The air above the ocean grew suffocatingly dense.
Bartholomew Kuma stood on the ruined iron platform, his massive frame blotting out the afternoon sun. He had dropped his Bible and removed his gloves, exposing the soft, pink paw pads embedded in his palms. To the uninitiated, they looked absurd. To Light Yagami, whose Intermediate Observation Haki was currently screaming at him, those palms represented an absolute, physics-defying wall of repulsion.
"Try to find out," Light smiled, his black, Armament-coated saber angled toward the deck.
Kuma didn't speak. He simply raised both hands.
Pad Ho. (Pressure Cannon).
Kuma thrust his palms forward at terrifying speed. Dozens of paw-shaped bubbles of hyper-compressed air erupted from his hands, shooting across the fifty yards of open water faster than musket fire.
Light didn't try to block them with his sword. His Level 5 Weapon Arts gave him a flawless understanding of kinetic force; if he blocked absolute repulsion with a physical blade, the shockwave would shatter his wrist, Haki or no Haki.
Instead, Light triggered Soru, blurring out of existence.
The barrage of pressure cannons slammed into the ocean where the warship had been drifting, blasting massive, geyser-like craters into the water.
Light reappeared in mid-air, halfway across the gap, using Geppo to kick off the atmosphere. He raised his left hand, aiming directly at the towering Warlord.
Force Authority: Attraction.
Light didn't target Kuma's massive body—the man was too heavy to move efficiently. Instead, Light targeted the ruined iron platform directly behind Kuma. A localized gravity well violently ripped a ten-ton slab of steel from the base, hurtling it toward the back of Kuma's head.
Kuma didn't even turn around. He merely raised his right hand over his shoulder.
Ping!
The ten-ton slab of steel hit the paw pad and was instantly deflected, shooting off into the horizon at the speed of light until it vanished from sight as a twinkling star.
Absolute defense, Light analyzed perfectly, landing lightly on the iron platform twenty feet away from the Warlord. Any physical or kinetic strike that touches those palms is neutralized and redirected. I cannot overpower his Devil Fruit. I have to circumvent it.
Kuma turned his imposing gaze down to the Rear Admiral. "You are fast. But speed without weight is meaningless in the New World."
Kuma vanished.
There was no sound of a footstep. No blur of motion. He was simply standing twenty feet away, and in the next microsecond, he was towering directly over Light, his massive palm descending to crush the Marine into the iron.
Teleportation? Light's eyes widened slightly. No. He is repelling himself at the speed of light.
Light's Level 2 Observation Haki barely registered the intent in time. He threw himself backward, executing a flawless, twisting Kami-e. Kuma's palm slammed into the iron platform where Light had just been standing.
The resulting shockwave shattered the entire eastern wing of the Flying Fish base. Iron beams shrieked and twisted, collapsing into the boiling sea.
Light caught himself on a surviving steel beam, his white coat billowing. He didn't waste a millisecond. If Kuma could move at light-speed, distance was an illusion. Light had to fight inside the Warlord's guard.
Light launched himself forward. Level 5 Weapon Arts took over.
He became a phantom of black steel. He unleashed a blinding flurry of slashes, aiming precisely for Kuma's joints, his neck, his blind spots.
Kuma remained eerily stoic. He didn't dodge. He simply moved his hands.
Clang! Ping. Clang!
Every single time Light's black saber was about to bite into flesh, Kuma's paw pad was there to meet it. Light had to instantly deactivate his swing the millisecond before impact, using Force Authority to violently pull his own sword back to prevent it from being deflected out of his hands. It was an agonizing, high-wire act of muscular control.
"You fight like an assassin, Marine," Kuma noted, his voice a low rumble amidst the screeching metal.
Kuma thrust his left palm forward. Light sidestepped, but the sheer air pressure grazed his shoulder, tearing a clean hole through his Commodore epaulette and drawing a thin line of blood.
Light gritted his teeth, his pleasant smile finally cracking. He used Soru to step completely behind the giant Warlord, aiming a devastating, two-handed downward slash at Kuma's spine.
Kuma simply repelled the air beneath his own feet, instantly shooting fifty yards up into the sky, leaving Light to cleave an iron crate in half.
Hovering high above the ruined base, Kuma spread his arms wide.
"The saber is sharp," Kuma said, his voice carrying over the roaring ocean. "But what happens when the saber cannot reach?"
Kuma brought his hands together. He began to violently repel the atmosphere into a single focal point between his palms. The air visibly distorted, compressing into a massive, translucent paw-shaped bubble.
Light's Observation Haki flared with blinding, agonizing intensity.
"Ursus Shock."
Kuma was compressing the ambient air of the entire bay into a bomb. If he dropped that on the platform, the resulting concussive blast wouldn't just destroy the iron base. It would instantly atomize the Marine warship anchored fifty yards away. It would kill T-Bone. It would kill Haas.
And it would kill Bonney.
Light looked back at his ship. He could see Bonney standing on the deck, restrained by T-Bone, staring up at her father with absolute, heartbroken terror.
