Chapter 45
*BOOM* One marine ship was engulfed by a fire produced by Carmen. Before the marines on the ship even got a chance to scream, they received the full force of fire and departed from life. At the same time, the fire that contacted upon the water caused the steam to arise.
Moving through the steam, Prominence revealed its full glory, standing with its impressive size that is larger than the average marine ships.
"No going back." Dan muttered to himself as he steered Prominence sideways to dodge the ruins of the destroyed marine ship. Carmen was standing on the front-most deck of the ship, with her arms crossed.
"Attention!! Ship A-13 sank, turn and aim towards the bright-orange ship, identified as the ship belonging to Grimheart pirates!" The nearest ship sent messages to all ships surrounding the marine base. "Two individuals sighted to be standing on the deck!! Maintain your distance and approach with caution!!"
Right after, the marine ships, amounting to fifteen in total, all turned simultaneously and began to approach Prominence, with their cannons ready to fire.
Watching the numerous marine ships moving towards them all at once, Carmen gathered her resolve as her hands began to glow in bright red.
"FIRE!!" Commodore Kazu, standing on the largest marine ship, shouted while pointing his unique, green-coloured sword towards Prominence.
*BOOM* *BOOM* *BOOM* Fifteen marine ships all blasted the cannonballs one after the other, and Carmen saw countless number of cannonballs rapidly flying towards them from the sky.
"Blaze Fortification!" Holding out her hands, Carmen, at her utmost concentration, created a huge wall of red-coloured fire at some distance away from Prominence.
Seeing this, the marines' jaws opened wide in a complete shock.
"Such large quantity of fire from nowhere, and look how it's maintained in midair!! This has to be the work of Flame Flame fruit, there is no other possible explanation!!" One marine shouted in an absolute horror.
Kazu slammed his fist onto the rail in anger, "Logia-type fruit... to think it's capable of doing something of this scale... how did it end up in the hands of the Grimheart pirates!!"
One after the other, the cannonballs entered the fire wall, before melting down into hot liquids and dropping to the sea, creating a large volume of steam once again. When the marine ships ceased to shoot the cannonballs, nothing could be seen.
Grabbing the dial from Den Den Mushi, Kazu immediately commanded, "Slowly back out and watch out for any incoming attack!! Our enemy is the user of the Logia-type Flame Flame fruit; staying clustered will only result in our loss!!"
Obeying to Kazu, the marine ships retreated backwards, dispersing themselves from their current formation.
*BOOM* Within the smoke, a bright flash was seen before another marine ship sank. Prominence stormed right in the middle of the marine ships!
"Tch, to think you would be so bold!!" Several marine officers from different ships launched themselves towards Prominence, with swords in their hands.
Carmen sighted them in the air, flying towards her in every direction. "Phoenix Flare!" Holding out her hands side to side, she emitted fire to both sides, and each morphed into a shape that resembles a bird with its wings wide open.
Watching the intense fire travelling towards them, the marine officers gritted their teeth as they pulled their swords back before rapidly slashing towards the fire.
The arcs of sword slashes flew to the fire, causing Carmen to snort. She, as the cook, knew how important oxygen is for the fire to continue to burn. The sword slashes, which are essentially the waves of compressed air, will fail to serve their purpose.
And just as she expected, when two attacks collided, the Phoenix Flares simply overtook the sword slashes and continued its travel towards the marine officers with larger sizes. Watching this phenomenon, the marine officers' eyes widened, and used each other to push off and dodge the fire.
Due to this, they failed to land on the deck of Prominence and fell into the water nearby.
"Oh, how simpleminded you all are! I cannot fathom how foolish one would have to be, to dare to use air against the very manifestation of the flame!!" Carmen dramatically posed and mocked the marine officers.
Kazu growled watching this scene; the marine soldiers seemed to have become even more terrified after witnessing how the marine officers couldn't handle one attack from Carmen.
"I shall not stand this injustice... the good will prevail over evil, no matter what circumstance it may be!!" As Carmen was about to blast fire once again towards the nearby marine ships, Kazu quickly propelled himself from the deck, while holding his green sword with two hands.
Carmen held out her hands towards Kazu, who was flying towards her at an incredible speed. "Inferno Beam!!"
An intense blast of red fire erupted from Carmen's hands and blasted towards Kazu. Watching as the huge pillar of fire blast approached him, he lowered his stance and pulled his sword back.
"One Sword Style: Geppo Kazekiri!" Pushing himself against the air with his feet, Kazu propelled himself even faster and slashed through the pillar of fire, horizontally which caused it to be split in two directions, where one part blasted towards the sky while the other crashed into the water and generated large amount of steam.
Kazu continued to fly towards Carmen and slashed very quickly through her, but the sword went through Carmen, whose body turned into fire.
*Tap* Gently landing onto Prominence, Kazu got into a stance and glared at Carmen, who was surprised that Kazu managed to cut through her fire.
'What a tough sword!' Carmen saw that Kazu's sword wasn't an ordinary kind; it had a weird green hue. 'However, he's still incapable of wounding me. Since I shall not be able to exert my full strength on Prominence, I shall... simply rampage on the empty marine ships!'
