[ Third Person POV ]
Somewhere a bit further from Sabaody Archipelgo
Doflamingo grinned as he stared at the three Marine Vice-Admirals. He had always suspected that they were going to come back for them after what had happened before, but this was a little too early for his liking.
"To what do I owe the pleasure? If I recall correctly, the last time we met, you let me leave in one piece; what changed?"
Doflamingo was mocking them for putting their sights on the ship that was behind him instead of him, it was something that had plauged his mind occasionally. So he was really curious as to why they did something like that when they had been so close.
"There is no need to explain our Righteous actions to you. Just know that it wasn't your day to be caught then, bit it is now," Sakazuki growled as he continued to stare down the quartet.
"All that really matters, is whether or not your going to come with us willingly," Kuzan explained casually, "but I have a feeling that your mind hasn't changed from last time."
Doflamingo grinned as he looked at Kuzan, "You're right, my mind hasn't really changed from the last time that you had asked me to surrender. So what are we going to do about it?"
Sakazuki growled before pouncing towards Doflamingo. He couldn't get very far because Pica had slammed into Sakazuki, and thanks to the use of his Armament haki. He had managed to keep Sakazuki in base form as he flung him out of the ship, and followed him closely.
Kuzan immediately summoned some ice Javelins and flung them towards Doflamingo, who sliced through them thanks to his strings.
"Trebol, Diamente! Keep the other one busy! The rest of the crew should be attacking the surrounding ice so we can make a run for it!" Doflamingo ordered his surbordinates.
Everyone immediately got busy as another battle between the Donquixote Family and the Marines ensued.
"Kuzan! Are you ready for round 2?" Doflamingo grinned as he sliced through more of Kuzan's ice.
Kuzan didn't say anything, but in the corner of his eye, he couldn't help but notice that there was a perculiar shaped fruit laying within the smoldered cabin. The fruit remained untouched, but the color of it and its appearance was an obvious sign for Kuzan.
"Where in the hell did you manage to get your hands on a Devil fruit?" Kuzan asked out loud.
"A Devil fruit~?" Borusalino couldn't help but be curious as to what kind it was.
Diamente and Trebol had quite a bit of trouble landing attacks on him. For the most part, this was mainly because he would either turn into light and dissapear to somewhere else, or turn into light and let the attacks faze through him. It was frankly quite annoying for the duo, but they needed to keep at it if they were ever going to hope to escape.
Borusalino, on the other hand, seemed to have something else in mind.
He immediately turned into light and went right for the cabin, and he was about to get there too, if it weren't for Doflamingo's interference. Doflamingo immediately coated one of his strings with Armament haki as he channeled as much heat to it as possible.
"Overheat!"
The tradgectory of the string was right in Borusalino's path, he couldn't help but stop and dodge it before he got hit. Seeing that his attempt to stop Borusalino from getting to the Devil Fruit was a success. He couldn't help but smile as he said.
"Finders keepers, Borusalino,"
"Don't get distracted when facing me!" Kuzan barked as he channeled more ice into the fray.
Doflamingo couldn't help but notice that his feet were frozen in place as Kuzan summoned more javelins to throw at him. Doflamingo didn't have time to directly dodge the ice javelins, but he wouldn't need to.
Pica flew into the fray and took the brunt of the attacks right on his chest before crashing a little bit further from Doflamingo. Walking calmly after him, Sakazuki had an arm full of lava on standby as he glared at the Stone-human. That initial hit that Pica had given him had ruptured some wounds that still hadn't healed after his fight with the Storm Dragon.
So he was currently fighting at 60%, just enough to beat the hell out of Pica. However, it wasn't enough to take on the rest of them by himself. His eyes scanned through the Numancia Flamingo before resting on where the Devil Fruit lay. He had also overheard what Kuzan had said, so he was also interested in what kind of fruit it was.
Doflamingo immediately broke free of the ice before leaping and landing right in between the Marine trio and the Devil fruit. This was a worst-case scenario for Doflamingo, he really didn't want to give the Devil fruit up because he knew that it was going to be a vital asset for the Donquixote family in the future.
However, at the same time, they were still facing the future of the Marines; and they weren't weak by any means. Matter of fact, it had been a miracle that they had managed to hold out this long, but it wouldn't be too long until the Family would face defeat.
He needed to find a way to contain the situation, so he decided to test the waters for a bit to see how far they'd be willing to go.
"Say, if I gave you this Devil fruit....Would you leave us alone?" Doflamingo grinned as he asked.
"Why would we accept bribes from pirate scum like you," Sakazuki scowled as he retorted, "It'll be easier to get the Devil fruit after we catch you."
Just like that, the offer was immediately shut down before it even had time to simmer. It was clear that the trio had no intention of letting them go today.
"Oh well, at least we tried," Doflamingo grinned as he spotted that his crew had already finished digging out the ship.
Pica immediately got up and shot for Sakazuki again as he speared him out of the ship. Pica had made it a priority not to let Sakazuki stay on the ship for too long because of how destructive his Devil Fruit was.
Meanwhile, Diamente had coated his hand in Armament haki, and managed to surprise Borusalino and grab him by the cape before flinging him right to the sky away from the ship. Moreover, before Borusalino could do anything, Trebol had sent a large blob of slime Borusalino's way to restrict his movements.
He had already coated it with armament haki previously, so it was shocking for Borusalino when he couldn't turn into light and dissapear before Trebol had set the slime ablaze with a shot of his pistol.
Meanwhile, Doflamingo resumed combat with Kuzan directly. He couldn't kill him without having the rest of the crew. However, that didn't mean that he couldn't put up a good fight against him.
Countless objects that were created from ice immediately were sent Doflamingo's way, and Doflamingo wasted no time dodging and slicing through the ice with his strings. It was then that he launched a counter attack by using his strings to pierce through Kuzan. The ends of the strings were already coated with Armament haki.
This meant that Kuzan would have to dodge them if he didn't want to be hit.
Doflamingo Smirked as he soon began to sense multiple Marine Presences make their way towards the Numencia Flamingo. Kuzan and Borusalino had already sensed them, but they didn't know that they were all under the control of Doflamingo's strings.