70: Chapter 70 Physical Decomposition of the Six Styles

Fierce winds, mixed with icy torrential rain, poured into this luxurious train compartment through the shattered soundproof door without any obstruction.

Rice stepped over the scattered mahogany fragments and shattered crystal glass, his bronze-colored torso radiating a terrifying, intense heat.

The moment the rainwater touched his skin, it was instantly evaporated by his immense body heat into white steam.

Blue electrostatic arcs danced at high frequency along the texture of his pectoral muscles, emitting crackling physical blasts.

Inside the compartment.

Rob Lucci remained seated on the tattered leather sofa.

The pigeon on his shoulder felt the terrifying biological aura radiating from Rice, spread its wings in panic, and flew out through the shattered window into the storm.

Lucci stood up slowly, raised his finger clad in a black leather glove, and gently brushed the wood chips off his suit jacket.

His eyes revealed a condescending arrogance, the absolute self-confidence solidified after experiencing cruel human modification training, belonging to the intelligence hub of the World Government.

"One person, single-handedly killing through all the guards on this entire train."

Lucci, with his hands in his suit pockets, spoke in an indifferent tone.

"Your physical output is indeed astonishing. Your muscle density and bone hardness exceed the physiological limits of conventional carbon-based organisms. However, a beast is ultimately just a beast. Pure accumulation of flesh cannot mask the poverty of technique. Faced with the Rokushiki, which has been refined over hundreds of years and born specifically for slaughter, your simple brute force is meaningless."

Kaku pushed up his square nose and gripped the hilts of his two samurai swords with both hands.

Fukuro unzipped his mouth and emitted a shrill, mocking laugh.

Kumadori brandished his tin staff, his long pink hair flying wildly in the gale.

Rice stood ten meters away from Lucci.

His black eyes swept across these four CP9 agents.

Rice had long since engraved the Rokushiki into his own muscle memory and mastered it through countless violent physical collisions.

He didn't need to learn the basics at all; what he needed was to observe how these professional killing agents developed niche branches of the Rokushiki, using them as a physical whetstone for the evolution of his own martial arts.

"Killing techniques?"

Rice twisted his thick neck, his cervical vertebrae making a creaking friction sound.

"Let those fancy moves test the hardness of this body. By the way, provide a little evolutionary data for my own Rokushiki."

Fukuro launched the first attack.

His round body suddenly crouched down.

The muscles in his legs completed extreme contraction within milliseconds, and the soles of his feet stomped on the mahogany floor dozens of times at an extremely high frequency.

[Rokushiki: Soru].

Fukuro's figure instantly vanished from the spot, breaking the limits of human retinal capture.

Rice did not move his gaze.

His Observation Haki was like an invisible electromagnetic radar network, covering the entire floor of the compartment.

He clearly perceived the microscopic physical vibrations coming from the mahogany floor.

Fukuro used the massive reaction force generated by the soles of his feet rubbing against the ground to forcibly propel his body to break the sound barrier.

However, Fukuro's stomping point was not vertical but had a slight inclination angle; this inclination sacrificed some linear speed but granted the body more flexible changing capabilities.

A sharp whistle came from the air.

Fukuro's massive body appeared in Rice's left visual blind spot.

He swung his thick right arm.

[Rokushiki: Shigan].

The fist, carrying heavy kinetic energy, smashed toward Rice's temple.

Rice didn't even turn his head.

His left hand instantly raised, precisely blocking the outside of his temple.

His palm opened.

Bang!

Fukuro's heavy fist smashed hard into Rice's palm.

A dull sound of physical collision erupted.

Rice's left arm was like a load-bearing pillar cast from pig iron, not moving a single bit.

The massive impact force was forcibly absorbed by his formidable bone density and conducted to the floor beneath his feet.

The wooden floor collapsed with a boom, creating a deep pit.

"The power is too weak. However, I'll accept the inclination angle data you added during the force-generation phase of 'Soru'."

Rice's five fingers suddenly closed, like a hydraulic clamp, locking onto Fukuro's fist tightly.

