A black and a crimson bolt of lightning collided violently in mid-air. The impact was like a clap of heavenly thunder shaking the firmament, as terrifying black lightning ravaged the sky for a hundred meters. The resulting shockwave was like a hurricane passing through, blasting everything in the vicinity.
The sea churned, raising monstrous waves dozens of meters high, and the entire area for thousands of meters became turbulent.
"Get the Sky God out of the battlefield, now!" Modi immediately ordered the crew to start the engines, and the ship quickly fled the battle zone.
In the sky, Zephyr's black fist and the blood-red blade of the Cursed Sword Hannya clashed. The edge of Hannya was unable to pierce Zephyr's fist, and the increasingly powerful black lightning crackled between them.
Zephyr's eyes seemed to spew flames of fury. He stomped on the air and threw his full weight behind his punch, sending Bege flying.
As he was thrown back, Bege swung his sword, unleashing a ferocious slash of blood-red energy that instantly shot toward Zephyr.
Zephyr didn't dodge or evade. He simply raised a fist and blew the slash apart. The dissipated energy scattered in all directions.
He then charged toward Bege again, an immense pressure bearing down on him.
Bege tapped his foot on a patch of hardened space. It quickly shattered, but a new one formed in its place. His right hand trembled, his entire arm numb and sore.
Without using Shadow Assembly, my own physical strength is still no match for Zephyr's, Bege thought, keenly aware of the difference in their physical abilities.
The blood-red energy surged through his body, and his arms began to bulge.
The Cursed Sword Hannya pulsed with a dazzling, bloody light, and an aura of supreme evil and ferocity erupted from it.
"Beast God!"
Bege unleashed his blade, swinging out with his most powerful slash. A terrifying wave of blood-red energy cut through the air.
Zephyr's expression changed drastically. He tried to stop his charge, but it was impossible to dodge the Beast God slash now. His fists grew even darker.
With a grimace, he threw a punch at the incoming attack.
The violent power of his fist and the supreme evil of the blood-red slash collided, instantly exploding. An extremely terrifying shockwave shot out for thousands of meters, pressing down on the surface of the sea and simultaneously stirring up monstrous waves that rolled for over ten thousand meters.
All the sea creatures in the area fled in terror, not daring to remain.
Bege and Zephyr were both thrown back by the storm of the impact. Bege had it much easier; he had transformed his external space into a streamlined cone in front of him, which very effectively dispersed the force of the blast.
Zephyr was sent flying by the shockwave, his hands crossed in front of his face. After being thrown back several hundred meters, he stomped his feet on the air to stabilize himself.
"It broke through my Iron King Martial Body."
He glanced at his fist. There was a cut on it. When he had punched the Beast God slash, its energy had still managed to tear through his defense and leave a wound.
His expression grew solemn. His Iron King Martial Body was a secret art, a fusion of Life Return, Armament Haki, and Rokushiki's Tekkai.
And his Tekkai was no ordinary technique. Each of the Six Powers, when trained to its highest level, was called a "King." His Tekkai had reached that peak and was known as "Iron King."
The Iron King Martial Body was Zephyr's secret art, combining his Armament Haki with the Iron King level of Tekkai, granting him extremely powerful defense. He could even catch the slashes of a Great Swordsman with his bare hands.
The wound on his fist began to heal rapidly, and he covered it with Armament Haki. His sharp gaze fixed on the approaching Bege, and in an instant, he was moving again, running through the air.
He blocked my Beast God slash that easily? As expected of the legend who trained the Golden Age of the Marines. Bege stared at Zephyr, his expression changing. Then, a strong fighting spirit erupted in his eyes. The supreme evil and ferocity of his sword's aura grew even more terrifying.
Wasn't Zephyr's incredibly strong and resilient body the perfect whetstone?
Bege soared into the sky, and with a swing of his sword, slashes of energy shot upwards.
Zephyr met them with his fists, his violent punches shattering every attack as he closed the distance. He bent low and threw a punch at Bege.
Bege's sword met Zephyr's black fist, and the two were thrown back simultaneously. Bege tumbled several times in the air, his face flushing an unnatural red.
Their eyes met, and their two terrifying auras clashed once again. Without a word, they both vanished. The next second, the sky exploded with a deafening roar, and a shockwave powerful enough to overturn rivers and seas swept out in all directions.
They collided and retreated, then collided and retreated again. The two of them exchanged blows in a frenzy, sending shockwave after shockwave ripping through the sky and churning the sea.
After several clashes, Zephyr's right arm suddenly swelled to more than twice its size, the veins on it bulging like pythons. He kicked off the air, and the powerful impact propelled him forward in an instant.
"Rokushiki Secret Art—Six King Gun!"
His right fist shot toward Bege like a dragon, and a terrifying pressure bore down on him, forcing his movements to slow considerably.
Bege instantly crossed his sword in front of him. His Castle Skin appeared, coated in Armament Haki.
With a deafening boom, a blood-red figure was sent hurtling from the sky like a bolt of lightning. It crashed onto the sea, and the surface for a hundred meters around instantly sank dozens of meters, pressed down into a huge, unnatural crater.
At the center of the crater, Bege lay on the surface of the sea, spitting out a mouthful of blood. The seawater could not flow in to fill the space.
The hardened space beneath him was covered in countless cracks. Just before he hit the water, he had hardened the space on the surface, preventing himself from falling in.
That was why the sea had been pushed down.
Zephyr's expression darkened. He had intended to knock Bege into the sea, where, as a Devil Fruit user, he would lose his ability to fight. He had never expected Bege's power to be so strange.
He immediately dove down, transforming into a bolt of black lightning that shot toward Bege.
Bege's figure vanished in an instant. The black lightning struck the surface of the sea, and the water for hundreds of meters around instantly shattered. The impact of the terrifying force expanded the crater even further, but in the next moment, the sea rushed back in, filling the crater and engulfing Zephyr.
Bege reappeared in the air. Without hesitation, he swung his cursed sword down, and a brilliant, ferocious slash of blood-red light shot out.
Before the slash even arrived, its sharp aura had already split the sea, carving a bottomless trench!
Zephyr was inside that trench.
"Iron King!" Zephyr's face was impassive. His black fists grew even darker as he used Tekkai beneath his Armament Haki.
The blood-red slash cut directly into the trench, deepening it even further.
Then, an endless bloody light erupted from within, and the entire trench exploded. The sea for hundreds of meters around shot upwards, and turbulent waves rolled out in all directions. The sea for thousands of meters became a chaotic, muddy mess of raging currents.
A moment later, a figure shot up from the depths and leaped into the air.
It was Zephyr.
He was dripping with seawater, and his two black fists were dripping with blood. They had been cut with wounds so deep the bone was visible, but the wounds were healing at an incredible speed.
In his Life Return state, his regenerative ability was also at a monstrous level.
He was panting heavily. He had been using Geppo to fight Bege in the air this whole time, which had consumed a great deal of his stamina.
He looked out at the distant sea. On the entire chaotic surface, only a single warship remained, rocking violently in the waves, looking as if it could sink at any moment.
All the other warships and pirate ships had been capsized by the monstrous waves created by their battle. The Marines and pirates had all been swept away by the violent currents. Most of them would die in the sea.
Zephyr's face was incredibly grim as he looked out at the further reaches of the sea.