Domain Expansion

Law looked away and swept his gaze around the stone room atop the tower.

It was empty!

As a result, the only object sitting in the middle of the room drew particular attention.

It was a gilded, ornamented coffin, encrusted with gems and covered in intricate, mysterious patterns...

So this was the stolen coffin of the former Holy Knights member mentioned in the introduction to the mission scroll. Ruidio understood and walked over.

A note lay on the lid of the luxurious coffin:

I'm inside! Captain, save me! (A simple drawing of a polar bear's face, with a few extra strokes for flying sweat.)

Ruidio and Law: "..."

Wasn't this trap a little too stupid?

Law raised a finger, preparing to use his ability to get whatever was inside the coffin out.

—His ability failed to activate!

That cold, stone-and-iron-like long sword was once again pressed against his neck.

Law dropped his hand helplessly and glared at Ruidio. "Even if Bepo isn't in there, I have to see for myself!"

Ruidio said, "They put this thing here because they knew you'd do exactly that, even knowing it wasn't him."

Law didn't understand. "It's just a corpse. What's wrong with taking it out? Get that sword away from me!"

Ruidio held the sword across Law's neck and said, "There are some things you're better off not seeing until you're qualified."

Every member of the Holy Knights signed a Deep Sea Contract with Imu. Who knows what Imu can do with their corpses? I came to meet Kizaru today. If Imu suddenly makes trouble from afar, I'll have to make an early escape.

"Heh heh heh... Young man, you seem to know who the person lying in that impossible-to-open coffin was, don't you?" An eerie, aged laugh came from outside the stone room. "Have you seen it too? That incredible, godlike power!"

There he is!

Law's eyelid twitched, and he motioned with his eyes for Ruidio to move the strange sword away.

Ruidio warned him with a look not to think about taking the zongzi out of the coffin.

While the two were at an impasse, two "ropes" shot out from the shadows outside the stone room, swept halfway around it, and stabbed toward them.

Ruidio turned the blade and used its exceptionally tough, Seastone-alloyed flat to send Law flying through the stone room's window with a bang. The two "ropes" stabbed toward Ruidio from the front and rear.

Ruidio dodged with a Soru and crouched atop the Holy Knight's coffin.

Biu! Law appeared out of thin air, having used the Op-Op Fruit's ability to transfer himself back into the stone room. When he saw more "ropes" stabbing toward Ruidio from behind, he raised a finger without thinking. His "operating room" enveloped the entire stone room, and he transferred Ruidio to the window on the left.

To his surprise, all the "ropes" stabbed toward Law himself. With a biu, he switched places to Ruidio's side. But the "ropes" seemed to have anticipated his reaction. As Law teleported, they all lunged toward Ruidio.

Ruidio pushed Law aside. This time, he didn't dodge, instead grabbing the "ropes" with his left hand.

Pain stabbed through his palm!

These weren't ropes at all, but tentacles. Once Ruidio grabbed them, they all pierced the skin of his palm. Like several straws plunged into a cup, they slurped up their "drink" with a hiss.

Ruidio's left arm shriveled at a speed visible to the naked eye.

"...?!" Law watched in utter shock as Ruidio, without the slightest hesitation, seized the tentacles that seemed to be sucking the flesh and blood from his left arm with his right hand and yanked hard.

Bang!

A figure at the other end of the tentacles was pulled through the wall and came flying toward them.

It was a shriveled old man with white hair and a bald crown. His head had been split open and was bleeding from the impact. The tentacles extended from both his hands and had been pulled toward Ruidio.

Gripping the tentacles, Ruidio hurled the old man over his shoulder and slammed him into the ground with a bang.

The strange sword that always appeared and vanished inexplicably, and could prevent Law from using his Devil Fruit ability, appeared once again in Ruidio's only remaining hand.

"Wait, wait!"

The shriveled old man with the tentacles cried out in terror, but Ruidio kicked him under the chin, sending him crashing into the wall. The next instant, the Demon-Subduing Great Grade Sword pierced his right chest and pinned him there.

"Whew..."

Ruidio let out a breath and said slowly, "The Suck-Suck Fruit. As long as you completely suck a person dry, whether they're alive or a corpse, you can obtain one ability they possess or once possessed, right?"

Law: "..." He was a little dumbfounded.

How to put it? The man's series of moves to subdue the old man had flowed seamlessly.

The scrawny old man struggled, but couldn't muster any strength. He tried to use his ability, but couldn't do that either. He stared in horror at the sword piercing his chest. "Seastone?!"

Ruidio pulled the now-limp tentacles out of his shriveled left palm and was about to interrogate the old man about the white bear Bepo's true whereabouts—

Just then, golden light flashed outside.

Inside the stone room, where a hole had been smashed through the wall, his, Law's, the old man's and the coffin's shadows stretched long. As the golden light raced around the island outside, the shadows kept turning with it...

Kizaru was here!

At first, it was just a speck of gold at the far end of the black sea.

Soon, the speck became a golden road of light spreading across the sea.

The golden light that illuminated the sea along its path flew onto the snowy island in an instant, then rapidly circled it again and again. Its dazzling radiance lit almost the entire island up as bright as snow, like a gigantic shadowless operating lamp in the night sky.

Amid the blinding light, Kizaru's figure slowly took shape. He looked toward the top of the tower at the center of the island, where the opening in the stone room was illuminated as brightly as day.

Of the three people inside, a young man with an injured left arm squinted toward the source of the super high beams.

The source of the super high beams turned into countless particles of golden light that flew forward together. Before the three people in the stone room, the particles rapidly assembled back into a three-meter-tall old man wearing a Marine Justice Coat, an expensive yellow suit, and brown-tinted sunglasses.

