Although Doflamingo had been intimidated by the overwhelming Conqueror's Haki Austin had unleashed, what he feared most was not Austin himself, who was three years younger than him,
but the possibility that behind him stood
remnants of the Roger Pirates!
Although Gol D. Roger, the Pirate King, had been captured, there had been no news of any mishap befalling his terrifyingly powerful crew members.
With the Donquixote Family's current strength, they were still far from capable of matching such monsters.
But he was just a fifteen-year-old brat. Doflamingo refused to believe he would lose to him. As long as he killed every witness, who would know it was his doing?
Doflamingo could not be blamed entirely for such inflated thinking. Having grown accustomed to the Four Blues, he simply could not comprehend the terror of the true powerhouses of the New World.
"Don't get so cocky, you bastard!!!"
An equally horrifying aura erupted with a bang, and clusters of black-red lightning from the collision of their Conqueror's Haki spread outward like spiderwebs.
Yet compared to Austin's Conqueror's Haki, Doflamingo's Haki was somewhat immature and reckless.
And compared to Austin's domineering, world-conquering presence, Doflamingo's Conqueror's Haki revealed more evil and brutality, as though it contained hatred and venom toward the injustices of the world.
With the slightest curl of his fingers,
clusters of thin, frigid strings emerged from his fingertips.
They were as fine as hair. To the surrounding onlookers, the strings were practically invisible; they could only vaguely make out cold reflections of light.
The String-String Fruit, once considered a useless ability, had become a deadly weapon capable of slicing through steel after continuous development.
He opened with a killing move, the vicious attack shooting straight for Austin's neck. Yet Austin seemed not to have reacted at all, still calmly watching Doflamingo strike without restraint.
Die!!!
You're nothing but a lucky bastard who caught a free ride. What right do you have to stand before me!!!
A bloodthirsty gleam flashed through Doflamingo's eyes as the invisible strings sliced through the air.
A faint black sheen coated them, adding several more degrees of power.
No matter how worthless he might once have been, Doflamingo could now rely on his Haki alone to be an absolute prodigy in Paradise, one of its finest!
Upstairs, the women watching the battle turned pale with alarm.
"Lord Austin!!!"
"No!!!"
In their eyes, Austin seemed completely unable to react to Doflamingo's sudden assault. He remained frozen where he stood, allowing himself to be slaughtered at will.
Some of the more timid women had even shut their eyes, covering them with trembling hands, terrified of seeing the incomparably heroic figure in their hearts spill blood.
Little Six and Little Seven nearly lost control and rushed forward on the spot, but Sammy stopped them with one hand.
Yet her pupils were trembling as well, her eyes fixed on the situation below.
Because she knew that if Austin lost, the humiliated and enraged Doflamingo would never spare anyone present. Everyone would be buried with him to quell his rage!
Just as the spectators nervously watched the center of the grounds, seemingly already foreseeing blood being spilled, no one noticed the uncontrollable shock appearing on Doflamingo's face.
What's going on?!
Why didn't it feel like it cut through flesh and blood, like it always did?
For an instant, the tall man before him seemed not to exist in this world at all, completely ignoring his killing move.
The savage expression froze on Doflamingo's face as he stared in disbelief at the utterly unmoving man before him.
Then he suddenly saw a terrifying scarlet light flash through Austin's pupils.
The slight upward curve at Austin's lips made everything that had just happened seem as though he had merely been toying with a clown.
Austin gently extended one hand toward the black strings that had just passed through his body, then seized them in his grasp.
With a slight exertion of force,
Crack, crack, crack, crack...
The sound was like casually crushing a handful of uncooked thin noodles.
Before Austin's flowing Ryou, the sharp threads Doflamingo had created with his shallow Armament Haki, capable of effortlessly cutting through steel, shattered inch by inch.
A glossy black hand surging with red energy suddenly shot out while Doflamingo's mind was in disarray.
That incomprehensible monstrous strength held him utterly helpless, even as Austin casually clamped his neck and lifted him off the ground.
Clearly, the scene before him had shaken Doflamingo's arrogant heart to the core!
The sudden reversal of offense and defense left the hundreds of Red-Light District women watching from the outskirts with their mouths slightly open as they stared at Austin.
Little Six, Little Seven, and the others were likewise frozen in shock. Even the cigarette that Madam Sammy had been holding in her mouth unknowingly fell to the ground.
Because Austin had finally gotten serious. His Black Long Hair began to stir without wind.
"BOOM, CRACK, CRACK, CRACK!!!"
Even denser black-red lightning than when he first appeared suddenly exploded across the entire area. Bolts of thunderous force intertwined and ground against one another, striking the surrounding high-rises and kicking up clouds of dust.
The tangible Conqueror's Haki Infusion was forcibly used by Austin as a means of overwhelming pressure, and the effect was remarkable.
Doflamingo, already at a disadvantage in their clash of Conqueror's Haki domains, now felt his entire aura being crushed. His whole body bore unimaginable pressure.
Under such pressure, he could not even form the thought of resisting.
His understanding of the world was being reshaped.
"What kind of joke is this!!! How could the gap be this huge!!!"
Blood flowed from the corners of his mouth, dripping down his chin to the ground.
Rather than submit before this Haki, Doflamingo would sooner bite his own teeth apart than admit the fear in his heart.
This power was so overwhelming that even though Austin consciously avoided the young women of the Red-Light District,
the faint residual force that leaked out still made them collapse to their knees, their delicate bodies trembling uncontrollably.
Amid the overwhelming black-red lightning, only one proud figure stood tall, like a demon god emerging from the abyss.
This was the first time he had released the Haki of his prime without restraint.
Even Austin felt that, for someone his age, his Conqueror's Haki might have been a little excessively strong.
With Haki like this, he would probably give plenty of people an addiction to being conquered in the future.
Though he was troubled by being too strong, the force in Austin's hand did not lessen in the slightest.
Conqueror's Haki Infusion combined with monstrous strength—despite using less than one-tenth of his power—still made Doflamingo's Armament Haki-coated neck creak beneath his grip.
Under the double assault of suffocation and mental pressure,
after holding out for only a few seconds, the rookie who had dominated the North Blue, Heavenly Yaksha Doflamingo, finally let his head loll to one side and completely lost consciousness.
From this day onward, (Pirate King narrator voice)
at the Sabaody Archipelago,
in the lawless zone,
the Donquixote Family led by the pirate Heavenly Yaksha Doflamingo, with a bounty of 340 million Berries,
encountered Black Gun Austin,
and was defeated.
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