He applied force with his knuckles, roughly contracting inward.

Crack.

A hair-raising sound of bone cracking rang out.

Fukuro's pride-and-joy finger bones and metacarpals suffered comminuted fractures under Rice's terrifying grip strength.

White bone shards pierced through the skin, and blood flowed out.

Fukuro let out a shrill scream.

Rice let go.

In his mind, he replayed the trajectory of the changing force he had just captured with his Observation Haki.

The lightning cells in his body instantly activated, releasing weak bio-electricity that directly stimulated the motor nerve centers in his thighs.

His right knee bent slightly.

The quadriceps on the outside of his thighs and the gastrocnemius muscles in his calves erupted with a contraction frequency far exceeding conventional Rokushiki under the stimulation of the lightning.

At the same time, his soles stomped at a high frequency, following the inclination angle data from Fukuro.

Boom!!!

The floor of the compartment exploded completely, and the wood chips turned into powder.

Rice's figure vanished instantly.

This was not a conventional [Soru]. It was an evolved version of physical technique that fused lightning nerve stimulation and inclination-angle redirection mechanics.

Pure physical strength endowed Rice with even more terrifying explosive thrust.

Fukuro only felt everything go black before his eyes.

His retina didn't even capture the disturbance of the airflow; Rice had already appeared abruptly in front of him, following a zigzag trajectory that defied the laws of inertia.

His right knee was raised high, carrying kinetic energy that tore through the air, and smashed hard into Fukuro's round abdomen.

Bang.

His stomach ruptured, and his intestines twisted.

Fukuro spat out a mouthful of blood mixed with stomach acid, his body flying backward as if hit by a heavy artillery shell.

His massive body crashed through the iron bulkhead on the side of the compartment and fell into the violent waves outside, losing consciousness on the spot.

"That was... an advanced redirection of Soru?"

The corner of Lucci's eye twitched slightly, and his arrogant expression finally showed a crack.

As a Genius who had mastered the Rokushiki, he saw at a glance that the physical technique Rice had just unleashed in that instant was even more violent and unpredictable than the martial arts they originally mastered.

Seeing this, Kumadori let out a roar.

He slammed his tin staff heavily onto the ground.

[Life Return: Hair Bind].

Kumadori's long pink hair seemed to possess independent life, growing and spreading crazily, turning into dozens of thick tentacles that wound around Rice's limbs and body.

Rice stood on the spot without dodging.

He let those pink hairs wrap around his arms, waist, abdomen, and legs.

"Got you! Demon! Accept your judgment!"

Kumadori laughed, formed hand seals, and attempted to control the hair to crush Rice's bones.

Rice lowered his head and looked at the hair wrapped around his arms.

Rice had long since mastered the [Life Return] technique through endless physical tempering.

By absorbing high-voltage lightning, he forcibly controlled his own cell regeneration and muscle fiber restructuring, which was in itself an embodiment of pushing Life Return to its limit.

At this moment, his Observation Haki permeated the interior of Kumadori's hair.

"Using bio-electrical signals to forcibly control keratinocytes that have lost their activity. Changing the molecular arrangement inside the hair strands to increase physical toughness. This kind of external control technique has a bit of reference value."

Rice snorted coldly.

He closed his eyes, and the nerve center in his mind released a massive control signal.

It was not just simple force application, but an order from the cellular level for the muscle groups in his arms to undergo explosive proliferation.

His bronze-colored arms expanded outward suddenly.

His latissimus dorsi, deltoids, and biceps all expanded fully, their volume increasing by a circle in an instant.

The dense muscle groups erupted with a destructive physical expansion force.

Snap—snap—snap—

Those hairs, which Kumadori had endowed with high toughness, could not withstand this unreasonable biological expansion and pulling. They snapped inch by inch from the ends.

Rice reached out with both hands and grabbed the remaining main hair bundles.

It was like dragging a heavy steel cable.

His arms pulled back suddenly.

"Come here."

