Chapter 247: The Straw Hat Crew’s Ultimate Weapon!!
"Grandpa… can't you just let us go for once?!"
"I seriously don't wanna fight you—!!"
Luffy's shout was torn apart by the sea wind—
Only to be answered by Garp's booming laughter.
"BAHAHAHAHA!! Don't wanna fight?!"
"Then take your Straw Hat and that little ship of yours… and sink to the bottom of the sea forever!!"
His words crashed down like iron hammers.
Veins instantly bulged across Luffy's forehead.
Silence lasted only a moment.
Crackle… CRACKLE!
Red-gold Conqueror's Haki erupted violently from his body like awakened dragons twisting through the sky before compressing entirely into his clenched fist.
The air screamed.
Light itself warped around his knuckles.
Then—
The spot where Luffy had stood exploded into an afterimage as he tore through the atmosphere and appeared directly before Garp in an instant.
"Then I guess… I don't have a choice!!!"
The raging wind whipped through his black hair.
The usual sunlight within his eyes had vanished—
Replaced by the terrifying focus that came before a volcanic eruption.
BOOOOOOOM—!!!
Their fists collided.
The exploding Conqueror's Haki compressed violently within the microscopic gap between their punches, forcibly creating a rapidly expanding and collapsing sphere of red-gold energy.
It resembled a miniature sun screaming with storm-born fury.
CRACK! RUMBLE!
Countless red-gold lightning bolts burst from the energy sphere like furious dragons, intertwining into a gigantic prison of lightning around the two combatants.
The lightning twisted through the sky, shredding clouds apart.
Heaven and sea trembled together.
The atmosphere wailed like shattering glass as layers of air collapsed under the pressure.
The clouds high above were pulverized into nothingness by invisible force.
Below them, the sea itself caved inward before erupting into gigantic ring-shaped tidal waves over a hundred meters tall.
"Hang on—!!!"
The Thousand Sunny became nothing more than a drifting leaf amid the raging sea, the ship groaning under unbearable stress.
The instant the shadow of a massive wave descended—
BZZZT!
A stray arc of red-gold lightning swept across the deck.
"Gah—!!"
Nami, Usopp, Chopper, and the others felt as though giant hammers had slammed into their chests.
The suffocating pressure crushed down on them as they dropped to their knees, cold sweat instantly soaking their backs while they struggled to remain conscious through sheer willpower.
"Hmph…!"
"No way I'm letting the ship go down here!"
Almost simultaneously—
Two entirely different yet equally overwhelming bursts of Conqueror's Haki exploded from the Sunny.
One sharp enough to resemble ten thousand unsheathed blades.
The other fierce as roaring ice thunder.
Zoro and Yamato stood on opposite sides of the ship, using their own Haki as barriers to protect the violently shaking Thousand Sunny.
The crew barely managed to lift their heads.
Through trembling, distorted vision, they stared into the heavens.
There—
The two figures remained locked in deadlock amidst lightning and storms, fist against fist as their Haki continuously collided, annihilated one another, and regenerated again.
Every stray burst of energy carried enough power to effortlessly tear apart a small warship.
Zoro's remaining eye remained fixed upon the apocalyptic clash.
Within his pupil, ambition burned like forged steel inside a furnace.
Still not enough…
Not even close!
So this…
This was the view from the summit of the world?
His ambition grew wildly within his chest like untamed weeds.
Scorching.
Relentless.
And not far away, aboard the Marine warship—
Another majestic wave of golden Haki rose skyward, spreading over the vessel like a giant umbrella and shielding it from the raging shockwaves and monstrous tides.
Fleet Admiral Sengoku stood at the bow.
The incoming wind and fury had practically blown his braided beard upright.
His veins throbbed visibly as he glared at the grandfather-and-grandson pair fighting overhead.
"THAT DAMN OLD IDIOT GARP!!!"
His roar nearly overturned the deck itself.
This was supposed to be a major operation coordinated with Admiral Kizaru and the others to eliminate the remnants of the Flying Pirates and corner Golden Lion Shiki.
But the moment Garp encountered his newly crowned Fifth Emperor grandson—
He immediately rushed in without hesitation!
Sengoku knew their relationship was a tangled mess beyond comprehension.
But was now really the time for family drama?!
If Shiki escaped because of this, the entire operation would become meaningless!
The more Sengoku thought about it, the angrier he became.
His fists clenched hard enough to crack audibly as the gigantic silhouette of a golden Buddha flickered behind him.
At this point, he seriously wanted to fly up there and blast both idiots with a shockwave just to knock some sense into them.
Yet the endlessly exploding red-gold lightning in the sky seemed to declare one undeniable truth—
No one could casually interfere in this battle anymore.
"Hey! Look over there! Isn't that former Fleet Admiral Sengoku?!"
Usopp's shout pierced through the aftershocks of the Conqueror's Haki clash.
Everyone followed his gaze toward the nearby Marine battleship.
Standing proudly at the bow was an elderly man cloaked in authority and golden radiance.
The "Buddha" Sengoku himself.
"Directly confronting the Marine Headquarters' highest combat forces in the Grand Line is not a wise decision."
Trafalgar D. Water Law's calm, low voice sounded as he lightly adjusted the brim of his hat.
His eyes swept across the violently trembling keel of the Sunny.
"Even a ship built from Adam Wood may not survive impacts at that level."
"Exactly! Which means it's finally time for this genius to take the stage! SUPER!!!"
