Chapter 90: Trampled Underfoot
BANG—
The giant goat's hoof, along with a spray of blood, flew into the air, then fell to the ground with a dull thud.
The intense pain instantly twisted Cabanha's ferocious face, his sharp fangs clenched tight. Apart from being a bit of a pervert and a bit of a fool, he was truly an elite among the Celestial Dragons. Even after suffering the pain of two severed limbs, he still hadn't let out a single cry of pain.
The red light in his already crimson eyes grew even more intense. He manipulated his ability to instantly dissolve the giant axe, preventing Louis from using it against him again. At the same time, he lifted his remaining leg, coated his bone-spiked knee in Armament Haki, and drove it heavily into Louis's abdomen.
To this, Louis raised his sword horizontally to block the sharp bone spike. However, the powerful force still sent him flying back. It wasn't until he was dozens of meters away that he spread his wings and slowly landed.
Dozens of meters away, Louis raised a hand and summoned the storm-wreathed spear from Cabanha's grasp.
Louis stood tall on the shattered earth, holding his sword and spear, quietly watching the crimson demon struggle to its feet on one leg.
Several hundred meters away, the goat-skull, who was once again engaged with Yelena, saw his colleague's tragic state, his eyes wide with fury. He tried to burst forward and push Yelena back, but she gritted her teeth and stubbornly held him in place.
Cabanha's form gradually shrank, turning into his hybrid beast-man form wreathed in black smoke. He leaned on the giant metal axe to steady himself, gasping for air.
"I underestimated you..."
"The intel that guy Garp gave was too conservative. In just three years, you've mastered the technique of Conqueror's Coating, and your Observation Haki has even reached the level of future sight. Even among the monsters I've seen, no one can compare to you at this age!"
Cabanha believed that if Kaido of the Beasts, Douglas Bullet, or Charlotte Linlin had met Louis at this age, they would have been beaten to the point of psychological trauma.
To this, Louis felt no pride. Future sight was a natural development for him, someone born with awakened Observation Haki. As for Conqueror's Coating, Louis could freely control his Conqueror's Haki at the age of ten and could distinguish between friend and foe. After personally experiencing Garp's Conqueror's Coated iron fist and seeing Shanks deliberately show him the process, it was not a difficult thing to grasp.
As Louis vibrated his spear with one hand and once again thrust it toward Cabanha's heart, he replied nonchalantly, "Aren't these things you can do as long as you have hands?"
"..."
Cabanha's face became terrifyingly grim. Louis's words, to someone like him who had no Conqueror's Haki and no advantages other than his awakened Devil Fruit ability, were an unadulterated insult.
Enraged, Cabanha's body erupted with an astonishing aura. He spread the bat wings on his back and hovered in the air. The giant axe in his hand burst forth with an unstoppable power, directly meeting the spear that was tearing through the atmosphere.
CLANG—
The blazing giant axe and the spear, flashing with black and red arcs of electricity, collided, creating the sound of clashing metal. The Haki-infused lightning exploded, raining down and enveloping an area of several thousand meters, shattering huge chunks of rock.
"I've changed my mind! I'm going to make a specimen out of your corpse and hang it in front of my family's gate!" With Cabanha's furious roar, the veins on his forehead bulged, the muscles on his crimson arms swelled, and he did his utmost to knock Louis's spear aside, driving it into the earth.
CRACK.
The surface of the earth split open, and cracks several meters wide appeared. Dazzling beams of light and black and red lightning shot out from the fissures, reaching for the sky.
The next moment, the ground beneath the two of them completely disintegrated. The incredibly hard rock was all reduced to fist-sized fragments and thrown into the air. Amidst the sky-blotting debris, the blazing giant axe swept out again, scorching countless fragments into lava along the way and, accompanied by the splashing molten rock, struck straight for Louis's chest.
Louis's eyes were stern. He held his sword in one hand and swept it across, coating the blade with a thin layer of golden light and Conqueror's Haki. It cut a perfect arc through the air, directly knocking the giant axe back. One of his wings turned black, wreathed in a fierce storm, and slashed directly at the demon's body.
SPLAT...
At this moment, the soft wing became an indestructible blade. From bottom to top, it once again cut a bloody gash across Cabanha's body. The open wound stretched from his abdomen to his cheek. Blood spurted out like a fountain, carried into the sky by the hurricane.
With one blow, Cabanha cried out in pain again, his body flying sideways like a broken kite, cutting a short red arc through the air before crashing to the ground.
Louis spread his wings and flew across the battlefield, landing directly on Cabanha's chest. He stepped on his ferocious head, trampling him underfoot.
CRACK...
Under the heavy blow, Cabanha coughed up blood. His fangs shattered, and cracks appeared in his skull. The rock and soil on the surface collapsed, causing both Cabanha and Louis to fall into the huge opening that had been excavated centuries ago. The violent tremor caused the Nika statue, standing not far away, to shake, showering it with dust and snow.
The heavily injured Cabanha's eyes rolled back. He had been knocked out of his Zoan transformation and had reverted to his human form. A cold leg-armor pressed down on his blood-stained face. A spear, wreathed in Conqueror's Haki, was thrust down heavily.
However, the next moment, Louis's spear froze in mid-air. The black and red arcs of electricity coiling around its teardrop-shaped blade flickered and disappeared. Louis's gaze fell on the dusty, black wing decorations on Cabanha's back.
The next moment, his gaze became exceptionally cold.
"These are... the wings of a Lunarian..."
Initially, when Cabanha had charged at him, he hadn't paid attention to the decorations on his back. Then, he had transformed into his demon form, and the wing decorations had become inconspicuous. It wasn't until Louis had beaten him back into his human form that he discovered that this Celestial Dragon named Cabanha had actually cut off the wings of a Lunarian and made them into decorations.
Louis frowned. He leaned down, preparing to swing his sword and cut off the black wings hanging on Cabanha's back.
Just then, Cabanha, having eaten a Mythical Zoan fruit, awoke again. Feeling his face being trampled, he became incomparably furious.
"You damn lower species!"
"How dare you step on the face of a descendant of the noble Twenty Kings?!" Cabanha propped himself up with his hands, struggling to get up and push the leg that was stepping on his face away.
"I will absolutely..."
Louis ignored his rage. He put force into his leg, stomping his head into the floor. Then, he quickly swung his sword and cut off the black wings.
Just then, feeling his dignity being ignored, the rage in Cabanha's heart grew even more intense, and he instantly burst forth with a surge of power. The battered and bruised Cabanha once again transformed into his awakened beast-man form, leaped up from the underground space, and, fueled by fury, rushed into the sky.
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