Chapter 86: Not as Easy as Hoped
Chapter 86: Not as Easy as Hoped
Luffy grimaced in pain as he fought hard to keep his form from shifting wildly. It was only his third attempt of the day to reign in and control his Awakened Devil Fruit powers, and he already knew it was going to be his last. Each one had been progressively more draining, and the only reason he was continuing with his current methodology at all was that it had, so far, been the only thing to move the needle at a useful speed.
Said needle, specifically, being the System granted knowledge of how advanced he was with manipulation of his Devil Fruit. Five attempts over the last two days had been sufficient to move ‘Spirit Fruit (Model: Raijun) Mastery’ from 81 to 82. Which was incredibly fast for training with a skill already that high. Outside of combat skills used in combat, at least. All skills slowed as you approached 100, which seemed to be the ‘soft cap’ that normally humans could reach. Only those who were either exceptionally talented, exceptionally stubborn, or both, ever seemed to push above that soft-cap. Luffy was extremely proud of himself for having multiple skills above the soft-cap, and even more proud that most of his crew had at least one such as well.
Chopper, it had to be said, was a special sort of completely ridiculous for having one of the highest single skills Luffy had ever seen. So far, the only three people he’d personally Observed with skills at a higher level that Chopper’s ‘Medicine’ skill were Garp, Crocus, and Chopper’s own former teacher. He suspected, if he’d ever managed to Observe Kizaru or that Elder, they’d have been on the list as well. Most likely Rayleigh as well, come to think of it. He just hadn’t had enough time to use his System-granted Observe ability on those three at any point. He’d been a little too busy focusing on staying alive for that, at the time.
“Gaaa!”
Luffy lost control again and was forced to tap the Seastone block next to him, using it to disrupt the Awakened state before his shapeshifting did serious damage to himself. The first time he’d tried this, back before Shiki, he had damaged several organs and only his own and Kaya’s healing abilities had kept it from crippling him. Thankfully, despite his own built-up ability to ignore ocean water and Seastone to an extent, that ability was based entirely in control. So when he lost control of the Awakened state, Seastone was brutally and unpleasantly effective in short-circuiting the problem.
Panting as he lay back, he checked his system and groaned that his Mastery level hadn’t risen again yet. This was, unfortunately, clearly going to be a long-term project. At least he had confirmed that he could lean into the lucky dice with small expenditure of Karma to get individual attacks off in the Awakened state. Yet that was, as he’d expected, an all-or-nothing desperation gamble. It worked, but left him completely exhausted in the aftermath. In a serious fight, he’d most likely be knocked out entirely, as he had at Sabaody.
“Ugh. I think I’m going to focus on mastering some of the abilities from the Seven Star Sword tomorrow. I need a break from this.”
He would allow himself that much, at least. Since many of the attacks he could use with the holy sword were best practiced with plenty of space, doing so while still on Sixis was on his priority list, just one notch below working with the Awakened State. He’d only allowed the diversion to something easier for a single day, though. They were only going to spend a month on Sixus, before moving on, and the first week had already been used to build the training grounds he and the others were currently spread out among.
Even now, they were still putting in some hours here and there building up other facilities, such as a dry dock and basic housing that could hold the entire crew at need. For the most part, however, they had each moved on from initial base construction, focusing on pushing their training to another level. Now that they knew what would likely be coming for them eventually, and also knew they’d thoroughly pissed off the Marines as an immediate threat, they were all motivated to get stronger, fast.
He groaned as he forced himself to back into a sitting position, from where he’d flopped over bonelessly after touching the Seatone. The downside of being a responsible Captain was that, if he was done making himself suffer, it was time to go train someone else…
… … …
Luffy yelped, only barely managing to dodge the high-pressure water as Nami managed to form not just one ‘Spring’ of water with a stamp of her hoof, but three. The first was a deep well under where he would have landed from his most recent dodge, the second and third were pinpoint water jets formed on the cave walls. Only Geppo and Observation together let him dodge, though the pebble he tossed Nami’s way hit her in return this time and she yelped. Obviously, forming three ‘Springs’ at once had cost her concentration, preventing her own Observation from feeling the ‘attack’ coming.
