Dragon truly hadn't expected Garp to be that ruthless.
Just moments ago, they were still talking and laughing, trading blows like men who understood exactly where the line was. Each attack had restraint. Each exchange had control.
So why did it suddenly change?
Why did Garp throw a heavy kick like that, without hesitation?
Dragon's face burned with pain and humiliation. Seeing the injury on his son's face, even Garp could tell, Dragon was furious. The old man's jaw tightened, and his mood shifted.
He had used too much force.
He had assumed his son respected him enough to keep his guard down, and that carelessness had made it easy.
And now, a different kind of worry crawled up Garp's spine.
Would the daughter in law he had never met resent him for striking Dragon in the face?
Would his grandson blame him one day, when he grew old enough to understand what a grandfather was supposed to be?
"Dragon," Garp said, voice low and heavy. "I can't let anything happen to Sengoku. Do you understand? Move."
To Garp, it didn't matter if Mary Geoise was reduced to rubble, if the Celestial Dragons were slaughtered, if even Imu and the Five Elders died.
But Sengoku mattered.
The Navy mattered.
Marineford mattered.
Yes, the Navy had scum, plenty of it. But that didn't erase the sacrifices made by the righteous majority, the ones who bled to hold the world together and keep some measure of peace alive.
Dragon's eyes sharpened.
"Then stop resisting and merge into the new navy," he roared. "Do it peacefully, and stop the pointless deaths!"
Why were Garp and Sengoku so stubborn, so loyal, so inflexible?
They could see the trend of the era as clearly as anyone. Yet they still chose to resist.
Was it pride?
Was it to prove loyalty, courage, and unyielding will to the world, so even if they were defeated later, history would praise them?
Did they understand how cruel the people on the other side were?
Akainu.
Bullet.
The Second Princess.
Hel, the Immortal Phoenix.
Those people didn't cherish talent. They didn't recruit. They didn't forgive. They killed, and they killed thoroughly.
Even monsters like Garp and Sengoku couldn't endure a siege from that many masters.
And if Garp and Sengoku managed to kill or injure one of those princes or princesses, the retaliation would be even worse. They would lose every remaining chance to survive.
Could they stop Brook?
Could they stop the Six Hell Kings?
So the only smart choice was to join early, and save themselves early.
That way, they could take a position in the new navy, like Zephyr, Tsuru, Gion, Tokikake, and the rest.
Garp pressed his lips together. His eyes went strangely vague.
"Fine," he said slowly. "Let me go back. I'll persuade Sengoku."
Even he didn't know how fake his words sounded.
"No," Dragon replied at once.
His eyes returned to calm, and whatever father and son sentiment remained was pushed aside. From this moment on, Dragon would do everything he could to keep Garp here.
"You stay until this war is over," Dragon said flatly. "Unless you step over my corpse."
"Hmph." Garp looked at the wound stamped across Dragon's face, then snorted like an annoyed old bull. "Brat. You can't stop me. And I'm not fighting you."
With that, he dove into the sea and vanished beneath the surface.
A non Devil Fruit user's advantage.
Sea escape.
From here, it would take less than ten minutes to swim back to Marineford. For a top tier physical monster like Garp, it was a single breath.
Dragon's expression changed instantly. All the harsh words he had just thrown out were nothing but wind to Garp. They hadn't slowed him down at all.
Anger spiked to the ceiling.
Dragon transformed into a storm and shot toward Marineford, his speed through the air absolutely faster than Garp's dive through the sea.
He needed to get there first.
If he could help the second generation of Hell bring down Sengoku faster, then Garp would arrive too late. The old man would be forced to surrender, with no chance left to cause trouble.
Dragon was sick with worry.
Even after being disfigured, even while burning with rage, he still couldn't ignore that bastard father of his.
··
At the same time, in the North Sea and West Sea, the Navy and allied forces, already drained by the loss of many admirals, were crushed by the armies of the Universal Government like dry weeds under a blade.
Countless Marines threw down their weapons and surrendered.
Giant troops, zombie troops, samurai troops, and more began pouring into the Grand Line, launching full scale assaults on Navy branches and member states. Some snail troops and flying troops even crossed the Red Line directly, pushing into the East Blue and the South Blue, aiming to conquer all four seas completely.
Member states panicked.
Requests for protection flooded the World Government. Some countries went further, throwing themselves into the World Government's arms and declaring themselves temporary vassals, desperate to earn favor and become core nations in whatever new order survived.
In the East Blue and the South Blue, naval fortresses and royal armies were dragged into war and civil unrest one after another.
The World Government had supporters.
The Universal Government had supporters.
