-Broadcast-
Ms. Tsuru's final words echoed in Gin's mind as he faced the Heavenly Yaksha.
Doflamingo's arrogance stemmed from leverage—secrets about the Celestial Dragons' highest echelons, evidence that made even the Five Elders hesitate to move against him directly. Combined with the Donquixote Family's continued existence among the Twenty Kingdoms' descendants, he'd woven himself into a web of protections that should have made him untouchable.
Should have.
But none of that mattered now. Too many parties wanted Doflamingo dead. Former Fleet Admiral Sengoku. Ms. Tsuru. The New Marines' Fleet Admiral. Countless victims across the seas who'd suffered under his criminal empire.
Admiral Gin was simply the knife they'd chosen to cut this particular knot.
"Donquixote Doflamingo," Gin said, his perpetually-tired eyes hardening with determination. "The crimes you've committed can never be washed away. I am judging you now—on behalf of the Marines, on behalf of justice, and on behalf of every person you've destroyed."
He activated his Devil Fruit power.
The Ame Ame no Mi (Rain-Rain Fruit) responded immediately. Moisture condensed around Gin's body—not ordinary water but acidic rain droplets that hissed faintly against the air. His coat billowed as atmospheric pressure shifted, clouds gathering overhead in response to his will.
"I'm fulfilling the last wishes of Former Fleet Admiral Sengoku and Former Chief of Staff Tsuru," Gin continued, his voice carrying deadly calm. "They want you in hell. I'm sending you there."
Doflamingo's response was that infuriating grin—the one that said he'd heard a particularly amusing joke.
"Fuffuffuffuffu! That's the funniest thing I've heard all day!" The Heavenly Yaksha threw his head back, theatrical laughter echoing across the Founding Titan's spine. "No one in this world can judge me, Admiral. The person capable of judging me hasn't been born yet."
His arms swung forward.
"Sora no Michi (Sky Path)!"
Two thick white cords erupted from his palms—thicker than the threads he'd used to cage Luffy, reinforced with years of Haki refinement. They shot toward Gin at tremendous speed, seeking to bind and strangle just as they'd imprisoned the Straw Hat Boy.
This technique had completely neutralized Gear Fourth. Had reduced Luffy to helpless struggling despite all his enhanced strength.
But Gin wasn't Luffy.
"Amenomurakumo (Rain Curtain Blade)."
Water vapor in the air condensed instantly—forming a katana-shaped blade of liquid in Gin's right hand. The weapon looked almost transparent, barely visible against the sky, yet it radiated menace through the way moisture in the atmosphere bent around its edge.
Gin swung once.
SLASH.
The water blade passed through Doflamingo's white cords like they were ordinary string. No resistance. No effort. The reinforced threads that had imprisoned Luffy simply... parted, severed ends falling away as the attack dissipated harmlessly.
In front of the Amenomurakumo, the Ito Ito no Mi (String-String Fruit)'s techniques seemed fragile as paper.
"Doflamingo," Gin said, his tone shifting from calm to commanding. "You'd better use your full strength immediately. Delay any longer, and you won't get another chance."
He swung the water blade multiple times in rapid succession.
Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!
Dozens of crescent-shaped water constructs flew toward the Heavenly Yaksha—each one a pressurized slice of liquid moving at cutting speeds. They carved trenches in the Founding Titan's bone surface as they traveled, demonstrating destructive power equivalent to master swordsmen's flying slashes.
Water can cut through steel if applied properly, Doflamingo realized, reassessing his opponent with renewed caution. This Marine Admiral isn't just a political appointment. He's actually dangerous.
The former Celestial Dragon's estimation of Gin rose several notches.
"Itonoko (Bulletstring)!"
Doflamingo raised his right hand defensively, fingers splayed. White spheres erupted from each fingertip—compressed thread constructs that expanded mid-flight into small nets. They intercepted Gin's water slashes head-on, the collision creating spray and scattered thread fragments.
The techniques neutralized each other—Admiral versus Shichibukai, neither gaining immediate advantage. Both were still testing, probing for weaknesses, conserving their true strength for when it became necessary.
But Gin's patience had limits.
"I've wasted enough time on you," the Admiral said, his voice dropping to something colder. "Die quickly."
The sky above him began to change.
What had been clear blue moments ago transformed into roiling gray-black clouds. The transition was instantaneous—one second sunshine, the next oppressive gloom—all due to the Ame Ame no Mi's atmospheric manipulation.
"Amemakura (Rain Curtain)."
The clouds rippled. Not like water disturbed by stones, but like reality itself developing cracks. Each ripple-point in the sky began gathering moisture, condensing vapor into solid forms through principles that defied normal physics.
Knives. Swords. Spears. Halberds. Axes. War hammers. Every common melee weapon used throughout the world's cultures materialized from compressed water molecules—thousands upon thousands of them, filling the air like a suspended armory.
The constructs surrounded Doflamingo's position completely—above, below, from every angle. No blind spots. No escape vectors.
"DIE!"
Gin's command unleashed the arsenal.
The water weapons shot forward simultaneously—a storm of blades moving at projectile velocities. Each construct possessed cutting power equivalent to the Amenomurakumo. Each one capable of carving through steel. And there were thousands descending from every direction at once.
