Chapter 157 - Chapter 159

The fighting had truly picked up speed, but it was nothing like Kaido had expected it to be. Instead, it was exactly what Amell described it to be, a slaughter. The common pirates belonging to the Gotei was on average better equipped and better trained than any other pirate crew, emperor or not. They completely massacred Kaido's crew and the once beautiful bright-blue coloured ice was now stained red in most locations between the two emperor's ships.

Kaido was climbing out of the crater that Amell caused by using his body. His wounds were healing but every hit from Amell felt like someone picked up a warship and hit him with it. Kaido was furious and he locked eyes with Amell that floated casually above the crater.

Amell summoned a small ball of pure wind to his hand and aimed it at Kaido's ship, "Say goodbye to your only way out of here," he released the ball and it travelled the distance in less than a second. *Boom* The entire ship was blown to smithereens and the incredible outburst of wind completely swallowed all three ships and within seconds thousands of tiny pieces were all that was left of Kaido's three ships.

"AMELL! I'LL KILL YOU!!" Kaido roared and his Haki spread far across the battlefield and knocked out countless pirates. And even most of the reporters that had been on Dressrosa already and got caught up in this war were knocked out as well. They all stood on the shore and recorded the entire battle to the best of their ability, albeit now there only a few reporters left that were still conscious.

"Come, let's play some more," Amell dashed forward and punched Kaido in the chest while simultaneously dodging his club. Kaido was sent sliding back on the ice with blood rushing out from his mouth like a waterfall. "Take a good look around, Kaido, you are losing," Amell said while covering his right index finger with his wind. He swiped vertically towards a group of beast pirates and a massive wind blade appeared and completely cut apart every single pirate in the group. Huge amounts of blood decorated the ground and Amell accidentally let out a smile and the surrounding got heavy as his killing intent seeped out from him.

"Boss, you're getting a little excited aren't you?" Hisoka stepped out from behind Amell almost like he had been there all this time. Amell glanced at him, "Just my old self taking a peek at the surface."

"Sure," Hisoka said and giggled to himself. Amell shrugged his shoulders and continued saying, "Hisoka, take care of the headliners, and go nuts," Amell said and pointed towards the headliners that were leading the charge of the beast pirates still conscious.

"On it, boss!" Hisoka said and faded away from view. After he disappeared, Amell turned to Kaido, "Should we end this now?" he asked his fellow emperor in a casual tone. Kaido had gone beyond his normal madness. After hearing Amell's question, he roared out his warcry and his body started to change drastically. He was turning into his dragon form. Soon, a massive dragon floated on a bunch of weird clouds above the battlefield. His shadow covered many of the ongoing fights and everyone looked over to either admire or inspect his dragon body.

"At least he'll die in his coolest form!" Cal that stood on the ship said stoically.

"After everything he has seen, I can't believe Kaido still thinks he has a chance here," Vash said. He, Cal and Toshiro didn't need to join the war so they just sat back and enjoyed the show.

"Some people just don't learn." Toshiro didn't even look at the battle going on, he was busy sculping tiny statues of ice. Vash nodded along knowingly and said, "Very true,"

Kaido and Amell had started trading blows with each other. Their fight destroyed whatever they came in contact with and took the life of anyone stupid enough to stand too close to them. Kaido was using his full strength in this fight and every swipe of his claws brought incredible power with them. The speed at which they were fighting made it impossible for anyone at the Headliner level to follow. The wind pressure from their clashes caused the ice to be destroyed all over and craters of different sizes were created wherever they passed during their fight.

"Come on, Kaido, you can do better than that!" Amell said while deflecting hundreds of punches from Kaido's dragon form. Amell had thrown casual taunts at Kaido through this whole fight and they served to anger him to greater heights. This whole day seemed like nothing more than a joke to Amell, and that was what bothered Kaido the most.

"Heat breath!" Kaido opened his mouth and shot his breath attack at Amell, but it missed as the commanders expected. Though it missed him, it kept travelling towards the three commanders standing on their ships observing the battle.

"I've got this," Cal said and her right eye started shining in a slight golden light. Then she gathered magic in her mouth and shot out her Heat Breath to stop Kaido's. And stop it, it did. The two attacks collided in mid-air and caused a massive explosion that destroyed a very big part of the ice, and with it killed many more pirates.

