The clash of blades rang through the air.
On one side: a sword of rosy light.
On the other: a silver-steel blade.
Both were wreathed in Haki. Each collision struck with such brutal precision it felt as though not even an insect could slip through the seams of their offense.
…So fierce was the exchange that it almost stopped looking like a "duel" at all. It was closer to a match—an honest martial contest, stripped of pretense, where victory would be decided by mastery.
"Incredible…" Marigold breathed, the word escaping before she could stop it.
Sandersonia said nothing, but she was just as transfixed. Neither of us could tear our eyes away from the battle unfolding before us—Sue against Hancock.
We watched our elder sister—the Kuja Empress—trade blows with a woman bound to Amazon Lily by deep ties: a benefactor, a close friend.
Mesmerized by a level of combat far beyond our reach, we Kuja warriors stared, instincts screaming at us to memorize everything—every step, every shift of weight, every breath between strikes.
Even Elder Nyon—Gloriosa, Empress of generations past—stood silent as judge and witness, overwhelmed by what she was seeing.
So young… and yet they've reached this height. At least in combat, I needn't worry about them anymore. I knew it, but seeing it… still shakes me.
Steel screamed.
Light flashed.
With a hard, metallic ging!, the two fighters broke apart at the same instant, springing back to create distance.
Anyone watching closely could see it: in pure swordplay, Hancock was being forced back.
As a Kuja warrior, Hancock had trained in countless styles beyond her specialties, including swordsmanship. Ordinary swordsmen were toys to her. Even seasoned veterans struggled to keep up.
But Sue's swordsmanship was sharper still. In a straight contest under equal conditions, Hancock would inevitably fall behind.
Of course… this battle was never meant to be decided by sword technique alone.
Hancock widened the distance and hurled her light-blade at Sue.
Sue knocked it aside with her steel sword—naturally.
And in that fraction of time, Hancock created two new weapons with her power: twin light swords, identical to the first, flaring into existence in her hands.
Then she fused them.
The shape stretched—lengthening into a naginata.
With a wide, centrifugal swing, she carved a brutal arc toward Sue.
The moment Sue received the first strike, she understood the disadvantage: reach and leverage. She deflected the force and lunged in, aiming to collapse the range where a naginata was least comfortable.
It was a trap.
Hancock used the wide swing to feed momentum into her signature finishing flow—
"Passion Femur!!"
Not the usual petrification-and-shatter.
This was heat.
A scorching kick, laced with the newly developed "love flame."
For a Paper Human, it was a nightmare made real.
Sue braced with Armament-coated arms—but whether it was elemental incompatibility, or Hancock's superior Haki, the blow pierced through. Heat bit into flesh. Pain ripped up her nerves.
Sue's expression tightened—only for a moment.
Then she reacted instantly, turning her body to paper and severing part of her own arm.
The burned section detached mid-motion, and her form reknit itself seamlessly from other paper fragments, restoring her body as if nothing had happened.
The severed piece ignited as it fell, fluttering down as ash.
Even the paper throwing knives she'd tossed as a feint disintegrated the instant Hancock's foot brushed them.
Sue let out a short, bitter laugh—more at the sheer incompatibility than at the pain.
She rolled her shoulder, shaking off the lingering shock, and Hancock smiled faintly.
"So. Still not ready to surrender?"
"Not a chance," Sue replied, voice steady. "I'm nowhere near finished. Don't think you've won with a flashy trick."
"…Is that so," Hancock said, eyes narrowing. "Then don't misjudge your odds."
Muah.
A kiss.
This time, the heart mark split—multiplying into eight small hearts that hovered around her like glowing motes.
Sue's posture tightened.
And Hancock came in again—naginata and legs moving as one, a close-quarters storm.
Sue dodged and parried, searching for an opening—
But the moment she pulled back to create space, pink beams erupted from the floating hearts and lanced toward her.
"Huh?! What are those—funnels? Mobile turrets?!"
"This is another new technique," Hancock said without slowing. "Slave Bit. Think of them as eight archers supporting me."
Her assault tightened, perfectly synchronized with the support fire. It wasn't just pressure—it was confinement, forcing Sue into narrower and narrower options.
Those funnel knock-offs are a pain… But I can do something similar, too.
Sue didn't answer out loud.
Paper sheets unfurled from her back and snapped into shape—
"Origami… Flying Swallow!"
Swallows—among the fastest origami constructs she could form—shot forward in a twenty-bird wave, aiming to destroy the Slave Bits.
Even as she fought, Hancock's Observation tracked them cleanly. The Slave Bits fired, beams slicing through the flock—
Yet swallows slipped through, diving in sharp angles. Their beaks punched through the heart-marks, and the Slave Bits burst one after another.
At the same time, Sue conjured two Lion Paper Dance constructs and sent them surging in to harry Hancock.
The chaos bought her seconds.
