Chapter 128: Memories

Pulling off his two shredded sleeves, Ian bared his arms and felt the burden disappeared, so he drew out the Devil’s Blade Yamato at his waist. (Like Zoro in the last arc)

Deploying his Nen to his sword, which suddenly turned his blade black, then Ian held the sword tightly with both hands and rushed forward!

His opponent was Kuma, a powerful enemy, one of the strongest Shichibukai. Therefore, he mustn’t have the slightest carelessness, he should only be calm and concentrated, which was the way to determine his combat effectiveness.

“Pressure Cannon!” (“Pad Ho”)

Seeing Ian rushing, Kuma extended his right hand forward, and a mass of air was ejected and shot towards Ian head-on.

During his running, Ian has opened his Nen field “En”. After sensing the trajectory of the Pad Ho, he immediately moved slightly to the side, and the Pressure Cannon flew past him.

However, it was not over yet. Seeing that one blow could be easily avoided, Kuma planted both feet firmly on the ground and started throwing his palms forward multiple times. Continuous projectiles of Pressure Cannon were launched towards Ian. This time, the speed of the “Slapping Thrust Pressure Cannon” (“Tsuppari Pad Ho”) was obviously much faster than the last one!

Ian was aware of this, but because of the excessive number of Pressure Cannons, he was afraid that he would not be able to successfully dodge them all, so he simply did not try to avoid them. He directly slashed his sword upwards and raised Yasuo’s Wind Wall towards the front!

This time, the Wind Wall was much more solid than the ones that Ian had used before. Kuma’s Pressure Cannons bombarded the Wind Wall and exploded there because they were blocked.

The Pressure Cannon was originally condensed air, as was the Wind Wall. However, due to a large number of Pressure Cannons, successive bombardments quickly dissipated the Wind Wall.

However, this also gave Ian a chance to attack. While hitting the Wind Wall, Ian jumped up and passed over the wind barrier in front of him. When he was still in the air, he held his sword solidly with both hands and slashed towards Kuma’s right shoulder.

Kuma looked up at him. At the moment when Ian’s sword was falling, he raised his palm to block Ian’s attack.

Ian’s blade struck the thick pink paw in Kuma’s right hand!

Originally, Ian didn’t dare to be careless about the battle with Kuma, so this blow can be said to be a swing with full power. However, when he hit the pink paw on Kuma’s hand, Ian felt that a huge force was reflecting from it, pushing him in the opposite direction, and the rebound force was also growing in his hands with the increasing power of the struck.

Bang! With a sharp sound, Ian flew back, rolled a few times in the air, then fell on the ground far away.

“Oh…” Although Kuma was still expressionless, he couldn’t help looking at his right palm. At that time, the paw’s surface of his right palm had a scratch, which was slowly recovering.

This was a rare thing. Kuma’s Paw-Paw Fruit (Nikyu Nikyu no Mi) has the ability to deflect any attack. As long as any type of attack (even gases such as air as well as intangible things such as the ghosts) comes towards him, it will be deflected when it touches the pink paw in his palm. However, Ian’s attack just failed to cause damage to Kuma, but because the sword blade was hardened by the Haki, the attack power increased so much that it left a little cut on Kuma’s palm, which made him feel slight pain.

When Ian gritted his teeth and stood up, Kuma suddenly disappeared.

This was his kind of teleportation method, which has been explained with: Kuma uses the incredible speed of his Devil Fruit power to propel himself across certain distances. (Though he has not actually been seen pushing himself to another location.)

“Right!” In Ian’s Nen field, he sensed the sudden appearance of an object, so he immediately reacted. However, there was something strange in his movements, what he did now was getting to a new stance, he immediately waved his hand and jumped to the right side!

This time, a ball of purple flame appeared beside his sword. This purple flame was like a stream of water running down on his arm. As Ian waved his sword, while jumping and turning in place, this flaming ball followed him, making a small whirlwind of purple flame.

100 Shiki: Oniyaki!

This was a move from his new card Iori Yagami, known as the “Flame of the End”, but Ian used his trick with the sword!

Kuma moved to Ian’s side in a flash. He had directly hit him with a strong close-range Pressure Cannon, but he didn’t expect that Ian would use such a move. Although he struck Ian with his palm, and shot him out like a shell, but he was also hit by the 100 Shiki: Oniyaki that Ian used.

Boom! Ian was shot dozens of meters away by this strong shock wave, and then slammed the ground and made a big hole, while Kuma’s right arm was burned by his purple flame, instantly burning all the clothes on that side, revealing a cybernetic arm.

This cybernetic arm was made of metal, which prevented the flame from continuing to burn. However, the metal on the surface also showed signs of getting melted. Kuma tried to move his arm, but he encountered some inflexibility.

Ian got up, trembling from the pit. The impact of Kuma’s last blow was so powerful that it made him felt strong dizziness. There was no place on his body where he didn’t feel pain.

However, even so, Ian stayed strong and stepped forward to face Kuma.

Whether it was Master Koshiro or Master Rayleigh, both of them have told him that when he’s in combat, the most important thing was the fighting intent. Only when the fighting intent is high, people can constantly stimulate their potential.

So even at the moment when facing the Shichibukai Kuma with terrifying strength, Ian was not willing to back down. He also wanted to know his limits.

