-Broadcast-
Can a person truly possess two lives?
Minutes ago, the answer would have been an unequivocal no. But Doflamingo's performance across the sky had thrust that philosophical question into terrifying, uncharted territory.
The Heavenly Yaksha stood resurrected before them, virtually unchanged. His silver hair remained pristine, not a strand out of place. Even the tears in his pink feathered coat had been seamlessly repaired by the Ito Ito no Mi (String-String Fruit), leaving him looking disturbingly fresh—as if he'd just stepped onto the battlefield rather than being defeated moments before.
He appeared so immaculate, so untouched, that anyone who hadn't witnessed Luffy and his companions' initial victory might mistake him for a newcomer to the fight.
The two opponents before him still wore expressions of shock. Doflamingo couldn't resist twisting the knife. His trademark grin widened behind his sunglasses. "Why don't you try again? Let's see if I can resurrect a second time after you kill me."
The words barely left his lips before he vanished.
The Ito Ito no Mi's blessing reduced his mass to nearly nothing, allowing him to explode forward at speeds exceeding ten times his normal velocity. The air itself seemed to tear in his wake.
"So fast—!" Luffy and Gin spoke simultaneously, but before the syllables could fully form, Doflamingo materialized between them. His long arms shot out like striking serpents, fingers wrapping around both their necks. Using his considerable height advantage, the Heavenly Yaksha effortlessly hoisted both men into the air, their feet dangling uselessly.
His palms transformed, white silk threads erupting from his flesh and actively coiling around his enemies' exposed throats. In a grotesque instant, the three became conjoined—Doflamingo the spider at the center of his web, Luffy and Gin the trapped flies.
The sequence happened so rapidly that most observers hadn't even registered movement.
The white threads gleamed with an obsidian sheen—Armament Haki woven directly into their structure. Gin, despite his Logia-type Devil Fruit, found elemental transformation impossible. The Haki-infused threads prevented any escape through intangibility. Both he and Luffy felt their airways constricting, each breath growing shallower, more desperate.
"This bastard... he's gotten even stronger," Luffy gasped, his voice strained.
"Something's controlling our bodies," Gin analyzed through the growing pressure. "There's something wrong with his Haki—it's not just the threads we can see."
Both captives instinctively struggled, but the moment Doflamingo's hands made contact, their bodies became puppets with cut strings. Invisible bindings wrapped around their limbs, their torsos, making even finger movement agonizingly difficult.
Gin, always the more analytical fighter, identified the problem first. While Observation and Armament Haki weren't his specialties, he possessed adequate proficiency in both. This suppressive force exceeded normal Armament—it had to be Conqueror's Haki, though he lacked concrete proof.
In truth, the Admiral stood on the precipice of understanding. From Doflamingo's perspective, countless invisible threads radiated from his body like the legs of a cosmic spider. These constructs, woven from pure Conqueror's Haki, remained visible only to those who possessed the qualification of kings. Luffy could see them—razor-thin filaments of will made manifest—and the sight made his stomach turn.
"What good is being a Marine Admiral?" Doflamingo's voice dripped with contempt as he tightened the noose around their necks. "What value in being the grandson of a Marine Hero? The only reason weaklings like you have survived this long is the mercy granted by the strong. Today, I'm reclaiming that charity."
But before the Heavenly Yaksha could savor his dominance, something wet touched his arm.
Water droplets materialized at Gin's neck, rolling down the silk threads and onto Doflamingo's exposed skin. "Ame Goku (Rain Prison)."
In an eyeblink, atmospheric moisture converged with impossible density. Water molecules multiplied exponentially, forming a sphere that engulfed Doflamingo completely. Simultaneously, Gin's skin began secreting a different substance—the acidic composition of acid rain, its corrosive properties immediately attacking the white threads at molecular level.
The Heavenly Yaksha found himself suddenly submerged. Initially, he assumed breaking free would be trivial. His invisible Conqueror's threads pierced the water sphere from within—only for external water molecules to rush in and seal the punctures instantly. The prison adapted, regenerated, refused to release him.
Drowning posed no threat to Doflamingo. The benefits of Devil Fruit Liberation had fundamentally altered his physiology. His body was now composed entirely of threads—breathing and eating had become optional rather than necessary. If not for retaining his emotions and consciousness, he would have transcended humanity entirely.
But while suffocation wasn't a concern, the corrosive acid rain was. The liquid ate through the silk threads at Gin's neck, dissolving them strand by strand. The moment the first thread snapped, Gin didn't waste time on rescue attempts. Instead, he began his transformation.
The awakening of a Logia-type Devil Fruit manifested before the watching sky.
Normally, such a transformation required accumulating massive quantities of rainwater—a time-consuming process. But awakening allowed Gin to bypass that limitation entirely. Water molecules gathered with supernatural speed, drawn from the very air itself. The Admiral's body began expanding, swelling beyond human proportions—fifty meters, seventy-five, one hundred.
A three-headed water dragon coalesced into reality. Each serpentine neck was as thick as a ship's mast, each head crowned with crystalline horns. The instant the transformation completed, the dragon didn't hesitate. Three sets of jaws opened wide, fangs like icicles gleaming, and unleashed torrents directly at Doflamingo's position.
The floods carried that distinctive acrid scent—highly concentrated corrosive liquid that instantly dissolved the water prison. But Doflamingo had already prepared. Black Armament Haki coated his entire body like a second skin, while invisible Conqueror's threads formed a barrier around him like the bars of a cage.
The acid struck with tremendous force. The Heavenly Yaksha's clothing disintegrated on contact, pink feathers dissolving into nothing. But his skin beneath remained pristine, unmarred. He didn't even register the burning sensation that should have accompanied such potent acid.
Below them, droplets of the corrosive liquid fell onto the massive skeletal structure supporting their battlefield—Eren's Founding Titan. Each drop burned craters into ancient bone, proving the Admiral's attack possessed genuine destructive potential. The problem wasn't potency—it was that Doflamingo's defenses had grown too formidable to penetrate.
Admiral Gin recognized the futility of direct assault immediately. Strategy shifted. The torrents pouring from his dragon heads transformed mid-stream, separating into dozens of smaller serpents. These elemental creatures possessed independent thought, crude sentience granted by their creator's will.
"Hold him—just hold him!" Gin commanded.
The water snakes obeyed without question, wrapping around Doflamingo's limbs, his torso, his neck. Before the Heavenly Yaksha could shake them off, the first serpent detonated.
The explosion sent water fragments flying in all directions, the shockwave rippling through the air. A single elemental creature's self-destruction barely scratched Doflamingo's Haki armor—but he wasn't facing a single creature.
Dozens surrounded him. And every single one was programmed to die.
The chain reaction began. Explosion after explosion erupted in rapid succession, each detonation overlapping the last. The cumulative force hammered against Doflamingo's defenses like a relentless drum. Cracks spider-webbed across his Armament coating. The violent concussions of super-compressed water molecules dealt damage even his Liberation couldn't immediately repair.
But "damage" and "lethal" remained two very different thresholds. The Ito Ito no Mi worked overtime, threads weaving beneath his skin to reconstruct damaged tissue, to reinforce failing structures. The Heavenly Yaksha endured like a cockroach—beaten, burned, but refusing to die.
"Luffy!" Gin's voice carried strain, his three dragon heads showing signs of dissolution at their edges. "Are you ready yet? I can't hold him much longer!"
Creating and maintaining sentient elemental creatures drained stamina at an alarming rate. But he needed to buy Luffy three minutes—three minutes to prepare the technique learned from Buggy the Clown himself.
Only that ultimate move could permanently end Doflamingo's infinite resurrection.
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