Kamui Dimension
Riser remained in front of the suspended screen for another second. The projection reflected the external confrontation with clarity, while the platform beneath his feet remained solid within the absolute void.
'I've seen enough.'
He raised his right hand and closed his fingers. The space ahead contracted into a single point, darkening as if it were being torn from the inside out. The distortion expanded in a spiral, forming a direct portal.
Kamui was activated with absolute precision.
___
Center of the Battle – Mary Geoise
Riser appeared at the exact point between Dragon and Figarland Shamrock. The stone ground beneath his feet cracked the instant he materialized, fractures spreading in an immediate circle.
KRAAAK!
The impact of his arrival kicked up dust and loose fragments around them.
Dragon halted his advance mid-motion. Shamrock froze his blade a few centimeters from the empty space where his opponent had been moments earlier.
Everyone stopped.
The wind spinning around Dragon lost direction and dissipated. Revolutionary soldiers halted their movement. The God's Knights adjusted their posture without advancing.
His presence occupied the physical center of the confrontation.
Dragon took advantage of the interruption.
He stepped back two firm paces, creating immediate distance between himself and Shamrock. His chest rose and fell heavily, sweat running down the side of his face as his control over the wind weakened.
He looked around.
Revolutionary bodies scattered across the stone ground. Some still moved, others no longer did. The difference in power was evident in the placement of the dead.
His gaze landed on Sabo.
The commander's arm was covered in deep cuts, blood running down his forearm and dripping steadily onto the ground. Even so, he remained standing, teeth clenched, trying to reorganize what remained of their forces.
Dragon's breathing was audible.
Shamrock adjusted the blade with a minimal turn of his wrist. The metal sliced through the air as it repositioned, firm and aligned for the next advance.
"What is a pirate doing here in the middle of a war between Celestial Dragons and revolutionaries?"
Riser ignored him.
He turned his head toward Dragon, assessing the distance, the wounded, and the broken formation. There was no urgency in his gaze, only calculation.
"I have to say this war is already lost for you. That idiot over there is stronger than you."
Shamrock did not like being called an idiot.
Outwardly, his posture remained controlled. The blade did not tremble. His body axis did not shift.
Internally, the judgment was immediate and cruel, directed solely at Riser.
'Idiot?'
'Some random pirate dares insult me on my own battlefield?'
'I will tear his head off and hang it on the main gate.'
Dragon looked around again.
The frontline was disorganized. The God's Knights advanced in coordinated formation, cutting through sectors with precision. Riser's words were not empty provocation.
They were a cold reading of the situation.
"Your luck is that I decided to exterminate every last Celestial Dragon." Riser took a step forward, the ground answering with a short crack beneath his heel. "So I'll fight him. If you can, escape with what's left of the revolutionaries. This is your chance."
"As if I would allow that." Shamrock pointed his sword directly at Riser, the tip aligned with his chest. "You have no authority here."
"Revolutionaries, priority is winning the war. We will not run." Dragon straightened his body, forcing stability into his breathing. "Riser, if you want to participate, I don't know your motives, but we will not retreat. You can fight that one. I will deal with the others."
Riser looked at him for a full second.
There was no smile.
"Suit yourself."
Dragon's decision didn't matter. Surviving or dying no longer changed the central calculation.
'I've already done more than I should have.'
Shamrock grew tired of waiting.
His body advanced in a straight line, the sword drawing a short arc before transforming. The blade twisted mid-motion, steel giving way to a living shape, and three heads emerged from the metal, attached to a single axis.
Cerberus opened its jaws.
The speed was extreme.
To everyone around them, the movement was a blur crossing the battlefield. The air was torn apart by the advance.
WHOOOOSH!
To Riser, it was not.
His gaze followed every centimeter of the trajectory. Observation Haki had already been active, expanded the moment before the charge, registering intent and direction before Shamrock even took his first step.
What seemed instant to everyone else became clear.
Shamrock was aiming for the neck.
He wanted a quick kill.
The three heads of Cerberus lunged with their fangs exposed, ready to crush and tear apart in a single motion.
Riser did not retreat.
He did not raise his arms.
At the last instant before impact, he activated Kamui on his own neck.
Space around that specific area distorted.
The jaws passed through.
They found no flesh.
The three heads of Cerberus snapped shut with enough force to break steel, but what they struck was empty space displaced into another dimension.
CRAAK!
The impact echoed through the air.
