"Come at me with everything you've got, rookie!"
"This sea is far too boring."
"Hatred, grudges, fate, revenge!"
"One day, we'll plunge the sea into utter chaos and overthrow the Celestial Dragons' dynasty!"
Kurozumi Semimaru crossed two fingers on each hand.
Two transparent barriers appeared at the same time.
They emerged beneath his feet and kept spreading.
Once they reached Shane and Kaido, they formed a perfect barrier in front of each of them!
"Hey! Don't interfere with my fight!"
"Do you want to die, Kurozumi Semimaru?"
Kaido flew into a rage. He hated people interfering with his fights more than anything.
To grow stronger, he had to cherish every opportunity to fight someone powerful.
Although Saint Garling had been gravely wounded by Rocks, he was still powerful.
He could help Kaido grow stronger.
If Kurozumi Semimaru stopped them, it would throw off his progress!
"It's only a fistfight."
"This barrier might be useful, but I prefer fighting head-on!"
"A Zoan's recovery speed is the limit of life itself!"
Shane also rejected the barrier's help.
What use was this thing?
All it did was stop someone from getting stronger!
"Hee-hahahaha!"
Kurozumi Semimaru laughed loudly.
"I never said I was helping you, much less taking orders from you!"
"Seeking profit by any means necessary is the principle I live by on these seas."
Shing!
A layer of Armament Haki actually coated the barrier.
It turned into a barrier fist.
It attacked Saint Garling and Saint Saturn head-on!
"That damned Devil Fruit power again!"
The sight of the barrier infuriated Saint Garling.
When Rocks had beaten them earlier, there had been more than the Dark-Dark Fruit's erosion and restraint.
The Barrier-Barrier Fruit user, Kurozumi Semimaru, had helped him too!
They had been picked off one by one, and finally suffered a total defeat.
If he hadn't possessed the strongest vitality and gotten back up once...
The humiliation would have been unbearable if word got out.
"Hee-hahahaha! I love seeing you hate me when you can't kill me!"
As a member of the Kurozumi Clan, Kurozumi Semimaru had spent years wandering overseas.
Unlike the Kozuki Clan, they placed greater faith in Devil Fruit powers.
In Wano Country, they called them sorcery, using them to bewitch and intimidate the common people.
Abroad, they regarded them as the foundation of their survival.
That was why the siblings had eaten the Clone-Clone Fruit and the Barrier-Barrier Fruit.
Those two together were the best combination for staying alive!
Among Zoans, the ones with the most lives were naturally the Mythical Zoans.
Especially the Phoenix Form and the Yamata no Orochi Form.
So...
They had been searching for those Devil Fruits all along.
All so the Kurozumi Clan could rise again and take revenge!
Kaido, Shane, Rocks!
It didn't matter who it was, as long as they could rely on them!
No one could have imagined it.
One of the siblings would later be killed by a single blow from Kaido's club, while the other would die of old age in Wano Country.
Revenge?
In the end, it was nothing but a pipe dream.
Bang!
Saint Garling fought Kaido head-on while also guarding against the barrier's sneak attacks.
He kept coughing up blood, and every use of Haki drained his vitality.
"Have you still got any strength left?"
Kaido struck the barrier with his club, but looked at Saint Garling instead.
"I told you, stay out of my fight!"
Whoosh!
He didn't wait for Saint Garling's answer.
The ferocious Oni monster delivered a heavy blow!
Haki crisscrossed through the air.
Kaido sensed that even wounded, the red-haired man before him possessed terrifying fighting strength!
"You're no fun, Kaido!"
Kurozumi Semimaru wasn't going to invite another snub, so he turned to Shane's fight.
Unlike Kaido, who exuded Haki at his young age...
Shane was even younger and had no Haki around him.
Instead, Purple Lightning coiled around him, activating his body's Lineage Factor and constantly increasing his speed and explosive power!
"That look in your eyes disgusts me!"
The sight of Shane made Saint Saturn want to cut him into a thousand pieces.
If Rocks's fruit hadn't countered his powers, followed by a savage beating from the Rocks Pirates...
How could he have fallen in such a humiliating fashion?
He had risen again through a Zoan's recovery power. He refused to believe he couldn't deal with an Apprentice Crew Member!
"I am one of the Five Elders! Do you know why I'm called the Warrior God of Science?"
Saint Saturn placed particular emphasis on "Warrior God."
He activated his Mythical Zoan form, with six limbs, a cane in one hand and the other coated black with Haki.
Black flames of Awakening coiled behind his two horns!
"Die!"
He glared at Shane, trying to destroy his consciousness.
Under normal circumstances...
Almost anyone he glared at would die!
Shing!
Just as Shane met his eyes without fear...
Spikes appeared behind Saint Saturn!
All of them were barriers shaped into the sharpest possible points, then coated with Haki!
Sure enough...
When it came to developing his fruit powers...
Kurozumi Semimaru hadn't lived all those decades for nothing.
Blood dripped from Saint Saturn's back.
Saint Saturn gritted his teeth and stared at Kurozumi Semimaru.
"Despicable! You scum in the Rocks Pirates are all sewer rats!"
Blood kept trickling down the spikes.
He stepped forward, and the wounds on his back healed at a speed visible to the naked eye!
At the same time, he thrust his palm toward Shane, his five fingers sharpened into points.
His other hand gripped his staff, attacking Kurozumi Semimaru from farther away.
"Shane! Kurozumi Semimaru!"
Saint Saturn roared. He had never imagined that he, one of the exalted Five Elders...
