The smoky air of the Flower Capital didn't just burn; it vibrated. The catastrophic collision of wills from the previous moment left the shattered execution plaza hovering in a state of absolute, breathless suspension. The boiling cauldron containing the tragic, eternal legacy of Kozuki Oden bubbled violently in the background, casting demonic, flickering orange shadows across the stone pavement.
Kaido didn't wait for a formal invitation. With a sudden, explosive flexing of his towering legs, the Governor-General of the Beast Pirates vanished from his standing position, leaving behind a crater of pulverized rock.
BOOM!
The massive, spiked iron kanabo Hassaikai cut through the air with a high-pitched, deafening shriek. But Giovanni was already moving. Utilizing the hyper-advanced reflexes born of a lifetime of dirty street fights and refined by high-tier combat mathematics, he dropped his center of gravity. Ace cleared its scabbard in a flawless, sweeping horizontal arc.
"Davy Sword Style!" Giovanni roared. "Sea King Clash!"
Instead of a physical clash of metal against metal, Giovanni violently emitted his Advanced Armament Haki from the edge of Roger's legendary blade. A dense, invisible torrent of destructive spiritual energy shot outward, bypassing the space between them and slamming directly into Kaido's exposed, heavily muscled chest.
BOOM-SHACK!
The internal destruction mechanic of the advanced Haki bypassed the legendary, impenetrable dragon scales entirely, detonating directly inside Kaido's muscle tissue. The massive Oni staggered backward three full steps, his giant boots carving deep trenches into the stone. A sharp, dark spray of blood erupted from his lips, splattering across the ash-covered floor.
Kaido wiped the back of his massive hand across his mouth, staring down at the fresh, bruising welt forming on his chest. A terrifying, wide-eyed grin split his face. "Worororo! Unbelievable! You've actually mastered the advanced subversion of the Color of Arms, rookie! To force a shockwave completely inside my hide without even making direct physical contact... you're a warrior fit to stand on the grand stage!"
The praise was genuine, but it carried absolutely no mercy. The wound was painful, but it wasn't a permanent, deep scar like the one Oden had carved into him. It had merely succeeded in throwing gasoline onto a volcanic fire.
"But don't get ahead of yourself, brat!" Kaido bellowed, his voice shifting into a terrifying, guttural roar as his physical size seemed to expand under the weight of pure malice. "There is a reason they call me the King of the Beasts!"
Kaido accelerated to a velocity that completely shattered the concept of his massive bulk. Hassaikai became a blur of absolute destruction.
CRASH! CRACK! BOOM!
Giovanni was instantly thrown into a desperate, back-pedaling defensive routine. He used Sky Walk to detonate himself backward into the air, but Kaido pursued him effortlessly, leaping into the sky and bringing the massive iron club down in a brutal, crushing overhead smash. Giovanni hoisted Ace horizontally to parry, but the sheer, astronomical weight of the blow violently shattered the air currents around them, driving Giovanni straight back down into the earth like a falling meteor.
SMASH!
Giovanni crashed through three residential tiled roofs before his body finally skipped across the dirt road of the main capital street. His medical bandages violently ripped open, fresh crimson blood staining his clothes. He barely had time to roll to the left before Kaido's massive club pulverized the exact spot his head had been resting on, sending a massive geyser of rock and debris fifty feet into the air.
Giovanni coughed violently, a sharp spike of agony rippling through his ribs as he forced himself back onto his feet, using Ace as a makeshift crutch. His golden eyes were wide, tracking Kaido's massive silhouette through the dust cloud.
'Damn it... his speed doesn't make any sense for someone that size,' Giovanni thought, his teeth grinding together so hard they threatened to crack. 'My body is screaming at me to run, but I can't budge. If I let this monster past me right now, he is going to fly straight to Kuri. He will incinerate the castle, and Toki... Toki will die just like the script says!'
Kaido stepped out of the debris, a dark, suffocating aura of pure Advanced Conqueror's Haki bleeding from his body in thick, crackling tendrils of black lightning. He raised his kanabo high, the weapon itself radiating a terrifying, world-ending pressure.
