If time travel were possible, Diamante would absolutely travel back to Spider Miles and slap himself violently across the face, fiercely refusing this mission regardless of what Doflamingo said.
He hadn't expected a supposedly simple cleanup operation to be this incredibly tedious, forcing him to drift aimlessly on the freezing North Blue sea for so long.
When he had originally arrived at the coordinates where their subordinate ship was sunk, there were no survivors and no ship to be found. However, by relying on the Donquixote Family's massive intelligence network in the surrounding waters, he eventually locked onto a highly suspicious, incredibly fast galleon.
He initially thought he could wrap things up quickly and head back to port. Instead, the suspect ship was absurdly fast, leading him on a relentless, days-long chase. Only now had he finally caught up and confirmed the identities of his targets.
Diamante had already realized who they were: the world-famous explorers who had recently discovered the City of Gold. However, he remained completely, blissfully ignorant of Bardock and his crew's true, monstrous combat strength.
If he had known exactly who he was chasing, he absolutely would not have risked his life getting this close.
"Listen up, you rats! You can't run anymore!" Diamante yelled arrogantly from the bow of his ship, adjusting his feathered cape. "Bring the ship alongside theirs! Capture them alive!"
Following his command, the Donquixote pirates rapidly sprang into action, preparing their grappling hooks.
Upon realizing that Bardock's group was the famously wealthy crew of explorers, Diamante had altered his original plan. Instead of immediately slaughtering them, he decided it would be far more lucrative to capture them alive, seize their legendary wealth, and hand them directly over to Doffy for interrogation.
"Rats?"
What Diamante completely failed to realize was that casually dropping the word "rats" had just deeply offended every single monster standing on the deck of the White Dragon.
"Boss," Daz Bonez stepped forward, his cold eyes locked onto the flamboyant Executive. "The loudmouth seems to be a swordsman. Let me handle him."
"Tch," Enel scoffed, lazily picking his ear as static crackled around his fingers. "If the Captain didn't explicitly want their loot, a clown like him wouldn't have even gotten the chance to breathe the same air as us."
"Captain! Leave the small fry to me and Killer!"
"Captain, I am also more than capable of contributing."
Eustass Kid, Killer, and Basil Hawkins were unwilling to be left out, eagerly requesting permission to enter the fray and test their skills.
Bardock nodded in deep satisfaction. The crew was truly coming together; he didn't even need to lift a finger to deal with minor annoyances like this anymore.
"Capture Diamante alive," Bardock ordered simply, leaning against the railing. "Do whatever you want with the rest."
That single, casual sentence officially sealed the fate of the Donquixote Pirates.
The two ships finally pulled alongside each other. Before the Donquixote pirates could even attempt to throw their ropes, the White Dragon rookies aggressively launched themselves across the gap. In the blink of an eye, the enemy deck descended into absolute, bloody chaos as the grunts were violently massacred by Kid's magnetism, Killer's scythes, and Hawkins' cursed blade.
Seeing this, Diamante was furious. These were his direct subordinates—the elites of the Diamante Army! How could they be slaughtered so effortlessly?!
"You're pissing me off! Half-Moon Glaive!" (Hantsuki Sojo)
Drawing his rapier, Diamante swung his blade, unleashing a massive, crescent-shaped flying slash directly at the White Dragon.
"Nice try."
Daz Bonez instantly launched his own compressed blade of air, violently intercepting Diamante's slash mid-air. The two attacks collided and shattered into a harmless gust of wind.
In the next second, the two men clashed directly on the deck.
Seeing that Diamante was capable of utilizing flying slashes, Daz Bonez was highly satisfied. This flamboyant fool was actually worthy of being cut down.
"Viper Glaive!" (Hebiken)
Catching Daz off guard, Diamante suddenly activated his Ripple-Ripple Fruit (Hira Hira no Mi) powers, turning his steel rapier completely limp and flexible. Like a venomous snake, the blade unpredictably bent around Daz's block and struck him directly in the ribs from an impossible angle.
Seeing his attack land dead center, Diamante opened his mouth to laugh triumphantly. However, his smug expression instantly froze, morphing into sheer, comical disbelief.
Daz Bonez was completely unharmed. The steel blade had merely sparked against his skin.
Ignoring the baffled Executive, Daz relentlessly pressed his offensive, utilizing the lethal, close-quarters lethality of his Dice-Dice Fruit to its absolute limit. His entire body became an unstoppable storm of steel blades.
Diamante was forced to frantically utilize his steel-infused cape to defend himself, desperately struggling to hold his ground. He even transformed his own body into a fluttering, flag-like state to evade the lethal strikes, but absolutely nothing he did could penetrate Daz's iron defense.
As Daz's Observation Haki rapidly adapted to the erratic, fluttering nature of Diamante's Devil Fruit, the scales of victory completely tilted. With a brutal cross-slash, Daz violently shredded Diamante's steel cape.
"Bull Glaive!" (Tougyuu Glaive)
Desperate, Diamante flattened and folded his rapier into the shape of a massive bull's head, aggressively thrusting it forward to force Daz Bonez back and create distance.
Seizing the brief opening, Diamante rapidly pulled out several party poppers and fired them into the sky, simultaneously deploying a thick steel umbrella over his head.
"Death Enjambre!" (Shi no Hoshikuzu - Death Star-Dust)
Instantly, the confetti in the sky transformed back into thousands of heavy, spiked iron balls, raining down like a lethal meteor shower.
Diamante maliciously intended to completely wipe out the rest of the White Dragon crew on his deck. Since his own subordinates were already dead anyway, he figured he could just slowly whittle down Daz Bonez after eliminating the distractions.
"Tsk, tsk."
Eustass Kid looked up at the apocalyptic rain of spiked iron with absolute amusement. "Attract!"
A massive magnetic field erupted from Kid's outstretched arm. Every single spiked iron ball was instantly ripped from its downward trajectory, effortlessly magnetized, and violently sucked into a massive, swirling metallic sphere floating directly above Kid's head. Not a single spike touched the deck.
Diamante stomped his feet in pure rage, so furious he wanted to violently hack Kid to pieces.
Unfortunately for him, he no longer had the luxury of paying attention to anyone else. Daz Bonez had already closed the distance.
CLANG!
The defensive steel umbrella was brutally sliced to pieces. Diamante panicked, his eyes widening in terror.
Unsurprisingly, it didn't take long for the fight to end. Within moments, the flamboyant Executive was brutally subdued, beaten to a bloody pulp, and formally captured alive by Daz Bonez.
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