Adams did not move an inch. Just as the attack was about to reach him, dense rings resembling tree rings suddenly appeared around his right shoulder blade.
"Crack!"
The crisp sound was like crushing a hard nut.
The Rankyaku blade, powerful enough to cut through rock, was forcibly caught in his palm. The violent slashing energy struggled futilely between his fingers, burst apart, and finally dissipated into a few chaotic currents of air.
Adams slowly opened his hand. His palm was as smooth as before, without even the faintest white mark.
The cold smile on Lucci's face, a mixture of brutality and confidence, froze completely.
His pupils suddenly shrank to pinpoints beyond his control, fixed firmly on Adams's uninjured palm.
Shock coiled around his heart like an icy venomous snake, squeezing so tightly that he could barely breathe.
How... was that possible?!
In the fatal instant when Lucci's mind was shaken and his defenses were wide open, the ground beneath his feet suddenly became like a scorching, viscous swamp, winding around his ankles, calves, and torso with lightning speed, wrapping and shaping itself around him.
In the blink of an eye, his entire body was restrained, with only his head exposed to the cold air.
Lucci's lips moved, as though he wanted to let out a roar.
Adams's gaze was indifferent. With a slight shift of will, the stone encasing Lucci's head immediately spread upward, sealing his mouth tightly. Only those eyes remained, blazing with humiliation and disbelief as they glared at the silver-haired youth before him like a god or demon.
Adams said nothing more and turned around. The heavy stone statue restraining Lucci floated up as though it had lost all weight, drifting lightly behind him.
He stepped out through the window, and his massive body merged once more into the boundless night sky.
"Coo! Coo-coo!" Hattori let out a mournful cry, flapping his wings as he desperately flew out the window. His white form looked so small and helpless in the night as he struggled to chase after his captured master.
Inside the floating structure ten thousand meters in the sky, Adams descended silently with his spoils.
Lucci's gaze immediately swept across the room. When he saw Kaku and Kalifa, restrained in the same way, a terrifyingly fierce light erupted from his eyes. He glared viciously at Adams, a low, murderous growl rumbling in his throat.
Adams looked down at him. There was not the slightest ripple in his eyes, only the sense of superiority brought by absolute strength.
"What? Not convinced?"
The stone sealing Lucci's mouth softened and fell away at Adams's command.
Fresh air rushed into his lungs. Lucci took a fierce breath, but what erupted from him was not a roar. Instead, he hissed through blood-scented teeth, every word trembling with extreme humiliation.
"If... if I were a Devil Fruit user too... I definitely wouldn't have lost!"
The pride of a genius had been crushed. What showed now was a young man's most primal unwillingness and stubbornness.
Adams curled his lips, but the expression was cold and utterly without warmth.
"Oh? Then let's do it again. This time, I won't use my ability."
The instant he finished speaking, the circulating tree-ring patterns on his shoulder vanished like receding tides. Beneath his smooth skin remained only the contours of pure muscle.
At the same time, all the rocky restraints around Lucci fell away like quicksand, clattering back onto the floor.
Freed once more, Lucci did not hesitate in the slightest. Driven by instincts honed through countless trials, his body instantly pushed itself to its limit.
"Shigan: Ouren!"
Countless afterimages burst forth before him. His fingers became deadly spearpoints, tearing through the air with enough piercing force to penetrate rock as they rained down upon Adams's broad chest like a violent storm.
A dense barrage of impacts, like rain beating against banana leaves, exploded through the empty stone chamber.
Adams stood like a mountain, completely unmoving. The Shigan strikes landed upon his bare chest, leaving only a few marks so faint they were almost impossible to see, before vanishing entirely with the next breath.
He even gave a slight nod, his tone calm.
"Not bad power."
With that level of power, it was at least more piercing than ordinary blades. Ordinary swords could no longer leave marks on him at all.
Yet to Lucci, that calm acknowledgment was ten thousand times worse than the cruelest mockery.
"Damn it! Don't look—down—on—me—!!!"
Lucci's reason was completely ignited by humiliation, turning into an all-consuming fury. His eyes turned crimson, and a beastlike roar tore from his throat.
Using the recoil from his final Shigan, his body bent backward to an unbelievable extreme. His right leg tore through the air like a battle axe, carrying all his strength and speed as it shot upward toward Adams's jaw from almost point-blank range—
"Rankyaku: Hyoubi!"
The pale-blue slash compressed to its limit was no longer a crescent. It condensed into a vicious air bird poised to take flight, crashing violently into Adams's jaw with a shrill scream.
"Screech!"
This time, it was no longer futile.
A shallow line of blood bloomed across the skin of Adams's jaw. Several ruby-like droplets were swept away by the violent airflow, streaking through the cold air in fleeting red lines.
Adams raised a hand and casually wiped his jaw with his fingertips. He looked at the glaring crimson on his fingers, then raised his eyes toward Lucci, whose full-force outburst had set madness blazing in his gaze.
His lips split apart, revealing stark white teeth like the fangs of a beast in the dim light.
"I told you. Even without my ability, you are still no match for me."
Before his words had even faded, the ground beneath Lucci's feet churned again.
Like a waking stone python, it surged upward and coiled around him with irresistible force.
Lucci did not even have time to assume a defensive posture before his body was restrained again, leaving only his head outside. The cold stone pressed tightly against his skin, conveying an unyielding hardness that reeked of despair.
Adams looked down at those eyes still burning with unyielding fire from within the stone statue and gave an indifferent order.
"Behave yourself. Tomorrow, I'll take you away."
Lucci clenched his teeth and glared fiercely at Adams. His chest rose and fell violently. At last, he forced out a cold snort from the depths of his throat, filled with all his anger and unwillingness, then sharply turned his head away, refusing to look at that nightmare-like figure again.
TO BE CONTINUED