King's Plateau, beneath a blood-red sunset.
The once magnificent royal palace of Dressrosa had become nothing but shattered ruins.
Wild winds carried sand and the smell of scorched destruction across the silent wreckage.
Kaido.
That name itself represented the ultimate embodiment of violence and chaos on the seas.
At this moment, the seven-meter-tall demon god tilted his head, his drunken yet terrifying eyes sweeping over the two tiny figures before him like they were ants.
"Hic."
Another alcohol-soaked belch escaped him.
Kaido casually held the kanabo wrapped in purple Haki, Hassaikai, as though it were merely a toothpick.
His massive body swayed, white steam blasting from his nostrils like an enraged dragon.
"What's wrong, Joker…"
Kaido's voice was low and hoarse, filled with drunken instability, yet each word crashed into everyone's hearts like thunder.
"Aren't you… usually pretty talkative?"
"Aren't you… some big shot… with that G-5 thing?"
"So why… aren't you talking now?"
Donquixote Doflamingo clenched his teeth so hard the veins on his forehead bulged violently.
Cold sweat slid down his face, mixing with blood and grime, leaving him looking utterly miserable.
What could he even say?
Before this irrational monster who only respected brute strength, and who was obviously completely wasted, any explanation felt meaningless.
"Damn it… damn it…"
Doflamingo's Observation Haki stretched desperately toward the sea, trying to grasp even the faintest trace of hope.
'Rehn!'
'That damn fat bastard!'
'Wasn't he supposed to arrive soon?!'
'Wasn't he supposed to come collect debts?!'
'I'm about to die here! Where the hell did G-5's efficiency go?!'
"Stall him… I have to stall him…"
Doflamingo roared internally, forcing himself to calm down.
He knew Kaido was a walking powder keg right now.
Trying to fight head-on meant death.
His only chance was to exploit Kaido's drunkenness. Even one extra second bought meant a slightly higher chance of survival.
"K-Kaido-sama…"
Doflamingo forced out a smile uglier than crying, raising both hands slightly in surrender.
"There's… been a misunderstanding between us. The SMILE factory may have been destroyed by these brats, but… but I have backups! Yes! Backup blueprints!"
"Just give me time… I can rebuild everything! And… and Admiral Renzo also has a shipment of new supplies prepared for you…"
He tried invoking Renzo's name as intimidation, even if only slightly.
"Renzo?"
Kaido narrowed his eyes.
The killing intent exploding from him instantly dropped the surrounding temperature below freezing.
"You trying to use that lazy bastard… to pressure ME?"
"Worororo!!!"
Kaido suddenly burst into violent laughter, filled with savage contempt.
"Joker! You've really gotten pathetic!"
"I'm a pirate! The strongest creature in land, sea, and air!!"
"You think I'd fear some Marine?!"
"If you love being a dog so much…"
"Then today I'll break your dog legs first!!"
BOOM!!
The ground beneath Kaido shattered instantly.
His gigantic body exploded forward with horrifying speed completely disproportionate to his size.
His kanabo, wrapped in black-red lightning, smashed downward toward Doflamingo's head!
"Not good!!"
Doflamingo's pupils shrank violently.
There was no time to dodge!
"Off-White! White Launcher! Thousand Arrows Pierce Heart!!"
At the edge of death, Doflamingo unleashed every ounce of his potential.
Countless white strings erupted from the ground like geysers, forming thousands of layered shields before him.
At the same time, endless hardened threads rained toward Kaido in an attempt to counterattack while defending.
He pushed his awakened Devil Fruit powers to the absolute limit!
But, before absolute power, technique was fragile.
BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG!!!
Kaido's kanabo smashed through Doflamingo's proud defenses like crushing crackers.
Strings snapped.
Shields exploded apart.
"PUAH!"
The shockwave alone blasted Doflamingo backward like a ragdoll.
He slammed deep into the ruins behind him, kicking up a storm of dust.
"Not done yet…"
Kaido didn't pursue him immediately.
Instead, he drunkenly turned toward the other side.
There, Luffy remained in Bounce-man form, bouncing in the air, glaring furiously at Kaido.
"Hey! Big guy!!"
Luffy simply did not understand fear.
Or rather, the word "back down" did not exist in his dictionary.
Seeing Doflamingo blasted away didn't make him happy.
It made him angrier.
"That's MY opponent!! Why are you interfering?!"
"And you made this country even worse!!"
Luffy clenched his fists, his arm muscles compressing violently like giant springs.
