At that moment, the sound returned— the familiar heartbeat he had once heard in Water 7.
Thump, thump, thump…
It disrupted Kuzan's rhythm, like a thief steadily pilfering away fragments of his stamina.
For now, Kuzan couldn't even sense the loss. But when that drain accumulated past a certain threshold, it would descend like the Sword of Damocles, delivering a final, inescapable judgment.
It felt as if someone had inverted an hourglass beside him— the hiss of falling sand reminding him: time was running out.
He needed relentless, decisive offense. He couldn't allow himself to be thrown off like in Water 7, when the colossal tsunami, that strange heartbeat, and his own frustration had broken his rhythm.
Hoo— Kuzan leaned back slightly, inhaled sharply, and exhaled a blast of freezing air toward Davy Jones.
The chill spread like a thin veil, unfurling as if it were gauzy silk.
The very next instant, Kuzan straightened, and his fists blurred like phantoms. He hammered at the freezing mist with a barrage of blows.
Tak-tak-tak-tak—
Where his fists struck, the cold congealed into a hail of frozen knuckles, each one hurled like an artillery shell straight at Davy Jones.
From beneath Jones's body, a swarm of tentacles lashed forth like serpents. They whirled dazzlingly, sharp as blades, and effortlessly shredded the icy fists.
For a master of Haki, famed swords and blades mattered little.
Even if Dracule Mihawk himself, with Yoru— one of the Supreme Grade Blades, the strongest black sword in the world— tried to sever these tentacles, he would need to weigh carefully how much Haki he poured into his edge.
After all, a fighter's reserves of Haki were not infinite. They must be divided between Armament, Observation, and sometimes even Conqueror's.
To cut through Jones's limbs, Mihawk's coating of Haki would need to surpass the Armament reinforcing Jones's tentacles in that fleeting clash.
This was why Rayleigh had said: Haki is a precise comparison of values— a numbers game.
And at the same time, it is a gamble between truth and feint.
Kuzan was engaged in just such a gamble. Most of his icy fists carried only meager traces of Haki— but a handful were packed with lethal concentration.
His aim was to lure Jones into wasting vast amounts of Haki on feints, sacrificing a little to deplete a lot, buying himself the advantage.
Even with Observation, judging each strike accurately would drain Jones's reserves.
To Kuzan, this was like hunting a beast of the deep: exhaust its stamina, erode its will, and when it falters— strike the killing blow, forcing it to yield… and die.
But Jones shattered his perfect design with a single instant movement. In one blink, he erased the space between them.
Now he was the aggressor.
Tentacles and fists combined, and he used Kuzan's very own method— probing, testing, sapping away Kuzan's Haki.
Kuzan's fists clenched, struggling to parry the storm. The Admiral soon found himself overwhelmed, forced to guard his head with both arms, shifting fully into defense while he gathered strength.
Boom— Freezing air burst from his body, powerful enough to still a tsunami. Though he restrained it, the ground beneath him erupted into a jagged mountain of ice, spearing upward into the clouds.
He slipped from its surface, stealing a breath to recover. A heartbeat later, Jones emerged as well, only a step behind.
The ice where he emerged had already melted, dripping down to mingle with the torrential rain, indistinguishable.
Kuzan had accepted the truth: whoever endured longer would seize victory.
And yet, that thump-thump heartbeat hammered at his ears like a death knell. The world around him seemed distorted— unnaturally so.
Though the skies were heavy with storm, the darkness had deepened beyond reason.
Is it my eyes failing… or has Davy Jones done something again?
He seized a handful of rainwater, freezing it into an ice spear, and hurled it straight at Jones.
But Jones flickered forward once more, weaving between Kuzan and the flying spear.
Kuzan's leg swept up— Ice Lance Kick!— a slicing arc that skimmed across the frozen surface like a shark's fin, aimed precisely at Jones's predicted reappearance.
Jones twisted his body the instant he materialized, narrowly avoiding the cutting strike.
Their Observation Haki intertwined, layers of foresight overlapping— and out of countless possible futures, this one unfolded.
Each breath Kuzan drew rasped like a furnace, his chest a roaring boiler.
His entire body radiated an arctic chill, yet his blood boiled, seared with battle-lust. It had been far too long since he had faced such a foe.
The New World was filled with monsters like this, yet he had been shackled at Marine Headquarters, bound as one of its strongest weapons. It was as if the World Government itself, not just he, was frozen.
Pain. Endurance. The razor edge of death. The thrill of outwitting an opponent. The will to throw another punch…
All of it surged through him again.
This was battle— a fight to the death. And this time, he swore, the victor would be him.
Silently, he tallied the Haki Davy Jones still possessed, compared it to his own, and lunged forward.
Jones advanced as well.
Their steps slowed, drawing ever closer. Within several hundred meters, not a single living thing dared remain.
Kuzan's focus sharpened, kaleidoscopic futures spinning before his inner eye. He had to pick apart the details— to know which path Jones would choose.
Now only three meters apart, he saw the man's unnerving calm. That composure made Kuzan uneasy.
"Admiral Aokiji, Kuzan," Jones said at last, for the first time speaking his title and name. His voice was a warning:
"You should not have cast my trident into the sea."
Kuzan's face stiffened. In an instant, the kaleidoscope of futures narrowed to just six. He glanced down— and felt the upheaval rumbling beneath the thick ice.
The trident… why didn't I think of the trident?
The tsunami at Water 7 had been nature's wrath. But now, the tremors under Marineford's crescent bay were man-made— echoing the devastation of Whitebeard's legendary strike.
Rumble—!
The ice sheet shattered in the blink of an eye. The frozen bay rebelled, roaring upward in a feral surge.
Kuzan's eyelids twitched violently. He shouted to the nearby Marines:
"Get back to land, now!"
But the collapse was merciless. Water devoured ice like a tiger swallowing prey. In an instant, half the bay gave way, hurling Marines and pirates alike into the sea without distinction.
A chill seized Kuzan's skull.
He spewed frost desperately, trying to stabilize the ice and buy the Navy time— but Jones's furious fist was already upon him!
Kuzan's arms crossed over his head, summoning an ice shield— but Jones's punch shattered it. His tentacles stabbed into Kuzan's abdomen like spears.
Blood welled, only to freeze the moment it appeared. Kuzan roared, detonation of frost erupting, threatening to entomb them both in another iceberg.
Bang!
One of Jones's tentacles fired a pistol at point-blank range— seizing the instant Kuzan's concentration wavered!
The spreading frost collapsed to nothing.
The bullet burst apart— and Kuzan's body locked in eerie paralysis, his eyes fixed in a flash of horror.
Davy Jones!
The man's hand clamped around Kuzan's face. His yellowed lips twisted in a grim smile as he drove the Admiral down, plunging him into the icy, fathomless sea below.
The paralysis lifted— but Kuzan's body was already submerged. Weakness flooded him in waves.
Through Jones's fingers he saw the bubbles rising, the light fading, and shadows gathering that should not exist.
I'm falling. Sinking deeper and deeper…
I'm in the deep sea.
Salt water invaded his nose, his throat, his lungs. His organs groaned under the crushing pressure, ready to burst. Even as a Marine Admiral, he could not resist the primal instinct to thrash.
But Jones's tentacles bound him utterly, drawing him close until their faces nearly touched.
"Kuzan," Jones said with a smile, "tell me honestly— are you afraid of death?"
But Kuzan could not answer. His grip slackened, hands falling limp.
Devil Fruit users in the depths were no different than ordinary men— weaker, even. Within moments, Kuzan slipped into unconsciousness.
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