Garp's fists hammered the sea over and over, and the wild recoil forced the ships to bounce violently across the surging waves.
The journey that should have taken them until noon the next day had been brutally cut down by more than half thanks to this absurd physical acceleration.
Now, the fleet had finally officially entered Totto Land's waters.
"BOSS!"
Shanks' crew clung desperately to anything fixed in place as they shouted toward their captain.
"VICE ADMIRAL GARP!"
The Marines also cried out with all their strength toward Garp, who was still punching furiously up ahead.
"WE CAN'T HOLD ON ANYMORE… URGH!"
These sailors had lived on the sea for years and were long used to the normal rocking of wind and waves.
But this kind of high-frequency, wide-range violent shaking had gone on for half a day.
Even battle-hardened men could barely endure it.
Hearing the waves of groans and shouts behind him, Garp finally stopped swinging his fists.
His hands were still hissing with white steam from the high-speed friction against the air, and the force in his knuckles had yet to fully fade.
He looked down at the chaotic deck.
Even the Marines who had undergone strict training were now sprawled all over the place, vomiting across large patches of the floor.
Garp raised his eyes toward the Red Force ahead and shouted at Red-Haired Shanks,
"HEY, RED-HAIR! HOW MUCH LONGER UNTIL WE REACH LINLIN'S TERRITORY?"
Shanks braced himself with one hand, quickly sweeping his gaze over his pale, unsteady crew.
Then he shouted back toward Garp,
"WE'VE ALREADY ENTERED TOTTO LAND'S RANGE. BASED ON THE CURRENT CURRENTS AND WIND SPEED… EVEN WITH YOUR HELP, IT'LL STILL TAKE US ANOTHER HOUR TO REACH WHOLE CAKE ISLAND."
"One hour? Too slow!"
Garp irritably grabbed at his hair.
He stared at the warship beneath his feet and understood.
Dragging two ships forward at once was still too slow in the end.
After all, he had come here for Cain.
This was entirely a private matter, and the Marines on his ship had no reason to follow him into danger.
So Garp immediately turned to his adjutant, Bogard, and gave a low order.
"Bogard, take the men and wait here! This is this old man's personal business. You all stay here and wait for me to come back!"
Just as Bogard was about to accept the order, Shanks' Observation Haki suddenly caught an incredibly terrifying burst of energy.
He immediately shouted sharply at the entire crew.
"QUICK! EVERYONE, BRACE YOURSELVES! GRAB ANYTHING FIXED DOWN AND PROTECT THE WHOLE SHIP WITH HAKI!"
He suddenly turned his head toward Garp, his face exaggerated to the extreme as he shouted.
"HEY! GARP-SAN, WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?!"
"Giving you a little speed boost, of course!"
A sharp red light flashed in Garp's eyes.
The muscles across his entire body instantly tightened and bulged, releasing a suffocating pressure.
He threw a punch straight down at the sea beneath his feet, and a terrifying shockwave exploded outward, blasting the Red Force into the air and completely lifting it off the water.
Immediately afterward, Garp leapt up.
In midair, he accurately grabbed the anchor chain hanging from the side of the Red Force, then stomped heavily back down onto the deck of his own warship.
"STOP! THE ANCHOR WON'T HOLD!"
Shanks clearly felt the ship shaking violently and hurriedly shouted to stop him.
"RELAX. THIS OLD MAN KNOWS WHAT HE'S DOING. THE CHAIN'S ALREADY BEEN REINFORCED WITH HAKI. IT DEFINITELY WON'T BREAK!"
Garp laughed wildly and wrapped the huge metal chain around his shoulders and waist in several loops.
With monster-like explosive strength, he swung both arms furiously, making the entire Red Force spin rapidly through the sky.
Then his waist and abdomen suddenly exerted force, and he hurled the whole ship hard in the direction of Whole Cake Island.
"Fist Bone: Meteor!"
The Red Force instantly turned into an afterimage and vanished beyond the horizon, leaving only a straight, blinding white trail of airflow across the sky.
Garp was dragged hard by the chain, his body stretched completely straight in midair as he slid forward at high speed behind the ship.
Meanwhile, the Marine warship he had originally been standing on was forced backward several hundred meters by the massive recoil, and the towering waves it raised nearly flipped the entire deck over.
Fortunately, these Marines had sailed with Garp for years and were experienced enough. T
hey quickly stabilized the ship and adjusted its direction again.
Garp, flying through the air, looked incredibly proud and laughed heartily.
Watching the islands ahead rapidly enlarge and flash past, he shouted toward Red-Haired Shanks,
"BWAHAHAHA! SEE? THIS IS MUCH FASTER!"
The mast of the Red Force groaned under the violent wind pressure, sounding as if it might give way at any moment.
Luckily, the sails had already been pulled in earlier, and with everyone desperately reinforcing the ship with Haki, it did not snap.
The crew continuously released Haki while digging their fingers into the cracks in the deck, terrified that the wind would throw them straight off the ship.
Shanks gripped the railing tightly and looked back at Garp, who was laughing freely behind them.
His eyes were filled with helplessness, yet the corner of the mouth curved into a faint, warm smile despite himself.
That way of doing things, without thinking about the consequences and focusing only on the result, instantly made him think of his former captain, Roger.
All he could say was that this truly was the old rival who had chased his captain for a lifetime.
Or perhaps, as expected of Luffy's grandfather.
…
As their bubbles surfaced from the sea and burst, Blackbeard and his crew emerged from the water.
"Hah… hah… finally made it out!"
Blackbeard lay across Burgess' back, gasping for breath.
"Captain, wasn't that thing the whole target of this operation?! You just handed it over so easily?!"
Burgess swam while turning back to ask Blackbeard in confusion.
Earlier, he had stayed behind on the ship to guard it, so he did not know Blackbeard had prepared backups.
"Zehahaha! Don't worry so much, Burgess! You think I'd do anything without a backup plan? Look."
Blackbeard balanced himself on Burgess' back while pulling two folded sheets of paper from his clothes.
"To be absolutely safe, I prepared three whole copies. I still have two left now. Even if another accident happens, we have a way to deal with it."
As he spoke, Blackbeard turned his head toward Shiryu, who was swimming nearby, and his tone carried a hint of approval.
"Thanks to the paper and ink you prepared, even seawater won't make them smudge."
Then he turned back and ordered Burgess,
"Swim faster, Burgess. The impact from Kaido and that brat Cain falling from the sky just now threw us all the way into this sea. I don't even know where we are. In any case, find an island first, get a ship, and leave this place as soon as possible…"
"For some reason, that bad feeling I had earlier still hasn't completely gone away."
"Hey, hey, Captain, don't tell me you're scared again?"
Burgess paddled hard while speaking without a care.
"We're in the middle of the sea now. Look around—there isn't even half an island in sight…"
"Besides, we just came up from underwater. As long as those two guys down below don't attack in our direction, we're perfectly safe. What danger could there possibly be…?!"
"What, is an enemy going to fall out of the sky?"
The moment Burgess finished speaking, a deafening roar suddenly came from the horizon.
Blackbeard and his crew instantly froze and looked up together.
A ship was tearing through the air with terrifying momentum, plummeting straight toward their location!