While Luffy and the others struggled against Aokiji, their followers weren't idle either.
Marianne, Bon Clay, Galdino, and Gem intercepted two Pacifistas that were firing destructive laser beams at the fleeing pirates.
However, Marianne merely stood behind Galdino, cheering frantically.
After all, her Colors Trap suggestion paintbrush was completely useless against these mindless cyborg humanoid weapons.
She could only use it to deal with the pursuing Marine infantry.
SWISH!
Under the effect of her Betrayal Black paint, several Marines had already begun fighting each other in confusion.
Fortunately, Galdino was indeed reliable, having developed his Doru Doru no Mi quite impressively over the past few months.
He created three massive candle warriors as tall as the Pacifistas, effectively restraining them in close combat.
Although his attacks didn't deal much damage to the cyborgs' tough armor, his wax warriors could constantly regenerate their broken limbs.
Moreover, when the candle warriors collided with the Pacifistas, they secretly left thick traces of wax powder on their joints.
Once enough accumulated and hardened, it would severely restrict the Pacifistas' robotic movements.
His candle hardness was comparable to steel, no weaker than the Pacifistas' defense, though slightly less mobile.
'If only my Devil Fruit had Awakened,' Galdino thought, sweating. 'I could have created dozens of candle warriors and handled these things in no time!'
As for the other two, Bon Clay and Gem, they relied on pure offense to confront the Pacifistas head-on.
Under Mikita's harsh guidance during their training, Bon Clay had learned basic Armament Haki.
His flamboyant Okama Kenpo kicks coated in haki could actually inflict effective internal damage on the Pacifistas.
Gem was the main damage dealer.
Each punch he threw carried massive, point-blank explosions.
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
At a rate of five explosive punches per second, he bombarded the Pacifistas, forcing them into a retreat.
However, the two had to be extremely cautious of the Pacifistas' mouth-laser attacks—either of them taking a direct hit would mean serious, potentially fatal, injury.
…
As for why Sentomaru, the controller of the Pacifistas, wasn't present at the scene to command them?
He had been intercepted too.
"Your barrier is really tough, Bartolomeo."
Sentomaru rubbed his sore, massive hands, glaring fiercely at the green-haired punk before him.
"Tch! If you can't beat me, just admit defeat already! I still need to go find Luffy-senpai and the others!"
"Me admit defeat?!" Sentomaru scoffed, hefting his massive broadaxe. "Try breaking through my defense first! My defense is the strongest in the world!"
"Nonsense! My barrier is the ultimate defense!"
The two tanks collided again, creating a scene of tremendous commotion where neither side lost any health points.
The fists and whips Bartolomeo formed with his barriers were completely useless against Sentomaru, who had mastered advanced Armament Haki to deflect attacks without touching them.
But Sentomaru couldn't break through Bartolomeo's protective barrier either—after all, this was the same Devil Fruit barrier that even Kozuki Oden, who possessed Conqueror's Haki infusion, couldn't cut through in the past.
In terms of pure combat prowess and Haki, Bartolomeo was far inferior to Sentomaru.
However, Sentomaru's movement speed couldn't match Bartolomeo's instant barrier deployment speed.
CLANG!
Thus, the two found themselves in a bizarre, immovable stalemate.
They were determined to settle who was the true "Number One in Defense"—this was a matter of masculine pride now.
'I am the toughest!' they both thought simultaneously.
…
On the sea outside Sabaody Archipelago.
Kizaru and Ray had already taken their battle to the skies above the ocean.
Their destructive power was too immense.
To protect the island's fragile mangrove facilities (and avoid sinking the archipelago), Kizaru had proactively shifted the battlefield over the open water.
"We've been fighting for five minutes already, Ray... shouldn't you have cooled off by now?"
Kizaru complained helplessly, blocking a heavy strike.
He genuinely didnt know Mikita was Ray's direct subordinate—if he had, he would've gone easier on her to avoid this mess.
But regret aside, his gaze remained fixed intently on Ray through his tinted glasses.
In these mere five minutes, he had personally experienced the absolute terror of what it meant to be a "Yonko Hunter."
Although Ray's raw movement speed was slightly slower than his, Ray's reaction speed far surpassed Kizaru's.
The so-called "slower movement speed" was only because Kizaru could literally transform into light to travel.
Yet... Ray could always lock onto his exact exit position.
Whenever Kizaru emerged from his light form, Ray would instantly appear right beside him with a blade.
In terms of kicking and punching speed in close combat, Ray matched him perfectly.
Moreover, when it came to countering moves, Ray could anticipate and respond even faster than the Admiral could.
