He awakened Observation Haki at the critical moment?
Could this brat be some kind of chosen protagonist?
Crocodile frowned. Ace's intangibility was already troublesome enough, and now this kid had unconsciously awakened Observation Haki as well.
Although Ace's reserves of Observation Haki could not possibly support him through a long battle, for an arrogant man like Crocodile, failing to take down Luffy and Ace in a short time was already a humiliation.
"What was that just now?"
Ace was deeply confused. He looked at his own hands, unable to understand how he had managed to perform such an extreme dodge.
But on the battlefield, there was no time for him to think.
After his attack failed, Crocodile directly unleashed a major move. He pressed one hand against the sand, and countless grains of yellow sand surged upward, gradually condensing into an enormous vortex.
The ground beneath their feet became unreliable. Ace and Luffy were uncontrollably pulled toward the vortex.
"Ground Death: Reincarnation!"
The yellow sand continued spreading, growing more and more violent. Its range soon enveloped half the capital. Countless buildings began swaying on the verge of collapse.
The civilians had no idea what was happening. All they could do was wail and flee into the distance.
Luffy and Ace felt the terrifying force most directly. The vortex formed from yellow sand seemed as though it would completely crush the two of them. The earth began to tremble, and the might of a Logia-type Devil Fruit gradually evolved into a natural disaster.
Yet in the next moment, a scene no one expected occurred.
The cries in the distance seemed to enter Luffy and Ace's ears.
Luffy, whose blood was already boiling, quickly turned red-eyed with fury.
He could imagine what would happen next.
Countless civilians would die under Crocodile's attack.
A man like this absolutely could not be allowed to continue living on the seas. He absolutely could not be allowed to keep doing evil!
"Stop it! I told you to stop!"
Luffy seemed as though he had been injected with adrenaline. His rubber arms stretched out and grabbed Crocodile by the shoulders.
His head rapidly pulled backward. Blood seeped from his forehead, making his expression look terrifyingly fierce.
Crocodile's move was indeed powerful, but it had one drawback—its recovery time was far too long.
He also never expected Luffy to take such an action.
Although Luffy's feet were restrained, for rubber, that was hardly a fatal issue.
Crocodile could only watch as Straw Hat's head grew larger and larger in his vision.
Finally, with a heavy thud, it smashed viciously into his forehead!
The move was forcibly interrupted.
Waves of dizziness washed over Crocodile, shocking him to the extreme.
How was that possible?
With his current body…
No!
The power of the male hormones in his body was constantly dissipating.
The power of Ivankov's Devil Fruit would eventually fade. But why now?
He had maintained this state for so many years!
"I'm not sure how long my hormones can remain inside your body, so be careful, Crocodile Girl! No, wait, I should call you Crocodile Boy now! When hormones are maintained for a long time and are about to dissipate, they'll cause a powerful backlash. The longer the maintenance period, the stronger the backlash. Be careful…"
Ivankov's words from back then echoed through Crocodile's mind.
At the time, Crocodile had not paid much attention to them.
He had never expected the boomerang to strike the back of his head like this!
Crocodile only felt his body become incomparably weak. Even raising his arm had become exceptionally difficult.
In this condition, never mind compared to his body when he had been a woman—even compared to when he first met Roldy, he had never been this weak!
After landing one hit, Luffy refused to let the opportunity go.
His body twisted dramatically. Using the power of rubber, he turned himself into a tornado. A storm of fists blotted out the sky as they rained down on Crocodile.
His blood-covered fists hammered every part of Crocodile's body.
Crocodile was too weak to fight back and could only endure Luffy's attacks head-on. Fortunately, his physical toughness remained. Luffy's relentless barrage could not cause him much damage.
But there was still another guy beside him!
"Hiken: Hotarubi!"
Specks of green flame flickered like fireflies in the night, quickly drifting toward Crocodile's body.
In the brief gap after Luffy stopped attacking, those sparks exploded.
Immediately afterward, even denser flames gathered.
"Great Flame Commandment: Flame Emperor!"
The intangibility granted by his Devil Fruit ability should have allowed Crocodile to avoid such an attack. But his body was far too weak right now.
He could not even turn into sand.
Feeling the scorching temperature of that blazing fireball, as well as the explosive energy contained within it, Crocodile felt nothing but overwhelming humiliation.
They were just two brats!
But all of his fury vanished like smoke and clouds when that sun-like fireball came crashing down.
Boom!
The earth trembled.
A giant crater more than a hundred meters wide appeared. Thick smoke and dust surged into the sky.
Crocodile lay at the bottom of the crater, his eyes dull and lifeless.
...
"Hey! Are you kidding me?! Crocodile didn't just die, did he?!"
In the underground space, Sheen shot to his feet.
The expression on Roldy's face beside him also turned somewhat stiff.
No one had expected that someone as powerful as Crocodile would suffer such a huge loss at the hands of two brats!
The backlash from the Hormone-Hormone Fruit, blood as a medium, the sudden outburst from the two youngsters…
All of this was far too coincidental!
"Big Brother! How about I go out there?"
Sheen cracked his knuckles, a trace of anger flashing in his eyes.
Although he usually ran his mouth nonstop and annoyed Crocodile to death, the two of them still had a very good relationship.
Now that Crocodile had been beaten into this state by two brats, it was not only Crocodile's face that had been lost. It was also the face of the Roldy Pirates.
As the number two figure of the Roldy Pirates, how could Sheen possibly sit still?
"No need. Those two brats have decent talent, but they're still no match for Little Croc. That remains true even if Little Croc can't use Haki right now. However, I think they've already pushed him too far. The real show is about to begin."
A red light flashed in Roldy's eyes.
In his Observation Haki perception, Luffy and Ace, who were currently standing shoulder to shoulder and cheering, would soon be pressed into the ground by Crocodile.
His current Observation Haki had not only expanded in range, but his Future Sight had also extended to three minutes.
That was an extremely terrifying power.
As for why Roldy would say there was no suspense in this battle?
Even if they surpassed their own limits, the enormous gap in strength could not be bridged.
They and Crocodile were simply not on the same level at all.
"Little Croc was still careless."
Roldy shook his head.
Naturally, he could tell that from beginning to end, Crocodile had held a trace of playfulness in his mind. Had he used life-or-death killing moves from the start, then no matter how heaven-defying those two brats were, they would have had no chance of victory.
That inexplicable veteran powerhouse attitude had dragged him down.
"Haha, since Big Brother says so… Still, I'm definitely going to laugh at him later! Seriously, where did all that Elbaf training go?"
Sheen burst into laughter.
At that moment, the battle outside also changed.
After their wave of attacks produced results, Luffy and Ace had only just caught their breath. Their gazes remained locked tightly on the smoke and dust.
Clearly, their caution was meaningful.
Three enormous sand blades, each a hundred meters tall, suddenly flew out from the smoke.
Their speed was terrifying, and their power was overwhelming. There was no visible weakness at all.
The two of them did not even have the thought of resisting. Shock filled their hearts.
Ace reacted swiftly. Relying on that faint trace of Observation Haki, he pushed Luffy away, but he himself was struck by the sand blade.
His body was split in two, flames burning at the severed section. Cold sweat flowed uncontrollably from his forehead.
"Brat, congratulations. You've earned my recognition. So next, savor this properly—just how far away you still are from the New World!"
A figure slowly walked out from the smoke and dust.
It was Crocodile.
However, what made Luffy and Ace widen their eyes was that the one who appeared was not the burly Old Croc from before.
Instead, it was Old Croc in the form of an unmistakably female woman, with an outrageously voluptuous figure
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