Under normal circumstances, when the Beasts Pirates conducted business with Doflamingo, there was no need for the Beasts Pirates' three top executives—the Three Calamities—to appear in person. Only the "Headliners," who ranked below the Three Calamities, needed to show up.
But this time, Doflamingo had specifically requested Jack to come.
…
Riding aboard his own "Mammoth," Jack stood at the bow, a steel mask covering his face, and let out a muffled, distorted voice.
"What the hell is that Doflamingo bastard up to this time? If he called me all the way out here for no good reason, I'll show him a thing or two!"
Two massive tusks extended downward from his shoulders, hanging prominently across his chest.
"Lord Jack."
Sipshead, a user of the artificial Devil Fruit—the Sheep Fruit—with a pair of short horns atop his head, spoke with fawning flattery.
"There's no need for you to trouble yourself, Lord Jack. Me and Ginrummy together would be more than enough to handle Doflamingo!"
But this time, Sipshead's bootlicking had undoubtedly landed him in deep trouble.
Jack turned his head expressionlessly, and without a word, reached out his thick right hand, tightly gripping Sipshead's neck and lifting the entire man off the ground.
"You looking down on me? You think an opponent I need to deal with personally is someone you and Ginrummy can just casually beat?!"
"Lord Jack, I—I didn't mean it like that…"
Though Sipshead was used to being beaten by Jack—who, having learned from Kaido, was prone to mood swings and roughing up his subordinates—being suddenly choked by the neck still nearly scared him shitless. His face turned pale as he begged for mercy.
Beside him, Ginrummy, wearing an outfit that would vanish from this book if described in detail, immediately dropped to her knees, trembling as she pleaded with the furious Jack.
"Your subordinate wouldn't dare!"
At the same time, she cursed Sipshead inwardly: You can kiss up to the boss all you want, but why drag me into it?
And with that pathetic look of yours, you think you can get at me? Dream on!
Jack squeezed Sipshead, whose legs were kicking wildly, for a while. Seeing his face turn blue and that he was truly about to die, Jack finally hurled him onto the deck with a forceful toss.
"Cough, cough, cough!"
Poor Sipshead, while coughing violently and gasping for air, still had to thank Jack for sparing his life.
"Thank you, Lord Jack! Thank you, Lord Jack!"
Around them, whether it was the Beasts Pirates' Shinuchi or the ordinary crewmen, everyone was silent as cicadas in winter, not daring to make a sound.
Seeing this, Jack—who was always thinking about learning from his boss—nodded with satisfaction inwardly: This is how Kaido does it. When he makes his entrance, no one around him dares to speak.
Unfortunately, Jack had never heard the saying, "Those who learn from me shall live; those who merely imitate me shall die."
No matter how closely he mimicked Kaido, he would never truly be Kaido.
…
As they neared Dressrosa, Jack stood at the bow and looked ahead. He soon spotted a figure clad in a pink feathered coat.
"Doflamingo?"
He sneered, crossing his arms over his chest, and declared with a laughable lack of self-awareness.
"So he does have some sense, knowing he should come to greet me."
The ship slowly docked. He leaped up, jumped off the vessel, and, bristling with anger as if addressing a subordinate, roared at Doflamingo.
"Doflamingo, you—ah!!"
Boom!
A flash of pink light streaked past, and Jack's figure vanished from where he stood in an instant.
Meanwhile, Jack's Mammoth, as if struck by a cannonball, had its entire mammoth figurehead obliterated, leaving behind a massive, pitch-black hole.
"Jack, listening to you talk is enough to burn my eyes. You salted fish, a hybrid of human and fishman!"
Doflamingo, who had taken Jack's former position, slowly withdrew his fist.
Under the sunlight, a glint of dazzling light flickered across his rose-tinted glasses.
The entire scene fell into dead silence. Some of Jack's subordinates even thought they were dreaming.
Where was the huge Jack who had been standing right there just now? How was he gone?
And a hybrid of human and fishman? Were they talking about Jack?
In an instant, many members of the Beasts Pirate Crew suddenly understood.
No wonder Jack always wore a mask. They had assumed it was just a habit, but it turned out to be to hide a face bearing unmistakable fishman traits!
Boom! Boom! Boom!
"Doflamingo!!! How do you know my secret?! How dare you spread it around?!"
Accompanied by Jack's furious roar from within the ship, a mammoth with a remarkably human-like face but blood-red eyes charged out of the Mammoth, whose decorative tusks had been destroyed, in a blind rage.
He was both ashamed and enraged: knowing full well that as a hybrid of grouper fishman and human, everyone who had learned of it, except Kaido, had been killed by him!
This secret was something Doflamingo absolutely should not have known!
Now, Doflamingo—the man he considered most fond of scheming—had not used this secret to threaten him or strike a covert deal, but had instead exposed it openly before the crowd.
And with that news bird still present, wouldn't the whole world know within days?!
Did this flamingo think he had him completely cornered?!
Fishmen are discriminated against by the vast majority of humans, not even regarded as a form of humanity—let alone a hybrid of fishman and human.
From today onward, he, Jack—one of the three Calamities and a top executive of the Beasts Pirate Crew—would become the biggest joke on the seas!!
"Did you hear? That Drought is actually a fishman mongrel!"
"That's right! I wonder if it's his mother or father who's the fishman? Either way, one of his parents really had the nerve! Hahahaha!"
"Aaaaaah!!!"
Just imagining those two lines of conversation was enough to drive Jack to the brink of madness!