Despite having gotten her with the pebble, something she was supposed to be avoiding, he was impressed. As such, when she gamely ‘reset’ for another round, Luffy waved her off.
“That’s enough practice on the sparring side of things for now. You honestly came really close to tagging me that time. Congratulations on managing three at once for the first time.”
Nami visibly slumped, even her Zoan-boosted stamina having been run a bit ragged over the last three and a half hours of sparring. Previous to their stop on Sixis, they’d mostly worked on getting her adapted to fighting with her Zoan forms, rather than focusing on the ‘Spring Creation’ aspect she got from being a Mythical Zoan. With more time on their hands now, Luffy and she were both determined to push that aspect harder. It was, after all, by far and away the better way to add to her weather-manipulation.
“Thanks. It still came at the cost of losing some concentration on movement or Haki, though. It’s going to take time before I can use it all together.”
Luffy nodded calmly.
“Of course it is. It took me years to fully develop all the bits and pieces I can do with my own fruit. Thankfully, yours doesn’t have quite as many ‘moving parts,’ as it were. But I’m still fully expecting mastery to take you a year or two, minimum. On the plus side, though…didn’t you say that three points in a combat situation was what you needed to properly form the Water Twister attack you were working towards?”
Nami blinked, then lit up with excitement.
“Yes! With the Clima-Tact to guide it, and three point sources, I can make it work! At least, I think I can…”
Luffy grinned and patted her on the head, his smile only widening as she seemed torn between leaning into it and swiping at his hand.
“Well, you’ve got your next training target, I think. We can do a bit more sparring in a couple of days. But I think focusing on making and manipulating your Fruit to create the Water Twister idea will help you get used to using multiple point sources more quickly. So I’d suggest you focus on that until then.”
Nami nodded, developing a determined look as she reached for her Clima-Tact, having set it aside as she focused on trying to hit Luffy with purely her ‘Spring’ based water attacks…
… … …
Luffy watched, surprised and impressed, as Vivi decimated her way through the moving target range that had been set up. Aside from teaching her Soru, Geppo, and Haki, Luffy had been somewhat poorly suited to help Vivi train in the past. But that hadn’t left her with no instruction at all beyond those elements. Hina, in particular, had taken the Princess somewhat under her wing in combat training specifically. Not only did Hina use quite a few whip-like movements with her Devil Fruit attacks, but unlike Luffy, she’d also known how to use Kami-e.
Vivi was, it had to be said, insanely flexible. To a degree that made everyone else on the crew, except Yamato who cheated with her Devil Fruit, look positively stiff in their movements. Given that Nami and Kuina weren’t exactly slouches in that area, that statement wasn’t without meaning. In truth, Luffy was fairly certain that Vivi could put on a pretty impressive contortionist act, if she’d been so inclined. Brook was all bones, with theoretically no flexibility limits, and Luffy still wasn’t entirely sure the skeleton could actually stretch and twist in some of the ways that Vivi could.
Luffy’s training had added speed to the flexibility, along with prediction ability from Observatin Haki. The resulting fighting style based in that combination, now that Hina had combined her own work with Vivi to build on those basic stats, was honestly a little terrifying.
Vivi’s ‘Peacock Slashers,’ now upgraded with superhard and supersharp crystal with Nojiko’s help, had become a whirling dervish of darting destruction. They’d been lengthened a bit, to the point they were essentially a pair of razor-sharp whips, and Vivi could make them blur even to Luffy’s eyes as she sent them darting and spinning around her body. Worse still was when she started truly moving, turning herself and the weapons into a drill of destruction. Worse even than that, was when she started bringing in her Devil Fruit by opening portals for the whips to come out at unexpected angles from equally unexpected directions.
Nami had tried to hit Luffy and come close.
