10/11

"A third of the Supernovas, the first Pirate King, the next one too, and the birthplace of all three crews that once and currently are punting your tail! Not bad for the 'weakest sea', huh!?" Barto shouted after him.

Perhaps fortunately for Shiki, the time it took him to recover from the blow and regain his wits prevented him from hearing Bartolomeo's taunt. When he had his head straight again, he didn't go on the offensive, or start another gambit. All that had gotten him were two wounds—albeit serious ones—and a collection of contusions for himself.

'What am I doing trading punches with them?' he mentally demanded. Some need to prove his superiority? Raw rage that needed to be expressed?

Well, whatever the reason, he was done with it. Now, he would be fighting smarter.

The facts were thus: close combat devolved into mutual exchanges, something the rookies were… better suited to handle. Because there were two of them, and for no other reasons. Black Bart was covering Straw Hat; he needed to get both at once. And Straw Hat kept charging after him.

Shiki glanced down at the island below. Perfect.

Drawing on the power of the Float-Float fruit, Shiki fired off more impromptu projectiles at the pair. They missed or were blocked, but that wasn't the point. The point was that Straw Hat and that stupid pea-duck were now flying straight at him again. Surreptitiously lowering one hand, Shiki levitated a large ball of water out of the small lake below him. And then, when Straw Hat was close enough, he sped it up.

The look on Straw Hat's face when the water engulfed him was a soothing balm to his embittered soul. As was the shocked yelp Black Bart let out. Granted, the bubble barrier the traitor had managed to create around the two of them, preventing them from immediately drowning, was annoying, but from the water-leaking cracks, that would not last long.

"Jihaha… JIIIHAHAHAHAAAA!" he cackled, floating his way around the ball of water as he basked in the glory of his victory, the glory of the brats' defeat! "You think you can come here to my island, my kingdom, and do whatever you want, hmmm!? You brats! You rookies! YOU FAKE PIRATES!"

Shiki's already present smirk widened as the brats froze in their panicking, their attention locking onto him. That had gotten their attention something fierce.

"You actually listening for once?" he asked mockingly. "Good, then open up your ears!" Shiki swept his arms out wide. "Let me educate you on just how the world truly works!"

-o-

"It's really quite simple, you know. So simple even a pair of total morons like you can understand: the strong rule over the weak!" Shiki raised his palm before his face, fingers clenching and unclenching menacingly. "We in the world who have power, we who stand head and shoulders above the weak, are granted this ability because we are worthy! Because we are inherently better than our lessers! To take what we want, when we want, solely because we want it and because we have the ability to take it! This is our right! The right of the worthy!" Shiki's hand snapped into a fist. "THE RIGHT OF THE STRONG!"

A murderous growl erupted from X. Drake's throat as he snapped his titan-sized jaws at the screen, positively itching to tear his fangs into the real thing rather than a simple simulacrum.

Because right then, in that moment, there was truly nothing Drake desired more than to devour the monster who so thoroughly reminded him of the other monster that had slaughtered the first family he knew in his life.

Or perhaps more accurately, he wanted to slaughter the monster that reminded him of his first family, full-stop.

Bottom line… Drake wanted Shiki dead.

And he wasn't alone.

-o-

"And as for the weak?" Shiki's leer turned sadistic. "The only right they have is to be crushed beneath the might of the strong! To serve at the beck and call of the ones whom they have no right to stand against, whom they should face with the utmost reverence by having the utter benevolence to allow them to set foot upon their dominion day by day… and then to perish as soon as it would benefit the strong ones best! The world is full of weaklings who will never amount to anything, a waste of space and breath for those who can make so much better use of it. The only worthwhile thing they can do with their existence is serving and nourishing the strong!"

"That son of a bitch…"

A good number of incredulous eyes turned toward the punk-like speaker. He met them with a scoff.

"You honestly think I can put up with this? Please!" He waved his hand dismissively. "I'm no hypocrite, I agree with what he said about strength. I don't have a problem with killing. I don't have a problem with pillaging and burning. It's how I live my life, and it's how I'm going to reach for One Piece."

Kid glared bloody murder at the screen.

"But… blind reverence? And this chickenshit having the utter gall to demand it!?" Kid's fist split the wood of the table. "Fuck that. I want enemies, or I want loyalty, and both ways, that shit's earned. This asshole? He wants a flock of sheep." Loudly clearing his throat, Kid spat the resulting loogie right onto the screen. "Makes me fucking pissed off that I'm lumped in with him."

