The sky was swallowed by black clouds, and in their midst a massive tear opened, spilling light down through the heavens.
"The sky… there's such a huge hole in it!"
Nami and the Marines aboard Garp's warship stared in shock, unable to believe what they were seeing.
Even Luffy, confined in his cabin, caught a glimpse of the impossible sight through the window.
All his life, he had known his grandfather was terrifying. But until now, he'd never truly understood the scale of that strength.
Today, for the first time, Luffy realized just how overwhelming Garp really was.
On the uninhabited island, half its coastline had been blasted away.
The dense forest in the center was torn apart, flattened by the aftermath of their clash.
Amid the collapsed undergrowth, Garp stood tall. His clothes were shredded, his body bloodied, his hands dripping red. He cracked his knuckles with a sharp, crisp sound and muttered:
"That move just now… why does it look so damn similar to mine, Guts brat?"
The attack had been powerful, absurdly so.
But what unsettled Garp most wasn't its strength.
It was the fact that Guts's strike mirrored his own techniques… yet carried even more force.
Even his son, Monkey D. Dragon, had never learned his signature style.
Though to be fair, that bastard never wanted to learn. Dragon had always rejected the tricks of his old man, the so-called "Hero of the Marines."
"Is that really what you're worried about? Whether your moves are being copied?"
Guts tilted his head, smirking as he raised his brows.
He stood completely unscathed. Not a scratch on him.
That fact alone planted a thought deep in Garp's chest.
But Garp wasn't one to overthink.
At Guts's provocative remark, he just laughed and cursed:
"Wahahaha! You've got a point, brat. What really matters here—" his grin widened, eyes burning with vigor,
"...is beating some sense into you!"
Age may have touched him, but Garp's decline wasn't anywhere near as exaggerated as Whitebeard's.
Anyone who assumed Monkey D. Garp had grown weak with the years… would only learn the hard way.
Because even now—he could still crush anyone foolish enough to test him.
Whoosh!!
In the blink of an eye, Garp's figure vanished.
He reappeared above Guts, his fist descending with all the force of a falling mountain.
It wasn't just a punch... it was the embodiment of his epithet, the "Fist."
BOOM!!!
The uninhabited island convulsed under the impact, the earth trembling, shockwaves ripping outward. The sea itself rose in waves, churned violently by the clash.
Guts braced himself, arms crossed above his head, as he caught the blow, Garp's fist cloaked in advanced Conqueror's Haki, its crackling force enough to split the skies once more.
"Old man, this is what I'm talking about!!!" Guts roared, a wide grin splitting his face.
"Let's throw hands!"
A surge of crimson Conqueror's Haki erupted from his body, exploding outward like a living storm. The sheer force of it twisted into a roaring vortex, shoving Garp back half a meter.
But before his boots could even brush the ground, Garp clenched his fists tighter, refusing to yield.
Guts mirrored him instantly, knuckles cracking, eyes wild with excitement.
"Then try me, brat!!!"
"Ora ora ora ora ora ora ora ora ora ora ora ora ora!!!"
Both bellowed in unison, their war cries overlapping as they charged straight for each other.
Not even his clashes with the Ten Tails or Six Paths Madara had ever stirred Guts like this.
This wasn't about sheer strength.
It was about who stood before him.
Monkey D. Garp.
A fight stripped of tricks and pretenses, just flesh, bone, and will colliding.
A raw contest of fist-to-fist, body-to-body.
And Guts loved every second of it.
Their fists thundered through the air like war drums. The very sound of knuckles colliding cracked the atmosphere.
Even Nami, who had retreated ten nautical miles away, could faintly hear the echo of their blows.
The Marines aboard Garp's ship trembled as waves crashed violently against the hull.
Red lightning lit the horizon, each burst a reminder of the storm raging on the island.
No sword auras.
No flashy Devil Fruit powers.
Only raw Haki and raw strength.
This was a true brawl.
Exchanging fists and kicks, both men searched for flaws in the other's guard. But their faces… were smiling.
For all his self-restraint, Guts couldn't completely suppress his monstrous instincts. His blows, sharp and relentless, outpaced most fighters alive.
And with sharper Observation Haki, he could read openings faster than most. In a battle of equals, that alone could tilt the balance.
But this wasn't a fight of equals.
Nearly eighty years old, Garp's combat experience was unmatched. Even without the ability to "hear the Voice of All Things," his instincts had been honed to the peak of human capability.
His fists carried decades of hardened resolve, the kind only a man who had fought legends could possess.
And for now just barely those instincts allowed him to keep pace with Guts.
From coast, to mountainside, to peak, to the far shore... their battlefield spanned the entire island.
An hour passed, and the once-pristine wilderness was unrecognizable.
Forests shredded, cliffs shattered, the earth torn open.
From the sky, the island looked like a rotting bun stomped flat, its crust and filling crushed into one ruined mess.
On the horizon, Nami and the Marines waited nervously. The storms and tsunamis still hadn't subsided.
To them, the raging hurricane was a ticking clock.
A countdown marking the duration of the two monsters' clash.
But no one expected this.
The fight had begun under the cloak of night.
And now, dawn was breaking.
Yet the hurricane still raged.
The tsunamis still thundered.
And neither man showed the slightest sign of stopping.
"Even the current Marine Admirals… none of them could push Vice Admiral Garp to this level!"
Garp's adjutant, Bogard, stared wide-eyed, disbelief carved across his face.
"Where the hell did this monster come from? Why haven't I ever heard of this guy before?"
The Marines around him were equally shaken.
"If he joined the Marines, he'd become an Admiral candidate in no time… and if he joined the pirates he'd be the next Emperor of the Sea."
"My god… this ocean never runs out of monsters."
Their voices trembled as they spoke, their worldview shattered again and again with every clash on the island.
Even Nami, who had already seen plenty of insanity since setting out to sea, stood frozen. Her pretty face went slack as realization struck her.
I… I really followed an unbelievable captain.
BOOM!!!
Thunder boomed across the heavens, echoing like a symphony. Even laymen who had never touched Haki before could feel the sheer power radiating from the island.
"No… another big move is coming!"
Bogard's eyes widened as he bellowed: "Everyone, get down!!"
Instantly, the thousand Marines aboard the warship dropped flat, clutching their heads against the deck.
"Galaxy Divide!!!"
Garp roared as his fist crashed forward, releasing a colossal shockwave that tore across the battlefield.
The impact split the very earth, a massive fissure opening as if the heavens themselves were struck.
The attack raced toward Guts like a comet's impact, unrelenting and absolute.
And yet...
Instead of fear, excitement blazed in Guts's eyes.
He grinned, mirroring Garp's stance perfectly, his fist drawing back in the same posture.
Then, with a voice full of fire, he roared back:
"Galaxy Divide!!!"
His punch shot forward, crimson Haki spiraling around his arm, unleashing an energy fissure equal to...no, even greater than Garp's.
The mountains covering half the island detonated in an instant. The landscape was obliterated, a deafening shockwave flattening everything in its path.
Garp froze for a split second, stunned.
This brat… is he my son from somewhere?!
The thought slipped unbidden into his mind, absurd yet strangely fitting.
But he had no time to linger on it because Guts's fist pressure, even more violent than his own, came roaring back toward him.
And what Garp didn't know was this:
If Guts had known exactly what he was thinking in that moment, he would've doubled down just to smash him harder.
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