Changes to the Fruit Encyclopedia, Special Fruit Slots?

Marineford, No. 73 Marine Training Ground.

"Black Spear · Giant Iron Thorn!"

Accompanying Hina's low shout, pitch-black giant iron bars materialized above her outstretched hands.

She hurled the massive, heavy iron bar forward.

"White Smoke · Jitte Cut!"

At this moment, facing her across the field, Smoker was the one she fought.

But now, Smoker chose not to use Elementalization to dodge this strike.

Quite the opposite—this already sweat-soaked White Hunter simply gripped his weapon 'Jitte' tightly, white smoke coiling around his wrist as he swung the staff to smash directly into the iron bar.

"Boom!"

And so, the giant iron bar was shattered by his strike, crashing heavily to the side.

"Huff, huff."

"Haha."

By now, both Hina and Smoker had clearly exhausted a considerable amount of stamina.

Yet even so, their movements were synchronized—one took out a ladies' cigarette, the other pulled a cigar from his chest, and they lit up at the same time.

"Puff." *2

Each exhaled a plume of smoke, their expressions seeming to ease.

Then—

"You—"

Hina was about to say something, but her words abruptly stopped.

Because at that moment, she saw a News Coo flying over Marineford drop two bundles of newspapers—clearly theirs.

"The World Economic News Agency's paper. Isn't it not time for the next release yet?"

Hina frowned slightly.

"An Extra Edition? What happened?"

Smoker reacted the same way.

She extended a hand, and an iron bar caught the newspaper, while on the other side, Smoker rolled up smoke to grab his.

Both looked at the headlines of their respective papers.

Then—

Both their brows furrowed simultaneously, shock flashing in their eyes.

"This really is... a huge incident."

Hina's voice was full of gravity.

There, at the very top of the headline, was a bold, thick line of text.

[Shichibukai 'Crocodile' Killed]

That simple sentence alone was enough to shake the sea.

But that wasn't even all of it.

The truly crucial content lay in the details of the report below.

"The government claims that the one who killed Crocodile is the President and leader of the Grand Line criminal organization 'Baroque Works,' codenamed 'MR.0.'"

"However, after our newspaper's reporter confirmed the intelligence, an Informed Source provided information—MR.0 calls himself 'Dragon of the Chen,' and appears to be related to the 'Celestial Gold Heist' criminal Rooster, who shook the world not long ago."

"They both come from a mysterious organization named—[Twelve Zodiacs], and Baroque Works may be their subordinate group."

Reading this, Smoker had already clenched his newspaper.

"Crocodile actually died. Dragon of the Chen, from the same organization as Rooster?"

His voice was low, his tone utterly serious.

"Yeah—last time it was stealing Celestial Gold, and now this time, directly killing a Shichibukai. The Twelve Zodiacs... seems like a troublesome organization."

At that moment, Hina took a drag from her cigarette.

"'Big News' Morgans, daring to report something like this—he's really not afraid of the government coming after him?"

She was a very meticulous person.

She knew well that within the Navy, the blockade of intelligence related to 'Rooster' was extremely thorough.

Aside from the Navy personnel led by Luo Yi, who had directly participated in the Master Port incident, almost no other Marines knew many details about Rooster.

But now, in the content of the 'World Economic News,' such information had appeared.

Coupled with the fact that this newspaper was a sudden 'Extra Edition,' Hina could almost guess—this time, Morgans probably hadn't coordinated with the World Government.

"A guy like Morgans, who thrives on chaos—nothing he does should surprise anyone, right?"

At that moment, Smoker just shook his head.

Then, he decisively tossed the newspaper aside: "Let's get back to training—I'm still 83 reps short of today's goal."

"..."

Hearing Smoker's words, Hina's expression stiffened.

"So... what's up with you?"

"Not caring about something that could shake the whole sea, only thinking about training—what's gotten into you lately? Hina doesn't get it!"

She couldn't help but complain.

Recently, Smoker had been dragging her into training almost every day, and the intensity was terrifying.

Even Hina, who normally didn't mind training, felt she couldn't keep up.

"Shake the sea. I never thought the Shichibukai should exist in the first place."

Smoker bit down on his cigar as he spoke: "Compared to caring about who beat that kind of guy, I've got more important things to do."

What he said was indeed true.

On a normal day, he might've been somewhat interested in someone defeating a Shichibukai, especially an organization called the 'Twelve Zodiacs'—as Morgans wished, that name's appearance was enough to shake the entire sea.

But the problem was, he had something more important now.

That was... the Three-Army Martial Arts Tournament!

"Luo Yi."

Smoker was a competitive man.

As peers and friends, his rivalry with Luo Yi had always been there.

Before, though he admitted Luo Yi was pretty strong, he always thought he was stronger.

After all, he was a Logia Ability User, while Luo Yi wasn't an Ability User at all.

But last time, after witnessing Luo Yi's fight with Zephyr firsthand...

His thoughts had naturally changed.

"That guy's already grown that far without me noticing..."

