Moya sat amid the supplies, resting as he devoured meat and fruit.
Some of the pirates were roasting meat, while others sat obediently on their knees, their faces full of fear.
Alvida lay bound on the ground, staring at Moya in terror.
One vicious-looking pirate fawned over Moya because he could understand some of what Moya meant.
So Moya kept him nearby as a "half-baked" interpreter.
Most of the pirates on the island had already been cowed by Moya's strength.
Moya ate the sweetest fruit and the best grilled meat, quietly recovering his strength.
At the same time, he thought about how to develop the Slip-Slip Fruit. Every One Piece fan knew the saying:
"There are no weak Devil Fruits, only weak Devil Fruit Users."
Moya had often thought about those words. They seemed right, yet somehow completely wrong.
Between the Mole-Mole Fruit and the Azure Dragon Fruit, even a fool knew which one to choose.
He recalled Devil Fruit Users whose abilities were similar to the Slip-Slip Fruit.
The closest was undoubtedly Empress Boa Hancock's Love-Love Fruit.
Or there was Vice Admiral Tsuru's Wash-Wash Fruit, as well as the Tyrant Bartholomew Kuma's Paw-Paw Fruit.
All of them could be developed to grant mental or psychic abilities that seemed unrelated to their original powers.
For example, the Love-Love Fruit's ability to charm and petrify, the Wash-Wash Fruit's power to wash away evil from people's hearts, and the Paw-Paw Fruit's Ursus Shock, air compression, and instant transmission.
It was clear that a Devil Fruit's development was largely determined by the direction its user pursued.
As a Marine, the great strategist Tsuru was kindhearted and just. She wanted to reform the hearts of pirate criminals and put them back on the right path.
That was why she had developed the ability to wash away the evil in people's hearts.
As for the Empress's Love-Love Fruit developing the power to petrify, Moya was utterly baffled. It had nothing at all to do with the fruit.
Could it have something to do with the legend of the Gorgon's petrifying gaze on Amazon Lily?
As for the Tyrant Bartholomew Kuma, he was a member of the Revolutionary Army, which often suffered from shortages of food and medicine in its early days. Its members were also frequently injured.
It made sense that Kuma had deliberately developed the Paw-Paw Fruit toward healing, creating Ursus Shock.
Of course, Kuma was also a brilliant talent.
In his hands, the Paw-Paw Fruit could do all sorts of incredible things, granting a wide variety of abilities.
Air compression, air cannons, Ursus Shock, spatial travel, teleportation, and more.
It was a busted power that could deal damage, heal, and move people around.
As Moya considered all this, he realized his most pressing problem was the language barrier.
So he desperately needed to develop the Slip-Slip Fruit into a power that would let him learn languages quickly.
For instance, by stealing other people's memories.
Moya pondered...
He placed a hand on Alvida's head and activated the Slip-Slip Fruit. Focusing hard, he kept thinking about viewing Alvida's memories.
Memories, memories, where are the memories?
Alvida looked terrified. She struggled, but didn't dare move too much.
Moya tried again and again, sensing Alvida's emotions and attempting to read her memories.
He made a little progress, but could always feel a barrier preventing him from seeing Alvida's memories.
Moya let go and began to think, while Alvida breathed a sigh of relief.
Suddenly, Moya struck the back of Alvida's neck with a knife hand, knocking her unconscious.
He had no sense of honor at all, attacking a fat woman who was bound and had a broken leg.
The pirates around them sucked in a sharp breath, but didn't dare move.
Alvida, their former captain, had often beaten and berated them. Seeing this ugly woman get hit gave them a strange sense of satisfaction.
Moya ignored them and continued activating the Slip-Slip Fruit.
At last, after repeated attempts, Moya felt that the barrier was gone. It must have been because his test subject had lost consciousness.
But he still couldn't see anything. It was like having a computer full of video files with no media player installed.
Moya wondered if he could pull the memories out, copy them like files onto a USB drive, and place them in his own mind. Would he be able to view them then?
He put the idea into practice, activating his ability again.
This time, he seemed to see groups of memories floating in order inside Alvida's mind. Moya immediately extracted a small cluster and slid it into his own mind.
Boom!
Moya felt a flood of memory fragments rush into his mind. They were Alvida's memories from the past few days.
Moya was overjoyed. This ability could let him learn the common language of the One Piece world in a short time.
Maybe in the future, he could even steal other people's swordsmanship, martial arts, or Haki training experience. The thought made Moya's heart pound with excitement.
"Slip-Slip Fruit: Memory Sliding Technique!"
That was the name Moya gave the ability!
The Slip-Slip Fruit could actually turn the abstract concept of memories into clusters. Devil Fruits really were completely illogical.
Moya extracted more memory clusters from Alvida's mind. They were like individual videos, while his Slip-Slip Fruit worked like a USB transfer device.
Moya kept browsing the memories, sorting out the useful ones and discarding the junk.
But the ability seemed to have a drawback. If someone's entire memory was extracted, they would usually lose their memories and become an imbecile.
The Slip-Slip Fruit couldn't modify memories. It could only slide memory clusters out and into his own mind for him to view.
The person it was used on would permanently lose those memories.
Moya sighed. It wasn't Pudding's Memory-Memory Fruit, so he couldn't freely alter memories.
Still, who knew how far he could develop the fruit's abilities in the future?
Moya was already fairly satisfied. He could quickly learn the common language of the One Piece world.
Using his Devil Fruit ability took a lot of stamina. Moya kept extracting Alvida's memories while continually eating.
The most important part was buried deep: her childhood memories. Moya viewed Alvida's memories of learning the language from a first-person perspective.
The sun sank and darkness gradually fell. At last, Moya opened his eyes. The pirates around him, who had been too afraid to move, grew tense.
Moya turned to the vicious-looking pirate and spoke haltingly, "What's your name?"
The vicious-looking pirate was startled. This little deckhand—no, this savage young man—could speak now.
But he didn't dare hesitate. "Captain, my name is Dis. What are your orders?"
"Dis? Good. Dis, get them organized and have them take the supplies back to the ship," Moya ordered.
"Right away, Captain!" Dis replied.
With Moya's authority behind him, Dis began ordering the other pirates to work.
Under Moya, their new leader, the pirates finally got busy again. To these low-ranking pirates, whoever was stronger was the boss!
At that moment, Alvida woke up and looked around in a daze, drool dripping from the corner of her mouth. She looked like an idiot. Moya fell silent for a moment.
"I'm sorry. This is a dog-eat-dog world."
Moya knew it was because he had casually extracted and slid out Alvida's memory clusters while searching for useful information and language memories.
That had caused most of her memories to be permanently lost and destroyed, leaving her an imbecile—or, one could say, like a baby.
But Moya wouldn't regret it. He wouldn't give up his determination to survive and grow stronger for the sake of some trash pirate!
Seeing that the supplies had nearly all been loaded, Dis walked over and bowed.
"Captain, everything's aboard. Can we set sail?"
"Let's go. Set sail!" Moya led the way toward the pirate ship.
Dis looked at their former captain, Alvida, now a fool, and gritted his teeth.
He followed Moya, leaving Alvida alone on the deserted island to live or die.
Then a gunshot rang out, and a bloody hole appeared in Alvida's forehead.
"How could I leave a loose end?"
The muttered words carried across the quiet island.
Before you continue