The Fish-Fish Fruit, Mythical Zoan, Is Mine Now

The fruit traced an arc through the air.

Katakuri reached out with both hands. His ten freshly reattached fingers were still wrapped in thick white bandages.

With his palms facing up, he caught the Devil Fruit steadily.

The fruit was incredibly heavy in his hand. It felt like a solid iron ball, dragging down with its weight.

The Azure Dragon's scale patterns pressed against the wounds in his palms. Fresh blood seeped through the bandages.

The violent aura of an ancient ferocious beast drilled straight into his nostrils through the fruit's skin.

It carried a strong earthy stench, the reek of blood, and an untamable wildness that refused to dissipate.

At Rektol's feet.

Kaido's face was pressed hard against the blue stone tiles.

His eyes bulged as he watched the fruit fall into Katakuri's hands.

A leaking, bellows-like wheeze came from his throat. His fingers clawed ten bloody marks into the stone, his nails completely torn off. Even a layer of flesh had been ground away.

Kaido opened his mouth and vomited a large mouthful of black blood. It sprayed into the mud. He tried to raise his hand and snatch the fruit away, but his arm seemed nailed to the ground.

Tenfold gravity crushed down on his spine. But even heavier was the despair in his heart.

The final thread in his mind snapped. His eyes rolled back, and he passed out completely, like a lump of rotten meat stuck to the ground.

Katakuri did not hesitate for even a moment.

He yanked off the tattered scarf around his neck, revealing a mouthful of sharp fangs.

He opened his mouth, aimed at the Azure Dragon Fruit, and viciously bit off a large chunk of flesh.

The stench was foul.

It was like a dead fish from the seabed that had been rotting for half a month, mixed with the sour reek of sewer water.

Katakuri's stomach convulsed violently. Sour liquid surged straight into his throat.

He closed his eyes and did not chew at all. He tilted his head back, his Adam's apple bobbing up and down as he forcibly swallowed the chunk of flesh.

The moment the fruit flesh entered his stomach, a sudden transformation erupted.

Katakuri clutched his chest with both hands.

"Gaaah—"

A distorted roar burst from his throat. It was no longer the hoarse voice of a boy, but a deep dragon's growl with a metallic resonance.

His body began to shoot upward wildly.

He had already been abnormally tall, but within seconds, he broke through four meters, then five. He looked like a machine forcibly injected with an excessive amount of fuel.

His bones exploded with crackles like firecrackers. The muscles in his thighs and arms swelled outward as if pumped full of air.

The clothes on his upper body instantly burst into tatters, leaving several strips of cloth hanging from his shoulders.

The cowhide boots on his feet split apart. His toes lengthened, growing sharp black claws. The tips easily pierced through the blue stone floor.

Then, something beneath his skin began to claw its way out.

"Riiip."

Hard blue dragon scales, each as large as a palm, brutally tore through his flesh, bringing tiny beads of blood with them.

The scales rapidly covered both his arms, his neck, and half his face. Under the blinding golden light of the underground chamber, they gleamed with a cold blue radiance.

The skin at the center of his forehead bulged high.

Two sharp dragon horns burst through the flesh, streaked with blood and pointing straight at the ruined ceiling.

Katakuri suddenly opened his eyes.

His eyes, once clearly divided into black and white, had become cold vertical pupils. His dark golden irises were filled with savagery.

"Boom!"

A dark red aura exploded outward from him.

Conqueror's Haki.

It was more than ten times more violent than when he had awakened it in the Sea King nest.

Mixed with the supreme dragon might of the Azure Dragon, the aura swept through the entire underground treasury like a tangible hurricane.

Dark red lightning raced wildly through the air above the treasury.

The lightning struck the mountains of gold bricks piled nearby. The intense heat instantly melted several bricks into gold liquid, which flowed down the stone steps.

The cracks in the ceiling rapidly widened. Huge chunks of rock came crashing down, shattering into powder the moment they hit Katakuri's dragon scales.

Behind him.

Cracker was holding up the enormous metal ball fifty meters in diameter.

When the dragon might and Conqueror's Haki surged into him, his legs gave out and he dropped to his knees. His kneecaps struck the rubble, making him suck in a sharp breath from the pain.

"B-Big Brother!"

Cracker's chubby face flushed purple-red. The magnetism in his hands nearly went out of control.

The enormous metal ball in midair shook violently. Hundreds of famous blades and iron safes pressed against one another, producing an ear-piercing scraping sound. Several rusty iron pipes fell from the sphere and crashed onto the stone floor.

Rektol stood where he was.

The gale whipped his pink hair backward.

He was completely unaffected by the Conqueror's Haki. He merely raised his left hand and dispelled the Tenfold Gravity Field on the ground.

Without the gravitational suppression, the dust on the ground began floating again.

Rektol looked at Katakuri, who had completed his transformation.

His dragon-scaled beast-human form. His sturdy muscles packed with explosive power. And the tangible Conqueror's Haki lightning that twisted the air around him.

Rektol nodded in satisfaction.

The Charlotte Family's roster of top-tier combat power had finally gained its most perfect piece.

With an Emperor's right hand of this caliber serving as a shield in front, and Cracker acting as a fortress in the rear, they could install Smoothie's Mecha Girl weapon after returning.

From now on, those self-important nobodies on the sea would not even deserve to stand before him.

Katakuri exhaled a breath of scorching white air. It sprayed onto the ground and dried a patch of water.

He lowered his head and looked at his scale-covered hands. When he clenched his fists, the air cracked with a crisp explosive pop.

The overwhelming power made his entire body tremble. The wounds that had previously gone deep enough to expose bone had already begun scabbing and stopping their bleeding under the terrifying regenerative power of the Mythical Zoan.

"Put away your Haki." Rektol dusted off his hands. "It's time to go."

Katakuri reined in his aura. His dark golden vertical pupils returned to their normal shape. The scales slowly receded beneath his skin.

Cracker breathed a sigh of relief. He quickly used magnetism to support the metal ball and slowly backed toward the underground passage.

Rektol bent down, picked up a golden dagger beside his foot, and casually stuffed it into his pocket.

Just as everyone turned around and prepared to retreat along the path they had come by.

The deepest part of the treasury.

In the shadowy corner behind that wall of Pure Gold bricks.

A thick metal gate hidden in the stone wall suddenly gave off a dull mechanical jam.

"Beep—"

An ear-piercing alarm echoed through the empty underground chamber.

Rektol stopped and turned his head.

A dazzling red line lit up in the center of the metal gate.

Heat.

The red line rapidly spread toward both sides. The special-alloy door, a full meter thick, was forcibly cut open by an incredibly high temperature.

Molten metal flowed downward from the cut, dripping onto the blue stone slabs and splashing up clusters of sparks.

"Clang!"

The enormous metal door, cut into two pieces, toppled heavily forward and sent dust billowing across the floor.

The dust spread everywhere.

Five slender figures stepped onto the fallen metal plates and walked out unhurriedly.

They wore matching white high-collared cloaks. Golden thread embroidered the World Government's cross-star emblem along the hems.

Featureless pure-white masks covered their faces.

Only two narrow slits remained where their eyes should have been.

There was no sound of breathing. Their leather boots struck the metal plates in perfect unison, as though only one person were walking.

The five figures looked like ghosts drifting out of hell itself. Each carried a strange-looking slender sword.

The temperature in the air dropped to freezing the instant they emerged.

The breath Rektol exhaled turned into white mist in midair.

Even the molten metal on the ground strangely solidified and blackened in an instant.

God's Knights.