Charlotte Linlin's Mother's Visit Cannon—Three-Thousand-League Ikoku was powerful, at least more practical than the Golden Lion's Earthly Lion, and its level even entwined Conqueror's Haki at an extradimensional grade.
But just like the reason for the Golden Lion's defeat, Charlotte Linlin's Mother's Visit Cannon—Three-Thousand-League Ikoku lacked one kind of energy compared to the Wood Human Arhat's palm from the heavens—natural energy.
Moreover, Mother's Visit Cannon—Three-Thousand-League Ikoku had a drawback: once unleashed, Charlotte Linlin could no longer continue supplying it with energy.
By contrast, the descending palm was different. Like Kaido's Flaming Bagua, Link could supply the Wood Human Arhat with chakra and Haki, letting each move carry Armament Haki and even Conqueror's coating.
When the clash deadlocked and the Wood Human's attack was being neutralized, Link could immediately feed it energy.
Thus, from the instant Mother's Visit Cannon—Three-Thousand-League Ikoku collided with the Wood Human's hand, its defeat was sealed.
Unless the Mother's Visit Cannon's power could obliterate the Wood Human's giant hand in a single instant.
But was that possible?
Clearly, impossible.
As Link's self-created extradimensional strike, the Wood Human's palm—though smaller in sheer size than Kaido's Flaming Bagua and Luffy's Kong Gun—was not weaker in level; in fact, it was somewhat stronger.
Blended with sage chakra's Yang Release, Earth Release and Water Release nature transformations, Armament Haki emission and internal destruction, plus Conqueror's coating and Frog Kata's way of drawing on natural energy
In Link's eyes, this one palm was far stronger than a slash from a full-body Susanoo's katana.
"Shirahoshi, Karina, put the island down."
After defeating Charlotte Linlin, Link immediately gave the order.
Quickly, the Wheat Island that had become a sea of trees slowly descended from the sky and returned to its original place.
Members of the Charlotte family were rushing over from Whole Cake Island.
The fastest was still Charlotte Katakuri, who had been blown off the island by the hurricane.
Although Link's battle with Charlotte Linlin was a contest under the pirate game's rules
Now that Charlotte Linlin had lost consciousness, who knew whether Link would break his promise and strike her down.
Though not Link's match, Charlotte Katakuri absolutely could not let that happen.
Like the Whitebeard Pirates after losing Whitebeard, if the Charlotte family lost Charlotte Linlin, their central pillar, then Totto Land's dozens of islands would draw countless jackals to scramble madly.
If Link truly moved to kill, then even at the cost of his life, Charlotte Katakuri would try to stop it.
Fortunately, Link had no intention of killing Charlotte Linlin.
When the Charlotte family members arrived in succession, Karina, returning to human-beast form, brought Pudding back to Link's side.
Link looked at Charlotte Katakuri and said, "I won the Davy Back Fight. By the wager, I'm taking Pudding."
" fine."
Watching his sister being taken away, though his heart burned with unwillingness and anger, Charlotte Katakuri nodded.
He had no choice but to agree!
If he dared refuse or move to block it, then today they might lose not only one sister.
The whole family might be killed!
After all, Link's persona was one of extreme hatred for pirates—extermination, skewering them all as the Impaling Lord.
Though after ascending to the Four Emperors he had done fewer such cruel things, Charlotte Katakuri did not dare gamble on Link's kindness.
Thus, the Charlotte family members could only watch as Link led a completely unhesitant Pudding into a different dimension.
The battle's result—no one knew who spread it—quickly reached the Marine surveillance ships on Totto Land's periphery.
Some scenes of the battle—no one knew by what means they were filmed—appeared the next day as the World Economy News Paper's front-page images, spread across the globe.
Among those images, two stood out most.
One showed the Wood Human Arhat unleashing a palm from the heavens, and one showed a wooden dragon spewing water.
Reading that article, those who had been secretly searching for who used the water dragon to wipe out Teach's crew instantly understood!
They had thought that person was one of the Impaling Lord Pirates' hidden assets.
It turned out that person was actually Link.
"Even water can be produced—is that why the Mori Mori no Mi is called the source of life that can stand shoulder to shoulder with the sea?"
At Marine Headquarters, Aramaki, who had not yet passed final assessment, murmured to himself: "I wonder whether my Mori Mori no Mi can reach that level."
If Link had seen that report, he would surely have burst out laughing.
Good grief—the more the Mori Mori no Mi user believed it, the more he thought Link was actually a Logia Wood-Wood Fruit user.
The strong focused their attention on how Link had developed the Mori Mori no Mi.
The world's attention, however Charlotte Linlin had lost!
Or rather, an Emperor of the Sea had lost—lost in a one-on-one!
What did that mean?
It meant the pirate-world rankings were about to change again.
Sure enough
On the day after the news broke, the Marines updated Link's bounty once more.
[The Impaling Lord Link. Bounty: 5,640,000,000 berries. Dead or alive.]
After Roger and Whitebeard, another pirate had broken the five-billion threshold.
Link's bounty surpassed Whitebeard's by more than ten million berries, making him the current No. 1 among active pirates.
After defeating Charlotte Linlin, Link directly surpassed her and Kaido, whose bounty was 4,611,100,000 berries, seizing the No. 1 throne among the Four Emperors.
At the end of the Sea Circle Calendar year 1520, the year that should have belonged to the Impaling Lord and Blackbeard.
In the final days of the countdown, Link forcefully turned it into his year.
Link had defeated Charlotte Linlin head-on, one-on-one—impact far greater than felling the gravely wounded Whitebeard and Golden Lion.
Such impact had examples in the previous era—not just one.
Even among superpowers there are levels, but every Emperor of the Sea without exception stands closest to the world's ceiling.
They represent the extreme of individual might—mind, skill, and body all at the peak.
Such superpowers are hard to separate one-on-one. Without outside interference, most end in stalemates, with wins and losses traded—almost never a total rout.
Thus, when such superpowers fight and a result emerges, the victor's standing surges while the loser's declines.
The classic case was the Edd War, where the Golden Lion lost to Roger.
Though not a one-on-one defeat, the Golden Lion became Roger's foil.
Another case was the Red Count defeating a Fleet Admiral.
On the strength of that record, the Red Count, despite lacking a sea-dominating organization, could sit as an equal with Roger, Whitebeard, and the Golden Lion—one of the four legends of the last era.
In recent years, the only one-on-one between such superpowers was Akainu versus Aokiji.
Thus the victor, Akainu, became the new Fleet Admiral.
Now, yet another superpower had lost one-on-one—one of the active Four Emperors.
And the one defeated was also a Four Emperor.
Unintentionally, Link had achieved a feat—an Emperor of the Sea defeating an Emperor of the Sea.
A same-tier victory—something even Whitebeard, Kaido, and Shanks had not done.
Hence, Link's bounty directly surpassed Charlotte Linlin's and Kaido's, and even the late Whitebeard's, second only to the Pirate King.
That bounty was tantamount to official recognition and a crown.
The next day, seizing the hype, Morgans used a single article to whip the craze to a peak.
Its headline blazed—"Pirate World No. 1, The New Strongest Man in the World—The Impaling Lord Link."
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