Two factions formed, each fighting for its own future, each convinced it was choosing the side that would still exist tomorrow.
Ambitious people rose fast in the chaos. The Revolutionary Army launched coups in brutal countries. Pirates and bandits took advantage of the smoke and blood to plunder freely.
For a moment, the whole world sank into madness.
In the East Blue, within the Kingdom of Oykot, a female Navy lieutenant with long dark red hair and sharply cut sideburns staggered through wreckage.
She clutched her wounds as she walked, despair hollowing her out.
All around her, her Marines lay in pools of blood.
After a brutal battle with pirates, both sides had suffered heavy losses, but in her squad, she was the only one left alive.
Severely injured, numb with grief, she wandered through the ruins of a village the pirates had destroyed.
Then she heard it.
A baby crying.
And the sobbing of a child.
Her head snapped up.
Among the broken beams and collapsed walls, a little girl with short blue hair sat shaking, holding a baby in her arms as she cried. The lieutenant rushed over, heart twisting.
She knelt down and gently gathered the two children into her arms.
"Don't cry," she whispered, voice trembling but warm. "I'll protect you."
Her name was Bellmère.
The blue haired girl, Nojiko, felt that unfamiliar warmth and slowly stopped sobbing. The orange haired baby in her arms also quieted, almost as if she understood.
Then the baby looked up at Bellmère's face and smiled, innocent and bright.
That single smile pierced through Bellmère's despair.
In that instant, the grief over her dead comrades didn't vanish, but it was… answered. Like something inside her had been pulled back from the edge.
Bellmère abandoned the thought of waiting to die.
With her badly injured body, she dragged herself to the scattered remains of her coat of justice. She wrapped the two children inside it, holding them close like treasure, and left the ruined land of the Kingdom of Oykot behind.
She would take these two battlefield orphans back to her hometown, Cocoyasi Village.
She would raise them herself.
Even if she had to quit the Navy, she would raise these two angels of salvation until they grew up.
It felt like fate.
At the shore, Bellmère saw broken warships and shattered pirate ships floating like corpses on the waves. She didn't stay. All her subordinates were dead, and other pirates could still be on the island.
She found a raft.
She carried the two children aboard.
And with wind and rain howling around her, Bellmère set sail without looking back.
-----------
Marine Headquarters, Marineford.
Vice admirals and rear admirals fell one after another.
Some were killed, some were captured, and many were dragged down by the new navy's monsters, Kizaru, Aokiji, Akainu, and Fujitora, who hunted through the battlefield with ruthless efficiency.
The rest were crushed by Brook's students and allies, Ryugi, Katakuri, Abel, Moria, Koshiro, Ashura Doji, and more. Every one of them had strength beyond the usual scale. Defeating a Navy vice admiral was not a problem at all.
And that was before factoring in the support.
High above Marineford, three elemental cannons dominated the sky. Satan with the Weather Fruit, Marco with the Cloud Cloud Fruit, and Vista with the Rain Rain Fruit hammered the plaza with constant air to ground destruction.
Behind them, Beckman and Van Augur acted as rear cover, their sniper fire cold, precise, and impossible to predict.
At the center of it all stood Sengoku.
The admiral looked like a super tank that refused to collapse, even under the second generation of Hell's relentless bombardment. His mythical Great Buddha form was famous for defense and recovery. The indestructible defense, paired with Buddha light that healed and restored, let him hold on for nearly two hours.
And he wasn't fighting one opponent.
He was fighting seven.
Hades, Osiris, Kanna, Anubis, Hel, along with Bullet and Teach, all of them pouring top tier killing power into him without restraint.
Even Sengoku could not endure two or three full hours of that kind of pressure.
Then the battlefield tilted even further.
Mephisto, wielding the Earth Fruit, succeeded.
The massive Navy Headquarters itself was seized and fused into an enormous towering stone giant, so huge it blotted out the horizon. Marineford shook as if the island was about to crack apart. Marines stared up, terrified, and many dropped to their knees right there, surrendering on instinct.
This was the power of a god.
"Damn it!" Sengoku roared, golden light flaring violently. "The fortress that protects the world, turned into this?"
The majestic headquarters castle becoming a stone man felt like a direct insult to the Navy.
"Haha! Fifth Brother's Earth Fruit is pretty impressive," Hel said with a smile, but her next move was pure slaughter. Dark claws hardened with Armament, wrapped in Conqueror's pressure, ripped toward Sengoku's chest like a guillotine.
Bullet's eyes shone with fanatic heat.
