What's Baki doing?
He's letting him get too close!
Is he even conscious?!
He slapped him.
That's... that's all I can do!
The impact of falling from 30 meters
It's just like the time I fell
from the top of the jungle gym when I was a kid
or the time I went flying off of the swing.
It's like getting hammered in the solar plexus by a powerful kick.
Incredible pain.
Difficulty breathing.
I can feel my internal organs are in total chaos
from the shock of hitting the ground.
My diaphragm's being forced up as far as it'll go.
It's crushing my lungs.
Which explains why I'm barely able to suck in any oxygen.
That salty taste.
Metallic smell.
That's blood!
I'm spitting up blood!
That means major organ damage!
I feel like I wanna fall to my knees!
Collapse on the ground!
It's like my legs are holding up a giant rock!
And I just wanna let it crush me!
No matter how tough Baki is,
falling from that height, it's more than any human could endure.
There's no way he wasn't hurt.
I'm surprised he can even stand.
But the primitive man saw through him.
His playmate might appear to be fine and as uninjured as he himself was,
but it was camouflage.
Pickle could sense the truth,
that the man had suffered grave physical damage.
Though he stood there looking like he was ready to fight,
inside, he was writhing in pain.
What are you waiting for Pickle?
Strike me down!
I'm defenseless!
The primitive man felt regret.
Don't just stand there, damn it. Punch me!
Kick me!
He said to himself...
Now's your chance!
..."I have gone too far.”
“I treated this plaything too roughly."
"I injured him.”
“Please get better.”
The humiliation of seeing his opponent pray for him
was too much for the young man.
And so his pride took over...
Don't you fuckin' pray me for me!
He momentarily forgot the overwhelming pain.
But his lungs had been crushed,
and he found that he could hardly speak.
Don't you fuckin' pray!
C'mon.
Come at me!
Stupid son of a bitch!
Uh-oh, here it comes!!
Huh?
What?
What in the world is Pickle doing out there now?
Tokugawa may not have understood,
but the experienced fighters knew what it meant.
It's too much.
I can't bear to watch.
What the...
Pickle tried to show him it was okay.
You see? They're not dangerous.
Everyone's afraid of them,
but you're perfectly safe when I use them like this.
You bastard...
All right now?
Then let's play!
Play with me.
Baki saw that Pickle was pretending his fists weren't lethal weapons.
In the past,
Baki's endorphins had been triggered by physical damage
or the danger of physical damage.
But now, it was the absence of danger that his brain reacted to.
Pickle's playful blows would not have hurt a fly.
But they had struck Baki in his weakest point.
They had hit him where it hurts the most.
In his pride.
This wasn't anyone's fault.
Hold on.
What's he doing?
I was just too weak,
that's all.
You fool!
I'm sorry, Pickle.
It's suicide!
I'm sorry I made you worried about me.
I'm the one who started this fight.
I'm the one who provoked you.
And yet you ended up having to pity me.
I know you've been around longer than me
by millions and millions of years.
But I don't need your pity, old man.
What is Baki doing?
Reckless little fool.
Unbelievable.
Was this more camouflage?
Pickle was confused.
He knew that camouflage was used by things pretending to be dead,
or feigning weakness,
or by things trying to trick your eyes in order to avoid detection.
Camouflage was used for survival.
And yet, Pickle had seen this man repeat that same action
that had so badly hurt him in the first place,
thereby increasing the damage to his already gravely injured body.
Can such a camouflage as this exist?
Could death be a camouflage?
Can such a being exist?
The weak eats the mighty?
And after all that, Baki missed him!
There's no way he could've recovered.
Wait a minute--
Pickle's down!
What? But how?
Baki didn't even touch him, did he?
Retsu.
what exactly is happening here?
I can't speak with certainty.
But I have an idea.
Whether it's ancient dinosaurs
or the best modern fighters,
nothing has been able to deliver
a blow strong enough to overcome the resilience of Pickle's body.
I think Baki realized that no direct blow with foot or fist
would ever shake that primeval brain.
That's why he struck him
with just the surface of the skin.
The what?
Hmm.
The punch doesn't land.
It only grazes the chin.
It's a technique used in the boxing ring, albeit rarely.
A sudden flick of a boxer's glove,
so quick it's mistaken for a miss,
and the other boxer goes down.
Sometimes,
never to get up again.
Hmm! True, unexplainable knockouts like that have been known to happen.
It is unexpected and effective.
Someone who can withstand a punch through a cushion
will black out when only the cushion is struck.
A thin layer of skin on the unguarded jaw is just grazed,
but the blow is so fast that it shakes the jaw,
and, imperceptibly, the brain,
at a super high speed invisible to the naked eye.
So he didn't miss him.
No, he hit him, but only with this.
The surface of the skin.
Once with his left fist,
once with his right fist,
and once with the heel of his foot.
No doubt Pickle's brain started vibrating with the first blow,
and the speed of the vibrations
would have been increased by the second and third blows.
The result was,
he lost the normal functioning of his brain,
which must have been very puzzling and alarming to Pickle.
One minute he's untouched, unhurt, and standing upright,
and the next minute, the ground is coming up to meet him.
That attack would have been something completely outside his experience.
Huh.
Whoa.
Pickle's in a state of utter confusion right now.
It was just as Sea King Retsu surmised.
Dazed by a blow he hadn't even felt,
Pickle now saw, standing there before him,
a man who had been on the verge of death,
who hadn't even begun to recover from his injuries...
