Chapter 826: Traits of the Super Saiyan
Whoosh!
The bright yellow flames shifted into a vibrant crimson, burning with furious intensity as an astonishing surge of life force rapidly evaporated into the air.
The Ten Phoenix Nirvana Technique took effect once more, and Kaito Shirogane began his return from the clutches of death.
The raging flames not only reconstituted his physical vessel in its entirety, but also freed him from the state of existential collapse that threatened to dissolve his body into primordial soup.
Son Goku's cataclysmic strike had fundamentally obliterated the near-death Kaito Shirogane. Now, revived through this pseudo-True Phoenix treasure art, he was completely free of his prior physical afflictions.
[Ten Phoenix Nirvana Technique successfully activated]
[You have made contact with the Concept: Immortality. Comprehension: 23%]
Kaito Shirogane's gaze swept across his surroundings, instantly taking in the three God Kings who radiated overwhelming divine majesty. Each had already expanded their divine domains. Standing closest to him was a burly elder with a bare torso, golden runes cascading across his skin.
A circular halo of pristine divine light hovered behind the elder's back, his sheer presence swelling to such an extent that it naturally warped and crushed the surrounding space.
Elemental lightning circled entirely around his divine domain, scouring the immediate area of any foreign elements and rendering the execution of most conventional abilities impossible within this perimeter.
Yet Kaito Shirogane merely glanced past these three deities, whose collective strength visibly surpassed that of the previous Thunder God Thor by an entire order of magnitude. His eyes came to rest upon a familiar silhouette standing with his back turned to him.
Pitch-black shadows cloaked the figure, making him appear as one whom light could never touch.
The terrifying burst of Conqueror's Haki unleashed just moments ago had traveled thousands of kilometers to cleanly shatter the incoming attack from the God King of Thunder.
Black King Luffy!
When Kaito Shirogane first encountered him, he had been exceedingly weak, incapable of even comprehending the true nature of Black King Luffy's power.
Absolute Haki, total mastery over the power of practically every Devil Fruit—he had exhibited absolute, overwhelming dominance in that world.
Yet that was during the early stages of Kaito's journey, when the strongest Reincarnators present were merely high-tier combatants. Kaito had only sensed Black King Luffy's terrifying strength without being able to perceive the foundational roots of that power.
Now, things were entirely different. Kaito Shirogane had begun touching authentic, pinnacle-tier forces. He had finally earned the capacity to interact with beings of this echelon.
Kaito Shirogane closed his eyes. When he opened them once more, they had reverted to their kaleidoscopic, multi-colored brilliance.
A familiar, chilling presence began to skyrocket. The three God Kings reacted instantaneously, expanding their respective divine domains in tandem, pinning Kaito Shirogane directly at the convergence point.
Under the ferocious compression of raw divine power, the invisible Three-Part Revolving Force field around Kaito's body was forced to manifest.
What should have been invisible kinetic force took on distinct hues under the competing pressures of solar, lunar, and thunder divine powers. It materialized as a translucent, spherical barrier encircling Kaito, buckling and caving inward under the agonizing pressure.
Kaito Shirogane's eyes turned icy. He cast a cold, sharp glance at the three elite combatants of the Void Paradise.
"Is this your decision?"
Apollo's solar eyes locked directly with those multi-colored irises. He discovered that even peering at them from such close proximity, he could not fathom the underlying truth behind those eyes.
Those pupils seemed tethered to an infinite ocean of information, with vast, churning maelstroms perpetually rotating within their depths.
To see through those eyes, one would have to decipher the endless streams of data cycling inside that vortex—a feat that was virtually impossible.
Apollo was merely a God King of the sovereign tier; he was not omniscient or omnipotent.
Yet, having been deployed as Third Sequence God Kings by the Void Paradise, it was naturally impossible for them to simply back down.
When all was said and done, though this martial artist had demonstrated power capable of overwhelming ordinary Third Sequence combatants during his clash with the Saiyan, he remained hopelessly far from the Second Sequence.
He still occupied the very same tier as the three of them.
Furthermore, while the True Eyes of the Sun could not completely decipher the origin of his power, Apollo thoroughly understood the explosive mechanics behind the Kaio-Ken and the Manifestation of the Cosmic Heavenly Deity.
Aside from those bizarre mystic eyes and a tier of martial arts that transcended the divine realm, this God of Martial Arts relied on an enhancement framework built around abilities that multiplied all base attributes across the board.
Such doctrines were not unheard of in the Void Paradise; the War God and Strength God pantheons possessed similar paths, though none pushed it to such a radical extreme.
The man's abilities provided an all-around, flawless multiplicative boost, stacking together to grant him a leap in combat power across entire operational tiers.
Yet, based on the fundamental laws of energy, multiplicative enhancements of this nature inflicted an exponentially scaling strain upon the physical vessel.
No matter how robust a Divine Body might be, it could hardly withstand pressure that multiplied exponentially. Most divine scions and True Gods who walked this path perished when their divine vessels shattered during extreme battles.
