Twenty minutes earlier—
After receiving the order from Sengoku, Kuzan immediately led a squad of Marine soldiers and rushed toward the A1 Armory with urgency.
Meanwhile, inside the Pica Temple, at the Bloodsworn Guard's Dimensional Strike Command Center...
"All units prepare. Kuzan is about to enter the wormhole trap zone. Initiate Dimensional Strike. All sniper teams, get ready to engage. Prepare to snipe Kuzan! Repeat—prepare to snipe Kuzan!" Bins commanded sharply.
"Dimensional Strike, commence!" Bins ordered.
As Kuzan was sprinting forward, several bullets suddenly tore out from the air—right beside his forehead, throat, legs, and abdomen—seemingly from nowhere. In an instant, they pierced straight through his body, shocking even him.
At the same time, bullets continued to fire one after another. The Marines following Kuzan to support the A1 Armory were struck violently—blood bursting from their heads as they collapsed to the ground.
These bullets emerged with zero warning—literally brushing past their targets at point-blank range. The time between the bullet's appearance and impact was almost nonexistent.
Even Kuzan couldn't dodge fast enough—let alone the regular Marine soldiers. One Marine lieutenant panicked as he saw Kuzan hit, and shouted, "Sniper fire! Everyone stay alert for snipers!"
But from such terrifyingly close distances, and with those shock-shell sniper rifles producing an overwhelming force in such compact barrels—what good was alertness going to do?
The moment he finished speaking, a bullet materialized out of thin air and pierced cleanly through his temple. Blood sprayed in a fine mist as he collapsed without a word.
Before the battle began, Bins had already placed numerous spatial markers around Marineford's core infrastructure. Especially along this road leading to the A1 Armory—they had anticipated the Marines would send reinforcements, so Bins had prepared an elaborate dimensional web here.
This trap, which he called the Dimensional Net, was one of Bins' deadliest creations. He had layered wormhole coordinates like spiderwebs all throughout this zone, allowing the Bloodsworn Guard to open tiny portals at will to strike from any angle—perfect for coordinated ambushes.
The moment someone entered this zone, it was like a fly falling into a spider's web. A death sentence.
"Oh my... that's really dangerous," Kuzan muttered, unfazed by the multiple wounds riddling his body. "To think you can open wormholes practically touching my skin... If I hadn't reacted fast enough, I'd have ended up just like them."
His voice remained calm, but his expression was icy cold. Watching Marine after Marine fall right before his eyes to invisible attacks—with no sign of the assailant—was infuriating even for him.
"Bins the Piercing Knight, you're watching, aren't you?" Kuzan called out. "Can't you let us through? I'm under direct orders from the Fleet Admiral. If I don't go, I'll get chewed out later!"
"I'm afraid not," Bins' voice echoed from all around. "We too act on orders from His Majesty. No one is to reach the A1 Armory. So I'm terribly sorry, but I must refuse."
The voice kept shifting direction, giving Kuzan no way to pinpoint its source.
"Yeah, I figured it wouldn't be that easy... Ice Time!"
Kuzan's body instantly transformed into a man of ice.
But just as he activated his power, two figures wielding laser swords burst out of wormholes right in front of him. Their blades crossed in a flash—like a massive pair of scissors—and sliced Kuzan clean in half.
But in the very instant they cut through him, both attackers were frozen solid by the icy aura he emitted. Their bodies were encased in frost almost instantly.
Kuzan's words had just been a feint—to lure them into attacking. And it worked.
Thankfully, just as the two nearly turned into frozen statues, wormholes opened beneath their feet and pulled them away at the last moment.
"How are you two holding up?" Bins asked anxiously as Ryan and Winter returned through the wormholes.
"I thought I was dead for sure," Ryan gasped. "If you hadn't set up so many wormholes ahead of time... we'd have been corpses back there."
"His Majesty was right after all," Bins muttered. "Kuzan's strength really is Admiral level... We're switching to Plan Two."
"Yes, sir!" all present responded in unison.
A strategy designed specifically for dealing with enemies of monstrous power.
After the disaster with Kaido, Bins and the others had learned—wormholes or not, some beings were simply too terrifying. One slight misstep could spell annihilation for the entire Bloodsworn Guard.
But their mission didn't always allow them to avoid such monsters. And so, Plan Two was born.
Unlike the aggressive Plan One, Plan Two emphasized extreme caution. All attacks were made within the safety of wormholes. Micro-portals were used to deliver pin-point assaults—sniper rounds, laser stabs, combustion blasts. Anything to limit the target's movement.
This web of overlapping wormholes—the Dimensional Web—was Bins' masterpiece.
They weren't aiming to kill the enemy. They knew that was near impossible.
Their only goal: immobilization.
If they could pin down a monster like Kuzan, even temporarily, the mission was a success.
Tiny wormholes opened and closed rapidly around the battlefield, each time unleashing a hail of bullets in an attempt to suppress Kuzan's movements. The bullets weren't imbued with Haki—Bins' forces weren't powerful enough for that. Even those who had Armament Haki couldn't scratch someone like Kuzan.
Better to overwhelm him with sheer volume.
And as the relentless barrage continued, laser beams and explosive shells joined in, targeting Kuzan and his squad.
As a Logia user, Kuzan could weather the storm, even if it was annoying. But the Marines around him had no such luck. Despite his efforts to shield them, they were picked off one by one.
"This is a problem..." Kuzan muttered, clearly annoyed.
He realized now that Bins wasn't trying to defeat him—only to trap him in place, robbing him of the chance to aid A1.
And for the moment... he really had no idea how to break through.