-Broadcast-
Mythical Zoan Devil Fruits occupied a special category among ability users. Superior to standard Zoan types from the moment of consumption, they transformed users into legendary creatures—phoenixes, dragons, deities from ancient mythology.
The naming convention could be misleading. Kaido's fruit was officially called the Uo Uo no Mi, Model: Seiryu (Fish-Fish Fruit, Model: Azure Dragon). Despite the "fish" designation, consuming it granted the power of an eastern dragon—serpentine body, storm manipulation, flight through sky-walking. No one who ate that fruit became a simple fish.
They became dragons. Always dragons. The transformation was absolute.
Or so everyone had believed.
Until today, when Kozuki Momonosuke—who'd previously transformed into a pink dragon—had instead become a pink carp.
How? The question rippled through viewers watching the Sky Screen. What changed? What caused a mythical beast fruit to devolve into something so... ordinary?
The return-to-nature serum Orochimaru had created apparently possessed effects beyond anyone's expectations. It hadn't enhanced the Devil Fruit. It had stripped away artifice, revealing the foundation beneath enhancement.
-Broadcast-
Momonosuke flopped on the ground in fish form, his body convulsing as gills struggled to process air instead of water. Panic overwhelmed coherent thought. Fins slapped uselessly against stone. His mouth opened and closed in gasping desperation.
Can't breathe. Can't breathe. Need water. Going to suffocate.
He forced the transformation to reverse, returning to human form with a gasp that hurt his lungs. For several seconds, he simply lay there, panting, one hand pressed against his chest as if he could manually force his heart to slow.
"It's the serum's effect!" Momonosuke's voice came out shrill, verging on hysteria. "You poisoned me! I'm supposed to be a dragon, not a fish! Change me back! Fix this right now!"
The boy had been deceived. Again. By adults. Again. Buggy the Clown had promised training, promised strength, but delivered only humiliation and degradation.
I knew it, the bitter thought surfaced. I knew trusting outsiders was a mistake. Just like Father trusted Orochi. Just like everyone who ever believed pirates would keep their word.
Buggy crouched beside the panicking child, his painted face showing something that might have been sympathy if not for the cruel amusement glinting in his eyes.
"The Devil Fruit you consumed," the Clown began, his tone almost conversational, "is most likely a replica created by Dr. Vegapunk. An artificial copy based on Kaido's bloodline—the genuine Uo Uo no Mi, Model: Seiryu. A counterfeit designed to mimic the original's properties."
He gestured toward the massive waterway behind him.
"If you want to avenge your father—if you actually intend to defeat Kaido rather than just fantasizing about it—you'll need to understand something fundamental. You cannot beat the original with a replica. Not as you are now. Not with borrowed power you don't truly own."
Buggy stood, pointing at the artificial structure. From this angle, its true scale became apparent. The waterway stretched a full thousand meters from base to peak, carved from living rock and reinforced with some kind of treated stone that gleamed wetly under the sun. Water flowed down its length in a thin, continuous sheet—fed by some hidden reservoir at the summit and recycled through mechanisms Momonosuke couldn't see.
The slope started relatively gentle near the bottom—perhaps thirty degrees. But it grew progressively steeper as it climbed, reaching what looked like seventy or eighty degrees near the top. The final hundred meters appeared nearly vertical.
"This is a training facility I designed specifically for you," Buggy explained with disturbing pride. "It's called 'Carp Leaping Over Dragon Gate.' A test based on ancient legend. Perhaps you've heard the story?"
Momonosuke shook his head mutely, still trying to process what was being asked of him.
"No? Then I'll educate you." Buggy's grin widened. "Long ago, it was said that ordinary carp who successfully swam upstream and leaped over a mystical waterfall called Dragon Gate would be transformed into dragons as reward for their perseverance. The weak fish who failed would remain fish forever—or more commonly, become food for predators."
He let that sink in.
"This structure before you is my interpretation of that legend. You will enter the water as a fish. You will swim up a thousand meters of increasingly steep incline, fighting current and gravity simultaneously. If you reach the summit—if you prove yourself worthy—then perhaps your Devil Fruit will remember it's supposed to grant dragon powers."
The boy's face had gone pale. "You're joking. This is impossible. That's not training, that's—"
"Death?" Buggy finished cheerfully. "Yes. Quite possibly. If you're not made for greatness, you'll die attempting it. That's acceptable. I need warriors who can face impossible odds, not children who need their hands held."