King that was currently in a brawling match with Guts looked over, 'Right eye of the Naked Goddes. Allows her to copy any ability she sees as long as she has visual contact with her target. Another extremely annoying opponent to deal with.' he started formulating a plan in his head while trading blows with Guts.

"Kaido, how are you feeling? Sensing the despair of your men yet?" Amell smiled evilly. He drew his sword and disappeared from view, "AAAAAAAH" Kaido's agonizing scream soon sounded out as Amell had appeared in front of his face and pierced his left eye.

"Turns out you're not immortal after all," Amell said and pulled out the sword, and a flood worth of blood started streaming down from his left eye socket. "AMELL!!" Kaido roared and started swiping his claws at lightning speed at him, but his arms stopped suddenly when Amell raised his finger in the middle of dodging all his claws.

"Not so fast, Kaido. The people of Wano has a deep-rooted hatred for you so I will elect myself to play the role of avenger and punisher." Amell looked at Kaido that had completely stopped moving. "First, you used fire to initiate your rule over Wano, so let me use fire to end your rule over that country." Amell turned his palm upwards and summoned a flame to his hand. "Let me show you hell!" He flew over and placed his hand on one of Kaido's massive dragon fingers. And the flame started seeping into Kaido's skin, and immediately you saw his expression twist from anger to absolute pain.

"AAAHHHAA!" Kaido started to roar in pain and agony. The place where Amell placed his palm started melting and just within seconds, bones were showing out in the open. This was the first time anyone had ever penetrated his skin as far as anyone inside the beast pirates crew knew. Jack that was being toyed with by Byakuya was shocked and completely horrified by this. King panicked and abandoned his fight with Guts immediately and flew towards Amell with rage and killing intent flowing out of every pore on his body.

"AMELL! YOU DIE NOW!" King flew over in his full dinosaur form.

Amell saw him coming and signalled Guts to leave it be. Amell moved his finger and Kaido's massive claw swiped at King when he was close enough to not be able to dodge in time. "What!?" King couldn't dodge in time as Amell predicted so all he could do was raise his arms in defence and get sent crashing down into the ice.

He struggled to get out of the hole his body created, and when he got up he had shock and confusion written all over his face, rightfully so. "Lord Kaido! What are you doing?!" He yelled, but Kaido kept screaming in pain as the flame had turned almost all of his hand to ashes, and it showed no sign of stopping.

"Kaido is not the one steering this ship now," Amell said and moved his hand, and King saw how Kaido's massive arm moved exactly as Amell's did.

"What did you do to him!!?" King roared furiously. He flew up purely on emotion alone. He spewed out a massive cone of fire at Amell. "Not gonna cut it," Amell pointed his finger at the fire and it all stopped advancing. It instead started rotating and decreasing in size until it was the size of a basketball, and then he sent it back at King. And when it collided with King's body, a massive fiery explosion took place that shook the battlefield.

"How are you feeling, Kaido?" Amell looked at him with no pity, nor mercy in his eyes. Kaido couldn't answer, let alone hear what Amell said, the pain was so unbearable that Kaido had almost fainted from it, and if he hadn't gone mad from it yet, he wasn't far from that state of mind.

King was on the ground badly hurt. His body was slowly healing, but he could barely stand anymore. Sheepshead, the headliner ran over in a panic, "Sir King! We need to retreat! Everyone is losing, and we have only killed a handful of Gotei footsoldiers. No commanders or Vice-captains have died on their side, yet we keep losing more people every minute." He said in a not so respectful tone. King wanted to refute him, but on what grounds could he possibly do that. He was too hurt to fight a commander and let's not even think about fighting Amell, that was impossible for even his immortal captain.

"Keep fighting, we have no ships to escape in! Either we die or they die! That was the captain's orders! Keep fighting!" King roared over the battlefield. He slowly stood up, and he had reverted to his human form. He had blood all over his body and a determined expression decorated his face. This was a man who knew he was gonna die, but fully accepted it and embraced it.

