"Get back here!"
Witnessing the scene, Charlotte Linlin let out a furious roar. Her massive, heavy frame charged forward with savage momentum as she swung the giant saber, Napoleon, aiming to cleave the soaring streak of lightning out of the sky.
"Big Mom, your opponent is me!"
Zephyr's eyes narrowed. Taking a rapid stride forward to intercept her, he threw a barrage of punches that blurred into countless afterimages, whipping up fierce gales that rippled outward.
"Shigan: Black Arm Twin Arrows!!!"
"You damn nuisance!"
Seeing Zephyr block her path yet again, Charlotte Linlin flew into a rabid frenzy. She shrieked at the top of her lungs, "Don't you dare look down on me! I am a Yonko—BIG MOM!!!"
A monstrous, ear-piercing shriek erupted from her throat. Visible ripples of sound waves tore through the atmosphere, expanding violently in concentric rings.
Not good!
In that split second, the horrific, bizarre soundwaves violently battered Zephyr's eardrums as if trying to burst them open, causing his movements to stiffen and lag.
The next moment, accompanied by a howling gale, Charlotte Linlin swung the giant sword Napoleon. The blade struck squarely against Zephyr's momentarily defenseless frame.
CLANG—!!!
A deafening metallic explosion rang out. Under the impact of a tremendous shockwave, Zephyr was sent flying horizontally across the sky, crashing heavily into the ruins hundreds of meters away and kicking up a towering cloud of dust.
"You bastards..."
Charlotte Linlin turned her gaze toward the distant horizon where the bolt of lightning had already touched down. Her face darkened to a terrifying degree, and her physical manifestation of Conqueror's Haki began cracking the stone ground beneath her feet.
Though she possessed absolute confidence in the strength of her children, Enel's arrival as reinforcement meant wiping out the forces at Unzan Port would no longer be a simple matter.
…
Unzan Port, Harbor Area.
Rat-tat-tat-tat-tat... Rat-tat-tat-tat-tat...
Swoosh— Swoosh— Swoosh—
ROAR—!!!
The crisp chatter of machine guns, the piercing whistle of projectiles slicing through the air, and savage, beast-like roars echoed across the battlefield in an unending symphony of war.
Eight-legged steel spiders scaled the walls of surrounding buildings with terrifying agility. From the heavy turrets mounted on their backs, tongues of flame spat continuously. Their 12.7mm heavy armor-piercing rounds shredded the environment, blowing apart cover and severing limbs with horrific ease. Had it not been for the monstrous physical fortitude inherent to the people of this world, a single one of these 12.7mm rounds would have torn a human being completely in half at the waist.
Alongside them were mechanical beasts standing three meters tall and five meters long. Moving on four heavily reinforced legs, these quadrupeds possessed lupine metal heads that radiated a cold, industrial sheen. Their crimson optical sensors swept over the battlefield. With a synchronized whir of gears, the armor on their backs split open to deploy thick, hollowed-out railgun barrels crackling with azure arcs of electricity.
Suddenly, a high-pitched sonic shriek pierced the air. A streak of light, nearly invisible to the naked eye, ripped through the atmosphere. It tore straight through a formation of several hundred Homies Chess Soldiers, leaving dozens dead and mangled in its wake before snapping a massive steel crane on the dock cleanly in two.
"It's the Chris Pirates' Dragonians!"
"Hold the line, quickly! Every single one of them has strength comparable to a pirate with a bounty over a hundred million!"
"Take this!"
Several Big Mom Pirates officers joined forces to withstand the onslaught of seven to eight Dragonians, humanoid killing machines. Their unleashed might tore the surrounding area to pieces, leaving the battlefield heavily scarred.
SHREEE—
A scarecrow with a pumpkin head wielded a knight's longsword. The flashing, snow-white blade hummed through the air, cleanly lopping off the head of a mechanical beast.
Charlotte Kato, Officer of the Big Mom Pirates.
"Damn it! Where did all these bizarre robots and Dragonians come from?!"
