A torrent of blazing flames spewed violently from the gaping Vulcan Cannon mounted on Carl's shoulder, the barrel glowing molten red as it unleashed destruction.
A long Eastern-style dragon composed entirely of crimson fire twisted and writhed through the sky like a mythical beast born from a volcanic eruption. Its roar echoed above the sea.
Dracule Mihawk, wielding the famed Kokuto Yoru (Black Blade Night), raised his sword in silence. A brilliant green arc of compressed sword aura—the same kind that once split entire icebergs at Marineford—surged upward in defiance.
Shing!
The brilliant green slash collided with the fiery serpent and cleaved it down the middle with precision honed through decades of mastery.
But—
BOOM!!!
Even bisected, the dragon's remains plummeted toward the sea and exploded into an inferno upon the Perfume Yuda, Boa Hancock's iconic Kuja pirate ship. Lava-like fire engulfed the deck in an instant.
It wasn't just fire—it was Carl's Vulcan Flame, condensed with Armament Haki and imbued with destructive will. This wasn't ordinary flame—it scorched even Haki-reinforced surfaces.
The crew screamed as plumes of flame surged over the deck.
"AHH! It's burning!"
The elite warriors of the Kuja Pirates, all trained in Haki and boasting fearsome strength on par with New World pirates, were momentarily overwhelmed by the sheer chaos of the assault. Even veterans used to fighting Sea Kings couldn't resist the onslaught of Carl's artificial calamity.
"Damn it, it's so hot!" Luffy shouted, batting at the embers searing his arms. His rubber skin was smoldering, steam hissing out with every motion.
"Luffy!" Hancock shouted, panic in her voice. She turned her furious eyes skyward.
The inferno wasn't abating.
Carl—still floating—showed no signs of stopping the assault. The Vulcan Cannon mounted to his right arm glowed like magma, channeling another volley. In his void-crafted armor, he stood like a harbinger of wrath.
Mihawk narrowed his eyes. "He's targeting the entire ship…"
Razor-thin sword aura coiled around him again, and with a flick of his wrist, he parted the next wave of flames with surgical precision. His body never moved from the railing of the Perfume Yuda.
Finally, after the Vulcan Cannon's barrel turned molten red and hissed ominously, Carl canceled the sequence. The advanced weapon—crafted using Void Technology—disintegrated into particles, fading into the ether of the King's Void, where his arsenal was stored.
Carl landed on the scorched bow with a light step, his coat fluttering in the heated wind.
Black smoke poured into the sky. The Perfume Yuda groaned beneath his feet, riddled with glowing cracks. It wasn't just burning. It was sinking.
Carl exhaled, lit a cigar, and took a long drag. Around him, red-hot fire serpents danced, flicked away by invisible shockwaves radiating from his body. His Conqueror's Haki crackled faintly in the air.
"It held up better than expected," Carl murmured. "But in the end, not enough."
"You… bastard!" Hancock shrieked, rocketing forward like a crimson arrow. "Perfume Femur!"
Whoosh—!
Her long leg swept forward, imbued with both Armament and Love-Love power.
Carl raised his arm lazily, and clack! caught her attack with ease.
Boom!
The air around them rippled as the impact cracked the deck beneath their feet.
"Well," Carl said, glancing down. "I did finally get a close look."
He smirked with a gleam in his eye.
All this time, he'd wondered: how could a woman wear a cheongsam and throw high kicks day after day and never flash even a glimpse? Some kind of cosmic censorship? Divine intervention? Observation Haki shielding?
"Where are you looking, you pervert?!" Hancock recoiled, her cheeks burning with fury.
Her charms—the ones that turned lesser men to stone—had absolutely no effect on Carl. Her powers, rendered inert by his spiritual will.
Black lightning sparked faintly along his arm. His Will of the Supreme King completely nullified her abilities.
"You'd be better off worrying about your crew," Carl said, letting out another puff of smoke and gesturing subtly with his chin.
Hancock's heart dropped. She spun around.
The red flames devouring the Perfume Yuda were unrelenting. Her warriors desperately tried to douse them with seawater, but it was no use. The flames weren't normal—they were generated by a combination of scientific enhancement and Haki infusion. Sea water couldn't suppress them.
Screams rang out as some collapsed from the heat, burns blistering their bodies.
"Tch!" Hancock spat and rocketed toward the burning deck to help her crew.
At the same time—
"Ugh… What happened?"
Zoro's voice croaked from a smoldering corner of the ship. Beside him, Nami, Usopp, Chopper, and Sanji were beginning to stir. Their bodies were scorched, their clothing torn, but they were alive—barely.
"It's hot… so hot!" Chopper squealed, blinking tears as he stumbled around with a bucket.
"What the hell is going on?! Why are we on fire again?!" Nami cried.
As their groggy minds tried to adjust to the chaos around them, the sounds of crackling fire and crashing waves overwhelmed their senses.
They had been unconscious only minutes ago—forced into a deep state by T. Penn's mysterious control. Now, they'd awoken in the middle of what looked like a volcanic eruption.
And towering above them, casting a long shadow over the flaming wreckage—stood Solomon Carl, his red eyes gleaming.
Ah, Zoro! You guys are finally awake!" Luffy shouted in surprise, his voice barely rising above the crackling flames. "Help me put out the fire together!"
His palms were already scorched with burns, darkened and blistered from shielding everyone from the flames. The red inferno that had encircled Zoro and the others had been momentarily pushed back by Luffy's desperate resistance.
If he hadn't, they would've been reduced to ash.
"I see," Zoro said, frowning as he picked himself off the scorched deck. "But why are we here?"
The last thing he remembered was being knocked unconscious by Carl's attack—and now, they were aboard the Kuja Pirates' ship, Perfume Snake, captained by none other than Pirate Empress Boa Hancock.