If Bonney died, Light lost his ultimate leverage over a Warlord of the Sea, although the same Warlord was trying to kill him AND her right now. She was a crucial piece on the global chessboard. But more importantly, the absolute, cold arrogance within Light roared in pure fury. No one destroys his property. No mere insect dictates terms to him.
Light sheathed his saber. He didn't have the Armament Haki required to cut a bomb of that magnitude. He had to rely entirely on his Transmigration Gift.
Light crouched low on the iron platform, focusing every ounce of his Level 5 Life Force stamina into his hands. He looked up at the descending Warlord, who had compressed the massive bubble down to the size of a marble.
Kuma pushed the marble downward.
It fell toward the center of the base, a tiny, glowing sphere of absolute annihilation.
"Force Authority!" Light roared, his composure finally breaking. "Maximum Output: Eclipse!"
Light thrust both hands toward the sky. He didn't try to repel the Ursus Shock. He knew he couldn't overpower Kuma's Devil Fruit.
Instead, Light created a massive, hyper-dense gravity well directly above the falling marble, pulling against it with terrifying force, while simultaneously creating a localized vacuum around the marble itself.
The tiny bomb paused in mid-air, caught between Kuma's downward repulsion and Light's upward attraction.
The air shrieked like a dying animal. The sheer gravitational friction caused the space around the marble to warp and bend, bleeding dark red light. Light's sleeves ripped to shreds. Blood vessels in his arms burst, staining his pristine white coat with crimson. His Life Force stamina was draining at an apocalyptic rate.
Kuma watched from the sky, his pale eyes narrowing infinitesimally. The Marine was tearing his own muscles apart to hold the blast radius away from the ship.
With a deafening CRACK, Light's gravity well finally destabilized the compressed air.
The Ursus Shock detonated prematurely in mid-air.
Because Light was pulling the pressure upward, the majority of the apocalyptic shockwave was directed into the sky. The clouds were instantly obliterated for miles. The ocean below was pushed down into a massive, temporary bowl.
The backlash slammed into the iron base. The platform beneath Light's feet completely disintegrated.
Light was thrown violently backward, crashing through three steel walls before finally skidding to a halt on a surviving piece of wreckage. He coughed up a mouthful of blood, his entire body screaming in agony.
Through the clearing smoke and settling seawater, Kuma slowly drifted down, landing effortlessly on a twisted steel beam. The Warlord was completely unharmed.
Light slowly forced himself to his feet. His white coat was ruined, soaked in his own blood. His left arm hung limply at his side, the muscles severely torn. He reached over with his right hand and drew his black saber once more, his eyes burning with a cold, unyielding darkness.
He had 4.1 million KP. If he had to spend everything right now to crush this damned cyborg, he would.
Kuma slowly picked up his thick purple Bible from the wreckage. He dusted the cover off with a massive hand.
He looked at the bleeding, terrifyingly resilient Rear Admiral, who looked like he was itching to go for another round. He looked past Light, to the Marine warship that was heavily rocked but entirely intact. His pale, emotionless eyes lingered on Bonney for a fraction of a second, registering that she was completely unharmed.
He betrayed absolutely nothing.
No relief.
No fatherly warmth.
"The world is entering a storm, Light Yagami," Kuma said quietly, his voice an eerie, mechanical rumble. "A man with your darkness will inevitably collide with both."
Kuma raised his bare hand, preparing to repel himself away.
"Why?!" Bonney screamed from the deck, tears streaming down her face. "Why did you attack us?! Say something!"
"PAPAAAA!"
Kuma's hand paused, barely. Kuma didn't look at her. He didn't answer. Then-
Pop.
With a sound like a bursting bubble, Bartholomew Kuma vanished entirely, leaving nothing behind but the smoking wreckage of the Flying Fish base and the churning ocean.
Light stood alone on the twisted steel. The adrenaline slowly faded, leaving only the agonizing throb of his torn muscles. He deactivated his Haki, sheathing his sword with a sharp click.
He had survived his first clash with the absolute top tier of the Grand Line. He had been thoroughly outmatched in raw Devil Fruit power, surviving purely on tactical genius and physics manipulation. It was a sobering, necessary reality check.
I need more power, Light thought, his dark eyes locking onto the distant horizon where the massive, striped mangrove trees of Sabaody Archipelago were finally coming into view. I need Advanced Haki. And this one-in-a-million Conqueror's Haki... maybe it was time to try it out.
"Major Yagami!" Haas yelled from the warship, having commanded the helmsman to bring the ship closer to the wreckage. "Sir! Are you alright?!"
Light pulled a clean, white handkerchief from his trousers. He calmly wiped the blood from his mouth, his posture straightening perfectly despite the pain. The pleasant, golden-boy smile returned to his face, a flawless mask sliding over the sociopath beneath.
"I am perfectly fine, Lieutenant," Light called back, stepping to the edge of the wreckage to be retrieved. "The Warlord had a disagreement with my jurisdiction, but he has decided to retreat."
Light looked past Haas, his eyes locking onto the towering mangroves of the bubble island. He could already feel it. The dense, rotting stench of millions of Karma Points waiting to be harvested.
"Set a course for Sabaody, Lieutenant," Light ordered, his voice echoing with cold, absolute authority. "It is time to clean up this ocean."