"What… is this?!" The three God's Knights stood in the clouds, staring in bewilderment at the towering heavenly gates and fluttering banners surrounding them.
Born in the Holy Land and raised above the rest of the world, they had never imagined such a breathtaking sight- a true Heavenly Palace- could actually exist.
"So that's how it is…" Saint Fabian finally began to understand why his ability had failed.
"Those four banners… He activated his power ahead of time?"
His awakened Devil Fruit technique, Eternal Stage, could only be set up on a stage he had already established. But looking around now, the answer was obvious.
At some point during their battle, that man from the Lower Realm, one of the Twelve Zodiacs, had secretly activated his own ability. This stage had never belonged to Saint Jaygarcia Fabian. It was Shinko's stage!
"A coincidence? What a lucky bastard!" That was Fabian's first thought.
After all, he'd never used his awakened ability before, so no one else should've known how it worked. But when he raised his eyes, his heart suddenly clenched. Shinko stood atop the sea of clouds, Golden Cudgel in hand.
Sunlight gleamed off his golden armor, and his eyes burned like twin torches. The sheer sight of him, his presence and bearing, made Fabian instinctively reconsider.
No… What if… What if Shinko hadn't shut down his awakening by pure coincidence?
What if he'd known about Fabian's ability from the very beginning and set this up specifically to counter it?
If that was true, Shinko had known Fabian was preparing to awaken his Devil Fruit all along, and still chose to keep playing around with them. In that case, what was his real objective?
The answer hit him like a physical blow.
"If I mean to beat you all to death, how could I possibly let you escape?" Shinko's quiet words from moments ago echoed through Fabian's mind, ringing so loudly they left him dazed.
He intends to… For the first time in his life, Saint Fabian felt genuine terror.
"Killingham! Pierre! Use everything you have and get us out of here!" He screamed. "Something's wrong with this monster!"
Saint Pierre and Saint Rimoshifu Killingham, who had been watching Shinko warily and reading the situation, froze. They could both hear the sheer panic in Fabian's voice, an emotion almost unheard of from a God's Knight.
Still, they trusted his judgment. As Saint Saturn's great-grandson, Fabian was renowned even among the God's Knights for his sharp mind and cunning. That was precisely why he'd been chosen to lead their three-man squad.
It was widely agreed that if Shamrock hadn't been so unnaturally talented, Fabian would've stood a real chance at becoming the next Supreme Commander of the God's Knights. Neither of them hesitated for a second.
"Devil Fruit Awakening: Vector of All Things - Maximum Output!"
"Devil Fruit Awakening: Dream Lord - Swift Bird!"
A colossal bird made of streaming light and howling winds burst out of the dream world. Wherever it flew, reality itself warped like a dream; it was the fastest creature Saint Rimoshifu Killingham could create.
At the same time, Saint Pierre pushed his vector power to its absolute limit, unleashing every ounce of force he could muster. Driven forward by that massive vector thrust, the giant bird accelerated until it seemed to blur beyond the concept of speed itself.
Whoosh!
Clouds and celestial light were blasted aside, leaving a vacuum in its wake. To the three God's Knights, the magnificent Heavenly Palace stretched and blurred into streams of light.
They couldn't even make out their surroundings anymore, catching only split-second flashes of key landmarks, the four massive heavenly gates with their fluttering banners, and the golden figure atop the clouds.
Finally, they began to relax.
"He isn't following us," Killingham exhaled in relief.
"At this speed, we'll be out of Dressrosa in a few seconds," Saint Pierre panted, straining to maintain the vectors. "Even that monster couldn't possibly catch us from here, right?"
Normally, these two God's Knights were fearless, proudly calling themselves gods. Now they were running like frightened animals fleeing a predator, hardly daring to breathe.
Then...
"No…" Saint Fabian was the first to realize the truth. "Look around."
His teeth were clenched so hard his voice came out raspy.
Killingham and Pierre instinctively looked back around them, and their bodies went rigid. The horrifying truth finally registered: forget escaping Dressrosa, they hadn't moved an inch.
No matter how furiously Swift Bird beat its wings, no matter how loudly the vector propulsion roared, no matter how vast a distance they felt like they were crossing in a single breath… the four colossal heavenly gates were still right beside them. And the golden figure standing above the clouds had never left their line of sight.
"Impossible…" Killingham gasped in disbelief.
Swift Bird ground to a sudden halt. All three God's Knights stared forward, desperate to deny what was right in front of them. The sea of clouds churned below, bathed in radiant heavenly light.
