"Rumble——!!!"
The red-hot torrent of flames poured down like a broken river, carrying enough heat to warp the air as it fell over the port's merchant ship district.
Before the flames even landed, the seawater below began to boil, and white steam burst from the sea.
On the merchant ships flying the G-6 Branch flag, the merchants who thought paying the fee would keep them safe now stared at the fire falling from the sky. They collapsed to the ground in terror and screamed.
"It's over... we're all done for!!"
"Didn't they say no one would dare touch us if we paid the special tax?!"
The pillar of fire was about to swallow the entire merchant ship docking area and turn everything below to ash.
"Roar————!!!"
A furious beastly roar erupted in front of the sea of fire.
Right after, the ground shook violently.
A massive figure rapidly expanded in the glow of the fire. His originally human body was instantly covered in a hard, thick, dark green shell. Three spear-like horns grew from his head, and a giant bone shield spread out from his neck.
Dragon-Dragon Fruit, Ancient Zoan, Model: Triceratops!
Kane! Right now, with Aiden, Jinbe, and Issho away, he was the strongest fighter at the G-6 Branch. He had to step up.
Kane, transformed into a Triceratops, stomped his four hooves and shattered the ground. His massive body turned into a fortress, blocking the direct path of the falling flames.
"Sizzle——!!"
The next second, the pillar of fire slammed into the Triceratops's head shield and back armor.
Heat pressed down on him from every side, burning through his scales.
"Arghhhhh!!!"
Kane roared from within the flames.
Even his Ancient Zoan body, with its tough skin and high resistance, could not fully take King's Lunarian flames.
The hard scales curled, turned black, and fell off. The sharp smell of burning flesh mixed with sulfur and filled the air.
Kane dug his thick limbs deeply into the concrete ground, but the impact still pushed him back dozens of meters. He plowed four deep, blackened trenches across the port square.
But he did not fall. He used his own body to block the breath attack that could have destroyed the port!
"Huff... huff..."
The flames scattered.
The Triceratops panted heavily, his entire body smoking and his skin badly burned. He looked a mess, but he still did not back down.
"Oh?"
In the sky, the Pteranodon circling in the thick smoke tilted its head slightly.
Behind his goggles, King stared through the layers of smoke and locked onto the heavily injured Triceratops below.
King originally just wanted to cause some random destruction and teach the Marines a lesson, but his expression changed completely.
King's attention shifted fully to Kane.
The flames on his back burned hotter.
"This form... a Triceratops..."
King's voice carried through the air:
"So... it's you."
"The rat who killed that trash Galt and stole the Ancient Zoan fruit that belonged to Mr. Kaido..."
"It's you!"
A memory of Mr. Kaido's cold order before his departure came to King's mind:
"If you get the chance... bring back the head of the guy who ate my fruit. As long as he dies, the fruit will naturally be reborn somewhere in the sea."
Since the target had delivered himself right to his door, it saved him the trouble of searching.
"Since we've crossed paths, leave your life here."
King's voice was flat, as if stating a simple fact:
"Hand over... what belongs to Mr. Kaido."
Facing King above him, Kane took a deep breath and swallowed the blood rising in his throat.
He took a step forward and shouted,
"Stop talking to yourself! You bastard!!"
"Open your eyes and look closely! This is the G-6 Branch!"
"Causing trouble here... are you ready to leave your life in these waters?!"
King scoffed as if he had just heard a joke.
The flames on his back suddenly turned deep blue. The air around him warped from the heat.
"It's just a Marine branch. Does it really deserve my fear?"
As soon as he finished speaking, the flames on King's body flared up, and he flapped his pitch-black wings.
"Whoosh——"
The wind howled.
His massive Pteranodon body dropped straight toward Kane. This time, he ignored the merchant ships around him and aimed straight for Kane.
He moved so fast that he created a visible white shockwave in the air!
"Tankyudon!!"
Using the massive momentum from the dive, King wrapped his dragon claws—which were sharp enough to crush steel—in Armament Haki. His claws came down toward the Triceratops's head.
"Damn it..."
Kane looked up at King diving toward him. For a moment, his body tightened under the force of that dive.
Was this how far above him King was?