Powerful advanced Armament Haki, top-tier Observation Haki, Conqueror's Haki infusion, and an abnormally sinister aura.
Combined with Ray's terrifying physical strength, Kizaru had been beaten until his pristine suit was dirtied and torn.
The real problem was... he couldn't even escape!
His Yata no Kagami had a limited teleportation range.
Against high-speed Yonko like Shanks, he could still fly away and be annoying from a distance, but Ray could fly freely too.
In Kizaru's eyes, Ray was the epitome of an all-rounder warrior with zero weaknesses.
He even had an intuition that the titles of "Strongest Man" and "Strongest Creature" on the seas had already changed hands quietly.
The only man worthy of those titles now was this silver-haired powerhouse before him.
If Ray insisted on continuing the fight to the death, Kizaru would have to go all out and risk his life.
'If I were to die before the war with Whitebeard... I must at least severely injure or take him down with me.'
'Otherwise, the Marines will face utter catastrophe.'
Just as Kizaru began contemplating his final desperate arrangements, Ray moved again.
Fortunately, Kizaru had been watching Ray closely with Observation Haki, so he reacted immediately.
FLASH!
His entire body dissolved into countless blinding points of light, scattering to surround Ray in the sky.
Then, all the light points converged in pairs, ultimately forming over a hundred Kizarus.
'Light Clones'
These clones were not mere optical illusions—each possessed physical attack capabilities.
This was an Awakened Logia trait.
Ordinary Logia users, even if capable of creating clones before awakening, would expend massive amounts of their own stamina and could never produce so many solid clones at once.
Take Crocodile for example.
Even after Crocodile awakened, he could only create a few solid sand clones.
But Kizaru was different since light was everywhere.
In an instant, hundreds of Kizarus wielding light swords charged toward Ray from all directions.
Seeing this, Ray drew his blade and slashed.
"WIND SCAR!"
BOOM!
A massive, multi-stream beam of demonic light shooting straight into the sky instantly annihilated about twenty Kizaru clones in front of Ray.
Seizing the opening, Ray flew forward, leaving the encircling Kizaru clones behind him.
With a backhanded slash, he unleashed another Wind Scar.
The Kizaru clones, having foreseen this through shared Observation Haki, quickly attempted to evade.
However, due to the immense spreading range of the Wind Scar, around twenty more Kizaru clones were still clipped and destroyed into scattering photons.
Ray floated in the air, carefully observing the remaining swarm of Kizarus, trying to locate his true body among the fakes.
With intense focus, Ray extended the foresight of his Advanced Observation Haki to its maximum duration.
Finally, he saw it.
Ten seconds into the future, the specific Kizaru launching a massive light wave at him from the rear.
But with so many Kizaru clones in the way, breaking through to the real one before being surrounded again required clearing a sufficiently long path.
"Kongōsōha!"
SHING!
Countless diamond blades, infused with Ryuo and advanced Armament Haki, surged forward violently like a shotgun blast of shrapnel.
"Oh, damn!"
Kizaru's true body, seeing this deadly Haki-coated move heading straight for him, immediately used energy transfer.
ZAP.
He shifted his true consciousness and body to a clone outside the range of the diamond barrage.
In an instant, another twenty clones were shredded to pieces.
Only forty remained.
Logically, he had been hiding safely in the rear, frequently switching positions among the clones, so Ray shouldn't have been able to detect him so accurately.
'Could it be that my intended future attack was detected by his Observation Haki?'
'But there were still ten seconds until I executed the move... could this guy foresee that far ahead?!'
'If so, that was truly terrifying.'
'Ten seconds of future sight was monstrous.'
But since he had been discovered, Kizaru abandoned the charging tactic and attacked directly from a distance.
"LASER RAIN!"
The twenty clones positioned alongside Kizaru's true body at the rear also sprang into action.
All raised their hands, forming a glowing cross of light in each palm.
PEW! PEW! PEW!
Dozens of thick laser attacks instantly converged on Ray's location.
And they were continuous, like a heavy bomber's assault.
These lasers were different from the scattered Yasakani no Magatama; they were far more powerful, concentrated, and nearly impossible to interrupt.
Kizaru didn't believe Ray would choose to tank them head-on.
As long as Ray started dodging, Kizaru was confident the other twenty clones could encircle him and restrict his movement.
Then, with lasers raining down like a storm, even if they couldn't kill the Demon God, they should at least inflict some heavy damage.
But the next moment, Kizaru's future sight showed him a terrifying impossible scene.
'What is that...? A black hole?!'
Without a second thought, Kizaru immediately flew backward as fast as his light form could carry him.