However, just as Shiki was basking in the feeling of absolute power, his gaze inadvertently swept past the railing of his golden flagship.
He noticed something small, insignificant, yet infuriatingly familiar, drifting lazily over the side of the island he had just claimed – his favorite, custom-made coconut hammock, perfect for sunbathing. He loved that hammock.
At that very moment, down on the deck of the Sexy Foxy, the hippo-shaped referee, who had been nervously scanning the sky with binoculars, let out a piercing, terrified scream.
"Cap... Captain! That flag! Look at the flag on the big ship! THAT'S SHIKI'S FLAG!"
Upon hearing that name, the boisterous, angry atmosphere on the Foxy Pirates' ship instantly froze.
It was as if a switch had been flipped, plunging them all into a state of icy, paralyzing shock.
Everyone stood there as if their souls had been snatched away, staring blankly, the sounds of the waves and the distant grinding of rock suddenly deafeningly loud.
The entire Silver Fox Pirates crew, lined up neatly on the deck ready for their glorious "island snatching game," collectively lifted their eyes.
They gazed up, past the rising islands, to the towering mast of the golden flagship.
Atop that mast, a faded, tattered skull flag fluttered vigorously in the wind.
The crossed dual blades beneath the skull appeared ancient, yet still exuded an intimidating, bloodthirsty aura.
The lightning-like golden mane entwined around the skull shimmered with an eerie glow in the wind, as if alive.
It was a flag whispered about in legends, a symbol from a bygone era of unparalleled piracy.
"The Flying Pirates…" Hamburger whispered, his voice trembling, the meat skewer slipping from his nerveless fingers.
"The crew that rivaled Whitebeard himself?"
"It's… it's really him," Porche breathed, her usual bubbly energy replaced by wide-eyed terror.
"Golden Lion Shiki!"
"Boss! We're in big trouble! This is bad! Really bad! Let's get out of here!" one of the crewmates shrieked, already looking for a place to hide.
"Who cares if it's a lion or a tiger or a damn flying goldfish!" Foxy, standing nearby, roared, snapping out of his shock and into pure, unadulterated rage.
He slammed his fist into the ship's railing beside him.
With a loud CRACK, the sturdy wood shattered into splinters under his full-force blow.
Veins bulged on Foxy's neck like winding earthworms, his face flushed a furious purple.
His pink cloak flapped violently, stirred not by the wind, but by the sheer, overloaded energy leaking from his Devil Fruit ability.
"HE STOLE MY HAMMOCK! AND MY ISLAND! GIVE ME BACK MY BEACH!" he screamed incoherently.
"FEHFEHFEHFEH! I'm gonna play a game of island snatching with HIM!"
At his nonsensical command, the pirate ship, against all reason and survival instincts, shot forward like an arrow, churning up massive white waves as it charged towards the Yonko-level legend.
Just then, Porche, recovering her nerve with practiced cheerfulness, shook her pom-poms, which erupted into a dazzling display of colorful, distracting fireworks.
"Go, go, Foxy Pirates!" she cheered weakly.
Immediately after, the Silver Fox Pirates' signature weapon swarmed out from hidden compartments all over the ship: the split boats.
Dozens of these small, ridiculously modified vessels sped across the water like angry water bugs, leaving white trails as they charged toward their impossible target.
When the thirty assault boats arrived beneath the newly claimed, still rising island, Shiki, who had been enjoying the view, finally turned his head slowly, an expression of utter boredom on his face.
"Silver Fox Foxy," he spoke, his voice carrying effortlessly over the wind and waves, dripping with a profound disdain, like a king commenting on a particularly annoying insect.
"Bounty… twenty-four million Berries." He almost laughed.
Twenty-four million.
It was less than the cost of the wine he'd just thrown overboard.
He gestured dismissively at the island still ascending above him.
"Your island?" Shiki casually waved his right hand. In that instant, the largest island of the Long Ring Long Land chain, miles away, suddenly tore free from the sea with a deafening, earth-shattering roar.
The massive landmass, complete with its unique stretched-out flora and fauna, slowly rose into the sky, casting an even larger shadow.
Simultaneously, several smaller surrounding islands also broke away, following it upward like obedient children.
Shiki turned his cold gaze back down to Foxy.
"It's mine now."
The sheer, effortless arrogance, the casual display of world-bending power, left Foxy momentarily stunned into silence.
This man… he was even more shameless, more infuriatingly dismissive than him!
"THIS PISSES ME OFF!" Foxy shrieked, finding his voice again.
Just then, up in the sky, Hamburger, peering through binoculars from one of the split ships, pointed his meat skewer toward Shiki.
"Cap… Captain! Look! He doesn't have a helm stuck in his forehead! He looks different from the wanted poster!"
