Defeat

Defeat

In an instant, the light swallowed every color in the harbor—the black on Ochoku's blade, the black mist on Garling's sword, the red of Maffy's lasers, the green of Somaz's thorns—all washed away by that radiance somewhere between gold and white.

The sky let out a sharp crack, as though the heavens themselves had been split apart. Cracks spread in every direction, and from each one poured waterfall-like lightning, like the roots of an enormous inverted tree hanging from the sky and plunging into the earth.

Ochoku's blade collided with one of them.

The Armament Haki Coating wrapped around the blade began to dissolve the instant it made contact!

It felt like throwing a block of ice into a furnace, turning directly into vapor.

Ochoku could even feel the will he had poured into his blade being devoured by some more tyrannical, purer will.

That power spread along the blade to the hand gripping it, from his hand to his arm, and from his arm throughout his entire body.

He heard his blood boiling, his bones groaning, and his heart being clenched by an invisible hand and squeezed hard.

Garling had it even worse. His sword and right arm were struck by a bolt of Divine Thunder together. The newly grown flesh had not even fully healed before it was torn open again.

But this time, what seeped from the wound was not blood, but those black filaments—they seemed frightened, pouring frantically from the wound in an attempt to repair his damaged body. Yet upon touching the black patterns crawling across the lightning's surface, they curled up and withered as swiftly as cobwebs touched by fire.

For the first time, Garling felt fear beyond pain.

Somaz's thorns turned to ash the instant the Divine Thunder fell.

Those thorns were