Standing at the pinnacle of publicly acknowledged power...
Would be bullied like this by a bunch of pirates!
"Without Haki, your body isn't as tough as mine."
Shane took in the sight.
He calmly analyzed the situation.
"But your recovery speed is impressive."
That was right.
Saint Saturn's fruit power allowed him to heal extremely quickly, but his body was no tougher than the Azure Dragon Form.
It was like the Phoenix Form: as long as one could endure the pain, any missing part could heal.
The Yamata no Orochi Form could regrow lost heads unless they were all removed at once.
Mythical Zoans truly were extraordinarily peculiar, no less so than Paramecias.
Correspondingly...
The Ushi-Oni Form healed extremely quickly.
The Azure Dragon Form had Dragon Scales with exceptional defensive power.
Shane also really liked the Buddha Form's shock waves and the mental effects they had on people.
Boom!
Countless thoughts raced through his mind, while a critical instant lay before him.
Shane likewise extended five fingers and leaped up in his Hybrid Form.
As his dragon tail lashed out...
He accelerated with Geppo and Soru.
Finger Pistol served as his direct attack, while Tempest Kick drew the Purple Lightning along.
"What exactly is Haki? Wake up for me!"
Shane faced Saint Saturn's Haki head-on!
But just before he could touch Saint Saturn's five fingers...
With roughly three feet still between them!
That invisible force blocked Shane's Purple Lightning and Finger Pistol!
It was Advanced Armament Haki, and it incorporated the technique of Ryuo!
An attack delivered without contact, capable of striking directly inside the body!
Crack!
Shane poured all his strength and electricity into his fingertips, combining them with his sharp claws.
They were sharp enough to pierce even steel alloys!
Yet they had no effect against this move from Saint Saturn!
"Every one of the Five Elders bears the title of Warrior God! Fool!"
Saint Saturn laughed loudly, thrusting his cane at Kurozumi Semimaru at the same time.
"And you! Don't think a barrier will let you escape!"
Boom!
The cane struck the barrier, but the Haki passed through without contact.
It passed through the barrier as though passing over skin.
Yet Kurozumi Semimaru wore a smile.
"Sorry, but I've developed my fruit powers to a very high level!"
Less than a meter away from him...
Another barrier rose!
It blocked even the Haki striking from a distance!
"Hee-hahahaha!"
"Don't underestimate Devil Fruit users, Celestial Dragon!"
Kurozumi Semimaru secretly rejoiced. The Five Elders and the Holy Knights had all been gravely wounded by Rocks.
And Shane and Kaido, two monsters whose physical enhancements were downright outrageous, were holding them off at close range.
As the Barrier-Barrier Fruit user, what did he have to worry about?
Bang!
Shane clashed against the Haki with Purple Lightning.
As his entire body suffered internal damage, the repulsive force sent him plummeting backward.
Boom!
The rocks shattered at the sound.
Shane planted one foot on the edge of the valley and shot forward again.
He coughed up great mouthfuls of blood, yet the smile on his face only deepened.
"I thought I was going to die. I didn't expect you to be so badly injured that your strength had weakened!"
The sounds of bones mending came from inside his body.
The injuries to Shane's internal organs were also healing rapidly.
If Saint Saturn had been uninjured and at his peak...
That blow would have been like the Thunder Bagua Luffy had faced in his first encounter with Kaido.
"What are you talking about?"
Saint Saturn's face twitched. He was indeed seriously injured.
In his current state, he was certainly no match for Rocks, Whitebeard, and the others at full strength.
But facing a mere Shane, a rookie pirate he had failed to kill even on their third face-to-face encounter...
The fury in his heart raged all the more fiercely.
"I really do want to try and see whether I can unravel it, thread by thread, and awaken Haki."
Shane straightened his back, and Electro coursed over his entire body again.
His overlapping black locks partially concealed his dragon horns, and beneath the jet-black dragon scales covering his body were sharp dragon claws.
He lashed his dragon tail, trying to channel Finger Pistol and Electro.
"Tempest Kick: Tail Fang!"
He attacked again.
Enduring the intense pain and his injuries, he faced his powerful enemy head-on.
There was only one thing Shane needed to do.
Drag out that hidden trace of Haki within his body!
After that, no matter how many more times he fell, he had to stand back up.
A doubly mutated human body, strengthened by the Mink Tribe's Lineage Factor!
Six Powers training that surpassed his limits, and a Mythical Zoan Devil Fruit's amplification in desperate circumstances!
Four layers of enhancement had forged Shane a devil's body.
"I have already foreseen your death!"
Saint Saturn refused to believe that after once and twice, there would be a third time!
"Finger Pistol: Purple Lightning Six-Fingered Finger Pistol Barrage!"
At the very moment his tail pierced Saint Saturn...
Shane spat blood as his head, limbs, and dragon tail attacked simultaneously.
Like a voltage device frantically pouring out Electro!
"You're nothing but a despicable thing courting death!"
Saint Saturn was likewise driving his attacks at Shane's heart.
His attacks were so fast that his swinging blows left afterimages!
Shane's vision grew vacant. Inside his body was a strand so faint that he could not perceive it.
Yet every desperate attempt to draw it out brought him a little closer!
"I absolutely will not die!"
Shane had no idea how many of his attacks had missed, nor how many blows he had taken.
In any case, the blood pouring from his mouth had never stopped.
The pain had vanished, though, because once it exceeded the limits of perception, he could no longer perceive what pain was.
Unless that power surpassed the mind's perception and reached straight into the soul!
Every attack was a breakthrough past death!
Before you continue