Rumble!
Above the desert of the royal capital, thousands of meters high in the sky, thick, city-wall-like dark clouds were swept by howling winds, surging like a tsunami.
Flickering lightning burst from the azure halberd blade. The sheer, unparalleled sharpness released from the Dragon's Heavenly Halberd alone tore through the atmosphere within thousands of meters.
"Roar!"
A clear dragon's roar erupted from the open maw of the blue dragon, and a shining red light brewed deep in its throat.
A destructive breath, capable of easily destroying a mountain, was about to erupt.
But the four-meter-long Dragon's Heavenly Halberd, gripped by the eight-meter-tall Rorschach, had already struck Kaido's dragon maw!
"300 Million Volt Discharge!"
"Deep Blue Armament!"
"Heavenly Thunder Slash!"
Clang!
An earth-shattering explosion resounded thousands of meters across the sky and land in the next instant.
Rorschach's Dragon's Heavenly Halberd, unleashed in a slash, collided with Kaido's raised dragon maw, instantly erupting in a dazzling flash of lightning. Thick, silvery-white bolts of lightning, like flood dragons, shot out in all directions, piercing through the void and shattering the dark clouds within hundreds of meters.
The clouds above the man and the dragon's head were shattered by the violent impact wave, creating a huge concave hole hundreds of meters in diameter.
Looking up from the ground, it was as if the sky had been punched through with an unfathomable hole.
The blue dragon, stretching for hundreds of meters, was cleaved by the immense force erupting from the Dragon's Heavenly Halberd, causing it to sharply tilt and plummet downwards.
Kaido's dragon eyes rolled a few times, his fanged dragon maw stretched into a grin, and his thick, upturned dragon tail, transformed into a pillar-like whip, exploded with a snap, striking towards Rorschach's head.
The speed of the dragon tail whip was incredibly fast, giving Rorschach no time to dodge.
Nor did Rorschach intend to dodge!
His already burly and muscular body suddenly swelled up, his muscles bulging and knotting, his physique as strong as a dragon's. Gripping the Dragon's Heavenly Halberd, he thrust it straight at the massive dragon tail that was crashing down like a sky-covering shadow.
The next instant.
Boom!
He was struck by the huge dragon tail, which bent like a collapsing pillar, and plummeted downwards like a falling meteor.
A massive ring of air exploded in the sky, and an overwhelming force, like mountains and seas, was driven into Rorschach's body by the enormous dragon tail.
Rorschach grunted, and scarlet blood spurted from between his teeth.
The moment the Dragon's Heavenly Halberd pierced Kaido's dragon tail, Rorschach clearly saw that beyond the blue dragon scales covering the dragon's body, there was another layer of flowing, invisible armor enveloping the entire blue dragon.
Even the Dragon's Heavenly Halberd, unleashed by him in his Life Return state, failed to penetrate that seemingly thin, invisible armor.
That was advanced Armament Haki!
The speed of light propagation was far faster than sound. When Law exerted all his strength to transfer all the residents from Alubarna Royal City, he saw a dazzling white light suddenly erupt in the distant sky.
The suddenly illuminated light cluster was even more dazzling than the scorching sun hanging high in the sky.
And it was only dozens of seconds later that a rumbling roar rolled in, thundering across the sky like muffled thunder.
Thousands of meters high in the sky, Rorschach, falling like a meteor, gripped the Dragon's Heavenly Halberd with both hands. Instead of trying to stop his descent, he gritted his teeth, manipulated the surrounding air currents, and propelled his body to accelerate towards the blue dragon's head, which was falling not far below him.
He gripped the deep blue battle halberd with both hands, his burly body suddenly inverted, head down and feet up. His feet exploded the air, and his body shot through the sky like a meteor, piercing into the top of Kaido's dragon head with a clang.
The immense force of the impact made Kaido's dragon eyes roll back, his vision blurred, and his sprawling dragon body became taut and straight like a spear, plummeting towards the desert ground below with Rorschach.
Before the two had even landed, the violent air currents they stirred up had already created a sandstorm, spanning thousands of meters, on the desert below.
Boom!
With an explosion that sounded like the sky and earth were tearing apart, the hundreds of meters long blue dragon and the giant standing on its head crashed together into the center of the endless yellow sand.
The desert ground in front of Alubarna Royal Capital was as if it had been struck by a meteor.
Mounds of sand dunes were flattened by the immense impact that swept in all directions.
Millions of tons of yellow sand were blown away, turning into rolling dust that swept across the land.
With their landing point as the center, the entire desert ground seemed to turn into a boiling sea, spreading out in ripples.