"Let's see how much of this kingly weight that fragile body can actually absorb!" Kaido roared. "Thunder Bagua!"
The strike was blindingly fast. Giovanni didn't even have time to blink before the massive iron club connected directly with his left shoulder.
CRA-RACK!
The concussive shockwave of Advanced Conqueror's Haki exploded through Giovanni's frame, violently blasting him completely across the execution plaza. He smashed through a massive stone torii gate, the entire structure collapsing into rubble on top of him.
For five agonizing seconds, the plaza was completely silent save for the crackle of the flames. Then, with a slow, agonizing clatter of stones, a bloody hand broke through the debris. Giovanni crawled out from the wreckage, his left arm dangling completely uselessly at his side, dislocated and broken. Yet, using his right hand to grip Ace, he forced his trembling legs to lock straight, standing erect once more as he spat out a mouthful of shattered teeth.
Kaido's eyes widened in genuine, unadulterated shock. He hadn't expected the rookie to survive the first named strike, let alone stand back up. A deep, roaring rumble built up in his chest.
"You're still breathing?! Fine then! Take another! Kundali: Ragnarok!"
Kaido leaped high into the air, spinning his massive body like a tornado as he brought Hassaikai down with a downward swing that threatened to split the very island of Wano in half. The black lightning generated by the strike was so dense it completely obscured the morning light.
BOOOOOOM!!!
The entire Flower Capital violently shook as if hit by an earthquake. The stone pavement of the execution square completely collapsed into a colossal, twenty-foot-deep crater. Giovanni was driven straight into the center of the abyss, his clothes completely tattered, blood pouring continuously from a massive gash on his forehead and pooling into the dirt beneath him.
Yet, through the thick veil of smoke and rising dust, a terrifying, metallic scraping sound echoed.
Giovanni, his body trembling violently, his vision completely blurred with crimson, was using the tip of Roger's sword to force his broken body upward. With an agonizing, scream of pure, unyielding willpower, he dragged himself out of the dirt, his golden eyes burning with a manic, defiant light that refused to be extinguished.
Kaido descended into the crater, staring down at the broken blonde pirate with an expression that bordered on absolute reverence.
"Incredible..." Kaido whispered, his voice echoing quietly through the crater. "The only person I have ever known in my entire life who could absorb that much sheer, unmitigated physical trauma and keep smiling... was my former captain, Rocks D. Xebec. You carry that same exact monstrous, unnatural tenacity, brat."
Kaido leaned heavily on his kanabo, his eyes narrowing as he looked at the blood-drenched outsider. "But it makes absolutely no sense. Tell me, Norwell D. Giovanni... what the hell are you fighting so damn hard for? As far as my intelligence reports go, you are an outsider. You have no family here. You have no country to protect?"
Giovanni's bleeding lips slowly stretched into a wide, feral, and completely unhinged smile. He lifted Ace, resting the blood-stained steel over his good shoulder as he looked the pirate dead in the eye.
"You oversized lizard..." Giovanni chuckled, his voice raspy but entirely devoid of fear. "I'm a pirate. I didn't sail into this hellhole to play the role of a heroic savior. I am doing this entirely for my own grand, beautiful selfishness! I didn't like the script of how this story was supposed to end, so I came here to tear up the pages myself... simply because I wanted to!"
Kaido stared at him for three seconds before bursting into a loud, earth-shaking roar of pure, ecstatic laughter. "Worororo! Worororo! A pirate driven entirely by pure, unapologetic ego! I love it! I absolutely love it! You are far too magnificent of a monster to die in this dirty plaza, brat. Forget Red-Hair! Join my crew! Become my right-hand vanguard, and together we will turn this entire world into a beautiful, unending warzone!"
Giovanni didn't hesitate for a single millisecond. He lifted his right hand, giving the Governor-General a highly distinct, blood-stained middle finger.
"Go to hell, horn-head."
High up on the ruined eastern balcony overlooking the crater, hidden beneath the shadow of a collapsed wooden support beam, a small figure was shivering.