Even with an Ancient Zoan fruit, the gap between them still felt hopeless.
But he had no way back!
Kane roared and forced out every bit of Haki in his body to cover his three horns. He lowered his head and slammed it hard into the diving King.
Kane had no way to dodge, so he met the attack head-on.
"Clang————!!!"
A deafening sound of clashing metal echoed into the sky.
Right after, there was a sharp sound of bone cracking.
"Crack!"
Against King's Haki-coated claws, Kane's hard horns lasted less than half a second before they completely snapped!
The force ran through Kane's skull, neck, and back.
"Pfft!!"
The massive body of the Triceratops was thrown backward by the impact.
He rolled through the air, smashed through several unfinished buildings, and finally crashed heavily into the material storage warehouse at the back of the port.
"Boom!!"
Dust filled the sky.
The warehouse walls collapsed and buried Kane in the rubble.
"Cough, cough... Gah!"
Kane, now back in his human-beast form, struggled to push away the broken rocks on top of him. He opened his mouth and spat out blood and pieces of flesh.
Three deep claw marks cut down to the bone on his chest. Blood poured down his body and stained the rubble beneath his feet red.
Just one clash.
One clash had nearly taken him out!
"Too weak."
King returned to his human-beast form and hovered in the air above the rubble.
The black wings behind his back flapped slowly, and the Lunarian flames burned brightly. He looked down at Kane without concern:
"It's over, little rat."
King hovered low in the air. He did not rush to finish the kill. Instead, he looked at him as if Kane could no longer escape and raised his right wing.
The intense flames gathered again and turned into a ten-meter-long flaming blade.
"Disappear... along with this ridiculous branch."
The Marines around them watched in despair.
"Captain Kane!!"
They tried to rush forward, but the heat coming from King caught their clothes on fire the moment they got close. It forced them to stumble back.
On the top floor of the office building.
Vergo pressed himself closely against the window and watched the scene. Slowly, the fear in him faded, replaced by relief.
"Foolish."
In Vergo's mind, Kane was already dead.
He knew he could not win and still fought back. Was this so-called loyalty? A completely worthless way to die.
But this was fine too.
As long as the G-6 Branch was destroyed, Aiden would definitely be busy rebuilding or getting revenge. He wouldn't have the energy to worry about that damn ledger.
In fact, if Aiden came back a little late, this ledger might just "accidentally" disappear in this huge fire...
Thinking of this, Vergo faintly hoped for the flaming blade to fall faster.
On the other side, the area around the collapsed warehouse was exactly the core zone of the forced labor area.
Hundreds of pirate prisoners who were moving bricks and fixing roads all stopped working.
They looked at Kane, who was lying in the rubble and coughing blood.
Then they looked at the figure in the sky—King the Conflagration!
The prisoners slowly raised their heads.
They looked at the guards, then at the remotes hanging from their waists.
"Hey... that's King from the Beasts Pirates!"
In the crowd, the former slave-catching crew leader, "Hound" Togo, shifted his gaze. His bloodshot eyes locked onto a Marine guard nearby who was entirely focused on the sky.
A set of black controllers hung on that guard's waist.
Those were the collar remotes that controlled their lives!
Togo grinned. He violently threw down his iron shovel and yelled:
"Our chance is here!!"
"That Aiden isn't here! These Marines can't stop King at all!"
"Now's our chance! Grab the remotes! We can live!!"
A pirate nearby hesitated and touched his neck: "But... the collars will explode..."
"Idiot! If we don't act now, we'll just die in King's fire anyway!!"
Togo roared and was the first to lunge at the guard.
"What are you doing!!"
The guard noticed something was wrong. Seeing the violent men charging at him, he instinctively pressed the button in his hand.
"Boom! Boom!"
The collars on the two pirates at the very front of the crowd instantly exploded. Two sprays of blood burst into the air, and their headless bodies fell to the ground.
Blood splashed all over Togo's face.
But this did not scare him. Instead, the blood on his face only made him more violent.
"Kill him!!!"
"If we don't kill him, we're all dead!!"
The pirates, already desperate and violent, rushed forward together. In an instant, they overwhelmed the guard as he let out a desperate scream.
"Got it!! I got the remotes!!"
