Three days after I ate the Mera Mera no Mi, Dadan's hideout nearly burned down four times.
"ACE! STOP! DON'T TOUCH ANYTHING!" Dadan shouted while smothering a small fire in the corner of the room with a wet blanket.
"Sorry..." I sat in the middle of the room with my hands submerged in a bucket of water. The only temporary measure to stop me from accidentally setting something on fire.
The problem was simple but fatal: I had absolutely no control over this power.
Every time my emotions spiked—anger, joy, even just surprise—my body automatically ignited. And as a one-and-a-half-year-old, emotional control was practically nonexistent.
"Dadan-san, maybe we should call Garp-san?" one of the underlings suggested while backing away from me.
"DON'T! If he finds out I let Ace eat a Devil Fruit, he'll definitely..." Dadan went pale. "I don't know what he'd do but it would definitely be terrible!"
"But we don't know how to train a Devil Fruit user!"
"I know!" I suddenly spoke up.
All eyes turned to me.
"What do you mean?" Dadan approached carefully, as if I were a time bomb—which wasn't entirely wrong.
"Training... control..." I gathered the simple words I could manage. "Focus... mind..."
Dadan stared at me in confusion. "A one-year-old talking about mental focus? You really are Garp's grandchild..."
I was frustrated. My speaking ability was still too limited to explain what was in my head.
I knew the theory. Devil Fruits were controlled by the user's willpower. The stronger the mental control, the easier it was to command the power. And Logia types like the Mera Mera no Mi demanded the highest level of control because the body could transform into its element at any moment.
But theory and practice were two very different things.
"Alright," Dadan let out a long breath. "Tomorrow we start training. But far from the hideout! I don't want my home turning to ash!"
That night, I couldn't sleep. My body felt strange. Warm. Like there was a furnace burning inside my chest that never went out.
I lifted my small hand in the darkness. Focus. Imagine fire. Imagine heat.
My index finger began to glow. A small flame appeared at its tip. Orange. Beautiful. Dangerous.
Then—
"GYAAA!"
My mattress caught fire.
"WHAT NOW?!" Dadan came running in with a bucket of water and drenched me without mercy. "EVEN IN YOUR SLEEP YOU CAUSE PROBLEMS!"
I coughed, soaked to the bone. "Sorry... sorry..."
Dadan looked utterly exhausted. The dark circles under her eyes were growing deeper. Since I'd eaten the Devil Fruit, she had barely slept—too worried I'd burn the hideout down while everyone was unconscious.
"Tomorrow... tomorrow we HAVE to start proper training," she muttered wearily. "Or we'll all die in a fire..."
The next morning, Dadan brought me to a forest area far from the base. An open clearing with few trees and rocky ground.
"Here!" she pointed at the ground. "If you want to do your fire practice, do it here! Far from the hideout! Far from the dense forest! Understand?!"
I nodded.
"Good. Now... what do we do?"
I sat on the ground, trying to piece together a training plan with my limited ability to communicate.
"First... small fire..." I raised my index finger.
"Small fire? You mean light a small flame?"
I nodded.
"Alright, try it."
I stared at my index finger. Focus. Imagine a candle. A small flame at the tip of a candle. Calm. Controlled.
Slowly, fire appeared. Small. Stable. Not growing.
"Oh! Good! You can—"
WHOOSH!
The fire suddenly exploded into a fireball the size of my head.
"GYAAA!" Dadan leapt backward. "PUT IT OUT! PUT IT OUT!"
The panic made me lose all control. The fire spread to my arms. To my body.
"WATER! I NEED WATER!" Dadan sprinted to find the nearest water source.
But I realized something—the fire wasn't hot. It wasn't burning my skin. Just warm. Comfortable even.
"Wait..." I stared at the flames wrapping around my body. "Doesn't hurt..."
This was the nature of Logia. The body transforms into the element. I wasn't "on fire"—I was fire.
Dadan returned with a bucket of water but stopped when she saw me sitting calmly wrapped in flames.
"A-Ace...? Are you alright?"
"Doesn't hurt," I answered with a smile. "Warm... comfortable..."
The fire gradually faded. My body returned to normal—not a single burn mark anywhere.
Dadan collapsed to the ground, drained. "My heart can't keep taking this..."
But I felt something. A small understanding of my own power. This fire wasn't my enemy. This fire was part of me.
"Again," I stood up. Eyes gleaming with a determination far too old for my age.
Dadan stared at me strangely. "You... why do you look like an adult trapped in a child's body?"
I ignored the question. "Again. Training."
She let out a long sigh. "Alright. But slowly. Don't rush. You still have plenty of time."
But I didn't have plenty of time. Every day wasted was a day not spent growing stronger. And I needed to be strong before the great storm arrived.
