Battle Against the Logia

Although feeling down, Garen dared not slack off in the current situation.

Because he had clearly seen that the thing flying down from the giant ship was not smoke at all, but a man.

The lower half of this man was a cloud of smoke spraying backwards, the upper half was a normal torso with tangled muscles, and he also held a strange long weapon with a crossbar on the side.

The smoke kept spraying out behind him, giving this man the ability to fly freely in the air.

"Turning the body into smoke... a Logia-type Devil Fruit?"

Garen immediately thought of a familiar name: Smoker the White Hunter!

Garen looked up again at the flag hanging on the giant ship, and sure enough, it was the flag of the Marines.

While Garen was thinking, Smoker had already charged in front of Garen at an astonishing speed.

"Wait!"

Garen shouted subconsciously, "I'm not a pirate!"

But Smoker didn't listen at all, just waved the jitte in his hand and rushed over.

As a hot-tempered and righteous Marine, Smoker would not listen to a pirate's explanation;

Even if there was a misunderstanding, he would have to subdue the other party before discussing it slowly.

"Damn it!"

Garen felt even more depressed, and no longer cared about Buggy the Clown beside him, he could only calm down and focus on dealing with Smoker's attack.

Smoker's movements were very fast, and the speed of his sprint far exceeded Garen's at this time.

As a Marine Headquarters Captain of high caliber, his strength was not something that Garen, a level 4 newbie, could compare to.

The half-man, half-smoke body quickly rushed in front of Garen from mid-air, and suddenly swung the heavy jitte at Garen.

"Fatal Strike!"

"Courage!"

Unable to communicate with words, Garen really activated the skill and swung his sword to meet it.

The greatsword in Garen's hand, flashing with bright light, collided heavily with the simple jitte in Smoker's hand, bursting out a crisp sound of metal clashing.

In the head-on collision, Smoker, with his stronger physique, steadily gained the upper hand, causing Garen to take two steps back.

"No silence?"

Garen was a little surprised.

The greatsword in his hand was still in the glowing effect of the [Fatal Strike] skill, and Smoker, whose body was generally transformed into smoke, was still using his Devil Fruit ability.

Must it hit the body to take effect?

Garen realized the shortcomings of his skill, and focused his eyes on Smoker's upper body, which was still maintaining its human form.

He bowed slightly to gather strength, and suddenly slashed up with his sword, the target being Smoker's body.

Smoker looked at Garen rushing over, but a disdainful smile appeared on his face.

Attempting to cause damage to the body of a Logia-type user?

The disdain on Smoker's face became more and more intense, and he swung the jitte towards Garen without any scruples, completely without defending against Garen's attack.

As the two intersected, Garen's glowing greatsword approached Smoker's body first.

Seeing that the greatsword was about to hit his body, that part of Smoker's torso suddenly turned into a void of white smoke before the attack arrived.

Garen's Fatal Strike missed, passing through the ethereal smoke.

His sure-hit normal attack missed for the first time.

The elementalization of the Logia-type body gave Smoker a special state in front of Garen that was judged by the system as an "unselectable target."

Garen missed the attack, but Smoker's attack took the opportunity to hit Garen's shoulder steadily.

The heavy jitte collided with Garen's solid shoulder armor, creating bright sparks, and Garen was also shaken back several meters by this powerful force far surpassing his own, and fell heavily to the ground, smashing out a large pit.

Can't beat him.

Not only was his physical function far worse than the opponent's, but the enemy could almost ignore his normal attacks.

This was Garen's clear understanding of the battle situation.

With his current strength, he simply couldn't face Smoker head-on.

However, that was a "head-on" confrontation...

Garen's expression froze, and he silently used the new skill he had just learned: "Mirror Image!"

Garen's body suddenly became illusory, and in the place where Garen had just collapsed, a dull fake body identical to Garen's main body was left behind.

Taking advantage of the invisibility, Garen quietly got up and stood aside, silently.

