Next Bonus, 100!!
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Meanwhile.
The New World.
The Beast Pirates and the Red Hair Pirates were locked in a massive naval engagement.
"Kaido! Why the hell are you trying to stop us?!"
Shanks' face was a mask of dark fury.
"Wororororo!"
Kaido threw his head back and laughed uproariously. "Shanks! Are you boys trying to rush over to Marineford?"
"Well, too damn bad!"
"I'm not letting you past! Wororororo... you bastards have ruined enough of my plans! Now it's my turn to return the favor!"
"What goes around comes around, Red Hair!"
Shanks seethed with anger.
After intercepting Kaido's fleet and preventing his opportunistic raid on Whitebeard's territory, Shanks had intended to immediately set course for Marineford to halt the Summit War.
But just as the Red Force was preparing to dive and navigate the undersea route, Kaido's armada had ambushed them.
Initially, Shanks had been confused by Kaido's relentless aggression. But upon receiving the intelligence that Jin and the Revolutionary Army had entered the war at Marineford, it all clicked into place.
Kaido wasn't just out for revenge; he was actively trying to escalate the scale of the conflict. He had been waiting, hoping for a war of this exact magnitude.
For every warlord, tyrant, and ambitious pirate in the world... the total defeat of Marine Headquarters signaled the beginning of an era of absolute, glorious anarchy.
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"KILL!"
"TAKE THEM DOWN!"
"HOLD THE LINE!"
...
The entirety of Marineford was consumed by a deafening, never-ending symphony of war cries, clashing steel, staccato gunfire, and concussive explosions.
It was a meat grinder. A slaughterhouse.
The brutality was unimaginable.
Countless pirates and elite Marines fell, their broken bodies littering the plaza as they closed their eyes forever.
The wounded writhed on the blood-soaked ice, screaming in agony.
And yet, those still standing continued to hurl themselves at the enemy with suicidal frenzy.
Koby was sobbing uncontrollably, utterly traumatized by the endless chorus of agonizing screams and brutal deaths. He hoisted the unconscious Helmeppo onto his back, desperate to flee the butchery.
He had never possessed a truly hardened warrior's spirit. In the original timeline, he had attempted to desert, only to be forced back by the terrifying presence of Sakazuki.
His later intervention to stop Sakazuki from killing Luffy wasn't born of a profound sense of 'Justice.'
It was born of absolute, primal terror.
And his deep friendship with Luffy.
For that moment of weakness, many fans of the series had derisively labeled him the "King of Deserters."
But the reality of this Summit War was exponentially more terrifying than the original!
In the original timeline, Sakazuki was practically the only top-tier Marine fighting with absolute lethal intent. Here, Garp, Sengoku, and all three Admirals had found themselves locked in desperate, high-stakes duels against equivalent monsters.
Elite Vice Admirals like Onigumo, Momonga, and Doberman were bogged down in bloody clashes with the Revolutionary Army commanders and the powerhouses of the Winter Blossom Kingdom.
The entire island of Marineford...
Was rapidly being pulverized into dust by the catastrophic shockwaves of these titanic battles.
This was, without question, the absolute pinnacle of global warfare. The sheer scale and devastation caused the entire world, watching via the broadcast, to tremble in horror and gasp in awe.
The ambitious and the ruthless watched with greedy anticipation.
The civilians and the weak watched with mounting, suffocating dread.
To them, the 'Justice' of the Marines was the last, fading beacon of light in an increasingly dark and chaotic world.
If the 'Justice' of the Marines was utterly crushed here today...
The world would be plunged into an age of absolute darkness!
Where would they find safety? Where could they possibly go?
It was this very fear that led so many nations and individuals to willingly bow their heads, accepting a life of subservient slavery under the World Government.
They refused to stand up and fight.
Even if it meant being a hero for just one second!
