Chapter 50

The pirate charging at the front had just raised his long blade when the boy abruptly accelerated and clamped five fingers around his wrist-bone cracked and a scream erupted at the same instant.

Before the blade hit the ground, Rossi twisted at the waist and swung the man into his companions rushing up behind him.

Amid the sharp clang of falling metal, he stooped, scooped up the blade, and slashed diagonally with a backhand stroke.

The edge sliced through flesh, drawing an arc of blood through the air.

But his opponent merely staggered backward. The wound across his chest exposed bone, yet he did not fall.

Rossi frowned and followed up with a kick that sent him flying.

These men were far tougher than ordinary sailors. Even with several bullets in them, they could still lunge forward to bite and tear.

"Kill him!"

The pirate whose wrist had been broken earlier actually scrambled back up and charged, swinging his uninjured fist.

The entire harbor had descended into a melee: clashing metal, explosive reports, the dull sounds of blades sinking into flesh, and the whimpers of the dying mingled together.

Rossi's side was still holding out, but the other merchant ships had already collapsed-the Black Skull squads drove into their defenses like knives, and the decks were soon stained red.

More pirates skirted the ships and rushed toward the docks.

Behind the cargo-laden piers, the city's outline flickered through the smoke.

"Over on Jora's side..."

Rossi parried a heavy chop and glanced deeper into the harbor district. "It should be time to act."

On the makeshift command platform at the docks, Square-Faced Man took a crescent-shaped instrument from inside his coat.

The battlefield's flames reflected in his deep-set eyes, and the sea breeze tousled his golden curls.

He gave Jora a slight nod and brushed his fingers over the strings.

He ranked second only to Jora in the city and was also the seldom-seen administrator of the Orphanage.

"Send in the knights."

The moment Jora finished speaking, the instrument sounded its first trembling note.

Like sparks flying beneath a blacksmith's hammer, the sound pierced the smoke and howls, driving straight into the battling crowd.

Rossi paused for an instant in mid-swing, his ears catching a chant that cut through every other sound-

"Here I recite, in the poet's name..."

The verses resonating in the man's chest rolled like boulders over every plank of the docks.

"Odense, land where fairy tales were born, now besieged by jackals!"

"The pirates' sails blot out the horizon, their greed more savage than the storm.

"And our Queen declares:"

Jora's voice joined in immediately, the two voices intertwining into a rope that tightened around the entire battlefield.

"Warriors of Akan!"

"Victory shall be ours!"

"For the sleeping rooftops behind us, for the kin who share our blood!"

The castle's iron gates halfway up the mountain suddenly burst open inward.

They did not slowly swing open, but crashed wide as though a colossal beast had smashed them from within.

A low rumble began to rise steadily from the ground, and a rhythmic vibration traveled down the stone steps.

Then something silver poured out-at first, a few scattered glints, then a shimmering ribbon, and finally a waterfall of metal cascading down the slope.

"Fight for the Queen!"

Hooves shattered the blue-gray flagstones with a sound like rolling, muffled thunder.

Encased in steel plates from head to hoof, the knights leaned low, their three-meter lances leveled like a forest.

As they charged down the slope, their armor joints scraped with piercing shrieks, mingling with their cries into a teeth-grating roar.

The torrent of steel bore down on the figures who had only just gained a foothold at the edge of the docks.

The pirates climbing the ships' sides froze.

They saw the silver tide sweep down the street, saw the cold gleam of lance points streak through the morning mist.

The lips of several men in the front ranks began to tremble uncontrollably, their facial muscles contorting into strange shapes.

"Damn it!"

"Fall back! Get out of the way-"

"Stop pushing! You lot in the back, stop pushing!"

Those at the front desperately tried to retreat, their heels striking their companions' boots.

But the men who had just leaped onto the docks kept squeezing forward, pressing their palms against the backs ahead of them.

And so the pirates at the very front could only watch the lances approach. They raised their flimsy cutlasses and met that forest of metal with chests clad in nothing but coarse linen.

The impact came.

Not one great crash, but countless sounds of breaking erupting at once-the crack of wooden gunstocks snapping, the groan of twisting iron, the dull crunch of breaking bones.

Lance points pierced bodies and lifted them off the ground, leaving them hanging briefly in the air like speared fish.

Fragments of flintlock pistols and shattered cutlasses sprayed through the air with dark red liquid before gravity dragged them back into the crowd.

The Knights Order tore through the pirates' lines like a red-hot knife slicing through fat.

The chaotic crowd broke apart to either side like soil turned by a plow.

Severed limbs and assorted fragments flew into the air, traced tangled arcs, and fell into the sea in a dense shower of crimson splashes.

A single downhill charge cleared a vast stretch along the edge of the docks.

Standing on the raised platform, Jora suddenly narrowed her eyes.

Rossi's gaze shifted for an instant.

The pirate fighting him caught that momentary distraction. His mouth spread into a grin, and he brought his cutlass down in a cold flash, carried by the force of his charge.

But Rossi had already turned his back.

-What?

Before the pirate's ecstatic expression had fully formed, he felt a faint, almost imperceptible resistance against his neck, as though he had struck something invisible.

Then his head and body fell in two different directions.

A few bloodstained threads quivered faintly in the air before vanishing.

"You got distracted."

Doflamingo flexed his fingers a short distance away, drawing the taut threads back from the shadows on the deck. "Were those tin cans worth staring at for so long?"

The fighting on deck was nearly over.

Rossi raised a hand and pointed toward the docks.

The cavalry were carving up the battlefield with astonishing efficiency, splitting into several groups that repeatedly plowed through the scattered weeds like red-hot iron plows.

Wherever their blades swept, the pirates' mangled bodies fell.

Even more striking was their condition-neither men nor horses showed any fatigue, and each charge was even fiercer than the last.

