Fred vs Lerna (Part 2)

CRASH! CRASH! CRASH!

Once again Lerna's heads came at him and he had no choice but to dodge them.

Cutting them was of no use, since more would appear in unexpected directions

Paralyzing, deadly, or sleeping poisons didn't work on them.

His hair, with which he could restrain many enemies, was of no use against such a large and numerous adversary.

Blinding them one by one was a waste of time, since there were too many of them, they all shared the same vision, could detect him by scent and Fred had no other stink bomb with which to stop that function.

'Such complicated enemy'

Because of this, Fred was doomed to accomplish the difficult feat of doge endlessly those innumerable, extremely poisonous, immortal jumbles of meat with little chance of ending the life of its origin

Or that would have happened if he hadn't eaten an Akuma No Mi that same night!

'TIME TO MAKE THE CHIMI-FUCKING-CHANGAS!'

Fed made many of his long, reddish hair pick up some of the branches scattered on the ground. Instantly a greenish light spread from the head to the hair and from the hair to the branches, which turned into long lianas that later received that green light again.

'Let's do it!'

With his great speed, Fred once again dodged the numerous snake heads that tried to end his life, but he didn't just dodge the attacks. With great dexterity he was winding the vines around the serpentine necks that didn't stop harassing him. A strange movement that didn't make much sense to Lerna's eyes.

'What the hell?'

It was impossible for a few simple vines to stop the movement of his heads. They weren't even tied properly to minimally restrict their movements.

But that was just the preparation...

"What the hell!?" Several heads of Lerna screamed as they felt a great weight on them

The heavy weight of lianas that were turning into huge trees around their necks, which grew splendidly and clung together, greatly restricting their movements! They couldn't even move anymore, much less attack Fred like they had been doing until now!

'Okay, now for the main body!'

Finally freed from the ranged weapons blocking his way, Fred had a free hand to attack Lerna's weak spot without opposition, at least until the heads managed to free themselves from their huge wooden restraints

SLASHHH!!!!!

A moment that lasted extremely little

"NANI!?"

Before Fred could even swing his sword against that barrier of flesh protecting his target, a scorched arm coiled around a serpent's head came out of his hideout and swung a giant spear with great skill, strength, and speed.

Such dexterity, strength and speed that he was able to create a beam of cutting energy that decapitated a large part of his trapped heads, which multiplied almost instantly and freed the rest of his sisters, who also multiplied...

And together they attacked Fred like before…

"Shit..." Fred sighed upon see how his plans went to waste again...

Not only did he have to deal with more snake heads than before, he also had to keep an eye out for the cutting energy attacks that Lerna launched with the help of his spear.

Fuck! How could he do that with the state his body is in!?' Fred thought as he ran at top speed, dodging heads, deflecting cutting energy with his sword and creating new biological obstacles with the power of his Akuma No Mi

Fred felt horrified and relieved at the same time...

Horrified to see the great combat power, diverse tactics and fighting spirit of his enemy, who despite being in such a precarious state was capable of making things so difficult for him. He couldn't help but shudder at the thought of what would have happened to him if he had to fight Lerna in a fair duel in perfect condition or if he hadn't decided to eat the unidentified Akuma No Mi.

And relieved to feel that he'd made the right choice. If he hadn't eaten that Akuma No Mi and set up all those complex traps and fires thanks to the powers he'd just gained and instead opted for the initial strategy of ambushing them in the forest he would surely be dead by now

However, he couldn't feel more relieved than horrified right now, as he was still fighting for his life with no choice but to avoid all the attacks without being able to land an accurate blow.

"STOP DODGING! FUCKING COCKROACH!!!" Shouted the furious heads of Lerna, which failed to sink their teeth into Fred time after time.

Lerna couldn't believe that a human being could be so absurdly elusive. He had been attacking him relentlessly from all directions and in ways that were very difficult to evade for minutes, but he hadn't managed to touch even one of his long, reddish hairs.

His speed, agility, coordination, reflexes, and stamina were absurdly abnormal! He had never faced anyone, not even in the Grand Line, that was able to resist such bullying for so long!

