The World Government's artillery support filled the nearly ten thousand ninjas on the battlefield with pleasant surprise—though it also left many of them deeply uneasy.
After all, not long ago, the World Government had been their enemy.
If these demons hadn't appeared… if the shinobi world had continued to resist, then perhaps those shells—each one nearly as powerful as a miniature Tailed Beast Bomb—would've landed squarely on their own heads… or flown straight into their villages.
"They're coming!!"
Ōnoki and Rasa, suspended high in the air, were the first to spot it—black dots emerging on the horizon behind them.
Those dots were actually thousands of armored vehicles, stretching for dozens of kilometers.
Overhead, shells continued to scream through the sky, one after another, crashing into the demon horde in the distance.
The noise of the shelling was so intense that it actually drowned out the thunderous rumble of the advancing vehicle convoy.
But as the distance between the two sides grew shorter, the ninjas naturally began to notice—the true reinforcements had arrived.
Soon after…
As the convoys of the Third and Fifth Divisions arrived roughly 200 meters behind the Allied Shinobi Forces, they began parking their armored vehicles side by side, quickly forming makeshift defensive barriers.
At the same time, figures in black cloaks stepped out of formation and rushed to draw large transmutation arrays on the open ground.
They were alchemists—battle-hardened ones who had chosen to enlist in the army.
"Members of the Allied Shinobi Forces—please follow our instructions and retreat behind our defensive line in an orderly fashion. I repeat—members of the Allied Shinobi Forces…"
A dozen armored vehicles equipped with speaker-type Den-Den Mushi rushed behind the ninja ranks, relaying this repeated announcement.
The shinobi, naturally, offered no resistance. Immediately, those in the rear began to move.
At the same time…
Lieutenant General Charlotte Oven and Lieutenant General Dalmatian each deployed a fifty-man platoon to rush ahead and secure the very front of the Allied Shinobi Forces' line.
This left senior ninja figures like Rasa, Chiyo, Jiraiya, Ōnoki, and Uchiha Fugaku completely baffled.
And when they heard that an 'experiment' was about to be conducted, they grew even more confused.
All they could do was watch helplessly as these fully armed soldiers in black opened intense fire on the demons.
Suddenly, the battlefield exploded with the roar of gunfire.
Meanwhile, the majors serving as squad leaders and the lieutenant colonels in charge of platoons squinted as they carefully observed how the demons reacted when hit.
Soon, they began to notice that the struck demons were collapsing and unable to rise—or if they did stand, they staggered unsteadily, struggling to maintain their balance.
It worked!
The Academy of Sciences' hypothesis was correct!
Previously, Director Vegapunk of the Academy of Sciences had proposed a theory:
Could there be some inherent similarity between the power of Devil Fruits and the power of these demons?
If so, then might seastone—known to suppress Devil Fruit abilities—also be effective against demons?
And based on the results so far, Vegapunk's theory had proven accurate—
Seastone really did work on demons!
It didn't kill them outright, but it did weaken them—draining their strength and leaving them sluggish and barely able to move for a short period.
What's more, the more seastone bullets embedded in their bodies, the stronger the effect. One or two rounds caused little visible change, but a concentrated barrage made the difference obvious.
"Tell Command to drop all remaining seastone ammunition immediately!"
Charlotte Oven and Dalmatian gave the order without hesitation.
Before long, four Air Force warships released large metal crates, which were retrieved and distributed by ground troops to every unit on the front lines.
Seastone bullets.
Thanks to the mineral resources from Wano Island and the McRucky Engine's ability to extract and compress seastone powder from seawater, the World Government had already achieved mass production.
Meanwhile—
Just as the Third and Fifth Divisions were fortifying their positions and preparing to relieve the Allied Shinobi Forces of their defensive duties—
At the westernmost edge of the Land of Swamps, Crocodile could fight no more.
He knelt weakly in a crater—half scorched earth and lava, half frozen tundra—barely clinging to life.
Not far away, Guren and Esdeath were in similarly dire straits.
The massive Nine-Tailed Celestial Fox lay wounded and motionless in the snow.
Esdeath, panting and drained, used her rapier to prop herself up as she shielded Guren.
Fortunately, Lilith and Nahamah had no intention of killing them.
Crocodile, however—
"How boring. Ever since that one lovely scream earlier, he hasn't made a sound. Nahamah," Lilith said coldly, her expression blank as she gazed down at the man below.
"The scent of fear on him is faint, too. Another so-called human 'hero,' it seems. Lilith," Nahamah replied.
It thought back to the many human heroes it had encountered over the centuries across countless worlds. All of them ended the same way—played with, broken, and eventually killed once their novelty wore off.
Still, even Nahamah had to admit:
Crocodile was the strongest human they had ever faced.
Even if they still didn't understand—
Why he carried the aura of a demon.
But it didn't matter.
Once they tore out Crocodile's soul and devoured it, everything would become clear.
"Lilith, finish him off. There are plenty more humans in this world for us to toy with… and to kill."
"Gladly, Nahamah. I've been looking forward to watching him die~" Lilith said with a wide grin.
As her voice fell, the two demons each raised an arm—unleashing a torrent of searing black flames and freezing black frost upon Crocodile.
Is this the end of my journey?
