"Hmph. No matter what, I will stall you until every last Marine from Headquarters arrives. Wounds be damned. You are not escaping."
"Is that so? You will be disappointed. I am not only getting out. I am taking you with me."
"Universal Pull. Black Hole."
"Arrogant brat."
Sengoku had not seen what Rakuya did to Zephyr, Sakazuki, and Borsalino. If he had, he would not have spoken so boldly. Trusting in the Giant Buddha's famed defense, he treated the swirling darkness with less caution than it deserved. In his mind, all he had to do was buy time and victory would follow.
He was wrong. The black hole was the most lethal move on the field.
"Hmm?" Sengoku's brows twitched. His eyes flashed as he studied the churning void. "What technique is this?"
"You wanted to see Zephyr and the others. I will send you to them now."
Light sparked in Rakuya's pupils. Gravity roared from his right hand. Everything around him lurched as if the world itself had been unmoored and dragged toward his palm.
"What a pull." Even in his third form, the Giant Buddha, Sengoku felt his massive body skid helplessly toward that impossible darkness.
"Universal Pull. Tenfold Black Hole."
Boom.
Air, sunlight, gravel, splintered trunks, even loose seawater ripped free and funneled into the pitch-black mouth. Pressure spiked. Wind howled. The tide of gravity slammed onto Sengoku like a mountain, sucking him down as if into a bog.
"Shave."
Veins swelling, Sengoku kicked off the air and tried to sling himself against the pull.
"Trying to run?"
Rakuya's smile barely moved.
"Twentyfold. Black Hole."
The ground split with a chain of thunderclaps. Boulders tore free and spun upward. Sand, trees, and spray all knifed past, devoured by the widening void. The very air warped. Space itself shivered.
Terrifying. Sengoku's skin crawled. His will screamed to withdraw.
Before he could, a fresh wave of gravity hammered him from every side.
"Armament Haki."
Cold sweat poured down his temple. He coated his legs in black and kicked again.
"Moonwalk."
He machine-gunned the air a hundred times in a breath, clawing for distance.
"Pointless, Sengoku. Be a good boy and let me bag you."
"Universal Pull. Vacuume Draw. Hundredfold."
Against a giant like the Buddha, Rakuya was stingy with nothing. Gravity surged off his hand like a calamity. The pressure was so brutal that space shattered into glittering shards that sliced the air like knives.
"Arrrgh."
Sengoku roared and tried to flee, but his feet might as well have been nailed in midair. He could not budge.
"Come here."
The word fell. His massive frame lost all control, wrapped in crushing gravity, and plummeted like a falling star. He hit the rim of the black hole and vanished whole.
In that same instant, a sliver of the pull lanced past the clouds into the cold void above. The moon, trundling along its quiet path, hiccuped. That stray tug stalled it for a heartbeat, nudged it by a hair. No eye could see the change, yet that hair's breadth would seed a disaster for the world below.
In minutes the moon crept one centimeter closer. The sea's draw on it strengthened by a breath. The balance between sky and world had shifted, and none on the seas knew. Not the people. Not Rakuya.
"Sengoku." Garp's eyes went bloodshot. He saw the Buddha disappear and bellowed, launching straight at Rakuya.
"Fist-Bone Meteor Shower."
His killing aura erupted, tearing at his cloak with its gale. Armament spread down both arms. Shells the size of basins seemed to sprout from his hands.
"Brat, try my god-cannons."
Face twisted with fury, Garp hurled them in a storm. The barrage blotted the air. Each shell burned white-hot from sheer velocity as it ripped toward the black hole.
Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom.
Blast waves rolled out in slabs, crushing everything flat. The world turned to fire as the storm hammered the darkness.
Sizzle.
Flame met void. The black hole drank deeper. Its pull multiplied, gulping the raging blaze like a starving beast. Heat and smoke poured inward without end. One heartbeat the horizon burned red. The next it was picked clean.
Only the black hole remained, humming as it fed.
"Wha… what?" Garp swayed, chest heaving. That was his strongest volley, the one even Roger had to take seriously. To see Rakuya standing calm at the center broke something inside his heart.
"Captain." Silvers Rayleigh stared at the void, face drawn tight.
"A monstrous technique. Even Garp's proudest strike could not smother it." Gol D. Roger drew a long breath. For once his voice held only gravity and awe.
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