Head

"Uorororororo...well played, boy. It seems that the rumors regarding your ability to mimic Devil Fruits weren't exaggerated. That's the ability of Fire Fist Ace, isn't it?" asked Kaido, coiling his body in a manner that reminded Vahn of Shenlong. As he did, a mix of cold and hot air swirled around him, causing the already overcast sky to darken, becoming storm clouds.

"In a manner of speaking..." responded Vahn, the flames rising from his hands congealing into golden spheres that rotated with extreme speed, forming a disc of dense, plasma-like Ki and flames that burned in excess of 5,000 degrees.

Ostensibly unconcerned by Vahn's actions, Kaido did not attempt to stop him. Instead, he continued coiling his body, strengthening his storm as he questioned, "Why have you come here? Even if it is to kill me, what do you hope to accomplish outside of increasing your fame?"

Shaking his head, Vahn answered, "Killing you is neither my intention nor my right. I'm here to send a message and hopefully get you to see reason and change your ways. If you can't, I will become a nightmare that haunts you to your final breath."

"You want me to change my ways...?" asked Kaido, a hint of incredulity in his deep, exceptionally raspy tone as it sounded like Vahn was attempting to bring him and the Beast Pirates to heel.

"I want you to stand for something. To be more than a beast: a man..." stated Vahn, punctuating his words by flinging the saucers in his hand, starting with the right and then spinning to fling the left diagonally with a backhand.

"Ha! As if a snot-nosed brat like you knows a single thing about what it means to be a man...!" bellowed Kaido, surging forward with considerable momentum and no fear. As far as he could tell, there was no Haki within the two fiery discs, so he didn't believe they could slice through his nearly indestructible scales. They were also incredibly small—at least compared to his colossal frame.

Surprising even Vahn, the first disc he threw cut cleanly through a section of Kaido's left bull-shaped horn, while the second left a cauterized trench down the center of his forehead. Had his aim been truer and a few meters lower, it might have cut a cauterized path directly into his brain.

'Holy crap...the Kienzan is no joke...' thought Vahn, his expression briefly exhibiting his incredulity as, while he believed the spinning energy discs would damage Kaido, he didn't consider that they would slice through his scales or hardened horns cleanly.

"Excellent! You should aim for my heart next time...!" exclaimed Kaido, his unexpected brush with death only making him more excited as he opened his colossal maw wide and attempted to swallow Vahn whole. The latter considered permitting this, certain he could do considerable damage from within Kaido's body, but the overwhelming stench of alcohol and halitosis compelled him to teleport at the last moment.

"Hmmmgh!?"

Sensing Vahn's presence disappear and then reappear behind him, Kaido twisted his colossal, elongated body as quickly as he could to look back, but as intimidating as a three-kilometer-long Dragon was, being so large was a severe impediment against an opponent that was not only fast but could fly and teleport.

Confirming it was the Kienzan that was busted and not a general lack of resistance against Ki-based attacks on Kaido's part, Vahn bombarded the former's Dragon form with a barrage of spherical Ki attacks. Each one was strong enough to level a small house or topple a building if struck on their supports, but they didn't so much as singe the black fur lining the ridge of Kaido's elongated back.

"BLAH—!"

Not expecting Kaido to attempt a second breath attack, Vahn briefly found himself enveloped by the former's flames, obscuring his vision and pushing him back as if caught in a powerful stream. Fortunately, he didn't need his eyes to perceive his surroundings, allowing him to tuck and turn his body sideways as the flame breath dissipated, immediately followed by King attempting to slice him at the waist with a hypersonic, bifurcating slash attack.

"You'll need to do better than that if you want to surprise me...!" bellowed Vahn, his borrowed Saiyan heritage compelling him to smile as adrenaline and other chemicals permeated his brain and body.

Surprised by Vahn's sudden burst of speed, King briefly found himself on the aerial backfoot as the former hammered him with a swift barrage that left the muscles and bones in his crossed arms straining.

"Get out of the way, King...!" shouted Kaido, giving his subordinate little time to follow his order before he appeared next to him and Vahn in his hybrid Zoan form, granting him an extraordinarily muscular physique with his legs, arms, shoulders, back, and parts of his face and chest covered in azure blue scales. His legs had converted from plantigrade to digitigrade, giving him extraordinary speed and leaping power, and a long, serpentine tail and antlers grew from his head, traits borrowed from his larger Dragon counterpart.

'This is going to hurt...' thought Vahn, the thought itself occurring after Kaido had struck him with a glossy black spiked mace, notably infused with both Armament and Conqueror's Haki. Amethyst purple and black, crimson-hued lightning burst forth from his body, which, due to the force behind Kaido's blow, conformed around the man's spiked mace before he was abruptly sent flying fast enough to ignite the atmosphere and leave behind a prominent streak.

"Divine Thunder...!" bellowed Kaido, his powerful voice resonating through the surrounding space like a statement to the world itself, utterly ignoring the restriction of conventional sound broadcasting at 1,235km/h.

'Yeah, this really fucking hurts...' thought Vahn, virtually every bone in his body shattered and all his senses but his perception through his domain momentarily nonfunctioning due to much of his nervous system and brain being destroyed. Unfortunately for Kaido, even destroying his head wasn't enough to force his respawn, so even after being sent crashing into the distant sea outside of Wano, producing a plume of water and steam more than two hundred meters tall, Vahn regenerated from golden flames and emerged unharmed, albeit with phantom pain that made his muscles and bones feel tense.

