Chapter 319: The Avalanche Stopped
Fist and blade collided once more.
In the middle of their struggle, Axel and Garp exchanged a glance.
"Hey, old man."
Axel tilted his head toward the mountain.
"There's a doctor behind that hill. If we let the avalanche through, it'll hit the cabin."
He paused.
"And just so we're clear, I'm not doing this to help you."
"You brat!"
Garp roared back.
"Do I look like I need your help?! And is that any way to speak to your grandfather?!"
The two pushed against each other for another moment.
Then, almost simultaneously, they broke apart.
Neither needed to say anything else.
Garp turned toward the avalanche.
Axel did the same.
Both moved.
Despite his broad, top-heavy build, Garp accelerated with astonishing speed. He shot past the retreating Marines and planted himself directly in the avalanche's path.
His huge frame looked almost absurdly small compared to the wall of snow descending from the mountain.
Yet he stood there without hesitation.
On the opposite side, Axel lightly tapped the ground.
His slender figure shot forward, passing over the Drum Kingdom guards who were desperately trying to escape.
Then he stopped.
Dalton looked back in surprise.
"What is he doing?"
The avalanche was already close.
Snow, rock, broken earth, and debris rushed downhill together at terrifying speed.
The farther it descended, the more material it gathered.
What had begun as collapsing snow had become a moving wall capable of burying everything below the mountain.
Dalton had seen avalanches before.
He understood exactly how hopeless their position was.
"Keep moving!"
He shouted to his men.
"The opposite slope! Once we reach it, we'll be outside the main path!"
The guards ran as hard as they could.
But humans could only move so fast.
Ten meters per second?
Perhaps twenty for someone exceptionally quick?
It meant nothing compared to the avalanche bearing down on them.
Dalton knew that.
He knew there was a very real chance they would never reach safety.
But giving up would guarantee death.
So he kept running.
Kept shouting.
Kept trying to get even one more man out of the avalanche's path.
Then his attention returned to Axel.
The boy was no longer running.
He stood alone before the avalanche.
The wooden sword rested behind him in his right hand.
His left arm extended forward.
Waiting.
Dalton stared.
Had he given up?
The avalanche carried far more than a hundred tons of weight.
If such a mass struck an ordinary person, there would be nothing left but shattered bones beneath meters of snow.
Axel had already displayed strength beyond anything Dalton understood.
Even so, stopping this?
Impossible.
Then something brushed past Dalton's face.
He frowned.
"Wind?"
Another gust followed.
Then another.
Dalton turned.
The air around Axel was changing.
Loose snow began spiraling upward from the ground.
The wind grew steadily stronger, flowing toward him from several directions.
Above them, the dark clouds that had covered the mountain began to split apart.
The accumulated cloud cover was pushed aside.
Sunlight fell across the snow once more.
Normally, after days of bitter weather, the people of Drum Island would have welcomed that sunlight.
Right now, no one noticed it.
Their eyes were fixed on what lay ahead.
The avalanche had reached Axel.
And stopped.
Dalton's eyes widened.
The massive wall of snow hung motionless before the boy.
It looked less like an avalanche now and more like an entire mountainside frozen in midair.
Axel's left hand remained extended.
His fingers were spread slightly.
The pressure of the avalanche pressed toward him.
It moved no farther.
In his right hand, the wooden sword began to move.
The wind gathered around its blade.
Thin streams of compressed air became almost visible, faint green traces twisting along the wooden edge.
Only a few narrow threads at first.
Axel swung.
Whoosh!
The instant those thin currents left the blade, they expanded violently.
The gentle wind became a gale.
The gale became a roaring vortex.
A massive tornado formed directly in front of Axel and tore into the suspended avalanche.
Snow exploded outward.
The tornado swallowed huge sections of the white wall, pulling them apart and scattering them across the mountain.
The sound was deafening.
Even from far away, Dalton and his guards could feel the suction of the wind pulling at their clothes.
One guard stared in disbelief.
"We're supposed to help the Marines arrest that?"
Another immediately shouted,
"Captain, we should leave!"
Before Dalton could respond, another enormous impact came from the opposite side.
BOOM!
Everyone turned.
The section of avalanche facing Garp had disappeared.
So had part of the mountain behind it.