The massive physical pulling force was transmitted along the hair.

Kumadori couldn't stabilize his center of gravity at all; his massive body was pulled directly off the ground by Rice and flew straight toward him.

Rice pulled back his right fist.

Jet-black Armament Haki instantly covered his fist.

He aimed at Kumadori's face as he flew over and punched out.

Bang!

His nasal bone collapsed, and his facial bones were shattered over a large area.

Kumadori's head tilted violently backward, and his cervical spine suffered a severe dislocation and fracture.

His body lost control and slammed heavily onto the floor, sliding to the edge of Lucci's leather shoes, with no more rise and fall of breath.

Two CP9 agents, under the crushing weight of pure physical violence, died one after another.

Fine cold sweat seeped out on Kaku's forehead.

He gripped his two swords tightly, leaped up with his legs, and jumped into the air of the compartment.

Utilizing the gravitational potential energy of his descent, his legs spun at high speed like a windmill.

[Rokushiki: Rankyaku: Ran].

Dozens of light blue vacuum slashes, like a dense net of blades, covered Rice's head from the sky.

Every slash possessed the physical destructive power to cut through refined steel.

Rice raised his head, his black eyes staring at those falling vacuum blades.

He raised his right leg.

Armament Haki wrapped around the surface of his lower leg.

Rice's Rankyaku originally possessed the terrifying power to sever the sea. But after analyzing the aerodynamic principle Kaku used of high-frequency rotation to create multiple cutting surfaces, his brain quickly completed an upgrade of the mechanical model.

"No longer simply pursuing large-area destruction, but compressing the airflow into high-density serrated edges."

His right leg, facing the sky full of blade nets, kicked out fiercely from bottom to top, carrying a strong spiral torque.

[Rokushiki Profound Truth: Rankyaku: Spiral Meat Grinder].

A spiral vacuum slash, not huge in size but presenting a deep dark blue color, shot out with a roar.

The edge of this slash was covered with high-density compressed airflow serrations, and the interior was mixed with a violent Haki force field.

Rumble—

Two different airflow blades collided violently in mid-air.

The dozens of Rankyaku released by Kaku were like branches caught in an industrial shredder, instantly shredded into tiny airflow fragments by that spiral slash.

Rice's spiral vacuum slash did not lose momentum, heading straight for Kaku in mid-air.

Kaku was shocked.

With nowhere to leverage his strength in mid-air, he could only force his waist and abdomen to twist.

"Rokushiki: Iron Body: No Blind Spot."

His entire body's muscles instantly densified, attempting to hard-tank this terrifying physical cutting force.

Bang.

The spiral slash impacted Kaku's chest.

Although [Iron Body] barely blocked the tearing of the slash, the immense spiral kinetic energy attached to it directly destroyed Kaku's physical balance.

Like an out-of-control meteor, Kaku was fiercely slammed to the ground.

He smashed through the floor of the compartment, falling into the chassis gear room below.

With a faint cracking sound from his sternum, Kaku spat out a mouthful of blood, his body stuck in the gaps of the massive cast-iron gears, losing all combat ability for the time being.

Inside the compartment, only Rob Lucci remained.

Lucci looked at his fallen colleagues, his eyes remaining cold, without the slightest pity.

"Monster-like learning ability. Parsing mechanical principles in real-time during battle, even integrating our techniques into your own muscle memory, forcibly raising the physical limit of Rokushiki."

Lucci tore off the tie around his neck and tossed it into the ruins.

He took off his suit jacket.

Revealing the tight black vest inside. The perfect muscle lines from years of killing training were exposed to the air, and the five scars on his back were hideous and terrifying.

"However, true killing techniques require tempering through countless actual battles. Your kind of last-minute advancement will eventually leave fatal flaws."

Lucci exerted force with his right foot.

His speed was more than double that of Owl.

His figure appeared in front of Rice's chest as if teleporting.

He extended his right index finger.

The muscles at the tip of his index finger underwent an extremely eerie, dense contraction, and the hardness of the finger joints soared.