Riser's body remained intact.
The struck portion simply wasn't there at the moment of contact.
Shamrock passed him, the momentum carrying his body several meters forward before his legs locked against the ground and twisted to regain position.
The battlefield fell silent for a second.
Dragon watched.
Revolutionaries stopped breathing.
The God's Knights adjusted their stance, realizing that the strike meant to end everything had drawn no blood.
Riser rolled his neck once, a simple motion, as if stretching.
The distortion around his throat vanished as he deactivated the intangibility.
His gaze returned to Shamrock.
"I expected a Celestial Dragon born into luxury to be more polite and wait for me to finish talking before attacking."
Riser did not advance.
It was not his words that weighed in that moment.
It was what had just happened.
Dragon watched silently, his breathing still heavy but now controlled. The God's Knights did not move, their blades raised but without clear command.
Everyone had seen it.
The sword had passed through Riser's neck as if there were no matter there.
That was common among Logia users. Partial intangibility, elemental bodies, temporary displacement.
But it was easily neutralized by Armament Haki.
And Shamrock had used it.
Without question.
The strike had not been careless. The spiritual coating on the blade was visible at the moment of impact.
Riser's head should have been rolling across the ground.
Shamrock was the most affected.
The attack had been his. The execution had been perfect. The intention had been lethal.
"How did you survive?"
He did not repeat the insult. He did not answer the provocation.
He wanted an explanation.
Riser tilted his chin slightly.
"How? Well, sorry about that. I'm not the type to reveal the secrets of my abilities."
Shamrock tightened his grip on the sword's hilt.
The metal returned to its solid form, the three heads of Cerberus retracting into the main blade. His gaze did not tremble, but his internal calculations changed rapidly.
One of the God's Knights behind him stepped forward half a pace, his white cape whipping with the abrupt movement.
"How dare you speak of Lord Shamrock's sword like that?"
He raised his blade and pointed it directly at Riser.
"That treasure is not something a filthy pirate can even mention!"
Riser did not turn his head.
His eyes remained on Shamrock.
"Dragon, didn't you say you were going to fight? What are you waiting for?"
Dragon understood.
The delay was not hesitation.
It was calculation.
He turned toward the other God's Knights, the wind beginning to concentrate around his hands again. His still-heavy breathing was forced inward, stabilizing his rhythm.
"Revolutionaries, reorganize the ranks!" He advanced two steps toward the left flank. "Hold the Knights and keep your distance!"
The air around him began to spiral, lifting dust and fragments from the shattered ground.
WHOOM!
The blast expanded sideways, forcing two God's Knights to block with their blades.
Shamrock did not take his eyes off Riser.
"My sword is a treasure." He turned his wrist, aligning the blade in front of his body. "If you want it, come take it."
"Come to you?" Riser let out a low laugh, the dry sound crossing the battlefield as his red eyes locked directly onto the hand gripping the sword.
The Mangekyō Sharingan rotated slowly, its absolute focus fixed on the connection between Shamrock's fingers and Cerberus's hilt, as if the very space at that point had been marked.
Shamrock felt it.
Not pain.
But something wrong.
The air around his hand began twisting, a slight circular distortion compressing space as if it were being pulled into an invisible point.
"What trick is this?" He tried to pull the sword back, forcing his arm with brutal strength, but the space around his hand collapsed before the movement finished.
VRRROOOOM!
The distortion snapped shut instantly.
Shamrock's right hand and Cerberus vanished.
His forearm ended in a clean void where seconds earlier flesh, bone, and steel had existed.
The battlefield froze again.
Shamrock's expression shattered.
His body reacted a second late, balance shifting half a step backward as blood began to gush violently from the severed limb.
SPLASH!
The stone beneath his feet was stained red.
Dragon halted his own movement as he felt the abrupt shift in the pressure of the battle. The God's Knights hesitated, unable to comprehend what they had just witnessed.
Shamrock clenched his teeth hard enough to lock his jaw.
The pain arrived.
Intense.
Raw.
But the scream did not come immediately.
He dropped to one knee for a moment, using the momentum to push himself back up, the mutilated arm pressed against his chest while blood poured through the fingers of his remaining hand.
"You…" His voice cracked, yet fury still filled it. "What did you do?"
Riser did not move.
He stared at the empty space where the hand and the sword had been.
"I came to you." His voice was calm, almost indifferent, while his gaze remained fixed on the point where the limb had been removed.
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