Chapters · Dressrosa › Punk Hazard

Chapter 684: Don't Do It, Vegapunk

Arc: Punk Hazard · Saga: Dressrosa · Released: 2012-10-15

Summary

Inside Caesar’s lab, Smoker confronts Vergo — the corrupt Marine “base commander” whom the G-5 rank-and-file “worship like a father” — having learned Vergo is a traitor. Vergo, vowing that everyone who knows his secret “will be disappearing,” fights Smoker with a Haki-hardened bamboo staff while Smoker fights to shield his soldiers. Elsewhere, a ruptured gas tank floods Structure B and Sanji leads the G-5 marines and Tashigi in a panicked retreat from the leaking “killer gas,” the once-hostile marines warming to him. From his hated Secret Room in Structure R (2nd floor), Caesar Clown unveils his master plan to his cult-like followers: seal the gates to Structures C and D so the only open route is the 1st-floor room beneath him — Vegapunk’s former command room — whose external vents will let him flood it with the gas weapon “Land of the Dead,” trapping every survivor in a giant locked gas chamber to be broadcast live to his New World “shadow brokers.” When a follower notes the gas resembles “Vegapunk’s gas from four years ago,” Caesar launches into his origin myth — “Don’t do it, Vegapunk!!” — casting himself as the man who tried to stop the mad scientist. The flashback exposes the truth: it was Caesar who insisted on building a weapon to “kill as many pirates as possible,” the Science Division who cried “Don’t do it, Caesar!!”, and Vegapunk who exiled him from the Division — moments before Caesar’s weapon detonated and poisoned the island. As the gates seal and the teams are scattered across the structures, a talking dragon rears up before Luffy at the trash dump.

New reveals

• The four-years-ago disaster was Caesar’s doing, not Vegapunk’s. The flashback (pp. 15–18) shows Caesar arguing for a mass-killing weapon, the Science Division begging him to stop (“Don’t do it, Caesar!!”, p. 16; “Shut down the experiment!!!”, p. 16), Vegapunk exiling him (“You’re exiled from the Science Division, Caesar!”, p. 18), and then the explosion (p. 18) — the accident itself, shown on-page for the first time.
• Caesar’s propaganda inversion. He tells his followers Vegapunk caused it and that he cried “Don’t do it, Vegapunk!!! …but it happened all the same!” (pp. 12–16). The chapter title is Caesar’s lie; the real line was “Don’t do it, Caesar!!”
• The gas weapon is named “Land of the Dead” (named p. 11; delivery via external vents detailed p. 13) — Caesar will pump it through the external vents of Structure R’s 1st floor.
• The gas-chamber plan (pp. 11–14): close the gates to C and D, funnel all survivors into Vegapunk’s former command room beneath the Secret Room, and fill it with no escape; broadcast the slaughter live to the New World’s “shadow brokers.”
• Caesar’s gigantification method (p. 17): “You need to kidnap growing children and pump ‘em full of special drugs!!” Vegapunk’s own human-enlargement experiment “failed again”; Caesar claims his succeeded.
• Caesar’s Marine-weapons context (p. 17): the navy “wants a weapon… that can kill as many pirates as possible”; “Fleet Admiral Sengoku’s ideas are soft… but Admiral Akainu would love some of my weapons”; collateral civilian death is “what I call world peace.”
• Vergo is named and shown fighting Smoker as the traitor “base commander” the G-5 troops idolize (pp. 2–7); he intends to kill all witnesses to his secret (p. 4).
• Vegapunk is established as head of the Naval Science Division at the time, the man who exiled Caesar (p. 18) — and “still sits atop the Naval Science Division” (p. 15).

Foreshadowing seeds planted

Payoffs (seeds from earlier chapters that resolve here)

Mentions / appearances

• Characters: Smoker, Vergo, Caesar Clown, Sanji, Tashigi (referenced/among the fleeing G-5 group), Luffy (p. 19), Trafalgar Law (team caption, p. 19), Nami (team caption, p. 19), Zoro (“Zolo,” team caption, p. 19), Vegapunk (named + flashback, pp. 15, 18), Akainu (named, flashback p. 17), Sengoku (named, flashback p. 17), Caribou (cover only)
• Groups: Marines (G-5; Vergo, Smoker), Caesar’s gas-masked followers/subordinates (a cult that blames Vegapunk for the four-years-ago accident); the New World “shadow brokers” network (off-page, “Joker”)
• Locations: Punk Hazard — Structure A–D map, Structure R (Secret Room 2F + Vegapunk’s former command room 1F), Trash Dump (Structure C), Biscuits Room (Structure B), S.A.D. Room (Structure D), gate R-66 / R-06
• Devil Fruits / techniques: Moku Moku no Mi (Smoker’s smoke + sea-prism jitte), Gasu Gasu no Mi (Caesar’s gas / “Land of the Dead”), Vergo’s Haki-hardened bamboo staff (hardening technique, not named on-page)

Notable panels

• Page 1 (cover): “Caribou’s New World Kee Hee Hee, Vol. 10: Caribou Pirates vs. Naval G-5” — cover-story B-plot, Caribou.
• Pages 2–3: Smoker faces Vergo; “If they knew you were a traitor…”; first clash — “VERGO!!!”
• Pages 5–6: Vergo blocks/strikes with a hardened bamboo staff; close exchange of armament-hardened blows.
• Page 8: the G-5 marines bond with Sanji even mid-flight (“Yeah, man! That was totally sweet!” / “I’ll say this for ya, pal—”).
• Page 11: Caesar in the Secret Room (Structure R, 2F) with the Structure map and the SAD screen; “my experiment performance isn’t complete if they all die this early.”
• Page 13: the gas-chamber diagram — sealing C/D, funneling survivors into the vented 1st-floor room; “fill it with Land of the Dead.”
• Pages 15–18: the four-years-ago flashback — Caesar’s true role, the Science Division’s “Don’t do it, Caesar!!”, Vegapunk’s exile order, and the detonation (mushroom cloud, p. 18).
• Page 19: team positions across the structures; a talking dragon rears up before Luffy at the trash dump.

Open questions raised

• What is “Land of the Dead,” and how lethal is the gas once it fills the sealed room?
• Who are Caesar’s gas-masked followers, and what is their grudge against Vegapunk over the four-years-ago accident?
• What is manufactured in the S.A.D. Room (Structure D), where Team Smoker & Law now are?
• Is the talking dragon at the trash dump the “child who transformed into a dragon” from the Secret Room (Ch. 683)?
• How deep does Vergo’s (and “Joker’s”) infiltration of the Marine high command run?