Chapter 68: The Emperor's Pride
Whitebeard's laughter was no longer the rumbling amusement from before. It was a deeper, more resonant sound, carrying the weight of decades as the world's strongest, and now, a spark of genuine, insult-fueled fury. The air around him warped visibly, not just from the shock halo on his naginata, but from the sheer density of his will. His Conqueror's Haki, usually a controlled, commanding presence, erupted outward in a torrent.
The effect was immediate and brutal. Across the ice field, hundreds of Marines—hardened veterans and recruits alike—crumpled where they stood, their eyes rolling back as they lost consciousness. Even some lower-ranking pirates from allied crews swayed and dropped. The plaza itself seemed to shudder. This wasn't the wide-area suppression Levi used; this was a focused, tidal wave of dominance, a declaration that this stretch of frozen bay was his domain.
Levi stood within the epicenter of this spiritual tsunami. His Admiral's coat whipped around him, but he didn't flinch. The Reiatsu barrier around him, which had deflected the shock-wave slash, now solidified further, a sphere of absolute spiritual negation. Whitebeard's Haki crashed against it like a storm surge against a sea wall. It roared, it pressed, but it did not break through. Inside the barrier, there was only calm.
"Gurararara! Not bad, not bad at all!" Whitebeard boomed, his eyes alight with a fierce, competitive fire Levi hadn't seen in him before. The insult, the sheer audacity of Levi's statement, had cut through the Emperor's strategic reserve and struck the core of his pride. "A brat who can stand before my full rage without kneeling! You have the right to be arrogant! But let's see how long that shell of yours holds!"
He didn't charge. At his level and in his condition, reckless charges were for lesser men. He planted his feet more firmly on the deck of the Moby Dick, raised his free hand, and clenched it into a fist. The transparent shock halo bloomed around his knuckles, shimmering with apocalyptic potential.
On the execution platform, Sengoku's face was grim. "He's focusing on Levi. That's… not part of the plan." The plan was to wear Whitebeard down, to let the Admirals and Warlords handle the commanders, and for the senior Admirals to engage the Emperor only when he was isolated and weakened. Levi, as the wild card, was supposed to be a deterrent and a cleanup force. Not the primary target.
Garp watched, his earlier internal conflict momentarily overshadowed by the spectacle. "That kid… he's poking the bear with a steel rod."
Akainu scowled. "Fool. Drawing that monster's full attention prematurely. He's risking the entire defensive line." Yet, a part of him was morbidly curious. Could the enigmatic Black Crow actually fight Whitebeard head-on?
Kizaru, having momentarily disengaged from Marco, watched with raised eyebrows. "Ohhh… so scary~ Two monsters are about to go at it."
Marco, freed from Kizaru's pressure, didn't press an attack. He hovered in the air, blue wings beating slowly, his face etched with deep concern. He knew his father's body. A full-power clash now, against an opponent who had casually negated a tsunami, could accelerate the inevitable collapse.
Levi watched Whitebeard's gathering power. This was the reaction he wanted. Not just anger, but investment. Whitebeard was now personally, passionately committed to breaking him. Every ounce of power the Emperor poured into this fight would amplify Levi's eventual victory.
"Your 'shell' isn't for holding," Levi said, his voice carrying clearly through his own barrier and against the howl of Whitebeard's Haki. "It's for measuring. I want to see the true height of the world's strongest man. Don't disappoint me, old man."
The provocation was a masterstroke. It framed the clash not as a desperate defense, but as a clinical examination. It further stoked Whitebeard's pride.
"MEASURE THIS!" Whitebeard roared. He punched.
It wasn't a punch aimed at Levi's barrier. He punched the air to his left, a short, brutal jab.
Crack-CRACK-BOOM!
The atmosphere didn't just fracture; it detonated. A localized, hyper-compressed shockwave, far more concentrated than the tsunami-causing punches, erupted from his fist. It didn't travel through the air; it teleported, a bubble of annihilating force that appeared instantly inside Levi's Reiatsu barrier, bypassing the outer defense entirely by violently distorting the very space it occupied.
Whitebeard's genius was on display. He hadn't tried to overpower the strange energy; he used his power to cheat, to make his attack manifest at the point of effect.
The explosion within the barrier was silent to the outside world, contained by the spiritual sphere. But inside, it was a maelstrom of pure force meant to pulverize matter and shatter souls.
Levi's eyes widened a fraction. Interesting. Spatial manipulation via shockwaves. Not just brute force.
He didn't try to block it. At this range, inside his own defensive field, blocking was inefficient. Instead, he dispersed.
Shunpo: Scatter.
His body seemed to fragment into a dozen afterimages, not moving linearly, but existing simultaneously at different points within the barrier as the shockwave passed through the space they occupied. It was an illusion of speed so great it mimicked intangibility. The shockwave ripped through the empty spaces between his spiritual fragments, rattling the barrier itself but leaving him untouched.
The barrier flickered violently, absorbing the residual energy. To the outside world, it looked like Whitebeard' punch had made Levi's protective sphere flash and distort dangerously. A cheer went up from the pirates. A groan of fear from the Marines.
Whitebeard's grin didn't fade. He saw through the trick. "Speed, huh? Let's see you outrun the sea itself!"
He swung his naginata downward, stabbing the blade into the deck of his own ship. A shockwave pulsed downward, through the ship, into the ice, and into the water below.
The entire bay heaved. The ice sheet Aokiji had created didn't just crack; it was lifted, tilted, and then dropped like a massive, frozen trapdoor. Towering geysers of water erupted at random points, and the sea beneath churned as if boiling. He was destabilizing the entire battlefield, making precision movement and stable footing impossible.
Levi's afterimages coalesced back into his true form just as the ice beneath where he'd been standing erupted upward in a jagged spike. He stepped onto the air, using a platform of condensed Reiatsu, appearing to walk on nothing.
"Better," Levi acknowledged, his tone still that of a critic reviewing a performance. "Using the environment. But it's still just force. Where is the skill? The technique you used to fight Roger? Or has age left you with nothing but overwhelming power?"
The words were calculated to wound deeper than any attack. They questioned not just his current strength, but his legacy as a warrior.
Whitebeard's eyes narrowed, the fury cooling into something more deadly: icy, focused wrath. "You want to see skill, you arrogant whelp? I'll show you the skill that split the heavens with that fool Roger!"
He yanked his naginata from the deck and assumed a different stance. The shock halo didn't just coat the blade; it vibrated at a specific, high frequency, creating a low, sub-audible hum that made teeth ache even at a distance. This was no longer about large-scale destruction. This was about cutting, piercing, breaking with surgical precision.
This was the true beginning. The probing was over. Whitebeard, personally insulted and now intellectually engaged, was entering the fray in earnest. And Levi had successfully made himself the sole focus of the Emperor's legendary combat arts.
Across the battlefield, Marco's heart sank. "Pops… don't overdo it."
Sengoku clenched his fists. "All units! Press the attack on all other fronts! Now! While Whitebeard is occupied!"
The war had just found its first, terrifyingly personal, duel at the highest level. And the world watched, breath held, as the unstoppable force of the old era prepared to meet the immovable, enigmatic object of the new.
(End of Chapter)
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