It wasn't clear just how many bags of Dance Powder Sherlock had burned this time, but the torrential rain shrouding the entire city of Alubarna showed absolutely no sign of stopping.
"Die! You four-eyed bastard who only knows how to hide!"
Gasparde, thoroughly sickened by the Sorcerer's endless illusions, let out a furious roar. His right hand transformed into green soft candy, churning to form a massive iron hammer.
—Candy Hammer!
The massive emerald-green hammer smashed through the curtain of rain, hurtling ruthlessly toward Sherlock, who stood motionless. However, just as the iron hammer came within a meter of him, ripples suddenly appeared in the air, like waves on a clear blue lake.
—Mirror Coat!
BOOM!!!
A piercing roar erupted in the air.
Gasparde felt as if he had struck an incredibly hard steel plate. In an instant, a mysterious, powerful force struck back, and the steel-hard candy hammer was shattered into pieces by this explosive counter-force.
Compared to back at Little Garden, Sherlock's strength had clearly improved, and the reflection limit of his Mirror Coat had increased significantly. If Sherlock were to face Blood Wolf Haska again now, the latter would likely have to beat himself half to death before he could inflict any effective damage on the Sorcerer.
"Just what exactly is your ability?" Staring at the candy fragments splattered everywhere, Gasparde roared viciously at the calm, four-eyed man in the distance. "First muskets, then illusions, invisibility, and now reflecting attacks..."
"How many Devil Fruits have you eaten?! Are you a monster?!!!"
This Marine scum had spent years in the Grand Line, yet it was his first time encountering someone with such varied and inconceivable abilities.
"Monster? No, no, no..."
Sherlock watched the green soft candy on the ground slowly oozing back toward Gasparde. He pushed up his glasses with a calm expression. "If you like, you may address me as the [Sorcerer]."
"After all, that is what the Marines call me..." Sherlock smiled gently, apparently quite resigned to this somewhat strange nickname.
"Sorcerer? That Super Rookie from the East Blue?" The Marine scum, his right hand now restored to its original state, looked ferocious. "A mere rookie dares to oppose me!"
Perhaps feeling it was humiliating to be made to look so wretched by a newcomer, Gasparde shouted arrogantly, "Although I can't figure out your fruit ability, before the power of my Candy-Candy Fruit, you can't do anything to me either!"
"This is a terrifying ability akin to a Logia! Against a rookie like you who can't use Haki, I am invincible!"
As he finished speaking, countless green spikes suddenly erupted from Gasparde's body. His massive frame charged at Sherlock like a spike-covered hedgehog.
—Phantom Shift!
Dodging the attack with an illusion, Sherlock's true body slowly materialized in the distance.
"Like a Logia? You really think highly of yourself." Sherlock gently pushed up his glasses, his eyes narrowing slightly.
"Although you can transform your body into candy at will to ignore most physical attacks, your ability is worlds apart from Elementalization..."
As he spoke, Sherlock consumed another small pinch of Insamona, which resembled white sugar. Although the side effects of this forbidden drug had been reduced, it caused strong dependency; if he didn't take it continuously, the Sorcerer would likely fall into a deep sleep the very next second.
"...Just now, after your body was shattered, you still had to slowly pull yourself back together to restore your original form. A Logia's Elementalization requires no such effort."
"In other words, you cannot completely ignore physical attacks like a Logia user can; you simply possess an extremely strong regeneration ability."
Looking at the Marine scum whose face had suddenly turned ugly, Sherlock continued in a flat tone, "Therefore, if you receive a single attack that exceeds the limit of your regeneration, you will still die!"
"I wonder, am I correct... 'Senior'?" Sherlock emphasized the last word, his tone dripping with sarcasm.
(Is this guy a monster? How did he spot the weakness of my fruit ability so quickly...)
Gasparde, covered in cold sweat after the Sorcerer exposed his weakness with a single remark, spoke with exasperated hatred:
"Humph! So what? Can a four-eyed bastard like you blast me into dregs in one hit?!!"
"Is that so..."
Sherlock looked at the massive man who had no idea he had just set a spectacular death flag for himself. He silently pushed up his glasses, and then, with a thought—
—Mirror Image Entity!
Whoosh! A dazzling crimson light suddenly flared beside Sherlock. A blood-red spear, about two meters long, appeared out of thin air. Controlled by the Sorcerer's will, the spear slowly floated above Gasparde, its sword-like tip aiming straight at the Marine scum, whose expression changed drastically.
"How unfortunate. It seems I actually can." Sherlock slowly raised his right hand, his pitch-black eyes filled with a rare look of bloodlust and tyranny.
—Fivefold Mirror Fusion!
Having finished off the Baroque Works Officer Agents, Zoro and the others reappeared on the battlefield in the plaza to support the Royal Army, who were at a disadvantage.
In the pouring rain, an agile figure in a black suit dodged several vicious attacks in a row. His blonde hair blew in the wind, his movements as fluid and nimble as a swift foraging in the rain.
Immediately after, the owner of the suit inverted his body and began to spin rapidly, like a black tornado, kicking away a large group of Baroque Works assassins.
Then, the blonde cook flashed underneath an extremely large pirate. His right leg kicked vertically upward with unimaginable force—swift as lightning, powerful as a thunderclap!
"Anti-Manner Kick Course!"
The shiny, polished black leather shoe made a very unfriendly intimate contact with the poor pirate's chin.
Bang!
