Zaraki attacked again before the last of his laughter faded.
Nozarashi's Shikai cut through the courtyard in a dark-gold blur, each swing heavy enough to break stone several meters away even when the edge never touched it.
Mihawk met every strike with Yoru, but he never traded strength with Zaraki directly unless the angle demanded it.
A slight turn of his wrist moved one slash aside. A shift of his heel let another pass harmlessly across the edge of his coat.
When Zaraki tried to bury him under three rapid blows, Mihawk stepped through the rhythm between the second and third and struck before Nozarashi could come back to guard.
The flat of Yoru slammed into Zaraki's shoulder.
Pain shot through his arm, and a thin black arc followed right behind it.
Future Sight flashed.
For half a second Zaraki saw Yoru's edge crossing his throat, and he leaned back.
The blade missed his neck by less than an inch and opened a clean line across his collarbone instead.
Blood spread under his torn shirt as he landed several steps away and touched the cut with two fingers.
Mihawk had not aimed to kill him. That was almost insulting!
"You saw it," Mihawk said.
"A little."
"Then why were you still late?"
Zaraki lifted Nozarashi again. "Because seeing something and stopping it are different."
"Correct."
Mihawk moved.
He crossed the courtyard in a straight line, Yoru already coming down by the time Zaraki noticed the change in distance.
Zaraki blocked with Nozarashi, and the impact drove him to one knee.
Stone shattered under him, and the old damage around his ribs flared hard enough to turn his next breath ragged.
Nozarashi pulled at his Reiatsu.
'More.'
Zaraki gave it more.
Dark-gold pressure thickened along the chipped blade.
Mihawk felt the change and put more weight behind Yoru, and the crater under Zaraki widened.
'More.'
His muscles tightened.
He could open the flow all the way, and he knew exactly what would happen if he did.
Nozarashi would drink until the pain was gone, until restraint was gone, until there was nothing left in his body but enough power for one last cut.
That was how he had fought Jack. It was how he had forced an opening against Kaido.
It was also exactly what Mihawk had just warned him about.
Zaraki grinned through clenched teeth. "No."
Nozarashi's hunger struck back through their bond, hot and offended. The pressure around the blade shook.
'Coward.'
"Greedy bitch."
Instead of widening the flow, Zaraki narrowed it.
The Reiatsu compressed.
Rather than spilling outward across the courtyard, it gathered along Nozarashi's edge in a dense dark-gold line, packed so tightly that the stones nearest the blade started to hum without breaking.
Mihawk's eyes sharpened.
Zaraki rose.
Yoru was pushed up a fraction, then another. For the first time, Mihawk stepped back.
Only half a pace, but he moved.
Zaraki surged forward and swept Nozarashi horizontally. Mihawk brought Yoru down to meet it.
The clash cracked across Kuraigana.
A thin cut opened through the courtyard wall behind Mihawk, clean enough that the upper stones stayed where they were for one long heartbeat before sliding apart and crashing to the ground.
From behind the ruined pillars, Law watched with a grave expression. Zaraki's raw strength had not doubled since Dressrosa.
His control had changed.
The pressure that used to explode in every direction was packed into the blade itself now.
He was finally learning the difference between releasing power and wasting it.
Mihawk turned Nozarashi aside and answered with a thrust.
Zaraki shifted his head. Yoru's point cut through his cheek and passed beside his ear, and Zaraki drove his forehead at Mihawk's face.
Mihawk leaned away, visibly irritated. "That is not swordsmanship."
"It almost worked."
"It did not touch me."
"Still almost worked."
Zaraki swung again.
Mihawk blocked, and the courtyard rang with the collision of Yoru and Nozarashi over and over.
Neither sword chipped and neither blade bent, but their wielders could not have been more different.
Zaraki fought like a beast that had finally learned where to put its claws. Mihawk fought like every possible movement had already been considered and thrown out until only the correct one was left.
Every exchange exposed another flaw in Zaraki's technique. His shoulders shifted too early before certain attacks.
His right foot carried too much weight when he set up a full-power cut. He used instinct to fix mistakes that proper form would have prevented in the first place.
Mihawk punished all of it.
A shallow cut crossed Zaraki's forearm. Another opened along his side. The crossguard of Yoru caught his jaw and sent blood spraying out of his mouth.
Zaraki only got happier. So did Nozarashi.
'This one.'
"Yes."
'Let me drink.'
"Enough to cut him."
'Everything.'
"No."
The whole argument took less than a heartbeat.
Zaraki stepped forward and let out another measured surge of Reiatsu.
Nozarashi did not roar this time. The pressure went quiet, and Mihawk's expression changed.
Zaraki brought the Shikai down. There was no sprawling wave of energy and no attempt to tear the whole courtyard apart.
All of the force stayed inside the path of the blade.
Yoru rose to intercept it. When the weapons collided, Mihawk's coat snapped hard behind him and his boots slid several inches across the stone, leaving a narrow trench under each heel.
The castle windows rattled in their frames.
Then he turned Yoru and guided the remaining force upward, and a dark-gold slash rose above the castle and split the low clouds over Kuraigana without touching anything below.
Silence returned.
Zaraki stood with Nozarashi lowered, blood running down his arms and his side.
His breathing had gotten heavier, and the injuries Law had treated were starting to reopen under the bandages.
The Shikai kept drinking, but only through the channel Zaraki allowed.
Mihawk looked at the enormous cleaver, then at Zaraki. "That was better."
Zaraki laughed. "Only better?"
"You still tried to overpower the answer instead of understanding it." Mihawk rested Yoru's tip against the stone. "That sword is not eating you."
Zaraki's grin faded a little.
"You are throwing yourself into its mouth every time a fight excites you."
Nozarashi gave an irritated hum. Mihawk went on as though he had heard it.
"A blade with a soul is not a beast to break, and it is not a tool to feed without limit. If you cannot tell its hunger apart from your own, one of you will eventually eat the other."
Zaraki looked down at Nozarashi.
The woman's presence stayed close, fierce and impatient and clearly offended by Mihawk's conclusion.
But the hunger did not feel like an order anymore. It felt like a challenge.
Zaraki lifted the Shikai again. "Then keep testing us."
Law stepped out from behind the pillars. "You are still injured."
Zaraki ignored him.
Mihawk studied him for a long moment, and whatever he found there seemed to satisfy him. He raised Yoru.
"Again."
Zaraki's golden eyes burned. Nozarashi answered with a hungry roar.
This time, when Zaraki attacked, the sword drank only what he chose to give it, and the clash that followed rolled across Kuraigana like the opening note of a battle neither man intended to finish quickly.