Rebecca and Soldier-san

Rebecca sits in the prison dorms with her hands over her face and finally says the truth behind her tears: "Soldier-san... is going to die." Luffy asks, "Soldier...?" and she explains that he is "a toy soldier... with just one leg..." Luffy remembers the toy at the colosseum entrance and says, "Didn't I meet someone like that near the colosseum entrance?" Rebecca confirms, "Yeahh... that was definitely him..." The prisoners nearby warn that they cannot leave the colosseum and cannot do anything about events outside, even if something needs doing. The page narrows the wide political rebellion into Rebecca's private fear: Soldier is not an abstract rebel leader to her, but the one person she is terrified of losing.

Luffy is confused that Rebecca is so worried about a toy, and she answers carefully. She says, "Given that you're an outsider, I didn't imagine that you'd understand... but they are the same as humans." In Dressrosa, toys become friends to the friendless, siblings for only children, and companions to lonely singles; because of those bonds, Rebecca says she does not understand why humans and toys are not allowed to live together. The images show toys integrated into families and daily life, not as tools but as emotional replacements. Rebecca then explains her own wound: "I... I'm the only one left from my family, but from the day my mother passed away... I was raised by Soldier-san... to me... he's no less than a real parent...!!"

The announcement from outside interrupts Rebecca's confession: "Rebecca, your match is gonna start!" and "Thank you for waiting patiently. The new ring is now in place!!" Luffy notices Soldier and mutters, "Ehhh... that guy..." while Rebecca quietly answers, "...Yeah." She apologizes for the food, saying she knows Luffy spent everything he had on her and that the two colosseum lunchboxes fell on the floor during their little fight. Luffy still eats them from the ground with "Chomp chomp," insisting, "But even though they fell, they're still real tasty!!" Rebecca smiles at him and says, "You really don't look like a prisoner." Luffy answers simply, "I'll see you in the finals."

As D-Block fighters head for the ring, Rebecca remembers a gentler past. A small Rebecca cries "Mommy!!" while her mother Scarlet works in a flower field. Scarlet points out the flowers, saying, "Lookit all the flowers!" and little Rebecca answers, "Oh, Rebecca." At home, Scarlet laughs and thanks her daughter for helping her work: "Thank you for helping me work! Now let's go to town to sell them." The memory is warm and ordinary: a small house, a table, flowers, and a mother teaching her child a life outside courtly splendor. Against the looming colosseum match, the quiet domestic panels show what Rebecca lost before she ever became a gladiator.

The flashback darkens on the night Dressrosa changed. People shout, "What happened to the king!?" "Stop it!!" and "The Riku Royal Fighters have set fire to the town!!" Scarlet looks toward the burning palace and asks, "What's happening in this country...?" while another voice cries, "The palace... it's burning!!" She flees with young Rebecca as soldiers or rioters rush through the fields, and someone screams, "Run away, Scarlet-sama!!" The attack shatters the flower-field life in a single page. What Rebecca remembers is not political theory but smoke, panic, the palace burning, her mother's fear, and the first moment the Riku name became a curse in the mouths of the people.

A dark figure attacks through the chaos, mocking Rebecca as "this little shrimp" while people shout, "Run!! Run far away!" and "Out of our way!!" Rebecca and Scarlet are separated by pursuit, smoke, and fields of flowers. Scarlet tells her daughter, "Rebecca... can I leave you alone, just for a bit?" Rebecca answers that she is hungry, and Scarlet apologizes: "I'm sorry, of course you are. It's been two whole days..." She asks Rebecca to promise not to move from the spot and says, "I'll go get us something to eat..." Rebecca agrees with "Okay." The page is painful because the promise is ordinary and doomed: a child waits in a flower field while her mother leaves for food in a city collapsing under violence.

Rebecca waits among the flowers until she hears "Rustle rustle" and calls, "Mommy!?" Instead, Soldier appears, breathing hard with "Haa!! Haa!! Wheeze...!!" and carrying Scarlet's body. He cries, "I couldn't! I couldn't protect her...!!!" and then says, "Sorry... you've been hungry, and waiting...!! ...She told me to give you this." He gives Rebecca food from Scarlet, but his grief spills out: "I couldn't protect your mother... I'm so sorry!!!" The page lets the child's hunger and the adult's guilt collide at the same moment. Rebecca wanted her mother to come back with food; Soldier comes instead with the food and the body, and with the failure that will define both of their lives.

Rebecca remembers the final trace of her mother in the food Scarlet sent. As she repeats, "Mommy, I'm hungry..." the bread sits in Soldier's hand, and the child tries to eat through sobs. Then grief breaks loose into a scream: "Aahhhh..." and "Waa..." Soldier apologizes over and over, saying, "I'm sorry!! I'm so sorry!!" Around them, people search the flower field because "I saw some blood on the stairs... He's gotta be hiding around here. Find him!!" Soldier hides Rebecca and says, "Sorry about this..." The page turns the flower field into a burial place and a hiding place at once. Rebecca is not only orphaned; she is immediately hunted because of the bloodline her mother carried.

Soldier tells Rebecca what the new regime means for her. Her mother, he says, "was once... a great person," and Rebecca, with her mother's distinguished blood running through her veins, will also be targeted. He asks, "Did you know that a new king has come to this land?" Then he explains the danger: the new king is capturing all the great people from the past, and he will want to capture Rebecca too. Soldier cannot undo Scarlet's death, but he makes a vow over it: "I couldn't protect your mother, but...!! Even if it costs me my own life, I will protect you!! Until the day when you can truly be happy! I will stand by you until that day!!"

