"You..." Kizaru stretched out his right hand and pointed directly at Jerry, his eyes moving frantically between Jerry's relaxed form and the massive crater beneath them. For several long moments, the Admiral of Light found himself completely speechless.
Landing smoothly on the edge of the enormous pit, Jerry glanced casually at Kizaru, scratched his head with obvious embarrassment, and offered what could generously be called an apology.
"Ah, sorry about that. This is the first time I've ever seen such a giant spider in person, you know? When I encounter something with that many hairy legs, I have this instinctive urge to punch it as hard as possible."
After delivering this explanation, he gently flexed his right fist while staring down into the crater, murmuring thoughtfully: "Hmm, still moving around down there? This thing's recovery ability is really something impressive."
"This situation has become truly terrible," Kizaru sighed with uncharacteristic seriousness. "Do you have any comprehension of how serious the crime you've just committed is? That's one of the Five Elders!"
Jerry blinked with apparent confusion and pointed at the rapidly regenerating creature in the pit, his expression a perfect mask of innocent bewilderment.
"Five Elders? Are you talking about that giant spider down there?" He paused for dramatic effect. "Wait, I thought the World Government's headquarters was supposed to be the holy land of Mariejois. Are you telling me it's actually some kind of spider cave?"
Although Kizaru couldn't quite grasp the cultural references Jerry was making, he had no intention of allowing this conversation to continue. Without another word of warning, the Admiral immediately transformed into light and shot toward Jerry with his signature attack.
"Light Speed Kick!"
The devastating technique combined overwhelming velocity with tremendous destructive power, creating a golden blur that moved faster than most opponents could even perceive.
Faced with this sudden assault, Jerry made no move to dodge or counterattack. Instead, he continued focusing his concentration on accelerating the healing process of his injuries, which had already recovered more than halfway back to full health.
At the critical moment, a thick barrier of compressed water suddenly materialized between Jerry and Kizaru's attack.
The resulting explosion from Kizaru's kick created violent shockwaves that rippled across the battlefield, but the water shield absorbed the impact completely, leaving Jerry unharmed despite standing directly behind the point of contact.
Before the explosive energy had even finished dissipating, the figure of "Jerry's" water clone suddenly appeared on the smooth surface of the water barrier.
The construct opened its right hand wide and drove it forward toward Kizaru with tremendous force. In its open palm, an extremely compressed water orb was spinning at incredible velocity, radiating dangerous energy.
Kizaru's eyes widened with alarm as he instinctively dodged backward, instantly increasing the distance between himself and the water clone to a much safer range.
The Admiral had learned not to underestimate attacks from Jerry's water constructs—especially techniques that appeared deceptively simple but were actually loaded with hidden destructive potential.
After all, Akainu's recent defeat served as a fresh and sobering reminder of what could happen when someone underestimated Jerry's capabilities. Kizaru remained constantly on guard against the water clone, determined to avoid being suddenly trapped within one of its devastating combination attacks.
If such a fate befell him, he could only hope that his fellow Marines would remember to burn extra incense at his memorial during the appropriate festivals.
"You dodged pretty quickly there," Jerry's water clone observed, standing protectively behind the original body while offering Kizaru a gentle, almost friendly smile.
Then, without any further warning, the construct pushed off from the ground and rushed toward Kizaru like an arrow released from a divine bow.
While controlling his clone to engage and restrain Kizaru, Jerry's real body stared down at Saint Saturn in the deep crater and whispered to himself with obvious amusement:
"What's there to be afraid of when it's just a spider? I mean, seriously..." He paused thoughtfully. "If I've been training for more than two and a half years now, I should definitely be able to handle this kind of opponent..."
At that moment, sensing a strange and malevolent energy approaching rapidly, Jerry immediately cut off his musings and controlled a water barrier to wrap around himself defensively.
The instant his shield formed, the area directly in front of Jerry's head exploded with tremendous force, sending water splashing in all directions from the impact.
"Huh? Does staring at people make them pregnant or something?" Jerry glanced downward and asked with leisurely amusement.
Inside the crater, a massive spider form stood completely intact, its multiple eyes fixed on Jerry with obvious malevolent intent.
"Regardless of your ultimate purpose here," Saint Saturn began speaking in a voice that carried the authority of absolute power, "surrender the Laugh Tale pointer immediately. Otherwise, you will—"
A tremendous crash interrupted the Elder's ultimatum as Jerry casually swung the fishing rod that had appeared in his right hand at some point during the conversation.
Looking down at the fresh crack he had created in the deep pit—a fissure over one hundred meters long—and observing the giant spider that had been cleanly severed in half but was already regenerating to its original form at a speed visible to the naked eye, Jerry's eyes widened with genuine amazement.
"Is this some kind of mythical Zoan-type Devil Fruit? With recovery abilities like that, if he provided barbecue ingredients indefinitely, wouldn't someone make a fortune?!" Jerry exclaimed with obvious excitement.
