At this moment, Doflamingo stepped forward. He felt a true necessity to make an appearance. After all, the very reason for this great brawl, this gathering of power, was due to his suggestion.
However, unlike Doflamingo's usual flamboyant and arrogant demeanor, this time was different. He slowly walked out from the ranks of the executives with a very solemn expression, his face devoid of his signature manic grin.
This change in attitude made everyone's gazes turn strange. His subordinates, Monet and Baby-5, were stunned, exchanging confused glances. They didn't understand why their Young Master would step forward so seriously.
Fortunately, Kaido broke the tension.
"Oh, Doffy?" Kaido's voice rumbled from above. "Who are you planning to challenge?"
This clarified things for the onlookers. Doflamingo, an outsider to the crew's hierarchy, was appearing here to test his mettle against the Beasts Pirates' elite.
At this moment, Doflamingo's brows were tightly furrowed behind his sunglasses. He was running a rapid threat assessment.
His gaze didn't linger on the Tobi Roppo at all; they were beneath his notice for this purpose. Instead, his eyes swept directly toward the All-Stars: King the Conflagration, Jack the Drought, and the newly appointed Lightning Disaster, Enelu.
He immediately discovered a very troublesome problem: he couldn't find an opponent he was confident he could defeat.
King was out of the question. Even if the Lunarian hadn't awakened Conqueror's Haki, his physical stats and flames made him an opponent Doffy couldn't hope to beat in a spar. The fact that this man held the position of the Beasts Pirates' Vice-Governor, with a bounty of 1,390,000,000, said everything that needed to be said.
As for Jack, Doffy quickly dismissed him as well. In the past, during his underworld dealings with the Beasts Pirates, Doflamingo had many encounters with the Mammoth captain. He knew Jack was a madman who lacked any sense of restraint. If they fought, Jack would likely lose control, turning a spar into a death match. Regardless of who won or lost, it would be difficult to explain to Kaido, and they still had business to conduct in the future.
Looking at it this way, there was only one viable option.
The Beasts Pirates' Fourth Calamity. The user of the Logia Goro Goro no Mi (Rumble-Rumble Fruit). The "Lightning Disaster," Enelu.
Doflamingo was not underestimating the Goro Goro no Mi. Its destructive power was terrifying; Doffy vividly remembered the scenes from the broadcast of the Marineford War, where lightning rained down like divine judgment.
But Doffy remembered one crucial detail very clearly.
Three months ago, when they first met, Kaido had explicitly stated that Enelu was not Doflamingo's opponent. At that time, Enelu had not yet mastered Haki.
In just three months, even if the Skylander had awakened basic Armament Haki, he couldn't possibly have bridged the gap to challenge Doffy. Doflamingo was a veteran Warlord who had mastered his fruit to the point of Awakening and also possessed the rare Conqueror's Haki.
This is the safe bet, Doflamingo thought.
Having made his decision, Doflamingo raised his head and looked directly at the ear-lobed man.
"I feel that Mr. Enelu and I have some kind of connection," Doflamingo said, his signature grin returning slightly. "Perhaps we can have a little exchange."
"Oh!"
At this, everyone's gazes snapped toward Enelu and Doflamingo.
Enelu's eyes lit up instantly. He had been waiting for this.
"Interesting," Enelu smirked, tapping his staff on the ground. "No problem. I accept your challenge!"
Enelu remembered Doflamingo clearly as well. Doflamingo was the second true "expert" of the Blue Sea he had encountered, right after Big Brother Kaido. He remembered the sting of Kaido telling him he wasn't strong enough to beat the "Joker" back then. He also knew that Doflamingo possessed the same "Color of the Supreme King" as Kaido.
Perfect, Enelu thought. I can use this guy to verify just how much I have grown during my hellish training.
"Alright then!" Kaido roared, sensing the excitement in the air. "The next battle will be Enelu versus Doflamingo!"
— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —
The moment Kaido's words fell, the air crackled.
Enelu's body dissolved into pure electricity. With a flash of blue light, he descended onto the battlefield, reappearing instantly opposite Doflamingo.
Enelu held a new weapon in his hand, a heavy golden staff he had forged and named "God's Judgment." He looked at the Warlord with a provocative grin.
"Hey, Doflamingo," Enelu asked, twirling the staff. "Do you want me to limit myself? Should I not use my Rumble-Rumble Fruit abilities?"
Doflamingo's brows furrowed slightly at the arrogance, but he quickly relaxed, his smile widening.
"No... no need," Doflamingo chuckled. "In our battle, of course, all means can be used. After all, I am very confident in my Devil Fruit power too!"