"I'm gonna punch you flying too!!!"
"Gomu Gomu-"
Luffy vanished in midair, propelled by overwhelming elastic force.
In an instant, he reached Kaido.
"CULVERIN!!!"
BOOM!!!
This punch carried all the power of Fourth Gear.
Fueled further by rage, it exceeded even Luffy's normal limits.
The fist powerful enough to shatter a city slammed directly into Kaido's broad chest.
"Bang."
A dull impact echoed.
Kaido's body… merely swayed slightly.
He looked down at the tiny fist pressed against his chest.
Then at Luffy's straining face.
That gaze,
It was like watching an insect trying to topple a giant tree.
"Hm? That hurt a little…"
Kaido belched, casually picking his ear with his pinky finger.
"So this is… the power that defeated Joker?"
"Too weak."
"It's basically… a back scratch."
Luffy's pupils contracted violently.
Impossible?!
Fourth Gear attacks… did nothing?!
"I DON'T BELIEVE IT!!!"
Luffy roared, unleashing a machine-gun barrage of punches.
"Kong Gun! Rhino Schneider! Double Culverin!!"
BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM!!
An endless storm of attacks rained onto Kaido.
Every strike detonated explosively.
Yet Kaido didn't even bother using Armament Haki.
He tanked everything purely with his monstrous physical body.
He even had enough leisure to lift his empty sake gourd and tilt it.
"No booze left…"
Kaido sighed, disappointment and boredom on his face.
"What a boring monkey show."
"Done playing, brat?"
The next moment,
Kaido's eyes changed.
The drunken haze vanished instantly.
What replaced it was terrifying clarity and icy killing intent.
He slowly raised his kanabo.
The motion wasn't even fast.
In Luffy's Observation Haki, every movement was crystal clear.
"MOVE!! LUFFY-YA!!"
From afar, Trafalgar D. Water Law screamed desperately.
He recognized it.
That attack…
Was certain death.
Luffy felt it too.
The sensation of death made every hair on his body stand up.
He wanted to dodge.
Wanted to flee.
But,
In that instant,
An invisible, overwhelmingly tyrannical force locked the entire space around him.
Under the crushing pressure of Kaido's supreme Conqueror's Haki, Luffy felt like he had sunk into a swamp.
Even his bouncing slowed drastically.
"W-what is this…"
Luffy's eyes widened in horror.
Blake-purple lightning crackled violently across Kaido's kanabo.
The air itself screamed under the pressure.
"Thunder, "
Kaido vanished.
Not moved,
Vanished.
His speed had exceeded what the eye could track.
By the time Luffy saw him again, the giant demon stood directly before him.
The kanabo had already swung.
", BAGUA!!!"
BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!!!!!!!!!!!!
For a single instant,
The world lost all sound.
Then came an explosion powerful enough to shatter souls.
The kanabo smashed directly into Luffy's abdomen.
Even with Fourth Gear's elastic defense.
Even with Armament Haki protection.
Everything was paper-thin before this strike.
"PUAH, !!!"
Luffy's eyes rolled white instantly.
Blood exploded from his mouth.
Fourth Gear shattered apart on impact.
WHOOSH, BOOM!!
His body became a streak like a fallen meteor, flying across all of Dressrosa before smashing into the rocky cliffs kilometers away!
The entire mountainside collapsed, burying Luffy completely.
One strike.
Just one strike.
The Straw Hat who had been battling Doflamingo moments ago,
Was instantly obliterated.
Alive or dead, nobody knew.
"LUFFY-SENPAI!!!"
Bartolomeo screamed in despair.
Law's limbs turned ice-cold.
Kikoku slipped from his hand and clattered to the ground.
So this was… a Yonko?
This hopeless gap…
No strategy or luck could overcome it.
"Hah…"
Kaido lowered his kanabo and exhaled.
He didn't even glance toward where Luffy had been launched.
As though he had merely swatted away a fly.
"Too weak."
Kaido shook his head, the violence in his eyes deepening.
"So this is the Worst Generation?"
"What a disappointment."
Then,
He turned once more toward Doflamingo in the rubble.
Doflamingo was painfully dragging himself from beneath broken stone.
One of his legs was broken at a grotesque angle.
His expensive pink feather coat had been soaked completely in blood.
He had seen Luffy get one-shot.
That sight had shattered something inside him.
For the first time in his life, the self-proclaimed "master manipulator" felt utterly powerless.