Compressing all his body's strength and explosive kinetic energy onto this single contact point of his fingertip. Reducing the force-bearing area to infinitely amplify the physical pressure.

[Rokushiki: Shigan].

Rice did not retreat.

He puffed out his chest.

His pectoral muscle fibers locked crosswise. Armament Haki permeated his skin and flesh like black molten iron.

[Iron Body: Steel] superimposed with Haki hardening.

Sss—!

Lucci's index finger stabbed into Rice's bronze-colored chest.

A sharp physical friction sound rang out.

Two completely different forces collided extremely at a single point.

Rice's pupils contracted slightly.

A sharp stinging pain came from his chest.

The indestructible Armament Haki defense layer was actually pierced by this index finger, creating a tiny gap.

The fingertip pierced the skin, went half an inch into the muscle fibers, and forcibly tore the local tissue structure.

A wisp of blood slid down his bronze-colored chest muscles.

"Concentrating on one point, the extreme physical pressure that breaks through defensive barriers."

Rice ignored the stinging pain in his chest, his black eyes staring intently at the way Lucci exerted force with his index finger.

His central brain completely deconstructed the mechanical model of Shigan.

"So that's it. Not pursuing area damage, only pursuing penetration depth. Utilizing the minute resonance of the finger joint bones to offset the reaction force of the impact surface. This is true physical piercing."

Rice's left hand suddenly lunged out, attempting to grab Lucci's arm.

Lucci snorted coldly. Without any support point, his body followed the airflow fluctuations brought by Rice's palm wind, drifting backward like a thin sheet of paper.

[Rokushiki: Kami-e].

The distance between the two opened up to five meters.

Looking at the bleeding wound on Rice's chest, a hint of an arrogant sneer finally curled up on the corner of Lucci's mouth.

"See that? Your armor that you're so proud of will still be physically pierced before an agent's fingertip. Next, I will use Shigan to completely mince your heart."

"Is that so?"

Rice stood up straight.

He raised his right hand.

His index and middle fingers were pressed together and extended straight.

A violent thirst for knowledge flashed in his black eyes.

The Qi, blood, and lightning cells in his body began to gather frantically toward the tips of his two fingers, following the mechanical model he had just deconstructed.

Not only that, a King's Aptitude, dormant deep in his Soul and transcending all living beings, erupted with a roar.

The jet-black Armament Haki flowed along his meridians, tightly compressed within one square centimeter of his fingertips.

Haoshoku turned into black-red arcs, wrapping around the surface of his two fingers.

His muscles and bones emitted a faint explosive sound.

A ball of dark red, high-density energy formed at his fingertips.

"Compress all physical mass onto one point, then add an unstoppable Conqueror's aura."

Rice felt the destructive throbbing coming from his fingertips.

His legs bent slightly.

[Soru: Thunder Flash].

Boom.

The remaining floor of the compartment was completely shattered by the reaction force, turning into wood shavings filling the sky.

Rice's figure instantly appeared in front of Lucci.

The speed was so fast that even Lucci's Observation Haki only captured a blurry afterimage.

Rice's pressed-together fingers aimed straight at Lucci's right shoulder and stabbed out.

[Rokushiki Final Evolution: God-Slaying Shigan].

Lucci was shocked.

Observation Haki emitted a deafening death warning.

He attempted to use [Kami-e] again to dodge.

But the moment Rice's fingertips stabbed out, the immense kinetic energy attached to them forcibly drained the surrounding air, forming a small vacuum suction zone.

The aerodynamic principles that [Kami-e] relies on failed directly in the vacuum environment.

With nowhere to dodge, Lucci could only instinctively activate [Iron Body] to hard-tank it.

Puchi—!!!

There was no sound of metal collision.

Only pure physical penetration.

Rice's two fingers, as if piercing a piece of tofu, easily tore through the [Iron Body] defense Lucci was so proud of.

The fingertips pierced directly through Lucci's right scapula.