'How would Baten-dono think in this situation?' Kazu grimaced as his grips on the sword tightened. 'The ultimate weakness of devil fruit... sea. Coincidentally, water counters fire.' Subsequently, he looked up and saw dense amount of steam levitating in the sky. 'Excess steam will result in condensation. Two ways to generate large volume of water: rain through steam or directing my attacks toward the sea-'
Carmen jumped from Prominence, before transforming her body into fire and flying towards the biggest marine ship Kazu was in charge of. Kazu's eyes widened seeing Carmen's sudden movement, before propelling himself to chase after Carmen.
"Wind Bazooka!" Kazu slashed his sword into the water below Carmen's fire-transformed body, in an attempt to create an eruption of water onto her.
*BOOM* The concentrated wind blew towards the direction that Kazu intended. However, before it could reach water,
"Orb of Flamboyance!" Carmen quickly changed her body back to normal in midair and summoned a large fire ball beneath herself, which absorbed the wind from Kazu and grew larger. Immediately after, Carmen threw the fire ball towards Kazu's ship.
"YOU WON'T DARE!!" Kazu screamed desperately as he watched the fire ball flying towards the terror-stricken faces of his subordinates.
*BOOOOM* The whole ship was blasted into a fire as the woods were instantly reduced to ashes, and the metal frame melted down. The ship sank and another volume of steam was generated.
"My comrades!!!!" The veins popped out from Kazu's forehead and his whole body shook in a fury. "I shall avenge you all-"
*BOOM* Before he could finish his monologue, Carmen blasted herself to another marine ship and wrecked it apart, causing Kazu's jaw to open wide comically.
"Where is your honour?! How can you be so despicable to such an extent?!!" Kazu seethed in anger in midair while constantly using Geppo to prevent himself from falling.
Carmen, while keeping herself in midair by blasting fire off of her feet, held out her arms open wide, dramatically. "Fire knows no mercy. It simply burns everything on its sight."
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Meanwhile, Dan was continuously weaving Prominence through the marine ships without a collision, by using the secondary steering wheel in the anchor room. By placing himself inside this room, he was able to avoid getting caught up by Carmen's assaults.
As soon as Carmen and Kazu left Prominence, Dan immediately pulled the ship back, to avoid any assaults from the marines with Carmen's absence.
'Four hours have passed.' Dan's expression darkened as he checked his watch once again. 'They probably heard the commotion here. The fact that captain and Carina are unable to help us only means that they are in quite a trouble.' Dan shifted his gaze to the small window, where he witnessed Carmen and Kazu's clash.
Thankfully, the entire marine forces seemed to be focusing on minimizing the casualty created by Carmen's destructive power. However, Carmen's flame was strong enough to demolish a ship in one go; they couldn't do much but retreat.
'Carmen's ability is potent enough to carry us through this mayhem. Issue is, she exerted a huge amount of fire up until now, without a rest. She will end up completely exhausting herself.' Dan thought as he stopped Prominence after it gained some distance from the battlefield. Positioning the ship so that its side is facing the battlefield, Dan quickly ran to the lower floor of the ship, cannon room.
As quickly as possible, he opened the small wooden windows to revel four cannon barrels from Prominence, pointing towards the battlefield.
'Carmen is a Logia; these cannonballs should be harmless to her.' Dan thought as he placed cannonballs into each cannon and lit up the cannon fuses. 'Time is against our side; we have to end this fast.'
*BOOM* *BOOM* *BOOM* *BOOM* Four cannonballs fired off Prominence and travelled toward Carmen, Kazu and the marine ships.
Hearing to the loud sounds of the cannons, the marine officers immediately reacted. They jumped up from the decks and used their swords skillfully to change the trajectory paths of the cannonballs, causing them to miss and land on the nearby water.
Noting how the cannonballs failed to do anything, Dan growled in frustration before quickly heading back to move the ship again. Without Carmen, Dan couldn't afford to risk staying still and allow the marines to get easy shots with cannonballs.
*BOOM* As soon as Prominence moved, one cannonball landed on its previous location, causing Dan to let out a cold sweat. 'That was too close for my liking.'
*BOOM* Watching another cannonball flying towards Prominence, Dan quickly turned the wheel and Prominence took a sudden turn, dodging another cannonball successfully.
Carmen took notice that Prominence acquired a distance as the marine ships started to shoot the cannonballs again.
'Prominence out of bound. Well done, Dan.' She smiled and began to glow brightly, causing Kazu to tense up.
In complete seriousness, Kazu lended on one marine ship before sheathing his sword into the sword sheath and holding onto the handle tightly.
"One Sword Style... Aragami." With his sword still sheathed, Kazu blasted off the deck, towards Carmen who was hovering midair.
"Flame Empress!!" Carmen declared as the light around her brightened and the heat intensified, before the her whole body completely transformed into a purple-coloured flame. The purple flame rapidly enlarged and filled the whole sky, creating a majestic view.
"And this shall conclude the fate of our battle!"