Sniper Hiruba exhaled in relief as the massive form of Quetzalcoatl dissolved from the sky. His shot had struck true—Fleet Admiral Kukulkan was down.
With so many seastone bullets embedded in his body, Kukulkan would need time to dig them out one by one. That window was all the Hell Pirates needed to swarm and crush the navy's strongest force.
This was why the cluster bomb was different. A single sniper round, even perfectly aimed, could be countered if Kukulkan tore out the seastone himself—or if his Knights of God and CP0 allies helped him. But this storm of bullets left no such chance. Brook had planned for this, knowing that only saturation could cage a monster like Quetzalcoatl.
"Yohohohoho! Kill him for me!" Brook's voice rang across the battlefield, filled with deadly mirth.
The Red Earl turned into lightning, streaking ahead to strike first. Golden Lion Shiki laughed wildly, cigar clenched between his teeth, and soared after him. Brook leapt onto Hera's somersault cloud, Linlin following with Zeus, while Whitebeard roared as he hurled himself forward on wind-jet boots.
Every airborne officer of the Hell Pirates surged forth in a frenzy. Even Kaido, clumsy on his newly gained Blue Dragon form, flapped forward with fire-clouds underfoot, eager to join the hunt.
Below, Fishman Tom and Tiger swam beneath the fleet, ready to save any crewmates who might fall. Fear of the sea meant nothing when allies like them waited below.
This was not just pursuit. This was a hunt. The prey: a Navy Fleet Admiral, a Knight of God, and the entire CP0 strike team. If they fell here, the World Government itself would bleed.
"Oh no… they're seastone bullets. Dozens of them!" Gabriel's voice broke with panic. His Observation Haki screamed with visions of death. He clawed desperately at Kukulkan's wounds, dragging out glittering shards of seastone. Each lodged piece was a chain binding the Kukulkan's power.
Kukulkan lay sprawled, eyes streaming blood, one socket pierced so deep he could no longer see. His breathing rasped. Without Quetzalcoatl's body, escape was impossible. Without flight, they were nothing more than falling targets.
The CP0 agents formed a desperate ring, stepping on moonwalk to hold the air, slashing at the incoming storm of pirates.
And above, the skies shifted. With Gabriel's Weather Fruit disrupted, the thunderstorm slipped from his grip and into the clutches of Vegapunk's PX-weather ships. Lightning bent at their command. Redfield and Linlin seized it eagerly.
"Two Hundred Million Volts… God's Judgment!" Redfield became a spear of thunder, his first strike lancing through the air, tearing apart two CP0 men before they could even scream.
"Zanku Senkiritani!!" Golden Lion Shiki's golden slashes followed, carving arcs through the agents who still hovered in guard.
"Not good!" Gabriel's teeth clenched. Seastone still riddled Kukulkan's body, his power shackled. Each second stolen by the pirates drove them deeper into despair.
Brook's eyes burned crimson. "Seven Star Soul-Destroying Slash!" His blade screamed through the air, fueled by years of hunger for this moment. The Quetzalcoatl Fruit would be his.
"Master Gabriel, finish tending to the Fleet Admiral!" Commander Eagle barked, blood hissing from his pores as he forced his body into the forbidden state of Life Return. His men followed, flesh steaming, veins bulging, their own lifespans burned away to hold the line.
One agent stepped in front of Brook's strike. His scream lasted only a heartbeat before the blade consumed his soul, his corpse falling like a stone.
The others staggered, their defenses collapsing under the storm of Redfield's lightning, Shiki's golden slashes, Linlin's thunderclouds, and Whitebeard's crushing fists.
Brook and Redfield cut their way through, closing in on the broken Admiral. Their target was Kukulkan himself—and the Knight who shielded him.
Eagle fought on with grim resolve, already knowing the truth. His commander's recklessness had doomed them all. If they had kept their distance, delaying from afar, they could have escaped at any time. Instead, Kukulkan's arrogance had dragged them into Brook's trap.
Perhaps this was fate. Perhaps they had always been prey.
The air exploded as Linlin and Newgate arrived, smashing CP0 agents from the sky. Scaredo's hammerhead fists cracked bone, Ashura Doji's blades reaped blood, and World, Woonan, and Chinjao carved their way into the melee.
Teach Angel, Bull, Stussy, Kaido, even Oden—all rushed in, many finding no opponents left. The CP0 agents, though elite, were too few. Airborne duels with pirates in wind-jet boots quickly turned into slaughter.
Back on the fleet, Hiruba's eye narrowed once more. He reset his weapon, the barrel still warm, and locked his Glare-Glare Fruit on Kukulkan's broken form.
"No second chances," he muttered. "Stay down, old bastard."
The trigger snapped.
The shot struck Kukulkan in the waist, another seastone shard burying itself deep. His body convulsed, blood spraying. Any lingering hope of rising as Quetzalcoatl again shattered.
Gabriel's howl echoed across the skies, torn between rage and despair. "FleetAdmiral!!"