Sand dunes shattered, and the earth swelled.
Deep, bottomless, spiderweb-like cracks split open on the ground, extending for more than ten kilometers.
This massive tremor was felt even by Hina and the others, who were dozens of kilometers away.
Many royal capital residents who were rushing forward were affected by the earthquake, their running figures swaying and falling to the ground.
For a moment, immense panic spread rapidly through the crowd.
"It's an earthquake! Has the end of the world come to Alabasta?"
"Look! A sandstorm, a never-before-seen giant sandstorm is coming!"
The royal capital residents, their faces filled with terror, watched in horror as a sandstorm, hundreds of meters high like a tsunami, surged from the distant desert ground, covering the sky and moving in all directions, scaring them so much they couldn't move.
"Everyone, hurry! Faster! Don't stop!" Cobra shouted with a hoarse voice, raising his arms.
"Still no connection? Hina!" Law roared.
Hina's forehead was covered in sweat. She looked at the continuously ringing Den Den Mushi that wasn't connecting. "Hina also knows what's wrong with the Den Den Mushi. No one at Headquarters is answering."
"No answer?"
Law seemed to think of something. He looked around, then suddenly shouted at Enel, who was staring into the distance: "Enel! Use your ability to absorb the strong currents around us! Perhaps those currents are interfering with the Den Den Mushi's communication!"
Enel snapped back to attention, suppressing his shock at the world-shattering battle in the distance. He waved his hands.
Soon, strands of flickering silver electric arcs drifted from all directions, quickly merging into his body.
As the currents within hundreds of meters were absorbed by him, the Den Den Mushi Hina was dialing, after ringing a few times, was finally answered by Headquarters.
"Is that Rorschach? What's wrong now?"
In the Den Den Mushi, Sengoku's voice had just sounded when Law snatched the Den Den Mushi from Hina's hand and shouted: "Old man! It's me! Listen to me, something's happened here in Alabasta Royal Capital! Kaido has come! Rorschach is fighting him! Where is Admiral Kizaru? Please tell him to come and provide assistance as fast as possible!"
"What did you say?! Kaido?"
At Marineford Port, Sengoku, who had been smiling and discussing with Zephyr how to teach the two powerful Logia users who would soon join the Marines, suddenly changed his expression drastically.
Being so close, Zephyr also heard the urgent shout from the Den Den Mushi. His body immediately shook violently. Without a word, he dragged his heavy mechanical arm and rushed towards the warships moored in the inner bay.
Sengoku saw this and couldn't help but shout, "Zephyr! Where are you going?"
Zephyr didn't look back. "I'm going to Alabasta Royal Capital!"
"Nonsense! Get back here! Alabasta is thousands of miles from here, what good would it do for you to rush there now? Borsalino already departed yesterday. I'll contact him immediately and tell him to go and rescue Rorschach!"
As Sengoku spoke, he directly hung up Law's Den Den Mushi and instead dialed Kizaru's Den Den Mushi.
Purupurupuru, purupurupuru.
Every ring of the Den Den Mushi felt like an agonizing second.
Sengoku had never felt time pass so slowly.
Fortunately, Kizaru didn't drop the ball this time. After the Den Den Mushi rang five or six times, it connected.
Before Kizaru could speak, Sengoku had already fully explained the predicament in Alabasta.
"Borsalino, where are you now? Don't worry about the warship. Use the fastest speed you can to rush to Alabasta Royal Capital. You must not let that bastard Kaido take anyone away, whether it's Rorschach, Enel, or Hibari!"
"Really? That terrifying Kaido actually went to Rorschach's location? Don't worry, I'm on my way."
Hundreds of miles from Marineford, on the sea near Water 7, a brilliant golden light shot up from the deck of a large warship, directly piercing the sky like a golden sword, soaring towards the distant horizon.
Although Kizaru had received Sengoku's orders last night to sail to Alabasta, since the mission was only to pick up the defeated Moria and wasn't very urgent, his warship wasn't rushing too much towards Alabasta.
He hadn't expected such a thing to happen.
At the inner bay port, Zephyr, dragging his heavy mechanical arm, had already disregarded Sengoku's dissuasion. He boarded a medium-sized warship, called a team of Marine soldiers to set sail, and left the port at the fastest possible speed.
"That bastard Kaido! A dignified New World sea emperor, shamelessly running to Paradise to attack a junior! Has he lived so long that he's gone senile? What a disgrace!"
After cursing Kaido a few times, Sengoku could only pray in his heart that Kizaru would arrive quickly at Alabasta Royal Capital to stop Kaido.
