Human Wave Tactics

Rain stood where he was. The dim hall began to warp before his eyes. The sound of a cello mingled with cloying incense, forming a sticky net that forcibly burrowed into his mind. His usually sharp instincts had become a chaotic mass of static.

The icy marble floor vanished. In his vision appeared the streets of that peaceful town in the West Blue. The scent of cheap ale overwhelmed the incense, while familiar figures swayed before his eyes. Deep within his mind, a gentle, seductive voice echoed without end:

"Let down your guard. You don't have to fight anymore. Just smile, and all your pain will end."

Rain's body swayed slightly, and his head gradually lowered.

As Odel watched Rain lower his head, the curve of his lips stretched wider and wider until he finally burst into arrogant laughter. This monster, who was no weakling, had ultimately fallen into his mental web within this hall.

"That's right, just like that." Odel laughed as he walked down the steps. He only needed to approach and make eye contact to issue an absolute command.

"Your body is strong, but human nerves are too fragile." Odel stopped less than half a meter in front of Rain, his eyes gleaming with morbid excitement. "Now, raise your head and swear eternal loyalty to me!"

Within the abyss of the illusion, the streets of the West Blue were melting away. Rain's consciousness was sinking into a warm, numbing swamp.

Suddenly, the fireproof bandages wrapped around his right arm turned to ash. The pitch-black obsidian framework lit up with blinding dark-red flames.

Since he had known from the start that his opponent possessed a form of mental control, how could Rain, a hunter who had carved reason into his bones, enter the royal court without precautions? Before attending the banquet, he had used high-pressure rock layers to tightly seal a mass of violent magma at its critical point deep within his right arm. The moment his mind faltered even slightly, the rock seal, no longer reinforced by his consciousness, would collapse. The spreading heat should buy him at least a moment of clarity.

The [Earth Core Furnace] in Rain's right arm was forcibly activated.

Rain abruptly raised his magma-transformed right hand and pressed it against his own left shoulder without hesitation, carrying a temperature of over a thousand degrees!

"Psssh—!"

The piercing sound of flesh scorching instantly exploded through the hall. A burnt stench spread through the air.

It was pure physical pain. Like a violent bolt of lightning, the agony surged from his nerve endings straight into the center of his brain, tearing apart every false neural suggestion through the most brutal means possible!

The illusion of the West Blue shattered with a crash. The cello and the incense's seduction were utterly crushed. Real pain forcefully reclaimed control of his mind.

Rain slowly raised his head, bearing the charred crater burned into his left shoulder.

There was not a trace of warmth in his bloodshot, pitch-black eyes. Only beastlike savagery and icy killing intent remained.

Odel's manic laughter froze on his face. Just as he tried to retreat, a right hand as hard as iron and radiating lethal heat clamped tightly around his throat, lifting his entire body into the air.

Watching Odel claw wildly with both hands and struggle with his legs dangling in the air, Rain spat out a mouthful of bloody saliva. His voice was hoarse and cold.

"A trash illusion that can't even override this much pain thinks it deserves to call itself Joy Boy?"

Scalding magma locked tightly around Odel's throat. The pungent stench of burning skin filled the hall.

The shadow of death instantly engulfed the great pirate who had once ventured through the New World. Faced with such a self-mutilating method of breaking free, the composure in Odel's eyes vanished.

"Bzzzt—"

Just as the magma was about to melt through his windpipe, a deep black sheen abruptly spread across Odel's neck. Armament Haki.

Relying on Haki hardening, he forcibly withstood the magma's lethal heat. At the same time, he drove his legs forward and viciously kicked Rain in the chest with his Haki-coated right foot.

Rain raised his left hand to block. Amid a dull impact, both men retreated half a step.

The instant Rain steadied himself, the magma in his right arm transformed into a heavy punch and blasted forward. But a red glint flashed in Odel's eyes. Observation Haki caught the attack's trajectory in advance, and he rolled awkwardly to the side, narrowly evading a blow that would have burned through half his body.

