Those eyes were looking at him.
He was enveloped by those eyes, as if he had fallen into some unseen realm, every inch of his body being watched, from his skin to his bones to his marrow.
He felt that the owner of those eyes was looking at him, scrutinizing him, judging him, and weighing him, but what was most terrifying was that he felt the other person didn't even care about him.
He will kill you, but he won't remember you.
"The legend is true..." Vaughn heard himself speaking, his voice as dry as sandpaper, each word scraped from his throat.
"Neither cannonballs, bullets, nor swords... can harm him..."
The Marine warship continued to approach, their bow cannons already aimed at the pirate ship, but they did not fire.
Several sailors raised their muskets and fired at the six shells still hovering in the air, aiming casually, as if doing routine cleaning.
The bullets hit the shells precisely, and the ammunition exploded in mid-air, scattering smoke and shrapnel, but not a single fragment fell within 100 yards of the ship.
Vaughn snapped out of his daze, sheathed his musket, and his voice was hoarse. "Everyone draw your swords! Prepare to board!"
The warships came within ten yards of each other, and white Utakata was squeezed out of the sea between the two ships, but the warships did not lower their gangplanks.
Just when the accompanying navy thought they were about to be rescued, Damian leaped up, his figure darting between the two ships, and landed on the pirate ship's deck. The sound of him landing was very soft, like a cat jumping down from a height.
Everyone on deck took a step back.
Dozens of pirates surrounded him, holding knives, axes, and muskets, all pointed at him.
Damian stood in the center of their encirclement, his arms hanging naturally at his sides, the hem of his coat fluttering in the wind.
He didn't draw his sword, nor did he even adopt any defensive posture.
No one dared to make a move.
A pirate wielding a long sword stood three steps to Damian's left.
He gripped the knife tightly, his knuckles white, his muscles taut like stone.
He only needed to take one step to cut Damian's neck.
This was the distance every pirate dreamed of, but he didn't move; his hands were trembling.
The mind wants to move, but the body won't allow it; every joint is resisting the command.
The pirates' breathing mingled together, heavy and disordered. On the deck, only the low rumble of waves crashing against the hull and the faint creaking of the ship's timbers exposed to the scorching sun could be heard.
No one spoke, no one moved.
A burly man with a face full of scars stood a little further away.
He was using his peripheral vision to calculate the distance to the side of the boat. Three steps—just three steps to climb over the railing and jump into the sea.
But the thought of having to face away from those eyes while airborne before entering the water immediately extinguished that idea.
He would rather die on the deck than jump into the sea with his back to those eyes.
Vaughn moved.
He stepped out of the crowd, each step heavy, the soles of his boots slamming against the deck with a dull thud.
He used the sound of his footsteps to bolster his courage, walked to a spot five steps away from Damian, stopped, and held the knife above his head with both hands.
"I don't care who you are!" Vaughn charged forward, hissing as he poured all his fear into the blade, which sliced through the air.
"I am Captain Vaughn!"
Damian looked up.
The knife stopped in mid-air.
Vaughn stood frozen in place, his arms still in a slashing stance, veins bulging on his arms, his face flushed red, but he just couldn't bring himself to strike.
He could feel his knife still in his hand, the tactile sensation of the hilt was clear and distinct, but it no longer obeyed his commands.
The air solidified into transparent iron before the blade.
A low growl escaped from deep within Vaughn's throat. Refusing to accept defeat, he released his grip on the knife hilt, took a sudden step back, and drew his musket from his waist with his left hand.
He pulled the trigger as he retreated, and the three shots rang out almost in one.
Three lead bullets traced three straight trajectories in the air, heading towards Damian's brow, throat, and heart.
Then they stopped too.
The knife and three lead bullets floated silently in the air, forming a static, absurd geometric pattern.
Vaughn stood there, still holding the musket, smoke still rising from its muzzle.
He stared wide-eyed at everything before him; his knife hung in mid-air, bullets hovered in mid-air, and the other man's eyes didn't even blink.
All the pirates on deck froze.
If anyone was thinking, "Maybe we can launch a sneak attack when he's not paying attention," that idea is now completely dead.
Sneak attack?
How do you ambush someone who can stop a flying cannonball in mid-air?
How can you harm an entity whose very existence is rendered powerless by the laws of physics?
Vaughn finally understood.
