"How far can you see? Does your mind feel tired?"
"Not very far." Monet, sitting in a chair, roughly estimated the range of her Observation Haki. "Aside from the whole room, I can only make out the hallway outside the door."
Hearing that, Gray quickly did the math in his head.
There were only so many rooms on the ship. Monet and her sister's room was probably around fifty square meters, and the hallway outside the door was only about a meter wide.
"So, about a ten-meter radius?" He nodded in understanding. Since he had no other examples to compare it with, Gray couldn't tell whether that was a lot or a little.
Still, one thing was certain: Monet, who had awakened Observation Haki, had already surpassed her counterpart in the original story.
In the Punk Hazard arc, aside from her Snow-Snow Fruit, Monet seemed completely useless in every other respect.
And she hadn't developed her Devil Fruit abilities very well, either.
The Snow-Snow Fruit: since it had no particularly powerful direct attacks, she could only develop it toward cold and blizzards.
Logia types were named after natural disasters!
Nature itself could also be developed in the direction of natural disasters.
Widespread blizzards and extreme cold were how snow affected people.
But in the original story, aside from briefly suppressing Tashigi, Monet had been instantly taken out by a single slash from Zoro, infused with killing intent, when she fought him.
After turning into an element, she couldn't even return to her normal body for a while. In the end, Caesar accidentally stabbed her heart, taking her out of the story.
Her Devil Fruit abilities were poorly developed, and she had no skill in hand-to-hand combat. She had never shown any Observation Haki, had no Armament Haki at all, and even let Luo turn her arms into wings and her legs into birdlike talons.
She'd completely picked up the sesame seeds and thrown away the watermelon!
She hadn't even figured out how to be human, and already she wanted to stop being one.
"Try to remember this feeling. Work on controlling Observation Haki yourself, so you can switch it on and off without my ability helping you."
"Okay!"
Monet really did have an amazing figure, putting aside how laughable her strength was. Even her voice and manner of speaking had a sort of refined, traditional Japanese femininity to them.
That kind of thing was right up Gray's alley.
Baby-5 and Sugar had naturally watched the whole exchange between Gray and Monet.
"Even with her eyes closed, Big Sis can see what's around her. Is Observation Haki really that amazing?" Curious, Sugar waved her little hand in front of Monet's face.
Monet asked, "What is it, Sugar?"
"Ah!" Monet's sudden response made Sugar feel like she'd been caught playing a prank.
But her curiosity soon got the better of her. "Big Sis! You really can see?"
"Of course!"
"That's amazing!"
"Big Brother Gray! Can I have this power too, like Big Sis?"
Hearing that, Gray answered without hesitation. "Of course you can."
"But not yet!"
"You and Baby-5 haven't reached the peak of your mental strength yet. Unless you awaken naturally, I'll have to wait until you're adults before I can help you awaken it this way."
"Then..." Gray's words left Sugar disappointed. But with those requirements in the way, all she could do was wait. "All right!"
"Then, Big Brother Gray, you have to remember, okay? You have to help me when the time comes!"
Gray replied firmly, "Of course!"
Their conversation passed the time. After only five minutes, Monet had reached her limit. Her mind felt exhausted, and she could no longer enter the state of using Observation Haki.
"That's enough for tonight. Get some rest." After stopping the rotation of Monet's Soul Magnetic Field, Gray prepared to leave with Baby-5.
"Oh, right! Don't tell anyone I helped you awaken Observation Haki. Say it was an ability you gained automatically when you were in danger before."
"Why?"
Monet stopped Sugar from asking and answered directly, "Okay, I understand!"
"And... thank you!"
"Okay! I'll accept your thanks." Gray nodded. Before the door closed, he gave her a careful reminder. "Make good use of this power. It'll earn you better treatment in the Donquixote Family."
"Because around here, only strength matters!"
Click!
Gray closed the door.
"Strength, huh?" Turning those words over in her mind, Monet understood that Gray had helped her awaken Observation Haki so that, as a newcomer, she would have some value.
Whether she wanted to be useful to the Donquixote Family or to Gray, she needed to have value.
Would anyone treat you well if you were worthless?
Every gift came with a price already written into fate. That was something Monet had learned over the course of her life.
From what Gray and Baby-5 had told her, she already had a clear idea of the Donquixote Family: the strong rose to the top, and the weak fell behind.
Leaving aside whatever Monet was thinking, Gray had already begun preparing to awaken his Armament Haki when he returned to his room.
"Rotating the Soul Magnetic Field can stir up mental energy and help awaken Observation Haki."
"Then... if I rotate the Life Magnetic Field that represents the body, it should be able to draw out the power inside me, too, right?"
"Haki is a power latent in every person in this world. On these seas, anyone with a strong enough body who knows what Haki is can naturally awaken Armament Haki in battle."
"Except in Amazon Lily, where their inherited traditions lower the requirements for awakening, everyone in the New World who awakens Armament Haki first has to reach a certain physical standard."
"I couldn't awaken it before because I wasn't physically strong enough. If I recklessly rotated the Life Magnetic Field and drew out the power within me to force an awakening, I was worried that power might backfire on me."
"But after three years of gravity training, the time has come!"
"Whether I succeed depends on this one shot." Having sorted out his thoughts, Gray took a deep breath. "Life Magnetic Field: rotate!"
At first, as it rotated slowly, Gray felt nothing at all. But as the speed increased, he felt a power being drawn out from within his body, and the sensation grew stronger and stronger.
Gray kept the Life Magnetic Field rotating while guiding that power toward his arm.
Honestly, Gray felt as if his aura nodes were opening. Could I be awakening Nen Ability too?
It was a joke, of course, but Haki and Nen Ability were so similar.
Nen was a power hidden within everyone's body, and so was Haki.
Nen was the manifestation of a person's [spirit], and so was Haki.
Training Armament Haki day after day was like practicing Nen's Ten.
Extending Observation Haki to predict an enemy's movements was like En.
Releasing Armament Haki was like Ken.
Coating an object in Armament Haki to strengthen its offense and defense was like Ko.
Distributing Armament Haki across different parts of the body according to the situation was like Ryu.
"So this is the power of Haki?" The black Haki covering Gray's fingers let him clearly feel the power known as [Haki].
"Not bad!" He dispersed the Haki on his hand and stopped the Life Magnetic Field from rotating. The power inside his body once again lay dormant.
After briefly recalling what it had felt like to coat himself in Armament Haki, Gray drew on the Haki within his body once more.
"Mm." He strained with all his might, but he couldn't draw out the unfamiliar Haki at all.
With no other choice, Gray started the Life Magnetic Field rotating again and once more tried to feel the Armament Haki being drawn out.
Again and again, just as when he had first awakened Observation Haki, he burned through his Haki to quickly get used to the sensation of releasing it.
Before you continue