We trained until evening. Over and over I tried to light a small fire. Over and over I failed. The fire was too large, or didn't appear at all, or ended up scorching the ground around me.
But slowly, very slowly, I began to feel the pattern.
The Devil Fruit responded to willpower. Strong and precise willpower. The more specifically I imagined what I wanted, the better the results.
"Ace, it's getting late. Time to go home," Dadan approached carefully—as if I could detonate at any second.
"Just a moment... one more time..."
I closed my eyes. Breathed deeply. Imagined a small flame in the palm of my hand. The size of a marble. Stable. Controlled.
Opened my eyes.
Looked at my palm.
There, floating above my hand, was a perfect little fireball. The size of a marble. Not growing. Not shrinking. Just... there.
"I... did it..." I whispered in disbelief.
"ACE! YOU DID IT!" Dadan cheered like a mother watching her child take their first steps. "LOOK! A PERFECT LITTLE FIREBALL!"
I smiled widely. This was only the first step. A small step. But it meant everything.
The fireball faded. I dropped to a sitting position, suddenly exhausted. Using a Devil Fruit drained stamina—especially in the body of a small child.
"You must be tired. Let's go home. Dadan will cook something good tonight!" she lifted me carefully.
I leaned against her shoulder, my eyes beginning to close. This small body had its limits. But the mind inside it did not.
Today I controlled fire the size of a marble. Tomorrow maybe the size of a tennis ball. The day after, a basketball.
And someday... I would command the sun itself.
Two months had passed since I ate the Mera Mera no Mi.
The progress was... slow but steady.
By now I could ignite fire without accidentally burning anything. I could control the size from as small as a candle flame to as large as a pillow. I could even transform part of my body into fire—though only my hands for the time being.
"Great, Ace! Better every day!" Dadan clapped watching me produce fireballs in both hands at once.
I tossed both fireballs upward. They collided and burst into a beautiful shower of tiny sparks.
"Whoa! Like fireworks!" one of the bandit underlings said in awe.
I smiled with satisfaction. Control was improving. But still far from enough.
From the memories in the manga and anime, Ace could create massive pillars of fire, fly on flames, even forge miniature suns. Those were the levels I had to reach. And beyond.
"Ace, take a break. You haven't eaten lunch," Dadan held out a packed meal.
I sat on a large rock and opened the box. Rice balls with meat. Simple but good.
While eating, I reflected.
I was now one year and eight months old. Luffy would be born about a year from now. Sabo already existed somewhere but I hadn't met him yet. And the story's timeline was still long—roughly fifteen years before Luffy set sail.
Fifteen years. Enough time to become tremendously strong.
But I couldn't stand out too much too soon. Couldn't draw the attention of the World Government or the Marines. They were still hunting for Roger's bloodline. And if they discovered a child bearing the name D. who possessed a rare Devil Fruit power...
I had to be careful.
"Dadan," I called out after finishing my meal.
"Hm?"
"Don't tell... anyone... about the fire."
She looked at me seriously. "You mean about your Devil Fruit?"
I nodded.
"Why? Are you embarrassed about having a cool power?"
"Dangerous," I answered in the most mature tone my child's vocal cords could manage. "If people know... dangerous for Dadan too."
She went silent. Then understood.
"You're right. Devil Fruits are rare and expensive. If pirates or bounty hunters found out a little kid had that kind of power..." she shuddered. "Okay. This stays between us. I'll tell the crew to keep their mouths shut too."
"Thank you."
She patted my head. "You're too smart for your age. Sometimes I forget you're barely two years old."
If only she knew I was actually a twenty-seven-year-old man from another world...
But that was a secret I would carry to my grave.
That afternoon, as we were walking back to the hideout, I heard a strange sound from the undergrowth.
"Wait," I stopped.
"What is it?"
"A sound... someone's there..."
Dadan and her underlings immediately went on alert. Their hands moved to their weapons.
From the bushes emerged a child. Blonde hair. Blue eyes. A pale, frightened face. Torn clothing. Injuries all over his body.
The child stumbled, then collapsed in front of us.
"Help... help me..." he whispered weakly before losing consciousness.
Dadan rushed forward. "He's still alive! Quickly, bring him to the hideout!"
I stared at the boy. Something felt familiar...
Blonde hair. Blue eyes. Around five or six years old.
Don't tell me this is...
Sabo?
The appearance matched Sabo. The future sworn brother of Ace and Luffy. But why was he here? In the original timeline, Ace met Sabo in the forest, but not like this...
But the timeline had already changed from the moment I ate the Mera Mera no Mi early.
And this was only the beginning of the changes.
The flame of destiny wasn't only changing my own path.
It was changing the fate of everyone around me.
TO BE CONTINUED