'What kind of life has he led to be like this!?'

But not only was he an incredible speedster, even with only one arm he was able to parry his spear attacks from time to time and even cut deep into his defensive barrier formed by his giant serpentine heads.

'How can he be so strong despite being so young!?

Wasn't he just a fast trickster?'

In addition, that unknown Akuma no Mi complicated his already complicated offensive exponentially. He had to be careful where his heads stepped to avoid falling into more trap-holes, dodging the trees that suddenly appeared in his path...sometimes directly into his mouths... deal with the beasts that came out of the ground or watch in frustration as Fred created wooden platforms to move three-dimensionally and thus attack and escape from complicated angles

'First that light envelops something and that something becomes when he wants in animals, plants, trees or oil

It seems that he can't transform anything into anything... or else he would have already transformed one of my heads into a bomb or something like that...

Maybe he can just transform non-living things into living things or something like that...

Either way it's definitely an Akuma No Mi Paramecia...'

Not to mention his annoying hair, which as if they were also snakes defended Fred from all directions from many of his attempts to bite him in addition to throwing small objects that were on the ground that later transformed into larger and annoying things

'I have destroyed one of his arms and yet he can do so many things at once?

How can he do that with his hair?

He has the power of two Akuma No Mi or something!?

This is cheating!'

And above all... the wounds and burns that covered his entire body hurt more with each passing second

'Fuck!

I FEEL LIKE I'M GOING TO PASS OUT AT ANY MOMENT!

This pain is unbearable!

NOT EVEN KING HAD BURNED ME AS MUCH AS THIS LITTLE SON OF A BITCH! HE FOCUSED ON PREVENTING MY HEADS FROM REGENERATING ONLY!

FUUUCKKKK!!!'

His body was being covered, transported and somehow manipulated by his own heads

Heads full of scales, which had no choice but to be as close as possible to his burned flesh, which was being painfully exfoliated with every movement. However, the one who was taking the worst part was his right arm, which despite being as bad as the rest of his body was being used to attack with his spear

All these factors created immeasurable stress on the Lerna psyche.

'Fuck…'

But Fred was just as frustrated as Lerna.

He had managed to circumvent the offensive heads multiple times and made his way near the defensive ones, but no matter how many times he sliced through that barrier of necks and heads, he never got a chance to see his enemy's charred body as there were always others to cut down next

There's no efficient way to pass through so many layers of scales, flesh and blood with just one arm and sword.

Unless I finally…"

It didn't matter how impressive Fred's speed, agility, and perception were to completely avoid his attacks. Some of them needed to be parried and blocked by various means, such as creating trees, deflecting them slightly with his weird hair and in a traditional way with the sword in his hand, especially to parry the powerful spear and energy attacks that Lerna summoned with it

'Fuck...

My right arm is somewhat numb from blocking all those attacks...

How long can he keep doing this with that bad arm!?

If it weren't for...'

Since before this direct confrontation began he had used his newfound power to create hordes of beasts and various traps everywhere, something he continued to do as he fought to the death against Lerna. He was constantly creating boars to stun him, giant anacondas for cc, bears to tank, lions to do dps, trees and holes to complicate his movement and targeting...and this showcase was starting to take its toll on him.

"I start to feel more and more tired than usual…

I think I have abused my new power a lot without even controlling it or fully knowing them...

I should have assumed that everything has a price...'

However, no matter how successful Fred was so far dodging, parrying, deflecting, hindering and distracting Lerna. Until now he had been avoiding all these attacks knowing that if any of them hurt him it could mean his immediate defeat. The stress he experienced every time he avoided the poisonous and rotting fangs or stopped the powerful energetic cuts began to affect his concentration.

'Fuck...

Once again I feel like I'm facing a Dark Souls final boss with no weapon or armor...'

Furthermore, his hypotheses about how Lerna's fruit power worked, its innate limits and weaknesses didn't turn out to be as he had imagined. His efforts to reveal these seemingly non-existent weaknesses turned out to be useless, something that made Fred very angry and greatly limited the strategies he could use against his natural enemy.

