One Piece Fan Fiction ❯ Cursed Island of the Devil Fruit Gods ❯ Light and Darkness ( Chapter 34 )

Chapter 34: Light and Darkness

 

The battle between Zoro and Kagemaru had become less a battle and more of a round of torture for the Straw Hat's first mate. "I'll cut your heart out and eat it!" Zoro snarled at Kagemaru, though Zoro was breathing hard and sweating heavily, while Kurotenshu was standing still, not fazed at all by any of Zoro's actions.

"Don't you know when to give up? Though you do have plenty of stamina, I'll give you that. Maybe I should test your limits, just for fun." Kagemaru chuckled. Gripping his shadowy blade with both hands, he thrust it downward into his own shadow.

Zoro's instincts kicked in and he sensed danger from outside the range of his vision. He jumped forward, narrowly avoiding Kagemaru's blade, which had traveled into Kagemaru's shadow and came back out of Zoro's. It extended up out of the shadow so high, it would have pierced through his foot and up into his leg if he hadn't avoided it.

As Zoro moved so did his shadow, and Kagemaru's blade faded into dark dust. However, that did not stop him from forming a brand new one from his hand as though it hadn't been damaged or lost at all. "Ah, you saw it coming. Shishou must have prepared you for that. I didn't know she'd intended for you to fight me, I thought she knew no one would ever dare stand up to me and live to tell about it. But all she did was ensure that you won't have a painless death. Some nice parting gift she gave to you, wasn't it? Well, you can thank her for that in about five minutes. After that I'll be too bored with you to want to keep you alive any longer." he chided.

"Do you EVER shut up?" Zoro gritted his teeth.

"Well, I don't like to talk to myself. So once you're dead, I'll stop talking." Kagemaru retorted, and conjured a second shadowy blade. "Try dodging two at once!"

He slashed out sideways, aiming at Zoro's midsection. It was blocked, but the second went straight into the ground, preparing to jut up underneath Zoro again. Zoro saw this coming and leapt back, hoping to avoid it again, but Kagemaru still had one blade left, and now he knew exactly where Zoro was going to land. He thrust the second blade into his shadow and watched as Zoro struggled vainly to navigate himself in the air enough to avoid it. He did so as best he could, but still managed to get a bad slice through the side of his foot.

Zoro cried out in pain and fell over. Those shadow blades hurt worse than regular swords, and he didn't know why. Apparently the look on his face was enough to get Kagemaru to explain.

"Shadows aren't just the absence of light, weakling. Not mine, anyway. The shadows have existed for longer than any living thing. They've collected everything, good, bad, hot, cold, solid and untouchable, and are the absolute essence of that which is impure. It's like venomous steel, releasing all the wretchedness they've absorbed into anything they touch. That's why they hurt so very badly. Even a light wound hurts thrice as much. And the pain will endure for twice as long." he laughed.

Zoro just knelt with his head lowered, panting, teeth clenched too hard to speak. All he could do was spit in disgust at his own weakness and helplessness. He struggled to get up, balancing himself with his swords and hoping to be able to continue the fight, but failing and dropping back to his knees. He was fatigued and weakened going into battle and it had only worsened as it dragged on fruitlessly. And still he had no idea how to defeat Kagemaru. His anger was blinding him to any of Shishou's teachings, though he had barely understood any of them in the first place. "I will...never...let you win..." Zoro coughed.

"But I've already won, are you too stupid to see that? I'm just toying with you now. But I was wrong...it hasn't been five minutes yet and I'm bored with you already. Prepare to die." Kagemaru began moving foward, making one of his blades disappear, needing only one to finish off his quarry. "Should I cut your head off? No, too quick. Maybe I should slice you open and watch your insides fall out...mmm, that one is a definite possibility. Or maybe I should cut off all your limbs and let the high tide come in and drown you..." he circled around the immobile Zoro, who was still losing blood. “I can try to keep from bleeding to death so you can spend your last moments in horror and torment.”

“Even if it kills me, I will see you dead. I was to be the greatest swordsman in the world before I died, but I don't care about that anymore. You have to pay, and I would rather die than see you get away with all this!” Zoro whispered, clenching his teeth and trembling. Even against Mr. 1, who he couldn't damage with all his strength and steel, had fallen to Zoro's blades. But Kagemaru wouldn't be susceptible to the Lion's Song. He had no weaknesses. Not even Shishou could defeat him. At this point, Zoro had to admit to himself that this was all bravado.

