The face of Whitebeard showed not the slightest trace of surprise. The magma-formed canine head was mere inches away, yet he showed no sign of evasion.
This man, hailed as the strongest in the entire world, did not even cover his upper body with Armament Haki. He simply raised his hand.
Sakazuki, who had one foot planted on the deck, was directly sent flying like a kicked ball by the sudden, immense force transmitted from the deck beneath him. He crashed onto the land where he had previously been standing.
Sakazuki maintained his elemental state to dissipate the force, magma splattering across the ground.
His expression was grim. Whitebeard's Gura Gura no Mi was undoubtedly terrifying, but he seemed to have forgotten that the Edward Newgate before him was not the sickly old man of the Marineford War who could be besieged at will.
This was Whitebeard at the peak of his life—invincible in the mortal world.
Perhaps Kaido could challenge his authority, but that person would not be Sakazuki.
Whitebeard glanced at the Marine who had returned to the battlefield. The corners of his lips curled slightly. I am Whitebeard. If I am attacking an island, you had best hold your ground and defend it properly. Yet you dare to take the initiative and attack my pirate ship, attempting to reverse the tides of battle? Do you really think that Sengoku, Garp, and Zephyr behind you do not exist?
He looked at the young Marine candidate for admiral and shook his head slightly. Still too green, he added in his heart.
"Brat, open your eyes wide, don't blink, and watch every single one of my movements carefully," Whitebeard said.
His right hand held his naginata downward, dragging the blade as he advanced. His massive body leaned slightly forward, gathering strength for a brief moment.
Whitebeard, with a speed that completely defied his gigantic frame, leaped down from the prow of the Moby Dick.
"If you don't dodge, you'll die!"
As his words fell, he slashed.
The naginata, quite similar in appearance to the Guandao of the Spring and Autumn period, was wielded with a speed as swift as a thunderbolt—heavy, powerful, precise, and ruthless.
The blackened naginata, accompanied by an overwhelming momentum, slashed downward.
Even though Sakazuki was fully focused, he was still caught somewhat off guard.
Whitebeard's attack was delivered with absolute clarity, without any flashy embellishments.
Unmatched physical strength, top-tier Armament Haki, and an overwhelming aura—these elements combined to create this swift, precise, and ruthless strike.
"Soru!"
Sakazuki did not dare to receive this blow head-on, nor did he dare to use Observation Haki to predict the naginata's descent and shift his body accordingly at the last moment.
He knew all too well that Whitebeard's Observation Haki was leagues above his own.
Thus, he chose the safest option—pulling away to create distance.
The ground was carved open by the sheer force of the strike, leaving a ten-meter-long scar in the earth.
Whitebeard did not pause in his assault. A light flick of his wrist transferred an invisible force from his hand to the naginata's blade.
With an upward swing, he sent another strike toward the Marine, who had left an afterimage in midair.
Crack—
It was as if glass had shattered—this single vibration tore the very atmosphere apart.
The air in front of Whitebeard cracked like a mirror, countless fractures spreading outward from the center.
Suspended in midair, Sakazuki had no way to dodge.
If he remained in his elemental state to evade the shockwave, Whitebeard's follow-up slash would strike him directly.
If he did not evade, he would have to endure this powerful, wide-ranging shockwave head-on.
The Marine vice admiral made his decision in an instant.
Armament Haki surged across his body—
"Tekkai: Steel!"
Boom!
The Marine vice admiral was sent crashing into a civilian
building dozens of meters away.
The shockwave collapsed all the structures within the surrounding area.
From where Whitebeard had launched his attack, the ground was plowed open, forming a massive fan-shaped scar centered around him.
"…"
Sakazuki kicked away a slab of concrete pressing down on him and stood up.
He had to admit—those two strikes from Whitebeard had rattled him.
Even though he had mentally prepared himself for a brutal beating, reality was even harsher than he had anticipated.
Whitebeard had not even unleashed the full power of his Devil Fruit, yet his immensely strong Armament Haki, far-reaching Observation Haki, and absolute physical dominance had already left Sakazuki struggling bitterly.
How strong was Whitebeard?
During the Marineford War, even in his weakened state, he had stopped a full-force attack from Giant Vice Admiral John Giant with a single hand and later halted a Moby-class warship, which could move freely on land using paddle wheels, with one arm.
Now, unburdened by illness or injury, Edward Newgate was like Guan Yu in his prime—his eyes open, ready to kill.
Against opponents of the same level, he would utterly dominate.
Against those even slightly weaker, he would simply annihilate them.
This sovereign of the New World was delivering a lesson to the young Sakazuki in the most direct and brutal manner—
With overwhelming might.
Magma dripped as Sakazuki reactivated his Devil Fruit ability.
He emerged from the ruins of the collapsed building, still maintaining his fully elementalized state.
Armament Haki wrapped tightly around his body, stabilizing the magma's surface while suppressing the immense internal pressure that caused cracks to form across his hardened lava shell.