"My Fusion Fruit will eventually create a monster that huge," he muttered, almost trembling. His Paramecia fusion power had already reached awakening. When that moment came, he would build a fusion giant over a thousand meters tall, and trample everything.
"Old man!" Osiris roared, now a red half dragon burning with impatience. "Fall already! You've wasted too much of our time!"
He wanted to rush to Mary Geoise.
Now.
Hades's face was equally dark. The eldest prince's anger simmered like molten rock.
They had been stalled for far too long by Sengoku alone, and that fact hurt more than any wound. It meant their strength was still short of this navy admiral's level.
Hades couldn't accept it.
He had already reached the admiral tier. How could it be possible that with so many brothers and sisters surrounding Sengoku, they still couldn't crush him quickly?
So the second generation of Hell exploded again, attacks intensifying, wrath turning into pure, shameless bombardment.
They battered Sengoku without mercy.
··
On the coast outside Marineford, Dragon arrived first.
He intercepted Garp before the old man could reach the plaza.
But the moment Garp saw the towering stone giant rampaging, saw the naval officers falling one by one, saw Sengoku being beaten into the ground, something in him snapped.
He ignored Dragon's furious stare.
Calmly, Garp began stripping off his soaked coat of justice, then his suit, then his shirt, revealing a body of hard, carved muscle that looked like it had been forged from iron.
"Father," Dragon said, voice strained. "Don't interfere. I'm begging you."
A violent whirlwind formed in Dragon's hand. He was ready to fight this bastard father without any restraint.
But the instant Garp appeared, others noticed.
Akainu, Kizaru, and Aokiji had already turned their attention this way.
Three elements flared into existence beside Dragon, one gold, one red, one blue, condensing into human shape as they stared down the Navy hero who had arrived with murder in his eyes.
They weren't here to watch.
They were here to stop Garp from interfering with the beating of Sengoku.
And Akainu wanted more than that.
He wanted to fight this legendary hero.
"No need," Dragon said quickly, face tight. "I can stop him myself!"
Dragon's expression had turned ugly. If these ruthless people joined in, Garp's life or death would become unpredictable.
Akainu answered with a flat, merciless voice.
"Hmph. We gave you a chance. This isn't about stopping Iron Fist Garp anymore. This is about taking down a threat."
If the Monkey father and son had simply fought honestly off the coast, Akainu wouldn't care.
But Garp had stepped onto Marineford.
That made him prey.
Prey of the Universal Government.
Prey of the second generation of Hell.
Garp cracked his knuckles, bone popping sharply. He was fifty nine, and the pressure rolling off him made the sea air feel heavy.
"Kid," Garp snarled at the thirty six year old Akainu. "What nonsense are you spouting? Don't get cocky just because you've got the Magma Fruit."
He hadn't enjoyed the fight with Dragon earlier. Too many emotions, too many restraints.
Now was different.
Now he could finally let go completely.
Now he could face the three admirals of the new navy and see what they were made of.
After all, Garp still held the position of Navy admiral. He would show them what kind of gap existed between the admirals of the World Government and the admirals of the Universal Government
"Dragon, move," Akainu said.
"Dragon, move," Garp said at the exact same time.
Both of them sounded equally annoyed.
For a second, the air went silent.
Akainu stared seriously at the legendary senior.
Garp grinned at the former monster rookie.
Dragon's face became expressionless. He turned into a storm and retreated, standing far away.
He didn't want to help the second generation of Hell by forcing Sengoku to surrender faster.
And judging by the way Sengoku was struggling, it seemed Dragon wouldn't need to do anything anyway.
Now he could only watch.
If necessary, he would force himself to save Garp's life, even if it meant offending the new navy and the second generation of Hell.
"Ahahaha!" Garp laughed, loud and fearless. "One brat isn't enough? Fine. I'll beat all three of you!"
The muscles in his fists swelled. Armament Haki wrapped them like armor, and thick red lightning snapped around his arms, Conqueror's pressure exploding outward so hard the air itself seemed to bend.
"Yo," Kizaru drawled, lips crooked, voice lazily irritated. "I'm really scared fighting a monster like this."
His eyes slid toward Dragon with open resentment.
If Dragon had been able to stop Garp properly, then Kizaru wouldn't be stuck here, babysitting a battlefield while facing the terrifying Navy hero.
Everyone knew what Garp was.
A peer of Redfield and Newgate, a king level monster.
Even Kizaru, fastest of the Flash Fruit users, wasn't sure he could handle those invincible fists.
Aokiji's body shifted into a half elemental state. One side of him became ice, and frost spilled outward, freezing the ground into a slick white field.
A small advantage.
A necessary advantage.
Because the Iron Fist was coming.
.....
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