"Your eyes can't even see the future."
"Then tell me..."
"Why do you, Marco, fight me?"
Ragnar shouted disdainfully, grabbing Marco's claws and tearing them out with brute force.
Puff!
Marco's expression didn't change, but a cold sweat trickled down his face.
Hiss—!
His phoenix claws were ripped off—torn away along with both his legs.
Yet even faced with this, Marco remained standing, kept alive by the powers of the Phoenix Fruit.
There wasn't even a drop of blood from the stumps.
His severed legs, engulfed in blue flames, landed in Ragnar's hands. The healing fire sealed the wounds—but couldn't regrow his limbs.
"Blue Flame Goose!"
Even without his legs, Marco didn't stop. Taking advantage of the moment Ragnar tore them off, he twisted his waist mid-air. His flame-wreathed wings sliced down like indestructible blades toward Ragnar's neck.
Clang!
As they struck the outside of Ragnar's neck—
The Armament Haki on Marco's wings erupted violently.
Its penetrating force bypassed defense and directly invaded Ragnar's body.
A thunderous boom followed.
White smoke curled upward from Ragnar's neck.
The direct hit forced him back several steps in the air.
"…It worked!" Marco exclaimed, eyes narrowing.
But Ragnar merely lifted his gaze and looked at Marco.
He returned the same words.
"Stop lying."
Marco looked around—Ragnar's neck was completely intact. Even his breath hadn't faltered.
The haze in Marco's heart deepened.
"Phoenix Slash!"
But he didn't falter.
He knew how terrifying Ragnar was.
And he knew the goal here wasn't to defeat this True Lord—but to buy time.
Bang!
Just as Marco gathered his last strength to delay Ragnar—
Two arms suddenly stretched out from behind him.
Alarm bells rang in Marco's heart. He tried to dodge instinctively.
But at that moment, the vertical divine eye between Ragnar's brows gleamed with a mysterious light.
Marco froze.
Paralyzed, he could only watch as the arms behind him grabbed his burning wings tightly.
"Oh no…"
When he finally regained control, he glanced back—
And saw a figure that looked exactly like Ragnar.
"…Two Ragnars?"
He looked from the incarnation behind him to the real Ragnar in front of him.
"Incarnation…!"
The two Ragnars spoke in eerie unison, as if each had its own will.
"So this is the technique that even Dad and Red-Hair suffered from…"
Just as the realization struck Marco—
Puff!
His burning wings were torn off.
Legless. Wingless.
His limbs now in the possession of Ragnar and his doppelgänger.
Marco, reduced to only a torso and head, began to fall.
But before he could descend more than a few meters, the towering Three-Pointed Double-Edged Sword behind Ragnar shrank in an instant, transforming into a silver streak that pierced forward.
Puff!
Marco's head was severed cleanly.
The Phoenix was fully dismembered.
Even his head was skewered on the tip of the divine blade, suspended in the air like a war trophy.
Admired by Ragnar.
"Ragnar!!!"
Marco's severed head spoke in fury—his voice filled with burning defiance.
Even now…
He was not dead.
Unfortunately, after his wings, legs, and head were torn apart, even the miraculous regenerative flames of the Phoenix Fruit could no longer restore Marco's combat power. He lingered on the edge of life, unable to resist.
His severed limbs and head—though engulfed in the phoenix's resurrecting fire—were not only torn apart, but controlled. And that was the problem.
Even with his willpower, Marco could no longer manipulate his dismembered body as he once could.
"I told you," Ragnar said coldly.
"I know every secret of your Devil Fruit."
"Slice off your limbs. Sever your head. You might not die—but you become useless."
Ragnar let go of Marco's legs, and his clone released the captured wings. But before Marco could fall or react—
Shing—!
A three-pointed, two-edged divine spear pierced through the air, like a divine judgment falling from the heavens.
The sound of flesh being pierced echoed through the battlefield.
Marco's head, wings, legs, and torso were all skewered together, impaled and nailed midair by the god-slaying spear.
---
"King! Go hold off the Phoenix and stop him from stalling Ragnar—huh?" Kaido's thunderous voice rang from afar.
Having just been blasted away by Whitebeard's punch, Kaido was preparing to regroup—until he noticed the Moby Dick retreating into the distance.
But just as he turned his head—
He saw Marco—skewered, motionless in midair.
"...So fast?"
Even the self-proclaimed strongest creature in the world was stunned.
He had never imagined that Ragnar would dispatch the Phoenix—Marco, a commander of the Whitebeard Pirates—so quickly.
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