Franky suddenly thrust both arms into the air while striking his signature pose, his metallic backside clicking loudly.
Before anyone could react, he transformed into a blur and vanished into the ship's lower control room.
"Now witness the Thousand Sunny's true 'ultimate weapon'!!!"
RUMBLE RUMBLE RUMBLE—!!
Heavy mechanical sounds echoed from the rear deck.
Massive deck panels slid open to both sides as complicated steel frameworks rose upward like the spine of some gigantic beast.
Gears meshed.
Hydraulics roared.
A colossal steel tower ascended dramatically from the Sunny, nearly reaching the height of the Straw Hat flag atop the main mast.
But that wasn't all.
HUMMMMM—
With a low vibration that shook the surrounding air, an enormous deep-blue cannon barrel nearly thirty meters wide slowly extended from the tower's front.
Its pitch-black muzzle resembled the eye of an abyss locking onto the distant Marine fleet.
"Wha… what IS that…?!"
Nami's jaw dropped.
Even Robin's calm expression faltered slightly.
Chopper outright hid behind Zoro's leg, only one trembling antler visible.
Everyone swallowed hard simultaneously.
This had completely surpassed their understanding of what counted as a "weapon."
It radiated the terrifying combination of Franky's "genius" and "madness."
"Usopp! Get to the top firing control station! The targeting and energy calibration are already complete!"
Franky's voice boomed through the loudspeaker, overflowing with excitement.
"L-leave it to me! I'm the great Captain Usopp—the Sniper King!"
Usopp scrambled up the tower and dove into the transparent spherical cockpit near the top.
On the targeting screen, the lock-on reticle perfectly centered over Sengoku's flagship.
"Then… FIRE!!!"
Usopp inhaled deeply.
His eyes sharpened.
Then he slammed the massive red launch button.
HUMMMMMMMMM—!!!
The entire Thousand Sunny suddenly sank lower into the sea.
Within the ship, an overwhelming torrent of energy surged like a tidal wave.
Every reserve of the Coup de Burst system.
The cola engine's maximum output.
Even the emergency Lion Cannon energy reserves—
Everything was violently funneled into the gigantic cannon through specially reinforced conduits.
Deep within the barrel, blinding blue plasma crackled wildly like an imprisoned thunderstorm, compressing further and further.
At the same time—
An indescribably ominous sensation pierced through Sengoku's spine like an icicle.
Battle-hardened instinct made every hair on his body stand upright.
Cold sweat instantly soaked his back.
"Wait… that thing is…?!"
He abruptly turned his head.
His eyes locked onto the gigantic cannon aboard the Thousand Sunny radiating catastrophic energy.
Then—
The world turned blue.
A gigantic blue-white beam thirty meters wide erupted forward, tearing through the air and vaporizing every drop of seawater in its path.
Its shrieking energy annihilated matter itself as it blasted toward the Marine fleet.
The ocean surface split apart beneath it, leaving behind a boiling abyss-like trench that could not close.
"Divine Radiance: Heavenbreaker Cannon!!!"
"DAMN IT!!!"
Sengoku's eyes widened furiously.
He no longer dared hold back.
Brilliant golden light exploded from his body as he instantly transformed into an enormous golden Buddha towering like a mountain.
"Daibutsu Form!"
Black-red Conqueror's Haki lightning wrapped around his massive golden palm as he pushed both Armament Haki and Conqueror's Haki Infusion to their absolute limits.
"Conqueror's Infusion: Buddha Shockwave!!!"
A shockwave powerful enough to shake islands erupted from the Buddha's palm toward the incoming beam.
—SHING!
But at the exact instant the shockwave was about to fire—
A ghostlike figure suddenly appeared beside Sengoku without warning.
Then vanished just as quickly, as though it had never existed.
BOOOOOOOOOOM—!!!!!
The golden shockwave and the blue-white electromagnetic cannon collided violently.
The impact created a blinding sphere of light rivaling the sun itself as berserk energy currents ripped across the sea once more.
Then—
A horrifying scene unfolded before the Marines' eyes.
BZZZT… CRACK!
The seemingly invincible Buddha Shockwave lasted only two seconds against the continuous torrent of blue-white energy before it was pierced through and completely obliterated.
Though weakened, the beam still surged onward toward Sengoku's chest.
"What?!"
For the first time, genuine shock appeared on Sengoku's face.
At the last possible instant, he thrust both palms forward, top-tier Armament Haki coating them as he forcibly tried redirecting the beam.
BOOOOOM—!!!!
An indescribable force crashed into him.
The gigantic golden Buddha body—stable as a mountain—violently trembled before both feet lifted off the deck entirely.
The destructive beam carried him backward through the air.
CRACK! BOOM!
The main mast snapped in half.
Heavy armor plating tore apart like paper.
The giant golden Buddha shot across the sky like a meteor, smashing through endless waves before finally crashing thousands of meters away into the sea in a colossal explosion of water—
And slowly sinking beneath the ocean surface.
The sea wind howled.
The deck of the Thousand Sunny fell completely silent.
"D… did we actually hit him?"
Usopp poked his head out from the control cockpit, staring blankly at the gradually fading explosion in the distance.
"SUUUUUUPERRRRR—!!!!"
Franky burst straight through the roof of the control room with tears streaming down his face as he raised both fists triumphantly.
"Did you see that?! THIS is the Straw Hat crew's ultimate weapon!!!"
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