Upper Yard, Shura Training Archipelago.
Three months had passed since Law landed on the Sky Island.
Over the past few months, the Heart Pirates had come to completely understand one fundamental truth. The "training" the Eclipse Pirates spoke of was entirely different from anything ordinary pirates comprehended.
There was no gentle adjustment period. There was no gradual ramp-up. The singular directive was to train relentlessly, consume massive calories, receive emergency medical treatment, and immediately return to training.
"Bang!"
A thick lead column plummeted from the sky, crashing directly toward Law's head. Law gripped Kikoku with both hands, raising the blade horizontally to intercept the blow.
Clang.
A dull, explosive thud of metal clashing rang out. The rocky ground beneath Law's feet fractured instantly. His arms trembled violently under the crushing weight. This time, however, he was not sent flying like a discarded rag.
Urouge rested the heavy lead column against his shoulder, a wide grin spreading across his face.
"Not bad, Law. You finally stopped breaking at the slightest touch."
Law ground his teeth together. A faint black sheen materialized across his forearms. Armament Haki. Though still weak and far from absolute mastery, it was enough to prevent his bones from instantly shattering against a physical anomaly like Urouge.
"ROOM."
The pale blue surgical sphere expanded instantly. The radius of Law's Room had always been vast; his true limitations had always been his physical stamina and biological baseline. The hellish conditioning of the past three months had forged the raw potential unlocked by the Limit Breaker serum into genuine endurance.
The massive surgical space now stably blanketed half of the deserted island. The suffocating exhaustion that plagued him just months ago was completely absent.
"Shambles."
Law's figure swapped positions with a suspended piece of rubble, narrowly dodging the massive lead pillar sweeping toward his ribs. In the next second, he materialized above and to the blind side of Urouge.
Kikoku left its sheath. A faint but dense coating of Armament Haki wrapped around the cursed blade.
Whoosh.
Law brought the sword down in a vicious arc. The blade did not connect with Urouge's flesh. Instead, the Haki-imbued slash tore straight through the kinetic shockwave generated by the Mad Monk's sweeping punch. The violent gust of wind split cleanly in two, roaring harmlessly past Law's shoulders.
Urouge chuckled, lowering his weapon. "Very good. You are adapting rapidly."
A short distance away, Ace sat on a flat boulder, leisurely pulling a piece of grilled hollow fish off a wooden skewer.
"Finally starting to look like a pirate of the New World."
Law landed lightly on his feet, dropping to one knee. Sweat poured down his forehead as he gasped for air.
Ace casually swallowed his food and pointed the wooden skewer forward. "You have patched the holes in your physical baseline, and your Haki has reached the threshold of a beginner. Even without relying on your Devil Fruit, you will not die instantly to Doflamingo's strings."
Law raised the back of his hand, wiping a smear of blood from the corner of his mouth. His eyes remained as sharp and cold as a scalpel.
"It is not enough."
Ace smiled. "Knowing it is not enough is half the battle. Keep moving."
Law tightened his grip on Kikoku and forced himself back to his feet. Months of torturous conditioning had not dulled his thirst for vengeance. The agony had only sharpened the blade in his mind.
On a neighboring floating island.
Boom.
A deep blue plasma Heat Breath tore through the atmosphere. A pink dragon aura coiled tightly around Sabo's arm. The thermal blast he unleashed was no longer just simple fire.
Compressed wind currents. Swirling atmospheric electricity. Roaring celestial fire.
Sabo forcefully fused the three elements, unleashing a blinding pillar of destruction that scorched the entire training ground.
"Yahaha!"
Enel closed his eyes, his body flickering into pure lightning and shifting erratically through the air. The devastating triple-element beam grazed his skin multiple times, yet always missed by a fraction of a millimeter.
"Left foot, half a step," Enel's voice echoed from the thunder.
The very next instant, Sabo pivoted precisely half a step to his left, altering the trajectory of his staff. Enel simply vanished a fraction of a second before the strike connected.
"The next strike is an upward flick."
Lightning rapidly coalesced behind Sabo's shoulder. Enel opened his eyes, a wild grin stretching across his face. "I have already seen exactly where you are going."
Sabo laughed, shifting his grip on the weapon. "Have you finally grasped the true depth of Future Sight?"
"Save the chatter," Enel countered, blinding electricity crackling around his Raigo formation. "Again."
Wind, fire, and destructive lightning violently collided once more.
Further across the archipelago.
Jeno stood squarely in the center of a barren crater, his mechanical arms crossed over his chest. Several massive mutated beasts, biologically enhanced by Dr. Indigo, roared and launched themselves at him. Claws and fangs tore frantically at his metal plating.
Crack.
A massive fang shattered into pieces.