This scene was like a spark thrown into a powder keg.
"Kill them!!"
"Kill these Marines!"
"I'm sick of moving bricks!!"
"Red Thorn" roared and swung the iron chains in his hands, cleanly snapping the neck of a Marine guard.
In an instant, the entire port district collapsed into chaos.
"A bunch of noisy bugs."
King glanced at the riot below and did not bother to care.
He had only one target.
"Die."
King dove down again, pointing the blade straight at Kane's heart in the rubble.
He was going to dig out Kane's heart and force the Devil Fruit to be reborn.
"Damn it..."
Kane looked at the flaming blade getting closer and closer. He tried to stand up, but it felt like all the bones in his body were broken. He couldn't move at all.
Kane clenched his teeth.
More than fear, what hurt him was that he had failed to stop this.
Commander... I'm sorry for everything you've taught me...
I can't even protect our home...
"Rumble..."
The sky, which had turned bright red from the burning flames, suddenly went dark... without any warning.
Black clouds rolled in from every direction. Thunderclouds gathered over Hachinosu, covering the sky in moments.
The heavy clouds pressed down incredibly low, looking like they were right within reach.
The air prickled with electricity, and every hair on their bodies stood up.
"Bzzzt... bzzzt..."
Thick silver lightning moved through the thunderclouds, lighting up the world in a pale white glow.
"What is this..."
The bloodthirsty pirates caught in the middle of the riot suddenly froze.
The pirates stopped moving. Their bodies reacted before their minds did.
Even King, who was in the middle of his dive, stopped moving without meaning to. He suddenly looked up at the sky.
Right after.
Aiden's voice came from deep within the clouds, accompanied by rolling thunder, and rang in everyone's ears:
"Kane, fall back."
Just three words.
Everyone heard them clearly through the thunder.
The moment he heard this voice.
Kane's breath caught. Then he laughed despite the blood in his mouth.
He didn't care about his broken bones at all. He used all his strength to climb out of the crater, and even adjusted his torn collar with his good hand.
Then, he looked up at King, who had frozen for a second in the sky. He stretched his bloody mouth into an arrogant smile:
"Heh..."
"You're dead, big bird."
After saying that, he didn't even glance at the deadly blade above his head again. Instead, he respectfully bowed his head, wiped the blood from his mouth with all his strength, and spoke, his voice rough from blood loss:
"Yes, Commander!"
Then, he turned around without hesitation. Dragging his heavily injured body, he retreated and completely exposed his back to the enemy.
Because he knew that as long as that man had arrived, this was no longer his battlefield.
"Cheap tricks!!"
Even King felt the change in the air, but his pride as King the Conflagration would not let him pull back because of thunderclouds.
He roared, and the flaming blade in his hand slashed down toward Kane at an even faster speed!
"I don't care who you are! I'm taking this head today!!"
"Not even Sengoku could save him if he came!!"
King roared. The flames on his back fired like thrusters, and his speed increased instead of slowing down.
The flames on his wing stretched into a blade and fell toward Kane's defenseless back.
But just before he reached Kane.
"Zap——"
High up in the sky, that thick layer of thunderclouds split open without warning.
A massive, pale white pillar of lightning pierced through the sky and struck down at King in mid-air.
It was too fast.
Even with Observation Haki, King had no time to dodge.
"What?!"
King only had enough time to pull his wings in front of him and rely on his Lunarian durability.
Boom————!!!!!
The deafening sound of thunder arrived a second after the lightning fell.
The whole of Hachinosu shook.
Vergo was blinded by the strong light and couldn't open his eyes. He could only block his face with his arm.
"CRASH!!!!!!"
The explosion tore across the port.
The ground split open beneath the impact.
With the point of impact at the center, hundreds of meters of concrete ground shattered and collapsed, forming a deep blackened crater.
A shockwave mixed with blue electric arcs spread out in all directions. It sent the pirates who were rioting just moments ago flying across the ground.
The dust cleared.
When the light faded.
King the Conflagration, who had been completely unstoppable moments ago, was now kneeling on one knee inside the blackened, dozens-of-meters-wide crater.
"Cough... Pfft!!"
