"Come on, make your move. Let me see just how much you learned from Byakuren and that brat Gengetsu."
Garp spoke casually, as if it were nothing.
Even if the other party was an enemy, he spoke according to the person he faced.
For someone like Rasa, for example, naturally, it would be.
"Someone come here. Feed the Kazekage to his own sand."
But for the Third Mizukage, he wasn't cheap about giving the man a bit of praise… at least enough for him to go to the Pure Land with some pride.
"Then I shall fight you with my full power."
The Third Mizukage didn't choose suicide like Chiyo or Ebizo.
As a shinobi, among his generation of Mist-nin, none could surpass him.
As a third-generation Kage, he had spent most of his life concealing his strength, but he believed that neither his methods nor his intellect lost to the Third Tsuchikage.
His strength and talent weren't inferior to Hiruzen or the Third Raikage.
As for the Third Kazekage? Apologies, he had never once considered comparing himself to a Kage who got killed by Sasori.
Now that he no longer needed to hold back, even if he was about to set foot on the road to the Pure Land, he would go with more pride than any other Third Kage of his era.
"Summoning Jutsu!"
Countless thoughts flashed through his mind, yet his movements remained lightning-fast, utterly unaffected by them.
In the blink of an eye, he finished the hand seals and slammed his palm onto the muddy ground.
White mist billowed, and a massive giant clam emerged from the summoning smoke.
"Genjutsu: Mirage."
Almost the instant the clam appeared, the Third Mizukage, standing atop its shell, formed hand seals again.
At the same time, the clam's antennae sprayed out a sky-darkening, battlefield-filling dense mist.
"The Clam Mirage, huh?"
Enveloped by fog, Garp's expression remained calm. He didn't show the slightest reaction to the illusionary cityscape created by the mist.
Even Hizashi, who had activated the Byakugan, had failed to notice that while the Third Mizukage was still standing atop the giant clam, a second figure, identical in every way, had silently slipped behind Garp.
"So it finally comes to this. Is this… what Lord Byakuren and Lord Gengetsu felt back then?"
Standing within the mist, the Third Mizukage looked at Garp's undefended back.
Seeing this hero of the shinobi world leaving himself wide open did not make him happy.
Instead, he felt an unreal but unshakable thought…
If I attack… I will die….
Yet even facing the certainty of death, he neither bowed his head nor retreated.
Bearing the crushing pressure that could shatter a simple man's spirit, he raised his right hand.
"Lava Release: Dissolving Jet!"
A trace of solemn resolve flashed in his eyes. The tip of his extended index finger pointed toward Garp's skull, and a bead of thick yellow liquid formed at its tip.
The next instant, that single drop burst forward like a fired bullet, carrying terrifying kinetic force and the corrosive power strong enough to melt through an incomplete Susanoo, as it shot straight toward the back of Garp's head.
"Combining Lava Release with Gengetsu's Water Gun… and even blending Lava Release chakra into the fog to make this enlarged Mirage Mist… not bad.
If it were any other shinobi, even a Kage-level one, without a special Kekkei Genkai, they'd likely already be dissolved within your Mirage."
Garp sighed softly.
"But unfortunately for you, you ran into me."
Just as the molten bullet came within ten centimeters of the back of his skull, Garp raised his hand without turning his head, extending two fingers to casually pinch the air.
His index and middle fingers didn't actually touch the molten projectile, yet the corrosive, bullet-like drop froze unnaturally between them.
"This is the Observation Haki that even the Mangekyo Sharingan of the Uchiha once struggled to deal with…?"
The Third Mizukage hadn't held much hope from the start, yet witnessing it with his own eyes still crushed him.
Mist infused with Lava Release, fog that should dissolve any flesh caught within it, had no effect.
The Dissolving Jet, enhanced by the Hozuki clan's secret Water Gun technique, had been stopped with two fingers.
This was the man whom the Second Mizukage, Hozuki Gengetsu, feared like snake.
This was the man whom the First Mizukage, Byakuren, could never surpass even with another lifetime.
As for himself, the Third, he probably wasn't even qualified to make this man throw a punch.
"You want to see my fist?"
Just as the Third Mizukage let out a bitter laugh in his heart and prepared to meet death with composure, Garp's voice suddenly reached him.
"In this shinobi world, I doubt there is anyone who doesn't want to witness the legendary Iron Fist.
Especially those bold enough to challenge you. They all seek only two things, either to shatter the hero's strongest punch… or to die beneath it.
It's a pity. I dare say I'm not inferior to the Third Raikage A or Hiruzen… but I am still not on the level of the previous generations."
The Third Mizukage let out a faint sigh.
Since the Warring States era, the only people qualified to make the Hero throw a punch were the First-generation Kage, or the level of the Three Legends of the Warring States.
He believed he was in no way weaker than any Third-generation Kage.
But he was no Uchiha.
And he was not arrogant enough to think he stood shoulder to shoulder with the First-generation Kage… nor with those who represented the absolute summit of the shinobi world.
Garp said nothing. He didn't turn, didn't look back. Before the Third Mizukage's increasingly stunned eyes, he simply raised his right hand.
Thunder cracked and lightning flashed.
Red black lightning wrapped around his fist, until with a metallic clang, his hand transformed into a reddish black fist.
"The Strongest Fist…"
The Third Mizukage's pupils contracted. His lips trembled as he whispered:
"To die by the Iron Fist…"
When I meet the First and Second Mizukage in the Pure Land… I can at least hold my head high.
......
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