Chapter 273
The fuse was lit, but not from the Red Force or the barren mountain where Kaido's enormous dragon body coiled above the harbor.
It came instead from the stretch of sea ahead of Zaraki's warship, the very waters that Kaido's Blast Breath had just carved apart.
Dracule Mihawk, a man whose expression was usually as still as an undisturbed lake, finally spoke in a voice quieter and colder than the seawater beneath them, yet every syllable cut through the battlefield like a blade dipped in ice and reached everyone present with perfect clarity.
"Kaido of the Beasts."
Mihawk did not even turn to look at Zaraki; his hawk-like eyes remained fixed on the enormous dragon looming over the barren mountain.
"Whatever grievance you have with him can wait until after our duel."
A brief silence followed as Mihawk's killing intent sharpened.
The simple presence of a swordsman prepared to draw Yoru made everyone close enough to sense him feel as though a blade had been laid against their skin, and when he spoke again, his voice had hardened.
"If you interfere now..."
One hand rested near Yoru.
"...my blade will cut you down first."
Complete silence followed.
Far out on the surrounding sea, the pirates craning their necks to watch looked as though someone had grabbed them by the throat; eyes bulged and mouths hung open because, as far as they were concerned, the world had gone insane.
First Red-Hair had openly provoked Kaido.
Now even Hawkeye—the lone swordsman who normally wanted nothing to do with anyone else's conflicts—was threatening the **Strongest Creature** to his face.
Zaraki stood on the rocking deck of the warship and wiped seawater from his face with the back of one hand.
A faint smile tugged at his mouth.
'Now this is getting interesting.'
He had assumed Mihawk's earlier slash had simply been a convenient way to keep Kaido's attack from ruining the duel before it started.
He had not expected the man to go this far.
Mihawk was apparently willing to openly turn against an Emperor simply to preserve the purity of their duel, and that was a kind of pride Zaraki could respect.
There was a reason this man stood at the summit of swordsmanship.
"Worororo..."
Kaido's deep laughter carried a fury cold enough to freeze the soul.
His enormous dragon head slowly lowered until those molten-gold eyes stared directly at Mihawk.
"What did you just say?"
The air trembled.
"You?"
Kaido's mouth curled back from his fangs.
"DRACULE MIHAWK?!"
BOOOOM—!!
Conqueror's Haki exploded from the mountain.
It swept across the surrounding sea like a physical storm.
The surface of the ocean was visibly forced downward beneath the pressure, while countless weaker pirates on the distant ships rolled their eyes back and collapsed unconscious on the spot.
"I'M GOING TO RIP THAT MARINE BRAT'S HEAD OFF RIGHT IN FRONT OF YOU!"
Kaido's roar shook heaven and sea.
"LET'S SEE HOW THAT OVERSIZED KNIFE OF YOURS PLANS TO STOP ME!"
Energy began gathering once again through his colossal dragon body.
Before Kaido could attack, a black figure dropped from the sky like a burning meteor and stopped above the water between the Red Force and the approaching Marine warship.
Enormous black wings beat slowly behind him, each movement sending waves of scorching air across the sea, while a black bodysuit and heavy mask covered almost his entire body.
Long silver-white hair trailed behind his head, and a fierce flame burned across his back with enough heat to make the surrounding air shimmer.
It was King the Wildfire.
His arrival immediately raised the temperature across the battlefield.
The enormous, violent presence pouring from him spread outward like a net, covering the waters around the Red-Haired Pirates.
Morgans nearly snapped his pen in half as every feather on his body stood on end.
The second-in-command of the Beasts Pirates, a monster with a bounty exceeding 1.3 billion Berries, had come personally; even by the standards of this gathering, it was beyond what Morgans had expected.
The mood among the spectators immediately darkened.
Kaido alone was already enough to destroy almost anything standing in his way.
Add King to the battlefield and even Mihawk, terrifying as he was, could hardly be expected to casually deal with both of them at once.
Just as the tension threatened to snap, a lazy voice cut through it.
"Hey, Kaido. King."
Shanks finally removed his arm from the railing and stepped slowly out of the shadow cast by the Red Force's sails.
The smile was gone from his face, replaced by the quiet authority of an Emperor who had finally decided to stop treating the situation as entertainment.
"I'm pretty sure I already said I came here to make sure this duel happens without anyone interfering."
Step by step, Shanks walked toward the bow.
His eyes passed calmly over King, who remained suspended in the air, before settling on Kaido.
"So what you're doing right now..."
His voice stayed quiet.
"...is pretty disrespectful, don't you think?"
The instant those words fell, Benn Beckman shifted the cigarette between his lips and rested his rifle across one shoulder, Lucky Roux tossed the massive bone in his hand overboard, and Yasopp placed a hand on his rifle.
One after another, the officers of the Red-Haired Pirates entered combat readiness.
The sea exploded into uproar.
Morgans was trembling so hard with excitement that he nearly started singing.
An Emperor was facing another Emperor while the world's greatest swordsman stood opposite King the Wildfire; this had gone far beyond a front-page story and into the sort of event that would become legend.
Would Kaido and King really back down now that the entire Red-Haired Pirates stood ready to fight?
"Shanks..."
Kaido's voice rolled across the island like thunder from the depths of hell.
