In the midst of the three sided war, the clash between the Hell Pirates and the World Government had become nothing but pure carnage.
Under the slaughter of the two ancient weapons, the sea itself looked like a graveyard. Broken masts and shattered hulls of pirate ships and warships floated on blood dyed waves, while countless bodies either bobbed to the surface or sank silently into the depths.
The sounds of battle and dying screams rolled endlessly across the New World sky. Marines, Government troops, CP agents, pirates… people on both sides were being cut down without mercy.
Maybe Imu did not care about the lives of these "ants."
But Brook, standing at the center of it all, felt his supposedly cold heart tremble as subordinates he had personally led, trained, and trusted died in droves under his orders.
He watched expressionlessly as lives withered one after another, his pupils trembling ever so slightly.
A massive scroll hung across his back, and several fine, smaller scrolls were tied at his waist. He had already burned one seawater scroll to trap the bald Five Elder, Figarland.
Now his gaze locked onto Uranus, the Heavenly King, darting through the sky at impossible speed. The killing intent in his chest could no longer be contained.
"Imu… I don't know what you're waiting for," Brook muttered, voice low and icy. "But the moment I've been waiting for is here. Are you ready to face it?"
His entire body shifted into the newly developed Underworld Awakening state.
His hair rose and flickered like pale green ghost fire. His skin and bones turned translucent and dark green, becoming a tangible specter of the underworld.
On the Empty Throne in Pangaea Castle, Imu leaned forward for the first time.
It was his first time seeing Brook's awakened form with his own eyes, though he had long known Brook's Devil Fruit was called the Yomi Fruit.
But Devil Fruit names were never official decrees of those in power. They were rough labels, based on what previous users had shown. No one could capture the true scope of an ability in a single word.
The Paramecia Paw Fruit could just as easily be called a "Deflection Rule" ability.
The Paramecia Operation Fruit was not merely the power of "surgery," but a rule bending ability encompassing space, immortality, dissection, and rearrangement.
"…Could the Yomi Fruit, like the Nika Fruit, also be the power of a god from the ancient texts?"
Imu sat up straighter on the Void Throne, eyes narrowing as he studied Brook's spectral body.
He wanted to see just how far this man had pushed his Devil Fruit.
Could this obscure Yomi Fruit truly be as unreasonable and divine as the Sun God Nika?
If so, then one more Devil Fruit needed to be added to his collection.
Besides the Sun God Nika, he would also have to claim the Yomi Fruit.
Imu continued to drive Uranus at full speed, pushing it to its limits.
At last, he found an opening.
Sixteen concentrated energy beams hammered down in succession, finally shattering Pluton's protective barrier. A corner of the battleship was blasted apart, and thick black smoke billowed skyward.
But as Uranus streaked away to reposition, Imu suddenly felt its speed drop sharply.
His brows knitted.
…What trick are you playing this time, Brook?
"Ah… I am sorry," Brook whispered, voice shaking as much from fury as from grief. "Soldiers… your deaths will not be in vain."
Whether they were Government troops or pirates, he would not waste this chance.
He was using them.
Just like Imu.
He had been unable to prevent these tremendous casualties, because it required an enormous amount of "sacrifice" to bind the Uranus.
All across the sea, tens of thousands of dead, friend and foe alike, pirates and Government soldiers without distinction, were drawn into one of Brook's domains.
Under the awakened power of his fruit, their souls could no longer move on to reincarnation.
They could only wail and writhe as Brook mercilessly refined them into pure soul power.
The instant Uranus successfully struck Pluton's hull, the entire sea was filled with the cries of countless ghosts.
Specters flooded the sky, a storm of wailing dead so terrifying that even the Four Elders and the Four Hell Kings momentarily froze in shock.
Under Brook's control, that amassed soul power surged upward, dragging the high altitude where Uranus flew into the realm of the underworld.
In one strike, the Uranus was forcibly anchored in place.
At that moment, Brook felt like a monster.
A tyrant no different from Imu, treating life as nothing but fuel.
He forced himself to breathe, to think.
These people had already died in battle.
He was only using the remnants of their souls, not killing them himself.
He repeated that to himself over and over, even as his chest twisted.
"Imu… weapons like the Uranus are the true sin of this age," Brook snarled, ice blue eyes turning blood red. "Things like that should not exist in this world."
If there had been any other way to restrain Uranus' speed, he would never have resorted to this.
Brook seized the fleeting opening without hesitation.
He stepped onto the Seven Star Demon Sword, driving his spectral body at full throttle toward the immobile Heavenly King.
With a heavy boom, he landed on Uranus' back, boots cracking the armor plate.
Inside the weapon, God Knight Zebai had already stretched the power of the Barrier Fruit to its utmost, layering barrier after barrier to block any attempt Brook might make to invade with his soul.
But this time, Brook did not use soul power at all.
Instead, he tore open the massive shaft strapped to his back and unleashed the payload sealed within.
