"Hmph. Listen well, brat. Tell me exactly how you discovered my secrets and tell me where the weapon is hidden," Crocodile demanded, his tone dropping to a lethal, gravelly growl. He completely ignored Bardock's mockery. "If you fail to satisfy me, all of you will be buried in this desert."
In Crocodile's mind, this crew of rookies had likely stumbled upon some highly classified intelligence through a bizarre Devil Fruit ability or blind luck. As long as he silenced them before the information leaked to the World Government, his master plan would remain secure.
First, he would extract the location of Pluton. Then, he would slaughter them all.
"Crocodile, do you honestly think you've got us cornered?" Bardock sneered, his golden eyes flashing. "You're nothing but a washed-up, dried-out salted fish hiding in a sandbox. Has beating up clueless rookies for a decade actually helped you step out of Whitebeard's shadow?"
Crocodile's arrogant, dismissive attitude deeply annoyed Bardock. 'If you're not going to let me have a good time, I'm going to ruin your day.'
Whitebeard was Crocodile's absolute, undeniable taboo. If Bardock had merely called him a 'salted fish', the Warlord wouldn't have even blinked. But the moment the name 'Whitebeard' left Bardock's mouth, Crocodile's severed left arm began to throb with phantom pain, and a blinding, uncontrollable rage instantly ignited in his chest.
"YOU'RE DEAD! Desert Spada (Crescent Sand Dune)!"
Crocodile's right arm dissolved into a massive, crescent-shaped blade of highly compressed, dehydrated sand. With a vicious sweep of his arm, the blade shot across the dunes, aimed directly at Bardock and his crew.
This specific technique was designed to instantly absorb all moisture from whatever it touched, completely mummifying the victim without killing them immediately. Despite his blinding rage, the Desert Croc retained enough tactical rationality to ensure he kept them alive for interrogation.
"Tsk, tsk, tsk. With a temper that explosive, why didn't you eat the Magma-Magma Fruit?" Bardock casually mocked.
Facing the incoming dehydration blade, Bardock didn't panic. He slowly drew his right arm back and launched a seemingly ordinary punch. However, utilizing the advanced Hasshoken shockwave techniques, a localized, concussive blast erupted from his knuckles.
BOOM!
The invisible shockwave slammed into the crescent blade mid-air, instantly violently dispersing it back into harmless, ordinary grains of sand.
"I see. So you have a bit of physical strength, and now you think you're invincible?" Crocodile sneered, his eyes narrowing. "I bury arrogant rookies exactly like you every single year. Sables (Sandstorm)!"
Seeing his initial attack effortlessly neutralized, Crocodile immediately escalated. He raised his hand, using his Devil Fruit power to conjure a miniature tornado of sand, and hurled it toward Bardock's group.
As the sandstorm traveled across the dunes, it rapidly expanded, its centrifugal force and destructive power growing exponentially with every passing second.
Bardock sighed heavily. This was exactly why fighting Logia users was so incredibly annoying; they could effortlessly spam massive, wide-area destructive attacks without breaking a sweat.
"Everyone, get on the Flying Nimbus and move back to a safe distance. Bonez, focus entirely on protecting them," Bardock ordered, summoning a massive cloud of Nimbus for his crew.
"Understood, Boss." "Be careful, Bardock." "Don't worry about us, Captain! We can take care of ourselves!"
Once Robin, Perona, Chopper, Leo, and Mansherry were safely aboard, Bardock commanded the cloud to rapidly ascend into the sky, completely out of the sandstorm's massive area of effect.
Bardock himself didn't retreat. He instantly shifted into his Beast-Human Monkey King form. Gripping the golden-capped Jingu Bang, he rode the violent wind currents, circling around the massive sandstorm before violently lunging at Crocodile, swinging his staff with bone-crushing force.
Crocodile frowned deeply as he watched the towering Beast-Human approach. 'An Animal-type Devil Fruit user?'
Refusing to back down from a physical clash, Crocodile raised his massive, golden hook to block the incoming staff.
CLANG!
An utterly terrifying, overwhelming force transmitted through the hook. Crocodile's eyes widened in sheer disbelief. He couldn't withstand the kinetic impact at all!
In an instant of pure survival instinct, Crocodile reflexively dissolved his upper body into sand, attempting to negate the physical blow. However, the sheer concussive shockwave of the Haki-infused strike still violently clipped him. When he reformed his body a few meters away, he immediately coughed up a mouthful of blood.
"Armament Haki!" Crocodile spat, his expression twisting into a furious scowl as he wiped the blood from his chin.
How many years had it been since he was last injured in combat?! To think he would actually bleed by the hands of a bratty rookie!
Realizing that this kid was a master of Armament Haki, Crocodile knew he couldn't rely on his Logia intangibility to carelessly ignore physical attacks anymore. And judging by that single clash, the kid's raw physical strength and close-quarters combat skills vastly outclassed his own.
"What happened to all that arrogance, Desert Croc?" Bardock taunted.
Activating Soru, Bardock instantly closed the distance, vanishing into a blur of afterimages. He relentlessly assaulted Crocodile with the Jingu Bang, launching a torrential downpour of heavy strikes from all directions. To the untrained eye, it looked as if multiple Bardocks were attacking simultaneously.
And Bardock wasn't even using his full strength. His staff-wielding skills were still far inferior to his swordsmanship and raw hand-to-hand combat prowess. He was deliberately holding back, genuinely curious to see if Crocodile possessed any Haki.
"Desert la Spada (Desert Adamantine Sword)!"
