rouse. Cautioned against careless work, he turns the matter over, asking whether the admiral has ever lost a dear companion. He thinks back to being dispatched to "arrest" the inventor, a thin pretext for harnessing his mind, and to the hand he had in raising the island itself. Weeping, he dares Sakazuki to descend and judge the ruin firsthand, and the admiral relents.

Tethered nearby, the Thousand Sunny carries Jinbe and Franky, who marvel that the crew slipped past so many threats at all: the Elders, then Kizaru, CP0, a line of Seraphim, and a wall of warships. Zoro coldly dismisses Luffy as pathetic for sulking. Then Lilith stirs awake, ringed by Usopp, Chopper, Nami, and Sanji, who apologize for saving only her, yet she reveals she already grasps the full account.

Once her tears pass, Lilith heads to the table, sees Luffy miserably eating over his broken vow, and explains that the others perished only in a conceptual sense. By her telling, the Stella and every satellite besides York remain functional, so Luffy partly honored his promise and should lift his spirits. He does, thanking the giants before the proper feast starts, and when asked who will seize the One Piece, he names himself without doubt. A supplementary note clarifies that, years earlier during the inventor's MADS days, it was Borsalino who carried out his arrest.

Belonging to the Egghead Arc and carrying a Yamato pilgrimage cover, the installment turns on the friendship that fuels Kizaru's grief. With the satellites' apparent deaths softened, the ship sets a heading for Elbaph, where a darkened figure, eventually identified as Scopper Gaban, waits for the captain to arrive.