"Drake, leave the rest to us!" Luffy slammed his palms together, a completely peerless aura suddenly erupting from his frame.
To the companions anchoring the space right beside him, this crushing pressure felt exceptionally solid. Sabo looked toward Luffy's flank, his sharp gaze filled with profound astonishment.
This was a tier of power that forced even an executive of his caliber to register a trace of lingering dread. Although he lacked the exact data files to decode what classification of energy this was, he recognized that it was a force locked exclusively within the absolute strongest of the strong.
Even an elite powerhouse anchoring the apex of military power—a Marine Admiral—was devoid of this caliber of presence.
This crushing, psychological dominance was a parameter he had historically tracked in only a solitary individual—the Supreme Commander of the global resistance, Monkey D. Dragon!
"Luffy... you..." Sabo unsealed his lips to phrase an inquiry, yet Luffy had already launched his vessel straight into the sky-wide canopy of descending light beams.
"Gum-Gum... Twister Pinwheel!!"
Taking a violent stride across the sky currents, Luffy twisted his forearms in a rapid, continuous sequence. The environmental properties of the airspace underwent an instant matrix shift, the wind vectors suddenly rotating counter-clockwise as a colossal hurricane violently awakened.
A visible vortex of compressed kinetic energy materialized across the field, flawlessly intercepting a massive registry of the oncoming artillery.
"Count me in!" Sabo's six wings erupted into a fierce vibration, rocketed his frame straight into the upper cloud layer. Executing a sharp mid-air pivot at the absolute zenith, a boundless sea of fire tightly enveloped his body.
"Thousand Hands: Dragon Sovereign!!"
In a fraction of a millisecond, the roaring ocean of flames contouring his frame morphed into countless gargantuan, blazing dragon claws, effortlessly blocking a massive cluster of the plasma beams with absolute zero structural difficulty.
Concurrently, every single powerhouse anchoring the theater moved out in tandem. Every individual systematically deployed their premier combat techniques to neutralize the incoming payloads targeted at their respective quadrants.
Within a breath, the cataclysmic, full-battery bombardment discharged by Pluton was completely intercepted.
The resulting spectacle was profoundly magnificent. Across the high heavens, a continuous cadence of thunderous detonations resounded in rapid succession, the violent residual shockwaves of the explosions aggressively grinding against the local spatial fabric.
Limitless ripples of distorted air cascaded out into the distant horizon. Drake snapped his eyes upward, the humanoid configuration of the Going Guard cleanly sundering the burning layers of fire and high-pressure shockwaves to drive a direct charge straight toward the center of Pluton.
The desperate, terminal counter-offensive initialized by the crumbling battleship had been entirely neutralized. Drake mathematically refused to cede them a single alternative operational window; he was going to execute immediate, total liquidation!
The parameters a moment ago had indeed bordered on absolute catastrophe. Had Luffy and the alliance failed to anchor the line, the sovereign territory of the Arabasta Kingdom would have been definitively transformed into a sterile, desolate wasteland.
Permanently forgotten within the deep, dark channels of history down the line.
"Advanced Critical Strike!!" Drake and the flagship synchronized their calculations to strike simultaneously, a monumental expansion of kinetic force saturating the surrounding grid as a massive fist hammered square into the superstructure of Pluton.
KABOOM!!
The structural framework of Pluton—which had already sustained a total penetration during the preceding exchange—was violently shattered by the impact. Deep, jagged fractures rapidly webbed across the exterior plating, while the interior compartments were instantaneously reduced to pulverized debris.
The original engineering layout of Pluton was heavily funneled to maximize exterior defensive density; the interior framework was merely composed of organic timber that stabilized slightly above standard structural grade.
Enduring centuries of unresolved degradation beneath the earth, the auxiliary internal rooms and non-essential architectural supports were already structurally incapable of buffering any kinetic strain. Now that the legendary outer armor had suffered a total breach, the interior was thoroughly, pathetically brittle.
A solitary strike sundered the ship into a thousand crumbling layers.
Even the exterior hull plates began splitting wide in a chaotic sequence, countless tons of seawater violently rushing into the breach. The legendary engine of destruction—the mythical Ancient Weapon Pluton—had officially initialized a total sinking progression!
"Frantic... engineer a protocol to discharge the water reserves! Maintain active targeting arrays to execute subsequent strikes!" the lead white-robed operative shrieked, his face a mask of dark, twisted panic as he barked frantic directives at his subordinates.
At this current juncture, his internal psychology had completely sundered all baseline logic. The reality that the mythical Ancient Weapon Pluton had been forcefully decommissioned and sunk by an adversary was a scenario his vanguard had entirely failed to simulate when enlisting for this campaign.
Yet there existed zero alternative data matrices. Who could have simulated a timeline where an apocalyptic engine of world destruction could be broken by physical pressure?
Had its baseline parameters been that elementary to fracture, an Ancient Weapon would mathematically fail to preserve its status across the sagas.
Throughout the generational progression of the world, the Ancient Weapons had perpetually served as the ultimate military assets coveted by every sovereign faction; securing a solitary unit guaranteed absolute dominance over the global layout.
That historical premise was far from empty gossip. Set aside the low-tier operatives; even the supreme executives anchoring the absolute summit of the World Government held that data as an absolute fact.
This black-budget excavation campaign targeting Pluton was cataloged as a maximum-security, high-priority phantom deployment; the high command of the regime was actively waiting for their fleet to deliver the weapon into their central inventory.