-o-

"And the strongest of all in the world? Why, there's no doubt about it!" Shiki flung his arms wide with a mad cackle. "It is us pirates! We, who fly our own flags and allow no limitations to hinder us! We, who cast off the shackles of the world, and are nations unto ourselves! There should be no doubts, no misgivings! We pirates, we conquer storms that send the meek fleeing for the shores! We defy all who stand in our way, be they beast or man!"

Shiki soared above the bubble, his face a rictus of rage as he glared down towards the world below. "WE FACE ALL DANGERS WITHOUT HESITATION! WE SAIL BEYOND THE HORIZONS THAT THE MEEK DARE NOT CROSS! THERE CAN BE NO DOUBT ABOUT IT!" Shiki shot his finger downward. "I TELL YOU NOW THE TRUTH I TOLD THAT FOOL ROGER, ALL THOSE YEARS AGO: THE SEA BELONGS TO US, AND US ALONE! AND I, AS KING OF THE PIRATES, WILL BE THE STRONGEST MAN IN THE WORLD! THE OCEAN WILL BELONG TO ME! JIHAHAHAHAAAA!"

"Twenty years of isolation has clearly not done the man's sanity any favors," the greatest swordsman in the world dryly stated, one hand reaching for a glass of wine. "Honestly… a veteran of the New World should know better than to assume he could actually get away with something like this."

"You know, up until that last line, I was actually prepared to agree with every word he said," the youngest of the Four Emperors concurred, a jug of sake in hand. "But you've got the right of it, Hawk-Eyes. He's completely lost it."

"He lost it when the captain died by a hand that wasn't his, brat, if not long before that," the Dark King groaned into his cup. "The world's just seeing it on display for the first time."

The three men exchanged looks, the same emotions between them, and drank deeply from their respective vessels.

"So, are you ready to set out, then?" Mihawk posed, cracking his neck in preparation.

"SHUT UP, SHIKI!"

Their attention redirected at the screen as an infuriated roar shook dust loose from the rafters.

"…Not yet. We'll see this fight to the end first," Shanks said firmly.

"I expected nothing less," the swordsman sighed. "You still hold the hope that your protégé can triumph over one such as Shiki?"

"You just said it yourself: his pride has inflated to the level of insanity."

The younger superhumans turned to the older, who was studiously observing the fight.

"He has the willpower, the potential, and he's not alone. All of that gives him a chance against Shiki."

-o-

It happened all at once. Rather than collapsing, Barto dropped his barrier of his own free will, so that at the exact same time, Luffy could throw a punch at Shiki - and to the shock of everyone watching, his hand managed to shoot out of the bubble, grab Shiki's collar and haul himself out of the aquatic prison, laying a punch on his opponent. There wasn't much force behind it, but the Golden Lion's face still twisted in pure, incandescent rage. Well, more so than before.

"Accursed brat!" Shiki roared, bringing up one of his legs. Counterintuitively, Luffy simply let go, and then punched the empty air to his left. Those few viewers with training in the Six Powers recognized the half-assed Moon Walk for what it was; everyone else was simply left gobsmacked by Luffy punching the air to dodge. This included Shiki.

That was when Barto and his dragon blindsided him.

Rookie and legend slammed together, Barto's barrier shimmering between them as Lindy gave him the velocity he needed to knock Shiki out of the sky. Gathering his wits, the veteran slipped out from under Barto, only to catch Luffy's sandal blasting him in the face.

Stars burst in his eyes as he flew back, taking the time that he needed to regain his sight. He turned his gaze back on them. And then his vision faded again as a blinding, crackling blur seared across his vision.

"A VALKYRIE?!" he exclaimed, open-mouthed.

"Not far off, you bastard."

With Nami's voice in his ears, Shiki snapped back to furious. "What have you done, witch?!"

"Tonight's weather forecast for Merveille is showers, thunderstorms, and cyclones, with a 100% chance of the entire archipelago falling back to the sea where it belongs, drowning and crushing every last monster that the last twenty years have spawned. This could have been avoided had a certain lion-bastard realized that his navigator was being held at gunpoint to lie to him and lead his base into certain destruction. And now, here's Straw Hat Luffy with the news."

"YOU'VE LOST, SHIKI!" Luffy roared, slamming his knuckles together.

"You only wish," Shiki drawled, spreading his hands. At first, it seemed as though nothing was happening. Then Nami spoke up again.

"You… You're lowering the islands?" she gasped in horror.

