One Piece: The Legendary Pirate

The floor trembled slightly every time Arex marched. The sand grains violently reacted to this phenomenon, which gave Darvy a rough estimate of just how dense and heavy this guy's muscles were.

"HAHAHA!!! Come at me, Darvy!!! What's keeping you long?!!"

Some slaves locked within cages of their own shuddered. They couldn't imagine themselves winning against this monster of a man named Arex, and pitied Darvy for his poor luck. He has overcome one impossible odd, only to face another that was even worse.

Darvy could see that no one expected him to win. Looking at Arex's huge fists, Darvy knew that even one proper hit would be a critical blow to him.

The idea of blinding him with light and sand was no longer applicable. Even if Arex didn't know this tactic, it probably wouldn't have worked due to the sheer difference in height between the two of them.

What then?

In silence, Darvy reached the wall full of weapons and shields. 

'High Doriki. Meaning high physical strength. Yet a relatively lower ranking than others around his Doriki level.'

With such a thought in his mind, Darvy first decided upon two knives.

'Muscles weigh more than lipids. The amount of muscles, at his size, reveals that his weight is tremendous—so much so that in return for gaining incredible strength, he lost agility.'

Of course, agility won't be enough for Darvy's knives to penetrate through those armor-like muscles. Furthermore, these thoughts of Darvy are, at this moment, nothing but speculations. There definitely was the possibility of his opponent proving him wrong.

Then, Darvy threw those knives across the arena, causing Arex to raise an eyebrow. Not stopping there, Darvy grabbed more knives and threw them all around, before finally settling with a mace.

"Oh?"

From the audience, Vallerina mumbled in curiosity,

"What's in your mind, Darvy?"

"...Hah?"

On the other hand, Arex frowned.

"Are you joking with me?"

The mace was heavy, especially so due to its weight being concentrated at the edge. Just trying to lift it up slightly above the ground caused Darvy's arms to tremble. Clearly, this was, instead of being the best, the worst choice for someone like Darvy to make, at least from everyone's perspective.

"A mace? You?!"

As if having lost it, Arex then placed his hand atop his eyes and laughed. He wasn't the only one as he did so, for he was joined by many Celestial Dragons who mocked Darvy's idiocy.

Ignoring them, Darvy dragged the mace across the sandy ground with his right hand.

"Hmph... I guess it's your freedom to choose how you want your end to be like."

"Foolish, but comedic. Quite a common device to lighten up the ending of a tragic novel, isn't it?"

Marchen commented from Vallerina's side, which was clearly meant to be heard by her. However, she didn't respond, with her eyes locked on Darvy alone.

Yes, she did see unlike the others.

Darvy's eyes—he intended to win.

"So,"

Finally, Darvy spoke, after the scene quietened down,

"When are you going to quit yapping and come at me?"

"...?"

Arex's face turned stoic. Then, he noticed as he looked into Darvy's eyes, his fearlessness.

"You..."

And Arex felt deeply insulted. How was it that he, with an evident superiority, didn't have his tiny enemy completely engulfed in fear?

Arex growled. He resumed his march, before it turned into a run, albeit slow. The sandy ground tremored even more violently and Darvy directly felt the vibration from the soles of his feet.

'...Here it comes.'

Grabbing the mace with both hands now, Darvy lowered his stance and got ready.

"Fine then—"

Arex then roared as he blasted his huge fist straight at Darvy,

"—DIE!!!"

'Now!!'

At the same time, Darvy swung his mace with his utmost strength, in a direction completely off. It was as if he didn't intend to hit Arex with it in the first place.

Then, due to the momentum of said mace, Darvy's feather-weight body was flung to the left along with it. Darvy, flying along with mace, then fell to the ground helplessly and, to the audience's point of view, miserably to some extent. Nevertheless, this motion enabled him to avoid Arex's fearsome punch that contained a surprising degree of explosive speed.

Arex's punch then struck the ground, and a sound akin to an explosion boomed throughout the arena. The sand arose, briefly covering Arex.

"Interesting."

Vallerina whispered. She almost seemed fascinated by Darvy's strategy.

"Turning your weakness into strength..."

"That weakness is too big for it to be turned into a strength."

Marchen disagreed, however.

"If that's all that he planned, nothing changes."

"Which I doubt."

Vallerina pointed out,

"There are knives that he threw all around."

