Nusjuro's enormous centaur form shrank rapidly, as though deflating, until he returned to his plain kimono-clad appearance.
He tightly gripped the hilt of First Generation Kitetsu, which was embedded in the ground. His arm trembled violently as he tried to lift it and point it at Gern.
But the agony and suppression inflicted by the dark purple Haki lightning raging in his wound made even that simple movement nearly impossible.
"Ugh... why..."
Nusjuro raised his head, his bloodshot eyes fixed on Gern at the edge of the crater. His voice was hoarse, his repetition almost obsessive.
"You... can't kill me... I possess the supreme blessing bestowed by 'that great one'...
'That great one' is watching... you... you can't kill me!!"
As he watched this old man, who had once stood at the pinnacle of the world's power, now reduced to frantic yelling,
Gern showed no emotion. He merely gave a cold chuckle.
"Heh. So this is a beaten dog's... barking from afar?"
"What an ugly sound."
With that, he said no more. He turned his wrist, light flowing along the Eight Desolations Blade as killing intent surged.
"So..." Gern shifted his grip, moving from a diagonal guard into the standard opening stance for a lunging slash. The ground beneath his feet cracked inch by inch.
"You high-and-mighty types... seem pretty easy..."
"To kill!"
The instant those words fell, Gern became a streak of dark blue lightning that tore through space!
The edge of the Eight Desolations Blade bore straight toward Nusjuro's throat, sweeping out in a savage horizontal slash with the resolve to end everything!
This strike would sever his head along with his obsession with that so-called "immortality"!
Yet just as the edge of the Eight Desolations Blade was about to meet flesh...
Nusjuro's pupils, which had dilated in