Blood mixed with bone fragments sprayed out from the back of his shoulder, splashing onto the dilapidated bulkhead.

"Argh!"

Lucci let out a painful grunt, his body staggering backward.

His right arm hung powerlessly at his side.

His scapula was completely pierced through, the nerve conduction of his right arm was physically severed, and his muscles completely lost control.

Clutching his bleeding shoulder, an emotion called fear appeared in Lucci's eyes for the first time.

He stared fixedly at Rice's blood-stained fingers.

"Impossible... only after one exchange!"

"Thanks for the demonstration."

Rice shook off the blood droplets from his fingertips.

Physical deconstruction complete. The mechanical principles of Rokushiki had all been absorbed by him, completing an all-around evolution of his taijutsu.

"As a reward, I will crush your bones, inch by inch."

Just as Rice was about to step forward to end this arrogant agent's life.

A blinding light suddenly came from the front of the train.

The storm had stopped unnoticed.

The thick cumulonimbus clouds were forcibly pushed away by an invisible, massive aura.

The sea area ahead was no longer a dark storm, but a strange sea area bathed in sunlight.

The sea train rushed out of the storm zone.

At the end of the tracks ahead, a massive waterfall hundreds of meters high appeared.

The waterfall was not flowing downwards, but eerily hung upside down above the sea, forming a huge abyssal hole.

In the center of the abyssal hole stood a magnificent island.

Above the island, there was no night; it was always blinding daylight.

The island was surrounded by a circle of steel walls that towered into the clouds.

Behind the walls, a huge judgment tower pierced the sky.

At the very back of the island was a steel gate forged from unknown metal, so huge it was suffocating.

Enies Lobby.

The power institution and judicial center established by the World Government in the first half of the Grand Line.

The train let out a harsh screeching sound of braking.

The wheels rubbed wildly against the tracks, sparks flying everywhere.

The massive train body rushed into the sea station on the outskirts of Enies Lobby.

Because the braking System was damaged in the previous battle, the train smashed directly through the station's buffer zone.

The carriages underwent violent physical rollover and disintegration.

Lucci seized the opportunity, using his only remaining left hand to pick up Kaku, who had fallen into the ruins.

His leg muscles exploded with power.

At the moment the train disintegrated and fell, his figure turned into an afterimage, rushing out of the compartment and leaping toward the sturdy square of the front island of Enies Lobby.

Rice stood on the overturned carriage, not pursuing.

The wooden carriage beneath his feet crashed into the seawater, kicking up huge white waves.

Rice stepped on Moonwalk, hovering in mid-air.

Behind him.

ship's massive dark gold hull split the waves and slowly sailed into the daylight sea area of Enies Lobby.

On the right, the going merry followed closely behind.

Lucci stood on the edge of the front island's square, clutching his bleeding shoulder with his left hand, looking back and up at Rice in mid-air.

A cold cruelty returned to his eyes.

"This is the absolute Domain of the World Government. It is garrisoned by tens of thousands of elite Marine troops and three Giant Race guards."

Lucci's voice drifted over with the sea breeze.

"Rice. We will wait for you at the top floor of the Judicial Tower. That place will be the physical grave of a beast like you."

After saying this, Lucci took Kaku and turned to disappear into the massive complex of buildings.

Rice slowly landed on the bow ram of ship.

His bronze skin exuded a bloodthirsty luster under the forever bright daylight sun.

The alarm of Enies Lobby sounded shrilly.

Countless Marine soldiers poured out of the barracks, holding muskets and setting up heavy artillery, establishing a dense physical defense line on the coastline.

Three Giant Race guards, twenty meters tall, holding giant cast-iron bars, took heavy steps and blocked the huge entrance of the front island.

Rice raised his hand, pointing at the magnificent island that symbolized absolute power.

A cold command was conveyed to the whole ship.

"Land on the island."

"Anything that blocks the way, whether it's buildings or Marine bones, grind them all into powder."

A unilateral physical slaughter that would shock the world was about to unveil its bloody curtain under the daylight sun.