At this time, Smoker took advantage of the victory and chased after him, flying in front of the collapsed "Garen."

"It's over!"

Smoker pointed the jitte at the "Garen" on the ground, whose body was limply collapsed, and prepared to put the weapon on the opponent's neck to complete the final capture.

Bang!

A muffled thud.

The knight of justice raised his greatsword, suffused with the light of justice, and delivered a righteous backstab to Smoker.

Smoker's face instantly filled with astonishment, as intense pain rapidly spread from his back, causing a momentary paralysis in his taut muscles.

Generally speaking, a Logia-type body can directly ignore such simple physical attacks.

However, in order to use his Nanashaku Jitte for physical combat, Smoker had consciously kept his upper body in a solid state, which conveniently gave Garen a target to strike.

And after that blow landed on Smoker, the elemental transformation of his lower body completely dissipated in an instant.

A large mass of smoke instantly gathered together, revealing his complete human form, causing Smoker, who had been suspended by the smoke, to fall heavily from mid-air.

Where's my power?

This feeling was completely different from the powerlessness caused by Seastone; it was as if the Devil Fruit ability he relied on for survival had simply disappeared.

A sense of fear for the unknown suddenly arose in Smoker's heart, and he couldn't help but be stunned.

"Go down!"

Garen, however, seized this hard-won opportunity, and while Smoker was still dazed, he swung his greatsword at him again.

But Smoker was, after all, a powerful Marine Captain, and he reacted in an instant, hastily raising his Nanashaku Jitte to block Garen's swinging greatsword.

But Garen's purpose was not to inflict direct damage.

The lifeboat was not large, and the fierce battle had already brought Garen and Smoker to the very edge of the boat.

Garen swung his sword with all his might, just to knock Smoker, the Devil Fruit user, into the sea.

Smoker's body soared into the air like a cannonball, and then fell rapidly towards the wide sea.

Seeing the rapidly approaching water surface, Smoker subconsciously tried to use his Devil Fruit ability to turn into smoke and fly, but...

A splash of water erupted.

The silencing effect on him had not yet ended.

Smoker was immediately turned into a drowned rat by Garen.

As a Devil Fruit user, Smoker's powerful abilities were completely useless in the water, and his large, knotted muscles seemed to have softened, unable to exert any strength at all.

The Marine Captain, who had made a domineering entrance, had become a weakling struggling in the water in a short three rounds.

He had lost this battle.

"Sigh!"

Garen stood on the boat, watching Smoker floundering helplessly in the water with some indignation, and said:

"I told you, I'm not a pirate!"

"Do you have to go into the sea to cool down before you can listen to people?"

"You"

Buggy, whose feet had been thrown into the sea by Garen and who was now slumped helplessly on the lifeboat, had watched the entire short but intense battle.

He couldn't help but say to Garen in astonishment:

"You can actually defeat a Logia-type user?!"

With Buggy's experience, he could naturally recognize that Smoker possessed the Logia-type Devil Fruit ability that was virtually invincible in the first half of the Grand Line.

But such a powerful and irresistible Devil Fruit user had actually been defeated by that unknown Pirate Hunter?

Buggy was already dumbfounded.

"Hmph!"

Faced with Buggy's shock, Garen snorted noncommittally:

"Logia-type Devil Fruit, nothing more than that."

Garen then planted his greatsword firmly on the deck, standing proudly upright.

"Pah!"

Even though he was limp and weak, Buggy couldn't help but mock this arrogant fellow:

"You ignorant brat!"

"The Navy's top combat power, the Admirals, are all Logia-type Devil Fruit users!"

Garen, however, paid no attention to this, simply maintaining his aloof and detached persona in front of Buggy.

"Hahaha"

A hearty laugh suddenly rang out behind Garen.

Suddenly, a broad hand rested firmly on Garen's shoulder.

With just this gentle movement, Garen felt a sense of powerlessness and fear, as if his whole body was under someone's control.

"Young man"

The voice rang out again in Garen's ear: "You've got a big mouth."