This man had transformed himself into a sorcerer
who could control the ground beneath their feet.
Pickle's whole body was trembling.
But still, he did not run.
He had overcome blows.
He had overcome weight.
He had overcome strength.
He had overcome danger.
He had even overcome that.
A sense of invincibility was engraved in every particle of his being.
He had come here,
and been challenged
by small men with the strength of giants.
And he had overcome pain too.
But this was different.
This was a new experience, beyond his comprehension.
The unprecedented experience
of his body slamming into the ground,
twice...
Pickle couldn't do that, make the ground move like that.
He'd never thought of making it move.
Even that thing couldn't make it move.
But he could.
The primitive man knew he would barely be able
to hold his own against this little giant who could move the ground.
No.
I still haven't recovered from the first fall, let alone the second.
I can't attack him head-on, not yet.
Sorry about this, Pickle...
Is he doing what I think he's doing ?
Wish I didn't have to,
but I'm gonna do something that's a little bit mean.
I can't believe I'm only seeing it now.
Why didn't I think of that when I was fighting with Pickle?!
Baki, my boy, you're a born genius.
That's what hell feels like, Pickle.
Look at the pain he's in,
in spite of all his toughness.
Look at the mark Baki's hand left on his back!
Hmm. Can you explain that one?
That one's a killer.
It's known as the "hip Strike,"
and it has the same effect on everyone, from infants to Yujiro Hanma.
It's taught in the Japanese art of Kudo.
It's a hybrid form of martial arts.
In kung fu, it's known as Columbus's Egg.
The muscles are relaxed until they're loose and flaccid.
Every part of the body goes completely limp.
Strangely enough, as the body is made loose,
the hands and feet increase in weight.
At last, when even the tension in the face has disappeared,
the body becomes a whip!
At this point, it's no longer a question
of looking for an opponent's weak spots.
Because now the target of the attack
is the largest organ of the human body, the skin.
Whether it's the skin of a hardened, well-honed warrior,
or the soft flesh of a young maiden,
a blow to it from a perfectly flaccid hand is equally painful.
- Take a punch to the face, Hanayama. - What?
It's going to hurt you less than it would, say, a small child, right?
But with a slap,
it doesn't matter whether you're a child
or the unconquerable Kaoru Hanayama,
the intensity of the pain will be the same.
You may be right.
You are right.
And yet, in the entire history of life on Earth,
from two billion years ago,
when proteins began the mutations
that would ultimately result in human beings...
Where are you going with this?
...of the many millions of creatures that have developed over that time...
You are going to get to the point eventually, I hope.
...has there ever been another living creature
that transformed itself into a whip and targeted the skin?
No. Not that I can think of.
Was that a metaphorical question?
On second thought, perhaps there is one creature.
The human female.
Women have been known to do it.
Oh. Like a slap in the face, you mean?
Yes, they'll do that.
Oh! Will you look at that!
I've never seen Pickle in such a defensive posture before!
Even he has to defend himself.
For him, this situation
is like nothing he's ever had to face before.
That's it, Baki! You've done it!
You've got that caveman on the ropes now!
No, I don't think so.
Baki's attack stung him badly,
but it stung his pride even more!
Look at that!
Retsu! You see what he's doing?!
I see it.
That's what he did right before he attacked me
and brought our match to an end.
And there's no using the Whip Strike again.
That's right.
But I suspect that Baki is fully aware of that already.
What?
Again? The Whip Strike?
Huh? Has he run out of tricks?
How does he think that's gonna work?
Pickle will flatten him before he can even use it!
Hold on.
That's something else...
Kokeiken?!
What's "Kokeiken"?
A style of kung fu
that integrates the form and strength of a tiger.
But I don't understand.
Why use king fu at this point?
Yosoken!
Toroken!
Saruken!
Yushoken!
What the heck?
Is there any actual fighting involved, or does he just imitate animals?
Genius.
His ability to master the integration of so many different animals
can only be described as genius.
But I hope you haven't forgotten, Baki
Of all those beasts you've so perfectly emulated,
there's not one of them that wouldn't be prey for Pickle.
Even if you did more than just emulate them
and actually transformed into those animals,
they could never win against that savage.
What's this?
What are you going to emulate next?
This is an animal as well.
But what?
Whatever it is,
it's strong
Incredibly strong
And big.
Enormous.
An elephant? A rhino?
No.
It can't be!
Triceratops!
Pickle was utterly bewildered.
This man was less than half his size.
And yet, in this small, supposedly helpless figure,
he sensed he was facing
the most powerful opponent he'd ever known.
The impression of boulder-like weight and enormous power,
as if a colossal tree had learned how to move.
The iron will that never wavers until the enemy has been destroyed.
Those things, all those things
in this body.
Here, in this little body,
he could sense their presence.
It's incredible.
I'd have never believed it if I hadn't seen it myself.
Baki's so small compared to Pickle.
And yet with that one move, he's got him completely intimidated!
Size has nothing to do with it.
I'm twice the size he is,
and I couldn't do what he's doing.
I don't think anyone could.
What now? Has he got something else up his sleeve?
He's focusing upward, toward the sky!
Ooh, it's a flying bird! Is that what he's doing?
Whoo! That's a T. rex! I think.
Pickle had seen this sorcerer move the ground.
Now he watched him changing shapes.
He could no longer envision the man in his true form.
In Pickle's eyes,
he had been utterly transformed
into the mightiest beasts that roamed the Earth.
It's truly incredible.
It's like magic.