For a moment, the Marines stood in crushed silence while the pirates roared with renewed spirit. The contrast alone made veins bulge on Sengoku's forehead.
"Gurararara! I didn't expect my son to hold such importance. Ace, wait for Pops to bring you home!" Whitebeard laughed, his booming voice echoing across the battlefield.
"Pops…" On the execution platform, Ace trembled, tears slipping silently down his face.
"Ace!"
A thunderous roar suddenly tore through the sky over Marineford. Everyone looked up as a Marine battleship descended from above like a falling giant.
Luffy had arrived, bringing with him the prisoners from Impel Down's sixth floor.
"Straw Hat… Crocodile, Jinbei, the Okama King…" Sengoku clenched his fists, fury burning in his eyes. "These bastards… how dare they!"
"Is that the group of Impel Down escapees?"
"Straw Hat Boy!"
"Fire Fist Ace's reinforcements again, it seems!"
Marines glared upward, muttering in growing frustration.
Luffy inhaled deeply, then shouted across the battlefield, "Ace! I'm here to save you!"
He didn't wait for a response. He jumped down and sprinted toward the execution platform. Behind him, Crocodile, Jinbei, and the others followed without hesitation.
Several Marines raised their weapons and charged, fully aware that these newcomers were enemies. But the prisoners moved through them with overwhelming speed, defeating them within moments.
A deafening explosion tore open the ground as a pillar of molten lava surged skyward. Akainu stepped out of the crater, expression dark and cold.
With a single sweeping motion, the magma around him surged like a sea of molten stone, crashing toward Luffy's group and cutting off their path.
Before Luffy could react, Akainu appeared beside him, lava coiling along his arm. His burning fist slammed into Luffy's abdomen.
A violent impact rang out, and Luffy shot backward like a falling star.
Akainu didn't pause. He turned sharply, magma churning around his body as his arm swelled into a massive molten limb. He brought it down toward Jinbei with brutal force.
"Five-Thousand Brick Fist!" Jinbei's stance tightened as he thrust his fist forward, releasing a white shock wave that made the air tremble.
Their attacks collided. For a moment, Akainu's magma halted, but only briefly. It broke through and struck Jinbei square in the chest, sending him flying and coughing blood across the ice.
Crocodile barely had time to react as the molten Admiral appeared before him next. He swept his arm forward, the impact alone creating a wind sharp enough to sting.
Crocodile's eyes narrowed. A sand barrier rose in front of him as he crossed his arms defensively. Akainu's attack shattered through the barrier and hammered into Crocodile, blasting him backward.
In only seconds, the three strongest escapees had been defeated.
Akainu's actions screamed a single message: Marine Admirals were the pinnacle of Marine power, and no one would tarnish that image.
His gaze snapped toward Whitebeard, face twisted with fury.
"Whitebeard!"
"Magma boy, you still want more? Come then!" Whitebeard smiled, his presence overflowing with Haki.
"Justice doesn't fear anyone!" Akainu roared, magma erupting around him as he charged.
Across the battlefield, Luffy groaned, shaking from the pain, yet he forced himself upright again. In a heartbeat, he was running toward Ace once more.
"Ace! I'm going to save you!"
"Luffy! Go! Leave!" Ace cried, voice cracking with the weight of everything he carried. It was the first time he shouted back since his execution began.
Beside him, Garp's face was shadowed with grief. His voice trembled as he roared, "If you feel this pain now, why did you choose to become a pirate? If you joined the Marines, even with that blood in your veins, you wouldn't be here!"
"What choice did I ever have?" Ace shouted back. "I was born with a criminal's blood! A pirate's fate is the only thing I could have!"
Garp could not answer. His eyes shut tight, and tears spilled freely from the man who had weathered the sea's dangers his entire life.
Akainu reappeared before Whitebeard, magma boiling around him like blood. Within the flames, a monstrous lava dog formed at his side, snarling with hellish ferocity.
Akainu's arm swept forward, the blazing hound lunging.
"Hellhound!"
A technique that had slaughtered countless pirates in the New World.
"Gurararara! Seems you still haven't learned your lesson, magma boy!" Whitebeard laughed.
His fist drew back, then tore through the air.
Cracks split space itself, spreading outward in a web of destruction. The shockwave shattered the massive lava hound instantly, continuing forward like a tidal wave.
Akainu's expression stiffened. He shifted into his elemental form, but—
The shockwave slammed into him anyway.
His body burst apart, magma splashing across the ice with a violent hiss. He reformed seconds later, blood dripping from the corner of his mouth.
"You… your shockwave can hurt my elemental form…?" he muttered, stunned.
"Did you think the Gura Gura no Mi was just for show?" Whitebeard growled.
The old titan vanished from sight.
Akainu felt danger crash over him like a falling mountain. Before he could react, a massive hand shadowed the sky above him.
The impact cratered the ice, and Akainu was slammed into the ground, Whitebeard's huge hand crushing his head into the frozen surface.
Whitebeard grinned, voice amplified by Haki as it thundered across Marineford.
"Sengoku! Are you still not moving? Or do you intend to lose another Admiral today?"
On the platform, Sengoku clenched his fists, face dark and grim. He leapt from the execution stand and landed on the battlefield.
"Whitebeard!!!" he shouted.
"Fleet Admiral Sengoku has entered the fight!"
"Akainu really shouldn't pick a fight with Pops if he can't win!"
"I don't know why, but seeing Akainu pinned to the ground like that makes me want to laugh!"
---