Shinko was standing in the exact same spot, having not moved an inch. It was as if they hadn't even tried to run.
He simply rested his iron staff over his shoulder and tilted his head, watching them with amused curiosity, like a person watching ants squirm. Granted, these particular ants considered themselves gods.
"Destroy those four gates!" Saint Fabian barked. "They're the key!"
Arrogant as he was, the God's Knight was sharp. In a matter of seconds, he realized they couldn't just run out of this Heavenly Palace domain, and he'd also spotted its probable weakness.
Before this domain appeared, there had been four banners. Those banners had turned into the four heavenly gates surrounding them; they were obviously what was maintaining the Heavenly Palace.
"Understood!" Saint Pierre spread his arms wide. The bloody mist around him condensed rapidly into countless bone-white spears. Just like before, he pushed his vector control to its absolute limit.
"God-Slaying Spear: Myriad Bones!"
Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!
Hundreds of lethal bone spears ripped through the clouds like a torrential storm. Each one packed enough punch to drill right through an island as they hurled toward the four massive heavenly gates.
Boom!
Clouds billowed as a deafening explosion shook the entire palace. When the mist cleared, though, all three God's Knights saw the exact same sight: the four heavenly gates didn't have a single scratch.
Layers of faint, nearly invisible golden barriers had manifested across their surfaces, stopping every single bone spear dead in its tracks.
"Ha!" Shinko's voice echoed across the domain. "You fools really think those pathetic tricks are enough to break my Heavenly Palace?"
All three flinched, instinctively dropping into defensive stances. Having their bodies pulverized dozens of times had turned that reaction into pure muscle memory.
When they looked at Shinko, they saw that he had taken his three-headed, six-armed form once again, one set of hands held in a strange seal with index and middle fingers crossed at his side.
Shinko knew better than anyone that the Heavenly Palace domain created by his God of War Fruit was nearly invincible. Inside this space, he was like the Monkey King rampaging through Heaven; he couldn't be hurt, it didn't drain his stamina, and a single graze from his Golden Cudgel meant maiming, while a direct hit meant death.
His enemies couldn't even run away. The domain's only actual vulnerability was the Heavenly Palace structure itself. If its four Battle Seals were destroyed, the whole space would collapse.
However...
[Barrier-Barrier Fruit, Level 5: Devil Fruit Awakening, Infinite Barrier. There is no longer any limit to the surface area of the barriers created, and they can be maintained indefinitely as long as the Devil Fruit user remains standing.]
As Shinko had just shown, the awakened power of the Barrier-Barrier Fruit patched that single flaw seamlessly.
[Barrier-Barrier Fruit: Four Directions Heavenly Gates]
"If you want to run, go right ahead," Shinko said, standing tall atop the clouds. "I won't send you to your deaths without letting you know the rules. There's only one way out of here." He grinned, pointing a finger at his own chest. "Beat me, and the Heavenly Palace disappears. After that, you can come and go as you like."
The three God's Knights thought the idea was utterly insane.
Beat him?
What kind of sick joke was that?
If they were capable of beating him, why would they be trying to flee in the first place?
Yet there was no denying it anymore. They were trapped.
"We should just go all out and fight him…" Saint Pierre trembled all over. The helpless feeling brought back bitter memories of that insect Roy beating him until only his head was left. It was a humiliation he refused to suffer a second time.
"No!" Saint Rimoshifu Killingham cut him off. "Fighting him head-on is pointless. The protection from the Deep Sea is already dangerously thin. If we get killed a few more times, the covenant's power might temporarily break down entirely! We focus on defense. No matter what kind of monster he is, his stamina and abilities have to have limits!"
Killingham was clearly keeping a cooler head, or maybe their earlier beating had just beaten the denial out of him sooner. Shinko was terrifyingly strong, way beyond anything they could fathom. Facing him head-on was suicide; all they could do was stall for time.
"We split up and stay on the move so he can't wipe us out all at once," Killingham ordered. "The Deep Sea Covenant is our biggest advantage." He knew all too well it was also the only advantage they had left.
The Deep Sea Covenant was a gift granted to them by Lord Imu. Its physical stat boosts were already useless against Shinko. With over two thousand victories powering up his God of War Stance, overpowering him in a collision was flat-out impossible.
Even so...
"We still have our immortal bodies! As long as none of us takes a prolonged beatdown infused with Conqueror's Haki, the covenant's power will regenerate quickly. We can keep dragging this out. In a war of attrition, we won't lose. If we hold on long enough, an opening will show up! Right, Fabian?"
