Blood sprayed through the air.
Kuma staggered back, his face going pale. A searing pain burned in his palm—a sensation he hadn't felt since eating the Paw-Paw Fruit.
"Attack!"
"Subdue the prisoner!"
"He's already wounded!"
...
World Government soldiers and CP agents drew their weapons and surged toward him.
The instant Bartholomew Kuma appeared, these ruthless executioners—tempered by brutal training—had moved without hesitation. Ginny was already seized, pinned under the muzzles of countless rifles. Shackled and injured, she was nothing but a helpless, living target.
There was no way for Kuma to simply whisk her away.
Shadows darted forward as figures executed Soru, the Rokushiki speed technique, with crisp, practiced precision.
Gritting his teeth, Kuma dropped into a low, sumo-like stance. His hands blurred with inhuman speed, striking out again and again like phantom limbs.
"Fierce Pressure Cannon!"
His bloodstained paw flashed into afterimages, launching a storm of bear paw-shaped shockwaves that tore through the CP agents in an instant.
As though an invisible force had punched clean through their insides, the agents groaned as one and were flung backward, blood spewing from their mouths.
But even as they fell, a suffocating killing intent surged in from behind Kuma.
His scalp prickled. Without turning, he pivoted, teeth clenched, and drove out a palm.
"Ursus Shock!"
A massive bear paw shockwave erupted and slammed into the Western sword hacking down from above, detonating in a cataclysmic blast.
BOOM!
A deafening explosion ripped through the air. Amid twisted flame and thick black smoke, Kuma's huge frame was blasted backward, his feet plowing a trench hundreds of meters long into the earth.
"I won't allow you to rescue them."
Saint Michael shot from the smoke like a silver-white comet, appearing above Kuma in the blink of an eye. With a sneer, he brought his blade down.
Blood vessels bulged crimson in Kuma's eyes. His figure vanished.
SHING!
A silver-white slash carved across the island, nearly cleaving it in two. The colossal blade of force ripped open the ground and split the distant sea.
A fracture several kilometers long, smooth as glass, cut through the ocean. Seawater roared into the gap with a thunderous crash.
Saint Michael's cold smirk deepened. Almost the instant Kuma disappeared with his Paw-Paw teleportation, the Celestial Dragon moved, as fast as lightning.
Clang!
Ten meters from Ginny, Kuma was violently forced back into existence by a frigid sword glow.
The silver-haired Celestial Dragon appeared in front of him like a ghost, lunging forward with his rapier.
"The Paw-Paw Fruit's teleportation is certainly fast, but in your situation, your intentions are far too easy to read."
As he drove Kuma back, layer upon layer of fresh wounds opening up with each clash, Saint Michael kept talking, his slim blade cutting in with effortless precision. A sinister crimson light flickered in his eyes, his tone light and almost bored.
His gaze held lazy contempt, as if this entire battle were nothing more than a trivial diversion.
"Sometimes I really can't tell. Are humans naive... or just stupid?"
"Even knowing that trying to rescue someone might drag them into ruin, they still rush forward to die."
He glanced sidelong at Ginny, who was struggling uselessly under the World Government guards' grip.
"Of course, true despair isn't death."
Kuma ignored the mockery. He didn't say a word. But the tempo of his teleportation spiked, and his complexion grew even paler.
His figure flickered again and again, using the Paw-Paw Fruit to slip and reappear, trying to force his way through the Celestial Dragon's blockade, edging closer and closer to Ginny.
Yet every attempt ended in failure.
Each teleportation route was read and cut off in advance by the languid, scornful Celestial Dragon.
To an outside observer, two phantoms—one black, one white—flashed over the ground and through the air, weaving a relentless dance of pursuit and evasion.
Bartholomew Kuma looked as if he were deliberately throwing himself onto Saint Michael's rapier, his massive body collecting more wounds with every clash.
In less than twenty seconds, he was covered in cuts, like a man dipped in blood.
Slowly, Kuma's eyes went completely bloodshot.
At that moment, Michael suddenly let out a sigh.
"So in the end, you're just another idiot, little human bug..."
"I thought you might have others coming with you."
"But it seems you just charged in here on a whim to throw your life away alone."
He continued to press Kuma back with his sword in one hand. With the other, he pulled a Military Den Den Mushi from his pocket.
"Drop stealth mode. It's obvious he has no support."
One second...
Two seconds...
No response.
Michael's brows drew together, his voice icing over.
"Answer me before I lose my temper."
Then a voice answered.
Strictly speaking, it wasn't just the Den Den Mushi in Saint Michael's hand that spoke.
That voice echoed from the Den Den Mushi and from the sky above at the same time.
"No, it's you who has no support."
The moment he heard it, Saint Michael's pupils contracted.
Boom! Boom!
Two pale shapes dropped from the clouds in rapid succession, slamming into the ground with bone-shaking force.
Dust and smoke billowed upward.
The sudden shift froze Saint Michael mid-strike. The World Government troops around him, already tense, turned toward the impact point with stunned, uncertain eyes.
As the dust cleared, the sight before them rooted them to the spot. Ice crawled up their spines, and the color drained from their faces.
They were two corpses.
They wore World Noble suits, a variation similar to Saint Michael's own, their faces blurred beneath blood and gore. Gaping holes yawned in their chests, as if some savage beast had torn out their hearts with its claws.
"Saint Lujes!"
"And Saint Mileriu!"
"Members of the Knights of God!"
"How is this possible?!"
"..."
The CP agents and soldiers gasped in unison, scalps prickling as they stared up at the bodies.
High above, two towering figures stood shoulder to shoulder, their immense forms pushing past the bounds of human proportion.
Broad, ominous black cloaks hid their faces, but a crushing aura of dread rolled off them in waves.
From beneath their wide sleeves, their right hands hung in the open, stained red with blood. Their fingers remained slightly curled, blood still dripping from the tips.
That same overwhelming, domineering aura—
Dragon's Claw.
"The Knights of God really are monsters... Every last one of them."
One of the cloaked figures chuckled, the sharp line of his jaw tilting as the corner of his mouth twisted into a vicious grin.
"...They've wasted a full minute of my time."
To be continued...