The white sphere of quake-energy that had formed around the blade of Edward Newgate's bisento shrieked.
The sphere expanded, glowing with blinding intensity that threatened dim the sun. The air surrounding the Emperor visibly warped.
Admiral Akainu did not feel awe. He felt a profound, volcanic surge of insulted fury.
"Why you...!"
TSSSSS.
The Red Dog planted his boots firmly onto the fractured permafrost, the ice instantly vaporizing into steam beneath his feet.
His entire right side expanded, bubbling and churning as he channeled every ounce of his hatred, his dogma, and his Devil Fruit into a single, apocalyptic strike.
He would turn this old man into black charcoal!
"You arrogant relic!" Akainu roared, his voice cracking with demonic rage.
"Do you think tricks will save your wretched pirates?! I will burn you and your 'sons' to cinders!"
"INUGAMI!..."
"GUREN!!!" (Dog God Crimson Lotus!)
THRUST.
Akainu thrust his arm forward, unleashing a massive, terrifying wave of pure magma shaped like a snarling, multi-headed hound.
GRAAH.
The molten beast roared, the ambient temperature spiking so violently that the surrounding air caught fire.
Beside him, Admiral Aokiji did not hesitate. Recognizing the apocalyptic threat gathering on Whitebeard's blade, the ice-man pushed his own powers to the limit.
"Ice Block:..".
"AVALANCHE!"
SLAM.
KRR-KRR-KRR-KRR-KRRRRRR!
Aokiji slammed both of his Ice Gloves into the ground, summoning a colossal, towering tidal wave of hyper-dense ice. The glacier surged forward alongside Akainu's magma, a perfect, paradoxical union of absolute zero and absolute boiling point, entirely intended to crush the Emperor into dust before he could swing his weapon.
But Edward Newgate did not aim his bisento at the Admirals.
He didn't aim at the magma hound, or at the glacier.
He aimed at it to the ground. He was going to destroy it.
"GURARARARARA!"
With a roar that tore his own vocal cords, Whitebeard brought the massive, vibrating bisento down in a devastating, vertical cleave.
"SHIMA... "
"YURASHI!" (Island Shaking!)
CLEAVE.
The supreme grade blade struck the ice at his feet.
For a single, suspended second, nothing happened.
The world seemed to hold its breath.
And then.
And then Marineford broke in two.
KRA-KOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!
The impact shattered the ground and the island opened.
B-B-B-B-BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!!!
A colossal, jagged fissure violently tore open directly in front of Whitebeard.
Calling it a crack would be an understatement; it looked more like an abyss.
The fissure raced horizontally across the entire width of the island at supersonic speed. It tore through the central plaza, effortlessly cleaved through the reinforced stone foundations of the Marine fortress, and shattered the thick perimeter walls.
CRACK. CRACK. BOOM!
The deafening sound of the earth screaming in agony drowned out the roar of the cannons and the cries of the dying.
Akainu's magma hound and Aokiji's glacier were caught directly in the epicenter of the tectonic rupture. The very ground beneath the Admirals' elemental attacks simply ceased to exist. The magma and the ice were violently sucked down into the expanding, bottomless canyon, swallowed by the churning, black ocean water rushing up from the depths to fill the void.
"WHAT IN THE NAME OF JUSTICE—?!" Vice Admiral Doberman screamed, throwing himself backward as the ground beneath his feet violently gave way.
"GYEAAAAAHHH!!"
"N-NOOOO!"
"SAVE MEEEEEE"
Ordinary soldiers had long lost hope. Many were killed in the apocalypse.
Thousands of Marine infantrymen, caught on the fault line, plummeted into the abyss, their screams echoing off the sheer, vertical cliffs of newly exposed bedrock. The entire northern front of the island was violently, geographically separated from the southern bay.
Marineford had literally been cleaved in two by a man.
On one side of the massive, impassable chasm stood the World Government: the towering Marine Headquarters, Admiral Akainu, Admiral Aokiji, tens of thousands of trapped infantrymen, and Edward Newgate himself.
On the other side of the chasm, closer to the frozen bay where the pirate galleons were anchored, stood the retreating Straw Hats, Silvers Rayleigh, and the vast majority of the Whitebeard Pirate commanders.
BOOM! THUD.
SKRRRR!
The shockwave from the island's bisection threw Luffy, Ace, Zoro, and Sanji onto their faces. They skidded across the ice, the violent tremors making it entirely impossible to stand.
"O-oye..." Sanji's cigarette broke in two as he looked behind.
People could do that.
"DON'T FUCKING JO-!"
Meanwhile.
High in the sky, Fleet Admiral Sengoku paused his desperate, frantic melee with the full-body Armament Haki wearing False Deity.
He looked down, his golden eyes widening in sheer, unadulterated horror as he watched the symbol of his authority—the island of Marineford itself—split perfectly in half.
Two Admirals hadn't been enough.
"HAVE YOU GONE MAD?" Sengoku's voice boomed from the heavens, cracking with unprecedented panic and outrage.
"WHITEBEARD?!"
Floating fifty feet away from the Buddha, Light Yagami wiped a streak of blood from his chin. His black coat whipped violently in the hurricane-force winds generated by the tectonic shift below.
He looked down at the massive canyon separating the two armies.
"Power!"
"This is power!" Light murmured to himself.
Though... this move. How many people died as collateral because of him?
The old man's bad Karma was continuously steadily increasing at the top of his head. He was very admirable, sure. But...
Light wasn't particularly pleased with the old man.
'This overpowered senile old man...'
'Does he think I'm on his side?'
Zoom!
BAM!
He spun his pitch-black saber, the Armament Haki instantly re-coating his bruised ribs.
Light utilized Soru, blurring back into Sengoku's guard, forcing the Fleet Admiral to entirely abandon his focus on the fleeing pirates just to survive the False Deity's relentless, supersonic onslaught.
"P-Pops...?!"
Down on the safe side of the chasm, Marco the Phoenix pulled himself up from the ice. The First Commander's blue and yellow flames flickered erratically.
He stared across the fifty-yard-wide abyss of churning seawater, his eyes locking onto the towering, solitary figure of his captain standing on the opposite cliff edge.
"Why..." Marco breathed, his voice trembling.
Edward Newgate stood at the precipice. Blood poured freely from his chest, his mouth, and his half-singed face. The supreme grade bisento rested heavily in his hand. He was a canvas of catastrophic, lethal injuries, but his broad back was completely straight.
He did not look at the thousands of Marines broken behind him.
He looked across the chasm, his golden eyes locking onto his sons.
SWOOOSH!
The wind howled through the canyon, carrying the Emperor's final, absolute decree.
"MY SONS!"
Whitebeard's voice boomed across the abyss. It was a command given with the heavy, unconditional love of a father who had finally realized his life's dream.
"MY FINAL CAPTAIN'S ORDER!"
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A/N: Some things never change. F.
{Read 30+ chapters at patreon(dot)com/Glivaria}