But it was too late. The serpent had fallen.
-------------
The suppression that seastone inflicts on Devil Fruit users varies depending on its purity and the strength of the one bound.
Ordinary seastone cuffs nullify abilities and drain stamina, sometimes leaving the user utterly collapsed. Yet stronger fighters can still muster physical resistance. Fire Fist Ace, on his way to the execution platform, was shackled in seastone and still managed to knock down two Impel Down guards with his feet—though Magellan crushed him in a single move soon after.
In the Udon quarry of Wano, special cuffs were forged that stripped ability users of powers without draining all their physical strength, forcing them into brutal labor. There, Straw Hat Luffy and Eustass Kidd even held a competition moving boulders for mere rice balls. With that pitiful reward, Kidd secretly honed his Magnet-Magnet Fruit toward awakening, while Luffy, under Hyogoro's guidance, grasped Ryuo Haki in a single day. Monsters among men.
Bound with high-purity seastone, however, even the strongest fall. Big Mom herself was subdued and dragged away by Queen the Plague.
Now, the cluster bombs designed by Vegapunk and fired by Hiruba were forged from the same high-purity seastone mined at Wano's Udon. For the Hell Pirates, seastone was no longer scarce—it was a weapon stockpiled in frightening quantities. Their cuffs alone surpassed anything the navy could craft.
And now, even Kukulkan, Fleet Admiral of the Navy, bearer of monstrous strength and the Quetzalcoatl Fruit, lay pierced and trembling, his body too exhausted to move.
He felt shame claw at his soul. A lifetime of triumphs, shattered in a single reckless decision before retirement. He had dragged the Knights of God and CP0 into ruin. Was this how he would be remembered? A commander who destroyed his own force?
Another gunshot cracked. Pain seared his side—another seastone slug embedding deep. His breath hitched. For the first time in decades, tears welled in the old man's eyes. His face withered before the watching world, his vigor drained, his body collapsing into the shell of a frail eighty-year-old.
"Fleet Admiral Kukulkan, don't you dare give in!"
Gabriel's roar shook with rage and resentment. Once, he had honored this man as a pillar of the navy. Now, he cursed him as the very weight dragging them into the abyss.
"Kukulkan, sacrifice yourself! Buy us time!"
Shiki's golden blades slashed forward, forcing Gabriel back. Using the momentum, the Knight of God carved space between himself and Redfield, then turned, dagger flashing. He dug into Kukulkan's eye socket, prying free the embedded seastone, then slashed across his face, peeling flesh from bone. He stabbed down again—kidney, hip—digging bullets out in a frenzy as Kukulkan bled.
Agony lanced through the Fleet Admiral, but with it, strength stirred. The Quetzalcoatl stirred once more within him. Yet his body was mangled, his face ruined, his eyes blinded.
"Kukulkan!" Gabriel's voice hardened. "In the name of the Celestial Dragon God Knights, I order you—stop the Hell Pirates, or your family will share your grave!"
The words cut sharper than any blade. Kukulkan's despair twisted into grim resolve. His battered form surged, expanding, twisting, until once again the sky was filled with the colossal wings of Quetzalcoatl.
"Commander Eagle! CP0! Escape while you can. I'll hold them back with my life!"
The serpent roared to the heavens. His face was flayed raw—he no longer had the dignity to return alive. All he could do now was atone with blood.
But fate mocked him still.
Brook appeared, Seven Star Demon Sword gleaming, eyes cold as death. "I said," his voice cut through the storm, "everyone must die."
The blade pierced CP0 commander Eagle's heart, dark spirits swirling as Brook ripped the man's soul into his army of ghost generals. The corpse fell, discarded, to the fleet below.
Brook turned, riding Hera's cloud straight toward Quetzalcoatl. "Redfield! Shiki! Go hunt Gabriel. This one is mine."
Redfield, crackling lightning, and Shiki, mane streaming in the gale, exchanged brief glances. One word of assent: "Clear!" They veered away, pursuit locked on Gabriel.
Kukulkan, blinded and broken, heard Brook's declaration and felt his last ember of pride burn. The loss of CP0, the slaughter of his allies—it was his fault. Fury rose like fire.
"I'll drag you with me, pirate!"
The serpent's vast body lunged, tail cracking like a thunder whip.
Brook met him head-on, Seven Star Sword blazing, ghost generals shrieking in his wake. Overlord of the New World against the Fleet Admiral of the Navy—two titans whose clash shook heaven and sea.
Elsewhere, the Hell Pirates fell upon the last five CP0 agents. Desperate, they tried to dive into the sea to escape. But the waters belonged to the fishmen. Tom, Tiger, and their troops erupted upward, spears flashing, sealing every path. The agents screamed, then vanished beneath waves or steel.
Gabriel, fleeing with bloodied face, was caught again as Redfield's thunderbolt split the sky and Shiki's golden slashes carved across the storm. The three forces collided in a battle that lit the heavens.
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