'ARE THESE HEADS ABLE TO REGENERATE WITHOUT LIMIT!?

I have cut so much meat that I could make barbecues for an Argentine family for life!

Even the power of Marco [The Fenix] was shown to have limits in his regeneration in the Onigashima war!

There're hundreds now! He's not affected by this absurd weight gain!?

Compared to him Orochi fruit is fucking shit!'

Neither of them was having a good time nor did they know to what extent their enemy was better or worse than them! They only knew that they had to keep pressing on, since only one of them would be left alive tonight and none of them had the intention of becoming just another corpse that plagued the island.

For this reason, they had no choice but to continue using the only strategies and means at their disposal to kill the other, even though they had failed many times so far.

'Let's go again!

I HOPE THIS TIME WILL BE DIFFERENT!'

After taking distance after one of his failed attempts Fred charged again!

His acceleration was amazing, so much so that he passed through many hydra heads without giving them time to react, however in front of him was a huge cluster of monstrosities waiting for his onslaught.

'Here he comes again'

It was something Fred had done many times since they started fighting so Lerna was prepared for that initial move

A large number of hydra heads had positioned themselves in front his body and would pounce on Fred as soon as he was within range and attack him relentlessly until was poisoned, devoured or death... furthermore, his arm was ready to launch a powerful energy slash to finish him off if he got good timing without sacrificing his defense

A strategy neither special nor innovative for tonight, but one that Lerna had been perfecting after many attempts to be more precise and lethal

However...

CRAFFF!! CRAFFF!! CRAFFF!!

During this night and of course in her life, Lerna had never experienced the sensation of having a forest growing right under his heads, pushing them up at the precise moment that Fred approached them

'Shit!'

Lerna didn't realize that five or six attempts ago the whole area under his feet with the strange green light and he didn't use the transformation ability until now, just when Fred managed to guide him again to this same position. And now, due to that understandable mistake, his first line of attack had been rendered unusable for a few seconds.

But Fred didn't need much time!

He was already facing the meat barrier that separated him from his target and he only needed to swing his sword with all his might.

SLASHHHH!!!

However... Fred didn't expect that Lerna had also prepared a new strategy against him.

"SHIT!!!"

At the moment Fred made his cut, dozens of hydra heads emerged from underground and bit into the area Fred was beginning to cut, catching Fred's sword.

"GIE!!!" Lerna's nibbling heads screamed as his spear sped toward Fred body

SLASHHHH!!!!

From above the heads of Hydra began to destroy the trees and descend towards him, from below more snake heads emerged from the ground and pounced towards him and from the front a powerful wave of cutting energy was approaching towards Fred

'Run bitch! Run!'

Faced with such danger, Fred had no choice but to abandon his precious poisonous sword created by Stephen and move back as far as he could to save his skin while creating more trees to use them as a shield and springboards

FIU!

"Ufff... by a whisker...." Fred sighed once he got far enough away. And immediately afterwards he pulled out a tooth that he kept in one of his pockets and un-transformed it back into a sword.

"SHIT! FUCKING FLEEING COCKROACH!!!" Lerna screamed not only for wasting this chance to kill him. He realized that taking the sword from him wasn't an achievement, the son of a bitch had swords stored in his body.

Another failed attempt by both, which would start another attempt

'I have to finish this as soon as possible...'

It had been a long time since Fred started using his Akuma No Mi to create all the traps and hordes of beasts in record time and also fight to the death against an enemy superior to him with similar tactics.

'I don't know how much stamina that semi-immortal beast has left, but I'm half dead.'

His exhaustion had been building up and Fred didn't think he could keep up that pace for many more rounds.

'It's not my style, but...

I will have to trust my training, what I have learned about my enemy after so many attempts, my talent and my luck to make it work…

GOD OF THE PLOTH ARMOR FROM THE SHONEN MANGA! GUIDE MY ACTIONS AND BE GOOD TO ME FOR FIRST TIME IN YOUR LIFE!' Fred thought as he took a deep breath to prepare for his next…

And last round!

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You'll be able to see 8 chapters in advance in my Pa-treon

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