"And you call me an idiot," he responded with cold smugness. "My powers will uphold these islands until the day I die… but I will admit that if too much force from the Grand Line's weather struck an island and sent it falling, my weapons would perish. But thanks to your warning, we are now at an altitude that should ensure that at least the strongest of them will survive. Any further advice, baby girl?"

"… Luffy? Break him."

Roronoa Zoro and Jeremiah Cross's voices spoke alongside Nami's for the final words, and their captain raised his head with a ferocious scowl.

"You were wrong, Shiki," Luffy said firmly.

-o-

Shiki's entire being twitched at the accusation, and he shot a positively evil look at the other pirate. "Care to run that by me again?" he rumbled, a vein pulsating on the side of his neck.

Straw Hat shook his head in disgust. "You've had your head in the clouds for so long that you've forgotten all about the sea. It actually shows just how stupid you are: you can fly and you don't even realize the most important thing in the world. You talk about strength like it's everything, but it's nothing compared to freedom. You say that the ocean belongs to you? Belongs to pirates!?"

Luffy flung his arm out in denial. "YOU'RE WRONG! THE OCEAN… IT BELONGS TO EVERYONE! There's nothing standing in the way of sailing from your home to the end of the world; you're free to go wherever you want to go. No matter what comes our way, no matter how much it hurts, we can still sail on! THE POINT OF BEING A PIRATE ISN'T TO BE STRONG!"

Luffy spread his arms and bared his teeth in bestial defiance. "PIRATES ARE FREE! THAT'S WHY I'LL BECOME THE KING OF THE PIRATES! SO THAT I CAN BE THE FREEST MAN IN THE WORLD! ME! NOT YOU!"

In the relatively new secondary commander's office in the fortress of Navarone, an imposing violet-haired man let out a low growl in response to the rookie's words. The words that, almost against his will, cracked ever so slightly through the cloud of hatred that the Kid Pirates had cast over him, and allowed him to look upon the rubber kid with something other than loathing.

But it was only hearing him say those feelings of the sea, the feelings that he himself agreed with, that caused 'non-loathing' to grow into what he was barely able to consider respect.

Behind him, his most loyal lieutenants had softer expressions as they too observed the fight between the two pirates.

"…he's… different, isn't he?" the woman mused. She rolled her eyes as her comrades snapped accusatory looks at her. "He's still a pirate, I'm not denying that, but…" She jerked her chin at the screen. "If nothing else, this Straw Hat Luffy, he's certainly shown he's nothing like Kid or Shiki, hasn't he?"

A tense silence fell. Then her superior let out a lengthy sigh before inclining his head the slightest amount.

Just as slightly, the corners of Ain's mouth turned upward.

"You… YOOOUUU!"

Apparently, however, not everyone was of the same opinion.

-o-

"YOU! LITTLE! BRAAAT!" Shiki all but literally erupted, raw fury blazing from his person, glaring at the rookie with unbridled hate. "YOU'RE AS DELUSIONAL AS ROGER WAS! But you know what? That's perfectly alright! THIS IS MY WORLD! A WORLD WHERE MIGHT MAKES RIGHT! WHERE STRENGTH MEANS EVERYTHING! YOU WANT TO PROVE ME WRONG?!"

Shiki put his arms out to his sides, a grimace of pain coming over his face. The reason why became clear a moment later as blood erupted from his lower half where his knees once were, the stumps no longer stopped. Then, just as suddenly, the blood flew back where it came from. Shiki hardly heeded this, more focused on the trade-off of leaving him legless once more; without a flinch, his hands reached out and closed around the newly freed hilts of Oto and Kogarashi for the first time in twenty years.

"THEN LET OUR CAUSES FACE ONE ANOTHER HEAD ON!" he roared.

"My freedom," Luffy snarled, pumping his legs and causing steam to course over his body as he swung his pipe out viciously.

"My strength," Shiki growled, effortlessly taking on one of his old fighting stances.

"I'LL PROVE ITS RIGHT!"

And with that, the two shot at each other, each swinging their weapons.

Right from the start Luffy was driven back, Shiki hooking the pipe out of the way with one of the swords and nearly taking Luffy's head off with the other. Only a frantic duck prevented the latter, and only an ironclad grip prevented Shiki from twisting the pipe out of his opponent's fingers barely a second later. Out of position, Luffy had to have Billy outright fly off to avoid the follow-up flurry of stabs. He still had to add a few thin cuts to the balance sheet.

