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The world outside fell silent.
Jin leaped into the air, using Moonwalk to ascend to the spot he had pinpointed earlier.
"Meteor Fist!" he shouted, throwing a punch that sent a powerful shockwave crashing down, shattering the palace and leaving a massive crater.
The force of the blast blew away the debris, revealing the seal below. A red, flame-like light was spreading out from it, burning the sky, twisting space.
In the next second, a deafening cacophony assaulted Jin's ears—a mixture of whispers, shrieks, and ferocious roars.
Illusions and sounds erupted from the broken seal.
It was the roar of a monster.
A chilling, oppressive terror washed over him.
In an instant, a surge of green flames erupted from his body. He entered his half-beast form, a fiery cloud swirling around him.
A massive, flaming serpent appeared behind him, its coiled body taller than the island's mountains.
Mythical Zoan: Hell's Red Serpent!
It opened its massive, flaming jaws and "swallowed" the cacophony, the illusions, the roars.
Paramecia: Munch-Munch Fruit!
The combination of the two fruit abilities allowed him to ignore the negative spiritual pollution released by Tot Musica.
Jin was now a "snake-man," his lower half human, his upper half a serpent with two arms. His already powerful physique, amplified by the fruit, was now even stronger. He raised his fist and punched the seal again.
Elegia shook.
The island trembled as if in an earthquake, and massive fissures spread out from the point of impact.
The seal shattered, and a black space was revealed—a space that was like hell, like a twisted version of reality, a bizarre, mottled landscape.
The sky changed. Dark clouds pressed down, and the sea churned violently.
In the palace library, the tremors sent books tumbling from the shelves, revealing the sheet music for Tot Musica.
The "demon's" power, clinging to the pages, was carried on the wind, and a strange music began to play through the trees and the rocks.
Uta's body began to glow red. As the link between the Sing-Sing Space and reality, she was pulling the two closer, unleashing the monster within.
She was twisting, changing, becoming the "demon."
At the same time, in the identical locations in both the real and the dream versions of Elegia, something opened its eyes.
Sorrow, anger, despair, oppression... a torrent of negative emotions erupted like a volcano.
Uta's song had, without anyone noticing, become Tot Musica. She was under its control.
The frenzied music resonated with everything in the space, emitting an endless wail of anguish, an infinite malice.
Robin and the others felt an extreme pressure, as if they couldn't breathe.
"The demon! It's out again!" Gordon fell to his knees in terror.
"UTA!" he cried, trying to wake her.
"Look!" Nami screamed. "What is that? Is that the demon?"
A massive, twisted, grotesque shadow blotted out the sky.
It was impossible to describe its form. It was a chaotic amalgamation of broken musical instruments, a blurry, indistinct monster, glowing with the dark-red light of a dying soul.
It was the physical manifestation of sorrow, pain, and despair, coalesced into a single desire: "destroy the world."
BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!
A massive bear paw slammed into it, shaking the monster and shattering a part of it.
Kuma had made his move.
And he had actually damaged Tot Musica.
It wasn't just because Kuma was strong. It was because of his spirit, his will.
What sorrow, what pain, what despair had Kuma not already experienced?
And what was his answer?
'I will bear it.'
'I will bear all the pain, all the sorrow, all the despair... But my heart will still hold light, kindness, and hope.'
"Paradise is seen in the eyes of those who look up at the night."
"Even in the darkness, you must look to the stars and search for the light."
That was Kuma.
You could call him a coward. You could call him a fool. You could say he made the wrong choices.
But you could not say he lacked courage.
A man like Kuma, with a fire of self-sacrifice burning in his heart, would always be willing to give his own life to light the way for others.
And that spirit, that belief—like Luffy's unshakeable optimism—was the perfect counter to the negative emotions of despair and sorrow.
Kuma's attacks dealt massive amounts of true damage.
"He... he blocked it!" Nami and the others were stunned, watching Kuma stand before the "demon" and shatter a part of its form.
But he could only damage it, not destroy it.
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In reality, Uta had become Tot Musica.
She walked, and an impassioned symphony echoed from her "body," a strange vibration that warped space and time. The sorrowful, angry, desperate song was like the whisper of a demon, assaulting the mind, polluting the soul.
The out-of-control Uta was like one of the Jailer Beasts, radiating an immense pressure.
Her power was not in her physical strength, but in her insidious ability to corrupt.
Any life, any matter affected by her became a part of her.
It was similar to how Luffy's Gomu-Gomu Fruit had awakened into Nika.
Long ago, the one who had composed Tot Musica... he must have written it in a state of extreme despair, sorrow, and anger. And he had poured his own soul, his own will into it, transforming it into the awakened ability of the Sing-Sing Fruit.
Jin used his Calm-Calm Fruit to create a massive zone of silence, neutralizing Tot Musica's effect on the surrounding environment.
His earlier attempt to swallow it had failed, and now he knew why.
"I have to swallow both the real and the virtual versions of Tot Musica at the same time to completely destroy it."
The two were one and the same—one part in a virtual space, the other in reality. The proof was that Uta existed in both spaces.
But in reality, Uta had become Tot Musica. In the dream world, she had not yet completed the transformation. This meant that the Tot Musica in the dream world was the original host's soul. If the two were allowed to merge, to complete the "possession," Uta would, in a sense, die.
It was a similar situation to Luffy and Nika. Luffy had been beaten to death by Kaido, his heart stopping, and only then had Nika emerged.
"In that case..." Jin's eyes glinted.
The demonic carrier let out a roar, and a magic circle appeared at his feet.
It locked onto Kuma's spiritual form in the other space.
Teleport!
The furnace roared, steam surged. A golden flame of soul energy ignited within the array, piercing through the fabric of spacetime.
In an instant, Jin's will appeared in the Sing-Sing Space.
"Your Majesty!" Nami and the others cried out, overjoyed.
Jin ignored them.
In both reality and the dream world, he charged toward Tot Musica, unleashing the power of the Munch-Munch Fruit.
A massive mouth, larger than the island itself, opened and swallowed Tot Musica, attempting to fuse the two into one.
"He... he swallowed it!" Robin, Nami, and the others were all dumbfounded. The King had swallowed the "demon"?
A cacophony of music, an endless torrent of negative emotions, slammed into Jin's will.
He endured it.
The Munch-Munch Fruit could make anything a part of itself, including a "demon."
It was an awakening against an awakening, a clash of abilities, of rules.
As he swallowed it, Jin was also being corrupted by the deathly music. It was a battle of wills.
Conqueror's Haki erupted from Jin's body.
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