The Hydra roared filling the shattered chamber with its fanged maws and boiling venom. Magellan's colossal form stood behind it immovable as if the prison itself had become his armor. Venom streamed from him in rivers, flooding the ground until every step hissed and burned.
Magnus stood opposite, Shusui clenched tightly in his hand. The black blade pulsed with his Haki, arcs of black lightning snaking along its edge as if the weapon itself hungered for release.
His body trembled, but not from weakness. His will was pressing against its limit, building to something greater.
"Shusui," Magnus whispered, his voice low, reverent. The sword hummed in answer.
He closed his eyes.
The venom tide surged toward him.
Magnus moved.
Shusui slashed once just once as the blade cut through empty air but black lightning exploded outward splitting into dozens of arcs that hung suspended in space like cracks in reality.
For a moment, time seemed to hold its breath.
Then the air itself collapsed.
The suspended slashes detonated in unison. A storm of invisible blades erupted across the chamber cutting in every direction. The Hydra was torn apart mid-lunge, its heads shredded into ribbons of venom. Magellan's poison tide exploded, scattering into steaming mist as walls split, stone crumbled, and the very foundation of Impel Down groaned under the force.
Prisoners screamed in terror as the shockwaves ripped through the corridors, shattering cells and hurling bodies against steel bars. The floor beneath Magnus cracked open into jagged scars, spreading like veins of destruction.
Magellan staggered back, arms crossed to shield himself. Venom dripped in torrents, but even his living fortress buckled under the storm. Shusui's black lightning cut into him, slicing through layers of venom armor to leave searing wounds across his body.
The chamber fell silent for a heartbeat.
Magnus then lowered Shusui its black edge still humming with residual energy.
He exhaled, naming the technique as if sealing it into existence.
"Judgment Cut."
The word hung in the air like a decree.
Magellan's breath came ragged, his massive frame dripping venom onto the ruined floor. His eyes burned with fury but there was something else now that filled those eyes of his wariness and fear.
From the upper levels, alarms screamed louder than before. Voices shouted in panic, boots thundered across stone, and den den mushi broadcast urgent calls.
"Level Two is collapsing!"
"Magellan has engaged...he's losing ground!"
"It's a calamity!"
Then came the words that froze every Marine's blood.
"AUTHORIZE FULL-SCALE DEFENSE! CALL FOR THE BUSTER CALL!"
The declaration echoed through the prison, carried by the trembling voices of men who had never imagined such an order within the fortress of Impel Down.
Magnus tilted his head with a faint smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. His aura hadn't dimmed yet it just flared higher, black lightning snapping along the blade in his hand.
The World Government had just declared war on one man.
And he bloody welcomed it.
---
The alarms shrieked without pause, their metallic wail bouncing off the torn stone of Level Two. Smoke and venom mist coiled together hanging heavy over the ruins Magnus had carved into the fortress.
"Judgment Cut…" one Marine whispered before collapsing in terror, his rifle slipping from limp fingers.
Magnus stood among the wreckage, Shusui's black edge dripping with venom and blood.
He glanced upward as the ceiling shook under distant detonations as cannons were primed on the surface. The Buster Call had been sounded. The World Government wanted him erased, even if it meant burning Impel Down with its prisoners inside.
Magnus smirked faintly, the expression thin and sharp. "So they fear me this much already."
Magellan's growl echoed behind him, venom sizzling against shattered stone as the Warden pulled himself free from rubble, battered but not beaten his eyes glowed with fury."You won't leave this place alive, boy!"
Magnus didn't bother replying because his attention had already shifted downward.
Level Six.
Douglas Bullet.
That name thrummed in his memory like a battle drum. The Demon Heir, once a rival to Roger himself. A beast locked in chains, a weapon too dangerous for the seas.
Magnus started forward, boots crunching over broken stone. Shusui hummed at his side as if it hungered for the descent. Each step was calm, unhurried, but the Marines that dared rush him found themselves swallowed by the storm of his Haki. Their screams echoed briefly before they collapsed with eyes rolled back and foam bubbling at their lips.
He reached the central staircase. Below, the air carried a colder bite as though the abyss itself breathed upward. The deeper he went, the more silence pressed against him broken only by the faint, guttural laughter of men who had forgotten what sunlight looked like.
Magnus's hand brushed along the railing as he descended, his mind sharpening. He remembered the panels and episodes he had studied back in another life. The nightmare called Level Six, where monsters slept in chains, their wills unbroken even by decades of darkness.
And among them, Bullet.
Magnus could almost hear the echo of clashing steel, the roar of a man who treated war itself as oxygen.
The corners of his mouth curved faintly. "Douglas Bullet… let's see if you still have the fire Roger couldn't tame."
As if answering his challenge, the walls shook violently. The cannon fire above had begun. Dust and fragments of stone rained from the ceiling.
The prison quaked but Magnus only kept walking, descending further into the dark, toward the cages where kings without thrones slept.
Behind him Magellan roared orders with his venom flooding the stairwell in pursuit. Ahead of him shadows thickened and the voices of forgotten titans stirred their chains rattling like war drums.