Chapter 276
An invisible force spread outward from the Moby Dick, washing across the surrounding sea in every direction.
There was no mistaking it.
Whitebeard had just used the power of the Tremor-Tremor Fruit.
He had not attacked anyone.
He had merely struck the deck as a warning—a quiet declaration that Edward Newgate was here, and that his presence was not something anyone could ignore.
Faces across the battlefield went pale as the sea itself seemed to grow heavier beneath that invisible pressure.
Edward Newgate, the Strongest Man in the World, a name that had long since crossed the boundary between man and legend, now stood before them in the flesh with Murakumogiri angled toward Kaido.
Zaraki could feel the gazes gathering around him from the Beasts Pirates and the independent crews watching along the outskirts.
Shock and disbelief dominated most of those faces, but awe was buried beneath both.
'What the hell is so special about Zaraki?'
The unspoken question seemed to hang over the sea. Mihawk had intervened to preserve his duel.
Jinbe and Hancock had their own debts and reasons for standing in Kaido's way.
Shanks wanted the rematch kept free of outside manipulation, and Whitebeard had come because the Government's attempt to move multiple Emperors around one target threatened the wider New World balance.
None of them had arrived for exactly the same reason, yet all of those motives had converged around the same man.
Even Zaraki had to admit the result looked completely absurd from the outside.
Across the battlefield, Kaido's face had twisted into a mass of bulging veins and barely restrained fury.
Rage, humiliation, and the shame of being challenged over and over again in front of the entire world churned inside those molten-gold eyes until they looked ready to spit actual fire.
His hand tightened around Hassaikai.
Creak...
His knuckles strained beneath the force of his grip, as though he might crush the kanabo itself.
"Newgate..."
Kaido forced the name through clenched teeth.
Every syllable carried murderous hatred.
Yet beneath that hatred was something much harder to notice.
A faint trace of bravado covering genuine caution.
Kaido could dismiss Shanks and sneer at three Warlords, but Whitebeard—the man known as the strongest in the world—was a different matter.
For the first time since arriving, Kaido's overwhelming arrogance had been forcibly pushed down.
Zaraki shifted his attention toward the senior officers of the Beasts Pirates.
King's wings had indeed lost their perfect rhythm for half a beat.
Whatever expression lay beneath his mask, his entire presence had turned darker.
Queen's enormous body had stiffened as well. He had stopped jumping around and shouting orders, instead staring fixedly at the Moby Dick.
Even the Tobiroppo, so arrogant only moments earlier, had quieted down.
Their bodies were tense, their earlier swagger gone as every one of them prepared for a battle whose outcome no one could predict.
"Kaido-san, this is bad."
King's deep voice carried through the air with unmistakable seriousness.
"If this continues, the situation will turn against us."
Zaraki saw King advising Kaido from a distance.
He could not hear every word clearly, but judging from King's grim posture and the way Kaido's muscles remained rigid with suppressed fury, the message was obvious.
King wanted him to withdraw. Whitebeard's thunderous laughter rolled across the sea once again, thick with mockery.
"Brat, looks like your subordinate has more sense than you do."
Kaido's head snapped upward.
His golden eyes flooded red with rage.
"SHUT UP, NEWGATE!"
His roar blasted outward like a physical shockwave, making the very air tremble.
"I'M NOT BACKING DOWN!"
Decades of resentment toward Whitebeard erupted all at once.
"YOU WANT A WAR? THEN LET'S HAVE ONE!"
Hassaikai came down violently against the sea.
BOOM—!!
The ocean caved beneath the strike, forming an enormous depression before erupting into towering waves.
Kaido was actually considering it.
Fighting two Emperors and three Warlords here and now in a battle capable of overturning the balance of the entire world.
The lunatic really might do it.
On the Moby Dick, Ace's already tense expression turned noticeably pale.
His eyes remained fixed on Whitebeard, filled with an anxiety Zaraki had never seen from him before.
He was worried about the old man—not because Whitebeard had suddenly decided to risk everything for a Marine, but because the Government's attempt to manipulate Kaido and Linlin had already dragged several Emperor crews toward the same point, and Whitebeard was now stepping into that storm personally.
"Pops..."
Ace's fist tightened.
Everyone on the battlefield had reached the limit of their nerves, prepared for an unprecedented melee to erupt at any second.
Then something else happened.
A Marine lookout on one of the outer spectator ships suddenly shouted and pointed toward the western approach.
A fast Marine warship was cutting through the waves at full speed, its reinforced bow throwing up a long white wake as it forced its way toward the center of the confrontation.
Zaraki recognized the vessel before the figure standing at its bow became clear.
It was Garp's interception group—the same force Kaido had slipped past earlier after changing routes while King delayed them.
The old Marine did not wait for the ship to reach the harbor.
Once it came within range, Garp bent his knees and launched himself from the bow in one enormous leap, crossing the remaining distance before landing hard on Kalles near the Oni Slayer.
"Gurararara!" Whitebeard had already recognized him.
His booming laugh rolled across the sea as he drew Murakumogiri back toward himself.