Accompanied by shattered teeth and blood splattering everywhere, the burly pirate shot into the air like a rocket, then crashed down heavily, smashing a large crater into the hard stone bricks of the plaza and sending water splashing.
"Tch, these guys in prison uniforms can really take a beating!" Sanji raised a curled eyebrow and wiped the rain from his face, sounding somewhat helpless.
After all, compared to the Baroque Works assassins who were written as 'killers' but read as 'small fry', these pirates who had once survived under the Sand Crocodile were naturally much, much stronger. (Otherwise, they would have been sucked dry long ago...)
delivering another powerful kick to send a sneak-attacking enemy flying, the curly-browed cook looked at the green-haired swordsman beside him, who was wrapped in bandages almost from head to toe.
"Hey Marimo, why do you end up looking like a dead dog every time?"
Truth be told, ever since their first meeting at the Baratie, in Sanji's eyes, Zoro had been completely thrashed by Hawkeye, then fought Hachi while heavily injured, achieved a pyrrhic victory in a duel against the Gale Swordsman at Little Garden, and this time had nearly turned himself into a mummy like Usopp.
"Even if Chopper is a great doctor, can't you be a little more careful yourself?" Although Sanji's words were sharp, anyone could hear the concern for his partner in his tone.
"Shut up..." Gritting his teeth, Zoro blocked the heavy slashes of several pirates with his dual swords. Then, suddenly exerting force, the sharp blade of the Sandai Kitetsu sliced a beautiful arc like a new moon. Accompanied by several blades snapping in two and blood spraying wildly, the pirates all collapsed with looks of disbelief.
Looking solely at that sharp slash, one really couldn't tell he was a heavily injured man.
"Even with these injuries, I can take you down with one hand! You lecherous kappa," Zoro grinned, mocking a certain curly-brow.
"Oh? I can't pretend I didn't hear that." Sanji walked over with a dark expression, going tit-for-tat with Zoro.
"It seems if I don't print my shoe hard on that stink-face of yours, you won't even remember your own last name..."
"Enough, you two idiots!!!" Nami the Demon King immediately gave each of the fools, who were about to fight again for some reason, a violent thump on the head. She bared her sharp teeth and roared, "This is not the time for you to argue!"
"According to Sherlock's plan, the Marines coming to take down the Sand Crocodile are almost here. We must finish these enemies immediately!"
"Yeah, yeah." Usopp, who was helping Dr. Chopper treat the injured Royal Army soldiers nearby, hurriedly added, "After minimizing the casualties of this war, our mission is complete. It'll be time to run..."
[Minimize the casualties of this war]—this was the ultimate goal Sherlock had explicitly stated during the strategy meeting, and it was a point highly praised by Princess Vivi.
(However, even saying that...)
(Will that idiot, who didn't listen to the battle plan from start to finish, really be satisfied with just minimizing war casualties?)
Hearing this, the green-haired swordsman clutching his head and the love-struck cook exchanged a look with perfect understanding, both wearing expressions of deep skepticism.
However, at that very moment, a blood-red light suddenly erupted in the distance, piercing through heaven and earth. The entire plaza began to tremble slightly. The light was so sharp, so dazzling, that those locked in life-and-death struggles involuntarily stopped their movements, looking up in shock.
"Th-that light is..." The little reindeer gaped, his furry face covered in fine sweat. Even though he was far away, he felt a tremor from the depths of his soul, a testament to the terrifying energy contained within that blood-red light.
Zoro, Sanji, Nami, and Usopp looked at each other, and a name popped into their minds simultaneously.
(Sherlock!) x4
In the torrential rain, a blood-red demonic sun burned furiously in mid-air, looking down with arrogance like a rainbow. Its soul-stealing, overwhelming aura was even greater than that night in Yuba.
"God-Killing Spear..."
The raised right hand swung down with force. The air immediately emitted a mournful hum like weeping ghosts. The overflowing blood-red light suddenly contracted into a bolt of blood-red lightning, chopping down with exaggerated momentum. The terrifying light and shadow, impossible to track with the naked eye, swept past with a haze of swirling blood mist, blurring the clarity of reality.
"Gungnir!!!"
In that moment, it was as if time stood still. Everything was terrifyingly quiet.
In a flash of lightning and flint, the surging aura swept out in all directions like a tidal wave. The rain filling the sky was instantly evaporated by the aftershocks of that horrific energy. The entire plaza lost its balance, shaking and trembling, fluctuating wildly.
When the blinding light dissipated, everyone around widened their eyes, their gazes all focused on the same spot. Then, the expressions on their faces suddenly froze in disbelief.
"What happened just now?"
"No way, what is with this hole?"
"Where did General Gasparde go?!!"
Where Gasparde had stood, only an exaggeratedly large hole remained. It was pitch black and bottomless, the edges of the hole eerily smooth—evidence of just how inconceivable the energy contained in that blood-red light had been.
And that Marine scum with a bounty as high as 95 million berries seemed to have evaporated from the face of the earth, leaving not a single trace behind.
"My apologies." Sherlock panted heavily, his face pale. He had given it his all just now; even having taken Insamona, he still felt he was nearing his limit.
"It seems I was wrong. I really couldn't blast you into dregs..." The corners of his mouth curled up slightly. Sherlock pushed up his glasses and murmured to the massive crater before him:
"...Because it seems I didn't even leave a single dreg for you."
Support me & read more advance & fast update chapter on my pa-treon:
pat reon .c-om/windkaze