"Drink this. You need to rest properly now; your mental exhaustion is too severe."
A cute little reindeer handed a potion to Shin, whose face under his helmet was as pale as a corpse. He hesitated, took the potion, and drank the pale purple liquid in one gulp.
"Thank you, Doctor Chopper," he said in a low voice.
The group in front of him was, without a doubt, the Straw Hat Pirates, the main characters of One Piece.
Chopper seriously looked at the gamma-glycine mental stabilization and enhancement potion in his hand, then stuck out his tongue and licked it. The reindeer doctor immediately guessed what kind of potion it was.
"A powerful stimulant that severely stimulates the mind and brain. If you use too much of this, you'll die!"
"If I hadn't used it, Doctor Chopper, I would have already died," Shin forced a smile, gasping for breath.
"Huh, how did you know my name?" Chopper asked, tilting his head in a rather innocent and curious way, as if just realizing it.
"The Straw Hat Pirates who attacked Enies Lobby, your names have been echoing throughout the seas this past month."
Shin looked up at Robin and Sanji, who were observing him with scrutinizing gazes, and Luffy and Franky, who were surrounding Barbatos, shouting and red-faced. Zoro and Brook were resting with their eyes closed. He let out a long breath.
If he had encountered any other pirate crew, Shin would never have relaxed his guard, but with the Straw Hats, he felt at ease.
At least in the treacherous environment of One Piece, the Straw Hat crew could be considered a pure group. These people wouldn't harbor any ill intentions towards Shin.
"Compared to you, we're not that famous," the intelligent black-haired beauty, Nico Robin, said subtly, looking at the scarred Barbatos.
"Iron Giant, the big shot who almost killed Emperor Big Mom three months ago, debuted with a 1.7 billion bounty, then increased it twice, now a super pirate with a 1.9 billion bounty."
"One... one point nine billion!!!"
Luffy, beside him, was so surprised his mouth couldn't close. Sanji glanced at him and retorted, "What are you surprised about? Didn't you just see his wanted poster a few days ago?"
"Uncle, are you that amazing? You're worth 1.9 billion! What did you do, Uncle?"
Luffy immediately rushed to Shin's side, asking curiously and expectantly, as if whatever Shin said he did, Luffy would immediately try to imitate.
"I just tried to assassinate a fat old hag, and failed."
Shin exhaled lightly, not bothering with being called 'uncle' by someone his age, since his outer appearance made it impossible to tell his age. He just said it lightly,
"Can't compare to you all, daring to attack Enies Lobby. I'm more curious how you weren't completely wiped out by an Admiral after doing something like that?"
The Straw Hats' attack on Enies Lobby seemed incredibly weak — and indeed it was incredibly weak — but in the World Government's hierarchy, Enies Lobby's status was equivalent to Marineford's.
Enies Lobby managed trials and law, Marineford was the military headquarters, and Impel Down housed prisoners. In the framework set by the World Government, the three institutions were of parallel rank.
What Luffy's group did, in reality, would be like attacking the supreme judicial headquarters, burning their flags, and breaking prisoners out of jail. It was practically spitting in the government's face.
So, after the Straw Hats accomplished this major feat, they immediately received a Buster Call. However, the Buster Call sent to deal with them was theoretically the smallest scale.
The maximum scale of a Buster Call includes one or more Admirals, 5 Vice Admirals, 10 Rear Admirals, nearly ten thousand elite Marines, and 10 top-tier battleships.
For Enies Lobby to be smashed, it would theoretically not be an exaggeration to deploy the largest scale Buster Call, the level used to deal with Douglas Bullet in the movie Stampede. However, the Buster Call sent to deal with Luffy's group only had Vice Admirals present, and Aokiji, who initiated the Buster Call, simply stood by and watched.
In fact, even the Vice Admirals didn't have much chance to act. The Straw Hats surviving was truly due to strong luck + a powerful background.
"Hitting one person can get you a 1.9 billion bounty? Ah ha ha ha ha ha ha, who was that person? I want to try too!" Luffy raised his fist and laughed.
Sanji and Robin rolled their eyes. Besides Nami, the only reliable ones in the crew who knew a bit about news from the sea were the two of them. The "fat old hag" Shin mentioned was one of the four Emperors reigning over the seas.
"What are you doing here, Iron Giant?" Robin narrowed her eyes, asking with a subtle tone.
"Could it be... that this is your secret base?"
They had just been tricked by Shiki, who had even taken their companion Nami, and were now preparing to find Shiki and rescue Nami.
"No... I just fled here," Shin looked up, his tone even more subtle.
"But I was originally planning to come here anyway. I just ran into someone who was looking for trouble on the way. We fought, and then he chased me all the way here..."
"Fought..." Sanji raised an eyebrow slightly. To fight a 1.9 billion bounty target and even make them retreat... could it be?
