Chapter 279
The sharpened clarity Zaraki had reached during the duel settled through him like cold water, washing away the last of the wild noise that had filled his head.
The wound in his abdomen still hurt badly enough to tear at his nerves, and the shoulder Charlotte Linlin had nearly ruined was burning beneath its bandages, but the pain no longer distracted him.
If anything, it anchored him more firmly to the battlefield.
Everything unnecessary had fallen away.
He could feel the wind moving over the broken assessment ground, hear Mihawk's rough breathing across the shattered stone, and read the minute changes in the man's stance from the angle of Yoru and the pressure beneath his feet.
The improvement was not some new supernatural sense.
It was the simple result of everything Mihawk had taught him on Kuraigana, everything the Miyamoto Musashi Swordsmanship Legacy had given him, and everything this duel had hammered into his body until thought and reaction had finally begun to move together.
The system notification from moments earlier still lingered at the edge of Zaraki's awareness.
**[Swordsmanship Legacy: Miyamoto Musashi — integration stabilized.]**
**[Technical combat experience successfully assimilated into the host's personal swordsmanship.]**
His Zaraki Kenpachi template remained exactly where it had been since Marineford: one hundred percent synchronized.
Nothing had suddenly increased his physical strength or spiritual pressure. He was simply using what he already possessed far better than before.
'So that's what changed.'
Zaraki slowly raised Nozarashi.
The dark-gold Reiatsu crawling along the chipped edge drew inward, becoming thinner and denser rather than spilling wastefully around the blade.
His breathing steadied as he closed both hands around the hilt, and the movement pulled hard enough at his injured shoulder to send a fresh streak of pain down his arm.
He grinned anyway.
Across the ruined field, the last trace of detachment disappeared from Mihawk's face.
On the distant Red Force, Shanks' hand moved instinctively toward Gryphon.
Yasopp tightened his grip on his rifle, while Benn Beckman's eyes narrowed through a thin veil of cigarette smoke.
"Hey..." Yasopp muttered. "You've got to be kidding me."
There was no colossal phantom behind Zaraki, no divine swords hanging in the sky, and no distortion of space.
What unsettled the watching swordsmen was much simpler than that.
His stance had changed.
Until now, even at his best, Zaraki had always looked like a monster forcing a sword to keep up with him.
Now the enormous chipped blade seemed to belong in his hands. His feet, shoulders, breathing, and grip had aligned around a single purpose without any wasted movement.
Mihawk understood the change better than anyone.
For the first time since their first meeting on Kuraigana, he was no longer looking at a man whose raw strength happened to be delivered through a sword.
He was looking at another swordsman.
The realization did not frighten him into retreat. It did, however, strip away the last trace of complacency.
Mihawk straightened.
Yoru rose in both hands.
Armament Haki hardened along his grip and forearms as he settled into a stance so economical that it appeared almost ordinary.
There was no need for a fabricated secret art or some power outside the path he had spent his entire life mastering.
Everything Mihawk possessed was already contained in the black blade before him.
Zaraki laughed softly.
"This..."
His golden eyes locked onto Mihawk.
"...is my sword."
He stepped forward.
The first movement was not spectacular.
There was no lightning transformation and no impossible leap through space.
His foot simply drove into the broken ground with perfect timing, carrying his entire body behind Nozarashi as he swung.
Dark-gold pressure gathered along the chipped edge and released in one concentrated line.
Mihawk moved at the same instant.
Yoru swept upward.
The two strongest remaining strikes of the duel met over the center of the abandoned Kalles assessment ground.
For one heartbeat, there was almost no sound.
Then the battlefield erupted.
BOOOOOOM—!!
The collision hit like a siege cannon fired directly into the island.
Stone beneath both swordsmen fractured in an enormous web.
The already damaged training field collapsed inward, old fortress walls split apart, and a nearby barren ridge burst open under the pressure.
A ring of compressed air tore outward and struck the surrounding sea hard enough to drive the water away from Kalles' shoreline before it came surging back.
The spectator ships pitched violently.
"BACK OFF!"
"TURN THE BOW INTO THE WAVE!"
"GET AWAY FROM THE ISLAND!"
Orders and screams spread across the fleets as captains finally understood that even the distance they had kept was not enough.
On the Red Force, Shanks braced one hand against the railing while the ship rose sharply beneath the first swell.