He turned away, apparently done with the explanation. "You have six months. Succeed, or drown trying. Those are your only options."
"Wait!" Momonosuke scrambled to his feet, voice cracking. "Six months for what? To do this once? That's already impossible! You saw how steep—"
"Six months to complete it successfully," Buggy clarified without looking back. "Once is insufficient. You'll do it repeatedly until the transformation becomes instinctive. Until you've earned the right to call yourself something more than a fish playing at being a dragon."
His tone shifted, carrying undercurrents of something darker. Urgency, perhaps. Or desperation masked by confidence.
"I'm compressing your growth artificially. Forcing evolution that should take years into months. It's brutal, potentially fatal, and absolutely necessary. Because the next millennium is about to begin. If we miss this critical window—this convergence of fate and timing—everything I've prepared will be wasted."
Momonosuke didn't understand. Millennium? What did that mean? What deadline could possibly justify this insanity?
But Buggy wasn't in an explaining mood.
"If I have to wait another thousand years, it's too long. Even if I survive that span—and I could, with the right techniques—my ambition would erode. I'd become like every other ancient monster: conservative, risk-averse, clinging to comfort rather than pursuing dreams. I refuse that fate."
He finally turned back, his gaze boring into Momonosuke with uncomfortable intensity.
"So you'll become strong now. Quickly. Through methods that would horrify anyone with functioning ethics. Or you'll die and become irrelevant. I genuinely don't care which, as long as the choice is made soon."
The casual dismissal was somehow worse than overt cruelty. Buggy wasn't torturing Momonosuke out of sadism. He simply viewed the boy as a resource that would either prove useful or be discarded. No different from evaluating a weapon's quality.
"The waterway is ninety degrees steep at the peak," Momonosuke protested weakly. "No fish can swim vertically. It defies physics. Even in dragon form, this would be difficult. But as a carp? Impossible!"
"Then prove the legend wrong." Buggy shrugged. "Die here, drowning in seawater while struggling against your own weakness. Or surprise me by achieving the impossible. Either outcome resolves my scheduling problem."
Momonosuke stared at the waterway, his mind refusing to accept what was being demanded. This wasn't training. This was execution with extra steps.
"I won't do it," he said, trying to inject conviction into his voice. "You can't make me participate in this suicide attempt. I refuse!"
Buggy the Clown laughed—genuine amusement rather than mockery.
"Oh, child. You don't have the right to refuse." His right hand made a casual snapping motion. "Since you won't enter the water willingly, I'll send you myself. Let the fishy smell on your body return to Mother Ocean where it belongs!"
The air itself seemed to fracture.
Buggy's Bara Bara no Mi (Chop-Chop Fruit) ability activated with surgical precision. The splitting power—awakened to affect the environment rather than just his own body—targeted the ground directly beneath Momonosuke's feet.
The stone separated. A perfect circle, perhaps three meters in diameter, split from Iron Island's main landmass with a sound like tearing cloth.
And Momonosuke, standing on that now-detached platform, began falling.
"Ah... WAIT! STOP!" His scream echoed across the facility. "You're going to kill me! There's ocean below! I'll drown! I'll—"
The protest cut off as his brain finally processed what he needed to do.
Transform. Transform now. Before hitting the water.
He reached for the Devil Fruit ability desperately, feeling it respond faster than ever before—Orochimaru's serum had at least improved activation speed. The transformation occurred mid-fall, human body compressing and reshaping into something designed for aquatic environments.
The pink carp that was now Kozuki Momonosuke hit the ocean surface with a splash rather than a painful impact. Water rushed over gills that suddenly knew how to extract oxygen. Panic receded slightly as breathing became possible again.
I'm alive. I didn't drown. I'm—
From the cliff above, Buggy's voice carried down: "Smarter than your father! At least you know how to adapt to circumstances. Now swim, little fish. Climb that waterway or sink to the bottom. Your choice!"
Momonosuke floated near the surface, his fish body instinctively maintaining position. But even this simple act consumed energy at an alarming rate. The ocean was still a cruel stepmother to Devil Fruit users—even in a form that could breathe underwater, he felt the water's antagonism. His strength drained twice as fast as it should. Swimming required double the effort a normal fish would expend.
This is insane, he thought, still processing. If just floating exhausts me this quickly, how am I supposed to climb a thousand-meter waterfall?