Their spines had been broken centuries ago. Their spirits had been crushed. They had willingly accepted their roles as nothing more than livestock, sheep waiting to be sheared.
"TEACH!"
Marco blurred across the sky, materializing directly in front of Teach and driving a vicious, flaming kick toward his head.
"Useless!"
Teach sneered, raising his right hand.
"Black Water!"
An invisible, gravitational force erupted from his palm, acting like a violent whirlpool, violently pulling Marco toward him.
"Zehahahaha! Gotcha again!"
Teach's massive hand clamped down like a vice around Marco's ankle.
Instantly, the nullifying power of the Dark-Dark Fruit surged into Marco's body.
Marco gasped as the familiar, terrifying sensation washed over him. His connection to his Devil Fruit was instantly and completely severed. The blue flames of his regeneration vanished.
WHAM!
Holding Marco helplessly suspended by the ankle, Teach drew his left fist back and delivered a brutal, earth-shattering punch, driving the First Division Commander deep into the bedrock of the plaza.
"Zehahahaha! How does it feel?! The power of the most sinister Devil Fruit in history! The power of absolute darkness!"
Teach roared with arrogant laughter.
He knew the Whitebeard Pirates' fighting styles inside and out.
He had watched Marco, Vista, and the others train and fight for decades. He knew every single nuance of their techniques. With the Dark-Dark Fruit, he could perfectly counter their every move.
Conversely, Marco and Vista knew absolutely nothing about the true extent of his new abilities.
In the original timeline, one year after the Summit War, the Blackbeard Pirates and the remnants of the Whitebeard Pirates had clashed in a massive, decisive conflict known as the Payback War.
The result?
The Whitebeard remnants suffered a catastrophic, absolute defeat.
Even now, without possessing the Tremor-Tremor Fruit, Teach's baseline combat power was already more than sufficient to overwhelm the division commanders.
Vista lunged forward, unleashing a flurry of devastating slashes. He wasn't a Devil Fruit user; the nullifying power of the Dark-Dark Fruit was useless against him.
Teach grinned, coating his massive fist in dense Armament Haki to meet the incoming blades.
CLANG!
Teach's absurd, monstrous physical strength absorbed the blow and violently repelled Vista.
Marco seized the momentary distraction to rip himself free from Teach's grasp. He scrambled to his feet. His shirt was in tatters, and he looked thoroughly battered, but his expression remained a mask of stoic calm.
He casually cracked his neck, the sharp popping sounds echoing clearly.
"Zehahahaha! These Mythical Zoans are a real pain in the ass!"
Teach panted slightly, watching in frustration as the horrific wounds he had just inflicted on Marco rapidly closed and healed under the wash of blue flames.
A glint of greedy ambition flashed in his eyes.
But he quickly suppressed it. His ultimate prize was still the Tremor-Tremor Fruit.
However...
Taking stock of the current battlefield, Teach frowned deeply.
The sudden, unannounced arrival of the Revolutionary Army and Jin had thrown a massive wrench into his meticulously crafted plans. This chaos was entirely outside his calculations.
RUMBLE...
"Ah! Fleet Admiral Sengoku!"
A horrified scream erupted from a nearby sector.
Teach's head snapped toward the sound.
The duel between Sengoku and Whitebeard had devolved into an unimaginably brutal, bloody spectacle. Whitebeard was clearly fighting with suicidal intent, willingly trading devastating blows in a desperate bid to take Sengoku down with him.
Sengoku, by comparison, was a 'Resourceful General.' Decades spent behind a desk had dulled his edge. In a raw, desperate brawl against a man with absolutely nothing left to lose, he found himself slowly being overpowered.
After a series of catastrophic collisions, Whitebeard finally saw his opening. Willingly accepting a brutal, chest-crushing blow...
He drove his naginata straight into Sengoku's body.
SHLUCK!
Murakumogiri pierced clean through the abdomen of Sengoku's massive 'Buddha' form, the bloody blade bursting out his back. Sengoku let out an agonizing cry, coughing up a massive torrent of blood from his nose and mouth.