Dozens of chunks of DYNA stone spilled out, glowing with a dangerous, volatile light.
On the Empty Throne, Imu's eyes narrowed further.
He remembered that substance.
The kinetic explosive stone rumored to be able to blow a hole in the New World itself.
"DYNA Stone? You think that alone can destroy the Uranus?"
His voice was icy.
"Wishful thinking."
He forced Uranus to divert more power to its barrier system, cranking the protective field up to its absolute maximum.
At the same time, he pushed the Uranus to pour all remaining output into blasting apart the binding power.
Brook's laughter rang across the sky, wild and hoarse.
"Yohoho… Imu! It's not over yet!"
"In order to deal with your Uranus, I paid an enormous price to obtain an artifact from Odin… the Spear of Elbaf!"
The deaths of tens of thousands and the fact that he had personally erased their souls drove Brook past the edge of sanity.
His eyes were bloodshot as he yanked free a delicate scroll from his waist.
In a burst of light, a titanic spear over twenty meters long tore out of the sealed space and hurled itself straight at Uranus' barrier.
The Spear of Elbaf, the sacred treasure of the Giant Kingdom.
It had been forged bit by bit from the world's hardest "Gungnir steel," a divine weapon dedicated to piercing anything in existence.
Under Brook's added acceleration, it crashed into Uranus' energy shield and bored through it like paper.
Imu's expression finally hardened.
…How dare those giants.
So the giants who had once begged for mercy and bowed their heads to his rule were starting to move again.
Brook, having driven the spear through the Uranus barrier, used the last of his strength to leap off Uranus, trying to get clear of the imminent blast.
The DYNA Stone vibrated faster and faster.
In the next instant, a blinding white light swallowed heaven and earth.
The explosion made the world itself seem to dim.
Inside Uranus, God Knight Zebai's pupils widened in despair.
He could only pray that the power of the Uranus could withstand a blast of this magnitude.
The Spear of Elbaf had fulfilled its duty piercing the barrier of the Uranus.
Caught by the blast wave of DYNA Stone, it was hurled away at terrifying speed, vanishing into the distant sky, streaking along a path that pointed straight back toward Elbaf… carrying with it the lingering, twisted energy of a Devil Fruit.
------------
The cataclysmic explosion tore the battlefield apart.
For a brief, terrifying moment, all fighting stopped. Pirates and marines, CP agents and revolutionaries, even the Four Hell Kings and the Elders themselves, could only run for their lives as the shock wave of destruction engulfed the sky and sea.
Even in the Valley of God, where Rocks, Roger, and Garp were locked in a three way death match, the blast was felt.
The ground shuddered. The air howled.
All three turned their heads in shock, staring toward the distant horizon.
Had the war between the World Government and the Hell Pirates really reached that level?
On the Empty Throne in Pangaea Castle, Imu's body rocked in place. His expression twisted into something ugly and inhuman, yet the defenses had not fully shattered.
"Warning, warning. Shield energy loss: ninety nine percent. Immediate replenishment required," the mechanical voice droned.
…
"Shield replenished. Remaining reserve: three point five layers."
…
"Shield replenished. Remaining reserve: zero point eight layers."
…
Inside Uranus, God Knight Zebai sucked in ragged breaths, his lungs burning. Standing that close to annihilation had left his entire body drenched in cold sweat.
"The brink of death…"
He could barely even move.
"Brook… Odin… all of you must die."
Imu's voice dropped to absolute zero.
Odin had actually dared lend the Spear of Elbaf to Brook.
There was no longer any need to tolerate the giants.
Once Uranus returned and recharged, he would erase Elbaf and Doragonzo Island from the map.
He was already prepared to sacrifice another eighty percent of the Celestial Dragons, leaving only a few heirs from each line to slowly repopulate later.
But the next instant, Imu lurched to his feet. His legs wobbled. His face went white.
"No…"
"The Uranus… Brook…"
"I will make you live a life worse than death!"
His roar shook Pangaea Castle itself. Cracks spidered across the Empty Throne.
Back at the Valley of God, Rocks, Roger, and Garp had barely resumed their brawl when a second, even more terrifying blast rolled in from Brook's side.
The entire island bucked, and tsunami after tsunami began racing toward the shores.
On the main battlefield, the Four Elders stood frozen.
Had their "national treasure" really been destroyed?
How could that be possible?
Brook had driven Pluton, straight into Uranus, and Pluton's hull had been stuffed with even more DYNA Stone than what he had just used.
The result was inevitable.
The God Knight Zebai inside Uranus was shattered to pieces in the blast. Pluton's battleship frame blew apart, disintegrating into a rain of twisted scrap that plunged into the sea.
Uranus, was blasted into sixteen massive fragments that fell like meteors into the ocean.
But even as they plunged toward the depths, faint lights flickered from the broken pieces.
Brook's eyes, half lidded with exhaustion, still caught it.
They were not completely destroyed.
