Kizaru flickered through the sky like a yellow star, blinking again and again as he dodged Whiteflame's bullets… He could feel how abnormal the Armament Haki on each bullet was—if he took a direct hit, the consequences would be unimaginable!
"To use Armament Haki this recklessly… how long do you think you can keep that up?"
Kizaru wasn't in any hurry to attack.
He knew everyone's Armament Haki had limits, closely tied to stamina… With Whiteflame going this wild—using Devil Fruit powers on top of ultra-dense Armament Haki—the combined drain on his stamina had to be insane.
Maybe Kizaru wouldn't need to do anything. Whiteflame's strength would plummet on its own from exhaustion, and when that happened, finishing him off would be as easy as blowing dust off his sleeve.
"You don't need to worry about that. At the very least… I can keep it up until you're dead."
Whiteflame replied coolly while raising his "gun" and aiming in a swift motion.
"Being underestimated really stings, you know."
"You think you're the only one who can pull off moves like that?"
Kizaru's figure flashed. This time, he wasn't just evading Whiteflame's attacks—he appeared behind Whiteflame in a burst of speed like a lightning strike!
He extended one finger, pointing at the back of Whiteflame's head.
"Goodbye."
The corner of Kizaru's mouth curled up, and a golden laser burst from his fingertip!
Puff!
Blinding light flashed out, and the golden laser instantly pierced the back of Whiteflame's head, leaving behind a thumb-sized bloody hole.
Speed is weight," Kizaru breathed, as if reminding a student
"Fleet Admiral Sengoku… this is the man you're so afraid of?"
"What a letdown."
As Whiteflame's body toppled forward like a felled tree, face-first onto the deck, Kizaru kept both hands in his pockets, looking down on him with utter disdain.
And then—
Every hair on Kizaru's body stood on end. He felt as if he'd suddenly fallen into a pitch-black room filled wall-to-wall with spikes—all of which were lunging straight at him!
Swish!
Kizaru immediately dispersed into photons, fleeing that spot at light speed!
When he reappeared in midair and reformed his body, he finally saw the source of that deadly threat. Even with an Admiral's composure, his pupils couldn't help but contract sharply.
"You've got to be kidding me…"
More than twenty figures identical to that humanoid bandage monster that had stabbed him earlier appeared, each one taller than the last. Their long, razor claws were already at the spot where he'd just been standing… If Kizaru had been even a tenth of a second slower, he might have been turned into a sieve by those twenty-plus bandaged monsters!
Of course, those monsters alone weren't enough to truly shock Kizaru. After all, none of them possessed Armament Haki, or he would've been finished the moment they appeared.
What really made his eyes narrow was that the bandages on one of those humanoid monsters suddenly unraveled—revealing Whiteflame's figure within!
"How the hell… did he do that?"
Kizaru glanced down at the "Whiteflame" he'd just killed. At that moment, bandages suddenly rose from that corpse as well, gradually wrapping around it and reshaping it into yet another humanoid bandage monster.
Threads whipped over the IBMs' claws, lacquer-black with Armament; Whiteflame couldn't give them minds, but he could sheath them in his Haki.
"Admiral Kizaru, you're hurt."
Whiteflame shifted his gaze, raising his head to look at the floating Kizaru as he spoke calmly.
"You never stop surprising me, do you?"
Kizaru's expression darkened.
His coat of justice was torn at the arm, his suit shredded open. Four savage claw marks gouged across his arm, fresh blood seeping through and staining his sleeve.
Kizaru was injured.
If Sengoku the Buddha were here, his face would definitely be pitch-black.
You had to understand—no matter who Kizaru faced, preserving himself always came first. Even during the Summit War when he went up against Whitebeard, he didn't have a single visible wound on his body. Even Marco the Phoenix's flying kick had been blocked cleanly, leaving him unharmed.
But now, in his clash with Whiteflame, Kizaru was the first one to bleed.
In other words, as an Admiral, not only had he failed to instantly kill or heavily injure his opponent, he'd actually let his own blood stain the battlefield first—this, to Kizaru, was a massive humiliation.
"Hm?"
Suddenly, Kizaru seemed to sense something. His gaze shifted downward.
Whiteflame noticed it too.
"My, my… looks like someone troublesome has come to visit. Whiteflame, you're quite the popular one."
A smirk tugged at Kizaru's lips, and there was a hint of "this should be entertaining" in his eyes.
"So this is the island Boss Kaido mentioned?"
"Damn it! Making me chase you all the way from the New World to the so-called 'Paradise,' then from there to the weakest sea, the East Blue… If you slip away again, I'll just level this island to the ground!"
At the island's shore, a massive pirate ship pulled in.
The flag of the Beasts Pirates fluttered proudly in the wind. At the bow, a stunning woman with long purple hair and a devilishly curvy figure stood in a white fur-beast outfit, two little tiger fangs peeking out when she spoke as she growled:
She was one of the notorious great pirates of the New World—one of the Three Calamities under Kaido of the Beasts. A woman feared by countless people, known as the "Rampaging Tiger," the Wind Calamity Queen!