He glanced toward the base of the waterway, where fast-moving current rushed down the incline. That torrent would fight against any attempt to swim upward. The physics were impossible. No amount of determination could overcome the fundamental disadvantage Devil Fruit users faced in seawater.
Buggy created this to kill me. There's no other explanation. This isn't training—it's disposal with theatrics.
From above, a stone suddenly arced through the air. Not thrown at full strength—Buggy was powerful enough to put a rock through Momonosuke's body if he wanted. This was deliberately pulled. A warning shot.
The stone hit the water three feet to Momonosuke's left, creating a splash that pushed him sideways.
"From this moment forward," Buggy called down, "this is your daily routine. If you don't complete the challenge today, you try again tomorrow. Fail tomorrow, try the day after. I'm giving you six months maximum. Once my patience expires, you'll remain a drowned fish forever. Literally."
With that pronouncement, Buggy turned and walked away. His footsteps faded into the distance, leaving only Douglas Bullet standing guard at the cliff's edge.
"Wait! Come back! Don't leave me here!" Momonosuke's fish mouth couldn't form proper words—only desperate bubbling sounds that conveyed panic without language.
No one responded. No one cared.
The ocean lapped against Iron Island's rocky shore. Waves created by wind pushed and pulled at Momonosuke's small body. Time passed—seconds blending into minutes—and he felt his strength continuing to drain.
I can't stay still, realization dawned with cold horror. If I just float here, I'll eventually become too weak to maintain position. I'll sink. And keep sinking until I hit bottom and drown.
"If you remain motionless," Bullet's voice carried down from the cliff, "you'll sink before nightfall. Nobody will rescue you. You must move. Take the first step toward the captain's challenge or accept death. Those are your only options."
The Devil's Heir bent down, selected a stone roughly the size of his thumb, and threw it with the casual accuracy of someone who'd spent decades honing combat skills.
The projectile hit Momonosuke directly in his side.
Pain exploded through the fish body—sharp, sudden, overwhelming. Scales cracked. Flesh bruised. The impact drove him underwater briefly, blood trickling from the wound as he frantically swam back to the surface.
He's serious, Momonosuke's shocked mind processed. They're both serious. This is really happening. They'll actually let me die here.
Another stone arced down. This one struck his dorsal fin, knocking loose several more scales. Bullet wasn't holding back now. Each throw was calculated to injure without killing—painful motivation to start moving.
"Swim toward the waterway," Bullet commanded flatly. "Or sink. Your choice."
There was no choice. There had never been a choice.
Momonosuke began swimming, his injured fish body struggling against current and exhaustion. Each movement toward the waterway's base consumed precious energy. His vision started blurring at the edges—early warning signs of fatigue that would eventually lead to unconsciousness if pushed too far.
I'm going to die here, the thought crystallized with terrible certainty. Swimming a thousand meters while fighting gravity and current and my own Devil Fruit weakness... it's impossible.
The ancient legend Buggy had referenced suddenly gained new context. Carp attempting to leap Dragon Gate weren't heroes achieving glorious transformation. They were desperate fish fighting impossible odds, with ninety-nine percent failing and dying in the attempt.
The rare success stories—those lucky carp who somehow reached the summit—were aberrations. Statistical flukes. Not evidence of achievable goals, but proof that natural selection favored only the most exceptional individuals while culling everyone else.
I'm not exceptional, Momonosuke admitted to himself. I'm just a scared child pretending to be important. Father was the strong one. Hiyori is the smart one. I'm...
I'm nothing.
The waterway loomed ahead, a thousand meters of impossible vertical challenge. Its base was a churning maelstrom where falling water crashed against ocean surf, creating riptides that would tear a small fish apart.
Momonosuke swam toward it anyway. Because staying still meant dying. And moving forward meant... also probably dying, but at least feeling like he'd tried.
Behind him, Douglas Bullet watched with cold assessment, another stone already selected for throwing if the fish stopped moving.
Weak, Bullet thought dismissively. Completely, utterly weak. But the captain sees something worth developing. So I'll make sure this fish keeps swimming until it either transforms or drowns.
That's what being a good subordinate means.
The sun continued its arc across the sky. The ocean remained merciless. And a small pink carp struggled toward an impossible goal, motivated by pain and fear rather than hope or determination.
This was training in the Buggy Pirates.
This was what becoming strong required.
And gods help anyone who couldn't survive the process.
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