"Doflamingo, I'll trample you into mincemeat!!"
Glaring at Doflamingo, his eyes seemed to shoot beams of light, desperate to annihilate him.
The mammoth roared to the heavens, every word dripping with blood-like anguish: This was an irreconcilable enmity!
Surpassing even the hatred of a father's murder or the theft of a wife!
Jack raised his thick, powerful, elongated tusks, his four hooves pounding the ground like a train stampeding, his immense weight causing the entire earth to tremble.
The reason Jack was called "Drought" was that the mammoth's colossal weight and strength meant that wherever he passed, whether buildings or trees, everything was knocked down and trampled into ruins.
As his elephantine hooves ravaged the land again and again, the earth dried up, the soil crushed into gravel, so that for months afterward, not a single blade of grass would grow—as if struck by a great drought.
Just as now, massive chunks of earth cracked apart beneath his feet, as if an earthquake were underway.
Under the force of this quaking power, the people around couldn't even keep their footing, and Doflamingo's side changed expressions one after another.
Although they believed that Doflamingo wouldn't recklessly make a mortal enemy of Drought Jack without any certainty of victory, behind Jack stood none other than Kaido, one of the Four Emperors!
On the dock, the long-accumulated power of the ancient beast within Jack erupted without restraint. He roared, snarled, and screamed as he charged at Doflamingo with all his might.
Jet-black Armament Haki covered his two tusks, turning them into twin pitch-black steel lances, their tips gleaming with razor-sharp light.
Having lost all reason, Jack had only one thought in his mind: to impale Doflamingo on his tusks, then trample him into mincemeat!
Unfortunately, Jack was completely dreaming.
Never mind the Doflamingo of today. Even the Doflamingo of before wasn't someone that a mere Drought Jack could take down just because he said so!
Coldly gazing at one of the three Calamities of the Beasts Pirates, Doflamingo remained expressionless as he raised his right hand.
Style, remember style!
Countless threads converged together, one after another, connecting and running parallel to his right arm, forming a massive fist comparable in size to a mammoth.
Jet-black Armament Haki swiftly coiled around it, transforming it into a colossal steel fist like that of a god.
Points, lines, planes, volumes. As a transmigrator, the techniques Doflamingo had developed with the Ito Ito no Mi far surpassed those of his original counterpart in both number and power!
"Giant God Fist!"
Meeting the mammoth that let out a bloodthirsty trumpet, this punch—carrying the combined power of Doflamingo, Ace, Katakuri, and Imu—slammed head-on into Jack's skull!
Crack!
Boom!
The colossal iron fist first collided with Jack's protruding tusks, snapping and sending them flying as easily as a hammer striking toothpicks.
Before Jack, suffering the agony of having his tusks ripped out without anesthesia, could even cry out, the fist smashed into his forehead.
THWACK!
Struck violently in the head, Jack's massive form shuddered, then came to an abrupt halt.
The next moment, the giant mammoth's eyes rolled back, and he crashed to the ground with a thunderous impact, carving another massive crater into the earth.
The Donquixote Family: …
The members of the Beasts Pirates who had come with Jack: …
One side felt that their young master had suddenly grown far stronger out of nowhere. The other side couldn't believe that Drought Jack, one of the three Calamities of the Beasts Pirates, could be defeated so easily by Doflamingo!
Through the dust, Jack quickly reverted to his human form.
Doflamingo looked at the somewhat battered dock around him and shook his head lightly.
"Tsk, tsk. A trash fish is a trash fish—no appreciation for the fruits of human labor. This dock was painstakingly built by my family. I can't have you destroying it just like that."
Picking up the two tusks that had been sent flying, their Armament Haki now faded, carrying a raw, primal, and savage air, a smile crept onto Doflamingo's face.
"But not bad. These two tusks are quite the fine trophies!"
His smile fading slightly, Doflamingo took two steps toward the battered Mammoth.
Seeing this, Sheepshead and Ginrummy on the deck involuntarily stepped backward.
Cold sweat poured down their faces and bodies.
Doflamingo had no desire to waste words on these small fry. He unleashed his Conqueror's Haki directly, a targeted shockwave.
Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!
In just a few seconds, Jack's subordinates—including two Tobi Roppo members of the Beasts Pirate Crew—who had endured the impact of the quadruple-stacked Conqueror's Haki, all collapsed to the ground.
At the sight of such a violent scene, the entire crowd fell silent, stunned by the combat power Doflamingo had suddenly displayed.
Only Monet clenched her fists tightly, her eyes gleaming as she gazed at Doflamingo's silhouette.
I knew it—Young Master will definitely become the Pirate King!
"Is this news explosive enough?"
At his feet lay the unconscious Jack, behind him a ship full of captives, and in his hands, a pair of ivory tusks.
Doflamingo turned his head and smiled at the president of the World Economy News Paper, whom he had invited under the pretext of "a colossal scoop you'd regret missing for the rest of your life"—a man now trembling all over from shock, habitually maintaining his half-beast form, Morgans.
"If it's explosive enough, then publish it. Say that I, Donquixote Doflamingo, have prepared an all-elephant feast and invite Kaido to come to Dressrosa in person to savor it!"
As the world's most renowned journalist, Morgans—who felt he was born for news his entire life—nodded frantically with excitement, his manner so fervent it was almost frightening, as if his bird head might suddenly fall off.
"Yes!"
If he didn't release news this big, he wouldn't be able to eat properly for the next year—it would haunt him for the rest of his life!