"You're insane, King! We stand no chance!" Sheepshead screamed and started running away. Unfortunately for him, he didn't get far as two bandages swished past King and wrapped themselves around Sheepshead's legs. A woman completely covered in bandages from head to toe came flying through the air and kicked him in the back so he face-planted down onto the ground.

"What happened to all that macho talk, little sheep? Not that long ago, you said I was a foolish woman for trying to stand up to you." She lifted his head slightly off the ground and kissed him on the cheek. "See now, you just stole a kiss from me, that warrants some proper punishment." She slammed his face down on the ground hard enough to break his nose.

"Sir King! SAVE ME!" Sheepshead yelled towards King, but the big man didn't move an inch, he simply stood there and watched this. "A traitor can die a traitors death. Kill him!" King said sternly to the bandaged woman.

"As you will, Lord King!" She said playfully and quickly and scarily efficiently snapped his neck, ending his life in the blink of an eye.

"What is your name, girl?" King said and took a deep breath in.

"Aroma," She said and bowed slightly after having stepped off Sheepshead's body.

"Funny name," King said stoically. He cracked his neck and started walking towards her, "He was a traitor and a coward, but he was still a pirate on our crew, so let me reward you for killing him by also snapping your neck." He said threateningly. Aroma showed little to no worry at King's threatening words.

Heavy footsteps sounded out behind King and Guts growling voice reached his ears, "That will only happen if you manage to survive your fight with me." he came walking while dragging his massive sword behind him. Without warning, he started dashing towards King and brought his sword down on him. King defended against the sword with his arms, but even though he used Haki, the sword still lodged itself in his arm causing King to scream out in pain.

"As the captain said, playtimes over." Guts used the rest of his strength and cut off King's entire arm using his sword. The blood from his arm flowed out like a river and coupled with King's agonizing scream, it made for a terrifying scene. "It's nothing personal, I promise," Guts punched him in the chest, making King fly across the battlefield towards where Jack was lying unconscious. He had been knocked out by Byakuya and no one knew why Byakuya hadn't killed him yet, but Jack's men had long since escaped or gotten killed by Byakuya.

Guts lept over and crashlanded down on King's body with his knee first causing a massive explosion. Another painful scream came out and Guts drove his sword through King's belly, staining the ground red. "You were pretty entertaining, I'm sorry to see you go already." Guts said with apparent apologetic words, but as his sword was ripped out of King's stomach and instead got driven straight through his chest, there were no emotions on Guts face.

"You are truly brutal when once you truly start fighting," Byakuya said as he sat casually upon Jack's body. He was wiping a great deal of blood away from his blade, blood that quite clearly came from Jack.

Guts looked over at him, "And you? Why let Jack suffer any longer?"

Byakuya shrugged his shoulders at the question, "For all the people he has tortured over the years, I see this as justice."

"That's not like you. What happened to the apathetic Byakuya we knew?"

Byakuya stood up, "Nothing, just think of me as the grim reaper of vengeance. I am simply handing out the punishment this man deserves." he raised his sword and walked over to Jack's head. "He deserves a painful death and that's what he'll get," Byakuya sliced at Jack's throat and a wound opened up and blood started flowing out. Jack's eyes popped open and he wanted to scream but no sound came out. His gaze landed on Byakuya that stood on his chest with his sword dripping blood down on his body. He knew he was gonna die within seconds, but there was nothing he could do about it, his body had no strength left from the severe beating Byakuya had administred since their fight started.

'Ho-How did this happen? Have they always been this powerful?' Jack found no comfort in knowing death was only seconds away, 'the captain was wrong. There is no reason to seek this feeling out.' His vision started to blur. As his consciousness escaped him all he saw was Byakuya with his bloody sword standing over him like the grim reaper himself.

"Whatever makes you sleep at night, Byakuya" Guts watched Jack bleeding out with an apathetic expression. He was rarely if ever bothered by the sight of brutality.

Byakuya wiped clean his blade then sheathed it again, "Now only Kaido remain. Kenshin will clean up Wano, so all we have to do now is to finally annihilate the beast pirates."

"Easy enough," Guts turned around and started walking towards the left-over beast pirates that were spread out over the battlefield. "I'll take care of the rest," he said and started running, while his feet left holes in the ground wherever he stepped.

---------------------------------------

End