[Location: Hakumai Coast, Wano]
The concept of "power" was being rewritten in real-time.
On the shattered coastline, a blue giant stood tall. It wasn't the full, mountain-sized Perfect Susanoo—Ren's chakra reserves, even with the sacrifice, couldn't sustain that for long—but it was the Armored Susanoo. A spectral samurai nearly as tall as the Moby Dick, wielding two undulating blades of blue energy.
Inside the crystal on the giant's forehead, Madara Uchiha stood with his arms crossed, looking down at the "little" golden man on the beach.
"Haki," Madara mused, his voice amplified by the chakra construct. "An interesting energy. It is not spiritual like chakra. It is vital. It is the manifestation of raw life force."
Whitebeard looked up. He didn't flinch. He gripped his Murakumogiri.
"You talk too much, ghost!" Whitebeard roared.
Whitebeard jumped.
It was impossible for a human to jump that high, but Newgate didn't care about physics. He launched himself toward the Susanoo's head.
Madara smirked. "Too slow."
The Susanoo swung its massive blades.
Yasaka Magatama!
Three spinning energy beads, blazing like blue suns, launched at Whitebeard point-blank.
Whitebeard didn't dodge. He pulled his left fist back, a white halo of quake energy forming around it.
CRACK.
He punched the air.
The atmospheric fracture shattered the Yasaka Magatama instantly. The shockwave continued, slamming into the Susanoo's ribcage.
BOOM.
The blue armor cracked. The Susanoo stumbled back, crushing a section of the forest beneath its ethereal feet.
"He cracked the absolute defense?" Madara's eyes widened slightly. "With a punch? Magnificent!"
Madara's battle lust flared. The cracking ribs of the Susanoo regenerated instantly as he poured more of Ren's life force into it.
"Then try this!"
The Susanoo drew a sword. It wasn't a normal slash. The blade extended, glowing with destruction.
Whitebeard caught the blade with his bisento.
CLANG.
The collision created a vacuum. The sea retreated for a mile. The Moby Dick was left stranded on the muddy seabed for a few seconds before the water rushed back in a violent tsunami.
"Pops!" Marco screamed, shielding his face from the wind pressure. "We can't get close! The pressure is too high!"
"Stay back!" Whitebeard yelled to his sons without looking away from Madara. "This one... is a calamity!"
Ren's Consciousness
Ren was floating in a dark void.
[System Warning: Critical Chakra Depletion.]
[Life Force draining at 2% per second.]
[Host is in cardiac distress.]
Ren couldn't feel his body. He could only feel the connection to Madara. It felt like holding a leash attached to a hurricane.
I have to... maintain it... Ren thought groggily. If Madara disappears, Whitebeard kills us all.
[System Proposal: Emergency Shutdown of other Summons?]
Do it, Ren mentally screamed.
The Battlefield
Across the beach, the other Akatsuki members froze.
Hidan, who was midway through swinging his scythe at Thatch, suddenly collapsed into a pile of dust and ash.
Kisame, battling Jozu in the shallows, dissolved into water and grey debris.
Deidara and Kakuzu followed suit.
Their souls returned to the Pure Land. Their chakra was siphoned back to Ren, and then immediately funneled into Madara.
Madara felt the surge.
"Oho?" Madara grinned. "The boy is desperate. He gave me more juice."
Madara looked at Whitebeard. The Susanoo grew legs. It stood up fully, towering over the landscape.
"Newgate!" Madara shouted. "You are the strongest in this world? Then show me how you deal with this!"
Madara wove a single hand sign inside the crystal.
It was the ultimate flex. The technique that defined a God of Shinobi.
The sky above Wano turned dark.
Clouds parted.
Descending from the heavens was not a ship, or a bird, or a lightning bolt.
It was a rock.
A meteorite. Massive. Spherical. Blocking out the sun. It was easily the size of the Flower Capital.
The battlefield went silent.
Kaido, who was pulling himself out of the rubble of a mountain, looked up.
"Worororo..." Kaido laughed weakly, blood dripping from his mouth. "That's... excessive."
King stared up, his mask tilting. "Ren... what have you brought to this world?"
On the Whitebeard side, panic set in.
"A meteor?!" Jozu yelled. "That will wipe out the island! We're all dead!"
"Pops!" Marco shouted.
Whitebeard looked up. The shadow of the meteor covered his face.
He didn't look afraid. He looked annoyed.
"A rock?" Whitebeard grunted. "You think a rock can stop me?"
Whitebeard stabbed his bisento into the ground. He crouched low. He crossed his arms over his chest, muscles bulging, veins popping like ropes.
A sphere of white light formed around his entire body, expanding rapidly.
"GURA GURA..."
He threw his arms out.
