What kind of scene was that supposed to be?
Behind the man who calmly lowered his head to light a cigarette, it was like a mechanical god had descended, radiating an icy metallic sheen.
Nearly a hundred meters tall, it still didn't surpass the towering Yarukiman Mangroves that formed Sabaody, yet it was massive enough that people in several nearby groves could see the spectacle.
A sudden shadow swallowed the light overhead. Confused, the crowd instinctively looked toward the source.
And then they saw it.
Like a deity looming over the mortal world.
Black clouds rolled above its head, and faint black-and-red lightning crawled across its body.
A mechanical construct even larger than a giant.
Kid stood there in a daze.
With his backwater imagination and limited experience, the coolest giant robot in the world was probably just a head and two big mechanical arms.
But the thing in front of him blew past that idea like it was a joke.
Three heads. Six arms. A divine machine that looked down upon the world.
He didn't want to admit it, but it was the most badass piece of machinery he had ever seen.
And as its creator, Ozz didn't even bother turning around to admire it. He simply conjured a chair, crossed his legs, and casually flipped through a list of other Supernova intel like he'd forgotten there was an enemy right in front of him.
That single act nearly made Kid explode on the spot.
"Hey!!! Stop looking down on me!"
"You seriously think this big, clunky thing is enough to beat the Kid Pirates?!"
"Get serious and fight me already!!!"
Kid admitted it. That massive robot was cool beyond words.
But huge size meant sluggish movement. If they seized an opening, they could rush Ozz himself.
Yet Ozz's calm, newspaper-reading attitude felt like a slap across the face.
And the next line Ozz uttered sent Kid straight into boiling rage.
Ozz seemed to have heard the shouting. His lips curled slightly, as if none of it mattered.
"When have you ever seen an adult go all out against a bunch of kids?"
"Hmph. You're just a pack of low-rate pirates."
"What did you say?!"
Kid snapped instantly.
He launched forward, raising his mechanical arm, one hand lifting high before slamming down with murderous force, aiming to crush Ozz into paste.
"Let's see if that clunky robot can save you!!!"
But in that very moment, the world felt like it froze.
Behind Ozz, the Susanoo's six eyes flared crimson all at once.
The two arms closest to its waist moved.
Both hands extended forward, and in an instant, a colossal steel blade formed in its grip.
"It's useless…"
Time seemed to pause for a heartbeat.
Then came a single, flashing draw-slash.
A strike so vast it felt like it wanted to split a world in two.
A thousand-meter blade wave erupted, severing Kid's mechanical arm cleanly, and still didn't slow as it tore onward, slicing straight through one of Sabaody's Yarukiman Mangroves at the trunk.
One stroke. Total collapse.
The Susanoo sheathed its blade and returned to stillness behind Ozz, as if it had never moved at all.
The entire sequence happened in the blink of an eye.
All that remained was Kid falling through the air, one "arm" gone, eyes rolled back, unconscious before he even hit the ground.
Everyone who witnessed it looked like their jaws were about to tear off their faces.
Their worldview had just been shattered.
"Kid!!!"
"Captain!!!!"
Only after a long beat did the Kid Pirates react, scrambling to catch him.
Killer held Kid's limp body, his hands trembling uncontrollably.
Then he looked at Ozz again.
At the man who calmly read intel from start to finish, never once taking them seriously.
A bottomless despair flooded Killer's chest.
How could the gap between people be this impossible?!
"Still not clear?" Ozz said without even lifting his head, flipping the page with elegance. His voice carried a lazy, superior tone.
"Pirate King… has nothing to do with brats like you."
Apoo's legs shook. He wanted to run.
But every time he left a certain range, his body snapped back to the same spot like an invisible leash.
He even tried using his sound attacks to interfere, but for some reason the sonic blast always rebounded onto him instead.
The sound resonated inside his own body, nearly vibrating him to death.
At this point, among the Supernovas present, only Killer still hadn't knelt.
He fell silent for a moment, handed Kid to his crew, ignored their worried shouts, and walked straight toward Ozz.
"Maybe you really are strong…"
"But Kid is the man who's going to become Pirate King!!!"
His blades spun faster and faster as he charged, straight at Ozz.
Ozz saw a faint shadow of Zoro in him.
Too bad this one didn't have that kind of fate.
"…Childish passion."
Ozz stood up and stretched lazily, as if he were just waiting for Killer to cut him in half.
The onlookers all held their breath.
Because the way Killer moved, the insane speed of those spinning blades, it looked terrifying.
An ordinary person would be sliced into two instantly.
"I've got you!!!"
Killer thought the same.
He couldn't believe Ozz was that arrogant, not dodging, not blocking, as if he was inviting death.
Fine.
Die for your arrogance, Black Spear!!!
But the next moment…
A surreal sensation hit Killer, and his instincts screamed that something was wrong.
It felt like…
He hadn't hit anything.
How was that possible?!
His blade passed clean through Ozz's waist with no resistance at all.
Ozz still looked absentminded, one hand propping his chin as if thinking.
"Hm. I'm getting hungry."
"Maybe I'll swing by that bar. Bonney seems to be there too."
Ozz was planning his route.
Meanwhile, Killer flailed wildly in front of him, slashing again and again like a furious child throwing a tantrum.
He couldn't touch him.
"No time to play with you. Move along."
One hand held the intel, eyes locked on the bar's location.
The other hand extended casually, fingers forming a simple flick against the forehead.
With a single flick, he used the technique of the Six Powers, Rankyaku, with his finger.
A several-meter blade of air snapped out.
Killer was smashed into the ground instantly.
His defeat was even more ridiculous than Kid's.
…
Elsewhere,
At the Donquixote Family's Auction House.
As Charlos and his group prepared to enter, they heard distant booming sounds.
But Sabaody was huge, and the massive tree trunks blocked their view, so they had no idea what was happening.
"Forget it," Charlos said eagerly. "I heard there's a mermaid in this auction!!!"
"Because of Saint Ozz, a lot of slave ships don't dare go near Fish-Man Island anymore. A mermaid captured on the surface is insanely rare!"
"I'm definitely buying her!!!"
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The tides are shifting, and secrets linger in the dark... Step into the shadows early on P@treon, where the next chapter awaits before the world sees it.
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