Walking forward step by step, Ian held the Yamato in his right hand, and with his left hand, he suddenly threw a purple flame against the ground.

108 Shiki: Yamibarai! (Dark hook)

This flame kept sliding on the ground, moving swiftly towards Kuma and burning all the grass along its way. Kuma has already tasted the power of this purple flame. So, he didn’t dare to be careless and wait until this fire comes to him. At that time, his right hand slammed down.

The air bobble was shot downward, with great pressure, directly scattered Ian’s flame, leaving a deep pit in the shape of a paw on the ground.

“He didn’t even jump up to avoid…” Ian smiled bitterly, that didn’t work, so he had to think of another way.

Rushing forward, Ian knew that he could only compete with Kuma in close-ranged combat. Although Kuma could move instantly by his teleportation technique, Ian’s shot was not an attack at a very high speed, and it was actually very slow. Ian was able to use the 100 Shiki: Oniyaki successively because Kuma teleported close to him. It should be the disadvantage brought by his huge size. As long as he was close to him, he will have the opportunity to hurt him.

Kuma didn’t know what he was thinking. So when he saw Ian coming, he didn’t use the Pressure Cannon to attack Ian. Only when Ian approached him and was about to cut his foot with the sword, he instantly flashed behind Ian and raised his big hand, covering Ian from the top.

However, Ian had been mentally prepared for this, and suddenly changed the direction of the wave and launched a Flying Slash upward. The sword aura hit Kuma’s palm, which was deflected away by his paw, and it also stopped Kuma’s attack.

Taking advantage of this opportunity, Ian immediately started his next move, with a step forward and slashing again towards Kuma. While moving out of the attack range of Kuma’s palm, he slashed at his feet again.

The Tyrant, Kuma, was a very tall man with a huge figure, but Ian himself was short, smart, and flexible. This attack finally worked. In order to avoid being struck, Kuma chose to jump up in place!

Ian was waiting for this opportunity!

“Sorye ge ton!”

(That was Yasuo’s ultimate named Last Breath, When he uses his ultimate he pronounces Sorye Ge Ton, means something like: The dawn remains / To raise towards the dawn…)

Ian’s figure instantly disappeared from his place and appeared beside Kuma in mid-air. The Devil’s Blade Yamato is his hand struck Kuma twice in a row, cutting him from both sides, then slashed him upwards while raising his sword high in the air. Finally, he chopped him sharply, slamming him to the ground! All of that was within a second.

Boom!!!!!

When Kuma fell to the ground, the Ultimate Skill of Yasuo’s card finally burst out at the last moment. Kuma’s landing point was like a mirror being hit by a heavy hammer. Countless cobweb-like cracks were spread out on the whole ground!

The 60% destructive power bonus meant that Ian’s attack was far away from his usual strength, and Kuma’s whole body was pressed into the pit, lying there quietly, motionless.

Ian stood beside Kuma, gasping for breath. It was his first time using this Ultimate Skill. However, because the Last Breath could only attack the targets in mid-air, he had a premise to move.

At first, he wanted to knock up Kuma directly with his Gathering Storm, but later, he thought about it, and he didn’t know for sure if it would work or not. Kuma was very huge, and he walked with heavy footsteps. The power of his whirlwind may not blow him up, so he had to find another way. His second idea was to knock him up with Iori’s Uppercut move (100 Shiki: Oniyaki), but when it failed, he thought about attacking his legs in a close range to make him jump up.

Even though he has successfully hit Kuma, Ian was not happy at all, because just when he was slashing him with his sword, Ian found that Kuma’s body was extremely hard, and his blade wasn’t affecting him that much even with the bonus, so he could only shoot him down, in the end, Kuma didn’t have any serious wound.

‘So it’s not just his arms, please don’t tell me that he has been completely transformed to PX-0?’

Just as Ian thought about it, Kuma suddenly raised his upper body and sat up.

Ian’s heart was shocked, so he clenched his sword tightly in his hands again, but at this moment, Kuma suddenly said with his low voice: “Ian, you have grown a lot…”

Upon hearing this, Ian fell to the ground and said with a wry smile, “Uncle Kuma, you still remember me…”

“I’m sorry!” Kuma whispered: “I just wanted to test your current strength!”

“So you didn’t have to beat me that hard, do you?” Ian glanced at his injuries, his body was covered with black mud and blood.

“I didn’t fight you with all my strength!” Kuma said, “As you can see, my body is now undergoing a transformation, which is only half done, and my strength has also been affected.”

Ian wanted to smile bitterly again, but his mouth kept twitching. What was it like when he goes all-in in a fight?

Are these Shichibukai extremely strong?

After Ian’s sigh, Kuma continued: “You should know, Ian, you have been removed from the original targets of this attack. You have been eliminated from the target list by Garp and Sengoku, but I still came to you…”

“Why?” Ian asked in perplexed, then looked at a pile of rubble behind him, and said: “Even though, you didn’t have to destroy my new house, do you? I have just finished building it, just a couple of days ago…”

“Because our next conversation can’t be heard by anyone! That’s why I used Ursus Shock, to stun all your subordinates!” Kuma said in a lower voice: “I’m here to stop you from participating in the operation of robbing the tribute gold…”