"Come on, hit me!"
Yas's utterly arrogant voice boomed like a thunderclap out of a clear sky over the elite training ground, which had already been reduced to ruins!
Time seemed to freeze at that moment.
Zephyr had only just climbed back to his feet and recovered a little of his dignity as an "instructor." Watching Yas, clad head to toe in bizarre blue-black heavy armor, openly challenge Garp, he felt as though his heart was about to leap out of his throat.
Insane! This brat had absolutely lost his mind!
That was Garp! Garp, the "Marine Hero"! The man who had chased Pirate King Roger all over the world with a pair of iron fists! His fists were acknowledged as some of the most destructive "weapons" in the world!
Volunteering to take a punch like that to the face? How insane, how conceited, how utterly reckless could he be?!
"Haha... hahahaha! Interesting! This is too interesting!"
After a brief, deathly silence, Garp's signature, unrestrained laughter rang through the entire mountain behind them.
Far from being angered by Yas's provocation, he flushed with excitement, his muscles trembling slightly in anticipation of the intense exertion to come.
"I've roamed the seas for decades, and this is the first time anyone's asked to taste my fists! Kid, you're my kind of guy!" Garp clenched his fists, his knuckles cracking explosively. His usually sleepy eyes now blazed with fighting spirit. "But let me warn you, my Love Fist isn't so easy to take! If I really do kill you, don't say I didn't warn you!"
"Garp! Don't do anything reckless!" Zephyr was terrified at the sight. He darted in front of Garp and spread his arms to block him, shouting urgently, "He only just awakened his Haki! His body and mind are still adjusting! That punch of yours will cripple him!"
"Step aside, Zephyr."
The answer came in Yas's cold, unquestionable voice.
Yas walked slowly toward them, his interwoven blue-black heavy armor gleaming with an unnerving metallic sheen in the sunset. Every step left a ring of fine cracks in the alloy ground beneath his feet.
"This is a battle between Vice Admiral Garp and me."
Zephyr stiffened abruptly. He turned to look into Yas's still, unruffled eyes. There was not a trace of humor in them, only pure hunger for power and confidence.
At that moment, Zephyr suddenly understood.
Perhaps he really was getting old. He was always thinking about protecting and guiding, forgetting that the person before him was no "uncut gem" in need of careful nurturing, but a primeval behemoth eager to break free of every restraint, fight the strongest, and evolve through battle!
"Ah..." Zephyr let out a long sigh and silently stepped aside, watching the two "monsters," whose auras had already risen to their peaks, with a complicated look in his eyes.
"Good! You've got guts!" Garp nodded approvingly. He rolled his wrists and assumed the simplest, most basic attacking stance. "I like guys who aren't afraid to die! Kid, out of respect for you, I'll start with a warm-up punch at thirty percent strength and see just how hard that turtle shell of yours is!"
The instant he finished speaking, Garp abruptly vanished from where he stood!
A second later, he appeared before Yas like a phantom!
He used neither the Six Powers nor a coating of Haki. It was nothing but a simple straight punch driven purely by physical strength!
Yet the instant that seemingly ordinary fist swung out, it produced a piercing sonic boom! Air compressed intensely before his fist, forming a visible white wave!
Facing that terrifying fist, powerful enough to punch through a warship, Yas neither dodged nor evaded!
He did not even blink. He simply straightened his chest and met it head-on with his face, covered in the heavy armor of Lightning Release Armament!
He would test the quality of his "absolute defense" in the most direct, most brutal way possible!
Dong-!
An incredibly deep boom, like an ancient great bell being struck, erupted from the point where fist met face!
The anticipated bloody scene of a shattered skull and splattered brains never appeared!
When Garp's iron fist, powerful enough to shatter mountains, struck the blue-black heavy armor on Yas's face, it was as though it had slammed into a Wall of Sighs forged from the finest divine metal!
The terrifying force of the punch was completely absorbed, broken down, and neutralized by that seemingly thin layer of heavy armor!
Centered on Yas's body, a violent ring-shaped shock wave suddenly spread backward, blowing away every ruined wall within a hundred meters behind him and leaving a huge, fan-shaped clearing on the mountainside!
The dust cleared.
Yas still stood in the same spot, his body not having swayed even once.
On his handsome face, the layer of blue-black heavy armor remained completely intact, without even the faintest white mark.
He merely rolled his neck slowly, producing a series of sharp cracks.
Then he raised his eyes to Garp, who remained frozen in his punching stance with astonishment written all over his face, and his lips slowly curled into a mocking grin.
"Vice Admiral Garp, did you skip your meal?"
Yas's voice was not loud, yet it struck the Marine Hero's face like a merciless slap.
"With that much force..." He stuck out his tongue and licked his lips, the madness and fighting spirit in his eyes boiling over completely. "Are you trying to tickle me?"
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