Fierce Battle! Whitebeard vs Sengoku

Sengoku shouted his orders: "All forces, advance! Surround the Rocks Pirates!"

"Understood!"

Every warship adjusted its formation, turning all cannons to face the enemy, closing in on the Rocks fleet in a crescent-shaped encirclement.

Sengoku and Zephyr exchanged a glance and nodded.

The two men stepped off the deck simultaneously, their Geppo creating sonic booms in the air as they transformed into two meteors, hurtling toward the main ship of the Rocks Pirates.

"Gahahahaha... boys, follow me and charge!"

Golden Lion Shiki stood upon the air, his golden mane dancing wildly in the wind.

He grinned hideously as he drew his twin blades, Oto and Kogarashi:

"Send the Navy straight to the bottom of the sea! The Heavenly Tribute belongs to the Rocks Pirates!"

Behind Shiki, a dozen pirate ships accelerated in unison, charging toward the Navy line.

"Kill them all--!"

The pirates swarmed the boarding warships like starving tigers.

Grappling hooks flew through the air, accompanied by the clash of steel and the roar of muskets. Nearly a hundred pirates flooded the deck of the lead warship in an instant, and the two sides locked in a brutal melee.

At the prow of the main ship, Whitebeard stood unmoved.

"Gurararara... Sengoku!"

Watching the golden Buddha figure rushing toward him, Whitebeard grinned, his fighting spirit igniting within his chest.

He curled his fingers, his knotted muscles tensing as he swung Murakumogiri through the air.

"Today, we settle this once and for all!"

A translucent halo shimmered on the blade, and the air on both sides of the edge twisted; fine cracks spread like a spiderweb, the sound of space itself wailing.

By now, Sengoku was within a hundred meters.

The golden Buddha's palms pressed together, the energy sphere condensing between them exceeding ten meters in diameter.

"Whitebeard, the end of the Rocks Pirates has arrived!"

Sengoku's eyes widened, his voice booming like a great bell: "Everyone will be thrown into Impel Down to repent for your sins in the Eternal Darkness Hell!"

"Great Buddha Shockwave--!"

He pushed his giant palms forward, and a torrent of energy tore through the air.

Wherever it passed, the atmosphere was compressed into a vacuum channel, and the sea split to both sides, revealing a trench dozens of meters deep.

Would Whitebeard show weakness?

"Too naive, Sengoku!"

Murakumogiri, wreathed in destructive, vibrating power, met the attack with the force of a mountain-splitting, sea-parting blow.

"Quake-Air: Sea Splitter!"

Where the blade passed, the atmosphere shattered like glass, covered in countless fissures.

Murakumogiri and the golden Buddha palm collided across the distance.

Time seemed to freeze for a second.

The next moment--

BOOM--!!!

The explosion was deafening, and the sound waves transformed into visible white rings of air, spreading wildly in all directions.

A massive crater, a hundred meters in diameter, erupted on the surface of the sea.

It wasn't just water splashing; the seawater was completely evaporated and displaced, exposing the jagged seabed. At the edge of the crater, the raging waves whipped up a fifty-meter-high tsunami.

The pirates and marines fighting nearby didn't even have time to scream before they were torn to shreds by the erupting shockwaves.

In the center of the swirling smoke and steam, the two figures were locked in a heated battle.

Sengoku maintained his ten-meter golden Buddha form, every punch carrying a shockwave capable of splitting mountains and shattering stone.

Whitebeard swung Murakumogiri like a dragon, every strike causing space to tremble and crack.

Both men were wrapped in flowing Armament Haki; as fists and blades clashed, the aftermath swept across the sea like a storm. Each collision detonated ring-shaped shockwaves, plowing deep trenches into the ocean surface.

"Gurararara... exhilarating! Sengoku, you've grown much stronger than you were three years ago!"

Whitebeard laughed, swinging his blade in a horizontal slash. The shockwave spread in a fan shape, forcing Sengoku to retreat a hundred meters.

The golden Buddha pushed his palms forward repeatedly, dozens of shockwaves counterattacking like a rainstorm.

"You aren't doing so badly yourself, Newgate!" Sengoku's voice was low. "But today, the Rocks Pirates must be destroyed!"