Huffing, Darvy quickly rose, clenching the hilt of the mace as hard as he could.

Then, Arex rushed out of the sand cloud, roaring savagely as he cocked his fist back.

The ground quaked. The man's entire shadow loomed over Darvy. Darvy read that this man's eyes were darting to left and right as if trying to guess where Darvy was going to throw himself to dodge this time around.

Darvy brought his body into a swinging motion.

"THERE!"

Arex roared as he, instead of punching with his cocked back fist, slammed both fists on Darvy's left and right, who surprisingly didn't move. 

Some Celestial Dragons gasped. Many wondered—how Darvy remained unfazed as such fists struck the ground on his left and right.

"Idiot."

Without flinching or an ounce of fear, Darvy snorted as, with both fists down, Arex's huge face was now right in front of him.

In shock, Arex's eyes widened.

And Darvy proceeded to slam his mace straight onto one of Arex's eyes—the most vulnerable spots on his face.

"GAHHHH!!!"

The huge man roared as he immediately retreated, taking a few steps back while covering his ruptured eye that was bleeding profusely. The blood, flowing out of his huge hand, dripped onto the sandy ground.

Darvy, huffing and sweating profusely, had his arms shaking so hard from extreme stress. Knowing that he no longer had the strength to swing the mace as strongly, he let go of the mace and, leaning down, picked up a knife that was lying nearby.

"FUCKER!!!"

Arex roared and cursed as he lowered his arm, no longer bothering with a bloody hole in his left eye that was no longer there. His steps were unstable and it was clear that he had trouble maintaining a balance.

Thus, Arex accommodated. Lowering his arms, he got on the four. Just like that, he began to run at Darvy like the four-legged animals did.

At this moment, Arex was more of a beast than a human being.

Darvy, withstanding the quake of the ground, narrowed his eyes at the nearing Arex.

Being four-legged meant that Arex's vision narrowed, for he obscured himself from looking up. Furthermore, he was without an eye. Not only was he currently withstanding an excruciating pain, but also lacking a sense of distance, a function that is generally impaired without having both eyes.

In contrast, the acuity of Darvy's vision was one of his greatest perks. Though he didn't specifically plan all of this to happen, his quick decision-making allowed him to make the situation as favorable to him as possible.

Now, Arex was right in front of Darvy once again. Seeing that Darvy was without a mace, Arex didn't bother to think that Darvy would be able to dodge his attack, and swung his right fist.

However, due to a lack of an eye, he couldn't properly gauge the distance. Darvy, by backing swiftly, evaded a fist.

Roaring, Arex began to pummel his fists, alternating between left and right. With his legs propelling himself forward, he was now standing again—only that his balance was maintained thanks to the momentum that drove his body forth.

Darvy continued to back, dodging the frantic punches of Arex by an inch every time he did so. Sweating and clearly exhausted, Darvy was using all the energy he had just to make simple movements. Arex knew this and decided to continue this regular pattern of him punching and Darvy dodging.

Then, Darvy suddenly changed his behavior. On Arex's next punch, Darvy leaned down and lied flat to the ground. With Arex's body propelling forward from the built-up momentum that was hard to stop in an instant, his punches landed past Darvy, and his body continued moving, with Darvy having escaped through his legs, before seeing that right in front of him, there lied a wall.

Boom. It was a full-on crash of Arex straight on the hard wall, hard enough to make a few wince from the noise it generated.

Darvy saw this as a chance and seized it. Running toward Arex, who was currently unmoving, he held the knife with both hands with the intent to stab it into the man's ankle, which was the most accessible spot to him.

However, he didn't expect Arex to suddenly turn up in this state.

Time seemed to slow down. Darvy's eyes widened as he saw the huge fist in front of him at the next moment, and it was too late.

A jolt of pain arrived as Darvy's vision whitened. Arex's fist struck Darvy's entire torso. With an explosive sound, Darvy was sent flying, bleeding everywhere as he did so.

Then, he crashed into a wall, before sliding down and leaving a trail of blood.

"You... scoundrel...!!!"

Arex growled, enraged. Huffing as he did so, he stood up and slowly began to walk toward Darvy, wobbling as he did so.

"I'll kill you. I'll murder you in the most painful way possible. How dare you embarrass me like this?!!"

Clearly, it seemed to everyone that the match was over. With a single punch, Darvy was reduced to a state worse than a corpse that was rolling in a grave.