Circling around, this time Luffy went on the offensive, swinging his pipe in a wide arc at Shiki's head. Shiki's swords flashed up, one neatly pushing the pipe out of the way and the other stabbing for Luffy's throat. Another frantic dodge saved his life, though the cut on his neck was still dangerously close to the all-important blood vessels.

"Jihahahaha, too bad!" Shiki cackled. "A sheet of paper more, and you'd have been dead!"

"Yeah, well, I'm still here!" Luffy roared. But he didn't order Billy in again. Instead he pulled back, to where Barto had unsuccessfully been circling for an opening. Shiki, for his part, let him, either confident in his chances or unwilling to risk hopping on the close-combat pain train again. Or a bit of both.

"This isn't working," Luffy grumbled.

"Well, I've got a new move to try out," Barto replied. "Should be able to brute-force through his guard. If you can get him to loosen his grip on his swords…"

Both pirates grimaced in thought. Then, Luffy blinked as something occurred to him.

"Hey, he's probably using his power on those swords in case he drops 'em or something, right?"

Barto frowned, turning that over. "Yeah, probably. Why?"

For the first time since the fight had started, Straw Hat Luffy smiled. It was not a nice smile.

"One loosened grip coming right up!" Luffy declared, tapping Billy and charging forward again, pipe raised high.

"The same thing again? How primitive!" Shiki scoffed, bringing up his swords in preparation for the attack.

Once again, Luffy's straightforward haymaker was brushed aside by Shiki, just on a different spot on the pipe. But this time, Luffy adeptly spun the pipe so that the other end tapped Shiki's other sword.

And suddenly, Shiki flinched and nearly fumbled the hilts out of his hands.

-o-

Back on the Sunny, the rest of the crew, who had by now finished their work and reconvened on the ship to watch the fight, had mixed feelings about the maneuver.

"LUFFY DID WHAT!? HE DOES REALIZE THAT ONE BRUSH WITH SHIKI AND WE'D HAVE FACEPLANTED ON THE OCEAN, RIGHT?!"

But with every iota of their attention trained on the brawl, and with the noise of the storm around them, none of the Straw Hats noticed that for a good while now, Soundbite's eyes had been blanked out, and static sang in the air.

-o-

Shiki stared at his swords. They'd gotten… heavy. Heavier than they'd been since Impel Do—

Sea prism stone! How had he forgotten that the brat's pipe was reinforced with sea prism stone!?

"Yo, Shiki!"

Glancing up, Shiki beheld a gleaming, barrier-made sword - the size of a galleon's mainmast and three times as wide. And it didn't hide the shit-eating grin on Barto's face.

"Take this! Barrier-Barrier Buster!"

With a heave of his arm, Barto sent the barrier-sword hurtling down. Shiki crossed his swords and caught the blade on them, intending to deflect it out of the way. But they were heavier than they'd been in twenty years. The weight distribution was entirely off.

"Gah!"

The result was that the massive cleaver knocked the swords clean out of Shiki's hands, also opening up a nasty gash in his left shoulder.

As he watched his beloved companions plummet down through the clouds to the sea below, Golden Lion Shiki felt… numb. For a little while, at least. Pretty soon it was overtaken by blinding rage. And then… then it passed from blinding back into numb. Oh, the anger was still there, but it was ice in his veins instead of magma.

So it was with calm and forethought that he executed his next move. He stretched his power further than he had since lifting Merveille into the sky, pulling four specific islands closer to him. From the Winter Island, he drew the snow that fell and compacted there. From the Summer Island, he drew sand hot enough to burn and rock the color of a setting sun. From the Fall Island, he drew scraps of leaves and wood, ignited by the lightning that witch had summoned. And finally, from the Spring Island, he drew air, and the cherry blossoms that wafted within.

And these elements, drawn from the four seasons, shaped themselves before the East rookies' eyes into lions of snow and sand and fire and air, nothing at all like the beast Shiki had summoned earlier to squash the witch.

"Celestial Emperors: Elemental Lions," he intoned, before jabbing his finger at Straw Hat and Black Bart. "Kill."

Luffy and Barto and their mounts all tensed up as the lions charged at them. The Wind Lion arrived first, splashing against and then around Barto's barrier. As Luffy prodded Billy to take the rear position, Barto shifted his barrier against the Sand and Ice Lions, wincing as they butted heads with his barrier. The Fire Lion followed that by breathing a gout of flame that also harmlessly splashed against his barrier, allowing the other two Lions to flow around his barrier.

"Luffy, you've got incoming!" Barto barked.

"I know, but the Wind Lion's run off, and—!"

Both rookies froze as a terrible thought came to them.

