One Piece: Path to Power

Chapter 37: [37] Encephala Island (II)

[2030 words]

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[Chamber of Gathering]

"Ma-Ma-Mam-Ma!"

Charlotte Linlin dwarfed the Overlord as she gazed at the mayhem below. 

"That brat Kaido, he's just as crazy as always…" She then zoomed in on the young pirate leading the charge, "So that's the new monstrous rookie everyone's talking about."

Enigma stood still, his face void of expressions, watching with loose interest. 

The Queen, on the other side, slowly walked up to her King. 

The Overlord shook his head. His stern face switched to a more interesting one. 

"Huhuhu," he laughed. "Let them come to us, I want to see the faces of these brazen youths myself."

…

[Below]

Damien and the party had already broken into the Citadel. They were now standing in front of a half dozen solid steel doors, thick as a warship's hull. 

Kaido didn't even pause and continued to run. 

Bam!

He shoulder-charged into the iron gate, his bulky frame rammed straight through! He didn't stop and reached the second gate… then the third…

Bam!

Boom!

*Shatter* 

It took a half minute before each door was left with an ogre-shaped hole, permitting Damien and Indra to easily walk through. 

"These top pirates have a thing for stairs," Damien muttered. 

The spiral staircase leading to the top was unnecessarily long, much like the one at Skull Rock. 

Damien tightened his calf muscles and leaped into the air. 

His foot, oddly enough, stepped down into thin air, as if attempting to take a step…

*Pop* The air let out a hollow pop as Damien began to take steps further and further up. 

Kaido saw Damien utilize Moonwalk and jumped up as well. 

Though he could not use Rokushiki, instead, he just went from one side of the staircase to another, leaping to and from, destroying everything in the process.

Indra slashed down his sword every so often, giving himself a boost of air to essentially fly up.

And just like that, they came to the final door leading to the true enemy.

Thud!

The door was ripped off its hinges by Kaido's massive hands, allowing Damien to see the enemies within. 

He first saw the Overlord, his face matching that of his bounty poster. 

Surrounding him was his Queen and both Bishops, yet there was another striking person inside.

'Charlotte Linlin is here too?' he thought with a solemn look.

Big Mom? More like Thick Mom! Or so a horny teenager might say. 

Kaido was also caught off guard as he gawked.

"Linlin!?"

Damien glanced at the giant beside him, recalling Kaido and Big Mom's love-hate relationship. 

The woman in question just grinned by the side, giving way for the real man of the room to speak. 

"Huhuhuhu, how impressive you are. Not even the Marines made it this far. You have my gratitude for bringing me such excitement," Enigma said as he raised his wine glass with a smile.

Such words earned a smirk from the lead pirate.

"Rahaha! I hope you enjoyed your final drink, Enigma."

The words were an alert to the forces of both sides. Indra tightened the grip on his sword, Kaido, his club. 

Enigma's top pieces also readied their weapons, awaiting their King's response. 

"How fierce you are, Sin Incarnate," the Overlord complimented. "I would rather not sully my treasured Citadel but it seems like I will not have such a choice."

*Crack*

The wine glass in his hands shattered into tens of pieces at the Overlord's words. Enigma glared at the pirates and expressionlessly uttered, "I want them alive."

At the drop of the last word was the united launch of the three top pieces. 

The two Bishops zoomed in ahead, their swords inches from cutting Damien's head off. 

Damien glanced at the coming duo and softly uttered, "Indra."

Clang!

As if a call to action, a sharp white slash flew from the side and onto the Bishops, forcing them to retreat a few steps. 

Indra walked in front of them, his purple blade gleaming dangerously. 

Boom!

On the side was another explosion. 

A thick, black club rocketed at the rather lithe figure of the Queen.

Kaido rammed his mighty weapon in a combination of tens of attacks, yet none met their mark, much to his chagrin.

"Where are you aiming, beast?"

Kaido just gave out a hearty laugh, his weapon crackling with arcs of purple lightning. 

…

"And here I thought you were going to come at me together," Enigma said with a tinge of curiosity in his tone. 

The contrast was strong. 

rookie pirate vs veteran pirate. 

The taller Damien fearlessly peered locked onto the Overlord, his eyes burning with a strong fire. Not so much for glory, but rather to test himself from the months of training; finally to go one-on-one with his first true enemy. 

Enigma scoffed at the ambitious gaze of the impertinent pirate before him. His eyes soon squinted alongside a deep exhale.

"!!!"

Damien's eyes widened and flashed with a quick, red gleam. His body moved subconsciously as if readying for a certain problem.

Boom!

A quick ripple echoed through the confines of the chamber as the air screamed around the young pirate. 

Damien, in return, exercised his Conqueror's Haki to the maximum, not to intimidate, but rather in defense. His actions yielded fruit as he soon felt a different form of weight fall upon him, followed by Enigma's lax voice.

.

"Might of Atlas."

.

The attack came in the form of an orange pulse and onto Damien.

"Ugh!" he felt a sharp pain in his mind. 

His brain was pulsating, expanding and scratching the skull. Damien's hands grasped the top of his head, his teeth gritted.

'Such weight…!'

Yet he stood tall, his Haki doing everything it could to diffuse the attack and regain clarity of his own mind.

.

The previous flare of Observation Haki didn't escape either Enigma or Big Mom's eyes.

"It seems you saw a dark future to explode such an unyielding spirit," the Overlord commented.

Damien calmed his beating brain, deeply exhaling.

"I was told only Supreme Kings can fight against you, I see why that is now."