Two more sheets of paper snapped into her hands.
In a blur, she drew her sword through them.
A cutout formed—an armored humanoid silhouette, jagged and angular, like something monstrous and not quite of this world.
Kirigami.
Sue flicked the cutout upward.
"All right," she said, calm as ever. "My turn. Kirigami."
The paper stirred—then swelled violently, expanding into a towering humanoid that landed between Sue and Hancock with a heavy thud.
"Go."
It charged, blade-like arms chopping down.
Hancock met it with her light naginata, parrying easily, then slashed for its torso—the same clean bisect-and-burn she'd used on the Lion Paper Dance.
But her strike stalled.
It barely sank into the first layer.
The flames hesitated, struggling to catch.
"What…?"
"Combat-specialized soldiers," Sue said. "Kirigami, made from paper infused with Haki. They aren't versatile, but one can erase an entire pirate ship. Don't underestimate them."
As she spoke, one Kirigami caught Hancock's blade, locking it for an instant while the other lunged.
Hancock extinguished the light sword in her hand, slipped away, and countered with a Passion Femur kick that sent one Kirigami skidding back.
But it didn't burn.
And the jarring, rock-hard feedback up her leg confirmed it—Sue hadn't been exaggerating. That thing was solid.
If it's that strong, it must consume an enormous amount of Haki… She can't summon these endlessly. No reinforcements, then. Good.
Hancock reformed her weapon into a fresh light naginata and resumed, parrying Sue and the two Kirigami in a tight rhythm. At the same time, she manifested more Slave Bits to harass them.
Then she widened the distance by a step, formed a heart-shaped bow—and loosed a Heart Arrow at one Kirigami.
It blocked.
But its stance faltered.
It collapsed.
Hancock's eyes snapped to its leg.
Stone.
One of its legs had petrified in place.
"…Right," Sue murmured. "Of course you can still petrify. Not just burn."
"Exactly," Hancock said. "Against monsters like this, restricting movement is more effective than brute force."
Her bow flared.
A barrage of Heart Arrows followed—this time laced with flames—hammering the fallen Kirigami relentlessly.
The Haki reinforcement crackled and thinned under the onslaught. When it could no longer hold, the Kirigami reverted to paper and vanished into fire.
Hancock swung the bow toward the remaining Kirigami—and Sue.
Sue surged forward, using the remaining Kirigami as a moving shield, closing the gap before it could be burned away. At the same time, she shot down Slave Bits whenever they drifted into her line.
The instant the Kirigami disappeared, Sue lunged into striking range, Armament flooding her blade as she swung.
Hancock met it with an Armament-coated kick.
For a heartbeat, the collision held—
Then the angle shifted, and both Sue's sword and Hancock's foot were knocked upward.
Hancock used the recoil to spring into the air, twisting with perfect control. Her other leg came down in a crushing arc—
And struck the side of Sue's blade as if it had been drawn there.
CRACK!!
"What?!"
The steel sword snapped in two.
Hancock followed through with a flame-coated kick—
Sue conjured a Paper Sword mid-motion, parried, and retreated in one smooth flow.
As Hancock landed, Sue unleashed a Paper Razor Blizzard to keep her back—
But the paper razors incinerated instantly under Hancock's heat.
Distance widened.
A brief lull.
Sue stared at the broken remnant of her sword—less than half its original length—then exhaled, almost rueful. She let it drop and tossed it aside.
The Paper Sword in her other hand was already scorched and blackened. It hadn't ignited, but it was brittle. Another hit or two and it would crumble into ash.
"You're out of weapons, Sue," Hancock said, voice cool. "What will you do now? Is it time to concede?"
The three witnesses watching—Sandersonia, Marigold, and Elder Nyon—found themselves thinking the same thing.
This should be the end.
The situation was brutally stacked against Sue.
Hancock could generate weapons endlessly, could burn and petrify—and Sue's natural counters were paper and blades that could not survive heat.
Even Haki-enhanced paper had limits. It could be pierced, scorched, set alight—just as they'd seen.
Turning the tide now should have been impossible.
Considering how hard she'd fought despite the elemental disadvantage, they might even say Sue had already exceeded what anyone could expect.
"Damn… I didn't think it'd come to this," Sue muttered, almost amused. "It wasn't some famous blade, but it was still decent steel…"
Then she looked up.
"But I'm not done. Let's keep going."
Hancock's eyes narrowed.
"I won't insult you by asking if you're serious," she said. "But I won't show mercy either. You understand?"
"Of course," Sue replied. "But I…"
As she spoke, she flipped the Paper Sword in her hand, pointed the tip downward, and—without warning—let it fall.
Hancock and the others expected it to stab into the ground or topple over.
Instead, it sank into the earth as if the sand were water, vanishing without a sound.
"…?"