"Oh, wow..." muttered Vahn, getting his first look at Wano from outside the country, encircled by tall and thin moss and tree-covered rock formations that jutted up from a whirlpool-ridden sea. Powerful winds, thick mist, and perpetual storms plagued the area, but that was to be expected when the entirety of the elevated, closed-off landmass was encircled by sheer cliffs and waterfalls nearly ten kilometers in height.

Rising from the sea to avoid being crushed by a wave nearly sixty meters tall, Vahn's tail flicked behind him as he flew toward the rim of Wano with extreme speed, overtaking it in under four seconds, even without turning his body to light. Once he had, he noticed Kaido coiling around Yasaka in his Long form, but while he had succeeded in entangling her, she had him pinned to the ground by her right paw and was on the verge of tearing out his throat like a fox battling an ordinary snake.

"Unhand Master Kaido, you foul creature...!" bellowed King, descending from the sky and dropping his flaming sword onto Yasaka's neck with the intent of decapitating her but failing to do more than singe her luminous golden fur before she flicked one of her nine tails like a whip, producing a sound akin to a thunderclap and sending him reeling hundreds of meters, nearly plummeting into the sea.

Unable to transform due to Yasaka's teeth clamping down on him, Kaido constricted around her with all his might, hoping to suffocate or at least inhibit her movements. Instead, his actions caused Yasaka's fangs to sink deeper into him as she threatened, "Cease your struggles, pretender, lest I tear your throat out and allow your blood to flow like a waterfall."

Hearing Yasaka's voice, Kaido, both surprised and impressed, remarked, "You're quite strong for a woman..."

"She is, isn't she...?" hummed Vahn, appearing in the air a short distance from where Yasaka was biting down on Kaido's throat, placing him within the view of the colossal Dragon.

"I take it this is one of your allies?" asked Kaido, surprisingly calm despite his predicament. He could sense that Yasaka had no desire to kill, only to restrain him, so while he continued attempting to wrest himself free, there was no urgency in his actions.

"She's much more than that..." responded Vahn, giving Yasaka a nod that caused her entire body to flash gold before she teleported free of Kaido's constriction. As she did, Kaido immediately shrank into his hybrid form, his left hand reaching up to clasp his bloodied throat, bearing puncture marks on both sides.

Touching down a short distance from Kaido's position, Vahn remarked, "That last attack of yours was something. I'm pretty sure you turned my organs to pulp and broke every bone in my body."

"Yet here you stand before me...grinning and completely uninjured..." countered Kaido, his crimson eyes narrowing and a bout of confusion washing over him when he saw golden blood spontaneously burst from the sides of Vahn's neck before vaporizing. At the same time, the pain in his neck faded, compelling him to touch it a second time, confirming that his bleeding had stopped and his wounds had disappeared.

"We're nowhere near finished..." said Vahn, grinning toothily, balling his hands into fists, and rising a few centimeters from the ground as golden Touki erupted from his body.

"I see..." muttered Kaido, adopting a fierce, fanged smile as he hoisted his nearly six-meter-long spiked club onto his right shoulder and adopted a squatting pose with his left hand extended and his tail flicking behind him. The only things he relished as much as a good battle were sex and booze, so even if he felt fury at the core of his being from being manhandled by Yasaka, he was more than willing to accompany Vahn for as long as he or the land beneath them could endure...

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[Nine Hours Later]

"This is never-ending..." remarked Kaido, his blue-scaled body covered in multiple bloody wounds and his breathing labored as Vahn, despite being beaten to a bloodied pulp within an enormous crater, regenerated, flipped onto his feet, and made a show of loosening the joints in his shoulders as he smiled and responded, "I have never lost a battle of attrition. Probably because I train my stamina at least a hundred hours each day..."

"Hmph...what nonsense are you on about now...?" asked Kaido, holding his club upside down by the handle and embedding it into the ground before abruptly taking a seat. By that point, many of the higher-ranking members of his crew had gathered to reinforce him aboard enormous galleons, but the ruined port was inaccessible due to a translucent, blue, dome-shaped barrier that endured everything they threw at it, including a bombardment on par with an island-destroying Buster Call.

"Are we taking a break...?" asked Vahn, floating toward Kaido and allowing his golden aura to disperse before sitting cross-legged a few meters from the remarkably burly man. Due to his size gradually increasing throughout their battle, however, they were around eye level with each other as Vahn produced what he thought was a large sake cup, only to find it barely fit in the palm of his hand.

"Hmm? I noticed it during our battle, but you can pull and put away items from thin air...?" asked Kaido, having long accepted that Vahn wasn't there to kill him, allowing him to lower his guard without care.

After quickly purchasing a much larger set of sake cups, Vahn produced them, telekinetically floated one to Kaido, and answered, "So long as it's something that can be imagined, there's very little I can't do. During our next bout, I think I'll try borrowing your hybrid form and seeing how mine compares."

"Uororororo...that should be interesting..." affirmed Kaido, extending the cup in his hand as Vahn produced a 2000-liter barrel of sake, leading to the two sharing drinks and enough food to feed a hundred normal-sized people before continuing their battle with renewed vigor...

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