Then he glanced down at his own wounds, which had now healed completely, and shuddered for reasons he couldn't quite explain.
"Well... I'm not exactly magical healing meat, so I'd better not consider this particular business opportunity," he muttered to himself.
After making this observation, he looked back down into the crater.
Seeing that Saint Saturn had already regenerated his severed limbs and was preparing to launch another attack, Jerry stretched his body and rushed toward his opponent with renewed enthusiasm.
"Try this move that I've been practicing for two and a half years!" Jerry shouted, his attack speed increasing dramatically.
"What?!" Saint Saturn's multiple eyes widened as he instinctively attempted to counter with his signature "evil eye" technique.
However, the supernatural attack proved to be like a single drop of water against an ocean when faced with the thick coating of advanced Haki that surrounded Jerry's entire body. The mental assault had absolutely no effect whatsoever.
As Jerry approached his target, he planted his foot firmly on the ground, lowered his center of gravity slightly, and gathered tremendous force from his feet up through his shoulders. With devastating Armament Haki enhancing his physical power, he drove forward toward Saint Saturn, who was still in the final stages of limb regeneration and unable to properly dodge.
Suddenly, an invisible ripple with Jerry's shoulder at its center spread through the air like waves across a still pond.
Jerry's entire form seemed to break through the very constraints of atmosphere itself as he slammed into Saint Saturn's massive spider body with the unstoppable force of divine thunder.
"Iron Mountain Ram!"
The air itself exploded from the impact, and Saint Saturn was launched backward completely out of control, smashing into the pit wall behind him and creating another series of tremendous crashes as smoke and debris filled the surrounding area.
Meanwhile, at the center of the island, Admiral Aokiji had arrived to observe the tactical situation.
He offered a brief greeting to Fujitora, who was approaching from the opposite direction, then knelt down and placed his left hand—which radiated supernatural cold—into the inland sea that Jerry had created.
Ice began spreading rapidly from the point of contact, and within moments it had extended from the inland waterway through all three rivers connecting to the open ocean beyond.
However, this thick ice barrier didn't last long. After only a few seconds, a powerful shockwave swept across the area, and the ice both inside and outside the island shattered completely.
Looking at the ships of the Whitebeard Pirates and Black Star Pirates setting sail in the distance, Aokiji couldn't help but release a weary sigh.
"Alas... vibrations simply can't be frozen, after all."
Fujitora, who was slowly approaching while using his sword as a walking stick, seemed to have overheard Aokiji's comment and responded with characteristic calm:
"Mr. Kuzan, since we cannot prevent them from departing, perhaps we should abandon this particular objective?"
"Ara ara, this really has become quite the headache," Aokiji replied, standing up and scratching his head while watching Whitebeard, Deuce, and the others sail away to safety. "We've deployed almost every available Marine we could muster, suffered tremendous casualties, and still haven't managed to locate that pointer. I can only hope Borsalino achieves some results up there, or else our entire operational plan will have to be completely reconsidered."
"Let's go," he said, turning to address Fujitora with a slight smile. "Maybe we can still arrive in time to be useful."
With that, both Admirals departed quickly toward the northern section of the island.
On the northern battleground, explosions and roars had woven together into a chaotic symphony of destruction.
Kizaru's facial expression had progressed through several distinct stages: initial shock, followed by greater shock, then extreme shock, and finally settling into a kind of numb acceptance of the impossible situation unfolding before him.
This emotional journey was entirely understandable, given that Jerry's water clone was gracefully entangling with the Admiral of Light in aerial combat, while Jerry's real body was systematically pummeling Saint Saturn across the battlefield like a cosmic game of pinball.
The ground surface, already cracked and damaged from the earlier magma flows, was being smashed into increasingly smaller pieces. Yet Saint Saturn proved to be like an immortal cockroach—no matter how many times his limbs were broken or his body was damaged, he recovered rapidly from every injury.
Apart from the fact that every attempt to speak was immediately interrupted by Jerry's relentless attacks, Saint Saturn didn't seem to be suffering any lasting damage from the sustained assault.
Kizaru, who had been witnessing this entire surreal process, had gradually evolved from his initial desperate attempts to rescue the Elder—attempts that were consistently intercepted and countered by the water clone—to simply concentrating on dealing with the supernatural opponent directly in front of him.
"Bicycle Kick!"
"Dragon's Touch!"
"Man, this spider-shaped punching bag is really fun to kick around!"
Jerry continued shouting out attack names while maintaining his incredible pace, refusing to give Saint Saturn any opportunity to react meaningfully or mount an effective counterattack.
The sight of one of the World Government's ultimate authorities being treated like a training dummy was perhaps the most surreal thing any of the witnesses had ever observed in their entire careers.
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