"That armor,"

Rossi said evenly, "is thick enough to deflect bullets and shatter blades.

"A single suit must weigh at least a hundred kilograms."

In certain corners of this world, lifting a warship might not count as a miracle.

But this was the North Blue.

Keeping an entire force clad in such heavy armor year-round while allowing them to move normally required more than a city-state's wealth. It required a kingdom's resources.

And Acanlia, this city named after fairy tales, had never been known for military strength.

"A Devil Fruit?"

Doflamingo caught on immediately.

"Most likely."

Rossi looked toward the figure behind the docks.

The solemn-faced man standing beside Jora had both arms raised, as though conducting a silent chorus.

As his lips moved, the knights' charges grew ever more ferocious, their hoofbeats almost merging into one continuous roar.

Pirates began jumping into the sea in groups, preferring the unknown depths to remaining ashore. "If I'm not mistaken, that's the Cheer-Cheer Fruit."

Most Devil Fruits bestowed power on their users alone.

This one was different.

It could awaken something sleeping in the blood, send fresh heat coursing through weary limbs, and turn fearful heartbeats into war drums.

Now those drums were beating for the knights.

"What a shame."

Rossi spoke softly.

Had the man been an enemy, he would only have needed to plunge that area into absolute "silence"

and the impassioned chorus would become a ridiculous mime.

But the man was no ally at present-at least, that endless flow of power was not reaching them.

Was he deliberately excluding them, or did receiving this inspiration require some resonance of belief?

He remembered that, in the future, this fruit would belong beneath another banner.

A woman who used her cries to ignite the fury of countless people, the Revolutionary Army's Commander of the Eastern Army.

At present, even the man called "Monkey D. Dragon"

was still a prominent naval officer. Newspapers were still speculating about when he might be promoted to Admiral, and there was not even a trace of the so-called four army commanders.

In that case-

That solemn-faced "poet"

would probably reach the end of his life in this melee.

A thunderous crash erupted!

While Rossi was still pondering the man's ability, the battle abruptly turned:

"Roar-Gedi's going to smash you all to pieces!"

A five-meter-tall figure, like a moving hill, swung an iron ball weighing several tons and forcibly tore a gap through the Armored Knights' formation.

"Look! It's 'Bloodthirsty' Gedi!"

On the other side, flecks of silver flashed through the air.

Several knights who had been hacking away with all their strength suddenly went limp and toppled sideways. Two jets of blood abruptly spurted from the eye sockets of the armored warhorses beneath them.

"Hmph. Tin men full of holes."

As the knights fell with blood seeping beneath their visors, a grim-faced man in a captain's coat and an ornate tricorn hat slowly emerged from the smoke, a silver rapier in hand.

"Oooooh! Captain Swift is here-"

As those figures in the pirate crews known as "combat captains"

and "boatswains"

and "captains"

entered the fray, the pirates, who had been on the verge of collapse, erupted in waves of howls. Something close to fanaticism flooded back into their limbs.

With these leaders, whose bounties generally exceeded ten million, serving as their spearheads, the pirates regrouped into another surging offensive.

The city's Armored Knights were certainly formidable, but there were simply too few of them.

Once several powerful fighters disrupted their formation, they were quickly surrounded on all sides.

"Cut the horses' legs! Go for the horses' legs first!"

"Use fishing nets to tangle up those tin cans-"

"Lift their helmets! Stab through the gaps in their armor!"

Blades chopped down to sever horses' legs, pried faceplates upward, then plunged viciously through the gaps in the metal.

As long as they could survive, no pirate cared whether their methods were dirty, much less whether they looked ugly while fighting.

The balance of victory tipped toward the pirates once again.

"Doffy, Rossi, this isn't looking good."

Tall and thin, Diamante swept his sword out and cut two charging pirates into four pieces, his gaze passing over the entire dock.

Out at sea, the many merchant ships were gradually abandoning resistance. Most of their crews had fallen beneath the bloodthirsty pirates' blades. Only captains who had prepared in advance were retreating with a few trusted men, fighting as they went.

The docks had become a meat grinder. Armored Knights and pirates fought in a tangled melee, one side defending their homes, the other seeking only to indulge their desires. Nothing remained in either side's eyes but blood-red.

But ultimately, against more than a dozen pirate crews and thousands upon thousands of desperate outlaws, the city's defenses were simply too thin.

"Have you still not contacted the navy?"

"What on earth are you doing? You can't even get a call through?!"

Up in the harbor's Crow's Nest, several officials' scolding sent beads of sweat rolling down the City Hall employee's temples.

He dialed the transponder snail in his hands over and over, but received no response.

"There's no need to continue."

Governor Jora stopped her subordinates from venting their anger on him.

By now, she fully believed the information Pica had brought.

Then-

Boom, boom, boom!

Muffled blasts suddenly erupted behind them, tearing through the air.

The Windmill Battery, "Bishop," which served as the city's second line of defense,

was still spitting flames, but amid a succession of explosive reports, thick smoke suddenly billowed from it.

"That's impossible..."

"Those cannons used up most of the city's budget! How could they blow apart so easily?!"

While the other officials fell into panic, Jora closed her eyes and let out a soft breath.

Every clue pointed to the same answer: Cipher Pol was pulling the strings.

The "Entegre Alliance," jointly established by five nations,

had exchanged three nations' Heavenly Tribute for the World Government's protection and poured all the money saved into improving people's lives... Had that choice truly been wrong?

"Lady Jora... Queen Jora."

Beside her, the user of the "Cheer-Cheer Fruit," who had been playing the lyre,

stilled his fingers.

He looked at the woman he had helped ascend to the position of ruler. Time had tempered the once-inexperienced girl into a composed woman.