"Excuse me~~" Kizaru had both hands in his pockets. He glanced at the luxurious coffin in the room. "Which one of you stole this? I need to take him to prison, so please cooperate with my work~~"

"..."

Holding his left shoulder, Ruidio looked straight at Kizaru and said slowly, "By rights, a Marine of your rank isn't qualified to decide what to do with us."

"..."

Kizaru looked up. Who's above me?

I'm not high-ranking enough? I'm a Marine Admiral. Can't you tell?

"Young people these days have such frightening things to say~~" Kizaru said, not particularly bothered.

Law was already drenched in sweat!

What is this weirdo who also wants to save Bepo doing? This is one of the Three Admirals of Marine Headquarters! If you're not afraid to die and want to provoke him, can you leave me out of it? I'm a pirate!

No reaction?

Ruidio studied Kizaru's expression closely.

He had specifically searched for this mission to conduct test one: would Kizaru, like Robin, have the setting stir up some confused memories from the Ohara mission?

Although Robin had said that if she hadn't "run the dungeon" with him, she wouldn't have recalled those dreamlike, hazy images, like those one had just after waking.

People were creatures who lived in the present moment. Who would go digging through the corners of memories from ten or twenty years ago for a tiny lingering image whose impressions had already faded?

Test result: Kizaru indeed showed no reaction.

Then...

Test two: the combat capabilities of Satoru Gojo Mode.

Snap!

Ruidio tore off his shriveled left arm. Before it hit the ground, a dark blue sphere of attraction compressed it and ground it into powder.

His black hair drifted up and turned white, and his eyes shone with a brilliant sapphire light. Dense, dark white energy, invisible to Kizaru, Law, and the shriveled old man, welled up where Ruidio's left arm had been severed.

Ssss...

Steam rose as a brand-new left arm rapidly grew under the healing of the Reverse Cursed Technique. Its index finger pointed at Kizaru, whose face showed surprise.

"Red."

A dark red sphere of repulsion formed at his fingertip and blasted straight through Kizaru.

Chapter 45: Domain Expansion

The repulsive Red sphere's power started at twice that of the attractive Blue sphere.

With a roar, it blasted through the entire wall opposite, revealing the night sky outside, which had turned pitch-black again. Kizaru, meanwhile, stood where he was with both hands in his pockets, having never moved. Green light flickered along the broken edge of the left half of his body, which had been blown apart. Countless green particles of light flew back through the air, forming his missing body...

Why is the light green?

Ruidio blinked his blue Six Eyes. Good grief. Kaya and Usopp are very weak, so the green energy around them is only a thin layer, but when a Marine Admiral like Kizaru shows his power, the green light practically fills every corner of this stone room.

Kizaru vanished from where he stood and flashed over to the ornate coffin.

Ruidio followed close behind, dense dark blue Cursed Energy gathering around his right fist. With destructive force enough to bring down a modern reinforced-concrete skyscraper, his punch smashed Kizaru's head apart.

"I'm not interested in you~~"

Light gathered back into Kizaru's shattered head, and he said leisurely, "Don't get in my way, all right?"

Bang!!!

A stone staff struck Kizaru across the face, whipping him hard through another wall and sending him flying out with blood trailing behind him.

Having lost the support of three walls, the tottering roof collapsed with a crash.

Law was about to use the Op-Op Fruit's ability when he saw the stone room's falling roof float upward instead, as though something higher up were pulling it in. Then, as if guided by an invisible giant hand, it flew into the night on the other side.

[Satoru Gojo Mode remaining: 43 seconds]

Just as I thought, Cursed Energy doesn't work on an elementalized body. It isn't Armament Haki, after all.

Ruidio swung the Three-Section Staff Playful Cloud and watched a flash of golden light in the night sky ahead. The next instant, Kizaru was back in front of him.

"A weapon made of Seastone?" Blood lingered at the corner of Kizaru's mouth. He studied the Three-Section Staff in Ruidio's hand, then extended a finger as golden light gathered. "How scary~~"

"Watch out!" Law shouted.

The instant the blazing laser shot from Kizaru's fingertip, it stopped five centimeters from Ruidio's body. It was as though the laser had plunged into a bizarre region where the farther it traveled, the slower it became, until the speed of light finally came to a standstill.

Law's eyes widened. He had lost count of how many times he had reacted in alarm, only to turn out to be making a fuss on his own... Just what ability did this weirdo have? Why was he completely unaffected while holding that sword and Three-Section Staff supposedly made of Seastone?

Rumble... The sound of something heavy hitting the ground came from outside.

[Satoru Gojo Mode remaining: 38 seconds]

"Do you know you're giving off green light all over?"

Ruidio flung the Three-Section Staff at Kizaru while using a silent Soru to flash to his side. With a finger strengthened by Cursed Energy, he stabbed toward Kizaru's temple.

"You should get your eyes checked~~"

Kizaru turned to light and flashed away. In his brown-tinted sunglasses, the young man whose hair had turned white raised a hand and pointed. The Seastone Three-Section Staff actually changed direction in midair and flew at him again.

"If you're color-blind, isn't there a doctor right here?"

Kizaru separated his upper and lower body, letting the flying Three-Section Staff pass between them. Golden light burst from the sole of his lower body's foot as he kicked at Ruidio, while his upper body pointed a finger and fired a beam of golden light at Law, who was watching from the side.

He really does know me! Law's nerves were already taut. He decisively used the Op-Op Fruit to transfer himself, but the laser still burned his cheek, leaving a bloody mark. Kizaru's moves were simply too fast!