Among New World pirates, the rumor went that wherever Jack the Drought passed, the land itself would be sucked dry and collapse—hence his title of "Drought."
But even more terrifying than drought was a merciless gale that swept up everything, leaving nothing intact in its wake. Not even wild grass remained rooted—such was the "Wind Calamity."
That was how the Wind Calamity Queen held the third seat in the Beasts Pirates. The Marines had placed a staggering bounty of 1,265,000,000 Beli on her head.
Just from the fact that her bounty exceeded Jack the Drought's by 265,000,000 Beli, you could tell how frightening her strength and brutality were.
"Lady Wind Calamity Queen, look up there—that's Marine Headquarters Admiral Kizaru!"
"And that guy next to him… if I'm not wrong, that must be the bastard who killed Lord Jack the Drought!"
Beside the Wind Calamity Queen, a huge, hulking brute—taller than even her, wearing Beasts Pirates armor and sporting two black demonic horns—spoke up with a fierce look on his face.
"You think I need you to tell me that? You think I'm blind?!"
Wham!
The Wind Calamity Queen lashed out with a kick, sending the big brute flying straight into the sea. After a frantic struggle, he was finally dragged back aboard by the others.
That was the Wind Calamity Queen for you—someone who threw hands at the slightest annoyance, with a temper even worse than Jack the Drought's.
"Dragging me from the New World to Paradise, then from Paradise to this birds-don't-even-shit-on-it wasteland… The one who killed Jack the Drought, you'd better wait right there—I'm going to tear you into tiny little pieces!"
Murderous intent surged in the Wind Calamity Queen's eyes. Her two cute little tiger fangs suddenly elongated into sharp fangs, gleaming with a chilling light.
She leaped, and her body shot up like a spring, soaring instantly over a hundred meters into the air—then came crashing down toward the Nine Dragons!
Boom!
With a thunderous crash, the instant the Wind Calamity Queen landed, the entire Nine Dragons shuddered. From below, it was easy to see the rock under her feet had already cracked. If she'd used any more force, it might have snapped clean in two.
Despite her seemingly light, graceful figure, she possessed ridiculous explosive power—her strength was obvious at a glance.
"My, my… the most unreasonable one under Kaido of the Beasts has arrived. This is going to be fun to watch."
Seeing the Wind Calamity Queen land on the Nine Dragons, Kizaru's eyes sparkled with interest.
He naturally knew exactly why she was here.
After all, the intel Kaido received had been provided by the Marines. Before Kizaru even set out, he already knew that Kaido had sent the Wind Calamity Queen to make trouble for Whiteflame.
He'd thought she'd take a while to get here. The journey from the New World to Paradise, then to the East Blue, wasn't short. Whiteflame had used a flying island to return, so in theory his speed should've been much faster than hers.
He hadn't expected that just as he arrived, the Wind Calamity Queen would show up as well.
Right place, right time, right chaos.
"So you're the bastard who killed Jack?"
The moment she landed, the Wind Calamity Queen's chilling gaze locked onto Whiteflame as she spoke in an icy tone.
"Do you really think that question still needs to be asked?"
Whiteflame replied coolly, his expression completely unshaken in the face of her overwhelming aura.
"So it was you?"
The Wind Calamity Queen's eyes grew razor sharp, as if she wanted to see straight through Whiteflame's soul.
And then, in the next second—
"Ha ha ha! That's great!"
She suddenly changed expressions. All that killing intent vanished without a trace, replaced by an excited, hearty laughter. She reached to her waist, pulled out a gourd, and tossed it at Whiteflame.
Her sudden mood swing didn't surprise Kizaru in the slightest. Whiteflame, on the other hand, frowned slightly, catching the gourd and wondering what she was up to.
"This is a drink from your Queen."
"You should be thanking me for that—thank you for taking out that eyesore Jack the Drought!"
"That idiot—weak as hell yet so damn arrogant. If Boss Kaido hadn't been protecting him, I'd have butchered him long ago myself!"
"But now it's perfect. With him dead, all his territory belongs to me."
Her face twisted again, her eyes turning dark and sinister, sharp as a hawk's, as surging killing intent spilled out.
And then, a second later, it vanished again like it had never been there.
"Drink up. Think of it as my farewell drink to you. Boss Kaido ordered me to kill you—you're dead for sure… Being able to have a sip of wine before you die is a privilege most people would kill for, you know?"
The Wind Calamity Queen looked at Whiteflame with the expression of "you should be honored I'm offering you a drink."
She didn't idle either, pulling out another gourd from her waist and tilting her head back to take a huge swig.
She truly embodied the air of a female warlord.
"Not interested."
Whiteflame casually dropped the gourd in his hand.
The instant it hit the deck, Kizaru smiled.
At the same time, a claw wreathed in bloody light lunged toward Whiteflame's head with lightning speed!
"You dare smash this Queen's wine?"
"You bastard! You must be tired of living!"
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