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"We're only one step away from rewriting history."
Kaecilius stood dead center in front of the massive, sealed gates of the London Sanctum. His eyes, cold and calculating, slowly scanned the ancient architecture. For centuries, this place had stood as one of Earth's ultimate magical strongholds. Breaking in used to be a pipe dream. No matter how many dark rituals he performed or how meticulously he planned in the past, he just didn't have the raw firepower to crack its defenses.
But the rules of the game had changed. The board was completely flipped in his favor.
Behind him stood his secret weapons: an army of modified humans. Each one possessed terrifying Devil Fruit powers that completely defied logic and twisted the laws of nature. On their own, any single one of them was a walking disaster. But together? They were an unstoppable juggernaut designed to flatten anything in their way.
With these brainwashed superhumans leading the charge, tearing through the Sanctum's ancient wards wouldn't take days; it would just take minutes, and without the Ancient One herself there to hold the magical lines together, no Sanctum on Earth stood a chance against an army that could literally bend reality with their bare hands.
Of course, Kaecilius wasn't stupid enough to rely purely on brute force; he liked to play smart.
Before even setting foot in London, he had already set the perfect trap. Using a highly advanced spatial illusion, he had tricked the Sorcerer Supreme, trapping the Ancient One in a tangled maze of fake dimensions. It wouldn't hold her forever, but it would force her to waste precious, irreplaceable time clawing her way back to reality.
By the time she figured out she'd been played and made it back to Earth... the London Sanctum would be nothing but ash and smoking rubble, and his path to ultimate power would finally be clear.
"Begin the purge," Kaecilius said. His voice wasn't loud, but it carried a chilling weight that cut through the chilly London air.
The moment the words left his lips, the brainwashed horde moved. They operated like a single, terrifying machine, weapons drawn, running straight toward the Sanctum's doors without a single shred of fear or doubt.
*Shing! Shing! Shing!*
Then, the sky broke.
The heavy, dark storm clouds hanging over London suddenly split wide open.
Massive pillars of brilliant golden light pierced the gloom, turning the gray afternoon into a blinding artificial daytime. The beams of light tore through the city's thick fog, slamming into the paved streets with a force that made the concrete vibrate under everyone's feet.
The light was so intense, so incredibly pure, that the advancing army came to a grinding halt, shielding their eyes in confusion.
"...That energy..." Kaecilius muttered, narrowing his eyes as he raised his arm against the sudden glare. For the first time since this operation started, the confident smirk vanished from his face, replaced by a sudden, heavy tension.
There was only one person on the planet who made an entrance like this. The man who could literally turn his body into pure light.
The legendary user of the Light-Light Fruit, Manager Rosh.
If The Manager had actually shown up to personally block his path, then this simple raid had just gotten a whole lot more complicated.
To be honest, nobody really knew how strong Rosh actually was. Despite being a living legend whose name was whispered in fear and awe across the globe, he rarely fought in public. Global intelligence agencies and world governments had practically zero reliable data on his actual combat limits.
But Kaecilius didn't need a top-secret file to understand basic math. A Logia-type Devil Fruit that gave someone absolute control over light itself could never be weak. That wasn't just power; that was god-tier status, and in a fight against a god, there was absolutely no room for error.
"Could it be... Rosh? The guy with the Glint-Glint Fruit... the Manager of the storefront?"
Lucian's voice was barely a whisper, completely swallowed up by the heavy silence gripping the courtyard. His knuckles turned stark white as he gripped his Eldritch dagger so hard his hand started to shake, a look of pure, unadulterated panic washing over his face.
He wasn't the only one losing his cool. The other rogue sorcerers didn't need to be told twice. Without waiting for an order from Kaecilius, they instinctively scrambled backward, falling into a tight, layered defensive formation. Every single eye was glued to that towering pillar of golden light, staring at it the way mortals might look at a god descending from the heavens.
No one had attacked yet. Rosh hadn't even released an intimidating aura. But the sheer psychological pressure hanging in the air was suffocating. Just knowing who was inside that light, knowing that this man could literally dissolve his body into billions of laser-sharp photons at will, was enough to make every nerve in their bodies scream at them to run.
*Shing!*
Under dozens of terrified stares, the blinding column of light began to collapse inward.
The endless stream of golden particles swirled together at dizzying speed, rapidly knitting themselves into the shape of a human silhouette. The harsh glow slowly dimmed, finally revealing a young man standing casually in front of the London Sanctum's entrance.
His posture was completely relaxed, and his hands were tucked casually into his pockets. His expression was deadpan, totally unbothered. Looking at him, you'd think he had just taken a casual afternoon stroll through the park rather than dropping out of the sky like a tactical nuke.
Rosh had arrived.
"Kaecilius."
