Newgate was clearly just as interested in a challenge like this.
“Dorum, adjust our course according to the intelligence.
We’ll avoid their main shipping lane and break in through the Thunder Abyss from the western side.” Rocks traced a devious new route across the nautical chart.
“The Thunder Abyss?” Dorum’s face immediately turned pale.
“Captain, that’s one of the most dangerous stretches of sea in the Grand Line!
It’s wracked by endless thunderstorms all year round, and terrifying Sea Kings lurk there.
They call it the Graveyard of Ships!” “Perfect.” Rocks grinned.
“The most dangerous places are often the least defended.
Besides…” He glanced toward the kitchen, anticipation flickering in his eyes.
“I’ve heard there’s a very special ingredient found there.” Ryne stepped out of the kitchen carrying a hand-drawn copy of his Ingredient Encyclopedia.
On one of its pages was an illustration of a colossal beast that looked both savage and majestic.
“Thunder Abyss Leviathan.” His voice remained as calm as ever.
“A colossal Sea King that inhabits perpetual storm seas and feeds on lightning itself.” “Its flesh contains remarkably pure lightning energy.
Its heart, known as the Heart of the Thunder God, is considered a legendary ingredient capable of dramatically enhancing the consumer’s physical vitality and neural response speed.
However…” Ryne paused before continuing, “This creature only appears within the very heart of the most violent thunderstorms.
Hunting one is extraordinarily difficult.” “Wahahaha!
Did you hear that?
The Heart of the Thunder God!” Gatz’s eyes lit up instantly.
He could already feel himself starting to drool.
“If I eat that, will my punches be able to shoot lightning too?” Silver answered with a perfectly timed deadpan.
“Maybe it’ll just make getting struck by lightning feel a little more comfortable.” With their decision made, the battered sailing ship turned its bow once again.
Like a fearless challenger, it sailed without hesitation toward the forbidden sea where thunder roared and lightning never ceased.
Three days later, they entered the Thunder Abyss.
The sky was blanketed by thick leaden clouds, turning broad daylight into perpetual dusk.
Silver serpents of lightning ripped across the heavens before exploding against the sea.
The relentless thunder battered their ears without pause.
The waves grew increasingly violent, each one towering like a moving mountain as it crashed against the tiny vessel, threatening to tear it apart at any moment.
“Hold her steady!
Grab onto something!” Dorum roared at the top of his lungs, clinging desperately to the helm as he fought a desperate battle against the raging sea.
Just then, Silver’s warning rang out from the crow’s nest.
“It’s here!” Everyone looked in the direction he was pointing.
In the distance, a colossal waterspout thicker than the ship itself shot skyward.
Within the towering column of water, an unimaginably enormous creature slowly revealed itself.
Its body was covered in blue-black scales as hard as forged steel.
A massive, ferocious horn rose from its forehead, its tip crackling with blinding lightning.
Every breath it drew was accompanied by rolling thunder and flashing bolts.
This was the Thunder Abyss Leviathan.
“Gurararara!
Now that’s a monster!” Newgate rose to his feet, rolling his shoulders as fighting spirit surged from his eyes.
“I’ll handle it.” Rocks stood up as well, an overwhelming aura of supreme dominance radiating from him.
The two monsters looked at one another, invisible sparks seeming to explode between them.
“Let’s do it together.” Ryne’s calm voice broke the standoff.
“The Heart of the Thunder God has to be removed within three minutes of its death.
After that, the lightning energy will dissipate.” “Wahahaha!
Fine!
Let’s see whose attack makes the bigger splash!” “Gurararara!
Works for me!” The next instant, both figures vanished from the deck.
Rocks appeared on the Thunder Abyss Leviathan’s left, his fist cloaked in pitch-black gravitational force intertwined with crackling Conqueror’s Haki lightning, as though it could swallow the world itself.
Newgate appeared on its right, his fist enveloped in a brilliant white sphere of vibrating force powerful enough to shatter space itself.
“Dark Water!” “Seaquake!” The two battle cries echoed simultaneously as fists capable of destroying islands slammed into the Leviathan from opposite sides.
BOOM!!
For a single instant…
The world fell silent.
Then came an explosion beyond the limits of language.
The sea within the Thunder Abyss was crushed into an enormous basin over a kilometer wide.
The surrounding ocean was violently displaced, forming a colossal ring-shaped tsunami hundreds of meters high.
Even the storm clouds overhead were completely torn apart by the terrifying force, allowing sunlight to shine through for the first time in ages.
When everything finally settled, the once-invincible Thunder Abyss Leviathan floated belly-up upon the sea, utterly lifeless.
A horrifying fist imprint pierced deep into each side of its massive body.
Aboard the ship, Gatz and Dorum had long since gone numb from shock.
Ryne, however, moved immediately.
He sprinted across the sea as though it were solid ground.
“Silver!
Now!” Silver had already been waiting.
His spear shot forward like a bolt of lightning, piercing the Leviathan’s chest with flawless precision.
With a powerful upward sweep, he extracted a crystal-blue heart still crackling with arcs of lightning.
The heart flew through the air and landed perfectly inside a specially prepared Seastone container Ryne had readied beforehand.
A flawless hunt.
That night, Ryne used the Heart of the Thunder God as the centerpiece of one final feast before the coming battle.
Instead of relying on elaborate cooking techniques, he sliced it into paper-thin pieces and prepared it as sashimi, allowing the ingredient’s natural flavor to shine.
It was accompanied by a sauce made from Leviathan blood and several rare varieties of seaweed, its surface shimmering with arcs of lightning.
The moment the first slice of the Heart of the Thunder God melted on their tongues, everyone felt as though their souls had been touched by a gentle bolt of lightning.