"Hold her steady!"
He did not order any impossible Haki barrier.
The crew simply did what one of the strongest pirate crews in the world was supposed to do: they secured the rigging, turned the ship into the pressure, and trusted their helmsman.
The Moby Dick did the same.
So did the Oni Slayer and Garp's approaching Marine vessel.
At the center of Kalles, Zaraki and Mihawk disappeared into a storm of shattered rock, seawater, and white spray.
The old assessment ground did not vanish from the map.
It simply ceased to resemble a training ground.
One side of the fortress folded into the crater.
Several ridges had been cut apart, and the shoreline collapsed in broad sections under the returning surge.
The force displaced enough seawater to send a destructive wall rolling away from the island in every direction, but Kalles itself remained beneath the dust and spray.
For several seconds, nobody could see either swordsman.
Then the sea around the island began to rise again.
The wave was large enough to threaten every vessel that had crowded too close.
And it was still growing.
"ALL HANDS, BRACE YOURSELVES! KEEP THE HELM STEADY!"
Several kilometers from Kalles, Garp's dog-headed Marine warship pitched violently as the wave created by Zaraki and Mihawk's final collision rolled outward from the island.
Across the deck, hardened Marines clung to railings, rigging, and cannon mounts while the white wall of water climbed higher in front of them.
It was nothing like the impossible thousand-meter apocalypse some terrified sailors first imagined, but it was still large enough to overturn ships and sweep entire crews into the sea if it struck them broadside.
"REPORTING TO VICE ADMIRAL GARP! THE WAVE IS STILL BUILDING! IMPACT IN LESS THAN A MINUTE!"
The lookout's shout was nearly torn apart by the wind.
Garp stood at the bow with his Justice coat snapping behind him. For once, there was no trace of his usual grin.
'Those two idiots really did it.'
"ALL MARINE SHIPS, TURN INTO THE WAVE! FULL POWER!"
His roar carried over the deck.
"GET THE SMALLER SHIPS BEHIND US!"
A lazy voice answered from farther back.
"Ahh... looks like Sengoku was right to send me after all."
Garp turned.
Kuzan stood near the base of the mainmast, having transferred from the fast support vessel that had caught up with Garp's interception group shortly before the duel reached its final exchange.
Sengoku had dispatched him once reports confirmed that Whitebeard, Shanks, Kaido, Mihawk, and Zaraki were all converging on the same island.
Garp frowned.
"Kuzan. Took you long enough."
"Sorry."
Kuzan scratched the back of his head and looked toward the approaching wall of water.
"I was hoping I'd arrive after everything was finished."
His tired eyes narrowed slightly.
"Guess I wasn't that lucky."
He stepped over the rail.
Cold spread beneath him before his shoe touched the sea.
A sheet of ice formed across the surface, and Kuzan landed on it lightly before raising one hand toward the advancing wave.
"Cleaning up a little mess," he murmured.
The temperature dropped.
"Ice Age."
Cold exploded across the water.
Crack—
Crack-crack-crack—!
The base of the wave whitened first.
Frost raced upward through the moving wall, locking seawater into ice faster than gravity could pull it down.
The thunder of the surge transformed into an endless chorus of cracking and grinding as the dangerous wall froze in place across a broad section of the battlefield.
The effect continued outward through the shallows around Kalles, creating a wide frozen field between the damaged shoreline and the ships nearest the island.
Sunlight scattered across the new ice in countless bright reflections.
On Garp's ship, the Marines stared.
"That's an Admiral..."
Someone breathed the words almost reverently.
Garp snorted.
"Quit gawking and check the wounded!"
...
"QUICK! GET THE CAMERA ON THE CENTER! THE DUST IS CLEARING!"
Morgans screamed from the observation deck of his press vessel, wings flapping wildly from excitement even though they were not carrying him anywhere.
"PRESIDENT! THE ICE AND SPRAY ARE BLOCKING THE VIEW!"
"I DON'T CARE! USE THE HIGHEST MAGNIFICATION!"
His eyes burned.
"I NEED THE RESULT!"
Morgans leaned so far over the railing that two assistants grabbed the back of his coat to keep him from pitching into the sea.
"Does the title of world's greatest swordsman stay where it is..."
His beak curled upward.
"...or did it just change hands?!"