Enigma just gave a small chuckle, "It seems the Black Death of the Rocks Pirates has quite the chain of information."

Damien wasted no time and reached out.

.

"Utter Ruin."

.

A powerful stream of raging red energy soon burst out from the palm of his hand. Spinning in a wide radius, dwarfing the Overlord.

Enigma leaned in, his eyes gazing at the attack.

.

"Lost Words: Barrier."

.

An odd sight occurred.

The air in front of the coming attack began to glow orange. 

They turned into wisps of energy, coming together to draw up ancient symbols and letters, bundling up into a shield-like structure.

Bam!

The crimson torrent of pulverizing energy crashed on the barrier. A powerful shockwave emanated from the collision, eventually causing Damien's attack to fall apart.

Enigma then tapped his forehead with his index and middle finger and swiped across the air.

.

"Lost Words: Onslaught."

.

A similar case of the air warping into ancient symbols recurred as, instead of defending, they shot out like cannonballs.

Damien saw the attack coming; his eyes once again pulsed red.

*Fwoo!*

The air shuddered as the young pirate whizzed through the air. 

Boom!

Before a symbol could land at his position, he was already gone.

It was rather uncanny.

Damien flickered through the air maintaining a stoic face. Though his heart was shaken, 'I can't block any of his attacks with my defense, they would go right through and attack my mind!'

The only alternative was to dodge, much to Enigma's chagrin.

.

"Fury of Atlas."

.

A heavier, more overwhelming coercion fell upon the young pirate, this time beyond his ability to see in time. 

"Damn!" he cursed. Damien's eyes scrunched up from the pain, a pain his durable body made no difference to have. The stinging feeling of having your brain pushing on the nerves of the spinal cord.

After all, the brain had no pain receptors, but the array of nerves linking to his spine was a location of great stimulation.

*Pop*

A few blood vessels within the young pirate's head couldn't help but pop like a water pipe, creating visible red blotches to appear under Damien's skin. 

The Haki poured out in surges, but it didn't amount to a strong enough defense. 

"Your Will is strong, but not enough," Enigma mocked, still standing without any damage. Naturally, he wouldn't wait around while Damien was locked down and immobile. 

.

"Lost Words: Onslaught."

.

The familiar orange marks reappeared before the Overlord as he shot out like a cannon. 

Bang!

The symbols went right through Damien's skin and were absorbed into his nerves. 

The nerves were sharply stimulated and buzzed with electricity as they overloaded the young pirate's sanity. Damien couldn't help but fall to a knee, his hands grasping his pulsating head. 

…

[Nearby]

Clang!

A single, dark-coloured blade met a thick axe, letting out a roar. 

The swordsman simultaneously jumped in the air while keeping pressure on the axe-bearer. He jumped just in time to dodge an enemy that had slashed down at where Indra was, missing entirely. 

The dark-skinned pirate swung his foot in an arc, crashing it onto the attacker. 

Bam!

The kick sent the man a dozen meters back, all the while holding off the axe-user. 

Indra wasted no time, utilizing the axe-using Bishop's massive weight to parry him into the direction of his colleague. 

The two Bishops crashed into one another, leaving an opening for Indra to exploit. With a single leap, the swordsman appeared in the air, his blade swimming with Armament Haki.

.

"One Sword Style: Evil Befall!"

.

A powerful slash fell upon Enigma's Bishops.

The slash quickly transformed into the figure of a large bird spanning its wings that dwarfed the two. 

Boom!

A wide ravine spanned out through the top of the tower, reflecting itself on the sides too. 

*Pop!*

The tip of the tower was cut apart from the base and separated into the sky. The warm sun fell upon the Chamber as the skies opened up. 

.

One Sword Style: Beautiful Death."

.

A second attack, this time in the glorious form of a peacock, rushed out into the cloud of dust, slamming into the general area where the Bishops were. 

Indra was merciless, he did not believe in giving his opponents even a second to recover; he would much rather overwhelm them with incessant bombardment. 

And it worked.

Two shadows fell to the earth below, their bodies cut apart. 

"The quality of his subordinates is quite subpar," Indra muttered.

He then glanced to the side and saw a more menacing figure: a giant woman with four of her kids at her side. 

Shing!

Kyoran was quickly wrapped in Haki once more, reflecting the same sharpness as seen in Indra's eyes.

"Ma-Ma-Mam-Ma! Don't be so jittery, I won't join in."

She then examined the swordsman with his blade sharply drawn in her direction. "You're under that crazy rookie? He has a good eye for talent."

Indra, instead of replying, was forced to turn his attention elsewhere. 

His eyes locked on the tens of thousands of Mindless Ones rushing into the tower.

They came as a wave of chaos, raging through the staircase. Kaido's ascent had left the stairs in ruin so the Mindless Ones chose the next best option: climbing on one another to scale the cleaved tower.

'It won't be long before they arrive,' Indra calculated. He gave one final glance at Big Mom and sprang to action.

The woman glared intensely at his departing figure, somewhat surprised.

'Was he seriously going to fight me if I wanted to join in too? How can someone have such fierce loyalty?' She thought. 

Linlin cackled to herself at the turn of events. 

A curious tone rang out next to her, "Mama, shouldn't we help the rookie since he's under the same crew?"

Linlin looked at her prized son Katakuri and then gazed at the fights with a playful smile. "Watch closely Katakuri," she instructed. "That Damien's eyes can see far more than you think."

"Maybe you can learn a thing or two…"

To Be Continued…

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