Desperately trying to parry the overwhelming barrage of Haki-infused blows, Crocodile was quickly pushed to his absolute limit. His strength and technique were severely outmatched. Realizing he was about to be beaten to death, he slammed his hands into the sand, generating four massive, hyper-compressed blades of sand that erupted from the ground and shot toward Bardock.
This was one of Crocodile's ultimate, high-lethality techniques. Right now, he was just using it desperately trying to force Bardock back and buy himself some breathing room.
The destructive power of the Desert la Spada was undeniable. The four massive sand blades effortlessly carved deep, jagged canyons through the desert, extending far into the horizon before finally dissipating.
Unfortunately for Crocodile, sheer destructive power was completely useless if it couldn't hit the target.
The exact millisecond Crocodile formulated the intent to attack, Bardock's Observation Haki predicted it perfectly. He effortlessly side-stepped the erupting sand blades and casually brought the Jingu Bang down hard onto Crocodile's left shoulder.
CRACK!
The sickening sound of shattering bone echoed across the dunes. Crocodile's collarbone was pulverized.
"I'm genuinely disappointed," Bardock sighed, resting the staff on his shoulder. "You really don't know how to use Haki, do you, Crocodile? What the hell have you been doing for the past decade since you ran away from the New World? Playing in a sandbox?"
Bardock had specifically restrained himself to test the Warlord, but he hadn't felt a single flicker of Haki from Crocodile. Based on the Warlord's pathetic reaction time and complete lack of physical durability, it was obvious he was utterly reliant on his Devil Fruit.
"Haki is nothing but a singular form of power!" Crocodile roared, coughing up another mouthful of blood as he clutched his shattered shoulder. "You already know my plan, brat! Once I acquire the Ancient Weapon Pluton, neither you, nor Whitebeard, nor the entire World Government will be able to stand against me!"
Crocodile glared at Bardock with pure, unadulterated hatred. "And who says Devil Fruit abilities are inherently inferior to Haki?! Stop spouting arrogant nonsense! Sables Pesado (Heavy Sandstorm)!"
A massive, hyper-dense, hyper-pressurized sandstorm instantly erupted, dwarfing his previous attack in sheer scale and destructive intensity. Crocodile completely dissolved his physical body, merging seamlessly into the raging vortex.
"Interesting," Bardock murmured, narrowing his eyes as the storm engulfed him. "Combining the localized crushing pressure of the wind with the high-speed slicing power of the sand particles, all while remaining completely intangible and hiding within the storm to launch sneak attacks... You really have pushed the Sand-Sand Fruit to its absolute limit."
Bardock raised his guard. While Crocodile's overall combat stats were pathetic compared to New World standards, his Devil Fruit lethality was still genuinely terrifying. If Bardock was careless and got hit by the dehydration hook or the Desert Prison technique, he would suffer severe damage.
The wind pressure violently intensified. Gripping the incredibly heavy Jingu Bang, Bardock wasn't worried about being blown away. However, the hyper-accelerated sand particles whipping around him were blinding his vision and relentlessly slicing against his skin.
He was forced to coat his entire body in a dense layer of Armament Haki. It was a crude, highly inefficient defensive tactic that drained a massive amount of stamina. He could sustain it for a short burst, but in a drawn-out battle of attrition, his Haki reserves would eventually deplete.
Therefore, he focused his entire mental capacity on his Observation Haki, waiting for the exact microsecond Crocodile materialized to launch a lethal counterattack.
Just like his standard Sables, once Crocodile's Sables Pesado grew past a certain size, it became a self-sustaining natural disaster, completely uncontrollable even by its creator.
Realizing the storm was reaching critical mass, Crocodile allowed the massive vortex to slowly drift away across the desert, while he silently dropped back down to the ground.
"Desert Girasole (Desert Sunflower)!"
The exact moment Bardock's Observation Haki locked onto Crocodile's location, the ground beneath Bardock's feet instantly gave way, transforming into a massive, rapidly churning sinkhole of quicksand.
"Geppo!"
Normally, Bardock could easily use Geppo to run on the air and casually step out of the sinkhole. But today, he was holding the hyper-dense, incredibly heavy Jingu Bang. Even kicking the air with maximum force, the added weight only allowed him to hover clumsily just above the surface of the quicksand, severely restricting his mobility.
"Desert Grande Spada (Desert Great Sword)!"
Seizing the momentary immobility, Crocodile unleashed his fastest, most lethal strike. A massive, singular blade of hyper-compressed sand shot across the ground like a torpedo. Just as it reached Bardock, it violently reared up like a striking cobra, attempting to cleanly bisect the Beast-Human from below.
CLANG!
Bardock accurately brought the Jingu Bang down, perfectly parrying the lethal strike. Utilizing the massive recoil of the impact, he violently kicked off the air, completely launching himself out of the quicksand and landing safely on solid ground.
"IT'S OVER! Desert Encierro (Desert Prison)!"
Crocodile materialized perfectly out of thin air directly behind Bardock. Reaching out with his uninjured right hand, he viciously grabbed the back of Bardock's neck, instantly activating his Devil Fruit's ultimate dehydration ability. He was going to suck every single drop of moisture out of the brat's body!
"Impossible...!" Crocodile gasped in sheer horror.
The Desert Encierro had absolutely zero effect!
Bardock casually turned around, completely unharmed, a terrifying grin spreading across his face.
"You're right," Bardock chuckled softly. "It is over."
Before Crocodile could even process why his dehydration ability had failed against Bardock's absolute full-body Armament Haki coating, Bardock's left hand shot out like lightning, seizing Crocodile's wrist in an unbreakable iron grip.
With his right hand, Bardock raised the golden-capped Jingu Bang high into the air and brought it down with apocalyptic, bone-crushing force.