Rage burned so intensely inside those golden eyes that it seemed ready to pour out like molten rock.
"Do you actually want to go to war with me here?"
Shanks' expression did not change, but Kaido's did.
"THEN COME ON!"
His roar shook the entire region.
There was no attempt to hide the destruction he wanted.
"I'LL SINK THE RED-HAIRED PIRATES INTO THIS SEA ALONG WITH THAT MARINE BRAT!"
Kaido snapped his head toward King.
"KING!"
The dragon's voice thundered through the sky.
"CALL QUEEN AND THE REST OF THEM OUT!"
King gave a silent nod.
He reached to his belt, drew a compact signal launcher used by the Beasts Pirates, and fired a flare high above Kalles.
BOOM—!!
A violent red-orange signal burst across the sky. It was not an attack, merely the prearranged order for the strike force waiting beyond the horizon to close in.
Zaraki watched the fiery ring sweep across the sky, leaving behind what looked almost like a scorched circle drawn across the blue.
Then he felt it.
A faint vibration traveled through the ocean from somewhere beyond the horizon and climbed through the warship's hull, growing steadily stronger until the deck beneath Zaraki's boots began to tremble.
It was neither cannon fire nor the roar of some gigantic beast, but something heavier: the sound of many enormous ships driving their keels through the waves at the same time.
"W-What is that?!"
One sharp-eyed pirate screamed from a distant vessel, voice cracking as he pointed toward the horizon.
At first there were only a handful of tiny black dots where sea met sky, but they multiplied and grew larger at a terrifying speed until the scattered shapes spread across the horizon like a single moving wall of darkness.
It looked less like a fleet and more like an entire continent made of iron, timber, and grotesque animal figureheads advancing across the sea.
Dozens of ships came into view, followed by still more silhouettes behind them.
It was a major Beasts Pirates strike force, not every ship Kaido possessed, but it was more than enough to turn the waters around Kalles into a battlefield.
Huge pirate vessels built in the brutal style of the Beasts Pirates surged in from multiple directions like a swarm of sea monsters crawling out of hell.
Their bows were carved into savage beasts.
Across their enormous sails flew the same emblem again and again—a horned skull over crossed bones.
Those Jolly Rogers stared down at the sea like death itself laughing at the people trapped beneath them.
The fleet became a black wall, its masts rising like a forest and its flags rolling like storm clouds as the ships continued spreading outward until every obvious escape route from Kalles Island was covered.
The entire region had begun to look like a cage—easy enough to enter, perhaps much harder to leave.
Whatever excitement had remained among the pirates who had come merely to watch disappeared.
The sheer scale of the Beasts Pirates' mobilization crushed it completely.
Hearts tightened and breathing became difficult as the scale of the deployment sank in.
This was real; Kaido was not posturing.
He had come here to start a war!
Zaraki's pupils narrowed slightly.
He could feel it clearly now.
Every one of those ships carried the savage, bloodthirsty presence of hardened pirates.
Thousands upon thousands of hostile gazes converged on the battlefield, combining into an almost tangible pressure capable of breaking weaker men before the fighting even started.
For the sake of killing him, Kaido had committed a major strike force to Kalles.
This was no longer a simple standoff between a handful of powerful fighters; the threat of a much wider war had become very real.
One Emperor had brought enough of his crew to challenge another Emperor's people, the world's greatest swordsman, and the Marine known as the War Demon at the same time.
"Wororororo... SHANKS!"
Kaido's laughter grew even more unrestrained now that the Beasts Pirates' fleet had appeared behind him.
The enormous dragon turned slowly toward the Red Force.
Mockery filled his molten-gold eyes.
"You still planning to protect that brat?"
Kaido laughed again.
"WITH WHAT?"
His voice boomed over the sea.
"THOSE PRECIOUS CREWMATES OF YOURS?"
His fangs showed.
"OR THAT PATHETIC LITTLE 'REPUTATION' YOU'RE SO PROUD OF?!"
For the first time, Benn Beckman looked genuinely grave.
His mouth tightened around his cigarette while the officers of the Red-Haired Pirates remained ready to fight, but another recognition had entered their eyes as well: this had become serious trouble.
They were willing to fight Kaido.
Some of them might even enjoy it.
But fighting the entire Beasts Pirates in an unfamiliar sea, far from their own territory and without any preparation, in a battle where defeat meant annihilation?
That was about as bad a situation as anyone could ask for.
Kaido, however, seemed finished wasting words on Shanks.
After that final taunt, the enormous dragon head turned away from the Red Force.
Slowly and deliberately, Kaido turned away from the Red Force.
His molten-gold eyes passed over Shanks and Mihawk, swept across the sea, and finally locked onto the figure standing on the deck of the Marine warship closest to Kalles Island: Zaraki.
In that instant, Zaraki felt as though some primordial predator from the dawn of the world had fixed its eyes on him.
For one fleeting moment, everything else seemed to recede—the sound, the light, the sea, and the ships—until there was nothing left in Zaraki's awareness except Kaido's enormous eyes filled with brutality and murderous intent.
"Brat..."
Kaido's voice dropped until it became quiet and heavy, like the final stillness before a storm broke.
Every word carried the cold certainty of a death sentence.
"Your life..."
His golden eyes narrowed.
"...belongs to me today."