"Try it if you can!"

The fierce battle reignited.

This time, neither man held back; as they unleashed their full power, the sky over the entire sea began to change color.

On another battlefield, the duel between Golden Lion Shiki and Black Arm Zephyr was equally intense to the extreme.

The sky was Shiki's home turf.

The Float-Float Fruit ability allowed him to move like a fish in water, his figure flickering like a ghost, while his twin blades, Oto and Kogarashi, transformed into a sky full of silver radiance, every strike vicious and cunning, aimed directly at vital points.

"Lion: Thousand-Cutting Flow!"

Shiki spun and slashed repeatedly, dozens of golden slashes raining down like a torrential storm, sealing off all of Zephyr's retreat paths.

The slashes did not travel in straight lines; instead, they curved and turned erratically in the air, striking from impossible angles.

Zephyr stepped on the air using Geppo, his figure leaving seven afterimages in the sky.

The Armament Haki wrapped around his iron arms had hardened to the limit, and every block sent blinding sparks flying.

"Hmph... Golden Lion, are you just scratching an itch for me?"

Zephyr shattered three slashes with a single punch, the remaining momentum carrying him straight toward Shiki's face.

This punch appeared simple, but it actually incorporated the principles of the Navy Six Styles' Finger Pistol into his fist technique; before the fist even arrived, a compressed air bullet had already pierced through the air.

Shiki crossed his twin blades to block, being knocked back over ten meters, yet a flash of excitement crossed his eyes.

"Now that's more like it!"

He licked his lips, gripped his blades tightly, and his aura surged abruptly.

Golden Haki rose from the twin blades like flames.

"Let me show you... the fruits of my training over the past half-year!"

Shiki's expression turned solemn, his blades raised high above his head, the blades vibrating and emitting a hum like a dragon's roar.

The airflow within a hundred-meter radius began to spin wildly, and dozens of waterspouts were sucked up from the sea surface.

"Lion Majesty: Sky Splitter!"

The twin blades slashed down ferociously.

Where the blades pointed, the sky was actually torn open, revealing a pitch-black fissure!

Zephyr's pupils shrank.

He couldn't dodge.

This strike didn't lock onto his body, but onto the entire space itself.

Since that was the case—

"Black Arm: Secret Technique: City Breaker!"

Zephyr stopped dodging, instead sinking his waist and planting his feet, pulling his right arm back like a fully drawn bow.

His Armament Haki no longer covered his skin but condensed into his fist like a vortex, the blackness so deep it began to absorb light, the space around his fist slightly distorting.

Not relying on a Devil Fruit, specializing in physical arts and Haki, and innovating upon the Navy Six Styles—this was the path of Black Arm Zephyr!

He threw the punch.

The moment the fist collided with the blade's radiance, time seemed to slow down.

BOOM! BANG—!!!

A chain of explosions bloomed in the air.

The shockwaves swept out like a tsunami, directly capsizing two ships below that were too close, sending pirates and marines falling into the sea like ants.

Amidst the smoke, two figures were sent flying backward simultaneously.

Zephyr slammed back onto the deck of the main ship like a cannonball, his feet carving ten-meter-long trenches into the reinforced steel deck before he could barely stand steady.

On the other side, Shiki was blown back a hundred meters by the impact, his twin blades trembling incessantly.

He licked the blood from the corner of his mouth, his fighting spirit burning even brighter.

"Interesting... too interesting! Zephyr, you are even stronger than the rumors say!"

At this moment on the main battlefield, the Navy and the Rocks Pirates had engaged in full-scale combat.

Buddha Sengoku against Whitebeard, Golden Lion Shiki against Black Arm Zephyr.

Four of the world's top combatants were locked in duels, the aftermath turning the sea for several miles around into a scene of devastation.

On the secondary battlefields, a dozen division commanders of the Rocks Pirates were entangled with four elite Navy vice admirals.

Luo Tian hovered in the air, his Spatial Perception scanning the entire field, his gaze finally fixing on the treasure ship protected in the center of the formation.

A white hull, the flag of the World Government, and the ship sat deep in the water.

Clearly, what was inside was the Heavenly Tribute offered by multiple member nations, the very guarantee of the Celestial Dragons' extravagant lives.