"Looks like there are plenty of old faces showing up today."
Whitebeard's gaze settled on Kaido and his grin widened. "Seems I'm not the only old bastard who came looking to catch up with you."
Then every word fell like a hammer onto the Beasts Pirates.
"The Hero of the Marines, Garp... is here too."
The instant that name left the mouth of the Strongest Man in the World, Zaraki clearly felt the change in Kaido.
The enormous fury that had been building inside the Emperor—hot enough to boil the sea—seemed to freeze in place as though someone had dumped a bucket of ice water directly over his head.
It was not fear.
Zaraki could tell the difference.
It was something more complicated.
Fury and wariness mixed with the deep, instinctive irritation born from years of knowing exactly what kind of nightmare this particular old Marine could become.
Kaido's face shifted from furious red to iron blue.
Veins twisted across the back of the hand gripping Hassaikai, while his knuckles groaned beneath the strain.
He could challenge Whitebeard.
He could trade threats with Shanks.
But Garp...
That unreasonable old madman who had spent his life knocking legends off their pedestals with nothing but two iron fists was a nightmare few great pirates ever wanted to provoke without good reason.
Especially when that nightmare had arrived on a battlefield already occupied by Shanks and Whitebeard, both of whom opposed Kaido forcing the issue here.
Zaraki rubbed his nose.
'The old man really knows how to pick his timing.'
His feelings were surprisingly mixed.
Being protected by an elder like this was strangely reassuring.
At the same time, there was something irritating about needing it at all.
On the Red Force, Yasopp, Lucky Roux, and several others visibly relaxed their shoulders.
Even Shanks' smile became easier.
Garp's arrival had finally crushed what remained of Kaido's desire to force the battle.
"Retreat."
Kaido squeezed the word through his teeth.
Humiliation and unwillingness saturated his voice.
He sounded like a cornered beast being forced to abandon its prey.
His eyes remained fixed on Zaraki.
That stare seemed determined to burn the young Marine's face into his memory before tearing him apart someday.
"We're leaving!"
King and Queen reacted almost immediately, relief obvious despite their attempts to conceal it.
Orders rang throughout the Beasts Pirates' fleet as the enormous ships began slowly turning away from Kalles Island.
As their formation shifted, the suffocating pressure covering the sea finally began to loosen.
Then a cool voice broke the brief calm.
"Hey."
Everyone turned.
Zaraki stood at the bow of the Marine warship.
One hand rested on his sword.
He met Kaido's murderous gaze without the slightest trace of fear.
Instead, a provocative grin spread across his face.
"You—the guy who's always trying to kill himself."
Kaido stopped.
Zaraki slowly drew several inches of steel from the sheath.
Cold light flashed along the blade and reflected the battle lust burning in his eyes.
"I'm remembering what happened today."
His smile widened.
"So wash your neck and keep it ready."
The steel slid another fraction from its sheath.
"Next time we meet..."
Zaraki's eyes locked onto his.
"I'm cutting your head off myself."
An uproar exploded across the sea.
A Marine had just issued a public execution notice to one of the Four Emperors.
To Kaido of the Beasts.
In front of practically half the New World.
Was Zaraki insane?
Or was he genuinely that confident?
Kaido's enormous body went still.
Slowly, he turned his head back.
Rage reignited in his golden eyes.
Yet only for a moment.
Then it transformed into something stranger.
Excitement.
Kaido bared a mouthful of white teeth.
"WORORORORORO!"
His booming laughter shook the sea.
"NOW THAT'S INTERESTING!"
He stared at Zaraki with brutal anticipation.
"So the Marines still have freaks like you running around!"
His grin widened.
"Fine!"
"I'll wait!"
Kaido's laughter became even louder.
"JUST MAKE SURE SOME WORTHLESS BASTARD DOESN'T KILL YOU BEFORE YOU GET TO ME!"
With that, he stopped lingering.
His enormous body leapt away and crashed onto one of his own ships.
The Beasts Pirates' fleet accelerated out of the center of the storm beneath an unusually subdued silence.
As Kaido departed, the murderous tension that had blanketed Kalles Island finally dissolved.
The pirates watching from afar released breaths they had not realized they were holding, feeling as though they had just stepped back from the gates of hell.
That relief lasted only seconds before something hotter took its place: excitement.
Every gaze shifted almost simultaneously between Zaraki and Dracule Mihawk, who still waited on the rocky shoreline of Kalles.
Hawkeye had barely moved through the entire confrontation.
He simply stood there with the black blade Yoru, his sharp eyes fixed on Zaraki with unmistakable interest.
It was almost the gaze of a man admiring a flawless work of art.
The spectacle involving the Emperors was finally over.
But the real main event had yet to begin.
The battle that would touch directly upon the title of world's greatest swordsman.
The wind seemed to die.
The waves gradually flattened.
Countless ships began backing away of their own accord, opening an enormous stretch of empty sea around Kalles Island.
No one needed to order them.
Everyone understood that the coming duel required a battlefield worthy of it.
Across the entire sea... it felt as though the world itself had stopped breathing.
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