Draw

"Kill them—!"

Soldiers no bigger than ants rode miniature warhorses, pouring out like a tide from the strange "castle gate" within Bege's body. The instant they crossed that invisible boundary, space itself seemed to be enchanted.

The thumb-sized soldiers instantly returned to normal human size, while the miniature cannons transformed into heavy siege artillery!

In just a few seconds, a fully armed miniature army had appeared out of nowhere on the previously empty street. Dozens of pitch-black cannons were aimed squarely at Rain.

"Fire!"

"Boom! Boom! Boom!"

Dozens of black solid cannonballs howled toward Rain with terrifying kinetic force.

Even Rain's rock armor could not withstand firepower of this level head-on. Just as the shells were about to hit him, Rain's body exploded with a bang, turning into a sky full of flying lime and gravel.

The cannonballs passed through the stream of rubble and flattened the buildings behind him.

"Physical attacks are useless? Then keep firing! Fire until he runs out of stamina!" Bege stood behind the army, directing them methodically.

However, the scattered stones in the air did not flee. Instead, they followed the explosive airflow and rapidly gathered again above Bege's head.

Rain's upper body reformed in midair. He pressed his palms together, then slammed them downward.

Countless highly compressed chunks of granite, each as large as millstones, fell densely upon Bege's position like real meteors, accompanied by ear-piercing howls.

"Arghhh!"

"Help!"

The heavy rocks instantly crushed the cannons and smashed dozens of gangster soldiers into pulp, their screams blending into one.

Rain did not stop. From midair, he locked onto Bege, who had remained standing in place. His right leg instantly transformed into a several-meter-long, pitch-black [High-Pressure Obsidian Greatsword], which hacked viciously down at Bege's head.

"Capture the ringleader first!" A cold gleam flashed through Rain's eyes.

Faced with this killing blow, Bege not only failed to dodge, but instead revealed an exceedingly strange sneer.

"Castle: Absolute Defense!"

Just as the obsidian greatsword was about to strike Bege, a layer of brick-and-stone patterns resembling the outer walls of a medieval castle suddenly appeared across his body. His skin and muscles transformed into an indestructible "castle wall"!

"Clang—!"

A thunderous impact resounded.

Rain felt as though his sword had not struck human flesh, but a fortress cast from ultra-dense steel and stone!

Sparks flew everywhere. The incomparably sharp obsidian greatsword only shattered a few bricks from the "surface" of Bege's shoulder before it could go no deeper. The immense recoil even caused fine cracks to appear in Rain's rock arm.

"What?" Rain's pupils shrank sharply.

This was an obsidian blade capable of easily cutting through steel safes!

"Surprised, brat?" Bege stood where he was and brushed the fallen brick fragments from his shoulder. The damaged areas recovered completely in the blink of an eye. "I ate the Castle-Castle Fruit—I'm a castle man! As long as my stamina doesn't run out, my body is a war fortress that can never be breached!"

Without Armament Haki, Rain's physical piercing power simply could not break through this conceptual "castle defense" and harm Bege's true body.

Bege faced an equally awkward situation.

"Boom!"

The cannons inside Bege's body fired another volley, and the close-range explosions instantly blasted Rain's body into two halves.

Yet less than two seconds later, Rain's severed lower half turned into a pile of rubble and swiftly merged back with his upper body. He stood up again completely unscathed.

The two stared each other down across the devastated street.

A breeze passed by, carrying several burning newspapers into the air.

The atmosphere sank into an eerie silence.

"...Tch."

After a full three minutes of deadlock, Bege suddenly spat the burnt-out cigar from his mouth onto the ground and viciously ground it beneath his foot. Irritably, he waved a hand, signaling his remaining men to stop firing and put away their weapons.

"I'm done fighting. This is just a waste of my ammunition." Bege's gloomy face was filled with displeasure.

Rain also slowly withdrew the obsidian blade he had manifested. The swirling current of rubble around him gradually settled.

There was no point in continuing this battle.

Bege's guns and cannons had no way to deal with the elementalization of the [Rock-Rock Fruit]. He had no Seastone weapons and had not mastered Haki, so he simply could not grasp Rain's real body.

Likewise, Rain's slashes and blunt strikes were merely scratching at a real fortress when facing Bege, whose flesh had become a "solid castle." Even if Rain tried to bury Bege alive by drastically altering the terrain over a huge area, Bege could hide hundreds of people and supplies inside himself and hold out underground for ten days or half a month.

This was a dead cycle of absolute defense against absolute defense, a helpless clash between the two toughest "bones" among the West Blue's strongest fighters.

"A Logia really is a fucking cheat ability." Bege lit another cigar, making no attempt to hide the envy and wariness in his voice.

"Likewise." Rain replied coolly. "A Paramecia that can turn your body into a miniature spatial fortress has opened my eyes too."

Though the two were hostile toward each other, an odd sense of mutual appreciation inevitably arose between them at that moment.

And during that brief but intense clash, they both realized a cruel fact: they had each reached their current bottleneck.

Rain realized that relying solely on the fruit's basic development left his offensive power lacking when facing someone like Bege, an ability user with extreme defensive traits. If he knew Armament Haki, that last strike might have pierced the castle's outer layer and severed Bege's collarbone.

Bege understood the same thing. If he possessed Haki, or had mastered the technique of coating bullets with Armament Haki, that last barrage would have long since left the arrogant Logia brat before him riddled with holes.

"You went to the shipyard earlier because you're heading to the Grand Line, right?" Bege exhaled a smoke ring, his gaze turning profound.

"What, are you planning to set an ambush for me over there?" Rain asked in return.

"Don't think too highly of yourself. We rule supreme in the Four Blues, but in the eyes of the real monsters on the Grand Line, we might not even qualify as a warm-up." Bege snorted, turned around, and prepared to leave amid a group of battered survivors.

He did not mention recruiting Rain again. He knew that a lone wolf like Rain, with absolute confidence and strength, could not be caged.

"Grayrock."

Bege stopped walking and spoke with his back to Rain. "I heard that the latter half of the Grand Line has a power called Haki. It can easily seize a Logia's real body, and it can also pierce the toughest armor."

Rain said nothing, merely listening in silence.

"I'm looking forward to it." Bege's voice carried a trace of fanaticism and ambition. "I'm looking forward to the day we meet again in the New World. When that time comes, I'll use Haki-coated cannons to blast your stone head to pieces!"

"You can try." At last, the corner of Rain's mouth curled into the faintest cold smile. "If you live that long."

Bege did not respond again. Laughing loudly, he led his men away and vanished at the end of the street.

Rain stood alone amid the ruins. The afterglow of the West Blue sunset fell across his gray-white trench coat, stretching out a long shadow.

He raised a hand and looked at his palm, still incomparably hard and made of rock.

This draw did not discourage him. Instead, it was like a fire that completely ignited the unwillingness in his bones and his desire for power as a transmigrator.

"Capone Bege... the Castle-Castle Fruit."

Rain suddenly clenched both fists, his joints cracking sharply.