The next moment, an extremely furious Conqueror's Haki, accompanied by an angry roar, echoed throughout the entire island chain.
"GET OUT HERE!!!!!"
"See, he's caught up," Shin said blandly, pointing at Kaido in the sky.
Sanji's mouth opened slightly, so startled that the cigarette in his mouth dropped. Robin's eyes narrowed slightly. Zoro opened his eyes and glanced. Luffy and Chopper shouted, "What a big mud eel!"
"Could it be..." Robin looked at Shin, astonished.
"Yes, that guy is Kaido, the Leader of the Beast Pirates."
...
"Get out, you brat, get out here!!!!!"
Kaido's furious roar echoed across the island and through the sky like rolling thunder. The layered dark clouds were scattered by his enraged bellow.
In his extreme rage, Kaido had clearly lost some of his ability to think, or rather, he simply didn't care what place he was destroying.
Thundering lightning descended from the sky, and savage heat breaths, accompanied by strong winds, transformed into fiery tornadoes sweeping across the land.
This was a Yonko, a human-shaped natural disaster, an emperor of pirates. Each was a being that "monster" alone could not describe.
Luffy and his crew on the ground widened their mouths. They had witnessed the power of strong individuals on the seas; they had even defeated two Warlords of the Sea. Even if they didn't outwardly admit it, they had indeed developed a bit of 'pride'.
Since the Warlords and the Navy were forces that balanced the Yonko, then even if they couldn't defeat a Yonko, they should at least be able to fight them, right?
Reality delivered the most direct slap in their faces.
In Kaido's rampant, rage-fueled attacks, both Luffy and Zoro deeply understood that in front of such a monster, they couldn't even withstand a single blow.
It was more despairing than facing Bartholomew Kuma. Back then, they could attribute their inability to win to fatigue after a great battle. But facing this Kaido, even at their full strength, they couldn't shake this disaster-causing monster.
"Cough cough cough, the owner of this island isn't a pushover either. I brought him up here because the owner here will definitely fight him."
Shin coughed violently a few times, but the expression under his mask looked a bit better, clearly the effect of Chopper's medicine.
"Then who is the owner here?" Robin turned her head, her shocked expression gone, and asked gravely.
"You'll know soon..."
"Who! Which bastard dares to mess around on my turf!!!"
A golden figure shot up into the sky from the center of the island like a meteor. A powerful aura, carrying a hint of Conqueror's Haki, confronted Kaido!
When Shiki flew in front of Kaido, he paused for two seconds, then shouted loudly,
"You... you're that brat from the ship back then, what was your name again?"
"Shiki? You old bastard, Shiki?"
Kaido was also surprised to see Shiki. He hadn't expected his 'old friend' to still be alive.
He and Shiki were old acquaintances. One could even say they were old-generation pirate overlords: Kaido, Big Mom, Whitebeard, Shiki, and many other once-famous powerful pirates were all old acquaintances.
Because they had all once served the same captain, and had all been on the same ship.
The Rocks Pirates, a terrifying group that ruled the entire sea nearly forty years ago. Compared to them, the power of the Four Emperors couldn't even hold a candle.
Among the Four Emperors, Kaido, the third youngest, had also served on the Rocks Pirates' ship back then. However, at that time, he was merely an apprentice pirate of the Rocks Pirates, while Shiki, Whitebeard, and Big Mom had already been serving on Rocks' ship for a long time.
And at that time, Shiki's status was actually far higher than the future Yonko, because of his Devil Fruit ability, his powerful naval combat talent, and his formidable personal strength. His position in the Rocks Pirates was infinitely close to that of a first mate.
At that time, Kaido was just an apprentice pirate. The hierarchical relationship between these two was equivalent to Silvers Rayleigh and Buggy the Clown. Yes, Kaido's status in the Rocks Pirates was that humble back then.
Robin and the others listened wide-eyed as Shin recounted this old secret. It was indeed hard to believe that the pirate emperors who now ruled the seas and dominated the New World had once all served one man.
"The Pirate King was only crowned with that title because he reached Laugh Tale, but that doesn't mean he was the most terrifying or powerful pirate crew at sea."
Shin looked at the sight of the dragon and lion meeting in the sky and said lightly,
"In fact, the defeat of the Rocks Pirates back then was full of coincidences. Most importantly, it was the alliance between Pirate King Gol D. Roger and Marine Hero Garp, along with the full assistance of the Navy, that finally ended Rocks' ambition in God Valley."
"Huh, so Grandpa was that amazing?" Luffy tilted his head, looking dazed.
That guy's perception and dictionary probably didn't contain any awe for strong people, or rather, his only respect and focus was on the ultimate goal of becoming the Pirate King.
"Then, according to you, aren't we in a very dangerous situation?" Robin's voice trembled slightly.
They hadn't expected that the person they were chasing was a man who once dominated the seas and was the only one to ever escape Impel Down. Now, that man was also an old acquaintance of a Yonko. Was it still possible for them to save Nami?