Rosh didn't yell. His voice wasn't even loud. It was remarkably calm, almost conversational. But the moment it cut through the air, the entire courtyard went dead silent. His words carried an undeniable weight that physically demanded everyone's attention.
"You've been going around poaching my premium customers one after another." Rosh's golden eyes shifted, locking directly onto Kaecilius. "Did you honestly think I'd just sit back and watch you ruin my business?"
For a split second, Kaecilius's internal survival instincts went into absolute overdrive. Every alarm bell in his head was ringing at maximum volume. Being on the receiving end of Rosh's stare was a kind of pressure he had never felt before in his entire life. Still, he refused to let his mask slip. He forced his expression to stay cold as ice, maintaining a perfectly poised, unbothered stance.
"No," Kaecilius replied, his voice steady. "Messing with your business was never my goal. Their abilities were simply a necessary sacrifice for my evolution." He paused for a beat, his tone completely flat and devoid of emotion. "If my actions have caused any financial losses to your establishment, you have my sincere apologies."
Rosh's face didn't change. Not even a flicker of emotion passed over his features.
"If you actually want to apologize..." Rosh's voice remained utterly detached, cold as the grave. "...then pay for every single life you took using your own."
A heavy, suffocating silence dropped over the courtyard again.
Kaecilius let out a slow, quiet breath. "A head-on fight with someone of your caliber was the one thing I wanted to avoid today." His eyes hardened, showing absolutely zero intention of backing down. "But if you're going to stand in my way... this operation isn't stopping."
He slowly turned his gaze toward the ten captured Devil Fruit users lined up behind him. The superhumans stood perfectly still, their eyes blank and hollow, waiting for their next order like brainless puppets.
A dark, cruel smirk slowly spread across Kaecilius's face.
"Look, your Manager came all this way to take you home," Kaecilius hissed, his voice suddenly snapping into a sharp, commanding edge. "So why don't you give him the welcome he deserves?"
"Kill him."
The second Kaecilius's command cut through the air, something clicked inside the minds of the ten brainwashed Devil Fruit users.
Any remaining hint of human hesitation vanished from their hollow eyes, replaced instantly by a cold, savage thirst for blood. The safety limiters on their stolen powers were completely ripped away, letting their abilities flood outward at full, dangerous capacity.
*BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!*
The historic streets of London violently shuddered.
Ancient cobblestones ruptured and tore apart as a massive wave of raw pressure exploded from the group. Three of these brainwashed fighters held the powers of Ancient Zoan-type Devil Fruits. In less than a single heartbeat, their bodies began to balloon at a terrifying rate. Bones snapped and stretched, muscles swelled to impossible proportions, and their human features were completely swallowed up by thick, prehistoric scales and dense, heavy flesh.
Within seconds, a colossal, towering Mammoth dominated the battlefield, its wicked tusks gleaming under the dying golden light. Right beside it, two massive Ancient Drakes unleashed deafening, primordial roars, their heavily armored bodies practically vibrating with destructive energy.
Flanking these three giant monsters were three more transformed Zoan users, a vicious, snarling jackal, a raging wild bison, and a sleek jungle cat that blurred with terrifying speed.
Six monstrous beasts. Six different angles.
They launched themselves at Rosh all at once, creating a flawless, inescapable kill zone as they lunged to tear him to pieces.
The sheer momentum of their synchronized charge was enough to make the entire courtyard feel like it was trapped in an earthquake. Even Kaecilius's own loyal followers scrambled backward, desperately trying to get out of the way so they wouldn't be turned into collateral damage by the impending shockwave.
Against that kind of overwhelming, muscle-bound nightmare, any ordinary sorcerer would have panicked. They would have scrambled to open a makeshift sling ring portal, thrown up every magical shield they knew, or dived headfirst into the Mirror Dimension to escape. Trying to stand your ground against a stampede of superpowered monsters wasn't just brave, it was straight-up suicide.
But Rosh?
He didn't even flinch.
His hands stayed casually tucked deep inside his pockets. His face remained totally bored, completely unbothered by the impending doom. He didn't trace a single defensive rune in the air. He didn't try to dodge. He didn't even bother shifting his stance to brace for the impact.
To anyone watching, it was blindingly obvious what Rosh was thinking. To him, these six apocalyptic, bio-engineered monsters weren't a terrifying threat at all. They were just a bunch of noisy stray animals playing in the dirt.
As the massive Mammoth closed the final few meters, its heavy footsteps shaking the ground, Rosh finally made his move.
He lazily lifted his right leg.
Instantly, a swarm of golden photons rushed to his boot, sparking with blinding brilliance as they compressed into a dense, crackling sphere of pure energy. The air around his foot began to warp and tremble under the sheer pressure.
"Light-Speed Kick."
*FLASH!*
His leg completely vanished.