He wasn't facing a Marine Vice Admiral, he wasn't even facing a single person, and the flag wasn't the navy's flag, the government's flag, or the flag of any force he could understand.
That was a declaration, a declaration that something existed in this world, a power more essential, more primal, and closer to the true meaning of the word "devil" than any Devil Fruit.
There was no anger, no murderous intent, and not even anything that could be called "emotion" in those red eyes.
He was looking at himself, like someone looking at a rock blocking their path. You don't get angry at the rock; you just decide to move it or crush it.
"Uchiha..."
Vaughn's lips moved, and he uttered these words.
Damian did not answer.
He neither drew his sword nor raised his hand.
An invisible slash spread out from where Damian was.
That wasn't sword energy, nor was it any form of power that could be recognized by the naked eye.
The air underwent a visible distortion, like steam rising under scorching sunlight, or like a giant, unseen blade sweeping across the entire deck of the ship.
The distorted boundary line swept across Vaughn's waist, and across the waist or chest of every pirate.
Moment.
The mainmast broke off, and the upper section, still attached to the canvas, crashed down onto the edge of the deck. Before the splinters of wood it kicked up could even hit the ground, the knives, bullets, and shells that had been hovering in the air finally came to their senses and clattered and rolled onto the deck.
Then, the sound of the waves returned, the sea breeze continued to blow, and the ship swayed awkwardly in the surging waves.
On the deck, the part of a person above the chest was neatly cut off, like a cake being sliced across the top with a knife, leaving a smooth cross-section where the cross-sectional texture of the bone could be seen.
There were no screams, no one had time to raise their arms to protect their heads, and some people still had their hands on the hilts of their knives, their postures frozen in their last moments.
Everything above chest height on the deck of the entire pirate ship was sliced through by the same invisible line.
On the sea, seagulls swooped down and then suddenly pulled back up, not understanding why there was suddenly no sound from the ship.
The pirate ship spun slowly in the wind, its tattered sail, missing the upper half of its mainmast, hanging limply on the broken stakes like a flag of surrender.
Damian stood in the center of the deck, surrounded by dozens of bodies that had remained in their living positions. There wasn't a drop of blood on his white Justice Coat.
He turned and walked back to the ship's side. The navy on the warship had already lowered the gangplank, and several marines in charge of the search jogged over, their footsteps making a pattering sound in the pool of blood on the deck.
They moved around the bodies on the ground with practiced ease, as if performing a routine they had repeated countless times.
A young marine ran to Vaughn's body, flipped up his collar, and compared it to the photo on the wanted poster.
"Target confirmed, Vaughn, bounty 74 million Beli." He looked up at Damian's retreating figure.
"Vice Admiral Damian, what should we do with the remaining supplies?"
Damian did not turn back.
In the distance, the edges of the cumulonimbus clouds on the sea have begun to dissipate, and sunlight is streaming vertically through the gaps in the clouds, illuminating the sea surface dazzlingly.
His gaze pierced through the shimmering waves, reaching into a distant direction from which no one knew he was looking.
"Let's count the fresh ones and put them as spoils; the rest, throw them into the sea."
"Yes!"
The sailors scattered and began to count the gold bars scattered on the deck and the supplies in the hold.
Damian leaped from the ship's side and landed steadily on the deck of the warship, the hem of his coat fluttering slightly as he landed before falling back down.
The adjutant was already waiting below the bridge, handing over a new patrol report.
"Vice Admiral Damian, a message from headquarters: White Bird Admiral requests that you proceed to Marineford for a report after completing your patrol of this area."
Damian took the document, glanced at it, and nodded.
The warship began to turn, its bow realigning with the course. The tattered silhouette of the pirate ship grew smaller and smaller behind the warship, eventually becoming a black dot on the horizon before disappearing completely.
Damian stood at the bow of the ship, the sea breeze making the hem of his coat flutter.
He remained silent for a long time, closed his eyes, and when he opened them again, they had returned to their normal blackness.
But his left hand had somehow gripped the hem of the Justice Coat so tightly that his knuckles turned white and the fabric became deformed, as if he wanted to crumple this white coat, which his father had never seen with his own eyes before his death, into a ball with the hand that held the knife.
The warship continued its journey. A seagull landed on a mast not far away, tilted its head to look at the silent Marine Vice Admiral on the deck, and then quickly flew away again.