29 Chapter 29: A Humiliating Figh

Third Person's PoV:

"Let's Begin..."

That voice was like the gong for commencing the fight as Josh immediately vanished in a flash of lightning, leaving the three spectators to comment in confusion.

Once they took a good look at their entire surrounding, all of them noticed Mihawk with one hand on his prized Yoru, tilting it a bit to the side. Usopp squinted his eyes and slowly, the figure of a man came to light.

Usopp's eyesight was the best among the current spectators present. As a sniper, one had to have good vision to shoot down enemies from far away.

In the instance Josh made that comment to begin the battle, he immediately dematerialized himself and dashed behind Mihawk, hoping to take the advantage by making the first move.

Josh decided some time during his training to call it Blitz and give it an actual name. Blitz is when he physically transforms himself into lightning and move at the speed of light.

The only problem with this is that the dematerialization and re-materialization isn't at the speed of lightning. Although it is as fast as humanly possible, a master like Mihawk is perfectly capable of taking that short time to his advantage.

The feeling of moving at the speed of light is incomparable. Everything zooms past you and not even the wind or air resistance can be felt. A few minor downsides to this, however, is that slowing down isn't an option, and the entire scenery blurs as if being censored.

It took Josh a while to be able to somewhat freely control the distance and direction he wants to Blitz to. The only thing Josh might be able to compare the Blitz to is a speedster, running at top speed from the Flash...with much more restraints.

Once Josh got behind Mihawk, he materialized himself again to strike at his back. Naturally, the time it took him to materialize again was caught by Mihawk and he immediately defended himself, leading to the current situation.

Josh backflipped away gracefully and landed on his feet. His whole body facing Mihawk with a smirk plastered on his face.

"He's so fast..."

"Y-yeah, no kidding."

The rest of the straw hats watching the fight were awed already by the first move that was made in the battle that was destined to produce much more awe inspiring techniques and attacks.

Raising his sword up, Mihawk decided to nab the next move as his sword loomed in front of Josh.

At this point, Josh has already activated his Kenbunshoku Haki and his senses were screaming at him to dodge. Josh immediately rolled to the side and avoided the deadly swing.

Mihawk was already assured of Josh's strength just from what he had observed so far and the first move. He felt that he could unleash more of his strength and not fear accidentally killing because he used too much power. Mihawk pressed on with one deadly attacks after another.

On the receiving end of the attacks was Josh. His movements were a bit unnatural and seemed too forced. This couldn't be helped, after all, this was the very first actual combat against a human Josh ever had, even if his previous life was included.

Josh sidestepped another swing from Mihawk a bit clumsily. His movements kind of reminded Luffy of himself when he fights but less sharp.

Josh also launched his own set of attacks against Mihawk, but those were blocked by the oversized black sword in his hands.

All that was keeping Josh from becoming two halves was his Observation Haki and the instincts he obtained from his three years of training. Josh narrowly avoided getting any injuries.

With another Blitz, Josh managed to gain some distance between himself and his opponent, allowing him to catch his breath. Mihawk didn't give chase as he allowed the youngster to calm his breathing down which was becoming a bit heavier.

'Damn...I really thought I'd do much better than that just now. Oh well, on to plan B.' Josh berated himself slightly in his mind, but this was during battle so he had to keep going, else the world's greatest swordsman gets impatient and finishes the match prematurely.

With a new plan in mind, Josh stood tall and waved his right hand to the side, causing his cloak to flutter in the wind. With his movement, the holster that was carrying the seastone-bullets shooting gun was revealed.

"If I can't fight you in close combat, I'll try using long ranged attacks." Josh spoke as he removed the golden colored gun from its holster. His confidence was still high as the fight was just getting started.

Wordlessly, Mihawk swung Yoru sideways, causing his own clothes to flutter as he took slow but deliberate steps closer to Josh.

The feeling that Nami and the others felt at this scene was indescribable. It was like watching the epic battle scene from an action movie. Excitement boiled in Luffy's heart and the other two couldn't help but also feel something churning inside themselves.

*Bang*

The first shot was fired. With a clink, the sound of metal hitting another metallic object sounded. This was obviously Mihawk using the Yoru as a shield to block the bullet.

After the initial shot, continuous sounds of gunshot rang out for over a minute. It was all skillfully stopped in it's tracks by Mihawk with differing methods. He would directly block some, while leading some bullets away from his body. Others, Mihawk didn't need Yoru, all he had to do was tilt his head to the side or move an arm. For the rest of the bullets, Mihawk didn't even need to move as it missed it's target completely.

'Oh crap! I forgot...I never used a gun before in my life!' Was all Josh could this when he first missed a shot badly.

One could easily tell that he was an amateur. From his posture, positioning, to the way he held the gun. Not to mention his actual shooting skills. Those were all obvious indicators of a novice.

"He sucks..." Usopp commented distainfully. He didn't even bother to hide his true feelings as he said those words.

"Really? But he's much better at it than I am." Luffy also commented. This only got a round of sighs from the rest.

With a flash, Mihawk suddenly disappeared from his original position and reappeared right in front of Josh, catching him slightly off guard as he was busy preparing to shoot another rain of bullets.

Without even bothering to speak, Mihawk swung his Yoru just as Josh used Blitz to flash away to another location to save himself as he felt imminent danger.

Luckily for Josh, he managed to get away scot free...however, he wasn't happy. This was because just as he was blitzing away, Mihawk somehow still managed to cut his arm off.

The arm that should've been a bleeding mess did not actually bleed, instead, it slowly reformed with the crackling of electricity.

'That bastard! He purposely didn't use Haki to cut me! Now I feel insulted...' Josh thought inwardly with a bit of anger and helplessness.

"If that is the full extent of your abilities, you might as well surrender." Mihawk finally said for the first time. The words sounded like he was mocking Josh, however, he was just a bit disappointed. Before Josh could retort back, he continued.

"From what I've seen so far, your skills in close quarter combat is okay, but a far cry from mastery. Your skills as a gunsman are nonexistent. You lack the battle experience of a veteran. The only things keeping you alive right now is your devil fruit and Haki." Mihawk calmly revealed the results of his analysis. There were more things he discerned but decided to keep to himself.

Mihawk was honestly disappointed. Usually, someone who awakened all forms of haki and has a devil fruit, one of the strongest logias to boot, usually have rich combat experience. They had to go through countless life and death battles and experienced many things to obtain such powers. Yet, the brat in front of him was fighting as if it's the first time in his life.

"I'm done testing the waters. It's time I got serious!" Josh roared indignantly. The words of insult he heard from Mihawk was enough for him to abandon his plans of testing all of his current combat related skills.

Initially, Josh wanted to test out his abilities and powers one by one to see how effective they will be against a strong adversary like Dracule Mihawk. This way, he could improve himself and benefit greatly from the fight.

But now, all thoughts of that were put to the back of his mind as Josh got ready to start fighting for real, without holding back any of his strengths.

'In memory of Ace...although he hasn't passed away yet' Josh said to himself in his mind.

"RAI....KEN!!"