Month one: accelerated growth
The switch controlling growth within Aaron Ball's body had been flipped all the way on.
The power of the Devil Fruit was no longer content merely to transform his abilities; it began reshaping the very foundation of his life on a deeper level.
His fifteen-year-old body began growing in defiance of common sense, as though it had absorbed excessive sunlight and energy.
Originally 159 centimeters tall, he shot up like bamboo after rain. Nourished by magnetic field energy, his bones gave off faint but rapid cracking sounds, while his muscle fibers tore and reformed, forcing his height up to 175 centimeters in just thirty days.
His appetite became that of a giant beast, rapidly depleting the fruit and game he could find on the island.
But the returns were equally astonishing-his physical strength, endurance, and reaction speed all increased to an unprecedented degree, laying a solid physical foundation for the explosive growth of his metal-control abilities.
Month two: a will of steel
As the second month began, his growth in height slowed, finally settling into a burly, 180-centimeter frame. But a stable outward appearance did not mean the transformation had ended; deeper changes began to emerge.
His overgrown muscles strained his skin beyond its limits, tearing dark red, weblike lines across his shoulders, back, arms, and other areas, bringing constant stinging and itching.
Boer understood that this was his body's warning: the strengthening of his physical vessel had nearly reached its limit for the current stage.
He shifted his focus entirely to exploring the Magnet-Magnet Fruit in greater depth. By now, the metal he could gather and refine from the island's soil and rock strata in a single day was enough to cast a standard cube measuring one meter on each side.
Controlling this massive lump of metal, weighing over a tonne, had become as effortless as breathing.
He could suspend it in the air, shape it at will into all manner of sharp or solid forms, and steadily maintain this precise control for over eight hours.
Yet when he tried to control a second piece of metal of equal volume at the same time, the immense mental burden and energy consumption surged over him like the final stretch of a marathon, leaving his brain throbbing and making it impossible to continue.
He had clearly felt the boundaries of his current abilities.
Month three: deep-sea hunting grounds
The preliminary transformation of his body was complete. Next came the tempering of his internal organs, sinews, and bones.
Boer began his brutal "Electromagnetic Overweight Training." No longer satisfied with merely controlling metal, he generated powerful directional magnetic fields that acted on the Iron Sand Armament he wore, making its "weight" fluctuate between several times and more than ten times its original weight.
Every abrupt change in gravity delivered a violent shock to his heart, blood vessels, bones, and muscles. He often coughed up blood-streaked saliva after training, but the resilience of his internal organs and his physical coordination also improved rapidly through this almost self-abusive tempering.
After each training session, as he lay watching the stars and the pulsing magnetic fields overhead, faint currents soothed his muscles, consuming the accumulated lactic acid as they pulsed, making him marvel once again at the power of the Magnet-Magnet Fruit.
Meanwhile, the island's ecosystem could no longer sustain his beastlike metabolic demands.
Wild fruit and small animals had all but vanished, and he turned his hunter's gaze toward something far vaster and far more dangerous-the ocean.
Hunting was child's play.
Month four: understanding energy
During the fourth month, the fish and shellfish in the coastal waters also dwindled at a visible rate.
The pressure to survive forced him to venture into deeper, more distant waters, and to develop more efficient ways of applying his abilities.
He began "High-Intensity Magnetic Field Rotation" training, attempting to convert magnetic field energy more efficiently into kinetic energy, heat, and even other forms of energy.
At first, he could sustain this intense energy output for only a few minutes, but by the end of the month, he could reliably maintain it for half an hour.
Food scarcity and his growing abilities, like a pair of contradictory twins, urged him on together-it was time to leave this isolated island that had both nurtured and imprisoned him.
Month five: the field of life
In the fifth month, the expansion of his core ability, "Extrasensory Vision," leveled off. Everything within a three-kilometer radius became part of an incredibly detailed three-dimensional map in his mind, composed of energy lines and the fluctuations of life.
He could now control that standard one-cubic-meter block of metal as naturally as his own limbs for a full twelve hours. His range of strong control extended to three hundred meters, and he only lost control completely beyond five hundred meters.
Even more astonishingly, his application of his abilities branched out into an entirely new dimension.
No longer satisfied with manipulation on a purely physical level, he learned to narrow and concentrate the range of his magnetic perception, applying powerful magnetic field energy precisely to a creature's nervous system.
He could make a charging wild boar's limbs suddenly stiffen and send it crashing to the ground, or cause a flock of vicious seabirds to faint in midair, as though an invisible force had stripped them of life.
The interplay of electricity and magnetism, the manipulation of life's fields-a whole new door was slowly opening before him.
Month six: the pseudo-ring concept
In the sixth month, an epoch-making concept was born in his mind-to create a "superconducting ring" capable of stably storing electromagnetic energy.
He envisioned using it as an advanced "battery," not only to greatly increase his staying power, but also to provide almost limitless propulsion for crossing the Calm Belt and traversing the vast ocean.
However, putting it into practice was far harder than conceiving it. He attempted to superimpose magnetic fields in empty space to create a perfect circular magnetic track. The step of "forming a magnetic field into a ring" alone consumed tremendous effort and repeatedly ended in failure.
Even when he barely managed to form it, the subsequent tasks of "confining electricity" and maintaining "continuous flow" demanded his complete concentration, like balancing a storm on the tip of a needle.