Vivi had succeeded, repeatedly, despite the fact her physical stats weren’t anywhere near on par with his own, or even Nami’s. All while being damn near impossible to hit at the same time. Between developing Observation, instinctive skill with Kami-e, the speed provided by Soru, and the redirection ability of Geppo? Vivi was a pinball of rapid movement and impossible dodges, with even Luffy struggling to strike her with anything other than area of effect attacks or resorting to his ‘lightning body’ form for extra speed.
Honestly, Vivi’s only real issue was that she still lacked power when she actually did hit you. Normal people would be mulched, Zoan users would feel her attacks but survive…Armament users, or even those who simply wore armor, would basically ignore her hits outright. Likewise, any Logia user and many Paramecias would shrug off most of what she could deliver. Vivi had finally unlocked Armament Haki, but she wasn’t a natural with it, and most certainly couldn’t currently keep up with her own attack rate. Which made what they needed to work on very obvious. If not very fun.
“Alright, Princess…I’m impressed as heck with how far you’ve come. But we both know what you need to work on. So today, we’ll be working on Armament Haki again.”
Vivi had puffed up at the praise, but then slumped at their goal for the day. Luffy sighed, understanding this was both counterintuitive for her natural instincts and…well…the training sucked. You only really got better with instinctive use of Armament by using it to take hits, after all.
“Right. Today is a speed day, at least. So lots of weak attacks. High frequency, but you aren’t allowed to dodge. Got it?”
Vivi pouted but nodded. She knew she needed to get this down, even if it was her least favorite type of training.
“Ready!”
Taking a reed switch out of his inventory, Luffy got to work, using his higher speed to lash at Vivi with darting, stinging strikes. She had to either block with Armament or suffer…and Luffy wasn’t above repeating strikes to certain areas that would make it embarrassingly hard to sit down later, if it helped the point sink in properly.
… … …
“I…did not know I could do that.”
Robin sounded stunned, even as Luffy was feeling extremely satisfied. Much of his knowledge of future events had been either rendered useless, or else was simply running out. His past life had simply…lost interest…only a little way after the two-year time skip in One Piece. He had attempted to watch the series after it resumed, managing to get through the Fishman Island Arc, but that was it. He’d been watching episodes as-they-released at that point and, after getting through that arc, he’d just…stopped.
Originally, it had been with some nebulous idea that he’d let the series build up a few arcs so he could binge them, thinking that the delay between episodes was part of the problem. As it happened, however, he’d simply never returned to the series. At least not before his untimely demise. He’d still be part of a number of SubReddits, Discord channels, Facebook Groups and so on that generally discussed anime and manga though. Which meant that, as popular as One Piece had still been, he’d still absorbed a certain amount of loose information about the series. He’d known a little bit about Yamato, for example, as the entire internet (particularly the Rule 34 artists) had gone gaga over her. He’d known nothing about these ‘Elders’ or whatever the hell ‘God’s Knights’ were, though.
For the most part the truly useful information he had left, as far as he was concerned, was details about how the main cast had trained during the time skip. That was where he’d gotten basic knowledge of Haki, just for starters, and why he knew about several islands he fully intended to make sure they visited over the next two years. It had been information he’d made extremely sure to preserve, and he’d already been using some of it. Such a getting Robin some basic training with martial arts that focused on short, sharp movements, building Nami’s Clima-Tacts, encouraging the idea of Zoro’s nine-sword-style with a few random comments/observations, and helping Usopp experiment with exotic ammo types.
Now, he was staring at the results of one of the last major tricks he’d still held in reserve for someone. Specifically, he and Robin were both staring at the giant foot she’d managed to create. Instead of merely a duplicate of her own, as normally occurred when Robin used her Devil Fruit, this foot went up to Robin’s own waist in size. All while actually ending at the ankle. Not as big as he remembered her being capable of producing post time skip, but an extremely good place to start. Clapping her gently on the shoulder to break her out of her momentary disbelief, he commented with a smile.
“Well, I think I can see one way that your offensive power is going to skyrocket, Robin. We’ll need to test this extensively. See how much more it takes out of you to use, how big they can become, and if there are any tradeoffs made, such as trading speed for power.”