Otherwise, Sengoku truly dared not imagine how great the losses would be this time.
Rorschach, Hibari, Law, Enel, Hina—they were all the future of the Marines.
Losing any one of them would be a huge blow to the Marines.
Especially Rorschach. If he were really taken by Kaido, those hot-tempered guys would definitely invade Kaido's stronghold, Wano Country.
"Borsalino, you need to be strong this time. Don't slack off anymore! The future of the Marines rests entirely on you."
Royal Capital Desert.
At the bottom of a hundreds-of-meters-deep giant crater in the center of the desert, which was riddled with countless circular ravines from the meteor-like impact, Rorschach, blood trickling from the corner of his mouth, tightly gripped the Dragon's Heavenly Halberd. He watched the massive blue dragon rapidly shrink, transforming into a burly and imposing figure, lying sprawled in the sunken sand.
Kaido raised his right arm, covered in dragon scale tattoos, and rubbed his somewhat groggy head, slowly rising from the sand.
Large amounts of sand slid off his fur cloak, showering down.
"Ugh, that was quite a kick. Good thing I wasn't drinking, otherwise, the alcohol would have been knocked out of me."
Kaido spread his thick arms, stretching in front of Rorschach as if he had just woken up.
His black hair was casually draped over his broad, wall-like shoulders and back. He had a pair of white, curved horns on his head and long, dragon-whisker-like facial hair. A large dragon scale tattoo covered his left arm.
His upper body was bare, with an X-shaped scar on his right abdomen. A purple top hung from his waist, with two golden chains dangling from its hem. His lower body was clad in loose, dark green trousers, and a shimenawa rope was tied around his waist, with a purple fur cloak draped over him.
At seven meters and one centimeter tall, he appeared shorter than Rorschach at this moment.
But Kaido's steel-forged, bulging muscles were truly like a high-density celestial body. Just standing there, he made the air near his body distort.
This was the first time Rorschach had seen Kaido in person since coming to this world.
The distance between them was no more than ten meters.
A rampant, violent aura, like a tsunami, washed over Rorschach, bringing with it a terrifying pressure like mountains and seas.
This pressure came from both his body and his mind.
At this moment, Rorschach deeply understood why Doflamingo was so afraid of Kaido.
Such a terrifying aura, even before a fight began, could already crush the minds of ordinary people.
Even fellow users of Conqueror's Haki would feel suffocated in front of this man.
Especially when there was a vast difference in physical size, this oppressive feeling became even more pronounced.
Kaido shook his head, not rushing to act. Instead, he looked at Rorschach standing opposite him with great interest, his eyes shining as he scrutinized his transformed, ferocious body up and down.
"Hmm, good, very good, Wororororo, a good physique. It's not just the credit of that Mythical Zoan fruit; you, Marine brat, your own constitution must also be strange. I truly didn't come here for nothing. Joker's intelligence is quite accurate, Wororororo!"
Kaido's words made a few black lines appear on Rorschach's forehead.
That bastard Doflamingo, he said he'd invite Empress Boa Hancock to deal with him, didn't he?
How did it turn into Kaido? This is completely not an opponent of the same caliber, is it?! Kaido didn't move, and neither did Rorschach.
He was buying time, trying to gain some evacuation time for Hina and the others.
But Kaido seemed to see through his thoughts. He suddenly spread his arms, grinning and revealing a mouthful of white teeth: "Marine brat, are you worried about your comrades? Wororororo, truly touching camaraderie. Come! Attack me with your strongest moves! If you can make me feel good, perhaps I can let them go. But if you disappoint me, then even if they escape this country, they will die without a burial place! Wororororo!"
Kaido opened his arms wide, leaving himself completely exposed, and let out a laugh like rolling thunder.
Before his laughter had stopped, a heavy battle halberd had already crossed a distance of over ten meters, carrying the force of wind and thunder, and pierced straight into his throat.
The silver-haired young man, his hair wildly dancing, roared to the sky, his fighting spirit soaring.
"Then let me witness the power of the strongest creature in the world, Beast Kaido!"
(End of Chapter)
────────────────────────────────────
"If you're interested, please support me in my other novel [Naruto: Starting with Tsunade-san]."
"If you're interested, please support me in my other novel [Battle Through the Heavens: Heavenly comprehension]."
"If you're interested, please support me in my other novel [Soul Land 2: Golden Dragon King]."
"If you want early access to nearly 35+ chapters, join my patreon:- patreon.com/BaDwYGaMeR"