Jeno glanced down at his arm. A thin but incredibly stable layer of black Armament Haki coated his chassis, layering perfectly over the indestructible Poneglyph Shell integrated beneath his synthetic skin.
He threw his head back and laughed. "Hahahaha! Finally stabilized it! It is not the thickest armor, but we will not have to rely strictly on artillery when fighting Logia users anymore!"
Buggy stood entirely out of the danger zone, crossing his arms and grumbling. "What is the point of a walking block of iron training Armament Haki?"
Jeno turned his head, his mechanical optics whirring. "Red Nose, have you finished your Observation Haki meditation for the day?"
Buggy's face went rigid. His head instantly detached from his neck and floated upward. "I just remembered the kitchen needs my vital assistance!"
"Anyone who dares enter my kitchen to cause trouble will be chopped up and boiled into soup!" Leona's voice echoed sharply from the distant camp.
Buggy's floating head skidded to an abrupt halt in mid-air. "Curse it all! Is there no safe haven left for me on this ship?!"
Deep within a frost-covered stone forest.
Brook stood entirely alone. In his skeletal hand, he grasped the Shichiseiken, the cursed blade he had completely subjugated as the Soul King.
Sickly green demonic flames burned silently along the spine of the sword. At the exact same time, the chilling mist of Yomi Frost seeped outward from the gaps in his hollow ribs.
One freezing. One scorching. One drawn from the depths of the underworld. One radiating from an ancient demonic weapon.
Brook did not immediately swing his blade. He bowed at the waist, resembling an elderly gentleman taking a final curtain call.
"Yohohoho. I suppose it is time to compose a new symphony, one truly fitting for this instrument."
He vanished from his position.
The skeleton swordsman drifted through the stone pillars, as weightless as a wisp of moonlight. Wherever the Shichiseiken slashed, the violent green flames did not spread indiscriminately. Instead, they were tightly bound by the Yomi Frost, compressed into razor-thin threads that clung specifically to the sword marks.
With the first strike, deep blue frost crystallized over the surface of a towering rock pillar.
With the second sweeping strike, ghastly green fire ignited deep within the frozen fissures.
With the third strike, an explosive chain reaction of ice and fire detonated from the absolute core of the stone.
"Sword Dance of the Underworld: The Burial Song of Ice and Fire."
Boom.
The entire stone forest ignited in a silent, devastating symphony. The exterior of the pillars remained frozen solid, while the interiors burned white-hot. Before the shattered boulders could even hit the ground, the demonic fire bored holes completely through them, only to be instantly resealed into solid ice crystals by the Yomi Frost.
Brook smoothly returned the blade to its sheath. The soul flames flickering deep within his empty eye sockets glowed softly. "Hmm. Compared to simply setting everything ablaze, concealing the inferno within the frost is infinitely more elegant. Yohohoho!"
In a secluded valley on the far side of the island.
Chopper conducted his drills in absolute isolation. A row of massive rock targets stood before him, alongside several heavy-duty impact dummies engineered by Jeno.
He did not ingest a Rumble Ball.
Chopper inhaled deeply, forcing his biology to tap directly into its dormant potential.
His skeletal structure expanded. Muscle fibers swelled and thickened dramatically. His antlers grew into massive, branching crowns. In a matter of seconds, he morphed into a towering beast the size of a small mountain.
Monster Point.
Unlike his past transformations, his eyes remained entirely clear and focused.
"Keep breathing... control the heart rate... do not let the raw power take the wheel." Chopper muttered the stabilizing mantra he had developed.
A massive hoof fractured the bedrock. He lunged forward, driving a devastating punch directly into an impact dummy.
Boom.
The reinforced dummy launched backward, embedding itself deeply into the cliff face.
Rather than succumbing to the bloodlust and giving chase, Chopper abruptly arrested his momentum. He planted his hands on his massive knees, his chest heaving as he fought for oxygen.
"Three minutes. No, I can hold the form a little longer."
He gritted his massive teeth and forced his spine straight.
"I am a doctor. If I cannot retain absolute control over my own body, how can I be trusted to help the others grow stronger?"
Hidden behind a ridge a short distance away, Bepo and the remaining Heart Pirates stared up at the colossal, hyper-muscular beast. Bepo swallowed hard.
"That is... the Marine's supposed pet? The one with a flat one-hundred Beli bounty?"
The rest of the crew stared in stunned silence.
"The Marines must be legally blind."
Chopper's massive ears twitched. His enormous head snapped toward the ridge.
"I am not a pet!"
The sheer volume of the roar vibrated through the bedrock of the deserted island.
Immediately realizing his volume, Chopper clamped two massive hands over his mouth, forcing his breathing to steady.
"No, no. Focus. Stay calm within Monster Point. One more time!"
He turned his back to the ridge, locked his sights on the next reinforced dummy, and charged.