Pirate Usopp vs Princess Perona

Perona hovers outside the tall window as naturally as if the air itself belongs to her, and Usopp, still rattled, shouts, "You!! Why are you flying?" She answers with her eerie laugh, "Horo horo horo horo...!!" and admits, "I just got caught in the moment. I never thought that there would be a bastard who wouldn't be affected by the negative ghosts...!!" Usopp looks up at her and snaps, "What's with that composure...!!" Perona reminds him that his courage has not looked very impressive: "Don't act brave...!! You were running away just now..." But Usopp plants himself, points back at her, and says there is one thing he has to tell her.

Usopp's answer is absurdly earnest: "Good things will happen." Perona screams, "Leave me alone!!!" but Usopp raises his new weapon and declares, "Even though you are flying, that doesn't mean I can't do anything!! I'm a sniper!! Whether you fly or dance, it doesn't matter!" He explains Kabuto with sudden pride: its five supportive stems improve stability and range, the Sky Island "Press Dial" activates when he fires, and added rotation lets the bullet change speed into a super pachinko shot; by choosing "flame," "flash," or "impact" dials, the shot gains even more power. He fires, only for Perona to vanish. Usopp cries, "Gone!!! Where did she go!?" and she answers from behind him, "Horo horo... Behind you."

Behind Usopp, Perona swells into a gigantic, terrifying apparition. Calmly, she tells him, "Shoot me already." Usopp screams, "Dowaaaaa!!!" and tries to force courage into his shaking hands: "Bastard... Hi... hi... hissatsu!!!" He launches "Ageha Ryusei!!!" and the page notes it as a Swallowtail Meteor, but Perona's enormous shape only laughs, "Horo horo horo..." When Usopp sees the attack fail to solve anything, panic overtakes him. "Eeeeeh!!? Wha!! Wh-wha!!" he stammers, while Perona's huge face looms over him like a nightmare that refuses to behave like a normal enemy.

Usopp's shot tears into the apparition and bursts, but Perona is not harmed. The enormous image contracts back into her usual form, leaving Usopp staring in confusion: "...? ...!? She changed back...!!" He switches tactics and fires "Kamakiri Ryusei!!!" the Mantis Meteor, hooking a line toward her so he can drag her down. "I'll pull you down!!!" he shouts as the cord snaps taut. Perona keeps laughing, "Horo horo horo..." and Usopp strains against the line, furious that the fight refuses to obey simple rules. "Bastard..." he growls, trying to turn sniping into a tug of war against a floating ghost princess.

The struggle turns stranger when Perona's body closes the distance and slips straight through Usopp's defenses. He freezes with a small, stunned "Eh..." and then chokes out "Gih..." as her hands enter his chest without tearing skin or cloth. Terror explodes out of him: "Gyaaaaaaa~~!!! Her hands... went inside me!!!" Perona, almost pleased by how frightening the illusion is, tells him, "Fool, look closely. There's no external injury, yet my hands are inside your body." The horror is not blood or wounds; it is that Usopp can feel the impossibility of her touch while seeing that nothing physical has been broken.

Perona pushes the fear as far as it will go. With her hands seemingly buried around Usopp's heart, she tells him, "But the fact you'll die soon is true. Right now my hands are around your heart. And I'm going to smash it!!!" Usopp coughs and panics, "Gehoh... oo!! Stop!!!" He begs, "Stop, please. I'm really going to die!!!" and then, in pure terror, "No, please stop... Haa... Shtop!!" Perona announces, "Now, die in pain and anguish!!" Usopp collapses under the imagined execution, choking out, "I don't want to d..." as his own fear almost finishes what her hands cannot.

Just as Usopp believes his heart is about to be crushed, Perona casually reveals the truth: "But I can't do things like that." Usopp snaps back to life, realizing, "It was a bluff!!!" Perona laughs, "Horo horo horo horo...!! If I were to have that kind of physical power, you would've died the moment I pierced you with my hands." Usopp, drenched in fear, mutters that either way, "that's bad for my heart...!!" Perona explains that her hand only passed through his body, and when her head floats separately before him, Usopp screams, "Gyaaa a severed head!!!" She makes the rule plain: even if he can see her, this body can go through anything.

Usopp refuses to give up and unleashes another attack: "Hissatsu!! Rokuren Mamushi Boshi!!!" The page identifies the move as six continuous viper stars, but every shot passes uselessly through Perona's intangible form. She reminds him, "Didn't I tell you I can go through anything?" Then Usopp tries a different kind of assault and charges straight through her body. Perona recoils, shouting, "Uwaaa!!! Stop it!!! That's disgusting!!!" but the result still proves her point. Her body can be invaded, crossed, and seen, yet not struck. In the end, the rule hanging over Usopp is simple and cruel: "In other words, your attacks can't hit me."

Usopp retreats through the corridor, yelling, "Uwaaa!! You bastard!! Get away!!!" and "Go over there, dammit!!" Perona drifts after him with another "Horo horo..." and Usopp tries to reason his way into safety: she bluffed about touching his heart, which means she cannot truly touch him either. "Shut up!!" he yells, then states the balance he desperately wants to believe: "I can't attack you, but you can't attack me either... am I wrong!?" Perona answers not with a denial but with a new technique. She raises her fingers and releases tiny ghosts, saying only, "Mini Hollow."