King violently coughed up a mouthful of black blood. His custom uniform was already torn to shreds, and the flames on his back flickered on and off. He had clearly taken heavy damage.
That feeling...
King clutched his chest and gritted his teeth.
The destructive force in that single instant, that lightning strike... made him think of Mr. Kaido's "Thunder Bagua."
No, the feeling was even worse.
Just one strike!
A single lightning strike from a distance broke through his Lunarian defense?!
Hachinosu fell silent.
Whether it was the fleeing merchant ships, the pirates getting ready to riot, or even Vergo hiding in his office, no one spoke.
The sunglasses in Vergo's hand slipped. They hit the ground with a "clack" and shattered, but he didn't even notice.
He stood frozen by the window, unable to process what he had just seen.
He was actually... taken down in one hit?!
"How... how is this possible?!"
At the bottom of the crater, King struggled to get up. But he realized in horror that his body was so numb that it refused to listen to him.
He lifted his bloody face and looked at the sky in shock.
"Run!!"
As a seasoned fighter who had survived countless battles, King made the most logical decision in a split second.
He couldn't win!
He could not win!
If he didn't leave now, he really would die here today!
"Screech——!!"
Without any hesitation, King forced through the intense pain in his body and directly transformed into his full-beast Pteranodon form.
Using the extreme speed of a Pteranodon that ruled the skies, he flapped his wings hard. His entire body turned into a streak of black light and fled wildly away from Hachinosu.
He moved so fast that he created a series of sonic booms in the air.
He didn't dare stay low. Instead, he desperately flew higher, trying to use his flying advantage to escape the sky covered by Aiden's thunderclouds.
"As long as I get back to Wano Country..."
"As long as I fly fast enough..."
Listening to the wind howling in his ears and looking at Hachinosu getting smaller and smaller below, King felt slightly relieved.
Even though he couldn't win, as a Pteranodon fruit user, he trusted his speed.
On this sea, if he wanted to leave, few people could stop him once he was in the air!
One kilometer... five kilometers... ten kilometers...
Within moments, he had already flown dozens of kilometers, leaving that terrible island far behind him.
King glanced back.
It was empty behind him. No lightning was chasing him.
"Phew..."
King let out a long breath, and his tight nerves finally relaxed a little.
"Good... even though the mission failed, at least I kept my life."
King turned his head back, adjusted his posture, and prepared for the long sprint back to Wano Country.
However.
The moment he turned his head and looked straight ahead.
King froze.
His body went stiff.
Because.
Right in front of him.
Even higher up in the sky.
A figure wearing a Justice coat was quietly floating there.
Aiden floated in the air with his hands in his pockets. The coat loudly flapping in the cold high-altitude wind did not make him feel cold at all.
He was even holding a half-eaten apple in his hand, looking bored.
He looked as if he had been waiting there for a while.
"This... this is impossible..."
King could not understand what he was seeing. He stared fixedly at the face he had seen all over the newspaper front pages lately.
He recognized this face!
This face had been showing up all over the newspaper front pages lately!
"Reaper Aiden?!"
King's voice cracked. Even the finger he pointed at Aiden was shaking. He couldn't understand the situation in front of him at all:
"Why are you here?!"
"The news said you killed a Celestial Dragon and were locked up in Impel Down Level 6! When did they let you out?!"
To the outside world, Aiden's "exile" had actually been framed by the Marines as "imprisonment" to calm the anger of the Celestial Dragons. In King's mind, this man was supposed to be locked in the Infinite Hell right now while wearing Seastone cuffs!
"Are those your last words?"
Aiden looked at King and tilted his head. He gave him a pleasant smile and took a bite of the apple in his hand:
"Crunch."
The crisp chewing sound was especially sharp against the high-altitude wind.
Aiden swallowed the fruit and spoke calmly:
"By the way, you fly really slow."
"I've been waiting here forever."
Before King could answer.
"Schwing————"
With a clear, long ring, his sword left its sheath.
It was no longer a bright silver edge. What caught King's eyes was a pitch-black blade giving off a cold, dark shine.
A Great Grade Sword—now a Black Blade!
Aiden held the sword with one hand and pointed the black blade straight at King's forehead. His smile disappeared:
"You attacked my base and thought you could just fly away?"