Mihawk swiftly evaded, narrowly avoiding the fatal strike.
The terrifying slash howled past him into the distance until—a thunderous crash echoed moments later.
A distant, cloud-piercing mountain peak was cleanly severed at its midsection, collapsing into a massive avalanche of rubble.
"Truly demonic strength," Bullet muttered, shrugging his massive shoulders with lingering fear.
Had Raleigh's earlier punch back in Alabasta been meant to kill him, Bullet doubted his Haki-enhanced iron armor could have withstood such an attack.
He likely would have been bisected just like that mountain.
"Rokushiki: Soru."
Raleigh's flawless use of the Navy's high-speed movement, passively amplified by the Typhoon Fruit's wind-speed enhancement, made his movements nearly lightspeed.
Even Mihawk's legendary hawk-like vision couldn't track him in time.
Relying purely on his supreme combat instinct, Mihawk violently raised the Black Blade Yoru overhead to block Raleigh's descending, bisecting strike.
CLANG!
Mikazuki Munechika slammed against the Black Blade's edge.
The sheer, astronomical physical impact forced Mihawk down to one knee, the cobblestone beneath him instantly shattering under Raleigh's overwhelming pressure.
"How terrifying," Raleigh remarked with exaggerated theatrics, though his eyes retained a glacial, unforgiving killing intent.
"I almost got sliced in half back there."
Mihawk's eyes showed absolutely no concern for his own life.
He took a deep breath and forced his legs to stand up again, pushing back against Raleigh's crushing power.
"I hate disobedient, arrogant bastards the most. For pirates like you, I prefer to break your bones so you can never stand again," Raleigh said with a ferocious, dark expression.
Mihawk's gaze showed no fear as he stared directly into Raleigh's eyes.
"You can try."
BOOM!
The Haki aura Mihawk erupted with once again sent both figures flying backward.
After retreating several dozen steps, their figures halted mid-air before charging violently toward each other again.
Time passed minute by agonizing minute.
Battles between true powerhouses always lasted a long time.
Even though Raleigh's overall strength heavily surpassed Mihawk's, cleanly defeating the world's greatest prodigy wasn't an easy task.
The island's civilian residents had all been frantically evacuated by Gion's Marines, as the small fishing island could barely contain the sheer collateral damage of the two monsters' battle.
One-third of the originally prosperous, beautiful port town had already sunk into the boiling sea.
What were once several rolling mountain peaks had been flattened into plateaus by stray sword beams, leaving behind land that looked like it had been relentlessly bombarded by Buster Call artillery.
Raleigh's crisp Marine coat and shirt had been torn to shreds by Mihawk's grazing blades, so he simply ripped off his upper garment, revealing his heavily scarred, muscular torso.
A deep, bleeding gash on his waist testified to the terror of Mihawk's desperate counterattacks.
However, Mihawk's injuries were catastrophically worse.
Under the combined, relentless assault of Raleigh's swordsmanship, raw physical brawling, and Devil Fruit wind powers, Mihawk's body was covered head-to-toe with bleeding wounds from tiny wind blades.
His right arm—the very arm that held his sword—had been severed by Raleigh moments ago.
His left leg was completely shattered by one of Raleigh's devastating kicks.
Mihawk could only maintain his balance by stabbing the Black Blade Yoru deep into the ground with his remaining left hand and leaning heavily against the hilt.
"Cough... cough... cough..."
Mihawk couldn't stop coughing up blood.
During the battle, Raleigh hadn't just clashed swords with him. In close combat, Raleigh's Haki-coated iron fists proved to be far too much for the swordsman to handle.
At one point, when Mihawk failed to parry in time, Raleigh shattered several of his ribs with a single, crushing punch.
The broken ribs had pierced his lungs, making every single breath an agony.
Mihawk's broken body swayed dangerously, but he stubbornly, proudly forced himself to stand tall.
He pulled his blade from the dirt, pointing the black steel straight at Raleigh.
Having fought this long, even Raleigh had developed some genuine appreciation for Mihawk as a swordsman.
If not for their opposing positions in this world, Mihawk would be quite a decent man to share a drink with.
But Mihawk shouldn't have sought fame by challenging the Marines.
And he especially shouldn't have harmed Marine soldiers right in front of Raleigh.
Raleigh wasn't the type of commander to disregard his subordinates' lives for the sake of "honor."