Thrown into the deep sea, they would be nearly impossible to retrieve, but not impossible. Anyone could, one day, fish them back up and study them.
Brook, however, had nothing left to give.
Even he could not fully endure the shock waves of two consecutive apocalyptic explosions. He was burning soul power just to hold his body together.
His regeneration had been forced to its limit. He had been destroyed and reconstructed by force again and again, every bone shattered, fleshless body torn and reformed, only holding thanks to the depth of his power.
"I'm sorry… to the scientists on Pluton."
Brook's voice was hoarse.
When he unleashed DYNA Stone, he had already used the Seven Star Demon Sword to forcibly control and evacuate the core researchers aboard Pluton. Even so, several of Vegapunk's remote robot bodies had been utterly destroyed.
The price they had paid today was obscene.
But Uranus, the greatest killing machine in the hands of the World Government, was finally gone.
Brook sprawled weakly across the back of the Quetzalcoatl form of the Seven Star Demon Sword.
In just a few hours, he had sacrificed tens of thousands of souls to pin Uranus in place.
Then he had endured the full brunt of those last two blasts.
His soul felt like it was about to splinter.
"Shakky… we're pulling out."
Brook no longer had the strength to face the full might of the Elders.
Retreat was the only option.
He swallowed a handful of blood crystal dandelions. The recovered strength barely flickered along his limbs.
It was a drop in the ocean.
Right now, he estimated that even draining all of Rocks' blood and turning it into blood crystal dandelions would only barely restore him to most of his peak.
As Brook began to withdraw, the Four remaining Five Elders lost their minds.
To soothe Lord Imu's rage, they needed Brook's head. Without it, the loss of the Uranus could never be forgiven.
"Brook is already at his limit. Move!"
Their hushed shout cut through the battlefield.
They had no trouble imagining the scale of Imu's fury.
Mars, Peter, Figarland, and Ethanbaron led a surge of CP0 toward Brook, eyes red.
On the Empty Throne, Imu snatched up a special Den Den Mushi, trying to contact them directly, but the double explosion had scrambled the electromagnetic waves in that entire sea.
The creatures shivered uncontrollably, huddling into their shells, some even fainting outright.
"Useless."
"Do not kill Brook. Capture him alive. I will be the one to break him."
Imu crushed the Den Den Mushi with a single slap.
For the first time in centuries, he stepped out of the Holy Land.
Under the arrangements of Saturn, who remained behind, an incredibly ornate Government warship cut through the sea at top speed, heading straight for the Valley of God.
On the battlefield, Redfield, Linlin, Newgate, Shiki, Kaido, Oden, and the others were bleeding and battered, but still standing.
They threw themselves in front of the Five Elders, fighting tooth and nail to buy Brook time.
Today's war would end here.
The next round would be when their captain could once again stand at full strength.
A horn sounded, long and sharp.
All forces under the Hell Pirates began to withdraw.
Uranus and Pluton were gone.
Brook, the overlord of the New World, was gravely wounded.
Tens of thousands lay dead or dying.
"We can't let Brook escape!"
The Four Elder, the two remaining God Knights, and countless CP0 agents rushed toward the fading aura of the Yomi Fruit user.
"Jihahaha! Next time, I'll be the one to kill you lot."
Shiki wiped blood from the corner of his mouth and laughed wildly.
Without the Uranus on the board, the next war, with Brook fighting at full power, would be the true reckoning for the Five Elders.
Unless that old monster Imu took the field himself.
"Brook! You're not getting away. Prepare for an eternity of chains!"
Figarland, the bald Five Elder, roared.
The Four Hell Kings fought like demons to block him, but they all knew the truth: Lord Imu had laid his own trap to deal with an exhausted Brook.
Brook could feel it too.
The moment he heard the Five Elder's roar, every instinct screamed at him.
Imu and the Five Elders had more pieces on this board.
He forced the Seven Star Demon Sword to accelerate, pushing his battered body to flee faster.
Then his heart seized.
A cold sense of crisis crawled up his spine.
A flash of light appeared in front of him, and two men in unfamiliar, ornate uniforms stepped out of the air.
"I need him frozen for three seconds."
"Got it."
They spoke quickly and calmly, then unleashed their Devil Fruit powers.
Both were awakened.
"Awakening… Seal."
The man with black markings across his face raised a hand.
Brook and the Seven Star Demon Sword were suddenly locked in place, space itself clamping down around them.
The strain hit instantly. Blood gushed from the man's nose and mouth.
"Hurry… he's still got some strength left!"
He gritted his teeth, barely holding on. Even in this state, Brook's resistance was enough to cause brutal backlash.
"Awakening… Space Teleport."
"Coordinates set. Enjoy your trip, pirate."
The gentle looking man beside him smiled faintly and laid his hand on the immobilized Brook.
With a three second chant time, his awakened ability activated perfectly.
In the next instant, Brook, bound to the Seven Star Demon Sword, vanished from the battlefield—
Dragged through warped space to the location personally designated by Imu.
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