But Whitebeard was in far worse shape.
He had collapsed to one knee. He was using his grip on the naginata, which was still impaled through Sengoku, to physically hold himself upright.
His face, his arms, his massive torso—he was covered in horrific, bleeding wounds. His injuries were catastrophic. A steady stream of blood leaked from his mouth.
Sengoku gasped in agony, gritting his teeth. "Whitebeard... do you have any idea what you're doing?!" he forced out, his voice laced with bitter resentment.
Because of the massive blade impaled through his gut, he too was forced to drop to one knee.
They had been rivals for the better part of a century.
And now, at the end of it all, they knelt facing each other on the battlefield.
"Fleet Admiral Sengoku!"
"Pops!"
Marines and pirates alike screamed in horror, frantically abandoning their fights to rush toward the two fallen legends.
"Hah... hah... hah... what's the matter, Sengoku?" Whitebeard wheezed, his voice barely a whisper. "Let the brats... forge the new era."
He coughed violently, forcing the words out. "You extinguished the one hope I had... to pass on my will... Ace!"
"So don't blame me for this!"
In Whitebeard's heart, Ace had been the spark. The one who would inherit his will and lead his family into the new era.
But he had been murdered!!!
It was an unforgivable sin!!!
He was determined to take Sengoku down with him.
First, to avenge Ace. Second, to repay the debt of honor he owed Jin for Law's surgical intervention. And third...
To carve out a future for his crew.
As long as he contributed to this battle...
As long as he used his dying breath to smash a path forward for the new era...
He knew that neither Jin nor the Revolutionary Army would mistreat the remnants of the Whitebeard Pirates.
They would be bound by honor to remember his sacrifice!
"The old man's done!"
"And Sengoku is down too!"
Teach saw the opening and his eyes lit up with maniacal glee. Utilizing the Dark-Dark Fruit to momentarily suppress Marco and Vista, he sprinted desperately toward the fallen titans.
If he pulled this off, he could harvest two god-tier Devil Fruits right here, right now!
"Pops! Look out!"
But Whitebeard was already acutely aware of the approaching threat.
As Blackbeard charged into range, Whitebeard suddenly wrenched Murakumogiri out of Sengoku's body. Fighting through the agony, he forced himself to stand, gripping the massive blade tightly.
Teach froze in absolute terror. His survival instincts screamed at him to run, but his arrogance, fueled by the power of the Dark-Dark Fruit, urged him to stand his ground and trade blows with the dying Yonko.
"You haven't changed a bit, Teach!"
"I've always known... your overreliance on your Devil Fruit makes you sloppy! Your physical combat skills are pathetic!"
Whitebeard roared. He didn't even bother activating his Devil Fruit. He simply swung his naginata with devastating, brutal physical force, cleaving Teach straight into the ground.
Blood sprayed from a massive gash across Teach's chest. He writhed on the ground, screaming in agony, tears streaming down his face.
"Stop! Please! Pops! Are you really going to kill your own son?!"
Whitebeard glared down at him with absolute contempt. "I have no son like you!"
"Your greatest weakness... is your arrogance."
BOOM!
He unleashed a massive quake-punch, blasting Teach across the plaza.
But he didn't deliver the killing blow.
"Pops!"
Marco, Vista, and the others finally broke through the lines and reached him.
By now, Whitebeard had exhausted every last drop of his strength. His vision was blurring; his consciousness was rapidly slipping away.
"I'm sorry, my sons. I'm leaving you with a hell of a mess..."
Using the last reserves of his willpower, he forced himself to stand perfectly straight. He faced the entire, chaotic battlefield.
He stood tall, a monument of unyielding resolve.
And with his final, dying breath, he delivered a roar that shook the very foundations of the world.
"THE ONE PIECE..."
"IS REAL!"
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