From the shadow of the clocktower a figure finally stepped out, his face wearing that lazy, half-smiling expression that would one day kick Supernovas across the Grand Line like pebbles.
Even after being called out by Kael he did not look embarrassed. Instead he lifted his hands in a slow, exaggerated pose of surrender.
Marine Vice Admiral, wielder of the Glint Glint Fruit, the flashy man, Borsalino.
Kael's response was faster than his mouth.
He also raised his right hand. His index finger pointed forward. At his fingertip a pinhead of light bloomed, brighter than the sun for a heartbeat.
The next instant the light was gone.
A beam just as focused, just as fast, and even hotter than Borsalino's own laser shot out in a payback straight down the middle.
"Oh my?" Borsalino's tone rose a little. For the first time his face showed a hint of surprise.
Boom.
The deafening blast even drowned out the clash between Garp and the Golden Lion in the distance.
The top of the high clocktower did not explode into rubble. The moment the golden beam touched it, it was wiped away as if a god's invisible palm had brushed across the sky.
No flames. No shattered stone. The entire upper half of the tower was vaporized by that extreme energy, leaving behind a smooth, glassy crater, white smoke and steam rising together.
That one shot was several times scarier than Borsalino's sneak attack.
Every Marine who still had consciousness stared at the new empty space with dumb shock. No one could make a sound.
Light flickered. Borsalino's body reformed several dozen meters in front of the ruined tower.
He looked down at himself, perfectly intact, then looked back at the man standing untouched in the rainless zone. The laziness on his face finally became a bit serious.
"Kowaine." He dragged the word out, that greasy tone still there, but under it was real wariness. "As expected of the monster who gives the Five Elders headaches. You are strong in a way that is kind of ridiculous, Waveguide King Kael."
That mocking-nasal voice was irritating to listen to.
Before anyone could retort, a biting cold spread through the square without warning.
Crack.
Raindrops froze in midair into tiny beads of ice. The water at Kael's feet froze at a speed visible to the naked eye. Frost spread outward and laid a white sheet over the ground.
A tall, lean figure pushed through the Marine officers and walked out.
His face was young and sharp. His eyes burned with a heat completely opposite to the cold around him.
"I still remember how you made me look bad last time."
Young Kuzan stared hard at Kael. His hands were buried in his pockets, his posture loose, but the cold boiling off him betrayed how fired up he was.
"Didn't think you would actually dare to walk into Marineford."
The embarrassment of that old clash was carved into his bones. Today seeing the enemy again, Kuzan's jaw was tight, his fingers cracking, his fighting spirit high.
Kael shifted his gaze from Borsalino to Kuzan and smirked. "How many years ago was that. You are still hung up on it."
"You." Kuzan's face flushed red. A vein throbbed on his temple.
Just as he was about to move, another heat rose from the other side, so fierce it seemed to light the very air.
A man with a cold face and a cigar in his mouth walked out without a word. He stopped between Kuzan and Borsalino. The three of them formed a loose triangle that surrounded Kael in the center.
He did not waste any talk. He just stared at Kael with eyes like volcano vents.
"Dangerous criminals like you," Sakazuki's voice was low and rough and full of killing intent, "should be completely purged here and now."
Justice allowed no stain.
Threats had to be erased before they grew.
The future three Admirals of the Marines had arrived.
Before the sentence was finished Sakazuki's right arm was already magma. Thick, dark red, bubbling.
Great Eruption.
No probing. No testing. His opening was his strongest kill move.
Boom.
The massive magma fist rushed forward like a moving volcano, trailing smoke and heat, smashing straight at where Kael stood.
The ground along the path melted into glowing slag. The air warped. The rain turned to steam the instant it got close, filling the world with hissing white mist.
The punch sealed off every path of retreat. Its power said very clearly that it intended to erase Kael and this whole square together.
Kael did not move.
If this was the three Admirals in their prime joining forces, even he would have to work to get out clean.
But right now these three had just come out of training. Far from their peak.
I should dodge?
Facing the mobile volcano that could melt a city, Kael finally made a move.
He lifted the black-gold naginata that he had been resting so casually on his shoulder.
For the next instant the world went silent.
Zzz.
Black-gold lightning, like snarling serpents, burst from Kael's body and wrapped around the old naginata.
Advanced Conqueror's coating, bro.
Facing Sakazuki's full-powered strike, Kael just swung.
No technique name. No flourish. Just an arm bringing a blade in a straight arc.
Shhh.
The huge magma fist that could turn steel to vapor did not explode when the blade touched it.
It was like a soap bubble popped by a needle. From the point of contact it dissolved silently, broke apart, vanished.
The molten rock, the scorching wind, even the will to burn everything, were all eaten by that one plain-looking slash.
And the slash did not slow down.
A black-gold wave of Haki, refined to the limit, left the blade, tore through the rain and flew straight at Sakazuki.
"Nani."
For the first time the always-stoic face of Sakazuki showed an emotion called shock.
He did not even have time to defend. The killing slash hit him square in the chest.
Boom.
Sakazuki's whole body bowed backward like he had been hit by a meteor. The cigar flew out of his mouth together with blood.
He became a black blur and flew back faster than he had come. He plowed a deep trench across the ground and finally crashed into a half-ruined Marine office building.
The whole building shuddered and then collapsed with a crash, burying him under rubble.
One strike.
With one strike the future Admiral Akainu, the man who would one day make pirates across the seas tremble, was blown away and his life or death was unknown.
The Marines watching from afar all went silent. Their mouths hung open. Their eyes bulged.
What had they just seen. That was Sakazuki. The elite of the Marine training camp. A monster among monsters. And he had been.
"Conqueror's. Coating." Vice Admiral Tsuru's voice carried a tiny tremor. She stared at the naginata in Kael's hand. The black-gold lightning slowly fading from it made even a strategist like her feel a chill in her soul.
This was not a Devil Fruit.
This was not advanced martial arts.
This was power that only those standing at the very top of the world, those with the disposition of a king, could wield.
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