Skypiea, the edge of Upper Yard.
Rector was experimenting with the abilities of the Munch-Munch Fruit.
He devoured clouds, and his body transformed into a fluffy cloud-man.
He devoured Rocks, solidifying into a rock-man with a hard shell.
He even swallowed an entire stone house, transforming it into a moving house with legs.
Aside from these homogeneous devouring experiments, he was also conducting fusion and synthesis experiments.
He swallowed three marmosets and synthesized them into a massive marmoset.
He swallowed three sky sharks and fused them into a three-headed shark growing three heads.
He even tried swallowing a Southbird, instantly turning into a Southbird-man with a bird’s head and wings.
After spitting the Southbird back out, he rubbed his neck, which had been twisted one hundred and eighty degrees, wincing in soreness.
Next time he fused with a Southbird, he’d better find the right angle first; he almost broke his neck.
When using the Munch-Munch Fruit to complete a fusion, he could completely suppress the will of the fused creature itself and directly utilize all of its abilities.
This reminded him of the plot in the original work where Wapol swallowed his elder brother Mushuru and was immediately able to use the Fungus-Fungus Fruit abilities.
In that case, wouldn’t everyone be able to become a dual Devil Fruit user?
However, without the suppression effect of the Munch-Munch Fruit, it was best to pair it with an unconscious body.
Fusing a conscious subject with an unconscious body, with both bodies controlled by the same consciousness.
That way, the issue of consciousness rivalry wouldn’t arise, and it could accommodate two Devil Fruits simultaneously, which was indeed a decent direction for development.
As expected, Paramecia Devil Fruits were bizarre and possessed infinite potential!
No wonder everyone on the vast seas wanted to be a mechanic freak or a stats freak.
Garp was a classic stats freak, standing at the apex of the world purely on physical attributes.
Teach was a classic mechanic freak, becoming one of the Four Emperors relying on two top-tier Devil Fruits.
Rector looked at the giant marmoset before him, its body moving crookedly, its limbs exerting force in different directions, unable even to walk normally, looking just like a marionette.
This was the consequence of a divided will; multiple consciousnesses all wanted to control the dominance of the body.
Watching the multiple consciousnesses within this body tugging at each other, Rector suddenly thought of Teach.
Blackbeard’s missing teeth were in different positions every time he appeared; could he also be a creation of the Munch-Munch Fruit?
“It couldn’t possibly be a coincidence, right?”
Rector rubbed his chin and fell into deep thought.
After seizing the Dark-Dark Fruit, Blackbeard had indeed gone to Drum Island, though the plot didn’t detail what he specifically did there.
He also remembered that during the Enies Lobby arc, three people huddled together to disguise themselves as a grand magistrate—could that be some kind of foreshadowing too?
“Forget it, forget it, I won’t think about it.”
Rector shook all the messy guesses out of his head.
As a veteran One Piece fan, ever since Shanks’s true identity was exposed, even if someone told him now that Imu was a parrot, he would find it reasonable.
…
On the training ground, a bulging large bundle was piled in the center of the area, filled entirely with the supplies listed on the inventory.
“Vegapunk, this clone can stay behind to help you with your research.”
A lightning particle drifted out from within Rector’s body, and Lightning No.
1 silently condensed and took shape.
This clone carried the abilities of the Munch-Munch Fruit, and its combat relied entirely on the characteristics of the Munch-Munch Fruit.
But its primary role was to assist Vegapunk in advancing his research, while also devouring Skypiea’s Poneglyph to temper its physique.
Rector’s goal was very clear; he wanted to train his body to be the hardest in the entire world.
This Poneglyph on Skypiea recorded clues related to the Ancient Weapon, Poseidon.
He knew that Poseidon was the future Princess Shirahoshi, so this stone tablet was of no use to him; he might as well use it to strengthen his physical attributes.
However, this method had a drawback: after devouring the Poneglyph, this clone had to be re-merged into the main body.
Only then could the strengthened physique be transferred to himself, equivalent to a large EXP pack filled with enhancement effects.
“I understand.”
Vegapunk immediately nodded in agreement.
The conventional temperature of lightning could reach seventeen thousand degrees Celsius, easily melting metal.
With this clone around, quite a few heating and smelting steps could be saved, and research efficiency could be increased by a large margin.
“Zeus, let’s go!”
Zeus was squatting by the edge of the training ground, watching the Thunder Emperor Guards drill with great interest.
Hearing Rector’s voice, it immediately turned around and flew towards him.
Rector casually tossed the supply bundle onto Zeus’s back and found a comfortable position to lie down on its back.
