Six Powers' Seventh Technique

Time passed like a white colt flashing through a gap, flowing by soundlessly. In the blink of an eye, an entire year had gone by.

Sea Circle Calendar 1519, April.

Deep within the dense forest at the edge of Ohara Island, night had fallen.

Dawn stood in a clearing. He had now reached an astonishing height of two and a half meters, his streamlined yet sharply defined muscles outlined beneath the moonlight in lines brimming with power.

His already striking golden hair seemed to possess a life of its own. It suddenly lengthened like countless living golden snakes, tightly coiling around and binding a giant tree that would have required several people to encircle.

"Up!"

With a thought from Dawn, his long hair suddenly exerted force, wrenching the deeply rooted tree straight out of the ground and hurling it into the air.

The tree, carrying the earthy stench of soil, rose to its highest point and began to fall. Dawn's eyes narrowed as he raised his right leg and kicked several times in an instant, too fast for the naked eye to follow.

"[Tempest Kick: Chaos]!"

Several incomparably sharp vacuum slashes howled forth, precisely cutting across the falling trunk. Amid a dense burst of cutting sounds, the massive tree was evenly sliced into dozens of neat blocks of wood, which clattered to the ground and kicked up clouds of dust.

Dawn slowly exhaled a breath of stale air, regulating the surging energy within him. With another thought, the will attached to his hair receded like a tide. The golden hair dancing throughout the air instantly lost its vitality, falling smoothly behind him and returning to normal.

The corners of his lips curled into a satisfied smile. After an entire year, he had finally mastered the profound technique of Life Return.

What delighted him even more was that, during his training in Life Return, the techniques of the Six Powers had come to him naturally, as though water had simply flowed into its channel.

At first, he had been somewhat surprised by this. But when he recalled the claim he had seen online in his previous life—that Life Return was actually the "seventh technique" of the Six Powers—he accepted it without concern.

Ordinary people who trained in Life Return directly could never master all Six Powers alongside it. The fundamental reason Dawn could do so was his physique, already far beyond that of ordinary people, which had been further awakened and perfectly controlled through the tempering of Life Return.

The essence of Life Return was allowing its practitioner to perfectly control every cell of their body and every fraction of their strength.

Once that control reached its peak, combined with his already inhuman physical capabilities, the so-called Six Powers became instincts he could use at will.

Put simply, ordinary people trained in the Six Powers to become "superhuman," while with Life Return's aid, he had become "superhuman" first and then naturally learned the skills of a "superhuman."

Likewise, thanks to the Mythical Zoan Fruit's extreme enhancement of her physical abilities, Stella had also mastered the Six Powers over the past year.

Just as Dawn was immersed in the joy of his successful training, he suddenly sensed that the cage constructed by his ability had been lightly touched.

With a thought, he opened the cage's entrance. Stella walked in, her expression slightly unnatural. At the moment, she was unusually maintaining her human form.

"Dawn, something happened."

"A giant drifted in from the sea. He seems to have lost consciousness."

Dawn's pupils abruptly contracted.

A giant? At this point in time, a giant drifting to Ohara... A name instantly surfaced in his mind—Jaguar D. Saul.

This meant that the cruel judgment against Ohara was about to begin!

"Pack up. We're leaving this place immediately."

Without any hesitation, Dawn immediately gave Stella the order, his tone utterly resolute.

Stella did not understand Dawn's sudden and urgent decision. After hesitating briefly, an unwillingness showed in her eyes.

"Won't we say goodbye to Robin? If we leave without saying anything... she'll definitely be heartbroken."

Over the past year, Robin had come to their little cabin almost every day, chatting with them and sharing her knowledge and thoughts.

Stella had long grown fond of the little girl, who appeared calm on the outside but was incredibly strong and kind at heart. They had formed a deep bond.

Dawn shook his head.

"She shouldn't become too deeply involved with me. You know my identity."

During the year they had lived together, he had found an opportunity to tell Stella that the David Family had been deemed taboo by the World Government and was fated to suffer ruthless pursuit.

Stella's gaze darkened as she recalled the grim past Dawn had once told her about, understanding his concerns. She nodded dejectedly.

"Alright, I understand. Then... at least let me leave Robin a note?"

"You can."

Dawn did not refuse such a trivial request.

The two swiftly returned to the little cabin where they had lived for a year. Its furnishings were simple. Most of its belongings had been "borrowed" by Dawn over the past year whenever merchant ships docked at Ohara.

In this world of a typical ocean civilization, travel between islands was extremely inconvenient. Inter-island trade brought astonishing profits, but it also came with immense risks from sea beasts, Sea Kings, and vicious pirates.

Stella efficiently sorted and packed her personal belongings. Dawn extended his palm, and a mass of profound darkness surged from it, forming a miniature vortex that swallowed the luggage piece by piece.

After fully mastering Life Return, he had unexpectedly discovered that the other-dimensional space connected to the Dark-Dark Fruit could, to a certain extent, be regarded as a special organ of the ability user.

The essence of Life Return was to infuse one's consciousness into the body, even into organs such as the internal organs that normally could not be controlled voluntarily, thereby achieving incredible effects such as rapid digestion and precise control.

Based on this, Dawn tried infusing his consciousness into that other-dimensional organ. He successfully canceled the compressive force in part of the space, separated that special area from the other spaces filled with destructive compressive force, and used it alone as a stable storage space.

Now, he could freely choose through thought which space to draw a target into.

He also stored the things he needed, including a map of the entire West Blue that he had successfully obtained through Robin, as well as sea charts recording the locations of islands tied to major events or important treasures.

By then, Stella had finished writing her note to Robin and gently placed it on the table in the middle of the cabin.

Everything was ready. Dawn and Stella exchanged a glance, no longer lingering. Under the cover of the deep night, they moved, both stepping on the air with soft bang bang sounds as they used Geppo to soar into the sky. They became two black shadows and swiftly vanished into Ohara's night sky.

TO BE CONTINUED