He knew that making an army truly obey required more than just overwhelming strength—he needed to make his soldiers feel a sense of protection and belonging.
If a pirate who freely harmed Marine soldiers appeared before Raleigh and walked away without facing lethal consequences, then Raleigh wouldn't be a qualified leader.
Even if Raleigh were promoted to Fleet Admiral in the future, he would never be able to unite his soldiers' hearts if he let men like Mihawk live.
Garp was just Garp—no one else could become Garp.
In fact, most people in the world viewed Garp through overly rose-tinted glasses.
Setting aside the heavy filter of him being the "Navy Hero," Garp's habit of letting powerful pirates go because they were "interesting" meant he wasn't actually a qualified, responsible Marine officer at all.
Raleigh would not make that mistake.
Now, it was time to end this.
Raleigh's right hand firmly gripped Mikazuki Munechika as he slowly approached Mihawk, whose life had already begun its final countdown.
Mihawk, fully aware of the inevitable fate awaiting him, offered no final words of protest.
He simply kept his hawk-like gaze fixed intently on Raleigh's movements.
Swish!
Two figures flashed past each other in a blur of speed and steel.
Both men came to a halt not far from one another, standing back-to-back in the ruined port.
Mihawk was the first to lower his blade, his golden eyes finally filling with deep regret.
"Old friend... it seems I cannot accompany you any longer," Mihawk whispered to his sword. "What a pity. I never reached the summit to become the world's strongest."
Then, using the last ounce of his strength, Mihawk threw the Black Blade Yoru backward into the air toward his opponent.
"If there is a chance, Marine... help me find a worthy new master for it. It deserves to become the world's strongest Black Blade."
Squelch.
A hair-thin line of blood appeared across Mihawk's neck.
A second later, it violently burst open.
Thud.
Dracule Mihawk's body, having lost all its strength and support, collapsed lifelessly to the ground.
Raleigh extended his left hand, effortlessly catching the massive Black Blade Yoru by the hilt as it fell from the sky.
He stood over the corpse, saying absolutely nothing.
As Raleigh finally turned around, a deep, bone-exposing slash across his own chest continuously bled onto the cobblestone.
His eyes flickered with a complex mix of amazement, admiration, and disgust, before finally settling into a cold calm.
Mihawk wasn't the first famous figure to die by his hand, nor would he be the last.
Though compared to monsters like the Golden Lion and Whitebeard, he was a much more honorable pirate, he was fundamentally different from Douglas Bullet.
Bullet could be broken and controlled.
Mihawk was a lone wolf, an utterly uncontrollable factor. And Raleigh eliminated uncontrollable factors.
"Raleigh!"
As soon as the battle ended, Gion, who had been anxiously waiting at the edge of the port for a long time, quickly rushed over using Geppo.
"You need immediate treatment!" Gion supported Raleigh's bleeding, exhausted body and hurried him toward the warship.
Raleigh's expression showed a sweet, tired helplessness. "Gion, I'm actually fine. Its just that I have lost quite a bit of blood."
He felt somewhat embarrassed being supported so openly in front of his men, but Gion paid his pride no mind.
"Don't speak right now! I will call the military doctor to treat you immediately!"
Gion placed Raleigh carefully in the ship's medical room, where the prepared military doctor quickly stepped forward to clean and suture the massive chest wound.
"Ouch! Damn it, that hurts! It hurts!" Raleigh hissed.
Having not felt any pain during the heat of the battle, he now experienced intense agony as the adrenaline finally faded from his system!
...
By evening, Raleigh's chest was wrapped tightly in thick, white bandages.
He sat up in his bed, leaning halfway against the headboard.
"You're awake, Raleigh?"
Raleigh snapped back to reality and looked at Gion, who was resting anxiously in a chair beside him.
"Yeah. Was Mihawk's body retrieved?" Raleigh reached out with his right hand and gently pulled Gion into his embrace.
"Don't move! Be careful of your stitches!" Gion didn't dare to struggle, terrified of disturbing Raleigh's freshly bandaged wound, and could only let Raleigh have his way.
"Bullet and the soldiers went to clean up the battlefield. They brought back Mihawk's body, his coffin boat, and the pirates' treasures."
"Thats good."
While gently stroking Gion's hair, Raleigh stared at the ceiling, deeply contemplating his next moves in the bloody chess game of the Grand Line.