Robin, still looking a little dazed, nodded. A moment later, she dismissed the giant foot and shuddered.
“It did take more out of me, at least enough to made quite a few more limbs. Possibly proportionate to the additional mass? This will definitely require more testing.”
Smiling, Luffy set about trying to figure out a testing and training plan with her. Including suggesting that they bring Chopper into things, as the way his Rumble Balls worked might just boost what she could do with her own Fruit when used like this. For that matter, they should probably try to find out what those things did to himself and Nami too, given that both of them had Zoan fruits…
… … …
Luffy took one look at the training area were Hina, Sanji and Perona were working and about faced. Was he morbidly curious why Sanji and Perona were both naked save for some of Hina’s Devil Fruit bindings, as they tried to navigate a constantly changing maze of more such bindings?
Yes.
Was he curious enough to risk his mental health by finding out the answer?
No.
Sanji had been developing nicely, more or less on his own, even before…whatever that was. And Perona was at the stage where a lot of what she needed was motivation and a lot of sweat put into develop her base physical stats to the point she could keep up with the rest of the crew. Something Hina was probably more qualified to help her with that he was. He was just fine leaving what that had been alone. So long as it produced results…
… … …
“There! That actually worked, at least for a moment!”
Brook stared at where the glowing phantom muscles had briefly shimmered into place around one skeletal leg. Luffy had to admit it he hadn’t been sure Kaya’s idea would work either, but that had very clearly been a working version of Stage 1 of her master plan. Brook shook himself, his skull stretching in his version of a smile.
“Yohohoho! I didn’t think that would work! Why, even if none of the rest does, it would still be an improvement while I can keep it up!”
Luffy nodded at that. The full idea was for the ‘phantom’ muscle and skin to act as a sort of guide to allow them to eventually encourage Brook’s Devil Fruit to restore more of his body. Of course, they weren’t sure that would ever work out. What he was now virtually certain of, though, was that the ‘Phantom Body’ would increase Brook’s speed and power if he could get it down. The phantom muscle didn’t weigh anything, after all. Yet it could still apply force. While he’d never say it, in some ways merely getting the Phantom Body trick down and stopping there, rather than trying to restore Brook’s physical body, would probably be better from a pure combat perspective.
“It’s a good start. You’re going to need to refine your control and build your spiritual reserves a lot to maintain it as a full body covering, though. I think the other idea we came up with will help there, the manipulation of sound waves through a combination of Dials and metal-engraved versions of Kaya’s seals…”
Brook nodded.
“Indeed, indeed! I dare say it will be a most enchanting performance if it works! Why, women may fall so in love that they want to show me their panties! Yohohoho!”
Rolling his eyes at the skeleton-mans antics, and thankful that he was more Kaya’s problem than his, Luffy decided to exit stage left while Kaya worked with Brook on the whole engraving bit. He’d check in with Kaya herself later, to see if she needed anything for training of her own, but she was arguably the most completely independent of his crew in that regard. Even Hina had a lot to learn from him in the form of Haki use, but Kaya had long since outstripped Luffy’s own understanding of using spiritual energy. The best he could really do for her is be a sounding board for her to bounce ideas off of…
… … …
“That one was easy, just building up your confidence! Long range, I wrote the book! Nobody alive can beat me!”
Luffy smirked as he holstered his smoking revolver and accepted one of Usopp’s spare rifles. He was already certain he would eventually lose with the longer ranges of the rifles in play. He was aware, via his System, that Usopp’s marksmanship skill was higher than his own, after all. Yet Luffy had already trounced Usopp at speed shooting on the shorter-range targets that had been rigged up. For all his insane skill, Usopp just couldn’t out speed Luffy on the draw and both of them were extremely accurate at the piddling little twenty-five meters where they’d had their rapid-fire contest. Still, Luffy fully intended to make their sniper work for his long-range win. If it pushed Usopp to improve, all the better.