"Anyway, I can't stand letting a lady get hurt!" Sanji shouted, eyes blazing with resolve—and more than a bit of tears—as he scanned the deck filled with Kuja warriors. "These are all real women!"
In an instant, Sanji vanished in a blur, rushing to defend the heart-eyed warriors, his sobs almost audible beneath the clamor.
"Let's help too," Nami said as she pulled out her Clima-Tact, the iconic Weatheria-crafted weapon that could summon storms and winds.
"Hey! Just wake up and already full of energy, huh?" Luffy grinned, his usual cheerfulness back. "Then watch this!"
His arms stretched out wide—Gomu Gomu no Fusen—and then began rotating like a windmill. With each spin, the generated wind stirred into a fierce gust, fanning back the flames and causing the fire to waver.
Whoosh—whoosh—
The rushing air created by his rotation buffeted the burning timbers. With the combined effort of the Straw Hat crew, the raging fire slowly lost momentum, but the damage was already extensive.
The hull beneath them creaked violently.
Cracks snaked across the charred wood, water spewed in bursts through seams. It was clear—the Perfume Snake was sinking.
Elsewhere on the deck, Dracule Mihawk, the world's greatest swordsman, withdrew his sharp gaze from the burning ship and shifted it back to the man before him.
"These young ones," Mihawk murmured, his voice steady, "They're quite… unpredictable, aren't they?"
Carl—Solomon Carl, dressed in black with that ever-present calm—gave a small shrug. "Unpredictable, yes. But this sea still bows to strength. Without it, death is inevitable."
He exhaled slowly, his crimson eyes gleaming.
"In the end, this pirate world is survival of the fittest."
"The Celestial Dragons, for example—they've reigned for 800 years not because they're descendants of the kings who formed the World Government," Carl said, voice growing colder, "But because they hold the reins of power."
"No amount of ancestral glory justifies their godhood."
He took a step forward, the wind and smoke parting around him.
"And now, I've got the biggest fist—so the rules of this era will be mine."
A long silence.
Mihawk didn't respond, but neither did he deny it. Even without considering Carl's overwhelming presence, there were still Yamato and "Nobita", the mysterious figure who hadn't lifted a finger yet.
Then Carl raised his hand—thumb, index finger, and little finger extended in a unique hand sign.
"Domain Expansion – Demon-Fufu Royal Cook."
Drip—
Water droplets echoed eerily in the void.
From behind Carl, a ghostly black shrine emerged, suspended in the air like a structure from another dimension. Four grotesque mouths lined the upper walls, open in silent hunger.
"This is…" Mihawk narrowed his eyes. There was something deeply unnatural about it—like the oppressive aura of Enma fused with a hellish deity.
Carl looked at him squarely.
"Do you know your biggest weakness?"
Mihawk lifted the Black Blade Yoru—the strongest sword in the world—and channeled his boundless sword will into its pitch-black edge. "What?"
Carl smiled slightly.
"You don't have Kaido and Big Mom to back you."
He raised his fingers and uttered one word—
"[摌]!" (Shou – Sever)
In an instant, a devastating drain hit his stamina. A massive surge of energy gathered at his fingertips.
Hummmm—
Sword aura rippled in every direction like ripples in a pond. The void trembled, as though an invisible blade was about to split the sky itself.
"This is…" Mihawk's pupils shrank. His senses screamed at him—this wasn't just raw power. It was pressure from a higher dimension.
"Slashing… that transcends slash?"
No—it wasn't even a simple enhancement of technique.
The kanji [摌] didn't boost his cut. It stacked an endless series of minute slashes together. Thousands, millions—until quantity became quality.
Swish!
A colossal slash carved through the air like a divine punishment.
Crack—crack—CRACK!
Reality itself fractured like glass. The atmosphere bent and split. Time felt like it slowed.
Zoro, mid-swing in clearing fire behind him, suddenly turned with disbelief. "That power…!"
Everyone looked toward the source of that slash.
Even the hardened Kuja warriors stood in awe, sweat running down their faces.
To them, it was like the heavens themselves had drawn a blade.
"Now that's more like it!" Mihawk shouted, his eyes gleaming with true excitement. He poured his entire being into the next strike.
"Black Blade Style—Supreme Horizon Severance!"
He launched forward. Not to evade. Not to shield.
But to meet the storm head-on.
Clang!
An ear-shattering collision echoed through the battlefield. Air exploded out in concentric shockwaves, displacing clouds and blasting waves outward.
Boom!
Mihawk staggered backward, both feet grinding through the deck, wood splitting beneath his heels. Blood spilled from his lips as strain tore through his body.
The trail he left carved a deep trench along the ship.
"That guy…" Zoro's eyes remained locked forward, fists clenched.
He wasn't the only one.
Everyone aboard could tell—Mihawk, the world's strongest swordsman, might not stop that slash.
Yet he didn't flinch.
Haki exploded from Mihawk's form—Coating, Conqueror's, Armament—it surged, seeking to answer the overwhelming threat.
Slice—!
A blinding arc of energy cleaved across Mihawk's chest.
Carl slowly exhaled smoke from his mouth, lowering his fingers. "That's why I said—Kaido and Big Mom could've handled this."
Even Big Mom, with her iron-like body and Soul-Soul Fruit-enhanced durability, would've needed most of Carl's stamina to unleash that move.
And Kaido—Kaido was practically unkillable.
But Mihawk, for all his unmatched mastery of the sword, lacked that monstrous physical resilience.
"Hawkeye…" Zoro whispered.
The figure of Mihawk stood unmoved, blood cascading down his coat.
But in his hand, Black Blade Yoru remained firm.
Unshaken.
Even against a power like that.
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