"Taking a few moments to think about it, I realized that I've been doing this all wrong," Shiki said with an icy smirk. "If I'm going to crush you brats… I need to crush your spirits first!"

"The Sunny!" Luffy cried out in horror, spurring Billy on. Barto would have followed had the Fire Lion not again thrown a fireball at him, and it didn't matter. Luffy's attempt to disengage was met by a rain of projectiles that forced Billy to hurriedly change course.

"Go ahead and see if you can stop them. But as soon as you turn your backs, I'll shishkebab you," Shiki drawled, curled javelins of rain and earth floating around him.

"Hey, dumbass? You're supposed to learn from your enemies' mistakes."

The grin fell off of Shiki's face as Boss Dugong's voice reached him.

"Forewarned is forearmed, and in case you forgot, the rest of us are still in fighting shape. Three Sword Style: 108 Caliber Phoenix!"

"Coup de Vent!"

"Aperitif!"

"Typhoon Lash!"

"Sekhmet's Might!"

Two wind cannons erupted from the Thousand Sunny, tearing through the form of the wind lion and leaving it to disperse. Two smaller ones followed, the remaining Lions having enough forewarning to dodge… right into a bracket pattern of explosives that tore the Sand Lion to shreds and batted the Ice Lion around like a rock in a tumble drier.

Assured that his crew could take care of themselves, the panic melted from Luffy's face, leaving behind only the icy rage that had held him the entire fight. "I'm not going to let you threaten my crew again," he said evenly.

Shiki's only response was to hurl the projectiles of earth and rain that he'd collected. But instead of hitting, or harmlessly flying by, they instead hit Barto's barrier - and the Fire Lion still plastered to the front of it. The earth, of course, was no harm to it, but that much water put out its flame with a hiss of steam.

"Ewps…" Barto drawled, shoving a finger up his nose.

Roaring in frustration, Shiki pulled more ammunition from the islands and from the sky, throwing it indiscriminately at the two rookies so determined to vex him. And to Shiki's delight, some of them actually hit, drawing blood as they stabbed in. How? Their mounts were flying slower, and the fighters were less nimble in dodging and deflecting; Barto often moved his barrier off himself and in front of Luffy to his own detriment. Grinning, Shiki upped the tempo, only to have his opponents duck behind an extra-large barrier and charge straight at him.

Rolling his eyes, he merely floated out of the way, only for the barrier to vanish and then appear right in front of him, too close to dodge. The collision was painful, and disorienting, and the kick that thundered into his kidneys even more so.

Whirling around, Shiki did one thing he almost never did: he grabbed Luffy by the leg, yanked him in, and punched him in the face. It didn't cause much injury, but it allowed Shiki to claw for distance.

"We're wearing him down!" Barto declared as Lindy flew up next to Billy and Luffy. "Heh. Good thing he didn't think to just, y'know, wrap up the Sunny in rock or tilt it into the ocean or something. Or heck, he's touched it before, he could—"

Suddenly, a low, grinding rumble caught their attention, and the two pirates looked around for the source.

"What the heck?" Luffy wondered. "It's like Cross' stomach after he's eaten a biscuit."

"Uh, Luffy?"

Drawn by the uncharacteristic tone of fear in his usually cocky voice, Luffy looked where Barto was looking. His immediate conclusion?

Yeah, fear was the appropriate response to someone—almost certainly Shiki—ripping an entire mountain out of a nearby island.

"JIHAHAHAHAHA!" Shiki laughed, obviously at the very dregs of his sanity, drawing the pirates' attention back to him. "LET'S SEE YOU TRY BLOCKING THIS!"

Luffy grimly eyed the massive mound of stone now flying towards them with deceptive speed. "Can you block this?" he asked Barto.

Barto also eyed the stone, trying to ignore the headache driving railroad spikes into his skull. "Yeah, I can," he reluctantly groaned. "But I'm probably going to be useless after."

"…Thirty seconds." Once again, Luffy bit his thumb. "Gear Third!"

Gritting his teeth, Barto threw up the widest, thickest barrier he could. The sheet of light then folded in on itself and doubled the thickness of the barrier, heedless of the railroad spikes in the caster's brain upgrading to steam-driven piles.

Then the barrier folded in on itself again, making it four times as thick.

And once more, for a barrier eightfold stronger than any Bartolomeo had ever produced.

"Barrier… Barrier…" Barto groaned in agony, before roaring and throwing his arms wide, which expanded the blockade to the size of a small fortress. "BASTION!"