Dragon lay on the ground. He raised his head and looked at the child in Maffy's arms, his eyes full of regret and unwillingness to give up.
"Wait..." he said with difficulty. "That child... is my redemption..."
"My redemption for taking part in this insane game of genocide and becoming complicit in it!"
"Give him... back to me..."
Maffy sneered.
"Redemption? Ridiculous. You Marines are nothing but the Celestial Dragons' dogs."
She raised her slender sword, ready to kill Dragon.
"Farewell, young man."
The sword fell.
Dragon closed his eyes.
But the pain he expected never came.
Instead, a roar ripped through the air.
"Get out of the way—!!!"
A gigantic crescent-shaped slash swept across the entire forest!
Everywhere it passed, dozens of towering trees were cut down at the roots and crashed to the ground!
Maffy's sword stopped an inch from Dragon's body.
She lowered her head and looked at her waist.
A line of blood slowly appeared there.
"When..."
She didn't finish.
Her body split in half.
Her upper body slid down, while her lower half remained standing.
Dragon opened his eyes. He saw Maffy's body, severed at the waist, and... a towering figure rapidly approaching in the distance.
In the forest.
Whitebeard was hurrying along.
The gigantic slash that had swept through the forest just now—
He'd meant to clear the obstacles ahead, but had accidentally saved a Marine and hit one of his own.
"Hey, hey, Whitebeard! You almost cut me just now!"
Charlotte Linlin came chasing after him, grumbling.
She rode Zeus, the thundercloud, and gripped Napoleon in her hand, her face filled with annoyance.
Whitebeard turned to look at Linlin as she caught up and grinned.
"I wasn't aiming at you. I was cutting down those enemies. How many pirate crews landed on this