Beastlike Instincts

Dragon ran over like a madman, stepped over Chu's corpse, and shed two streams of bloody tears.

"Chu! Chu!!"

He raised his head in fury. "You poisoned him?!"

Among pirates, nobody talked about fighting dirty.

But poisoning was undoubtedly shameful.

"No, I really wasn't the one who poisoned him."

Lowett wore a relaxed smile and shrugged.

He raised his "left hand." Pitch-black sand swirled around it, making his arm look as though countless tiny insects were crawling over it.

"Curse Magic Black Sand was poisonous to begin with... and he scattered the toxic sand everywhere himself."

To defend against Chu's water-ball bullets, Lowett had used the black sand as a shield.

After being sprayed everywhere, the black sand scattered in all directions. Most of it fell into the swimming pool, turning it into a poisoned pool.

Then he lowered his head and drank from it...

Could Lowett be blamed for that?

He had only brought it upon himself.

"Besides... instead of questioning me, you should worry about your other companions."

Lowett suddenly reminded him with a cold sneer.

Dragon instantly turned around.

"Ah!!!"

"Help... help!!"

"I can't see!"

The fishmen who had been brimming with confidence moments ago were now rolling about in the water and screaming. Once diluted by seawater, the Withered Black Sand was not terribly toxic. A small amount would hurt for half an hour at most.

But soaking their entire bodies in it...

Their fate would only be slightly better than Chu's, after he had swallowed the poisoned water.

But the outcome would not change.

Splat!!

A rusty blade pierced out through the chest of a wailing fishman. The undead stretched out their rotten, pallid hands and dragged the fishman, who was vomiting blood, beneath the water.

Before long, a thick crimson stain spread across the pool.

The undead the fishmen had shoved into the water earlier now became the last straw that broke the camel's back.

"Stay away from the pool... no, stay away from all black sand!"

Hachi watched the scene in agony.

No one had expected this to happen. That single mistake had already cost more than a dozen fishman brothers their lives.

They had originally had a chance to climb out, but the undead they themselves had ordered thrown into the water had utterly snuffed out that hope.

"Bastard!!"

Hachi's tentacles lashed about in rage. As an octopus fishman, he had six arms, and his attack speed far surpassed that of a human swordsman.

"Give me back my brothers' lives!!"

With that, he charged forward.

But then, a figure stepped in front of him.

Hachi's blades stopped against the other man's shoulder. He stared in stunned disbelief. "Boss?"

The one who had stopped him was Dragon.

Taking a deep breath, Dragon gritted his teeth. "This guy... is mine!"

"But—!"

Hachi cried out unwillingly.

"Shut up. When I tell you to get out, then—"

Before he could finish, Dragon's expression tightened. He violently shoved Hachi away, and the two tumbled apart.

Pfft... flap flap!

A pitch-black raven burrowed out from the flesh at the end of one of Hachi's octopus-like arms, flapping its wings as it flew into the sky.

"Argh!!!"

A scream of unimaginable agony burst from Hachi's mouth. That pain was far beyond what any ordinary injury could inflict.

"Oh? He actually dodged it?"

Lowett was secretly amazed.

The same spell would certainly take longer to activate through brute force, but this time he had targeted only one person, and it had still been evaded?

"Beastlike combat instincts!"

Lowett recalled that description.

"Hachi!"

Seeing the end of Hachi's arm withering and rotting at a visible speed, Dragon made a snap decision and opened his mouth to bite down at the joint connecting his upper arm.

Splat!

Amid a spray of blood, a severed arm flew out.

It should have been excruciating pain, yet a trace of relief appeared on Hachi's face.

Compared to the pain of that creature gestating inside his body, having his arm bitten off alive was far easier to bear.

He glanced at Dragon, wanting to say something, only to find Dragon staring fixedly at Lowett without turning his head.

"Run! Don't stay here!"

"This guy hasn't even shown his true strength yet!!"

Dragon glared at Lowett. A bead of cold sweat slid from the tip of his nose.

Only now did he finally understand what was wrong.

They had made a mistake!

Who said his confidence came from the Undead forces?

Why couldn't he himself be the source of all that confidence?!

Magic?

Remembering the sense of danger that had frozen his marrow earlier, Dragon could not stop himself from trembling.

Yes, only magic could accomplish attacks this strange, absurd, and impossible to trace.

If they could not even see it, how could they defend against it?

Staying here was simply courting death!

"I..."

Hachi froze for a second, then ran without looking back as he shouted.

"Retreat! Everyone, withdraw from the battlefield!"

Hearing the call, the surrounding fishmen froze, then immediately abandoned their opponents and retreated beyond the walls.

"Interesting. Mercy and cruelty coexisting?"

Lowett's lips curled upward as he planted his cane on the ground. "You remind me of Gilgamesh, the Hero King of an ancient age."

"But unfortunately, I willingly took this risk for your corpses. Escape is not allowed."

Dragon was a formidable leader as well. Once he had judged Lowett's level of danger, he decisively ordered a retreat, staying behind himself to cover the others' escape and uphold the fishmen's supreme racial honor.

But if he succeeded, then what had this whole adventure of Lowett's been for?

"Do you really think the Undead forces are not where my confidence lies, Dragon?!"

His lips trembled as an obscure chant slowly drifted through the air.

Under Dragon's shocked, bewildered gaze, streams of blood shot out from the corpses scattered across the ground, gathering high in the air into an expanding ball of blood.

