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"You know, his arms are pretty annoying," Gin grunted, his breathing uneven. Even though he held himself high, the ancient zoan user was getting worn out, "Think you can take care of that…"
"He's very good with his observation haki," Usopp admitted, also panting, "It's hard for any of my sea stone bullets to make contact. They aren't fast enough… I will have to use my slingshots. Think you can keep him busy."
Gin smirked, "I can do that…" he said.
It might be odd to think, but Usopp's Kabuto slingshot hit targets faster than his handguns. His slingshot was modified and upgraded with dials. While his handguns were a bit out of date for fighting individuals they casually broke the sound barrier.
Onigumo moved again, this time going for Usopp, but…
"Oi, fight me you bastard!" Gin came in with a tackle, making him stop and engage him in battle.
Gin punched by hardening his fists with tekkai, while the Vice Admiral used his sword covered in armament haki. With each strike, the room trembled, large cracks splintering up the pillars and across the ceiling. Dust filled the air, choking visibility. Yet both fighters were relentless in their efforts.
Still, due to the Vice Admiral having armament haki, his attacks were sharper. Each time his blades met Gin's fist, small wounds would appear on them. But even with that he continued his onslaught of attacks so that Usopp could prepare.
Even though Gin didn't have observation haki, his attacks were fast and Onigumo couldn't just ignore them. And as a zoan himself, he knew Gin was dangerous, and wasn't fully relying on his fruit powers.
It also made him wonder how an unknown pirate from the first half of grandline was so strong.
Gin was always an eager one when it came to training. Taking on anyone without any fear. So even though he didn't have haki yet, he knew how to work around them by fighting haki users in his crew.
And with the recent gravity training, all of his punches were fast enough to even make a Vice Admiral take things seriously.
But that didn't mean Gin was winning. No. The pirate's fist bled from getting cut every time he striked and the pain was almost unbearable, but Gin held it off.
"Why do you even struggle, pirate," Onigumo said, pushing back with his strikes. Gin, even though was physically stronger, was getting clumsy due to all the wounds adding up. "Your death is inevitable…" With that, he went full attack.
"We'll see about that…" Gin said through gritted teeth as he barely avoided some of the attacks, while tanking others.
Ducking under a swipe the ancient zoan rolled to the side, using his tail to attack Onigumo. "Tail Hammer Gun!"
The Vice Admiral had already jumped back by then, but that didn't mean anything as he had to block a sudden wind attack. Onigumo crossed his swords in front of him, and got pushed back due to the attack. He had a look of surprise on his face, "How is a pirate like you able to not only learn the Rokushiki but also make variants out of them…"
Gin smirked, "What can I say, I had a great teacher." With that he came down on the floor and started spinning in place, "Tail Hammer Gun Barrage!"
Spiked-hammer-like air attacks that looked similar to the mace end of his tail, were fired off at extreme speed at the Vice Admiral.
Onigumo clicked his tongue, using his multiple hands to fire sword slashes that countered Gin's barrage attacks, "Your attacks are powerful but against my own, they are useless…"
It was true, as Gin still had a lot of improvement. His attacks were only enforced by his physical strength, while Onigumo's sword slashes were enforced by both his physical strength and haki. That's why many of the sword slashes managed to hit the spinning Gin.
But the pirate tanked them by using tekkai and pure determination. Still, every wound was adding up and Gin wouldn't be able to last for long.
Seeing this, Onigumo was about to go after the pirate when suddenly…
"Shining Star!"
Onigumo's senses flared up again, and this time he immediately covered his whole body with armament haki, while trying to dodge the attack. He didn't even try to cut down the attack like previously. He won't make the same mistake twice. Or that's what he thought.
Rather than the projectile exploding into destructive flames, it exploded into something else.
"What's this… white power?" Onigumo asked as rather then getting covered with explosion, the last attack covered his whole body in some kind of white power. And for some reason, he was getting a strong urge to itch his body.
"Oh, did I say Shining star? What I meant was "Itching Star!" Usopp said from behind his cover.
Automatically the spider limbs of the Vice Admiral became busy itching his whole body. "You will pay for this, damn it!" he growled, with all intensity and fury, and yet he was itching away at his body.
He tried to shake the white power off, but they stuck to his skin and cloth. Making it impossible for the itch to go away.
Seeing this Gin openly laughed, "Well, that's an unexpected way to keep his hands busy." He said with a smirk, before picking up some rubbles and throwing it towards the Vice Admiral.
Like, before Gin didn't attack the Vice Admiral head-on as his fists were a bloody mess and he needed some time to recover. So like Usopp he was going around the battlefield throwing things around with long-distance attacks from his tail to keep the Vice Admiral busy.
Onigumo himself wasn't giving chase too much as the itching power was making it hard to concentrate in the fight. And even fully use haki for that matter. As Haki needed you to have focus.
But he needed to get the itching power off of him first.
——