Kato glared in shocked rage as hundreds of mechanical weapons and Dragonians continuously poured into the harbor, aligning with the members of the Chris Pirates to push back the Big Mom Pirates' offensive.
Faced with these monsters of steel, the ordinary pirates and Chess Homies were caught completely off guard, suffering catastrophic casualties under the high-tech onslaught.
The Wolf King Type-4 mechanical beasts were particularly devastating; the electromagnetic railguns on their backs fired 50mm tungsten-carbide rounds. Even seasoned pirates with hundred-million-berry bounties could not withstand a direct hit.
"Get out of my way! They're nothing but metal toys!"
A towering silhouette launched himself forward at extreme speed. With a thunderous boom, his fist smashed a steel spider-drone into a mangled heap of scrap metal.
The man boasted a thick, pale-gold beard, wore formal white attire beneath a distinctive hat, and possessed a massive, imposing build.
Charlotte Gala, the 9th son of the Charlotte Family and an Officer of the Big Mom Pirates.
Charlotte Noisette, Charlotte Nusstorte, Charlotte Basskarte, Charlotte Saint-Marc... a swarm of Big Mom Pirates officers showcased their respective abilities, ruthlessly dismantling the mechanical ranks.
The Big Mom Pirates were not without heavy ordnance of their own. After an initial period of chaotic panic, they managed to stabilize their formations.
Due to the absence of top-tier commanders on the field, even with the reinforcements from Alvis Island, the Chris Pirates' military forces could do little more than desperately hold the line, barely preventing their defensive perimeter from collapsing under the Big Mom Pirates' relentless pressure.
CLANG! CLANG! CLANG!
On the coastal docks, Katakuri wielded his trident, launching a blistering assault against Backan.
Trident and massive wheel-axe clashed repeatedly, filling the air with the screech of grinding metal and a brilliant spray of sparks. Utilizing his Future Sight Observation Haki to anticipate every variable, Katakuri disarmed Backan in a matter of exchanges, sending the massive axe spinning through the air.
"Corrosive Heavy Punch!!!"
Backan roared, charging forward bare-handed to drive a brutal fist straight toward Katakuri's head.
In that instant, Katakuri's head liquefied into mochi, shifting to form a hollow gap ahead of time that allowed the heavy fist to pass harmlessly through.
"Unstoppable Mochi Gatling!!!"
With a low mutter, Katakuri reshaped his left arm into a six-barreled gatling gun, pressing it directly against Backan's exposed chest.
"Shit…"
Backan's pupils shrunk to pinpricks. He was completely stripped of the time needed to react.
The next second, the barrels spun into a blur. Rat-tat-tat! A torrential hail of mochi pellets hardened by Armament Haki erupted like a storm of bullets, tearing into Backan at point-blank range.
The sheer volume of the impact forced Backan backward step by agonizing step. The surrounding pavement was chewed into a cratered ruin by the stray rounds, throwing up a dense curtain of dust.
When the tempest finally subsided, Backan had been driven back over a dozen meters. His entire body was heavily lacerated, dripping with fresh blood from the brutal barrage.
"Let me finish you."
Katakuri's left hand reverted to its original state, but his right arm ballooned into a massive, pale-yellow mass of dense mochi. It completely enveloped his trident, spinning at a violent, whistling velocity.
"Mochi Thrust—!!!"
With a sharp shout, Katakuri lunged forward, his drilling arm thrusting ahead with blinding speed.
Yet, in that split second, a dazzling bolt of lightning flashed across his vision.
KABOOM—!!!
The earth groaned as Katakuri's displaced strike bored a perfectly smooth, circular crater into the ground. A violent shockwave accompanied the impact, blasting fragments of shattered stone and dirt outward in a massive wave.
"What a miscalculation... I didn't expect you to arrive so quickly."
Katakuri pulled his trident free from the shattered earth. His calm, heavy gaze shifted toward the side, locking onto the two figures standing amidst the clearing dust, Mountain Axe, Diego Backan, and the God Enel!!