"Is that so?" Enelu narrowed his eyes. "Since that's the case, I won't waste any time. I'll make the first move! God's Judgment!!!"
Apparently, Enelu wanted to emulate Page One's instant victory. He raised his golden staff high. A bolt of lightning shot from the tip directly into the storm clouds above.
BOOM!
The sky tore open. A pillar of lightning as thick as a bucket crashed down from the heavens, aiming to incinerate Doflamingo where he stood.
Seeing this, Doflamingo's movements were not slow at all. He lightly leaped backward, his feather coat fluttering.
"A familiar move," Doflamingo mocked. "But I'm not like Blackbeard or those unprepared fools you caught off guard before!"
The huge lightning pillar struck the ground where he had just been standing, creating a dazzling explosion of white light and scorching the earth black.
"Is that so?"
Before Doflamingo could land, Enelu's voice appeared right behind him. The Logia user had transformed into electricity to move at blinding speed.
"Speed is mass," Enelu whispered. "Lightning Kick!"
BOOM!
Enelu's foot, wreathed in dazzling high-voltage lightning, slammed into Doflamingo's back.
However, Doflamingo didn't try to dodge.
Enelu instantly understood why. The moment his kick connected, the sensation was wrong. It didn't feel like flesh and bone.
From the "body" of Doflamingo, countless invisible white threads exploded outward. They wrapped around Enelu's leg and swept toward him in the air, piercing through his elemental form like needles.
Enelu, however, smiled as if he felt nothing. He allowed the threads to pass through his lightning body.
"You can actually create a clone with threads?" Enelu asked, impressed.
"Just a small trick," Doflamingo's voice came from the ground below. "Your Observation Haki is also very strong to notice the difference so quickly."
At some point, the real Doflamingo had maneuvered to the ground. The figure Enelu had kicked was a "Black Knight," a string clone. The clone dropped from the sky and landed next to the real body.
Suddenly, two Doflamingos stood on the battlefield.
"Thread Knight!"
This scene greatly interested the high-ranking executives of the Beasts Pirates.
"He can actually develop a Paramecia Devil Fruit to this extent?" Who's-Who muttered.
"Joker actually has some real ability," Sasaki admitted grudgingly.
Whoosh!
Seeing this, Enelu, who was floating in the sky in his elemental form, found his gaze becoming more intense.
"Interesting. Interesting," Enelu laughed, the electricity crackling around him intensifying. "It seems I'll have to get a little serious now."
"Fufufufufu! Me too!" Doflamingo laughed back, his fingers twitching as he prepared his strings.
The two looked at each other, and the atmosphere instantly became tense.
"Lightning Banquet!"
"God Thread!"
In the sky, Enelu transformed fully into dazzling lightning. Countless jagged bolts erupted from his body, turning into streaks of electricity that rained down like a storm.
Below, Doflamingo was not afraid. Dense threads flew out from his clone, weaving together to form white arrows of compressed string. He launched them upward to intercept the lightning.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
Lightning and white arrows continuously intersected in the air. They collided with deafening cracks, creating dazzling sparks that illuminated the gloomy sky with strobe-light intensity.
The dazzling light forced the watching captains to squint their eyes, shielding them from the glare. The continuous explosions filled the air with a roaring sound that drowned out the thunder.
"Hey, hey," Basil Hawkins muttered, watching the magnificent battle through the gaps in his fingers. "Is this the strength of a Shichibukai and a Calamity?"
He frowned tightly. It seemed his choice to join was not wrong. The density and speed of these attacks were simply something he couldn't withstand right now. The barrage reminded him of Admiral Kizaru's "Yasakani no Magatama" technique during the war, though on a smaller scale.
More importantly, it was clear to everyone that neither of them had truly gotten serious yet.
As the explosions faded, Doflamingo twitched his five fingers.
Countless thin threads emerged from the Thread Knight's right hand. They twisted and condensed into a single thick rope, a "super whip" made of thousands of compressed strings.
The Thread Knight launched itself into the air, rapidly approaching Enelu. As it swung its right hand, the whip was coated in jet-black Armament Haki.
"Super Whip!"
The Haki-clad whip lashed out, aiming to coil around Enelu and strangle him.
"Interesting!"
Enelu, floating in the sky, saw the Haki attack coming. A mysterious smile played on his lips. He spun his golden staff with one hand, while he raised the other, forming a pistol gesture with his fingers.
His thumb pointed at the approaching Thread Knight. Blue lightning flashed on the tip of his thumb, condensing rapidly into a coin-sized ball of black, crackling energy.
It wasn't just lightning. It was magnetism.
"Micro Electromagnetic Cannon!"
------------------------
For Advance chapters visit : patreon.com/Mythic_Muse