"Damn it… damn it…"
Doflamingo gasped, fingers clawing bloody trenches into the ground.
"Rehn… Renzo… if you bastards don't get here soon…"
"…I'll haunt you even in death!!"
"Joker."
Kaido approached step by step.
Each footfall shook the earth like a countdown to death.
"That Straw Hat brat's asleep now."
"Now…"
"…it's our turn to settle accounts."
Kaido stood over Doflamingo, his massive shadow swallowing him whole.
"To be honest…"
"I'm disappointed in you."
He looked down coldly.
"I thought you were smart."
"Didn't expect you'd become another coward hiding behind someone stronger."
"You really think that 'Gray Sheep' can protect you?"
"Or do you think…"
"…I don't dare kill you?"
Doflamingo painfully raised his head.
Despite being covered in blood, his mouth remained stubborn as iron.
"Fuffuffu… cough…"
He spat blood and laughed bitterly.
"Kaido… killing me won't help."
"The SMILE factory's destroyed… even if you kill me, you won't get any fruits."
"And…"
A mad gambler's light appeared in Doflamingo's eyes.
"Do you really want all-out war with G-5?"
"Do you even know… what Renzo controls?"
"Do you know… why even the World Government bows to him?"
"SHUT UP!!"
Kaido exploded in fury.
He hated cryptic nonsense more than anything, especially people trying to intimidate him with others.
"I DON'T CARE WHAT HE CONTROLS!!"
"In this world, only strength is truth!!"
"If you trust that Renzo bastard so much…"
"Then I'll send you to hell first!"
"After that, I'll head to G-5 and rip that lazy bastard's head off to bury with you!!"
BOOM!!
Kaido raised his kanabo again.
This time, the Conqueror's Haki coating it was even denser and more violent than before.
He truly intended to kill.
Doflamingo stared at the descending weapon of death, his pupils shrinking to the limit.
He wanted to move but couldn't.
Wanted to defend with his strings but no strength remained.
He experienced despair.
"So this is death…"
"Me… Donquixote Doflamingo…"
"…dying here…"
"…at the hands of some drunk bastard…"
"What a pathetic ending…"
The kanabo descended with annihilating force.
Less than half a meter from Doflamingo's head,
Law shut his eyes.
Everyone believed the Heavenly Yaksha was about to fall.
Then- SHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII!!!
A piercing sound like the tearing of reality exploded from the distant horizon!
It came too fast.
Too suddenly.
It even drowned out Thunder Bagua itself!
BZZZT! BOOOOOM!!!
A gigantic pillar of lightning crossed dozens of kilometers in an instant,
Striking Kaido's kanabo with force surpassing light itself!
BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!!!!!!!!!!!!
An apocalyptic explosion erupted.
The energy storm instantly flattened the surrounding ruins!
Kaido's attack, was forcibly knocked off course!
The kanabo barely missed Doflamingo's head, smashing into the earth beside him and creating a bottomless crater!
Doflamingo was blasted dozens of meters away by the shockwave.
Though battered senseless, he survived.
"Hm?!"
Kaido's arm tingled from the impact.
Furiously, he turned toward the source of the lightning.
Far out at sea, a pitch-black warship wrapped in golden electric arcs was charging toward Dressrosa at insane speed!
At the bow stood a fat man in a tuxedo, gold chains hanging from his neck, holding an enormous loudspeaker.
"KAIDOOOOOO!!!!"
The fat man's voice, amplified through electricity, rolled like heavenly thunder across all of Dressrosa!
"STOP RIGHT THERE!!!"
"That flamingo bastard is LORD LEVI'S PRIVATE PROPERTY!!!"
"IF YOU BREAK HIM, CAN YOU EVEN AFFORD TO PAY FOR IT?!!!"
Rehn.
G-5's Chief Steward.
At the most critical, most hopeless, moment… had finally arrived.
"Hah…"
Amid the ruins, Doflamingo stared at the approaching fat man.
A tear actually slid down his face.
At this moment, that greedy, scheming, shamelessly corrupt fat bastard Rehn…
Looked more beautiful than an angel.
"You finally… came…"
Doflamingo's head tilted.
He lost consciousness completely.
Meanwhile, Kaido narrowed his eyes at the lightning-cloaked fat man racing toward him.
A savage, excited grin spread across his face.
"Oh?"
"So finally…"
"…someone slightly interesting has arrived."
"G-5… Thunder God Rehn…"
"Then let me see…"
"…just how capable you people really are, daring to interfere in MY business!!"