An incomparably pure surge of energy coursed through their bodies in an instant.
Every cell seemed to rejoice as their physical vitality awakened, while their neural response speed reached an entirely new level.
Gatz found that he could clearly see every beat of a mosquito’s wings.
Silver felt his thoughts accelerating several times over.
As for Dorum, the hands that had grown somewhat sluggish after years of repairing ships suddenly became more dexterous than ever before.
Rocks and Newgate experienced an even more remarkable transformation.
Their Haki resonated with the lightning energy in a strange and powerful harmony, becoming fiercer and far more destructive than before.
Ryne watched the satisfied expressions around the table before glancing at the experience bar that was rapidly approaching its limit.
A faint smile curled at the corner of his lips.
He knew that another transformation was about to begin.
Meanwhile, on the distant horizon, the silhouette of a massive steel fortress gradually came into view.
… The afterglow of the feast still lingered, while the fury of the Thunder Abyss had finally subsided.
The battered sailing ship glided across a sea washed a brilliant blue.
The air was crisp, carrying the refreshing scent unique to the aftermath of a storm.
Every member of the crew was adapting to the changes in their body.
Gatz excitedly swung the ship’s anchor around, discovering that his reflexes had become astonishingly fast.
He could even predict the path of the wind pressure generated before the anchor completed its swing.
Silver quietly closed his eyes.
The range of his Observation Haki had expanded severalfold, and his perception had become far more three-dimensional.
He was no longer merely hearing or seeing.
Instead, he could sense the flow of all things, as though the entire world had become an intricate web woven from countless invisible threads.
Dorum pulled out his toolbox and began giving the ship the most meticulous maintenance it had ever received.
His hands moved so quickly they left afterimages, every motion flawlessly precise, making him more than twice as efficient as before.
Rocks and Newgate continued drinking as usual, but every now and then, a faint spark of lightning flashed in their eyes when they exchanged glances.
Their Haki was silently testing one another.
With the Heart of the Thunder God acting as a catalyst, both of them were steadily advancing toward an even greater level of power.
As for Ryne, he stood quietly in the kitchen, carefully wiping down his chef’s knife.
Outwardly, he appeared perfectly calm.
Inside, however, he was anything but.
At the very instant the feast had ended, the voice he had been waiting for echoed through his mind.
[Ding!
The host has successfully cooked the legendary ingredient, the Heart of the Thunder God, granting an extraordinary enhancement to every member of the Rocks Pirates.
Massive experience awarded!] [Ding!
Top-Tier Culinary Arts EXP has reached its maximum (200,000/200,000).
Beginning advancement…] Ryne’s consciousness was pulled into a pure white space.
Before him, the enormous system interface began undergoing a dramatic transformation.
The emblem representing Top-Tier shone with blinding brilliance before suddenly shattering into countless particles of light.
Those fragments gathered together once more, forging an entirely new emblem.
It was more intricate.
More ancient.
Its surface radiated a warm, refined glow.
Upon it were engraved two bold characters: Master.
[Advancement successful!
Congratulations!
Your Culinary Arts have advanced to Master Level!] [Master-Level Culinary Arts: Returning to Simplicity.
Your understanding of ingredients has been greatly enhanced, allowing you to perceive both their fundamental energy and the pathways of their soul.] [Ding!
Congratulations on reaching Master Level!
Your spiritual power has increased significantly.
Observation Haki has resonated with the Way of Food, unlocking a new exclusive ability—Soul of Food!] [Soul of Food: The host can infuse dishes with their own will and soul, granting food a specific “soul.” While enjoying the meal, those who eat it will temporarily inherit powerful, targeted enhancements based on the soul infused within the dish.] [Example: Create a dish imbued with the Soul of Fury to dramatically increase aggression and destructive power for a short period, or a dish infused with the Soul of Tranquility to conceal one’s presence and greatly enhance perception.] [Ding!
Congratulations on reaching Master Level!
Reward: 50,000 Cooking Points.
Master-Level Shop Exchange List unlocked.
Master-Level Recipe Gift Pack obtained.] An overwhelming torrent of information flooded Ryne’s mind.
Yet instead of feeling overwhelmed, his thoughts had never been clearer.
When Ryne opened his eyes again, the world itself had changed.
Previously, when he looked at an ingredient, he saw only its texture, fibers, and freshness.
Now…
He could see the energy flowing within it.
He could witness everything it had experienced—from the moment it first grew until the instant it was harvested.
He could perceive the very source of its flavor.
Its soul.
Ryne picked up an ordinary piece of dried fish.
To him, it was no longer an inanimate object.
He could see the fish swimming freely through the sea during its lifetime.
He could sense the traces left within it by sunlight and sea salt.
He could even hear the faint whispers of its deepest flavor.
“So this…
is what Master-Level Culinary Arts truly are…” Ryne murmured softly, enlightenment shining in his eyes.
This was no mere improvement in technique.
It was evolution on the level of life itself.
And with it, his understanding of the Way of Food had entered an entirely new realm.
If the Way of Food had previously strengthened his companions only passively, then with Soul of Food, Ryne could now actively and precisely shape the kind of power each of them would receive.
He had become a true battlefield chef.
“Hey, Head Chef Ryne!” Gatz’s booming voice pulled Ryne out of his profound state of enlightenment.
He poked his head into the kitchen with an eager grin.
“So…
when’s breakfast?
After fighting that giant monster, I’m starving again!” Ryne turned toward Gatz.
He looked at the man’s face, which practically had the word hungry written all over it, then shifted his gaze toward the steel fortress on the horizon, now growing clearer with every passing moment.
A calm smile spread across his face—confident, and carrying just the slightest hint of amusement.
“Breakfast?”
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