“Bring in on, Usopp. You’re already down one event, after all, and my eyes are as good as yours…”
Shifting his eyes to be very similar to Usopp’s falcon eyes to bring that point home, he enjoyed watching Usopp puff up with braggadocio. As he started to rant about how much he would trounce his Captain by, Luffy only smiled. After all, even if Usopp won, he’d still lose, in a way. After all, if he won, Nojiko was going to be ‘ordered’ (she’d volunteered already) to teach Usopp the rifle-based martial art that she rarely used any longer. If he lost, he would instead be put through ‘intense training’ by Luffy, who had announced that fact with as horrifying of overtones as he could manage.
In truth, since Luffy was expecting to lose, he’d wanted Usopp to look at Nojiko’s training as the lesser terror. If, somehow, he beat Usopp, then he’d just put him through hell to boost his base stats, then give him over the Nojiko anyway. As Luffy raised his rifle in time with Usopp, an amused-looking Robin tossed a ball out. They would start firing when it hit the ground…
… … …
Luffy watched, impressed, as Nojiko struggled against the Crystal Mech that Pagaya was finally properly ready to field. It could have been deployed in an emergency quite some time ago, but the older man was a perfectionist and had kept refining the mech until he was happy with a ‘MK I’ design. That said design was at least ten percent better than the ones made by the Crystal City wasn’t missed by Luffy. Clearly, he’d also had his pride and refused merely duplicating someone else’s work, let alone making do with an inferior version.
Now, the older man was sparring with Nojiko, with the single handicap that she wasn’t allowed to manipulate any of his Crystal. It was proving to be a much more even match than expected, with the Mech providing physical power and various Dial effects being used to increase its mobility. Nojiko hadn’t been able to damage the armor meaningfully so far, though he suspected that was about to change as he saw some of her Crystals darken with Haki. Curiously, they turned purple whenever she did that, which was enough of a visual indicator for her opponent to do his best to avoid those blows. Something which he was only partially successful at as Nojiko finally began to properly chip away at her opponent.
Then Pagaya countered by breaking out AOE attacks that ranged from sonic to electric, and Nojiko was forced back on the defensive. This, Luffy decided, was turning out to be an instructive fight. Even if Nojiko was unquestionably the stronger fighter overall, Pagaya’s equipment was making a major difference. Pursing his lips, Luffy began to consider if there were any additional ways to boost Nojiko’s own loadout. Given she mostly used a Dial-modified rifle herself, with many of the same crystal-based ammos that he and Usopp now used, Luffy wasn’t entirely sure where to go with that idea. They might need to outright change her fighting style…or possibly take some notes from that Mech and see if she could replicate them without the supporting frame?
Making a note to follow up on that thought, Luffy continued to observe the battle…
… … …
“RAHARARGGG”
Luffy sighed, parrying ‘Monster Form Chopper’s’ blow with very little effort. Yes, the ‘monster’ body gave the little reindeer a considerable boost in strength, but his form was horrible when he lost himself to Berserker rage. Either he or Yamato could easily contain him, and it was his turn today as Chopper worked towards controlling himself in this state. He was making progress, that much was certainly true, Chopper had managed to hold off the berserk rage for several minutes this time. Yet he still had a ways to go.
Ah well, at least two days ago Chopper had managed to summon one of his Rumble Ball forms without needing the drug. They’d figured out fairly early on that his Rumble Balls were just a drug-induced way of manipulating his spiritual energy, and Kaya had started working with him on summoning/controlling it without using the drug as a crutch. It was slow going, the science-minded reindeer struggling with the nature of spiritual energy. But he was making progress. That was more than enough for Luffy…
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A/N 1: The crew's need for a true 'base' is a bit nebulous, due to Vivi and the Discovery's abilities. This is why the set Sixis up mostly as a training location, where they can be destructive without inconveniencing anyone, and not be seen as they develop either.
A/N 2: I totally stole a small bit of the shooting competition lines from the Mass Effect shooting competition between Shepard and Garrus. Bonus nerd points for anyone that spotted it ;-).