Perona's New Move

The two Vice Admirals glanced at each other and came to a silent agreement.

They dashed to opposite sides of Cabernet in an attempt to get around her.

Cabernet decisively went to block Momonga, as he was the biggest threat with his sword to the lives of Robin and Perona.

Touma meanwhile charged straight towards Robin and Perona. He needed to close the gap as quickly as he could knowing that they were both weakest in melee range.

A swarm of Mini Hollows emerged from the walls, ceiling, and floor in between himself and the two women.

He sent a haki covered jab at one as he got near. He was inwardly shocked when it exploded on impact, then he swiftly realized he had a veritable minefield of moving explosives between himself and his targets.

Doing a quick calculation, he quickly worked out that the number of Mini Hollows blocking him wasn't enough to cause him any major injuries given the weak explosive power they possessed. Thus he decided to push on forward with the brute force method.

"ORA ORA ORA ORA!" Touma shouted as he punched away at the Mini Hollows that came close to him.

Occasionally one of the Mini Hollows would manage to get past his punches and explode on his body, which hurt a bit but was still manageable.

At least it was, until…

*BOOM!!!*

One of the Mini Hollows that had managed to cling onto his chest erupted in an explosion with considerably more force than the others.

"Horohorohorohoro! How do you like my new Compact Hollow? Did it hurt?" Perona mocked him with a laugh.

This was a technique she had painstakingly created in her efforts to keep up with her precious Cabby. It was indistinguishable in both size and appearance to her normal Mini Hollows, but contained all the explosive might that her large Toku Hollow possessed. Only it was more concentrated and as such more damaging in a smaller radius.

Needless to say, she was quite pleased with the result of her hard work during this first real usage of it.

Touma was not pleased at all. Blood dripped down his torso from his chest and his shirt was torn asunder. He was thankful that he had been using haki to mitigate the damage of the Mini Hollows that broke through his guard, but he had taken quite the blow from that one.

He looked at the remaining Mini Hollows with heightened vigilance. He couldn't tell the difference between them and the Compact Hollow, so any number of them could be a death trap waiting to pounce on him.

What he didn't know was that making the Compact Hollow was the most time consuming type that Perona could make, so she had only created the one. Still, it served its purpose of slowing down the Vice Admiral with his paranoia.

Over on Cabernet's side, Momonga wasn't having it any easier.

He had at least found that Cabernet's toughness wasn't absolute. He was able to slowly build up the number of superficial wounds on her body, hoping that blood loss would exhaust her faster.

Unfortunately for him, the heat of her flames was also increasing the rate of his own energy consumption.

Thankfully he wasn't taking too much damage from her, and when he did get hit he was able to minimize it. Cabernet wasn't very skilled in the art of battle and seemed more like the brute type that attacked with basic martial arts.

No, Cabernet was a headache, but his main issue was Nico Robin and her vanishing dagger. He couldn't believe that she was still focusing on him instead of the swiftly approaching Touma, who was more of a threat to herself and ought to be someone she has more of a grudge against given his involvement at the destruction of Ohara.

Nevertheless, he had to desperately dodge her deadly stabbing attacks at the most inopportune moments and fend off her grasping arms that tried to make him stumble.

It was only a matter of time before…

*BAM*

He sensed it coming, but he had been cornered. Several of Nico Robin's arms had grabbed him and he took a direct hit to his jaw and his brain bounced around his skull, disorrientating him and burning his face.

He swiped at one of the offending arms holding onto him and it vanished into flower petals. Removing just one wasn't enough to free himself, however, and the resulting beating would be something he'd remember until his dying breath.

Though he wasn't sure if his dying breath would come shortly after this or much later.

His final thoughts before everything went black were that Cabernet looked a bit like a young child who had just managed to catch a particular elusive frog.

*BAM BAM BAM BAM BAM*

It had to be said that while Cabernet lacked skill, she certainly had enough raw power to make up for that fact. It took less than ten seconds after her first proper hit on Momonga to pummel him into the ground, unconscious.

Afterwards both she and Robin turned their attentions to the remaining Vice Admiral who now thought that he should have kept his mouth shut about Ohara.

The poor Rear Admiral, who had been searching for another opportunity to take a shot with his rifle, decided that perhaps it was best for him to make a strategic retreat. Easier said than done when you had multiple bone fractures into all four of your limbs.

Touma made a rash decision. He decided to gamble on the Mini Hollows and rushed forward with no regard for whether another Compact Hollow would be among them. Taking another one of those blasts was better than being beaten half to death by the lunarian woman at least.

Luckily for him, his gamble was a winner and he was merely a few steps away from reaching Perona.

Strangely, Nico Robin stepped between them, putting Perona behind herself.

This was strange for two reasons. One, Nico Robin shouldn't be any better in melee than Perona according to his knowledge of them. And two, it went against the selfish nature that he believed her to possess.

Robin put up her arms in a defensive stance and took Touma's punch head on.

She let out a yelp of pain as his fist collided with her raised guard, causing her to stumble backwards. However, this wasn't exactly what he expected to happen, rather he expected her arms to buckle beneath his power and that didn't happen.

Sadly that's all he could manage before Cabernet loomed over him from behind.

"Ahhhhhh!" Touma's screams were heard from quite a distance within the marine base by many marines before being cut short.

Cabernet, Robin, and Perona let out a deep breath and Perona rushed into the embrace of Cabernet.

"Let's go quickly, girls. There'll be plenty of time for that later." Robin said, urging them to keep moving.

Robin cast a glance at the unconscious Vice Admiral Touma. She had decided to keep to her decision not to kill anyone since she had joined up with the Straw Hats. Revenge wasn't something she ever wanted to obtain through violence, but rather she wanted to do so by exposing the truth they tried so hard to conceal.

So the old fool would live on, left behind by her as she pursued a brighter future.