Or rather, it moved so insanely fast that the human brain couldn't even process the motion. A brilliant, laser-sharp line of golden light sliced cleanly across the battlefield.
The kick connected squarely with the center of the Mammoth's massive chest.
*BOOM!!*
The giant prehistoric beast didn't even realize what hit it. One millisecond, it was a multi-ton freight train charging forward with unstoppable momentum; the next, its entire body was launched backward like a plastic toy struck by a semi-truck.
The massive monster shot through the air across the courtyard at a ridiculous, physics-defying speed. It smashed straight through one heavy stone archway, then pulverized another. Chunks of shattered rock exploded everywhere as the Mammoth kept flying, finally cratering into a distant brick wall with an earth-shattering impact.
*CRAAAASH!!*
The sound of the collision echoed blocks away, leaving a massive, smoking crater in the wall and a thick cloud of dust that completely swallowed the area.
The massive Mammoth hit the dirt and didn't so much as twitch.
It was still alive, and its chest rose and fell with a slow, heavy rhythm, but the sheer, concentrated force of that single kick had completely short-circuited its entire nervous system. Before its brain could even process the concept of pain, it was lights out.
Rosh hadn't held back because he lacked the power to finish the job. It was the exact opposite. He had dialed his strength back with surgical precision.
Thanks to his Observation Haki, he could see right through the thick mental fog clouding their minds. These weren't willing soldiers; they were brainwashed victims, and more importantly to his bottom line? They were his premium customers. Rosh wasn't about to go around killing off his own clientele.
His goal here was simple: Disable them, recover them, then bring them home in one piece.
"W-What?!"
"No way... That's impossible!"
For the first time since the raid began, Kaecilius and his rogue sorcerers completely lost their cool. Their jaws dropped, their eyes wide with pure disbelief as they stared at the smoking crater.
They had already ranked Rosh as one of the most dangerous people on the planet, but what they had just witnessed completely broke the scale. An Ancient Zoan user, famous for having an ironclad defense and ungodly durability, had just been turned into a lawn ornament by one casual kick. No epic showdown. No trading blows back and forth. Just a lazy flick of a leg while the guy kept his hands shoved firmly in his pockets.
The sheer gap in power shattered every single calculation Kaecilius had painstakingly made before setting foot in London.
Before the remaining five transformed users could even process that their biggest tank had just been one-shotted, they crossed right into Rosh's strike zone.
Rosh didn't even blink. He just casually flicked his wrist.
Instantly, five tiny, brilliant spheres of golden light materialized in the air in front of him.
One. Two. Three. Four. Five.
Each little orb glowed like a miniature sun, humming quietly with an unsettling, dense amount of energy. Without another movement, the glowing spheres shot forward.
*SHUNG! SHUNG! SHUNG!*
Five golden streaks sliced cleanly through the dust-filled air. The projectiles curved with terrifying accuracy, locking onto their targets like heat-seeking missiles with a mind of their own. There was nowhere to run, and definitely nowhere to hide.
*BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!*
Five explosions rocked the courtyard at the exact same time. The charging beasts were blasted square in the chest before they could even get within arm's reach of Rosh. The massive release of photon energy lifted them clean off their feet. Just like the Mammoth before them, the jackal, the wild bison, the jungle cat, and the two Ancient Drakes went airborne, their enormous bodies tumbling over the shattered cobblestones before crashing hard into the dirt one after another.
Then came a dead, heavy silence.
Not a single one of them could get back up. In a matter of seconds, an entire squad of superhumans had been completely neutralized.
Through it all, Rosh stood exactly where he had started. His clothes weren't even wrinkled, his breathing hadn't picked up, and his hands hadn't left his pockets for a single second.
*Swish!*
A faint, almost imperceptible ripple stirred the air right behind his left shoulder. It was a disturbance so subtle that even a master sorcerer would have missed it. But hidden inside that tiny tear in space was a razor-sharp Vibranium blade, driving forward with lethal, silent precision.
The target? Rosh's heart.
The man holding the blade was Frank Castle. Even with his mind completely enslaved by Kaecilius, the Punisher's terrifying instincts as a veteran soldier hadn't faded one bit. He hadn't blindly charged in with the rest of the monstrous horde. Instead, he had stayed back, patiently blending into the shadows, waiting for the exact millisecond Rosh finished his attack.
Against anyone else, that tiny transition window between moves would have been the ultimate opening for a fatal blow. It was a flawless, textbook ambush.
Too bad for Frank, he wasn't fighting a normal human. He was dealing with a man who had long since broken the laws of reality, a walking, talking exception to the rules of common sense.
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Next Chapter: Light Cannot Be Escaped
Next Next Chapter: Ancient One Comes Knocking
Next Next Next Chapter: The Ancient One is No Longer a Threat
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