Too sharp? No—that wasn't it. The way it fell was wrong. There was no resistance. No impact. No sound.
It simply… disappeared.
"From here on out," Sue said quietly, "I'm going all out."
Hancock's gaze sharpened.
And then—
The ground beneath Sue's feet began to peel.
Soil, sand, stone—everything crumbled into thin sheets that fluttered upward.
The earth itself was becoming paper.
Sheets swirled around Sue, filling the air in a rising spiral, a storm blooming from nothing.
Hancock, Marigold, and Sandersonia could only stare.
Elder Nyon—and Hancock—understood immediately.
"Could this be… Awakening?!" Elder Nyon breathed.
"Sue… you've already reached that realm…!"
Countless sheets climbed into the sky, swirling into a vortex like a paper tornado.
Dozens.
No—hundreds.
It was strangely beautiful, like cherry blossoms ripped from their branches and forced into a storm.
And horrifying.
Because if Sue's power worked the way it looked like it did…
Every single sheet of paper could become a blade.
"Be careful, Hancock," Sue warned. "I haven't mastered this yet. I can't control the intensity."
And then, in the next instant—
"Paper Razor Blizzard!"
"Senbonzakura Kageyoshi!"
The world became white.
Countless paper blades swallowed Hancock's vision.
---
The next thing Hancock saw was a cloudless blue sky.
The rough grit beneath her back, felt through her clothes, told her she was lying on a sandy shore—no, that she had been carried there and laid down.
The throbbing aches across her body, the clean medicinal scent, the pressure of gauze and bandages—she understood before she even opened her eyes.
…I still couldn't win.
Her last memory was of struggling against Sue's trump card, her resistance already feeling too small.
When she finally opened her eyes—
"Oh, Hancock's awake."
"Sister!"
"Thank goodness… you're all right…"
She forced herself upright through the soreness and found Sandersonia, Marigold, Elder Nyon, and Sue nearby.
Sue was injured as well, but compared to Hancock—wrapped in bandages from head to toe—Sue looked almost untouched. Hancock's injuries weren't severe, but the difference was still unmistakable.
Hancock let out a long breath, her smile edged with frustration.
"…I thought I'd at least be able to steal one win by now."
"No," Sue said at once, firm and sincere. "You've gotten so much stronger. And that new power—fire? I was genuinely shocked. I never expected you'd develop that."
"A loss is a loss," Hancock replied, refusing to soften it. But even as she spoke, there was satisfaction beneath her regret—because she had fought with everything she had.
She laughed quietly, and in that laugh was a renewed vow: train harder. Sharpen everything further.
Sue, who knew Hancock better than almost anyone—friend, confidante, rival—understood without needing words.
The next day, after returning to the palace, Hancock summoned Sue to the treasure vault.
During her stay, Sue was allowed to remain in the castle as Hancock's close friend. She had been resting in her room, still recovering from travel, when the summons arrived.
The vault held the Kuja's ancestral treasures alongside the wealth and plunder brought back from countless expeditions.
Hancock called for the custodian and instructed her to retrieve a specific item.
After a short wait, the custodian returned carrying a single sword.
"Huh?" Sue blinked. "You're giving this to me? Really?"
"Yes," Hancock said. "Your blade broke in battle. Use this as a replacement. It is plunder—do not hesitate."
"That's… really kind, but…" Sue carefully took it, fingers testing the weight. "This feels like an absurdly high-quality blade. The edge is pristine…"
Hancock tilted her chin toward the custodian.
"Explain."
"Yes, Lady Sue," the custodian said. "That sword is called Floating Cloud. It is distinguished by faint cloud-like patterns etched along the blade. It bears no official rank, but it is considered a renowned masterpiece."
Sue drew it slightly from the sheath.
A delicate cloud pattern shimmered along the steel.
It was undeniably superior to anything she'd used before—true craftsmanship.
Sue smiled and sheathed it again, then bowed her head in sincere thanks.
After that, Hancock asked, almost casually, "So, Sue. You're staying a little longer. Have you decided what you'll do afterward?"
"Not really," Sue said. "I'll probably head back to the Four Blues and drift around a while longer."
"I see," Hancock murmured. Then her eyes sharpened with that familiar intensity. "In that case… I must become even stronger before you return to the Grand Line for good."
Sue couldn't help laughing.
"Ahahaha. That's scary. It means I can't relax for even a second. I'll have to get stronger too… I still haven't fully mastered my Awakening."
"We both have work to do," Hancock said simply.
Strict with herself. Strict with others. Always carrying the dignity of the Pirate Empress.
Sue, who rarely revealed herself to the public despite her works, and who carried her own burdens quietly.
Seeing the two of them laugh together—relaxed, unguarded—was a rare sight.
Aside from Hancock's sisters, Elder Nyon, a few trusted attendants, and a handful of close companions… almost no one would ever see this side of them.
To be continued...