"It's too difficult... this simply isn't something I can accomplish at this stage." He slumped wearily on the beach, unconsciously manipulating a lump of metal as it shifted between liquid, solid, and various geometric forms.
Suddenly, he sat bolt upright, a gleam of understanding flashing in his eyes!
"Wait! Why am I so fixated on creating it out of thin air? Couldn't I just use a physical material as the medium? If I remember correctly, silver has the highest electrical conductivity of any naturally occurring metal! I'll make a 'Pseudo-Superconducting Ring'!"
Knowledge from his former world became a light illuminating the path ahead.
He chuckled softly. "Knowledge really is power."
With his goal clear, Boer set off at once. Sitting cross-legged on a floating metal disc, he sped toward the reef area southwest of the island as though riding an invisible wave.
He was going to find the sunken ship that had changed his fate. The gold and silver those pirates had plundered would become the foundation of his new power.
With Extrasensory Vision fully extended, the underwater world appeared before his "eyes" in another form:
Small fish and shrimp emitting faint bioelectric glimmers resembled swimming stars;
Ores containing special energy flickered with distinctive fluctuations of blue or red;
And iron ores with their own magnetic domains stood out like beacons in the darkness.
His "gaze" swept swiftly over these ordinary sights, until two incongruous "black dots" in the distance intruded into his field of vision against the vast blue background.
As he drew closer, he perceived two signal sources filled with hostility and chaos.
"Oh? Looks like something interesting is about to happen."
On the sea, a desperate chase was nearing its end.
A three-masted pirate ship flying a flag depicting a "skeleton holding a bloodstained greatsword" remained hard on the heels of a smaller merchant ship whose sails bore an elegant purple iris emblem.
Aboard the pirate ship, over a hundred bare-chested outlaws brandished blades and howled bloodthirstily; aboard the merchant ship, the twenty-odd crew members, including the captain, clutched harpoons, boning knives, and a handful of muskets, their faces pale and their expressions taut with tension.
The merchant captain-a middle-aged man whose complexion had grown ruddy from years at sea-looked at his crew, most of whom were novices on their first voyage, and a trace of resolve flashed in his eyes.
He walked to the railing and shouted toward the other ship with all his strength, "Captain 'Greatsword' Thatch! We're willing to hand over all the spices we bought in the Flower Country this time! All we ask is that you let us leave once you've taken the cargo!"
His voice echoed across the open sea, carrying a barely perceptible tremor.
Among the crew, a young man with thinning hair and a bulbous red nose gripped a harpoon, his legs trembling uncontrollably. On the verge of tears, he said to the burly man beside him, "Rukuku, we're done for, we're done for... How could I run into 'Greatsword Thatch' on my very first voyage..."
The burly man he called Rukuku was the ship's winch operator. His eyes blazed as he brandished the thick, heavy steel pipe in his hands and growled, "What are you afraid of! If they dare board us, I'll knock every last one of them into the sea to feed the fish!"
At the cabin entrance, however, an elderly navigator with graying hair calmly sipped the rum in his hand, his clouded eyes holding the serenity of someone who had seen through the ways of the world.
"Relax, boys. Pirates make their living at sea too. If a real fight breaks out, they'll lose men as well. These days, nobody wants to risk their life lightly.
"I reckon once the captain throws the cargo on deck into the sea to show we mean it, they'll fish it out, and we'll be able to leave... Ah, I thought we could shake them off. Man proposes, but heaven disposes."
As if to confirm the old man's words, the pirate ship slowed when it came within five or six meters, showing no intention of boarding immediately. Everyone aboard the merchant ship could not help silently breathing a sigh of relief.
But just then, an even more frenzied, expectant cheer erupted from the pirate ship opposite them!
An iron-tower-like figure leaped from the pirate ship's bow!
He was a massive man nearly two meters tall, his bare upper body covered in scars. In one hand he carried a terrifying two-handed greatsword nearly 1.7 meters long. He reached the apex of his leap, then gripped the hilt with both hands and brought it crashing toward the merchant ship's deck with mountain-cleaving, rock-splitting force!
The shadow of death instantly fell over the heart of every sailor aboard the merchant ship.
At the critical instant!
The greatsword, bearing immense force, abruptly froze in the air less than half a meter above the merchant ship's deck!
As though time had stopped at that moment, the greatsword hung motionless in midair.
The tremendous momentum flung the pirate captain named Thatch straight through the air. Like a torn sack, he crashed heavily into the piles of cargo at the stern of the merchant ship, smashing several wooden crates. Expensive spices spilled out in a rush, their rich fragrance instantly filling the air.
Everyone was stunned by this unimaginable sight.
Then they witnessed a scene they would never forget.
A figure was slowly walking down from the sky, as though descending an invisible staircase.
His entire body was covered in flowing black-sand armor that gleamed with a cold metallic sheen. The armor's contours were savage, and the helmet was shaped into a fiend with sharp fangs.
Sunlight shone on him, reflecting a radiance both divine and terrifying.
He finally came to hover in midair between the merchant ship and the pirate ship, like a deity descending into the mortal world.
A voice altered through metallic resonance emerged from between the helmet's vicious fangs, clearly branding itself into the depths of every person's soul:
"It seems I've arrived at just the right time."
His "gaze" swept across the frightened, awestruck, and bewildered faces aboard the two ships below.
"Now, I'd like to grant you an opportunity to make your fortunes and rise in the world..."
"Gentlemen, will you accept?"
Before you continue