The magma fist struck the pure gold throne, instantly melting its heavy base into a pool of liquid gold.

"Madman... you complete madman!"

Odel knelt on one knee over ten meters away, gasping heavily. He touched his neck, where a ring of blisters had formed despite the Armament Haki coating it, while cold sweat slid down his forehead. At last, he understood why the helplessness he had felt facing those monsters in the New World had returned.

The man before him possessed not only Logia power capable of melting everything, but also a rationality crueler than any pirate's. Someone who would mutilate himself to break an illusion could never be mentally controlled.

What he did not understand, however, was that the earlier illusion had ultimately not been enough. If the power of suggestion had been stronger—strong enough to help Rain recall scenes from his past life—perhaps the outcome might have been different.

Of course, he might no longer have the chance to try.

"You forced my hand!"

Odel rose to his feet and threw his arms wide. The pale-purple ripples in the whites of his eyes instantly spread to their limit, distorting even the surrounding air visibly under the violent tremors of his brainwaves.

"Paramecia, Suggestion-Suggestion Fruit—[Elysium Death Realm]!"

An invisible wave of sound and mental force swept across the entirety of Sisval Island in an instant, centered on the royal palace.

Inside the hall, the puppet king, who had been lying on the ground scrubbing the floor, suddenly stopped moving.

He slowly rose to his feet, still clutching that filthy rag tightly in his hand. Turning toward Rain, the peaceful smile on his face split apart in an instant, transforming into a bizarre manic grin that nearly reached his ears.

Without making a sound, the king raised the heavy solid-copper candlestick beside him and lunged at Rain like a beast that could feel no pain.

Rain frowned slightly and casually swung his hand.

"Bang!" His granite-covered knuckles smashed into the king's chest, and the crisp sound of ribs breaking rang out. The king was hurled away and crashed heavily into a corner. Yet he neither vomited blood nor screamed. Twisting his broken limbs, he maintained that manic grin as he tried to rise again.

This was only the beginning.

Outside the palace, the deathly still night was completely torn apart by dense footsteps.

"Tap tap tap tap..."

The sound drew closer like a surging tide. The hall's heavy copper-clad doors were violently smashed open from outside.

Hundreds of palace guards, miners dressed in rough linen, and even civilian women clutching kitchen knives flooded into the hall like water released from a broken dam. They shoved and crowded together, every one of their eyes unfocused, filled only with pure pale purple.

Under Odel's awakened Fruit power, hundreds of thousands of citizens had completely become an army of smiling zombies who knew no pain and feared no death.

The crowd formed an impenetrable wall of flesh, swiftly shielding Odel behind them and surrounding Rain from all sides.

Odel stood atop the high steps, hidden beneath the protection of countless civilians, and once again burst into fearless laughter. The most important lesson he had learned in the New World was to use every bargaining chip available to him.

"Kill them!"

Pointing at the densely packed citizens below, Odel spoke with morbid triumph. "Isn't your magma hot? Burn them all to death! There are three hundred thousand people here! The moment you act, you'll become a demon who slaughtered hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians. The Marine Admirals will hunt you to the ends of the earth!"

He was certain Rain would not dare to act. On these seas, even the most vicious pirates would feel psychological pressure when facing hundreds of thousands of civilians who would not resist and were merely being controlled. As long as Rain hesitated for even a moment, these tireless monsters would use human wave tactics to wear him down until he died.

Faced with the zombie tide flooding in from every direction, their bizarre laughter echoing through the hall, Rain did not retreat even half a step.

He slowly raised his head, his gaze passing over countless bobbing heads to lock directly onto Odel standing above.

The burn on his shoulder was still bleeding, yet his gaze was as calm as a stagnant pool. There was no anger, no pity, and none of the hesitation Odel had expected.

The way he looked at Odel was as though he were looking at a corpse.

"Using civilians as shields—is that your final trump card?" Rain shook the blood from his hand as the magma in his right arm began to boil at an intensely suppressed rhythm.

"If that's all you've got, then you might be about to die."