Killingham looked over at Saint Fabian, but all he saw was Fabian's pale, shadowed face, twisted with undeniable terror.
"No…" Fabian didn't answer the question directly. "Killingham, haven't you realized it yet? That bastard was just playing around with us earlier. He wanted to weaken the Deep Sea Covenant without making us suspicious. He… He…"
Fabian ground his teeth until they creaked. A horrific thought was forming in his mind, something so absurd that it chilled him to the core.
"Wh..." Killingham and Saint Pierre froze.
Before either of them could speak, Shinko's voice drifted down again. "That's right."
They looked up to see him leap down from the cloud layer. "You three don't actually amount to much, but that annoying trick you have for surviving is a pain in the ass. So I asked my old boss for a little favor."
His old boss?
The three God's Knights stared in confusion.
Then...
Thump! A heavy rhythm echoed through the air.
Thump! It was the beat of a drum.
Thump-thump! Thump-thump!
Ancient, grand war drums resonated across the Heavenly Palace domain. The sound seemed to cut through space itself, rumbling across the sky like rolling thunder.
Inside the clouds, it sounded as if countless gods and Buddhas were chanting in harmony. High above the Heavenly Palace, it felt as though an immense, invisible eye had opened to look down on them.
Saint Fabian trembled under the crushing weight of the rhythm. Right then, the Deep Sea Covenants on their left hands flared with a freezing pain that cut straight to their souls.
Through those marks, their souls had been cast into the deep sea long ago, surrendered to that Great Being. Now, they felt those souls being pulled back up toward the surface.
"Could this be…?" They stared at their covenant marks in horror, then looked past Shinko toward the Heavenly Palace behind him.
Countless stars blazed in the sky above. Starlight expanded across the sky, as if the endless universe had fused directly with the palace.
At the center of the stars, far beyond the highest roof of the Heavenly Palace, stood a hazy figure that flickered between real and surreal. That grand drumming was coming directly from them.
A name that was practically myth, even to the God's Knights, surged into their minds.
"The Drums of Liberation?!"
[Nika Fruit, Level 5: Wish for Freedom, Drums of Liberation]
[The user can match their heartbeat to the rhythm of the Drums of Liberation.]
[As long as the Drums of Liberation are beating, the user and nearby allies gain "freedom," rendering their bodies immune to any form of restraint or binding.]
Thanks to the massive treasure stash Katakuri had recently delivered from taking down almost the entire Big Mom Pirates, Roy had finally amassed the absurd eighty billion Berries needed to unlock the Nika Fruit's awakening. That was what made this scene possible.
[Cloud Palace Resounds: Drums of Liberation]
Starlight blended into Shinko's golden armor. On his mask, a monkey face emerged, snarling with fierce intensity. He hoisted his iron cudgel high.
"Alright then. Let's see… After taking this hit, will you so-called 'gods' actually die?"
The instant the words left his lips, he swung down.
"Dodge!" That single word was all Saint Fabian could scream out. Light flashed in his hand as the imagery shifted rapidly, his body flickering through space like movie frames snapping past to blur the line between reality and illusion.
The other two didn't need to be told. Saint Rimoshifu Killingham and Saint Pierre were already dodging on pure instinct. Swift Bird sliced through the sky while Killingham shifted into his qilin form, firing up the regenerative abilities of his Mythical Zoan to absolute capacity.
The crimson mist around Saint Pierre churned violently as vector energy surged around him with enough force to crack his armor, pushing his power to the absolute limit.
And yet, all three of them felt it at the same moment. No words could capture the feeling. It was like an ant watching a mountain crumble overhead, or a bird watching the firmament crash down.
"No! No! No!" Snot and tears poured down the faces of all three God's Knights. It was an emotion they had never known, one they assumed they would never have to feel. "We are God's Knights! Lord Imu…!"
They had inflicted this horror on countless people throughout their lives, never once entertaining the thought that it could happen to them. It was, [Death]!
Their screams and desperate cries meant nothing. Bathed in golden radiance, Shinko brought his cudgel down, and the Golden Cudgel began to swell.
Boom! As massive as a tower.
Boom! As vast as a mountain.
Boom! As huge as heaven and earth itself.
By the end, the staff stretched across almost the entire Heavenly Palace domain.
[Heaven-and-Earth Colossal Form: Havoc in the Heavenly Palace]
Black lightning crackled from his Conqueror's Haki, intertwined with golden flame clouds as the colossal cudgel slammed down!
"Take this!"
(End of Chapter)
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