"Oh, the hell with it. I'll just scalp you!" Kagemaru drew back his sword, to slice off the top of Zoro's head from behind.

"Oh, no you don't!" Tashigi interrupted. She had finally made it, her sword drawn and ready to battle Kagemaru.

Kagemaru flinched, shielding his eyes from the burst of sunlight shining on Tashigi's blade. “Tch…insects always run in swarms.” He sneered.

Tashigi moved closer, the light on her sword intensifying more and more the way she was holding it, reflecting the sunlight into Kagemaru's face. Zoro whirled around, amazed to see her, and even more amazed to see what had happened to Kagemaru's face. The shadows had faded from it slightly, his eyes were now normal, no longer the illusionary glowing red. That was Zoro's change and he knew it. With one quick stroke, Zoro reached up as far as he could and slashed Wado Ichimonji across Kagemaru's eyes. There was a piercing shriek, and Kagemaru began to roar.

"I'm blind! You maggots, you filth, I'm blind!" he sounded almost like he was crying, and he fell to his knees clutching his face.

Tashigi ran over to Zoro, helping him to his feet. "Are you all right?" she asked him.

"Why do you care?" he asked her, re-arming himself with his three swords.

"Shishou." was her only answer.

He softened slightly. "Did she tell you about that?" he pointed at the still writhing Kagemaru.

"What do you mean?" she was confused.

"I think we've just found his weakness." Zoro smiled.

 

Robin and Smoker maintained their footing against Tomoshibi. “Something tells me you're the weakest of the Shinigami.” Robin smiled.

“H-how dare you?!” Tomoshibi said indignantly, turning red in spite of her otherwise white-light complexion. “Just because I'm a woman, you're taking me lightly? Big mistake!” she growled, losing her cool.

“All the noise the others are making, and you've barely made a move at all. Seems to me that makes you the weakest.” Smoker interjected. “But in all seriousness, I am a Marine Captain and I would advise you to surrender before things get too out of hand. Now…” he drew his cane tipped with a Sea Stone. “This can rob you of your power if it touches you. And there's two of us, and one of you. I don't think you're dumb enough not to be able to do the math and see that your odds aren't great.”

Tomoshibi was now glowing bright red. She threw her hands up in the air. “I'll kill you both where you stand!” she shrieked. Her body became translucent and a pillar of light erupted from her, going all the way up to the sun in the sky. As before when she had used the power of the sun's rays to eradicate the vegetation around their battleground, she was once again going to use it to vaporize Robin and Smoker in one attack.

Robin was speechless. She had no idea how to avoid the attack, and there was no way either of them could run out of range in time. “Nico Robin.” Smoker put his hand on her shoulder. “Get close to me.”

Robin didn't know what he was suggesting but didn't see why not to agree with him. “Take a deep breath and hold it.” He said to her before going silent. She wasn't sure why he had asked her to do that but sucked in a deep breath and held onto it. She felt like closing her eyes but Smoker's face made her too curious to turn away. His hair turned from chalky gray to jet black, as did the rest of his face. She couldn't very well ask what he was doing with her breath held, but he did give her one last warning. “Close your eyes and cover your nose while you're at it.”

She did so, now suffering from terrible curiosity. She had heard of Smoker's reputation and knew that with his Devil Fruit power that he was just one step away from becoming a Supreme Admiral if one of the three were to fall in battle, but she had never heard of him doing anything like this with his power before.

Smoker's entire body became that of smoke, but this time it wasn't merely a mass of fog, it was thick, acrid smoke like that of a chemical fire. That was why he had told Robin to close her eyes and cover her nose. The smoke expanded from his body two meters in every direction, completely engulfing Robin and making discerning his body from the smoke impossible. Just as Tomoshibi's devastating light ray came crashing down upon them, the smoke formed into the shape of a dome and was still visible as utter darkness even as the light bombarded it.

Tomoshibi was laughing maniacally, convinced she had eradicated them, but as the light cleared and the ground stopped smoking from the heat, she felt her breath catch in her throat. The dome of darkness remained, and Nico Robin stepped out of it, followed by Smoker. They were both completely unharmed. “No! Impossible! That's completely impossible!” she dug her fingernails into her hand so hard it drew blood.

“Nothing impossible about it. On a foggy day or when an intense fire rages, they both block out the sun. If I'm not mistaken that seems to be the main source of your power. If we can find something that defeats the sun's power, or we take away the sun, you're powerless.” Smoker explained.