Then it burst apart, turning into a rain of blood that poured down upon the earth.

Flesh Magic Fury!

"Roar!!"

The zombies' eyes immediately turned red as they entered a berserk state.

If their casualty ratio against the fishmen had previously been twenty to one, now it would be three to one at most.

But they still outnumbered the remaining fishmen several times over!

"Bastard!!"

Dragon's eyes were bloodshot. He knew perfectly well why Lowett needed fishman corpses.

Watching the rampaging zombies pin down his companions one by one and wear them down with sheer waves of corpses, Dragon stomped forward and burst into motion.

"Here he comes!"

Lowett's expression tightened. Even Kuroobi possessed such enormous strength. As the captain, Dragon could only be stronger.

He had guessed correctly.

Boom!!!

The stone slabs beneath Dragon's feet exploded, sending rubble flying. The terrifying muscular power, dozens of times greater than that of an ordinary person, turned Dragon into a black streak that shot toward him.

In a straight-line burst, he was even slightly faster than Kuro!

Bone Magic Armor!

Lowett knew exactly how much his own body could take. With no time to chant, his Mental Power erupted. A layer of gray-white bones surfaced over his shoulder, then spread rapidly along his frame as though bones were growing a body around themselves.

Crack!!

The next instant, the terrifying impact struck, scattering bone fragments everywhere.

Dragon's reaction speed was astonishing. Seeing that Lowett had not used the black sand on his left arm, he decisively opened his mouth and bit down.

Different fishmen had different specialties. As a Sawshark Fishman, his most powerful weapon was his teeth, which could crush steel.

"I got him!"

Dragon inwardly relaxed, but his gaze quickly turned cold.

"But he dodged."

Rustle!

The torn shoulder pad made a valiant sacrifice, shredding into fragments that fluttered through the air. The bones on Lowett's left shoulder were completely shattered, and cracks spread through the rib armor around his chest as well.

"So this is a fishman?!"

Surprise gleamed in his eyes. A body capable of unleashing more than ten tons of brute force—it was no wonder thousands of oppressed civilians had never dared to resist.

But the stronger Dragon was, the more anticipation filled Lowett.

Blood Plague Raven!

Lowett swung his cane, and an invisible wave of mana surged toward Dragon.

Whether a spell could be seen by the naked eye depended on many factors, the most important being its attribute. Fire and frost, for instance, could be seen, while Soul Magic originated from the soul itself, something the naked eye could never perceive.

Though Blood Plague Raven was Combination Magic, its main spell circuit was still Soul Magic Devourer Bug, so it likewise could not be observed.

But...

"That feeling again!"

Dragon's pupils shrank to pinpoints as a terrifying chill flooded his heart.

There were clearly no visible ripples in the air, not a sound to be heard, yet he was certain that something was approaching him.

With no time to think, Dragon tensed every muscle in his body, dropped to the ground, and lunged left. He smashed through the wall, desperately dodging aside.

Pfft...!

The mana crashed into a concrete pillar. Like a burst of air scattering on impact, it kicked up dust.

Fear lingered in Dragon's eyes. If he had hesitated for even an instant, that airflow would have burst apart where his head had been.

Remembering the agony Hachi had suffered earlier, Dragon shuddered inwardly.

"How could there be such an unreasonable Devil Fruit ability?!"

Controlling corpses was one thing. It could create highly toxic black sand as well, and now even its method of attack could not be observed. It was utterly shameless.

"I told you, it's magic!"

Suddenly, Lowett's voice came from beyond the wall. Dragon's pupils contracted, and without a second thought, he leaped high into the air.

Bone Magic Prison Needle Mountain!

Thud thud thud!

Two-meter-long sharp bone spears erupted from the ground, like spikes rising from an acupressure mat. They shattered the stone slabs as they pierced upward. Ordinary bones could never be this sturdy, but magic granted them unimaginable power.

"Truly a beast!"

"Those instincts..."

Sensing through his Mental Power that Dragon had escaped once again, Lowett remained unhurried. He raised his cane and lightly tapped the stone pillar beside him.

Necro-realm Summon Chasing Beast!

Let us correct a misconception: the Necro-realm was not a three-dimensional world like reality, but a mysterious concept whose existence could not be proven.

It was unrestricted by time or distance. Even whether time and space existed there could not be proven. No matter which planet or which time and space a mage occupied, it answered their summons with zero delay, as though they lived on isolated islands wrapped within the Necro-realm.

The reason Emperor Haisan was respected by Necromancers was because he had opened up a three-dimensional space within that void which mages could observe: the Underworld.

Of course, that was another legendary tale.

"Hiss... hiss...!"

A translucent black tadpole the size of two basketballs spread from the tip of the cane onto the concrete pillar as though squeezed from a tube of toothpaste.

It had no eyes. Its head possessed only a disgusting lamprey-like mouth, followed by a short, thick tadpole tail. Its two claws were incomparably sharp, hooking into the pillar.

"Go. Catch him."

Lowett gave the command softly. The Soul Chasing Beast immediately turned into a pool of inky shadow and sped across the surface of the pillar.

"Dragon... and Luffy from the original story as well. They could defeat so many powerful early enemies through instinct alone. And this world has even higher powers like Observation Haki in its later stages. Avoiding battle with Momonga was indeed the right decision."

Lowett summarized as he fought.

Remembering the monsters at Marine Headquarters in the original story, his lips curled upward.

"Only pressure creates motivation!" Isn't that so?