Vice Admiral Bastille scoffed at the warning, completely dismissing what Dalmatian had just shouted.
But Dalmatian was growing desperate.
Their flagship, if it continued at its current speed and trajectory, was on a direct collision course with a screaming artillery shell fired from afar.
"Since when did the Whitebeard Pirates have someone capable of this level of battlefield command?!"
From detecting their approach in advance…
To calculating the exact lead required for a long-range cannon strike…
Dalmatian had never seen tactics this precise—not even from Whitebeard himself.
"If Whitebeard had always possessed this kind of firepower, our elite naval fleets would've been wiped out long ago!"
What frightened Dalmatian most was…
Only one cannon had been fired.
And yet the enemy was fully confident that it would land.
"They didn't guess. They knew. That kind of confidence—terrifying!"
Realizing the urgency, and with the roar of the incoming shell growing louder, Dalmatian no longer hesitated.
He launched a brutal kick, sending the dazed helmsman flying across the deck.
Then he seized the wheel himself and cranked it hard—full left rudder!
---
The sudden change in direction caught Bastille completely off guard.
He'd been standing tall with arms crossed, smug and brash—and not holding onto anything.
The sharp turn sent him staggering violently, nearly tumbling headfirst onto the deck.
"You damned mutt! Have you lost your mind?! This is mutiny!"
Bastille roared, lunging at Dalmatian.
Dalmatian, for all his fondness for his canine Zoan form, hated being called a dog.
But now, with a massive shell bearing down on them, he swallowed his pride.
Out of the corner of his eye, he caught the flicker of fire—the shell, descending fast, superheated from the friction of its long flight.
"You idiot—LOOK UP!"
Bastille's face twisted in rage.
"Trying to trick me now? Are you high on expired dog chow?!"
But before he could finish barking insults, he was already within striking distance—swinging both fists like hammers toward Dalmatian.
---
Blinded by anger, Bastille didn't notice that the previously-kicked helmsman had now frozen in terror.
His mouth hung open, staring upward at the streaking fireball approaching from the sky.
His knees buckled.
He pissed himself.
---
Dalmatian took a brutal pounding—his jaws clenching, steel teeth nearly shattering under the barrage of punches.
He coughed up blood, again and again.
But even as Bastille assaulted him, he refused to let go of the wheel—desperately holding the course on that evasive turn.
The ships flanking the flagship, seeing it swing erratically and suddenly, scrambled to avoid a collision, plunging the entire formation into chaos.
---
And then—
The shell arrived.
Bastille finally heard the telltale shriek of metal slicing through air.
He turned, eyes wide—
And saw it.
A glowing-red iron sphere, ablaze from its descent, plummeting toward the ship like judgment from the gods.
Even with his middling Observation Haki, Bastille could immediately calculate the impact point.
The trajectory was perfect.
It would strike starboard side, just below the bow—
Directly where the forward ammo hold was located.
"No…"
Not even Dalmatian could adjust the ship's path fast enough now.
---
There was no escape.
No options.
No salvation.
---
Bastille and Dalmatian's minds went blank.
"Is it… really possible for someone to fire from that far…
and precisely hit this exact spot?"
"And account for every evasive maneuver…
we might try?"
Dalmatian gave a bitter chuckle, his lips now dripping with blood.
He let go of the wheel…
…then dropped to all fours and sprinted toward the left side of the ship.
Bastille, shaken at last, scrambled after him.
---
BOOM!
The shell struck—dead center.
The ammo room exploded instantly.
The forward deck shattered into flying splinters, debris spraying in all directions.
A column of blinding fire surged upward.
A shockwave of concussive force tore through the air—
every loose plank, every nail, every cannon—blown sky-high.
Wooden shards, like thousands of arrows, pierced the deck.
Not a single inch remained untouched.
Not a single crewman on deck remained unscathed.
Only two survived:
Bastille and Dalmatian—bloodied, backs full of shrapnel—leapt desperately to a nearby ship.
---
But the damage wasn't over.
The force of the blast also triggered the already-loaded forward cannons.
They fired—
directly into their own allies.
At such close range, even the Navy's steel-reinforced hulls were torn open like paper.
Explosions rippled across the next ship.
Its ammo stores ignited, setting off a chain reaction of internal detonations.
The starboard side was obliterated.
It looked like a giant invisible beast had taken a massive bite out of the ship's flank.
Flames roared inside exposed lower decks.
Dozens of off-duty sailors were incinerated in seconds.
---
And then…
CRACK!
The ship's keel snapped.
Unable to handle the warped weight distribution, the ship broke in two.
It sank swiftly, the split hull vanishing beneath the waves like a toy tossed into a tub.
---
The Navy fleet hadn't even fired a shot in return—
and they had already lost their flagship and a secondary warship.
---
The shock was immediate.
The sailors—those who remained—were utterly shattered.
Confused, panicked, paralyzed.
Most had no idea what had just happened.
When the flagship suddenly veered left, the formation broke.
And because of that chaos, no one saw the cannonball coming.
---
And that was the most terrifying part.
The unknown.
Fear bloomed in the minds of every soldier.
And spread like wildfire.
---
Bastille rose to his feet, seething, blood dripping from dozens of wounds.
His Armament Haki flared.
He expelled every splinter lodged in his back, sending them rattling across the next ship's deck like falling arrows.
"All units—resume the advance!"
"We'll make Whitebeard pay dearly for this sneak attack!!"
---
But Dalmatian…
Dalmatian was silent.
He said nothing, eyes still locked on the horizon.
Compared to Bastille's ignorant bluster, Dalmatian had seen the truth.
And that was what terrified him.
He replayed the entire cannon strike in his head—over and over again.
Each time, the pattern became clearer. The logic more undeniable.
---
"The enemy commander didn't just fire a lucky shot…"
"He knew exactly when I would detect the shell."
"He knew I would instinctively order a hard left turn…"
"And he placed the shot precisely where I'd end up—because of that turn."
"I… I'm the one who steered the ammo room into the path of the blast…"
"I brought the shell to us."
---
A one-shot kill.
A trap laid with the future in mind.
And Dalmatian had played his part… perfectly.