"It's over, Vallerina."

Shaking his head, Marchen closed his eyes.

However,

"Look."

Vallerina whispered, as she smiled in almost a scary manner, as if witnessing something that she yearned for.

"...Heh."

With his back leaning into a wall and his entire body bloody and injured, Darvy, with his equally crimson hair covering his eyes, grinned.

Then, he reached his trembling arms to the ground and pushed his body up. His entire body, having reached its limit, trembled so hard that it seemed almost as if he was convulsing.

However, his grin in this dire situation said otherwise. Even with a step into the gate named death, Darvy was fearless.

Through his hair, his eyes—daunting—were revealed. For some reason, Arex, looking into Darvy's eyes, felt a chill down his spine because he had never come across someone like this, someone who didn't fear death.

"Kill me? You?"

Blood dripped down from Darvy's body. Its color, being somewhere between red and black, looked to some as if a grim reaper was opening its mouth to engulf Darvy.

Arex growled as if trying to get rid of a foreign feeling that invaded his mind. Ignoring his body's injuries, he began to speed up, though limping.

Slowly leaning down, Darvy grabbed a knife nearby and lifted it.

Screaming words that Darvy couldn't understand, Arex threw a punch at him.

'...Really, there is no way.'

He didn't have enough energy to formulate a specific way to win. That meant that the only option left for him... was to gamble.

Darvy saw the motion of Arex's punch. Predicting its path, Darvy raised his left arm and brought the knife straight onto the path.

At the next moment, the blood was drawn from both sides. The knife penetrated straight into Arex's knuckle, causing immense pain. On the other hand, Darvy's left arm's bones shattered into pieces upon the impact, and said arm powerlessly flew around his shoulder, disfigured in an unsightly way. Nevertheless, through this motion, the impact of Arex's punch didn't transmit onto Darvy's whole body, keeping him alive.

"GAHHHHH!!!!"

There was Arex's scream, with his knife-embedded fist shaking and him falling to his knees.

"Hahahaha..."

Contrastingly, Darvy grinned as if unable to register the pain.

Walking slowly to Arex, who was occupied with the pain, Darvy slowly reached for the knife in his fist and slammed his fist down on the protruding hilt, causing Arex's scream to intensify before he aimlessly flailed his huge arms around.

However, none of those arms hit Darvy, as Darvy was extremely close to Arex, far closer than the reach of the latter's arms. Leaning down, he grabbed a knife—one he lost his grip of back when he was punched by Arex.

And then, he proceeded to stab Arex's exposed heart, only to realize that it was too shallow due to the man's muscles.

Then came Arex's punch on Darvy's side, at a point-blank range. Due to Darvy being very close to Arex, Arex's inward punch was naturally weaker. It still generated a flinching noise, and a loud cracking sound was heard in Darvy's body as the blood splattered, but Darvy, this time around, withstood.

Darvy then raised his arm again and stabbed Arex in the same spot, deepening the stab—but still not enough.

Arex, recognizing the lethality of the situation, raised his fine hand and again, punched Darvy.

Boom.

And that wasn't the end.

Boom. Boom. Boom. Over and over, Arex punched Darvy.

However, something was strange. Darvy's entire body was getting torn and shredded apart, but somehow, his thin and frail body was still moving within this bombardment.

"S-STOP!!!"

Finally, at last, Arex shrieked in fear. His punches were weakening from stress and exhaustion, while Darvy was yet going for his heart.

A third stab to the heart. Arex puked blood, feeling the deep pain in his chest.

"S-Stop..."

His arm loosened as the nausea overtook him. Then, a fourth stab came. Slowly, the knife was pulled out. Then, a fifth stab came. His body fell to his back. Walking up to it, Darvy stabbed again—a sixth stab came. Then, pull out again.

Then, seventh. Darvy successfully reached the heart, and Arex was not responding to it.

Yes, the man was dead.

Slowly, Darvy raised his body. He looked around at the shocked audience of Celestial Dragons and slaves.

Doriki of 3 vs 600? The fight will be over in an instant? He is weak?

Darvy proved them all wrong.

With a satisfied smile, Darvy fell to the side, signalling an end to the battle.

There was a silence after. Then, there was an uproar as Celestial Dragons erupted in excitement.

"That..."

On the other hand, Figarland Garling, who was also one of the watchers, frowned as he muttered,

"...Armament Haki?"