"So fast…"
Shanks and Buggy watched, hands quivering around their hilts, as smoke and dust geysered and rubble spun through the air.
Kozuki Oden hit like a fired shot, blew a coral sculpture apart, and stuck there. He hacked up dark blood.
His bloodshot eyes, bulging with disbelief, locked on the menacing black gleam he'd barely caught on his single blade.
"How… how is this possible?"
The dark radiance resolved into a blade sheathed in purplish spectral flame. A three-pronged hilt. An aura cold and crushing—
Enma, one of the 21 Great Grade swords—"the blade that can cut Hell."
Ryuo crawled and cracked across its length; violet energy coiled in a vortex. Its tip pressed into Ame no Habakiri. Both swords shuddered; sparks shrieked between them.
His two beloved blades were crossing.
But what gutted Oden wasn't Enma's speed or bite. It was that, up close, he could no longer feel Enma at all.
His Meito had been broken to another's will.
It no longer belonged to him.
Rage tore through him like an old volcano waking. Head tipped back, eyes gone red, he bellowed at the ceiling:
"DARREN!!!"
Boom.
Power blasted out from him in an invisible wall. Ryugu Palace shook to its roots.
Conqueror's Haki.
The air itself trembled. Shanks and Buggy went pale, clutching their heads as the pressure drove them back.
The crew stared, stunned. They knew Oden's strength; this was more than they'd ever felt from him.
He was beyond himself—Haki burning unchecked, licking up in eerie green fire; his eyes glowing crimson, demon-bright.
"Oden! Calm down!"
"Rein it in! You can't hold a release like that—you'll die!"
Rayleigh and Gaban traded a grim look and lifted sword and axe as one, ready to break in.
They'd seen it before: a swordsman forcing his spirit past its limits, twisting it into Fiend Aura, stepping onto the "Shura" path that ends in ruin.
"Don't stop me!"
Oden's teeth bared. Fury warped his features. With a hysteric cry, he brought his blade down.
Clang.
Enma went spinning—but the collision ripped him up inside; blood poured from mouth and nose.
"I stake my honor—my life. Today he dies, or I do!"
His aura surged, feral and unchained, arcing higher.
One exchange—without the Marine even moving—and Oden was a ruin.
The speed of that man's rise terrified him in a way he had never known, a fear that tasted like despair.
If he didn't kill him now, he might never touch him again.
When Oden first sailed, they were equals. A bare year later, the gap had yawned wide.
What future? There was none.
A samurai's road ended in a glorious wreck.
Boom.
His right geta smashed down; stone within ten meters sank like a drumhead punched through.
Eyes fixed on the Marine Vice Admiral standing in the storm, he roared and charged like something set free at last.
Fiend Aura writhed. Ame no Habakiri screamed.
"Damn it!"
"Stay clear!"
Rayleigh and Gaban couldn't hold themselves back any longer. They leapt—
—and a figure slid in front of them.
"Roger?!"
They stopped short.
"Let him go," Roger said, all levity stripped away. For once, he stood with the weight of a captain. "And…"
His gaze cut across his crew. "No one interferes."
"B-but he might die!" Shanks blurted, palms slick.
Roger turned, eyes following Oden's stubborn back. A faint smile touched his mouth.
"Listen close, Shanks."
"On this sea, everyone has their moment. When it comes, nothing can stop it—not even death."
He clenched a fist and muttered, "For Oden, it's now."
Mouths opened and closed, empty of argument. They stared at Oden's reckless back and bit down on their words.
He was their comrade. To drag him back now would be to break him. Better to honor his choice.
---
"Oh? His Haki's gotten stronger…"
At Fish-Man Island's gate, Darren let his will roll without restraint, a storm that flattened Ryugu Palace soldiers around him.
Cigar clenched in his teeth, he watched the samurai come on yet again. He flicked a glance at the Roger Pirates, motionless in the distance, and a cold smile slid into place.
"So this is Kozuki Oden's proof."
He stepped forward.
His boot touched stone—
BOOM.
A surge of Haki, fiercer and heavier still, detonated outward, a crimson gale that tore down the passage toward Oden.
"…Very well," Darren said, almost amused. "I'll play along for now."
To be continued...