Currently, the geopolitical landscape of the oceans remained highly unstable, with an unrestricted global war between the World Government and the Revolutionary Army initializing across all theaters. Should the regime successfully integrate an Ancient Weapon into its frontline mass, it would yield a truly cataclysmic tactical advantage.
Possessing more than enough mass to completely, effortlessly rewrite the equilibrium of the war during a critical flashpoint.
Merely analyzing the reality that the regime had deployed a sovereign member of the Gorosei to oversee the theater sundered any doubt regarding the monumental strategic weight they allocated to Pluton.
Yet as of this hour, Pluton was being sunk!
An outcome of this nature was an equation that lay completely outside their historical baseline of common sense.
After all, the Ancient Weapons had perpetually functioned as targets to be aggressively fought over and integrated; their databases archived absolute zero records tracking a unit sustaining direct, physical destruction on the field.
The raw, world-shaking magnitude commanded by the Going Guard was an engineering anomaly they had never historically witnessed or logged. The pure terror woven into its chassis completely sundered their imagination.
CRUNCH!
Ultimately, Pluton's structural framework reached its absolute tolerance ceiling. Under the crushing weight of Drake's terminal mechanical strike, the three-hundred-meter battleship sundered completely, violently fracturing into four independent chunks of sinking metal.
"NO!!" The bald Elder's eyes exploded with thick webs of dark, bloodshot fury, his frantic gaze locked immovably onto the cascading fragments of the ruined Pluton.
His cognitive models completely failed to compute a reality where the ancient weapon could be broken and dragged down into the oceanic abyss by an enemy vanguard.
The scenario was mathematically impossible to rationalize.
This was the legendary Ancient Weapon Pluton, for god's sake! Who could possess the physical mass to break its armor?
Yet the cruel, unyielding parameters unrolling directly before his boots represented the definitive ground truth.
Under this layout, his independent survival metrics had officially stabilized at a absolute dead end!
He had originally simulated a path to secure his survival by delivering a monumental service to override his previous failures, but looking at the field, that option had been reduced to a hollow, impossible dream.
With Pluton permanently destroyed, returning to the Holy Land of Mary Geoise would mean marching straight into an absolute execution script. Lord Im would mathematically refuse to allocate a single fraction of mercy to his profile.
"All units, optimize your reception arrays!" The bald Elder rotated his lethal gaze to lock onto the sea of white-robed CP0 operatives struggling amidst the ruined decks.
"The Ancient Weapon Pluton has sustained absolute destruction. At this current milestone, the options unsealed before your perimeters resolve to exactly two pathways. The initial alternative dictates that you execute an immediate tactical flight, permanently severing your alignment from the World Government grid."
"The parameters governing that script require zero verbal dissection; choosing to flee defines your profile as an absolute renegade. You shall endure a permanent, unrestricted liquidation campaign managed by the regime's shadow wings until your lives are erased."
The Elder swept his sharp focus across their alignment, his tone dripping with an absolute, razor-sharp edge. "The secondary alternative mandates that your vessels anchor this exact coordinate... to engage the enemy in a total, unrestricted battle to the death!"
"Either their biological vessels are liquidated, or our own frames are permanently erased from existence!"
The panicked, chaotic behavioral models that had previously fractured the discipline of the CP0 agents vanished instantly. The initial shock of witnessing Pluton's destruction had indeed triggered a severe lapse in their internal stability.
But now, the parameters of the battlefield were permanently finalized.
True to the Elder's syllabic strike, their vards had only ever commanded two options—or more accurately, a solitary one.
Permitting their networks to betray the absolute authority of the World Government was an impossibility!
"KILL!!" Waiving any subsequent verbal noise, a solitary command sundered the airspace. Every single white-robed operative vaulted into the sky currents simultaneously, their boots aggressively churning the air via Moonwalk as they launched a high-velocity charge straight toward Drake's perimeter.
CLANG! CLANG! CLANG!...
A dense succession of rapid strikes slammed flush against the hull of the humanoid Going Guard. Yet aside from a continuous, hollow metallic resonance echoing across the field, the offensive output failed to register a single fraction of structural efficiency.
BOOM!
Drake drove a colossal mechanical fist forward, connecting square against the torso of an advancing agent. The sheer kinetic weight behind the blow instantaneously pulverized every single bone anchoring the individual's skeletal framework into fine shards.
The white-robed operative shot backward across the spatial grid like a high-velocity cannonball, plunging straight into the deep ocean channels below. His survival metrics had effectively dropped to an absolute zero.
Regarding the performance metrics commanded by this cybernetic mecha configuration, Drake's internal thoughts harbored a deep fondness. However, evaluating the active tactical layout, he noted that his offensive capabilities had become remarkably singular.
The mechanical interface lacked the fluid flexibility and unpredictable pacing native to his personal martial techniques and specialized combat traits.
Even his foundational spatial manipulation parameters were completely redacted from his active control registry while piloting the chassis. This structural restriction generated a significant layer of cognitive discomfort within Drake's mind.
[SYSTEM NOTIFICATION: Requesting the Host to refrain from forcefully projecting their personal operational incompetence onto the flagship's supreme algorithms. Operating the Going Guard's Piloted Combat Mode imposes absolute zero restrictions upon the Host's native traits or specialized abilities.]
The sudden, crisp auditory notification clearing his mental framework caused Drake to violently freeze on the spot, before a wave of pure, radiant delight instantaneously illuminated his features.