Alubarna

During the days from Nanohana to Alubarna, more than a dozen officials and unscrupulous wealthy merchants who had profited shamelessly from the national disaster caused by the Drought were wiped out by Rain's brutal rock and lava. The scorch marks turned into glass-like crystals and the rubble scattered everywhere made the name "Grayrock" spread to every corner of Alabasta like a terrifying nightmare.

Now, whether lofty nobles or desert bandits living on the edge of a blade, everyone trembled from the depths of their hearts upon hearing that name.

When Rain's black military boots finally stepped onto the edge of Alubarna's enormous circular plateau, Alabasta's proud and magnificent capital had already sunk completely into the mire of war and smoke.

"Rumble—!"

Deafening cannon fire echoed beyond the city. Countless rebel soldiers, like a black flood bursting through a dam, had already collided head-on with the King's Army, who were defending the royal capital to the death. Battle cries, screams, and the metallic clash of weapons intertwined into a tragic symphony for a fallen nation.

Baroque Works' Operation Utopia had fully begun.

Rain stood atop the towering city wall, looking down at the enormous battlefield below, like a meat grinder. He did not interfere with the armies' slaughter. He knew cutting the strings controlling the puppets was meaningless; the most direct method was to crush the puppet master's throat.

Rain leaped down from the wall and headed straight into Alubarna's inner-city streets, which had already fallen into extreme chaos.

War was often fertile soil for evil.

The once-prosperous commercial street was now billowing with thick smoke. The King's Army's main force was tied down outside the city, and law and order within had completely collapsed. Hoodlums and desert bandits lurking in the shadows took advantage of the chaos to begin a frenzied spree of arson, murder, and plunder.

"Bang!"

The ornate wooden door of a gold shop was violently smashed apart. Several thugs with vicious faces, brandishing machetes, dragged along a civilian girl crying out in despair as they crazily stuffed the shop's gold coins into sacks.

"Hahaha! Where are those high-and-mighty watchmen now? Gone, aren't they? This city belongs to us now!" the bald thug at the head of the group laughed wildly.

Then, suddenly, he could no longer laugh.

A man in a rough dark-gray cloak, half his face hidden in shadow, had somehow appeared in front of the gold shop's shattered doorway.

"Get lost! Can't you see we're working here? Looking to die..."

Before the bald thug could finish, Rain slowly raised his right arm, wrapped in fireproof bandages.

Without any unnecessary movement, Rain merely snapped his fingers casually.

"Snap."

A crisp sound rang out.

"Sizzle—!"

A horrifying heat wave, utterly impossible to catch with the naked eye, erupted from Rain in an instant! The thugs did not even have time to scream before the steel blades in their hands melted into molten iron. Then, the raging heat pierced straight through their flesh.

The human torches struggled violently outside the gold shop for two seconds before turning into several piles of charred black ash that gave off a foul stench.

The robbed civilian girl collapsed to the ground, staring blankly at the horrifying scene before her. Even her sobs were caught in her throat.

Rain ignored her. Stepping over the ashes on the ground, he continued toward the royal palace at the city's highest point.

As he moved forward, it was as though death itself had passed through.

Whether they were thugs looting amid the chaos or desert bandits who had entered the city in the confusion, none of them had even the right to delay him by half a step before Rain's restrained yet devastatingly hot [Flame Demon Arm].

"Hurry! Make the fires in the southern district even bigger! Let those stupid King's Army soldiers fall completely into panic!"

On a broad main road leading to the royal palace, a group of around thirty Baroque Works Billions, dressed in uniform, held torches as they brazenly set fire to both sides of the street, deliberately creating even greater chaos.

"Hey, Captain, look over there..." An agent suddenly stopped what he was doing and pointed toward the other end of the street.

Amid the sparks flying through the air and the thick smoke, Rain was slowly approaching with steady strides. The calmness he carried, so different from the panicked crowd around him, instinctively made these well-trained agents sense danger.

"That outfit... the cloak... and that bandaged right hand..." The agent captain stared at Rain, and a high-priced wanted poster suddenly flashed through his mind. His pupils shrank sharply. "It's Grayrock. He really didn't die, and he even came to the capital!"

"Open fire! Kill him! His bounty is fifty million!"

More than thirty finely made flintlock muskets were raised at once, all aimed at Rain.

"Bang bang bang bang!"

A dense barrage of bullets screamed out, nearly sealing off every avenue of retreat.

Yet Rain neither transformed into an element to evade them nor changed the rhythm of his footsteps in the slightest.

The dense lead bullets poured down onto Rain like a torrential storm. Yet the anticipated sight of flesh and blood flying everywhere never appeared.

Amid a rapid chorus of metallic clinks, the lead bullets capable of tearing through human bodies shriveled and warped the instant they touched Rain's surface, dropping feebly to the ground. A layer of grayish-white Granite stone skin had merely appeared across his body, without so much as a crack.

"What?" The wild delight on the agent captain's face instantly froze, turning into terror. A monster that even muskets could not penetrate?

"Against you lot, stones by the roadside are enough."

Rain's right foot slammed heavily onto the hard bluestone pavement of the main road.

"[Earth Vein Strangulation: Rock Spears]!"

"Rumble!"

Centered on where Rain stood, the once-flat bluestone street churned violently like the surface of water. Then dozens of sharp gray-black rock spears burst violently from beneath the ground!

"Splat! Splat! Splat!"

Blood sprayed everywhere! More than thirty elite Baroque agents did not even have time to think about running before the hard rock spears instantly pierced their chests and abdomens.

They were hoisted high into the air like rag sacks. Their shrill screams lasted only a few short seconds before falling completely silent. Crimson blood flowed down along the grayish-white stone veins, staining the street with a shocking red.

The once-arrogant arson squad had become a blood-soaked, deathly silent forest of stone.

Rain did not even spare the corpses nailed in midair a glance. He stepped over the bloodstained stone steps, calmly crossed the Slaughterhouse he had created with his own hands, and continued toward the royal palace.