The tiny ghosts drift toward Usopp with little "Psha" sounds, and Perona snaps her fingers: "Ghost Wrap." They burst around him, not like sadness this time but like compact explosions. Usopp is hurled by the blast and realizes with horror, "...!!? A... A shock wave...!?" Another Mini Hollow floats beside him, and Perona triggers it too. The corridor erupts again with "Wrap!!!" and Usopp is blown across the stone floor, screaming, "Ugya~~~!! Let go!!!" Perona watches from a distance, calm and silent after the attack, while Usopp learns that even if her ghost body cannot strike him, the little ghosts she commands can detonate right on him.

Bruised and furious, Usopp drags himself up with a ragged "Kuh..." and "Haa..." then launches one of his strongest flaming shots: "Hissatsu!! 'Hi no Tori Boshi'!!!" The page labels it Phoenix Star as the fire bird roars down the corridor. For one instant it seems like the kind of attack that should erase the problem, but Perona sits serenely in the middle of the flames, laughing, "Horo horo horo horo." Usopp bolts away, shouting "Damn!!" and then breaks down at the unfairness of it all: "This isn't fair!!! I can't even attack, and she can!! Winning this match isn't possible!!!"

Perona keeps gliding after Usopp, laughing "Horo horo horo horo," while he yells, "Hey!!! I can't see if you are there! Move!!!" Her ghostly body overlaps his vision and position, making the chase itself disorienting. Usopp is knocked and shoved through the hall, crying "Fugeh!!" as he crashes along the floor. Around him the Mini Hollows gather with soft "Zee" and "Psha" sounds, and he pants "Haa" under their pressure. The page turns the fight into a nightmare of bad visibility and impossible targets: Perona's real threat is not one solid blow, but her ability to occupy space, block his senses, and surround him with bombs he cannot safely touch.

Perona calls out "Ghost Wrap!!" again, and the corridor detonates around Usopp in a cluster of small blasts. He survives the smoke and rubble, shaken but still thinking, while Perona observes him from afar. Usopp notices the absurd imbalance and mutters, "That woman... I thought she was weaker than me...!! What's with this lame appearance...?" Then something huge enters the corridor. Usopp spots it and blurts, "A bear..." The stitched body of Kumashi looms into view, and what had been a duel with an untouchable ghost suddenly gains a solid, crushing body that Usopp very much can be hit by.

Kumashi slams down with terrifying force, cracking the floor and throwing Usopp aside. Perona cheerfully warns him, "Be careful... Kumashi's physical strength is superior to that of a real bear!!" The blow makes Usopp realize what changed: "What's this...!? My attacks couldn't even do a thing against that woman's ability... I was the only one that could stand against it...!!" His confidence collapses into panic. "Your power cannot stand against that woman!!!" someone calls from his memory, and Usopp thinks, "I even said this was my chance... I even said that to them... It's over... I can't go on any longer. I feel like I'm gonna win..." then corrects into helplessness: "For me to save them... that was a load too heavy for me... Help me...!!!"

Kumashi closes in and Usopp, crushed in the bear's grip, cries, "Uhh!?" and then, "Help me, Sogeking...!!!" The mask answers the call in Usopp's own desperate theater. He puts it on and pleads, "Please tell me!!! What would you do...!?" The Sogeking persona erupts with "Ooo oooh!!!" and a bold command: "One down!!" Perona stares, shocked: "Kumashiii!?" Then anger takes over. "Bastard, how dare you do that to Kumashi!! What's that stupid mask!!!" To Usopp, the mask is not a disguise so much as a fragile tool for forcing courage back into his body.

Wearing the mask, Usopp insists, "... Haa... This is no stupid mask!!!" and lets Sogeking introduce himself: "Nice to meet you!! My name is Sogeking!!!" Perona immediately cuts through the act: "Don't fuck with me!! What part of you is someone else!!?" Usopp tries to run, shouting, "Now I run!!" while Perona yells, "Bastard!! You are running away!!" Inside his head he argues with himself: "Calm down!!! Fight back Usopp-kun!!" "Shut up!! There's no way for me to win." "That's not true. You are a man that can do it when needed to!" "Do you have some proof of that!?" "None." "See!!! You don't have any!" Then Usopp notices the pattern: Perona feared him at first and ran, but suddenly became full of confidence. As he thinks there is too much unknown about her, she releases another "Mini Hollow."

Usopp finally starts solving the trick. If his attacks were useless from the beginning, Perona would never have needed to run first; she should have been able to fly through walls and escape. She calls another "Wrap" and explosions chase him, but he remembers the moment when he lost sight of her: "That's right... I was once stopped by the bear, and lost sight of her...!!" He realizes that at that time she must have done something besides simply dodging. Perona, seeing him stagger, laughs, "Horo horo horo... Now... isn't it about time I hand you over to Moria-sama?" Usopp pants, "Haa...!!" yet his fear gives way to deduction: "That's it! I solved it...!!! Your trick...!!!"

Perona stiffens. "Eh!?" she cries as Usopp changes aim. He has found where to shoot, and Perona shouts, "Wait!! Where are you aiming at!!?" Usopp answers with a new attack: "His-satsu!!! 'Atlas Suisei'!!!" The page labels it Atlas Comet as the shot curves past the ghostly Perona and smashes into a hidden room beyond the corridor. Perona panics, "That's it... Hey!! Wait!!!" but it is too late. Usopp has located the truth behind the intangible body, and through the broken wall he points to the real Perona sitting in a separate chamber. "I found it...!!!" he declares. "That's your true body!!!"

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