Chapter 1608 They were all lying neatly together.

Amidst the deathly silence of the ruins, a palpable sense of oppression permeated the air, leaving the Five Elders in an unusual dilemma.

Itsumade's Observation Haki scan, covering the entire island, was like the most sophisticated radar, sweeping over every inch of land, every pile of rubble, and even the depths of the earth.

The result was still an empty void; apart from a few scattered, faint signals, there were no other noteworthy signs of life.

The sandworms thoroughly searched the entire island, from east to west and from south to north.

Its enormous body burrowed into the ground, stirring up towering waves of earth and shattering everything in its path, but it gained nothing but more pits.

Luffy, Kid, Eren, Reiner, and even the CP9 agents—none of their bodies were found.

“This is unreasonable,” Nasujiro Sei’s icy voice broke the silence.

He surveyed the mess before him, wondering, "Could it be that some force really rescued them right under our noses?"

This conjecture made the Five Elders' hearts sink. What kind of methods were needed to quietly rescue so many people under the blockade of Itsumade and the rampage of sandworms?

Is it Bucky the Clown lurking in the shadows? Or some other unknown force?

Nasujiro stared at the ruins, lost in thought. Should he leave or not?

If we were to return to the Holy Land now and report back to Lord Im, claiming that the target had been eliminated, but were unable to produce any concrete evidence of a corpse, it would undoubtedly be extremely dangerous.

If the body is not found, go to Lord Im to claim the reward. If one day that straw hat boy suddenly reappears in some corner of the sea, the consequences will be unimaginable.

They deceived Lord Im by falsely reporting their battle results!

Let Joy Boy continue to live!

Any one of these would be enough to provoke the wrath of the Celestial Dragons, and at that time, these five old guys would probably have to suffer unimaginable punishment, or even be wiped out on the spot.

"Did they really fall into the sea?"

After all, Feng Xi's roar was incredibly powerful, and it wasn't impossible for it to blow people into the sea. However, given their strength, the chances of them surviving a fall into the sea seemed slim.

"Fishman Island, that cowardly King Neptune doesn't have the guts to protect the people we want to kill."

Satan Saint sneered, "Neptune wouldn't dare offend the Five Elders and start a war with all the Celestial Dragons for a few pirates he's never even met."

"Even if Luffy really is Joy Boy and has some kind of agreement with the mermaid princess from the past, that's all in the past."

"Neptune now knows very well what he should and shouldn't do."

However, even after ruling out Fishman Island and concluding that their target had perished at sea, the unease of not seeing the person alive or dead still hung like a dark cloud over the two Elders.

Will Lord Im accept this outcome?

On the edge of the ruins where they were, in an extremely inconspicuous corner, lay the remains of what should have been a small shop, long since reduced to dust in the roar of destruction.

But if someone could see through the surface of the space with a perspective that transcends common sense and peer into the gaps beneath, then he would see a perfectly intact little shop, swaying in the dim light.

It seemed to exist independently of time and space, quietly suspended in a boundless void.

The shop sign was blurry and the window displayed some strange objects that were hard to describe, as if they came from different eras and different worlds.

Inside the shop, several figures lay sprawled on the floor.

Luffy, Kid, Eren and his sister, Lucci and other CP9 members are all still alive, but they are in a deep coma and have more or less injuries. The deadly roar did not really take their lives.

Perhaps it was because of Kidd; his specially made metal helmet provided some protection at the last moment, making him the first person in the store to wake up.

Kidd groaned softly and slowly opened his eyes, where he saw a familiar wooden ceiling.

"Where is this..." Kidd's consciousness was still a little hazy, but the sense of familiarity stirred his heart. It seemed like he had been here before.

He struggled to sit up, his only remaining left arm supporting him on the ground. The surroundings were quiet, without any sense of danger. The dim light even gave him a strange sense of security.

He glanced at the people lying on the ground: Luffy, Eren and his sister, several allies, and those CP9 lackeys, all lying neatly together.

"There are quite a few people here this time," Kidd recalled the terrifying roar, the destructive sound waves that entered his ears, and then everything went black.

He stood up unsteadily, and with his only remaining left hand, he laboriously reached into his tattered inner pocket and rummaged around for a moment before pulling out a small card with a peculiar texture, which seemed to be neither gold nor paper.

It was the owner of this business card who, at the critical moment, rescued them from the Five Elders' deadly attack.

He carefully put the business card away and looked around the shop again. The layout was almost unchanged: old wooden counters, dusty strange objects, abstract paintings on the walls with unclear meanings, and an old smell permeating the air.

The only difference was that the high-backed chair behind the counter, which usually housed a blurry figure, was now empty.

Is the shop owner not home?

He tried to sense his body, and sure enough, the power belonging to the Magnet-Magnet Fruit seemed to be dormant, with no reaction from the fruit's ability.

In this shop, he felt like an ordinary person, even more powerless. This feeling of being completely stripped of his power was unpleasant.

Here, his arrogant temper would be greatly restrained. He was a realist who knew how to treat people according to their status. When facing an unspeakable strongman, he had no right to make a loud noise or provoke him recklessly.

He simply walked silently toward the shop's rustic wooden door.

Taking a deep breath, Kidd reached out and pushed open the door.

Outside the door, there was neither the ruins of the Sabaody Archipelago as one might have imagined, nor any familiar scene.

It's nothingness!

Pure, boundless nothingness, without sky, without earth, without starlight, without clouds, and even without the concept of space.

There was only a profound, chilling darkness, and a deathly silence that seemed to devour everything, even melting existence itself; nothing existed, nothing was left.

Only this small shop, bathed in dim yellow light, stood out like a solitary island in a vast void, a unique point of reference.

"Where...is this?"

Kidd's pupils contracted slightly. Even though this was his third time here and the third time he had seen this scene, he was still overwhelmed with shock and a hint of instinctive fear. Everything in the shop was beyond his comprehension.

"It's good that we're not in the Sabaody Archipelago for now," he muttered to himself, trying to justify his strange situation.

He gently closed the door, shutting out that unsettling void.

Turning around, looking at the crowd still unconscious on the ground, Kidd's face showed a complicated expression.

The only certainty is that we are safe for now.