No one except Yonko Kaido would dare face this assault head-on.
Doflamingo's Observation Haki captured the approaching signatures—nearly ten thousand individual weapons, all radiating killing intent. His mind processed the information in fractions of a second.
Logia fruits are terrifying for large-scale destruction, he acknowledged grimly. Paramecia abilities can't compete with this kind of area coverage.
He couldn't dodge. Couldn't counter-attack effectively. Against overwhelming numbers and perfect coverage, only one option remained.
Defense.
"Hakuja (White Serpent Armor)!"
White threads exploded from Doflamingo's ten fingers—not just dozens but thousands, weaving together at impossible speeds. Within heartbeats they'd encased his entire body in layered thread-mail, forming a second skin of interlocking white strands.
Then the threads darkened—covered completely in jet-black Armament Haki that transformed the armor from white to obsidian.
The final appearance was striking: black armor with white thread-patterns visible beneath, giving Doflamingo an demonic aesthetic that matched his epithet perfectly.
The water weapons struck.
CRASH! CRASH! CRASH!
Hundreds of blades slammed into the Haki-coated armor within the first second—leaving water-mark impacts but not penetrating immediately. The defense held... for now.
But Admiral Gin's assault didn't stop.
More weapons formed. More attacks descended. The production rate was obscene—tens of thousands per second, an endless barrage that gave Doflamingo no respite to counter-attack. He could only stand and endure, pinned down by sheer overwhelming volume.
The water-shaped weapons began leaving cracks in the black armor. Small fractures that widened with each subsequent impact. The principle was simple: water dripping on stone. Given enough time, enough repetition, even the hardest defenses would erode.
And Gin had effectively infinite ammunition.
Doflamingo found himself in the humiliating position of being a punching bag—unable to retaliate, slowly being worn down, treated like a training dummy rather than a fellow top-tier combatant.
For someone as proud as the Heavenly Yaksha, the indignity stung worse than the physical damage.
The audience watching the Sky Screen—both inside Dressrosa and across the world—stared in rapt attention. Admiral Gin's spectacular combat display had completely overshadowed everything that came before.
Monkey D. Luffy? The passionate young pirate who'd fought so desperately?
Most viewers had already forgotten him, attention captured by this newer, flashier confrontation. Abandoning old favorites when superior alternatives appeared was human nature.
The black-and-white armor began fragmenting. Pieces flaked away under the relentless assault, exposing vulnerable flesh beneath. The water-shaped weapons showed no signs of diminishing—if anything, their production rate was increasing as Gin refined his technique mid-battle.
I can't wait any longer, Doflamingo realized with gritted teeth. If I don't counter-attack soon, I'll be worn down to nothing. This kind of frustrating death doesn't suit me at all.
Time to show why he'd survived the New World's cutthroat politics for decades.
The Ito Ito no Mi began manifesting its Awakening.
The Founding Titan's bone surface around Doflamingo rippled—transforming from calcium into white threads at the molecular level. What had been solid skeletal structure became malleable string constructs under the Awakening's reality-warping influence.
Eren, controlling the titan from within, actually helped by supplying additional mass. The amount of bone converting to thread exploded exponentially—vast quantities of white material rising from the ground like a tidal wave.
To Doflamingo, these transformed threads felt like natural extensions of his own body. He could manipulate them as easily as his fingers, command them with thought rather than conscious effort.
"Senjumantō: Hashiori no Ito (Thousand Arrows Piercing Heart: Feather Strike Thread)!"
Tens of thousands of thin threads erupted from the converted bone—each one wrapped in Armament Haki, each one sharp enough to pierce steel. They spread outward like flamingo wings, rising to meet the rain curtain descending from above.
Thread met water in mid-air.
The Haki-coated strings pierced through the water ripples generating new weapons, disrupting the formation process. With continuous reinforcement from the awakened battlefield, Doflamingo's counter-attack quickly suppressed Gin's production rate.
The rain of weapons slowed. Stopped. The Admiral's overwhelming assault had been neutralized through superior positioning and infinite ammunition of his own.
"Kyodai na Nami Hakusen (Giant Wave White Line)!"
The awakened threads gathered into a massive torrent—a tsunami of razor-sharp strings that surged toward Admiral Gin's position. Any ordinary pirate caught in that flood would be instantly shredded into paste, ground down by thousands of cutting edges moving with tidal force.
But the technique served a secondary purpose beyond offense.
As the white wave swept across the battlefield, it crashed into Luffy's suspended Birdcage.
The prison—which had been slowly contracting, gradually crushing the trapped Straw Hat—was swept away in the torrent. Not destroyed, but displaced, carried off the Founding Titan's spine entirely by the awakened thread-wave's momentum.
Luffy tumbled free, gasping for air as the constriction finally released. His Gear Fourth form was already deflating, body shrinking back to normal proportions as the technique's time limit expired.
He'd been saved. Inadvertently. As collateral benefit of Admiral Gin's large-scale suppression forcing Doflamingo to respond with equally large-scale counter-measures.
In terms of fighting without honor, the New Marines were proving themselves just as pragmatic as pirates.
Why fight one-on-one when you can gang up on enemies?