"They… they say he went mad twenty years ago," Porche added, her voice filled with confusion.
The man floating nonchalantly above them, radiating an aura of absolute control, showed no signs of madness at all. Just pure, terrifying power.
Foxy also eyed Shiki suspiciously. Something wasn't right here.
This wasn't the broken, crazed legend he'd heard stories about.
This was something else. Something worse.
"Even so," Foxy declared, his pride overriding his rapidly diminishing survival instincts.
"I MUST TAKE BACK MY ISLAND!"
Just then, the previously calm atmosphere was instantly shattered.
Shiki's tall and imposing figure seemed to simply evaporate before everyone's eyes, vanishing from his position without a sound or trace.
In the blink of an eye, faster than anyone could follow, he reappeared like a ghost directly above Foxy's fleet of flimsy split ships.
"You noisy pests," he growled, annoyance finally coloring his tone.
Instantly, a terrifying wave of pure, undiluted Conqueror's Haki erupted from him.
It wasn't the joyous, celebratory burst from before; this was cold, sharp, and utterly overwhelming.
It surged downwards like a raging, invisible tsunami.
With an earth-shattering CRACKLE of displaced air, the thirty neatly arranged, aggressive split ships were instantly, simultaneously shattered into kindling.
They didn't just break; they exploded outwards, wood splinters flying like shrapnel, metal twisting like paper, debris scattering everywhere as if hit by a massive bomb.
The sea surface erupted in a chaotic spray of massive waves.
The pirates aboard vanished in the blink of an eye, either knocked unconscious and drowned or simply vaporized by the sheer force of will.
Shiki showed no intention of stopping.
He stood firmly on empty air as if stepping on invisible stairs, descending slowly towards the main ship, the Sexy Foxy.
Each footfall carried an immense weight, the air compressing violently under his steps, forming visible, circular sonic booms that echoed like rolling thunder across the sea.
"You want the island?" Shiki's voice reverberated over the now eerily quiet sea, like a judgment delivered from the depths of hell.
As his words fell, he raised his legs high, his sword-limbs gleaming with Haki and the faint, golden shimmer of his Phoenix flames.
He slashed downward through the air.
"Lion's Threat: Earth Wave Slicer!"
A brilliant, horizontal crescent of golden energy erupted from his legs.
It wasn't just sword energy; it was infused with the fire of the phoenix and the crushing force of his Haki.
It wasn't aimed at the ship, but at the sea in front of it.
The sea was instantly torn apart.
The seawater violently surged to both sides as if ripped open by an invisible, colossal hand.
A kilometer-long chasm appeared on the surface, a bottomless trench like a massive wound torn into the earth.
Seawater continuously poured into it with a thunderous roar, splashing spray like giant blooming flowers reaching dozens of meters high, creating a temporary, impassable wall of churning water and mist.
"If you want it," Shiki roared, his voice filled with a chilling killing intent, "trade your life for it!"
Not far away, Foxy was in a rather sorry state.
He had been thrown back by the Haki wave, his exquisite pink suit torn in multiple places.
He stared, trembling, at the impossible chasm in the sea, then up at the reassembling, stolen islands in the clouds.
His eyes revealed traces of raw fear, but also a stubborn, furious resentment.
Suddenly, Foxy let out a piercing, high-pitched shriek that grated on the ears.
"EVEN IF YOU'RE A LEGEND—"
At the same time, a strange, sickly pink light began to gather in his gloved palm.
The light grew increasingly intense, gradually forming a dense, pulsating flare as brilliant and unnatural as a radioactive sun.
This was his ultimate weapon, the culmination of his Slow-Slow Fruit power.
"—YOU CAN'T STEAL MY NAPPING SPOT!" Foxy roared, hurling the Slow-Time Light Wave with all his might, not at Shiki, but spreading it out in a wide arc across the entire area between them.
In an instant, the entire sea area fell into an eerie, viscous state, as if time itself had been stretched infinitely thick, like molasses.
Everything caught within the pinkish field became incredibly, agonizingly slow.
Shiki's descending figure, the churning waves, even the falling debris from the destroyed split ships, all crept forward at a snail's pace.
The Silver Fox Pirates, however, unaffected by their captain's power, suddenly moved with blinding speed relative to their surroundings.
"FEHFEHFEH! Now's our chance!" Foxy shrieked triumphantly. "Board the islands! While the old geezer is stuck in slow motion, we'll finish him off!"
"This is my moment to make a name for myself!" Hamburger roared, brandishing his giant fork.
"Fufufufu! Victory is ours!" Porche cheered, shaking her pom-poms as they scrambled onto ropes dangling from the slowly rising islands, ready to claim their prize.