One-Sword Style Iai!
His stamina heavily depleted, Kuzan's movements lagged by a beat. The blade smashed through the remaining ice pillars and slashed open his Armament Haki-covered chest, leaving behind a terrifying wound. Blood streamed down the ice as Kuzan collapsed to the ground in utter shock. The long diagonal wound across his chest exposed bone, and though the cold had frozen the blood and prevented much loss, he was still gravely injured, without even the strength to stand.
Duke withdrew his Armament Haki and coughed up several mouthfuls of blood. He nearly blacked out and fell to the ground, his chest heaving violently as he gasped in the frigid air. Only after resting for a long while did the dizziness subside. Supporting himself with Flower Continent, he slowly rose to his feet and staggered over to Kuzan. With two fingers held together like a sword, he jabbed several points on Kuzan's body, then roughly bandaged him to keep his injuries from worsening.
Kuzan let out a muffled groan, his eyelids half-open as though he could fall asleep at any moment. "You're not going to kill me?"
"If you died, I probably wouldn't have any good days ahead of me... Besides, I'm a doctor. Healing the sick and saving lives is my duty." Duke had quite a favorable impression of this lazy admiral candidate, if for no other reason than the justice Kuzan upheld. If Kuzan died just like that, the sea would lose far too much.
"Did you think the same way when you saved Fisher Tiger?" Kuzan tried to prop himself up, but his strength was utterly spent. Tugging at his wounds made him grimace, and he lay back down.
"More or less. If someone like that died, wouldn't Heaven be blind?" Duke muttered as he sat cross-legged