The air in the throne room was thick enough to choke on. King Cobra stared into the cold, reptilian eyes of Sir Crocodile, the word hanging between them like a poisoned blade.
"Pluton."
Cobra's blood ran cold. The ancient secret, buried in the royal lineage, known only to the sovereign and the stones of the tomb itself. "How… how do you know that name?" he whispered, the strength leaching from his voice.
A slow, merciless smile spread across Crocodile's face. "A falling palace buries its kings. But first, it surrenders its treasures. Tell me where it is, and your daughter might yet rule over the rubble."
---
Elsewhere in the crumbling palace, the air crackled with a different kind of tension.
"Running is pointless, little thief," Miss Doublefinger's voice was a syrupy purr as she advanced, her spiked fingers scraping against the stone wall, cornering Nami. "That stick is a child's toy. True weapons…" She lunged, a blur of deadly points aimed at Nami's heart. "...have only one purpose: to terminate life!"
Nami twisted, the spikes grazing her tunic as she rolled aside. Her mind raced faster than her heart. An opening. I need one clear shot. She's too fast.
"A wool sweater could generate more spark than your pathetic 'Thunder Ball,'" Doublefinger taunted, flexing her lethal fingers.
Moisture. I need more moisture in the air! Nami spun her Clima-Tact. "Rain Tempo!"
Instead of a downpour, a few sad, sprinkling fountains pattered to the floor.
"Pathetic." Doublefinger's patience vanished. "Enough games. Sea Urchin Stinger!" A storm of sharp spikes erupted from her body.
Nami dove, firing a rapid volley of Cool Balls into the air as she moved. "Not trying to hit you," she panted, sweat mixing with the mist. "Yet."
"Toge Toge Doping!" Doublefinger's form bulged, spikes growing longer, sharper. She became a living avalanche of needles, charging forward.
Nami barely escaped, a spike tearing through her calf. She cried out, but her eyes were on the air above them. A small, wispy cloud had formed where her Cool Balls had met the palace's dry heat. It worked! Now, grow!
Ignoring the searing pain in her leg, she unleashed a frantic barrage—Heat Balls, Cool Balls, feeding the nascent cloud. It swelled, darkening.
"What is this?" Doublefinger scoffed, looking up.
"A storm," Nami hissed, aiming her staff. "Thunderbolt Tempo!"
A single, focused Thunder Ball shot not at the agent, but into the heart of the cloud. For a second, nothing. Then, the world turned white and roared.
CRACK-BOOM!
A searing lance of lightning connected the cloud to Miss Doublefinger. The smell of ozone and burnt fabric filled the hall. Doublefinger screamed, her body convulsing, smoke rising from her scorched suit as she collapsed to her knees.
Nami sagged against a pillar, her injured leg buckling. It's over.
But from the smoke, a figure rose. Enraged, bleeding, but far from finished. "You… insect!" Doublefinger snarled, her form a nightmare of burns and persistent spikes. She lunged in a final, desperate strike.
It passed through empty air—a mirage.
Nami's voice came from behind her, weak but defiant. "You should worry less about insects… and more about tornadoes."
Usopp's words echoed in her mind: 'The ultimate combo, Nami! It'll take everything you've got, but it'll blow them away!'
Gritting her teeth, Nami planted her feet, raising the Clima-Tact high. Energy swirled at its tips. This was it.
"Your leg is shattered," Doublefinger spat, blood on her lips. "You can't even stand. Sea Urchin Sting!" She fired a last, concentrated spike directly at Nami's heart.
Nami swung the staff down to block. The impact jarred her arms, and a fresh, white-hot agony exploded in her wounded leg. She screamed, but didn't fall.
"This pain…" Nami gasped, tears of strain in her eyes, her whole body trembling. "It's nothing! Nothing compared to what Vivi is feeling right now! For her… FOR ALABASTA! TORNADO TEMPO!"
She poured every ounce of her will, her hope, her friendship into the attack. The Clima-Tact hummed, whirred…
And with a soft poof, two small, plastic toy doves on strings popped out of the ends, fluttering limply in the still air.
Nami's face went blank with utter, soul-crushing disbelief. Miss Doublefinger stared, then began to laugh, a raw, broken sound of triumph.
"A toy," she wheezed, pushing herself up, her shadow falling over the paralyzed navigator. "I told you… it was just a—"
Her laughter cut off. Her eyes widened, not at Nami, but at something over her shoulder. A new, deep, and chillingly familiar voice sliced through the haze of pain and defeat.
"Well, well. What a disappointing performance."
Nami's blood froze. She knew that voice. Slowly, painfully, she turned.
Standing in the shattered doorway, sand swirling around his polished boots, was Sir Crocodile. And dangling limply from one hand, beaten and bloody, was the unconscious form of King Cobra.
He dropped the king to the floor with a thud and eyed Nami's broken Clima-Tact, a cruel smirk on his face.
"It seems I've arrived just in time to collect the last of the trash." He raised his golden hook, the tip glinting in the dim light, aimed directly at her. "Any last words… thief?"
The chapter ends with Nami, injured and weaponless, staring down the Warlord of the Sea, her king defeated at his feet, and her ultimate attack having just failed in the most humiliating way possible.
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