"Heh…"
Lugart slowed his assault, eyes full of mockery.
"You… don't actually know swordsmanship, do you?"
Gern exhaled quietly.
He couldn't deny it.
Before gaining the Heavenly Quake Fruit, he'd been nothing more than a logistics soldier with slightly above-average strength.
Afterward, he'd spent a year forcefully raising his combat power through raw fruit development.
Against a truly experienced fighter—
his flaws were obvious.
That's why Gern always studied his enemies.
No system.
One life.
"Haha! As I thought!"
Lugart laughed.
"A fine blade wasted on wild swings!"
The spear snapped forward.
"Blood Beak · Throat Pierce!"
Gern twisted aside, the spear grazing his neck, drawing blood.
He leapt back, eyes calm.
Now he understood Lugart completely.
No trump cards.
Basic Armament only.
"Scared already?"
Lugart sneered.
"Once your tricks are exposed, all that's left is despair!"
Gern smiled—dangerously.
"You're right."
He reversed his grip on Eight Desolations.
"I'm not a swordsman."
The blade hummed—not metal, but space screaming.
"But…"
His left hand slid along the spine of the blade.
Billions of vibration particles compressed—collapsed—compressed again.
Vacuum spirals twisted around the edge.
"Your Haki…"
Gern lifted his head.
"Isn't very refined either."
The blade fell.
Silence vanished.
The harbor floor flipped upward like a torn carpet.
Hundreds of tons of stone disintegrated mid-air.
Sea water shattered into crystalline cubes.
Air broke like glass.
"Whitebeard…!"
Lugart's face went pale as buried memories resurfaced.
"What kind of fruit did you eat?!"
He coated his arms with Haki—his absolute limit.
"I don't know," Gern said calmly.
"But I know its destructive power…"
He crouched.
"…is enough to temporarily ignore—"
The ground collapsed.
"—and crush the so-called gap between us!"
"Heavenly Quake · Sky Rend!!"
Space shattered like a mirror.
A world-cleaving vibration slash tore through heaven and earth.
Half the harbor and coastline split open in a hundred-meter fissure—
as if a god had scratched the world itself.
Lugart raised his arms instinctively.
His Haki shattered like ice.
BOOM!!
His body was hurled away, the ground collapsing behind him.
When the dust settled—
The harbor was ruined.
Gern sheathed his blade slowly, space still trembling.
Lugart lay broken, organs reduced to pulp, arms severed.
"Your Haki…"
Gern murmured.
"…is as thin as paper."
He impaled Lugart's skull with Blood Beak, pinning it beneath the pirate's own flag.
Only then did Gern collapse.
That strike—
his ultimate move—
came at a brutal cost.
"Sixty-nine million… and I still had to go this far…"
He closed his eyes.
"I'm… still too weak."
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