"Hm?" Seeing Zesi easily block his strike, Kaido was briefly taken aback.
A hint of interest entered his gaze as he looked at Zesi.
Kaido had originally been a member of the Rocks Pirates.
But among the Rocks Pirates, who were teeming with powerful fighters, Kaido had not stood out at the time.
Later, after Rocks was defeated by Garp and Roger, the Rocks Pirates disbanded, and the crew scattered to establish pirate crews of their own.
Kaido had also wandered throughout the New World, challenging powerful fighters wherever he went.
In recent years, however, Kaido had begun building his own pirate crew. He had established a base in Wano Country and partnered with Orochi to begin manufacturing weapons.
Because Wano Country had closed its borders, Kaido had vanished from public view over the past few years. Others did not know what he was doing, and he knew little about events outside, so he did not know Zesi.
Seeing someone so young actually block his attack surprised Kaido somewhat.
"Not bad. Then let's fight to the death!" Kaido shouted.
The spiked club in his hand swung swiftly toward Zesi.
Clang, clang, clang! Zesi's blade repeatedly clashed with the spiked club.
With every collision, the ground cracked apart.
The island shook from their battle, and the beasts on it sensed the danger and fled in panic.
Clang! After blocking another powerful blow from Kaido's spiked club, Zesi sprang backward.
"Seriously, I can't even eat a meal in peace. How should I put this? You're pretty annoying!"
"Reverse grip, Tremor Sky Slash!" Zesi held his sword in a reverse grip behind his back, then suddenly slashed out from behind him.
The air split open, as though a mirror had been cut in half.
Splat! An enormous wound appeared on Kaido's body out of nowhere, sending blood spraying.
"What a fast blade. Looks like you're no nobody. I've never heard of you. You must have only made a name for yourself in the past few years, right?"
That slash seemed to cut through space, ignoring distance as though it had struck Kaido in an instant.
By the time Kaido sensed the slash and its sharp edge, the blade had already struck him.
With such an enormous wound, an ordinary person would have been at death's door.
At the very least, they would have lost the ability to fight.
Yet Kaido stood there as though he felt nothing at all.
As though the wound did not belong to him.
Most importantly, the wound really did little to hinder him.
A closer look would reveal that, although the wound looked gruesome, the slash had actually only broken the skin.
The wound was not deep. Kaido's powerful muscles had stopped the slash.
"I've been getting by in the New World for several years, you know. You make it sound like all those years counted for nothing. You're really making me lose face. Let me formally introduce myself: Zesi of the Roger Pirates. Oh, right, I think I also have a nickname-Natural Disaster!" Zesi said calmly.
"Natural Disaster. Now I remember. The Roger Pirates do have someone called Natural Disaster. I heard he's pretty strong. So you're that Natural Disaster!" Kaido said, raising an eyebrow.
Although Kaido knew little about events outside,
he still kept an eye on the sea's top pirate crews, such as the Roger Pirates and the Whitebeard Pirates.
So Kaido had heard the name Natural Disaster, though he paid more attention to their captains.
As for people like Zesi, who had some fame of their own, he had only heard their names.
"Perfect. Let me see just how strong someone from the Roger Pirates really is!"
Kaido spoke coldly as all the Haki in his body gathered toward his palm and the spiked club in his hand.
"Plenty of people on the sea have wanted to see how strong the Roger Pirates are. But they all regretted it, because it made them feel helplessness, despair, and a gap as vast as the sea!" Zesi said with a cold laugh.
As he spoke, he shifted his sword from a reverse grip to a forward grip. Instantly, an overbearing aura, terrifying might, and cries like a dragon's roar emanated from his blade.
Streams of sword energy poured from Zesi's sword and body, gathering around him and taking the form of a giant dragon that wheeled and roared!
"A dragon? I'm the real dragon! I'm Kaido of the Beasts! One dragon is all there needs to be!" Seeing the dragon roars surrounding Zesi and the flood dragon flickering in and out of view behind him, Kaido spoke with an utterly furious expression, as though he had been greatly provoked and challenged.
"Bagua Thunder!"
"Azure Dragon's Roar: Dragon Battles in the Wild!"
Both shouted at the same time and charged at each other.
Strength, speed!
Thunder Bagua was a move that combined ultimate speed with ultimate strength.
It was a terrifying move that pushed Kaido's strength and speed to their limits.
A spiked club came swinging, lightning flickering over it and Armament Haki howling around it.
It was utterly terrifying!
Zesi's Azure Dragon's Roar: Dragon Battles in the Wild, meanwhile, was an even more wondrous move.
The swordsmen of this world-even Mihawk, the World's Greatest Swordsman-sent their sword-energy slashes straight out.
Their strengths lay in speed and power.
But in Zesi's understanding, sword energy flowed freely, could be hard or soft, and carried sword intent in every direction.
After Zesi learned swordsmanship from Rayleigh, he combined his mastery of slashes, Haki, and his Devil Fruit to create Azure Dragon's Roar, a sword move that likewise traveled straight ahead with overwhelming force.
But through constant battles over the years,
his swordsmanship, strength, and Haki had continued to improve, and he had developed his own understanding of the way of the sword.
He incorporated descriptions of swords and sword energy from wuxia novels, along with his own insights into the way of the sword, to create several more moves.
Together with the first move, Azure Dragon's Roar: Grasp the Sword, they were collectively called Azure Dragon's Roar Swordsmanship.
Azure Dragon's Roar: Dragon Battles in the Wild was one of those moves.
This move combined hardness and softness, blending yin and yang.
With a single swing, dozens of flood dragons formed from sword energy followed.
Some of these flood dragons were overwhelmingly fierce, while others were yielding and bone-eroding.
These flood dragons were also imbued with the powerful Tremor-Tremor Fruit's power.
As the flood dragons wheeled and fought, their vibrations formed a distorted domain.
It made anyone caught within feel as though they had sunk into a mire, while waves of vibrational pressure assailed them from every direction.
For an ordinary person, this Vibration Domain alone would have been enough to crush them to pieces.
Even Kaido of the Beasts found his body severely restricted.
He could only rely on Thunder Bagua's absolute strength and speed to defend himself and fight.
But Dragon Battles in the Wild combined hardness and softness, blending yin and yang.
Thunder Bagua possessed overwhelming force. Against fierce attacks, it could still defend, meeting force with force.
But against the yielding, bone-eroding attacks that coiled around it, that force was like a blow striking empty air. The yielding flood-dragon sword energy wound around the spiked club and surged up along it.
At once, Zesi's sword energy left enormous sword wounds across Kaido's body.
Kaido's expression changed.