Lin Xuan did not stop their rescue efforts.
He had no strength left to stop them, either.
That strike with Dark Coating had almost drained the little Spiritual Pressure he had just recovered. Combined with the injuries from taking Canine Red Lotus head-on, sheer determination was all that kept him standing.
Just as he prepared to steady his breathing a little-
A sense of danger far greater than before shot from Lin Xuan's tailbone straight to the top of his head.
Even his scalp prickled, and he instinctively tried to raise his blade to defend himself.
But that presence came too fast, too fiercely.
It held no killing intent, yet carried a terrifying weight capable of crushing mountains.
Thud-!
A fist wrapped in pitch-black Haki stopped short less than three inches from Lin Xuan's nose.
The shock wave from the punch alone completely shattered the reef beneath Lin Xuan's feet. The gust sent him sliding several meters backward, and he barely stopped after his soles plowed two deep furrows into the ground.
As the dust cleared, the burly old man wearing a dog-head hood stood there, the veins at his temples throbbing even harder than Sengoku's.
It was Garp.
"You little brat! Have you had enough of living?!"
Garp's booming voice left Lin Xuan's eardrums ringing.
Though the old man roared fiercely, he could not hide the anxiety in his large eyes.
He strode up to Lin Xuan in a few steps, his rough hand reaching for Lin Xuan's charred left shoulder, where bone lay exposed. Just before touching it, however, he abruptly checked his strength and merely patted the uninjured right shoulder gently instead.
"Taking Great Eruption head-on? And trying to smash the magma apart? Did I teach you Iron Body so you could get yourself killed?!"
Garp's breathing