“We’re killing a clown?” Dante asked. “What do you mean?”
“I’m more interested in why.” Maxwell said. “What did this clown do, exactly?”
“I mean, a clown to deserve a death sentence,” Mike chimed in. “Means that he wasn’t very good clown. Or maybe I’m wrong and he was good. Too good. And other clowns want him gone.”
“I think you all are ignoring the most glaring question.” Darios said. “Are you doing well, David? Where did you sight this clown?”
I sighted. They weren’t letting me explain. “Darios, you too? Aren’t you supposed to be the eldest among us? Don’t encourage them.”
“Well, we’re in the middle of nowhere.” Darios said with a knowing smile. “We're quite short of entertainment and you brought up a clown. We’re ought to be left with some questions. It’s only natural.”
Despite his current appearance, Darios was an old man. A wise and kind old man, judging from the short time I had spent with him. And he cared great deal about others. I knew what he meant. The team needed some distraction. To take their mind off the past long gone and focus on the future ahead. The one that, hopefully, wouldn't be as grim and cruel. I wished to make that better future the new reality.
“You idiots are joking, but this seems serious.” Oliver turned to me. “Are you going to transform a titan into a clown?”
“Wait, really?” Mike asked. “Isn’t he going to end up like us, then? Why kill him?”
“Friends, how about we let the man explain.” Wilhelm said. “And David. Are you intentionally starting those speeches in the most absurd way possible? You get some twisted amusement with making us listen those geniuses bicker, don’t you? Please just get it over with. Thank you in advance.”
“Alright, fine.” I raised my hands. “You got me, I’ll explain it properly.”
And when the group finally calmed down, I began. “What do you guys know about piracy?”
---
“Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!” Maxwell screamed as he sprinted through the forest on his unicycle, with a titan in tow. “Why the hell did I sign up for this!?”
“Why is he screaming?” Wilhelm asked. “Can't he just turn around and kill it?”
“I’m not sure.” Darios shrugged. “Maybe he has yet to process how unbelievable stronger he is now. And superhuman or not, not faltering when something that large chasing you down takes a man with a certain character.”
We were standing in the direction that Maxwell was running, near a small pond that was deep enough to submerge an average man above their waist.
The plan was simple. Bring a titan near the pond, mark it as a vessel and make sure that its corpse was in the pond after we killed it.
All of this, to make sure Buggy wouldn’t pull something on us.
Despite Buggy being a joke of sorts for the straw hats, he was a more than enough threat to us. His subordinates’ forms that Dante and Maxwell have taken were obviously not enough to overcome him, and even Zoro's form would be incapable of killing him due to his Devil Fruit. He was a tricky opponent, and therefore the best way to go around defeating him was to incapacitate him from the get go, before he had chance to activate his ability.
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Maybe I was being paranoid and overestimating him, but I didn’t want to take chances with someone like him. If he somehow slipped away from my grasp, next thing we knew, he might end up overthrowing the government of the Walls and become the next founding titan.
I was definitely being paranoid. Probably. It didn’t matter. The plan was already in motion.
“Move your asses, guys!” Maxwell shouted. “Some help would be appreciated here!”
As Maxwell approached closer, and the titan’s body became more distinguishable, I realized why Maxwell was so freaked out.
“It’s an abnormal!” I shouted and stepped forward to intercept the titan earlier than planned. “Dante, cover me. Those guys can be especially troublesome to deal with.”
The titan was running on its fours, and Maxwell could barely stay out of its reach. It would leap at him from time to time with a rapid speed, and would collide with trees. If not for that impatience, Maxwell would have probably been caught already.
“Maxwell, get ready!”
When the distance between us became half a dozen or so meters, I had Merry make his move.
Charged with aura, he shot forward, going through the flesh and bones, ripping off the leg of the titan.
It fell, and Maxwell turned around, maneuvering his unicycle with an inhuman level of skill, and drawing his sword. His strength wasn’t enough to cut off the titan’s wrist in a single slash, but it was enough to definger its right arm. When the titan mindlessly brought its hand forward to grab him, Maxwell jumped, meeting it head on and cutting three of its fingers in a single strike, followed by index and a thumb with a downward slash.
At that point, I was already upon the creature with Dante next to me, when it jumped once again, almost swallowing Maxwell whole. He managed to dodge, but the suddenness of the attack made him fall of off his unicycle.
“Now!”
Dante moved the moment I gave the sign, cracking the whip towards the titan. The giant face that was about to descend on the frozen Maxwell was slapped away. The strike drew blood, and shattered the giant teeth it came in contact with. It gave enough time for Maxwell to stand up, and for me to charge Merry with aura again.
While the titan was about to turn its rage towards Dante, I had already reached its torso. Quickly, I touched its side and flowed aura into its body, marking the titan as a vessel for Buggy.
“You two, get back!” I shouted the moment I was done and immediately drew back. Then, Merry descended, breaking through the bones of the titan’s second leg. “We need it in the water!”
All three of us retreated while the titan crawled after us. Meanwhile, Merry followed right behind it, flying near its head.
You’d expect for the thing to struggle with no longer functional legs, but the bastard was dragging himself forward with surprising force and anger. It was glaring at us with exaggeratedly furrowed brows and furious gaze like we had committed a grave sin against it.
I jumped into the water, while the two went sideways; far enough to not bring the titan’s attention to themselves while near enough to jump in in case something unexpected happened.
Fortunately, that didn’t happen. The titan merrily followed me in the water, and Merry choose that moment to descend once more with great force and tear through the titan, this time though, through its nape.
The hunt for the vessel was finished.
With the titan dead, the mark on it automatically activated and its body began to shrink. The vessel slowly took the form of the man and the legend himself.
Meanwhile, I climbed out of the pond. Other members of the group approached now that we were clear. Buggy wouldn’t be able to pull off anything like that.
“So, we just wait?” Maxwell asked.
“You can jump in, if you wish.” Dante said, before turning to me. “Just how strong is that guy that we had to go through all this length?”
“It’s not as much about his strength. He’s just too much of a trouble to deal with.” I replied. “Don’t get me wrong, compared to us, he is strong. If you two fight him in your current form, it would be like kids taking on a grown man. But like I said, the main problem is that he’s got a tricky power.”
“The situation’s that bad huh?”
“Then it’s good that we don’t have to worry about taking him head on.” Darios said.
“He’s that strong, yet he still carries a moniker of a clown.” Wilhelm noted. “I can’t even imagine what sorts of monsters we might encounter in the future.”
Mike was about to say something, but his words were cut short by a sudden scream.
“What the hell?! What have you imbeciles done to me?!”