Chapter 37

"Wait a second... wait, wait, wait!"

John hurriedly tried to stop him, but Maron ignored him and attacked.

Clack, clack, clack, clack!

With a sound like mechanical gears turning, Maron's right hand transformed into a Gatling gun, its rotating barrels aimed at John.

John's eyes widened. The next second, he was met by countless bullets flying straight at him.

The powerful barrage tore through the buildings behind him, shattering the trees along the street and cracking the ground.

The pirates who had been eagerly watching nearby were caught in the crossfire and scrambled for cover. Some failed to dodge in time and were torn to pieces by the bullets.

Maron looked different now.

An oversized pair of goggles covered his face. Their lenses were translucent blue, with streams of data flashing across them.

A silver-white halo hovered above his head, its edges emitting a faint red glow.

A pair of metallic wings had sprouted from his back.

The transformation of his right arm into a Gatling gun extended up to his shoulder and chest. Nearly half his body looked as though it had been peeled open, exposing its mechanical structure.

He could sense the unusually active Reishi in the air around him, like invisible sprites.

He could gather the Reishi, convert it into fixed Reishi bullets, and fire them through the weapon his body had transformed into.

Other skills might take time to practice and control, but Reishi Gathering was an ability Quincy mastered naturally. It was the foundation of all their techniques.

"How do you like that, John? Under my firepower, all a guy like you can do is scurry for cover!"

The muzzle flashes lit up Maron's face. With a cigar still clenched between his teeth, a gentleman's hat on his head, and a suit on his body, he now looked every bit the gangster.

John could only use his Observation Haki at full strength and do his best to dodge the Reishi bullets pursuing him.

When he absolutely couldn't dodge, he used metal to take the hits.

The surroundings were a complete mess. Who knew how many buildings had been destroyed? Gunsmoke filled the air, making it look as though a fog had descended.

Damn it! That guy actually became a Quincy!

John cursed inwardly, then quickly remembered that Maron had joined Kaya.

In other words, Maron might have become like Loki, possessing very strange abilities and being extremely troublesome to fight.

He wanted to just concede, but the gunfire was too loud. Even if he spoke, Maron would only pretend not to hear him.

He thought he was really unlucky. Everyone he had crossed lately was a Quincy, when all he wanted was money and to collect lots and lots of treasure...

Treasure?!

John thought of something, and his eyes suddenly lit up.

That's right! I don't have any grudge with Kaya. Judging by how he accepts anyone, even I should be able to join him, right?

After all, even someone like Maron, who had nearly been killed by Ochoku, had been chosen to become a Quincy.

"Magnetic Current Great Waterfall!"

John activated his ability, drawing countless iron objects toward him and turning them into waves of metal that crashed outward in every direction.

Like a flood, the attack brutally swallowed everything around it, leveling it all.

Now there was nothing obstructing the space between him and Maron.

"Maron, listen to me..."

John suddenly fell silent because Maron had taken off his coat, exposing his entire upper body.

He could see that Maron's wounds had healed long ago. When the bandages fell away, they revealed not flesh, but several rows of pitch-black openings.

"Fire!" Maron said coldly.

Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh, whoosh!!

Countless missiles fired at once! The flames they spewed lit up the world, and every missile trailed a long plume like a meteor.

There were too many to count, and they weren't even aimed at anyone in particular. The target was the entire area.

"Bastard!"

John cursed under his breath. He had no time to think about anything else and threw everything he had into defending against the attack.

A continuous series of explosions followed!

People elsewhere on Hachinosu could feel it too, the faint rumble of the earth shaking.

Over the battlefield of flames and thick smoke, even the sky changed color. It looked as though the sun had set, dim as dusk.

Whew~

Maron opened his mouth and breathed out a cloud of scorching white smoke that curled around his face.

His Schrift and his ability complemented each other.

Combined, they allowed him to alter his attack form according to the actual battle and develop a variety of methods.

He didn't really intend to kill John. Their fight was just for fun, and neither of them would take it seriously.

But if someone died, things would get troublesome.

Ultimately, he had been in a terrible mood lately, and John had happened to put himself in the line of fire.

As the explosions died down, Maron surveyed the battlefield.

The spectators were gone, though he could see a few corpses beneath the collapsed buildings.

Directly behind Maron, beneath the only building still standing, John quietly appeared. He had circled around there at some point.

John held a long spear fashioned from compacted metal. Its black spearhead was long, narrow, and sharp, like an oversized ice pick.

He tapped his toes against the ground, then suddenly lunged forward, his whole body becoming like an arrow.

Maron turned, but he was too slow.

John drove the spear into Maron's body! The impact forced Maron backward.

"Got you!" John grinned.

But his smile quickly froze.

Maron was still staring at him expressionlessly, his gaze calm, as if asking whether he had done anything.

John noticed that no blood flowed from where the spearhead had struck Maron, and he hadn't even felt it pierce flesh.

"How... is that possible?!"

"Surprised you didn't pierce my stomach? Did you really think I hadn't noticed you?"

Maron's voice carried a hint of mockery. On his abdomen, where he had taken John's steel spearhead head-on, a layer of blue-green branching patterns had appeared on his skin.

Blut Vene!

In the collision with John's Armament Haki-coated attack, Blut Vene had taken the entire blow!

At that moment, Maron raised his hand. His fist bore the same branching patterns. That was Spiritual Power, but it wasn't resting on the surface; it was flowing through his blood vessels.

"Blut Arterie!" Maron threw a punch, sending John flying backward like a rag doll and straight through a building.

Now not a single building nearby had been spared, and John was buried under rubble and broken wood.

Maron looked at his hand. It was stained with a little blood that had splashed onto it when John spat blood from the blow.

He took a handkerchief from his jacket pocket and leisurely wiped his fingers.

Then he pulled his coat closed and left with his hands in his pockets.

No sooner had Maron left than John crawled out from under the collapsed building, covered in dust.

"That bastard Maron! Was he showing off his new power to me?!" John was furious. His injuries weren't serious, but he had lost all face.

He realized that if things kept going this way, he would soon be unable to get by in the Rocks Pirates.

His eyes flickered, and in the end, he lowered his head and walked away.