Robin's eyes were still watering and she was coughing, but she had a satisfied grin on her face. “Smoker-san…I think we can use our powers together to do just that.” She laughed.

“Bitch!” Tomoshibi snarled, wrapping herself in an invisible tangle of light and slapping Robin as hard as she could. Robin merely continued laughing and crossed her arms. Within moments, dozens, then hundreds of arms, with length from the shoulder to the fingers, appeared out of the ground.

“You're right, I am a bitch. After what I'm going to do to you, I'm really going to deserve being called that by a lowly hag like you.” Robin opened her slightly reddened eyes and began to crack her knuckles. “Now, Smoker-san!”

Smoker's body began giving out more and more of the black, light-consuming smoke and started racing around the edge of the battlefield, leaving thick clouds of it all around. “Let's shut down her power!” he agreed, pumping out more of it the longer he ran.

“Cien Fleur…Fan Dance!” Robin nodded. Suddenly all of the arms she had summoned began to twirl and spin, like a hundred fans blowing upwards all at once. The smoke began to rise, filling the air with thickening black fog, rising higher and higher, growing darker and darker as it began to enshroud the battlefield.

“No! What the hell do you think you're doing?! You…you can't…that's cheating!” Tomoshibi protested, fearing that she may have bitten off more than she could chew.

“Now I know you're the weakest. But on the bright side, this is giving me a pretty big headache.” Robin laughed, as a slight trickle of blood began to drip from one of her nostrils. “It's not easy controlling this many hands at once.”

“Keep it up, Nico Robin!” Smoker began shooting out smoke from his arms now that he'd worn himself out from running, as her fan-hands were working at full power.

The sun was starting to fade behind the black curtain of smoke, until it was no longer visible at all from where they were standing. “Now we can finish this.” Robin rubbed her hands together eagerly. Half of her fan-hands vanished, the rest continued pumping Smoker's fog into the air.

“No! Stay away from me, lowly commoner! A Shinigami is invincible! You cannot lay a hand on me no matter what you do!” Tomoshibi began to rant hysterically. She had never been in a position of such weakness before. “Just try and land a hit!”

Robin slapped her across the face. It connected sharply. Tomoshibi was no longer able to become intangible. “N…No…” she whimpered, backing off.

“I'm going to enjoy knocking some sense into that dumb blonde head of yours.” Robin approached her ominously. “And I'm going to test out something I've been wanting to try ever since I saw Luffy do it.”

“Huh?” Smoker turned around, not sure what Robin was going to do.

“Diez Fleur Gatling Gun!” Robin put up both fists. Ten arms sprouted from Tomoshibi's shoulders, arms and chest, and before she knew it, all ten of them were pummeling her in the face.

“Thank you, Nico Robin. I really wouldn't have liked being the one to have to strike a woman, regardless of how evil she may be.” Smoker halted his production of black fog.

Tomoshibi, her face swollen and bloody, her eyes rolling back in her head, fell to her knees. “M-master…” she sobbed. She suddenly began to sound like she was choking. “N-no…Master, please, I…I can still win…I haven't failed you in a thousand years, I deserve another chance…no, please…” she appeared to be begging to someone or something Robin and Smoker could not see.

“You're beaten. Now surrender.” Robin demanded.

“NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!” Tomoshibi cried, only this was no ordinary cry. It sounded as though a great beast was lurking beneath her feminine form. Robin and Smoker braced themselves for whatever great surprise may have been waiting for them, but there was nothing beyond that roar. Tomoshibi merely stood up, reaching out to the sky as if begging for mercy, before her body began to stiffen, and her skin became transparent, as did her clothing and hair. In moments, her body had become a glass statue, her face frozen in fear, pain and sadness.

“So, this is the fate of the Shinigami. Whoever this master of theirs is, he is not a merciful one. I hope Luffy is having less difficulty with him than the rest of us would.” Robin panted. That last effort had taken a lot out of her.

“We should regroup with the others and help them. Even though I'm feeling exhausted from using my powers like that.” Smoker agreed.

“I'm going to check on the three in the forest. You should check up on Tashigi. I think she went in that direction.” Robin pointed Smoker towards the battlefield where Zoro and Kagemaru were fighting.

“Right. You fight well with a team. I never thought the woman who brought a curse to every crew she joined would have that talent.” He complimented her.

“And I never would have thought you could team up with and protect a pirate during a fight.” She winked.

They both split up and headed off to find their respective protectees before it was too late.