Even if this God of Martial Arts was an ace nurtured with every resource the fragile Space could muster, it was impossible for him to possess the authority to unleash such power without limit.
If that were the case, that Space would have mass-produced and deployed legions of Reincarnators of his archetype.
The divine light behind Apollo did not form the conventional disc of an ordinary True God; instead, it resembled a blazing sun crowned with undulating tongues of fire.
Beneath that scorching solar power lay cold, calculating logic.
He felt no fear.
Luna placed absolute trust in Apollo. Without needing divine telepathy, she instantly grasped his tactical intent. Moonlight cascaded violently as a colossal, luminous moon manifested directly in the heavens.
Basking under that lunar glow, Kaito Shirogane felt his own physical power climb. While the Qilin Armor was exceptionally effective, his Silver Wolf Beneath the Moon trait received a massive amplification in this environment.
He could clearly read the mindset of the three God Kings of the Void Paradise. They did not fear him. Unlike the cold, sterile automatons of the Machina Court, these higher lifeforms carrying divine blood possessed a genuine hunger for combat.
Hah.
A faint smile finally curled on Kaito Shirogane's lips. He lightly shook his freshly reattached left arm and spoke toward Luffy: "Black King over there, please wait for me a moment. Rest assured, I won't keep you waiting long."
As his battle lust surged, the Limit-Break Spiral behind his back whirred to life once more. Divine power rippled across his skin, forming intricate, flowing patterns almost identical to those of Apollo's cohort.
The Authority of Ki and Force behind him began condensing into a circular halo of divine light, though its contours remained somewhat jagged and unpolished.
With merely a single glance, he had grasped the operational methodology behind this divine energy. Overlaid atop his Physique of the Primordial Man, a nascent Divine Body began to coalesce.
Simultaneously, a violent aura of Conqueror's Haki, intertwining crimson and pitch-black, began rising from within his frame.
Crack!
Kaito Shirogane suddenly felt the fabric of space shear apart. A tremendous repulsive force erupted, propelling his entire body straight toward the outer atmosphere.
His muscles snapped taut. He reacted in an instant!
In that fleeting microsecond, Black King Luffy had made his move. Yet unlike in the past, when an attack from an entity of this caliber was utterly impossible to counter, Kaito's Martial God's Ultimate Intent responded. He braced his frame, yet the local coordinate space, his Three-Part Revolving Force, and even the ambient divine energies were violently repelled along with him.
A colossal shockwave shaped like an enormous bear's paw encompassed dozens of square kilometers of space.
Black King Luffy's strike had not targeted Kaito Shirogane directly; instead, it had deflected the entire volume of space he occupied.
Because Kaito had sensed the strike in advance, he naturally had the opportunity to evade using Musō Tensei combined with Spirit of the Wind.
Yet he chose not to, because...
BOOM!
A blinding, razor-sharp plane of intermingled golden and black Ki erupted violently from the distant ocean.
In an instant, it cleanly severed everything in its path.
Kaito Shirogane watched without blinking. Strictly speaking, in terms of sheer energetic quality, Ki was an ordinary form of energy.
Yet now, under the leverage of an incomparable, horrifying quantity, it had achieved far more than a simple qualitative change through quantitative accumulation.
Driven by the serious clash of the two Super Saiyans, their Ki had formed an all-consuming tidal wave that drowned reality.
Whether it was the Conqueror's Haki Kaito was preparing to unleash, or the divine domains deployed by the three God Kings to purge foreign forces, everything collapsed and was blown apart by the concussive surge.
Kaito Shirogane had been deflected out of the blast path by Black King Luffy, but the three God Kings enjoyed no such luxury. Aside from the God King of Thunder, who reacted the fastest and transformed into lightning to shoot toward Kaito Shirogane, Apollo and Luna both experienced an immediate crisis.
Their divine domains collapsed and shrank, the vast fields blanketing the sky compressed into fragile zones that clung tightly to their individual Divine Bodies.
They bobbed helplessly like battered skiffs amidst a raging storm.
Their breathing turned erratic. Under this terrifying deluge of Ki, their mental composure frayed. Through their divine senses, they witnessed the two Super Saiyans locked in combat over the distant sea.
Fists collided continuously, releasing wave after wave of golden and black Ki that swept across the world as mere aftershocks of their duel.
Kaito Shirogane found the situation peculiar. He had assumed Black King Luffy came to fight him; after all, during their encounter in the One Piece world, Kaito had been certain Luffy would have killed him if not for Cindy's presence.
Yet now, Black King Luffy had chosen to take his side. With his Limit-Break Spiral active, Kaito pieced the deductions together almost immediately.
Was it because of that former Azure Sky Reincarnator, the vengeful spirit that once inhabited his flesh—the Hand of God, Roland?
Or was it the doing of the Abyssal God and the laws of causality?
Only those two possibilities made sense.