"...TSUNAMI!"
He didn't target the meteor. He targeted the air under the meteor.
He punched the sky with both hands.
The sound was gone. It was too loud to hear.
The air pressure shot upward like a vertical cannon. The shockwave hit the bottom of the meteor.
CRACK-BOOM.
The meteor paused.
Then, slowly, cracks formed on its surface. Spiderwebs of light.
And then, it shattered.
The massive rock exploded into millions of smaller fragments. It rained fire and stone over the ocean, splashing harmlessly into the sea or vaporizing in the atmosphere.
Madara watched the destruction of his masterpiece.
"He destroyed the Tengai Shinsei?" Madara laughed. "Hahahaha! This world is fun!"
But as he laughed, the blue armor of the Susanoo began to flicker.
"Tch," Madara looked down at his hands. They were cracking. "The summoner is at his limit. pathetic."
Madara looked at Whitebeard, who was panting slightly, steam rising from his skin.
"Edward Newgate!" Madara declared, his body beginning to dissolve into ash. "I acknowledge you! In terms of raw power, you are magnificent!"
"Leaving so soon?" Whitebeard growled, picking up his weapon.
"My time is up," Madara smirked. "But pray we do not meet when I have a real body."
Madara Uchiha crumbled into dust.
The Susanoo vanished.
The battlefield fell silent, save for the crashing waves and the falling debris.
The Standoff
Ren lay face down in the dirt, unconscious. His hair had turned completely white from the life-force drain.
Kaido walked out of the dust cloud. He was battered, bruised, and bleeding, but he was standing.
King, Queen, and Jack rallied behind him. The remaining Beast Pirates—thousands of them—emerged from the treeline, weapons drawn.
On the other side, Whitebeard stood alone on the beach. His commanders rallied to him, but they were tired. The Moby Dick was heavily damaged.
Whitebeard looked at Kaido. Then he looked at the unconscious Ren.
"The ghost is gone," Whitebeard said heavily. "I can sink this island now."
"Do it!" Kaido roared, stepping forward. "Sink it! We can swim! Can your hammer-eaters swim? Can your sons swim?"
Kaido gestured to the ocean.
"If you sink Wano, Newgate, you kill Oden. You kill the citizens you're trying to save. And you kill your own crew."
Whitebeard gripped his bisento until the wood creaked.
He knew Kaido was right. He could win the fight, but he would lose the war. A quake capable of killing Kaido would destroy the Moby Dick and drown his fruit users (Marco, Jozu, Blamenco).
"Release Oden," Whitebeard demanded one last time.
"No," Kaido grinned savagely. "He is my trophy. But..."
Kaido paused. He looked at the devastation. He looked at Ren's unconscious body. He realized how close they had come to annihilation.
"I won't kill him," Kaido lied—or perhaps compromised. "He will live. He will serve his sentence in the mines. If you leave now, he breathes. If you take one more step... I execute him right here."
Queen stepped forward, holding a snail phone.
"I have the dungeon on speed dial!" Queen shouted, sweating profusely. "One word, and the guards pour poison gas into his cell!"
Whitebeard stared at them. The veins in his forehead pulsed.
He looked at Marco. Marco shook his head slowly. We can't risk it, yoi.
Whitebeard closed his eyes. He took a deep breath.
"Kaido," Whitebeard said, his voice low and dangerous. "If I hear that he is dead... I will return. And next time, I won't care about the island."
Whitebeard turned his back.
It was the hardest thing he had ever done. To turn his back on family.
"We're leaving!" Whitebeard ordered.
"Pops?!" Vista gasped.
"I SAID WE LEAVE!" Whitebeard roared.
The Whitebeard Pirates scrambled back to the Moby Dick. The ship, battered and broken, limped away from the coast, back toward the waterfall.
Kaido watched them go. He didn't move until the ship disappeared over the horizon.
Only then did the Emperor of the Beast Pirates collapse to his knees.
"Worororo..." Kaido coughed, clutching his chest. "That old man... is a demon."
King walked over to Ren's body. He checked for a pulse.
"He's alive," King reported. "Barely. His hair is white. He looks like an old man."
Kaido looked at the unconscious boy. The boy who had summoned a god to save them.
"Get him to the best doctors," Kaido ordered, standing up shakily. "Use the best medicine in Wano. If he dies, I kill the doctors."
Kaido looked at the sky where the meteor had been.
"The Fourth Calamity," Kaido whispered. "He earned his name today."
[System Notification]
[Event Complete: The Clash of Emperors.]
[Result: Stalemate / Survival.]
[Renown: Legendary.]
[Penalty Applied: -20 Years Lifespan.]
[Status: Comatose.]
[Timeskip Initiated...]