Within his body, the molten rock continued to pressurize at an alarming rate.
He stood with his feet together and took a small step forward—this step was less than a third of an average person's stride.
The second step reached half the length of an ordinary soldier's stride; the third step barely matched his usual pace...
Sakazuki suddenly burst into a run, closing the dozens of meters between them in an instant. Combined with the explosive final push of Soru, Sakazuki, having reached the peak of his momentum, leaped up and drove his elbow down toward the great pirate before him. The speed of his red streak was so intense that even the loose stones around him were swept up into the motion.
"Purgatory Heat!"
Whitebeard burst into laughter: "Gurararara! Well done!" He swung his naginata in a sweeping arc, aiming to sever his opponent's elbow.
"Oi! Is that Marine crazy? He's been getting beaten up so badly, yet he still dares to charge in head-on?"
The pirates aboard the Moby Dick remained in spectator mode—before them, that Vice Admiral from the Marine Headquarters had been thoroughly suppressed.
But the Marine moved faster than him—his powerful right elbow strike smashed into the edge of the naginata. After sprinting for dozens of meters and gathering all his strength, Sakazuki's strike knocked Whitebeard's naginata off course. Taking advantage of this, he pressed in closer, exploiting the opening at the center of Whitebeard's stance.
"Titan's Wrath!"
Sakazuki's elementally transformed body suddenly erupted, resembling a volcanic explosion right in front of Whitebeard's eyes.
"!?"
Whitebeard's Observation Haki foresaw the attack, but with his massive size, there was no way to dodge it. For the first time, he wrapped his body in a hardened layer of Armament Haki.
A humanoid volcano erupted!
With the two of them at the center, the ground collapsed and lifted, and the terrifying impact even pushed the Moby Dick back nearly ten meters.
"Huff..."
Sakazuki reformed from his magma state and landed on the ground, nearly stumbling. This kind of Allahu Akbar-style technique drained his stamina and mental energy considerably. In just those few dozen meters of buildup, even his Armament Haki was struggling to suppress the raging magma within his body.
"Old man!"
Thatch anxiously shouted into the smoke screen. No one had expected that Marine to charge in with such a point-blank attack.
Sakazuki quickly raised his arms to guard as a massive black fist emerged from the smoke and punched him away.
At the most dangerous moment, Whitebeard had activated the power of the Tremor-Tremor Fruit directly through his body.
The shockwave had been hurriedly released, but in the end, he had still managed to block the magma blast to his face.
Using his entire body as the epicenter of a tremor, Whitebeard was inevitably injured by his own shockwave.
However, compared to suffering a direct hit from that terrifying magma and having it adhere to his body, Whitebeard decisively chose to endure the backlash instead.
From the moment the battle began up until this ambush, this brat had surprised him a little. Decisive and adaptable, these adjustments made in split-second moments were the kind of mental fortitude a strong fighter should possess.
With a single swipe of his hand, he dispersed the lingering smoke and once again pressed in toward the magma brat.
By this time, Sakazuki had recovered from his previous outburst. His right arm transformed into a massive lava hound's head as he charged forward.
"The same old trick?"
Whitebeard frowned. While this attack arrived in the blink of an eye, compared to that earlier move that had been somewhat impressive, this was merely standard fare.
He pulled his left fist back to his waist and sent it forward in a straight thrust. The air cracked apart once more, and the lava hound's head was shattered instantly.
At the same time, he swung his right hand in a sweeping strike—he was going to teach this brat a lesson: if a move didn't work the first time, don't bother using it again!
"Huh?"
His naginata was suddenly clamped down on—by the jaws of the lava hound!
Just as the first hound had been destroyed, Sakazuki's right arm immediately formed a second flaming dog head.
Whitebeard twisted his wrist and attempted to pull his weapon free.
When facing high-level Armament Haki users, Logia-type abilities had to be carefully controlled—expanding the body into a larger elemental mass only made it a bigger target.
However, no cry of pain came from the Marine.
Whitebeard noticed that his blade hadn't actually hit anything—it felt as though the magma had preemptively moved aside before the strike even landed.
"Not bad, kid. Your Observation Haki is quite decent."
Whitebeard still had the leisure to comment on Sakazuki's refined technique.
His response was a third lava hound emerging from the magma.
The naginata danced through the air, swift and seamless—Whitebeard's swordsmanship was immaculate. He slashed, chopped, lifted, hooked, cleaved, wiped, intercepted, blocked, lifted, and stabbed—all executed with crisp precision.
At the same time, Sakazuki, who had mastered his Devil Fruit with exquisite finesse, managed to use his three-headed hound technique to fend off Whitebeard's medium-range attacks.
Yet, Whitebeard made no move to shatter this technique outright with the power of the Tremor-Tremor Fruit.
It was as if he was deliberately testing every aspect of the Marine's adaptability.
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