"No, you don't need to worry..." Shin narrowed his eyes, his gaze somewhat hazy.
"I don't know what the relationship between those two guys is like, but given Shiki's semi-brain-damaged state, they're definitely going to fight..."
"Jie ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha, Kaido brat, I heard you're some kind of Yonko now?"
Seeing his 'old friend', Shiki laughed heartily, cigar in mouth, his expression amused and maliciously mocking.
"I thought you'd never get out of Linlin's chest. After all, you two had a very 'good' relationship back then."
"How is it? Did you two have a child? Is the child with her or with you?"
"You're dead, old man, I'm going to kill you today!!!"
In less than three sentences, Kaido was provoked by Shiki, and Shiki, whether intentionally or not, was unlikely to tolerate the humiliation of Kaido suddenly coming to his territory and causing such a disturbance.
If a clear-headed Shiki, his pride would not allow a junior from his former pirate crew to insult him so. If it was a foolish Shiki, it would be even more direct.
"Boro Breath!!!"
A scorching, brilliant white flame swept out in a fan shape towards Shiki. But Shiki, floating in the air, merely showed a condescending gaze and lightly raised his palm.
"Lion's Threat: Imperial Earth Command!"
Surging seawater mixed with the blizzards drifting from the sky, converged before Shiki into a colossal lion's head, roaring as it met Kaido's Boro Breath.
The surging flames and the furious wind-and-snow lion's head collided, erupting in high-temperature steam that enveloped the entire sky.
"Lion: Thousand Grinding Valley!!!"
Shiki's figure maneuvered and flickered in the air. His beloved swords "Oto" and "Kogarashi," replacing his legs, danced like phantoms, unleashing several sword slashes that cut through mountain-sized thick water areas!
Kaido, maneuvering his body, struck the golden slashes with lightning, but still allowed several sword slashes to land on him, carving out bloody wounds.
For a moment, these two were evenly matched!
"Just as expected..." Shin murmured, Shiki was indeed not as 'lame' as he was in the movie.
After all, simply dividing a person's strength by level is a foolish act. Reality is not a game; there is no situation where a lower level cannot break a higher level's defense. As long as the conditions are right, an ordinary Marine could potentially kill an Admiral.
Did Shiki look weak in the movie? Yes, losing to a Gear Third Luffy was practically the epitome of weakness.
But was his display of power weak? In several confrontations with Luffy's crew, he had the ability to instantly kill the entire group with ease. Several times, he could be said to have easily let Luffy's crew go. The power of the Fuwa Fuwa no Mi was completely awakened and had been developed to its peak in his hands.
Awakening of Paramecia Devil Fruits comes in two forms: one is like Katakuri and Doflamingo, who transform other substances into substances in their hands; the other is like Shiki and Whitebeard, who extend their Devil Fruit abilities to other substances.
It wasn't the Gura Gura no Mi that was powerful; it was Whitebeard who was powerful. The same logic applies to Shiki.
Not everyone can develop their Devil Fruit to the extent of Shiki, who could float islands weighing hundreds of millions of tons into the sky. If floating in the sky is a Devil Fruit ability, then Shiki raising it to high altitudes and developing the Fuwa Fuwa no Mi to its current level is proof of his immense power.
As for his defeat to Luffy, it was purely because his condition was indeed poor.
As a great swordsman, he was forced to abandon his hands and wield swords with his legs, and the rudder stuck in his forehead clearly made Shiki's mind extremely abnormal.
And because of this, his Haki could barely be utilized due to his abnormal neurological state.
Haki is a manifestation of spirit and willpower, and Shiki, whose mind was completely warped, was even worse than Chinjao, whose head was smashed by Garp. Coupled with his advanced age and weakened body, and without Armament Haki for twenty years without fighting, it was only normal for him to be knocked unconscious by a single punch from Luffy.
But this is not a reason to underestimate Shiki. This guy's weakness was due to his unstable condition. If specific conditions were met, this guy could very well recover the strength of the former Sky Pirate Fleet Admiral.
"Wow, so amazing..."
Luffy's eyes widened, watching the spectacular and chaotic battle in the sky. Yet, in his eyes, there was only joy and awe, no fear whatsoever.
Shin glanced at him and said indifferently,
"Soon, a winner will be decided. Shiki is about to lose."
"How could that be... I thought he was gaining the upper hand?"
Zoro frowned and said, as a swordsman, he could see Shiki's powerful swordsmanship, which was almost superior to Kaido's at the moment.
"What was your first impression of Shiki?" Shin didn't directly answer the question, but instead countered,
"Did you think he was like a madman? You're right, the current Shiki..."
"He's already completely mad."
-----
Give me Powerstones,
100 Powerstones = 1 Chapter
[Maximum Bonus 7 Chapters]