Chapter 277: Unstoppable Spear

Chapter 277: Unstoppable Spear

Nôv(el)B\\jnn

Jesus Burgess slipped away from the back of the crowd of former toys. Under normal circumstances he was a very confident individual, but he was possessed of enough wisdom to realize he was a bit out of his depth at the moment.

He had been very close to the S.M.I.L.E. factory at the time that Cherry had destroyed it. He wasn't afraid of Elizabello because his King Punch took such a long time to charge up, and at the worst you'd just have to dodge it once. Cherry's replication though? That didn't seem to take anywhere near as long as a whole hour like Elizabello's version.

Fortunately he hadn't antagonized her too much during the tournament, and even the amount he had could be chalked up to normal fight banter he reckoned. How did he realize that Nightmare was Cherry in disguise? He just made the assumption automatically to justify his loss against her and Zoro.

"You were one of those guys with Blackbeard, right? At Marineford?" a voice that sent a chill down his spine spoke right into his ear.

Shifting his head slightly, he saw the woman in question standing on shoulder. He cursed his herculean strength in this moment, as he couldn't even feel her weight even now that he knew she was there.

"Where were you slinking off to like a coward? Your life is on the line as well, you know?" Cherry asked.

"The Champion isn't a coward." Burgess momentarily forgot who he was speaking to in the face of that provocation.

"Last I checked, you lost in the very first round of the tournament." Cherry chuckled. "Perhaps you'd like a rematch, though? I have the prize right here..."

Cherry pulled the oversized, drill-shaped strawberry out of her clothes. Burgess' eyes locked onto it instantly, filling with a dangerous glint of greed.

With that fruit, he was sure that he could defeat this monstrous woman. The question was whether he could take it from her.

The answer was no, but Burgess was an arrogant man so he thought there was a chance at least.

"You're on!" Burgess shouted and reached for her.

*pop*

Sensing the way to use the spear's devil fruit ability instinctively, Cherry let out an impressed whistle. "I think you guys were underestimating this thing. Let's see..."

Cherry reared back, the spear started to spin with exponentially increasing speed, then she thrust it forward. It was then she realized that she might have poured a little too much juice into it only just after obtaining the fruit. "Uh oh-"

The spear wrenched itself out of Cherry's vise-like grip and shot like a missile through the birdcage, nearly taking Burgess' head off in the process and taking just an ear instead. It continued onwards at blistering speed, sailing through the air unhindered.

-

Luffy and Cabernet had run out of ideas to mock Pika anymore and had grown quite bored with the stone man crushing them into the ground.

Pika reared up to slam into them again, but this time Luffy was going to meet the attack with his own. He figured he just had to be careful not to destroy the whole body and just the arm.

Luffy blew his arm up into a giant, haki coated fist. The two slammed together and naturally the one with haki won in the end. Pika's stone arm cracked and crumbled from the impact, but quickly started to reform itself causing Luffy to frown in annoyance.

"It's useless, Straw Hat! I can do this all day!" Pika shrieked.

Pika winded up another punch. Luffy was ready to meet this one as well.

"Huh-?" Pika paused.

A flash of starlight from outside the birdcage turned into a streak of color that crossed the distance in a split second. It penetrated Pika's stone exterior and with a few more flashes of starlight Pika's stone chest exploded out of his back, leaving a several meter wide hole through the construct.

Pika would have been shocked, if the drill spear hadn't pierced clean through his actual chest as well, killing him instantaneously.

Fortunately, Pika's untimely demise didn't compromise the structural integrity of his stone body. It still stood right where it had been before, only now it was completely inert.

""..."" Cabernet and Luffy didn't really know what to make of it.

So they stopped thinking about it. Cabernet flew Luffy up to the palace to have a confrontation with Doflamingo, now that they didn't have to worry about collateral damage so much.