Rebecca's grief does not become gratitude immediately. She cries, "But I want my mommy!!!" and then lashes out at the only guardian left to her: "You couldn't protect my mommy. I hate you, Soldier-san!!!" Soldier tries to coax her away, saying, "Well... how about this!?" and promising that the new king's friends are lying in wait in town and in her house, so they must go home. Below them, the colosseum and city erupt with cries of "Doflamingo!" and "Doflamingo-sama!!" while the crowd welcomes the new ruler. The page shows the personal and national tragedy together: Rebecca mourns Scarlet, and Dressrosa, unaware or manipulated, cheers for the man whose takeover made that death possible.

Doflamingo presents himself to Dressrosa as a savior. From a balcony, he tells the crowd, "For hundreds of years now, this destitute country has been ruled over by the Riku Royal Family! Ultimately, that despicable family greedily stole away money and resources from you, the people!!" He promises, "I will bring... prosperity to this land!!" The crowd cheers beneath him. Meanwhile, Rebecca's survival is reduced to scraps and danger. Soldier works despite being a toy, telling a man, "Have to make a living," while the man asks whether he can really work. In winter, wild dogs chase Rebecca with "Grrr!" and "Kyahh!!" Soldier charges through the snow to save her, turning his small toy body into her shield again and again.

The years with Soldier are shown in small bruising fragments. Soldier is knocked around, crushed, and sometimes exhausted, but every scene circles back to the same fact: "Soldier-san is always by my side!" Rebecca remembers him bringing warmth, saying "Ahh so warm!" and comforting her when she is cold or crying. She also remembers trying to endure by herself, saying, "Wahh... no... I'm just fine," while Soldier insists she is not alone. The page stacks moments of poverty, hunger, and protection until the repetition becomes the point. Soldier cannot restore what was stolen from Rebecca, but he keeps answering each immediate wound: hunger, cold, loneliness, and fear.

Soldier and Rebecca live as quietly as they can, but hardship reaches even through windows. Soldier asks her to close the window, and Rebecca says no because it is warm. He scolds that the town has turned so cold and that the empty houses and empty streets are still the fault of the new king. Yet he also turns that hardship into care: when Rebecca is hungry, he says he will go to the next town to find a job and bring food from the window sill. He warns her not to open the window or talk to anyone, because the people of the town see what he buys for her and call her selfish for eating while others go hungry. Rebecca listens, trapped between needing help and being blamed for receiving it.

The daily rhythm continues. Soldier greets Rebecca with "Good morning, Soldier-san!" and "Ah, good morning." He brings food, fixes things, chases threats away, and returns to her even when battered. The panels show him kicking, dodging, working, and being knocked through alleys as Rebecca grows from a frightened child into a girl who watches every sacrifice. There are few long speeches here because the repetition is the speech: Soldier has no organic body, no legal place beside her, and no permission to live with her openly, yet he keeps showing up. Rebecca's bond with him is made from breakfasts, repairs, rescue, silence at windows, and the repeated sound of him running back to her.

The town's cruelty grows louder. People look at Rebecca and say, "She's an orphan. Ain't got nobody to look after her." Others decide, "Let's catch her and sell her off." When the door bursts open, Rebecca screams "Ahh!!" Soldier charges in and shouts "Rebecca!" as he smashes the attackers away. They yell "Gyahhh!!" and someone cries, "Let's smash that toy!!!" Rebecca calls, "Soldier-san!!" while Soldier takes the blows meant for her. Afterward, away from the violence, Rebecca apologizes and says, "Forgive me... I'm now a wanted man..." Soldier answers with unexpected tenderness: "Fufufu! But we're together! Now let's find a new place to live!" The page shows why Rebecca sees him as family: he turns exile into survival.

Rebecca begins to imagine a future with Soldier. Sitting beside him, she says, "Someday, I really want to... live in a house together, Soldier-san." Soldier answers, "I will teach you how to fight!" She asks what will happen if something happens to her, and he says, "Nah, that's alright. I've got you, after all." But Scarlet's lesson remains inside Rebecca: "Mother always said it's wrong to hurt others..." Soldier refuses to teach her cruelty. Instead, he says, "So I will teach you how to avoid being hurt, yourself!! Now come at me!!" Rebecca trains, learns to dodge, and later remembers, "You were always by my side. Time and time again you protected me." The page turns her defensive fighting style into a direct inheritance from Soldier's love.

The flashback returns to the present D-Block ring, where Rebecca enters to hatred instead of applause. The crowd screams, "Fuck you!!" "Go to hell, Rebecca!!" "You damn Riku royal!!" and "You member of that rotten family!" Some shout, "Today's the day you'll drop dead!" Rebecca stands alone and answers herself, "I won't lose!!!" The announcer calls her "our colosseum's most beautiful young gladiator," "the phantom princess," and "the fighter who heats up the ring to the boiling point." Luffy, watching from the prison dorms, asks why everyone hates her so much when she seemed so nice and even bought him lunch. A prisoner explains the cruel reason: Rebecca's grandfather is the much-hated former king of the land. Rebecca grips her sword and thinks, "Don't die, Soldier-san...!! Because I..." The chapter ends on her fear and resolve, with a note that One Piece will take a break next week.

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