A Joke
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One Piece: Desperate
🕑 Added 2021-08-23 14:48:04 +0000 UTCChapter 85: Red String of Fate
***
The battle between Big Mom and me lasted for hours. Negan, with Raynare’s help had been able to keep anyone from Big Mom’s crew interfering in our battle. Which meant quite a lot, because the fight with this monster was hanging by a thread.
We were both covered in injuries, and Big Mom had slightly more injuries than me. But after fighting like this for hours, my body though couldn’t handle this power for much longer. My bones creaked and the only reason I hadn’t fallen was that the old hag had gotten weaker too. Her body had thinned and she had become faster, but more feeble. Unlike me though she could probably keep going for days.
Once again, I can feel it. This time, for the first ten minutes of the fight I was dominating, inflicting the most injuries in this fight during those ten minutes. Though due to the high energy demand my Emperor Form continued to weaken more and more each second. I had long since gone past my limit and didn’t like to even think just how recked my body will be after this. It’s gonna suck.
“Ready to give up little bear?” Big Mom said, breathing heavily while insulting me, but she still had a smirk on her face. “Bear D. Max, I will remember that name.”
“Yeah, if you forgot it then it would be worrying for early signs of dementia. Meaning that you are beyond old, old hag, have you seen that ugly face and those wrinkles?” insults flew out of my mouth as if I was Negan. But I was desperate for her to show an opening in anger, it would make this fight easier if she lost an arm or a leg.
Her face morphed into anger again, something that had been happening a lot during this fight. But this time I could sense due to Observation Haki that she wasn’t really mad. While I hadn’t developed future sight yet, I gained the ability to tell people’s feelings. This was kinda useful as every time she was really angry would be a signal for me to attack because anger made people sloppy.
Unlike usual, Big Mom wasn’t in a fight where she could afford to get angry or have the leisure to let my attacks land on her. Because we were equals as long as I stayed in this form, meaning that the one amongst us who was the most careless would lose and very bad too. Neither of us was willing to let the other life once we got a chance to attack, giving freebies wasn’t something we could afford. Well, we could but that would increase the chance of death exponentially.
“You sure you aren’t related to that fish somehow?” Asked Big Mom, implying that I was similar to Kaido.
“No, not really, I don’t like drinking, nor am I suicidal,” after clarifying that, my ax and her sword clashed dozens of times in a second.
Big Mom was known for her raw power. But her swordsmanship, mastery over her Devil Fruit and Haki wasn’t anything to joke about either. A Yonko wasn’t someone who just got born lucky to be strong.
“But you seem pretty suicidal, coming to fight me out of nowhere,” big mom smiled confidently. “I have also noticed that you have grown weaker, how long do you think you can keep up this form?”
She is smarter than she looks. Having figured this out, she will at least drag on the fight till my transformation ends. Yeah, it would be the end for me, and Reiju didn’t have any poison that would work against Big Mom. So the situation wasn’t to my advantage at all, but…
Suddenly my vision changed, instead of seeing my world through my eyes, everything changed. There were strings and some of them were red, instinctively knew that those were attacks.
Seeing a crimson red string slash across my shoulder and cutting off my arm, I got out of the way.
Fwish!
Suddenly I came to my senses and saw Big Mom slash at where the red string would have passed through my body and cut off my arm.
She narrowed her eyes. “So you are like Katakuri too?”
No, it was different… or was it? I saw the future, that was undeniable. Big Mom’s attack had become visible before her hit had even landed on me. Huh… I will think about this later. Right now I just need to remember that feeling and not forget it.
Suddenly, as Big Mom charred me I saw the strings again, this time the red string at where the attack would hit was so crimson that it seemed to be black.
[Ikoku Soverginity]
BOOOOOOM!
At such point-blank range, it would hurt me once it hit, I could try blocking it, but my physical strength had deteriorated unlike the start of the fight. I wasn’t confident in getting out of the attack uninjured… wait… this hasn’t happened yet.
I move out of the way and the attack goes past me.
[Ikoku Soverginity]
BOOOOOOM!
This time it happened in real life, but I had already started moving and was out of the way of her attack. While her attack was at where it would have hit me. I attacked her and saw an opening.
<Launching Shock>
A slash of air shit through Big Mom and didn’t seem to hurt her until blood came out of her mouth. Again, she charged at me and our weapons clashed without touching, but immediately I dropped my ax, knowing that I couldn’t overpower her physically any longer.
I then lined my fists towards her stomach.
<Six Emperor Guns>
FWOOOM!!
A blast went through her organs and Big mom’s eyes widened in pain. Unlike what we have fought for the last hours, suddenly my attack sequence changed and from a raw physical fighter into a technique one. This had taken her by surprise, and I won’t give her enough time to adapt.
I grabbed her by the face, my claws digging into her face, drawing blood. I moved behind her and pushed the back of her head toward my knee.
BAAAAM!!
Her skull made a strange sound, her defenses didn’t matter this time as I directly had attacked her brain by a shockwave.
Big Mom extended hands to grab me, knowing that if she grabbed me now, I would be unable to get out of her grasp. Plus I no longer had a weapon to cut her fingers.
<Kamisori>
But she was too slow and I was in front, right her heart should be and I lined my fists in the middle of that area.
<Six Emperor Gun>
Her body stood still for a moment. I turned around and started moving toward her ship, having seen the outcome.
Big Mom’s body fell on her cloud. Prometheus took a deep breath, ready to blow fire at me, but I just turned around and looked at him. “Try it and I will kill you,” my words stopped him in his tracks.
“Mama! Wake up!” yelled out Zeus, tears coming out of his eyes.
As I charged towards Big Mom’s children, I don’t know why... Was it because my adrenaline stopped or what? But my body suddenly got by an unbearable sense of weakness, my claws retracted back, the fur slowly disappeared and my muscles got smaller.
Damn it… my Emperor Time had ended… how unlucky, I was so close to victory…
Suddenly, it felt like I didn’t even have the energy to move. An overwhelming sense of fatigue hit me like I hadn’t slept for a month.
Just like so, my body started plummeting towards the water.
***
A/N: Max’s change in fighting style took Big Mom by surprise and made her unable to counter him till she got used to it… which Max didn’t allow her to adjust. Think of it like Mike Tyson going from his usual cannon punches to fighting like Muhammed Ali. Yeah, that would confuse anyone.
P.S: I doubt I need to explain this, but Muhamed Ali and Mike Tyson are real-world legendary boxers. Muhammad Ali was known for his footwork.
Also:
Six Emperor Guns - is a similar attack to Lucci's Six King Guns, using the peak of the Rokushiki Techniques. Though Max this time combined with his monstrous physical power and advanced form of Conquerors Haki.