Carrying the full pack of supplies, Zeus flew in the direction of Hachinosu, with the churning sea of clouds beneath its feet and the wind brushing past its ears, carrying the chill of high altitude.
…
The next day at noon, the port of Hachinosu was baked scorching hot by the fierce sun, the bluestone pavement hot enough to scorch feet, and the air was filled with a blended smell of alcohol, ocean stench, and roasted meat.
A heavily intoxicated pirate slumped on a roadside rock to sober up.
Seeing the clouds rapidly drifting over, he rubbed his eyes hard, thinking he had hallucinated from drinking.
“Why are these clouds drifting faster than a ship?”
Silver-white lightning slashed through the sultry air, stopping steadily in front of that pirate.
Lightning crackled as it wrapped around Rector’s robust arms, and his light golden eyes swept over the pirate indifferently.
Rector spread out his Observation Haki, currently locating Charlotte Linlin’s position, when a group of pirates wielding large sabers swarmed around him in a flurry.
“Hey, kid!
Are you here looking for someone?”
The burly man at the lead reeked of alcohol, his face flushed with a post-drinking red, sizing Rector up and down with malicious intent.
“Get lost!”
Rector glanced around, his gaze as cold as ice.
As soon as his words fell, the sky above the port abruptly darkened.
“Rumble!!!”
Muffled thunder tore through the clouds.
“Crack!!!”
Several pillars of lightning tens of meters thick crashed straight down, striking right in the middle of this group of burly men.
“You picked the wrong prey; I am not someone you can mess with.”
This commotion instantly attracted the attention of all the pirates at the port; people nearby drinking, gambling, and unloading cargo all stopped their movements and craned their necks to look over in this direction.
“Is he a Logia-type user?”
“So what if he’s a Logia type?
If he doesn’t know Haki, he’s just all show!”
The pirates shouted and slashed their swords toward Rector.
For this newcomer rookie, they had to make him witness the brutal competition of Hachinosu.
With a smile on his face, Rector covered his right arm in Armament Haki, with sizzling lightning darting across its surface, and threw a punch at the charging group of pirates, bursting out a sharp whistling sound of breaking wind in the air.
“Lightning Fist!!!”
“Crack!”
Shadow punches flickering with lightning were thrown out one after another, and the pirates who were hit wailed and fell to the ground.
In the blink of an eye, thirty pirates were lying on the ground; some were charred black and twitching, some were clutching their arms and rolling around in pain, and others passed out directly, their trouser legs soaked wet.
“Thump!!!”
Just at this moment, an aura of extreme brutality swept over from the depths of Hachinosu, like a dormant beast eyeing prey that had strayed into its territory.
A massive figure rapidly approached, its heavy footsteps causing the bluestone pavement to crack layer by layer.
Like a giant boulder falling from the sky, the person landed heavily in front of Rector, kicking up a cloud of dust all over the ground.
“Worororororororor——!!!”
“Kid!
You’ve got some nerve starting trouble in Rocks’s territory!!”
A figure nearly seven meters tall walked out from the dust, dark hair draped messily over his shoulders.
His shoulders and back were as wide as a wall, his arms as thick as Rocks, and a pair of curved large horns stood upright atop his head.
He held a massive kanabo in his hand, surrounded by a violent murderous aura, and took a step forward.
“Hey, kid!
State your name!!”
The surrounding pirates instinctively backed far away, fearing they would get caught up in the upcoming fight.
Because the person who had arrived was Kaido, an intern of the Rocks Pirates and a newcomer favored by the officer Charlotte Linlin.
(Young Kaido)
Rector swept an indifferent gaze over the person before him, his Observation Haki having long since firmly locked onto Kaido’s aura.
The corners of his mouth curled into a ferocious grin; this was the guy who had stolen the Azure Dragon Fruit that originally should have belonged to his younger brother.
Thinking of this, his silver-white long hair fluttered wildly in the wind, and thumb-thick electric arcs crazily darted across his body, continuously converging and intertwining in mid-air.
The air was full of crackling electrical explosions, and even the surrounding temperature rose significantly.
Rector raised his right hand, pointing his fingertips at the ground.
“Hey, before asking someone else’s name, you have to bow ninety degrees first, understand?”
“Crack!!!”
The lightning instantly surged, and a silver-white lightning tiger coiled and formed behind Rector, its entire body glowing.
Its size was a circle larger than Kaido’s, and its fangs and sharp claws were condensed entirely from pure lightning, emitting a scorching heatwave.