Now that she knew her Devil Fruit ability was useless against these hounds, Smoothie had no choice but to unsheathe the longsword from her back. She thought to herself, "Regardless, I am one of the Sweet Commanders. Since I am facing a Yonko, Mama shouldn't punish me too severely."
Smoothie's plan was to throw the fight. She would put on a show for the onlookers, trade a few blows with Alucard, and then intentionally lose, making it look as though she had fought with every fiber of her being. She calculated that if she appeared to have given her all against an opponent as formidable as a Yonko, Big Mom's retribution would be manageable.
"Oh? You actually want to fight?" Alucard's lips curled upward. "Then try to keep me entertained for at least a little while."
Gulp...
Smoothie swallowed hard. Her long legs blurred as she lunged toward Alucard, swinging her blade in a powerful horizontal cleave.
Clang!
The screech of metal on metal echoed as sparks flew. Smoothie gasped; Alucard had blocked her blade effortlessly with a single black handgun.
"What's wrong?"
The smile on Alucard's face vanished instantly, replaced by a cold, simmering fury. "What is with this half-hearted attack?"
Smoothie froze. As she had swung the sword, she had indeed been distracted, calculating exactly how to stage her defeat. But how could Alucard tell?
Click!
Alucard's white gun, Casull, lunged forward. Due to the massive height difference between them, the barrel was pressed against Smoothie's thigh.
"Shameless!"
Alucard's voice was laced with a murderous chill so intense that Smoothie broke into a cold sweat, her body failing to react.
BOOM!
The Casull roared. The heavy round tore straight through Smoothie's leg, instantly shattering her balance.
Splat!
Smoothie's tall frame crashed to the ground, a massive, bloody hole gaping in her left thigh.
"S-Smoothie-sama!!"
"She was taken out in a single move! How is this possible?!" The surrounding Big Mom pirates began to scatter in a blind panic.
"If you had knelt and begged for mercy at the start, I might have spared you. But to face me with such a half-baked resolve is unforgivable." Alucard stepped forward, pinning the fallen Smoothie down with a boot to her abdomen. He leveled the Jackal, the bane of ability users, directly at her skull.
"I don't know exactly what your power is, but you're definitely an ability user, aren't you?" Alucard bared his fangs and grinned. "Bang."
He mimicked the sound himself as he pulled the trigger. Under Smoothie's terrified gaze, the bullet buried itself in her forehead and detonated an instant later.
BANG!
A spray of blood mixed with white brain matter splattered across the side of Alucard's face.
His expression remained icy. "A piece of dog shit like you is only fit to be dog food!"
As he spoke, the pool of blood surged, forming into hounds that lunged forward to devour Smoothie's remains. Even the battle-hardened pirates watching from afar felt their stomachs turn at the sight.
Suddenly, the colorful juices flowing through the city turned into stagnant, red blood, emitting the foul stench of decay.
"So it was maintained by her power?" Alucard looked around the blood-soaked city. The fairy-tale scenery had completely evaporated. "I'll leave the rest for Vegapunk to research."
With one island conquered, the next target was Palom-Polom in the southwest of Totto Land. But just as Alucard prepared to leave, a bolt of lightning struck down from the sky, hitting him directly in the crown of his head.
A grinning face appeared within the lightning cloud (Zeus), but three seconds later, the expression twisted into agony. A moment later, grey-purple translucent wraiths erupted from the cloud's body, wrapping around it and beginning to devour the living thundercloud.
"H-Help! Mama!!" the cloud wailed in terror. "Mama, save me! Save me!"
"It's useless," Alucard's mocking laughter echoed from within. "A mere soul-construct dares to attack me directly? You clearly don't understand my power."
Countless vengeful souls burst from the cloud's form, circling back in mid-air to relentlessly tear at its essence.
"Stop it! You bastard, Alucard!!"
A woman's piercing shriek cut through the air as a violent gale swept in, slicing through the surrounding buildings like invisible knives.
"A body of wind and a human soul? Old tricks." Alucard flicked his wrist. The "Smoothie" who had just been devoured by his hounds suddenly crawled out of a hound's maw, drew her longsword, and stood before Alucard. Her blade moved in a blur of afterimages, cutting through the oncoming storm.
"Smoothie!!"
Big Mom, Charlotte Linlin, descended from the sky. She stared at the daughter standing between her and Alucard, her fierce eyes locking onto the vampire. "Alucard! You trespassed on my territory and I haven't even settled that score yet, and now you've killed my daughter?!"
Alucard gestured with a finger, causing Smoothie's "familiar" body to melt back into his pool of blood. He smiled thinly. "If your daughter is gone, can't you just give birth to another? Isn't that your only real talent?"
Alucard had always viewed Charlotte Linlin with a single dismissive thought: "Great at breeding, useless at everything else." While derogatory, it was truly how he perceived her.
Big Mom's face contorted with rage, her wrinkles twisting into a mask of fury. She gathered her soul power, calling Zeus and Prometheus back to her palms. "You've been riding high lately, boy... don't push your luck!"