Pfft.
Blood burst from Rocks' lips.
He stared at his battered body, eyes briefly out of focus. That towering frame wavered, then sank to one knee. Just staying upright took effort.
What a joke.
Power like that?
Out of the corner of his eye he saw what lay behind him. Half of God Valley was simply gone. The vast ocean beyond had been cut clean in two and the wound refused to close under the lingering force.
Such an attack had already stepped beyond reason.
"But you do not think that alone can kill me, do you, Ozz?"
He could not fathom how Ozz had unleashed a strike that exceeded the scale of their era, yet Rocks was sure he would still win, because Ozz's state was worse than his own.
Blade and gun had crossed for that one all out blow. Ozz had already burned through terrifying reserves of stamina and willpower. After a four on one, then a face to face with the era's outlier, even Ozz had limits.
"Your Haki is running on fumes, isn't it, Ozz?"
Rocks forced himself upright. He was mangled, that Sovereign Sea had left him on his last sliver of life, but he was not dead. He was certain he could ride this final breath and finish Ozz here.
"Who do you think I am?"
As if flaring before the end, Rocks' Conqueror's exploded. Darkness swallowed everything. Ozz's clones, already exhausted, could not even raise their Haki in time. His fruit powers were devoured and for a heartbeat he felt hollowed out. When the clones vanished the backlash ebbed.
"I am the world's strongest man, the one who will be king of the world."
Ozz only sighed.
He dropped to the ground. The sword clone fizzled away. Only his true body remained. He used the gun like a cane with one hand while the other rifled inside his coat.
"Ozz."
Seeing Rocks advance, Roger and the others went bloodshot and roared at the tall figure sitting there. Ozz merely raised a hand to calm them.
All eyes fixed on him as he pulled something from his inner pocket.
"A rice ball?"
"Hey, how does that kind of thing not get pulped mid fight?"
Roger could not help himself. Ozz did not bother to answer. He just ate.
"Good. The compressed rations survived."
The ultimate stage of a peak battle, and this guy was chewing. Rayleigh and Jabba paused mid exchange with Garling. Garp and Roger even broke rhythm. Rocks himself blinked, dumbfounded for a second. Only a second.
Veins stood out on his forehead.
"Die."
The ground split. Shockwaves drove a circle of land a hundred meters across into a bowl. Everyone stared at the center.
When the dust cleared, only Rocks stood there with his fist out. Alone.
"Ahhhhh."
"Ozz got turned to ash."
Roger's eyes bulged. His tongue lolled.
Rayleigh smacked him.
"Idiot. He missed."
Far off on a shattered boulder, Ozz flickered into view, cradling his beloved Black Gun. At some point he had polished off the entire rice ball.
"Stamina is back a little. Time to end this."
He could feel it. His time here was truly almost up. He would go all in for real.
"Tch."
Rocks drew breath to speak, then saw Ozz lift the gun. Lines of cold light pulsed along its frame. Black and crimson lightning surged over Ozz's body.
"Sorry."
Red flashed in his pupils.
"I told you. I am not losing."
The shot cracked like judgment. The round vanished from the muzzle, carrying the weapon's raw force, the warp of space, Conqueror's coating, ryuo, and flame, all packed into a seastone core. It was a bullet that could not be stopped, one that countered everyone, fruit users and body monsters alike. A round that would pierce anything.
When Ozz threw restraint aside, he could kill anyone.
Even Rocks, for all his might, staggered as multiple Haki coated seastone slugs buried into him. Powers blinked out. Flesh unraveled.
He tried to grab Ozz, Conqueror's flaring around his hand for a final death match.
Ozz only looked at him the way a hunter watches a boar's last charge. Struggle. Lunge.
"Useless."
Shots barked in a ruthless rhythm.
Rocks pushed through the hail, monster body screaming, and reached Ozz with a hammering blow. Ozz's figure snapped into being on a distant snapped trunk, still sitting with lazy poise, eyes cold and red, the gun already level again.
A blink.
Another shot.
Faced with that unanswerable power, that rain no man could endure, Rocks' mind went blank for the first time. Despair crept into his eyes.
The seastone did its work. Even Rocks felt his strength ebbing away, defenses failing, as bullets layered with ryuo, Conqueror's, and space tore him apart.
"What kind of joke is this."
It was shameless beyond reason, shameless enough to kill anyone with ease. Against anyone, it could be made unsolvable.
That was the definition of the Black Gun. Ozz's final hidden blade as he walked the world.
It was why the World Government feared him. It was the key he carried to yoke the age. So long as no one could crack this method, warlords of the underworld, the Seven Warlords to be, Marines, pirates, all of them would remain within reach of Ozz's leash.
Black Gun Ozz's debut was nothing like Ozz of Divine Departure, or Ozz of Fist, or Ozz of Demon Wind. It struck the world dumb. If he had wished it, Roger, Garp, Garling, none of them would have left God Valley alive. That was what gnawed at their minds now.
Silence ruled the Chamber of Authority.
They stared at the figure holding the black rifle, seated in the cold wind, watching Rocks die.
It was a long time before anyone spoke. Eyes met, slipped away, then finally a voice.
"Suspend the CP investigation into Gick."
"How long."
"Forever."
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