Furthermore, Kaito Shirogane realized that the Black King Association was far from a tightly unified organization. Its members held widely divergent personal agendas.
Black King Clark had directly sealed his Stairway of Eternal Return, whereas Black King Luffy had stepped in to assist him.
Their true objectives remained shrouded in mystery.
Yet these fleeting thoughts lingered in Kaito's mind for only a moment before being tossed aside.
Kaito Shirogane's prism-colored eyes trembled as he voraciously absorbed combat telemetry and informational data. Golden lightning flashed like a spear, piercing through his outer layer of Three-Part Revolving Force.
Yet that dense kinetic field managed to stall the lightning strike for an imperceptible fraction of a second.
That microscopic delay was all Kaito Shirogane needed to fully adapt to the attack without relying on high-multiplier Kaio-Ken.
Crash!
Lightning ripped through Kaito Shirogane's previous position, detonating like a thunderclap in a clear sky.
Arcs of dense electricity carpeted the local space. The God King of Thunder immediately locked onto Kaito Shirogane, who had just used Musō Tensei to evade the strike, the spear of lightning in his hand flaring with blinding brilliance.
Just as the lightning was about to detonate, a pitch-black hand clamped firmly down onto the shaft of the spear.
BOOM!
A colossal, suffocating presence exploded outward.
Kaito Shirogane wore a manic expression, the streaks of multi-colored light trailing from his eyes sparking with raw electricity. He engaged the Sixteen-Fold Kaio-Ken once more.
The crucial difference this time was that he lacked the protection of the Key of Miracles.
Blood-red Ki tore through his pores, sending the Third Star Particles within him cascading into an unbridled frenzy.
The God King of Thunder froze. That anomalous, surging presence forcibly displaced his divine energy, carving out an independent domain directly inside his personal divine territory.
Zzt!
Midst the flickering arcs of electricity, the God King of Thunder's hyper-fast cognitive faculties adjusted, only for another palm to descend toward his face.
He reflexively raised his arm to block, but the lightning spear in his grip shattered instantly.
Crack—BOOM!
Devastating divine thunder detonated indiscriminately in all directions. As one of the most lethal elements in existence, it unleashed a cataclysmic electrical discharge across the local sector.
Yet the sheer crushing force pressing down on his face told the God King that this God of Martial Arts was far from dead. The man possessed extraordinary resistance against lightning!
A terrible elemental matchup!
Hum!
The surrounding atmosphere was blown clean away. Sonic boom clouds linked together as Kaito Shirogane, his hand clamped firmly over the God King of Thunder's face, ignored Apollo and Luna below entirely.
He surged like a missile directly toward the sector where Son Goku and Son Gohan were locked in battle.
The God King of Thunder attempted to disperse his form. He could elementalize his Divine Body at will, yet a wave of crimson and pitch-black Conqueror's Haki erupted from his captor.
That suffocating aura, carrying an absolute trait that suppressed foreign forces, threw his divine energy circulation into complete disarray.
His elementalization was forcibly interrupted. Though he froze for only a split second before his divine halo flared to purge the mimicked Haki, that moment was enough.
The God King of Thunder shattered into electrical currents to escape into the sky, and Kaito Shirogane retracted his left hand. He didn't spare a backward glance at the escaped combatant.
His eyes remained fixed on the sky ahead.
Son Goku, his golden hair cascading down his back in Super Saiyan 3, stood opposite Son Gohan, who was enveloped in pitch-black Ki, his short hair remaining dark while his musculature bulged, radiating an aura of despair and cruelty.
The clash between these two was infinitely more compelling than trading blows with a God of Thunder.
Kaito Shirogane observed Gohan and Goku. Both bore fresh wounds, indicating that their previous exchanges had already reached a lethal tempo.
No matter how reluctant Son Goku was to fight, One-Armed Gohan was pressing the offensive in a state of reckless, self-destructive fury.
Kaito Shirogane cared nothing for the tragic drama driving the Black King. To him, this battle was an absolute goldmine.
He wanted to see it, he wanted to grasp it—that absolute power!
Bang! Bang! Bang!
In a fraction of a millisecond, Son Gohan and Son Goku vanished from sight. Kaito Shirogane's pupils quivered, their kaleidoscopic hues melting into the lustrous sheen of polished gemstones.
The two fighters reappeared in his perception. Yet at that moment, Kaito's body began to wither at an alarming rate, the blood in his ruptured veins rapidly drying up.
The next second, under the bewildered gaze of the God King of Thunder, Kaito Shirogane detonated into a cloud of blood mist.
Then, amidst the violent turbulence of the Third Star Particles, his immortality and instantaneous regeneration engaged simultaneously, driving the evolution of his Physique of the Primordial Man forward once more.
The God King of Thunder clenched his fists. His divine senses flashed with an overwhelming premonition of danger, warning him that intervening right now would invite a catastrophic fate. He chose to hold his ground, watching closely to see what this God of Martial Arts truly intended to accomplish.