An eight-year-old Yamato was clutching her tiny hands tightly against her chest, her large, wide eyes completely fixed on the blood-drenched form of Giovanni standing defiantly at the bottom of the pit. She had just witnessed the magnificent, heart-shattering execution of Kozuki Oden, a sight that had permanently altered something deep within her young soul.
But now, staring down at this completely unknown, golden-haired outsider. A man who was bleeding from every single pore, who had no connection to her land, yet was willing to look her terrifying, invincible father in the eye and tell him to go to hell out of sheer, unyielding personal freedom. Yamato felt an absolute, reality-altering wave of pure awe wash over her.
'He's... he's so incredibly cool,' Yamato thought, her breath catching in her throat as she watched the black lightning crackle around Giovanni's sword. 'That is what a true pirate looks like. That is what absolute freedom means!'
"Lady Yamato! What are you doing out here?!" a panicked voice hissed from the shadows behind her.
Two high-ranking Beast Pirate vanguard members rushed out from the corridor, their faces pale with terror as they noticed her proximity to the cataclysmic battlefield. Without waiting for her response, they scooped the young girl up into their arms, quickly retreating into the safety of the interior castle corridors to keep her clear of the incoming crossfire.
Down in the crater, Kaido let out a deep, disappointed sigh, his terrifying smile completely vanishing as he raised Hassaikai once more, the black lightning wrapping around the metal spikes with lethal intent.
"It truly is a massive, historic shame," Kaido rumbled, his voice dropping into a cold, executioner's register. "I truly would have loved to see what kind of monster you would have grown into, Norwell D. Giovanni. But I cannot allow a threat like you to keep drawing breath in my world. Die."
The massive kanabo began its final, lethal descent toward Giovanni's skull. Giovanni braced his feet, preparing to throw his remaining life force into one final, suicidal counter-attack.
FLASH!
Before the club could connect, five powerful, authoritative silhouettes violently burst through the thick curtain of smoke surrounding the crater, their weapons drawn and radiating an immense, unified torrent of high-tier Ryou.
BOOOOOM!!!
A spectacular, synchronized combination strike of absolute samurai steel slammed directly into the side of Kaido's massive weapon, the sheer, concentrated kinetic force of the impact successfully throwing Hassaikai off its trajectory and violently pushing the massive pirate back five full steps across the dirt.
Giovanni blinked through the blood in his eyes, his breath hitching as he recognized the five legendary figures who had just formed an impenetrable wall of steel directly in front of his broken body.
Standing at the front vanguard, his long hair fluttering in the wind, was Shimotsuki Ushimaru, the legendary Daimyo of Ringo. Flanking him were the smiling but deadly Shimotsuki Yasuie of Hakumai, the massive Fugetsu Omusubi of Kibi, the stern Uzuki Tempura of Udon, and the legendary, heavily muscls-bound Yakuza boss, Hyogoro of the Flower.
The five masters of Wano stood shoulder-to-shoulder, their katanas drawn and vibrating with an immense, protective aura of pure defiance.
Shimotsuki Ushimaru slowly tilted his head back over his shoulder, his sharp, stern eyes looking down at the heavily bruised, blood-drenched form of the young blonde pirate behind them. A small, deeply respectful smirk broke across the samurai's face.
"I have absolutely no idea who the hell you are, young outsider," Ushimaru declared, his voice carrying the calm, unshakeable dignity of the Shimotsuki clan. "But to come to our country, stand completely alone against this demonic conqueror, and hold him to a standstill for this long while our borders bleed? You have performed a feat worthy of absolute, eternal praise."
Ushimaru turned his gaze back toward the roaring, furious silhouette of Kaido, his grip tightening on his katana as the remaining samurai raised their blades in unison.
"Rest easy, young warrior," Ushimaru barked, his voice echoing across the ruins of the Flower Capital. "The samurai of Wano have finally arrived... and we will take it from here!"
---
Find early chapters on my patreon
[Patreon.com/tenten100?]