"Don't know when to stop, do you!"
Saturn—one of the Five Elders—had seen his fill of fools. These two before him were exceptional examples: fearless, reckless, and destined—he thought—to be a blight on the future. He could never have guessed that one day he would personally order that no one provoke the name of the Hundred Beasts.
Fist and spiked club swung, drawing every ounce of strength. The blow split the storm clouds.
"Moon Lion!"
Bathed in pale lunar light, Sharn's whole body went snow-white—white hair, blood-red irises. In hybrid form his combat prowess was already frightening; now he had risen another level. Electric arcs hissed from his skin.
"Moon-God Raid — Violet Nine Strikes!" he shouted as lightning braided his fingertips.
Kaido tightened his grip on the haft of his club, haki and lightning twining along the wood. This was the nascent shape of his thunderous technique.
"Thunder Hexagram!"
Twin bolts forked toward the sky. Red veins threaded Sharn's eyes: since the soul had slipped into this body, he had faced many lethal opponents—Garp, Sengoku, the Five Elders—each one a possible end. He could not hang his fate on others. Each fight now demanded drawing every last ounce of strength for even a sliver of survival.
"Is that the Mythical Zoan resilience? Why are there two of the same type?" Saturn wondered aloud, striking Kaido with his staff while raking claws at Sharn. Devil Fruits were complicated; even within the Beast types there were varieties. Multiple "dog" and "cat" Fruits existed in later ages — and even the "Human-Human" or "Person" types had different forms. If this pair's forms weren't even mapped in any fruit compendium… that was a nightmare.
Black flames and haki filled staffs and fingertips; lightning carved a jagged scar across the field. Saturn seized the moment. A thunderous impact hurled dust and electric motes everywhere. The Elder—who had once stood above the seas—believed he could snuff these two brats out.
"Kid, next time pick something sharper to swing!" he mocked.
Kaido spat blood. High-ranked haki often needed but a single true strike; yet his body bore no wounds. Instead, Kaido's club had splintered under the force of earlier blows—staff against club. He tossed the ruined haft away.
"I will," Kaido growled. From now on he swore to wield a club reforged with seastone.
Saturn looked down into the crater Sharn had gouged. Smoke swirled; from within, Sharn climbed out. He felt the limit of life itself drawing nearer and nearer. Beyond Rokushiki's thresholds lay "life's return" — the ability to pour life energy into any limb and amplify one's body. Later masters of the system would loop life into hair, bones, or muscles to fight; Sharn, with his Mythical-Zoan vigor, had already been buffed by a string of rewards. Awakening Rokushiki had pushed him closer still to the threshold of true life-augmentation.
Bones creaked, flesh rewove, and Sharn felt his organs cheering as the body reformed. He wiped blood from his mouth and met Kaido's gaze. In one instant they both shifted—dragon forms uncoiling.
Azure dragon fire coiled through Kaido's flames; the black dragon's white-hot heat rolled from Sharn. "Old man, take this!" Kaido roared. Saturn raised his staff; haki armored his whole frame.
Sharn's breath turned to a furnace. The twin pillars of flame slammed forward in a desperate bid.
"You wretched ants, worthless scum!" Saturn snarled, enraged beyond reason. These two worms dared resist the Celestial Dragons—those conveners of the world conference—and had no idea what catastrophe they invited. "This war will end! You will be trapped and cleaned away! Pirates will never sit atop the throne!"
Saturn's body fully took on its nightmarish beast form: six spider-like limbs, extra hands, twin horns—an ogre incarnate. Black flame coalesced into spiraling ink-fire as he hurled the attack. The previously unstoppable twin-heat attacks suddenly felt threadbare against that darkness.
"Darkness falls!" Saturn spat, and from his maw came black ink that blotted perception. Without Observation haki, a warrior would become a headless fly—maimed and blind.
Sharn's blood-red eyes did not dim. White beard and mane whipped as he wreathed the hot breath in violet lightning, attempting to turn the black into raw energy. "You can do that?" Kaido wondered, quickly threading his own blue-white lightning through his heat. The double-heat fusions rose again, but in the face of the Elder's ink and black flames they strained.
The two sides ground at each other—final decisive moments—when a familiar laugh cut through the chaos.
"Dark water!" Rocks himself stepped into the fray. A tide of shadow poured from him, wrapping Saturn in ripping gravity. The Elder's cells and lineage felt violated—this was the dread power of the Dark-Dark Fruit.
Saturn's advantage melted. Rocks had broken through—suddenly the battle swung. The paladins who'd opposed Rocks were in trouble. "Rocks!" Saturn cried, bracing his haki as best he could; he, too, had animal-type recovery.
"Any Devil Fruit user before me is a flea!" Rocks proclaimed. "Now the clean-up begins! Turn them all to statues!"
Rocks drew darkness, and huge swathes of soldiers—marines, pirates, and commoners—were petrified. Panic spread in a tidal wave of shadow. The God-Knights, the so-called divine enforcers, were ragged and exhausted; their barrier fruits held some, but after a day and a night of fighting, Rocks' pirate crew stood at the pinnacle.
Rocks' eye fixed on Saturn like a quarry. Behind him moved his monstrous lieutenants: Whitebeard Newgate, Lion Suki, Charlotte Linlin, the island-wielder Wang Zhi, Silver Axe, John the Drunk, the gourmand Captain Bread, Buckin, the Serpent Flame, and the Barrier twins — a roster of lunatics bent on toppling heaven.
"Those who profane the gods," one God Knights tried a last stroke—only to have seastone bullets meet Buckin's crossing fingers and an implacable barrier. "Don't disturb our world-domination!" she warned.
Even Saturn felt his scalp crawl. "Let this world drown in madness!" Rocks crowed. Then, a voice crackled through a Den Den Mushi: "All captains, vice admirals and below, withdraw!" Admiral Steel Bone Kong ordered. "Otherwise you will waste the Navy's next generation!" Only those at and above vice-admiral were to remain—sacrifices to stop Rocks' tide. "If gods cannot protect their children, then leave the world to us!"
Saturn lunged; Whitebeard's storm of cloud-swords drove the blow aside. Steelbone marched through the field. Sengoku, Zephyr, and Tsuru—the Navy pillars—arrived, and the battlefield tightened like a noose.
"Can anyone stop Rocks? That man is invincible!" marines whispered in despair. Yet amid sorrow, two young figures stepped into history. "He's stronger!" Rayleigh muttered, hand on his sword. Roger adjusted his hat as if polishing the sky itself. "He's just Rocks—beat him," Roger said, grinning.
Garp surged forward, cutting fear from the hearts of marines. In that instant, justice and freedom raised their own flags—different banners, different visions—each now fighting for tomorrow.
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