Thinking about the 'Three-Army Martial Arts Tournament' starting in a few months, and the harsh words Luo Yi had thrown at him back then—

"If I really lose to that bastard, he might demand I become his vice-captain—then I'd be laughed at for the rest of my life."

Afraid of a brother's hardship, yet scared of his success—that was Smoker right now.

So lately, his training had been this insane.

Even more precisely, despite training this crazily, Smoker still felt uneasy.

"He became Instructor Zephyr's disciple, and Zephyr said he'd pass on the essence of his physical techniques to him."

Smoker worried: "It's been half a month now. That guy... he's probably been training hard every day lately, gotten a lot stronger, right?"

At that thought, even the cigar in his mouth didn't taste as good.

So, he looked at Hina, who was still bewildered: "Come on, keep training—I changed my mind, we're doing 50 more reps today."

"Huh?"

Hearing that, Hina frowned and tilted her head.

Seeing Smoker's serious 'I absolutely can't lose' expression, she could only shake her head helplessly: "Hina is speechless."

While Smoker was obsessing over his good brother and training like crazy, he naturally had no idea—

Inside Zephyr's exclusive 'Z' Training Ground dormitory.

"Burp!"

A loud belch rang out.

Though it was already broad daylight, Luo Yi was still sprawled limp on the bed.

"Whoa—awesome! Downing a whole bottle in one go—I really have gotten a lot stronger!"

Eyeing the cola bottle in his hand, Luo Yi looked very satisfied, as if he'd accomplished some great feat.

Hard training?

Of course not.

It wasn't that Luo Yi was lazy, but Zephyr's situation was a bit strange.

In fact, after Zephyr said he'd take him as a true disciple and pass on the essence of his physical techniques...

Luo Yi had indeed prepared himself for hellish training.

But the reality was—after bringing him to the training camp, Zephyr only had him do some basic strength exercises every day.

If anything was special, it was that the training covered a very wide range of aspects.

Muscles, bones, strength... Zephyr had him train in every aspect and recorded the data.

Aside from that, Loi rarely saw his so-called cheap teacher.

And Loi was perfectly happy with that.

Every day, he did some basic strength training, then sipped cola and basked in the sun, then sipped more cola—life couldn't be better.

Especially these past few days.

"Baroque Works' business is already in hand, and before long, the Belly King Cobra promised will also be delivered to Dragon of the Chen."

At the thought, Loi almost couldn't help but laugh out loud.

In this Alabasta plan, he had been targeting Crocodile from the very start.

As a notorious criminal organization on the Grand Line, Baroque Works had over 2,000 members.

Such a behemoth wasn't just sitting around doing nothing.

Bounty hunters, black market deals, mercenaries, hunting Sea Beasts—its business network was extremely extensive.

And its unique internal structure had long caught Loi's eye.

His plan had gone quite smoothly—the 'Dragon of the Chen' he had carefully arranged truly had an ability that countered Crocodile.

After dealing with Crocodile, Dragon of the Chen had officially become Mr. 0 with Nico Robin's help.

Now, Baroque Works belonged to him.

"But... the nature of the business needs a slight adjustment."

Of course, Loi had his limits in this regard.

He would never touch things like human trafficking or illegal drugs.

Even so.

"Just from Baroque Works' operations alone, after deducting the basic funds needed to keep it running, I can get at least over 6 billion Belly in net profit every year."

"Too bad Crocodile spent most of his liquid assets on the 'Utopia Plan,' or I'd have a lot of cash right now."

After learning about Baroque Works' situation through Nico Robin, Loi was more than satisfied.

No wonder, in the original story, Crocodile could build a behemoth like 'Cross Guild' and even put massive bounties on Marines.

That ambitious man might not be the strongest in combat, but when it came to making money, he had real skill.

And that wasn't all—don't forget, Loi also had a partnership with King Cobra.

From the previous rainfalls, King Cobra had already paid 1.5 billion Belly as compensation.

Beyond that, the reward for saving the country would also be sent to Dragon of the Chen later.

That would mean another 3 billion Belly coming in, enough for Loi to strengthen quite a few more Fruits.

Of course, for Loi—this wasn't even the biggest gain.

The truly most important gain was the illusory Light Screen before him.

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[Fruit Encyclopedia]

[Holder: Loi Amos]

[Current Encyclopedia Fruit Types: 34 (Paramecia-16, Zoan-12, Logia-5, Special Paramecia-0, Mythical Zoan-1)]

[Fruit Slot Count: 3→4]

[Current Belly Held: 1.27543 Billion]

[Currently Equipped: Ox-Ox Fruit: Rhinoceros Form LV2, Dragon-Dragon Fruit: Model Pterodactyl LV3, Human-Human Fruit: Model Great Buddha LV1, Vacant]

As the Light Screen flickered, Loi could clearly see a new illusory page opening in the latter half of the Fruit Encyclopedia.

And on that page, new text appeared.

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[After accumulating 60 analyzed Devil Fruits, the fifth Fruit Slot will unlock a special Fruit Slot—'Fruit Fusion Slot']