Garp stomped the air with Moonwalk and shot straight for the pirate ship.
Seeing Garp storm over, face purple with rage, Dragon shivered in fright and waved his hands, sweat pouring off him.
"D-Dad! It's not what you think! I'm not trying to become a pirate! I—I—"
Before he could finish, Garp reached the bow, yanked off his slipper, and whipped the sole across Dragon's face.
"Want to be a pirate, huh? I'll show you pirate!"
"You little brat! I'd rather lock you back up than let you run off and become a criminal!"
Dragon tried to duck and run at the sight of the enraged Garp and the slipper swinging overhead.
But where could he run?
The moment he turned, Garp's big hand clamped around the back of his neck.
The mud-stained slipper came down in a flurry of smacks.
Right under Ivankov's stunned gaze, Dragon howled like a banshee.
He was still dazed when a slipper caught him on the head and sent him reeling.
"And you, runt—learn some manners while you're young!"
When they saw Dragon and Ivankov take a beating, Kuma and Ginny, who'd been peeking from the hatch, couldn't stay put.
They yelled "Stop!" and rushed over—only to collect several slipper-swings themselves, skin stinging.
Ginny burst into tears under the rain of slippers.
Garp spun left and right, twin slippers flying, driving the kids scurrying for cover.
"Pirates, huh? I'll show you pirates!"
The pirates who'd tensed in terror at Garp's arrival now stared slack-jawed.
For a moment no one knew whether to charge to the rescue or do anything at all.
Mid-beatdown, Garp felt someone's eyes on him.
He followed the stare toward the cabin.
There stood Alice, hugging a trembling Teach, and Garp froze.
His mouth opened in shock, but before words came—
A heaven-spanning bolt of lightning cracked overhead and struck him in an instant.
A deafening boom echoed.
Garp was blasted backward off the bow, crashing through the rail and plummeting toward the sea.
Shaken, he sensed a vast, familiar life-force racing closer.
"Carlo!!"
He roared, and just before hitting the water his foot stamped down.
Air and sea exploded beneath him; like a cannon shell he rocketed back toward the ship.
Before he could land, the wide ocean suddenly convulsed.
For hundreds, thousands of metres the sea heaved upward as if a mountain range rose beneath it.
Through the dark water a huge golden silhouette rushed upward, swelling fast.
A piercing bird-cry split the sky.
The ocean burst apart across kilometers.
Amid flying seawater, a golden bird hundreds of metres across—cast as if from molten gold—erupted, wings shaking off sunlight.
One beat of those wings birthed category-eighteen gales.
Towers of water a hundred metres tall spun into waterspouts, whirling like colossal tops straight for Garp, the Marine ships, everything.
In an instant the entire sea turned upside-down.
Garp lashed out with a dozen mighty punches, blasting the cyclones apart, then shot skyward against the wind, fists crackling with black-red lightning.
"Carlo! Get down here!"
As he neared, the titan bird opened its beak; blinding light gathered inside.
"Crackle… BOOM!"
A thunderbolt dozens of metres thick lanced down.
Garp tried to dodge, but future sight showed the blast would shred the Marine ships behind him if he did.
"Damn it, you planned this, Carlo!"
Cursing, he met the bolt head-on.
"Fist Bone! Impact!"
The lightning swallowed him and slammed him into the sea.
From hundreds of metres up the great bird flapped again, churning the ocean into sky-darkening hurricanes and tsunamis.
The gale shoved the pirate ships like arrows from a bow, hurling them clear of the battle while driving the pursuing Marine vessels back, some even capsizing.
The Marines who'd come with Garp tried to give chase, but in the storm they couldn't even open their eyes, let alone follow.
Only Garp, blasted into the sea, burst out again, running across water and air, still trying to catch the golden titan.
"Leave it, Garp—don't chase…"
A weak voice rose from the sea below.
"Zephyr?"
Startled, Garp looked back to see Zephyr, pale and bloodied, bobbing on the waves, too weak even to swim.
Garp swore under his breath, dived in, and grabbed his arm.
The moment he touched him, Zephyr went limp—unconscious.
"Zephyr! Zephyr! Wake up!"
Feeling the fading pulse, Garp hoisted him and raced for the nearest warship, shouting,
"Medic! Medic!!"
"Carlo, if Zephyr dies, I'll never forgive you!!"
Far away, riding the storm the golden bird had birthed, the pirate ships skimmed the surface like flying fish.
In mere tens of seconds they'd left the Marines a dozen miles behind, their silhouettes shrinking to nothing.
High above, the colossal golden bird shrank rapidly, folding back into Carlo, who dropped straight onto Dragon's deck.
Everyone cheered his return.
They'd long known the storm-riding golden deity had been Carlo all along.
Spotting the fresh sandal-print on Dragon's face, Carlo's mouth twitched.
So the famed "sandal-tattoo" really had been stamped there by Dragon's dad.
Dragon wasn't the only one—Ivankov, Kuma, and Ginny all wore several dark slipper-prints.
Garp had definitely been furious.