Chapter 45: Bright Night (III)

As Van Augur's body hit the ground, a sharp pain surged through me as another blood vessel burst inside. The intensity of my attack had not only decimated Augur but also leveled multiple buildings behind him from the shockwave alone. I hadn't held back even slightly—if I was going to kill, I'd make sure my target was genuinely dead. I'd watched Luffy claw back from the brink of death far too many times to risk leaving my enemies even a sliver of life.

The remaining two Blackbeard pirates, Burgess and Doc Q, stared at me with visible shock, horror flickering in their eyes. The death of a comrade was an agony I understood well. It was the reason I had gone through great lengths to hide my origins. Not even Law knew where I was born; to everyone, I was simply Zephyr, a pirate from the North Blue, no last name. My father wasn't naive. He knew that if I became powerful, then people would try to harm my family. So, he had made a deal with the local coroner to forge my death certificate. Zephyr Rowan from Minion Island, North Blue, officially died at the age of sixteen from leukemia. Later, Phantom Blade Zephyr, a pirate from the North Blue, had also "died," slain by Rear Admiral Vergo. In many ways, I was already a dead man twice over.

Faking my death has kind of become a thing for me.

My thoughts were interrupted as another blood vessel popped inside my body. I've been trying to find a pattern on how much time it takes between two eruptions. But therein lies the problem. There was no pattern. The eruptions were random. If there was a pattern, I could've calculated my attacks using that. The absence of pattern was deeply concerning for me.

I'm just a human after all. If given the chance, even a small knife can kill me. That is why I targeted Augur right now. One stray bullet, one second's distraction, and it would've been the end of me.

But now the sniper was gone. I turned my attention to the brawler and the doctor.

Burgess charged at me, anger and hate burning in his eyes. His fist was coated in armament haki. Any other time, and I would've tried fighting against him using only my fists. He would've been a great training dummy. After all, I was pitifully weak without my sword. I had the raw strength and speed, of course. But raw strength is totally useless without proper technique.

Alas, I needed to finish it quickly. So, as he charged at me, I took a familiar stance—a stance that had even shaken this world's main protagonist.

Swordsmanship of the Giants, Only Form: Titan's Impact

My muscles contracted as if preparing to burst, my bones hardened, and my arteries surged with oxygen. In an instant, my body partially transformed, drawing upon the power of a giant—the mightiest race in this world. My sword sliced through the air as if it were tearing the sky itself.

I didn't look at Burgess; I didn't need to. This was an attack that took two full-blown giants to properly defend against. In front of those two, Burgess was practically nothing.

As my sword came down, hitting nothing but empty air, the world itself seemed to stop. Then the sound of a massive explosion went through the air as everything within a fifty-meter radius was obliterated into nothing. I stood in the center of a massive crater, chunks of flesh and blood raining down around me. I tasted blood in my mouth, but it wasn't mine—it was Burgess's, mixed with perhaps some of Augur's, whose body had been near when I unleashed Titan's Impact.

I was speechless, seeing my own power. I have used 'Titan's Impact' before, but most of the time I practiced on dinosaurs. But it was different this time. I had just seen a human burst into countless pieces of flesh with just a single swing of my sword. He had no hopes of surviving it; he didn't even have time to think about his death. One moment he was a real person, with real hopes and ambition; in the next, he was nothing but chunks of flesh and blood.

It was frightening, but at the same time it was also amazing. And I used this technique with the Straw Hats. I couldn't help but wonder—what if Dorry and Broggy hadn't intervened when I used this technique with the Straw Hats? Would they have ended up like Burgess? I shivered at the thought. Yes, better not to think about it right now. I can't change the past. But I needed to properly assess my surroundings in the future. This attack had a wide range AoE. There were just way too many possibilities of collateral damage.

As I looked at the half-dead sword in front of me, I thought to myself,

"If I'm this strong now, with this crappy sword, how strong would I be when I'm at the end of my journey? How strong would I be when I have a Supreme Grade Blade in my hand?"

I didn't know. But I felt my heart fill with anticipation. The fear of my own strength was still there, but the weight of my ambition was nothing in front of it. My lips curled upward as I thought about the future.

Yet, my brief moment of reflection was cut short. There was still one more loose end to tie up.

I jumped out of the crater that I had created without much problem. Doc Q was now sitting on the ground while leaning against his scythe. His face contained way too many emotions for me to decipher properly. His shoulder was now also bleeding. It seems that whatever drugs he used to stop the bleeding had lost their effectiveness.

He looked utterly pitiful as I slowly walked towards him. I didn't need to be a therapist to know that the man in front of me had lost his will to live.

Doc Q spoke slowly,

"You... you're a monster, aren't you? There isn't a single scratch on you. If I hadn't used my pollen, you'd have killed us all without breaking a sweat, wouldn't you?"

"Yes," I replied coldly. "This fight was never about whether I could kill you or not. It was about how much strength I needed to use. You forced me to dig a little deeper; I'll give you that. But the moment you came within range of my sword, your fates were sealed."

As I came to stand directly in front of him, a bitter laugh escaped his lips. "You almost look like the Grim Reaper."

"Yeah, all I'm missing is the scythe," I answered, tone half-joking.

"Joking before you're about to kill someone. Guess you'd fit right in with the Blackbeard Pirates." His face turned somber. "Are you planning to go after my captain after you've killed me?"

"Yes. While I know that Ace is strong, I still don't think he's strong enough to defeat Blackbeard yet. He might stand a chance if I'm there with him."

Doc Q smiled faintly, as if my answer had confirmed something he already knew. "Our captain... he's a great man. He'll change this rotten world. So my life doesn't really matter."

His words faded as Doc Q picked up a small knife with his only hand. Before I could react, he drove it into his own heart, his eyes filling with a strange mixture of pride and satisfaction.

"Blackbeard will be the King of the Pirates," he declared, a fanatical smile breaking across his face.

All my senses flared with an awful premonition as I took every defensive maneuver that I could use. I was already moving to get away from that man, to get away from the explosion that I knew was coming. But this time I wasn't fast enough.

A blinding explosion thundered behind me as my vision turned black.