A gigantic hole had been punched straight through the snowy slope.
For a moment, no one spoke.
Then Garp's booming laughter echoed across the mountain.
"Wahahahaha!"
He stood amid shattered snow and rock, completely unconcerned.
"How was that, brat?"
Garp raised his fist proudly.
"That's the power of my Fist of Love!"
Axel stared at him.
Then turned around and began walking away.
Garp's smile disappeared.
A vein bulged on his forehead.
"HEY!"
Axel kept walking.
"I'M NOT DONE TALKING!"
Garp launched himself forward.
His fist crossed the distance in an instant.
Axel turned and raised the wooden sword.
Bang!
The punch struck the blade.
Axel's feet slid slightly through the snow.
"Old man."
His eyes narrowed.
"Don't push your luck."
"Push my luck?"
Garp repeated.
His face darkened.
"Oh, I'm definitely pushing it today!"
He drew back another fist.
"I'm going to teach you exactly how a grandson is supposed to speak to his grandfather!"
Axel sighed.
Then Garp attacked again.
BOOM!
The ground shook.
Axel redirected the strike and countered.
Another explosion followed.
Their fight resumed as though the avalanche had been nothing more than an interruption.
Bang!
Boom!
Crack!
The mountain trembled repeatedly beneath them.
The guards could only watch.
One slowly swallowed.
"Monsters."
Another nodded.
"They're both monsters."
He turned toward Dalton.
"Captain, what do we do?"
"If we leave, the Marines might think we're abandoning them."
"But if we stay here..."
Another tremor shook the slope.
Everyone looked toward the distant battle.
Dalton thought for a moment before answering.
"We stay."
The guards stared at him.
Dalton looked toward the mountain above them.
"The unstable snow is already gone."
"Another avalanche is unlikely."
He glanced toward the route down.
"And right now, trying to leave might put us closer to the battle."
That immediately ended the argument.
The Marines under Hina were also regrouping.
Several soldiers had suffered injuries earlier when Axel reflected their bullets directly back into their own weapons.
Most of the wounds were concentrated around their hands and arms, where rifles had burst apart.
Hina approached Dalton.
"Do you have any medics?"
"Several Marines are injured."
Dalton shook his head.
"No doctors."
Then he signaled his men.
"But our patrol units carry emergency medical supplies."
"They should be enough for basic treatment."
"Bring the medical kits!"
"Yes, Captain!"
The Drum Kingdom guards quickly began treating the injured Marines.
Most wounds were not life-threatening, but several required bandaging and stabilization before the soldiers could safely move.
As the treatment continued, Dalton looked toward the battle.
Axel and Garp had already moved farther away.
Even at that distance, every collision could still be felt beneath his feet.
Dalton finally asked,
"Colonel Hina."
She looked toward him.
"Can the Marines win?"
Hina paused.
The question had never seriously crossed her mind.
Not because the answer was obvious from what she could see.
Quite the opposite.
The battle had moved far beyond anything she could properly judge.
Ordinary Marines could no longer interfere.
Even approaching those two recklessly might only result in getting caught in the aftermath of their attacks.
At this point, they could do little more than wait.
Wait for Axel to be overwhelmed.
Or wait for Garp to create an opening large enough for them to assist.
But there was one thing Hina did not doubt.
"Vice Admiral Garp will not lose."
Dalton blinked.
Then his eyes widened.
"Vice Admiral... Garp?"
Because Dalton had remained outside the main battlefield earlier, he had never gotten a clear look at the older man.
Now everything made sense.
That overwhelming physical strength.
Those fists capable of breaking the mountain.
The ability to stop an avalanche with nothing but brute force.
"The Hero of the Marines..."
Dalton murmured.
"No wonder."
If the man fighting Axel was Monkey D. Garp, then the absurd destruction suddenly seemed almost reasonable.
Almost.
But another thought quickly followed.
Dalton looked toward the white-haired youth fighting him.
Axel was still standing.
Still exchanging attacks.
Still forcing Garp to fight seriously.
Dalton's expression slowly changed.
A four-hundred-million-Berry bounty no longer seemed like enough to describe what he was looking at.
For someone so young to fight the Hero of the Marines on this level...
Just what kind of monster had come to Drum Island?
....
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