Crocodile's heart clenched with bitterness. He truly hadn't expected to die in a place like this.
That bastard Bullet… he's probably going to laugh himself to death when he hears I'm gone, huh?
The thought filled him with a deep, helpless frustration.
And in the next instant—
The black inferno and the black frost fell upon him simultaneously.
[BOOM!!!]
And in that very instant—
The earth beneath Lilith and Nahamah began to slowly rise—then a crimson glow burst forth from the ground.
Like a fountain erupting straight upward, the blazing stream shot toward them, casting a searing red light across their now visibly shocked demonic faces.
It all happened with unbelievable speed.
Lilith and Nahamah had barely locked eyes with the molten figure rising before them when a wave of searing heat exploded against their abdomens.
But before they could even process the pain—
A shockwave erupted with a thunderous blast, and the two demons were instantly blown away like streaking meteors, their silhouettes blurred in the haze. A chain of sonic booms exploded behind them midair.
[BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM—]
They crashed violently into two active volcanoes more than ten kilometers away, vanishing into the fiery peaks without a trace.
"You did well. I'll admit… you're worthy of being called a General."
At that moment—
A towering figure, molten lava flowing down his body, landed before Crocodile, who was still kneeling on the ground.
Around Crocodile lay a thick ring of hardened magma.
One half still burned with black fire, while the other steamed fiercely, locked in battle with black ice.
"…Sakazuki."
Crocodile looked up at the crimson figure with a complicated expression, murmuring softly.
Because in his voice, Crocodile heard something shocking—praise and respect.
Coming from Sakazuki, of all people… someone who had always despised pirates like him?
"But you must take them back to Rōran immediately. Leave the rest to us."
Sakazuki continued, his voice low, his back never turning.
Crocodile didn't argue. He nodded without protest. "Understood."
But just as he braced himself to stand—
A high-grade Purple Butterfly Emergency Pill flew through the air and landed before him.
"…What's this?"
Crocodile instinctively caught it.
"Take it and go. You should know how dangerous these opponents are."
"…All right. Thank you, General Akainu."
Without another word, Crocodile swallowed the pill.
A gentle green glow shimmered across his skin, and his nearly exhausted strength returned rapidly.
At the same time, he transformed into a massive swirl of golden sand, sweeping up Guren and Esdeath—who instinctively reverted to their human forms—and vanished swiftly from the battlefield.
[BOOM!!!]
[BOOM!!!]
Just seconds after Crocodile and the others had left—
Under Sakazuki's watchful gaze, the two distant volcanoes reacted: one shattered violently after being frozen solid, and the other was swallowed entirely by a towering black pillar of fire.
"Hmph. Their presence is certainly intimidating…" Sakazuki scoffed coldly. "But I'm not alone on this battlefield."
With that, he took a heavy step forward, his crimson trousers swaying as he began to walk slowly toward the demons' location.
Meanwhile, Lilith and Nahamah—still recovering as the burns on their abdomens healed—had just turned to rage at Sakazuki…
Only to immediately sense another overwhelming aura approaching from a different direction. Their gazes snapped toward it in unison.
Sure enough, over ten kilometers away, a white silhouette appeared—gliding toward them atop a bicycle sculpted entirely from ice.
"These two humans are stronger than the last one, Lilith," Nahamah said grimly.
"And one uses fire, the other ice. How fitting, wouldn't you say, Nahamah?" Lilith replied with a cold, indifferent tone.
Nahamah, familiar with her, knew that Lilith was furious.
"Too bad… still weaker than us!"
Lilith and Nahamah spoke in perfect unison.
In the blink of an eye—
they split left and right, transforming into black ice and black flame, slicing through the air like two pitch-black meteors.
In an instant, they appeared midair, a mere 100 meters in front of Sakazuki.
At that very moment—
Kuzan, riding his bicycle, arrived at Sakazuki's side.
"You're not late for once. That's rare. I figured I'd have to fight them alone for a few days."
Kuzan scratched the back of his head as he dismounted, his expression helpless.
"Ah la la~ I abandoned the main force from Kirigakure, rode my bike across this world's oceans and continents alone, passed through who-knows-how-many countries… And on the way, I even got ambushed by a bunch of people calling themselves the Funato Clan. Can't you show a little appreciation for my struggle? Cut me some slack, will you?"
Sakazuki ignored the complaint entirely.
"You've seen the intel on these two demons, haven't you? Don't drag me down."
Kuzan nodded. "More or less. Either way, we should split them up."
According to the reports, Lilith and Nahamah's demonic ice and fire could not only merge seamlessly, but amplify one another without clashing—producing destructive power beyond either element alone.
But more crucially, the intel provided by Imu had clearly warned them: these two demons could devour each other to merge their magic and power—forming a single being that would possess the true strength of a First Layer Lord of the Underworld.
"In that case, I'll take Nahamah. You handle Lilith. Sound good?" Sakazuki said.
"OK!"
Kuzan agreed immediately. Because he understood Sakazuki's real intention.
This battle wasn't just about defeating the enemy—it was about understanding the fundamental laws behind their powers,
and learning to wield their principles of burning and freezing.
"Then let's do this, Sakazuki!"
"Take it seriously, Kuzan."
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