The following afternoon, deep within the island and far from Diwen Village.
Vast stretches of forest had been obliterated.
Towering trees lay shattered across the ground, their trunks blackened and twisted. The air reeked of scorched wood and molten stone, while chunks of earth had fused together into hardened formations resembling cooled magma.
"Hoo… hoo…"
Ash braced his hands against his knees, breathing heavily.
Despite his exhaustion, his eyes shone with unmistakable satisfaction as he surveyed the destruction around him.
This devastation was the result of his own testing.
And this was after deliberate restraint.
Had he not carefully limited the temperature and output of his flames, Diwen Island itself would likely have been burned straight through.
The Mythical Zoan Devil Fruit, Human-Human Fruit, Di Jun Form, had exceeded expectations.
First came the physical transformation.
Even though it was classified as a Human-Human Fruit, a Mythical Zoan was still a Zoan at its core.
The moment Ash consumed the fruit, his physique surged by fifty points, an increase that immediately eclipsed the effects of Iron Body Level One.
Then came the secondary effect.
Because he had personally designed the Innate Divine Sense, even with most of its power sealed due to balance restrictions, it still granted a massive boost of fifty points to his mental attributes.
That increase alone was enough to forcibly awaken Observation Haki.
More than that, his mind became so clear, so active, that sleep became impossible. His thoughts raced endlessly, overflowing with awareness and energy, forcing him to leave the village in the middle of the night to test his abilities.
It absolutely had nothing to do with excitement.
Definitely not.
Setting physical growth aside, every other ability left Ash deeply satisfied.
First was the Golden Crow Rainbow Transformation Technique.
With his current physique, the maximum distance he could traverse in a single activation was one hundred and twenty li, roughly sixty kilometers.
That was barely a fraction of its full potential.
Even so, after ten consecutive uses, fatigue began to set in.
Ash still found it more than acceptable.
Sixty kilometers in an instant was more than enough to disengage from any fight he could not immediately win.
Until the day he stood invincible.
Even Kizaru, the Navy's fastest Admiral, would never be able to catch him.
Speed could reach absurd heights, but reaction time could not.
Neither could the limits of the human body.
No matter how monstrous they were, the Admirals and even Whitebeard himself were still human.
And humans had ceilings.
Next came flight.
At full output, Ash's maximum flying speed reached nearly five hundred meters per second, cleanly surpassing the speed of sound.
Sustained flight at that level drained stamina quickly, but maintaining a cruising speed of around one hundred meters per second consumed almost nothing.
It was effectively free movement.
The Five Elements abilities behaved exactly as expected.
Aside from fire, the remaining elements could be controlled but not created from nothing, unlike a Logia.
Compared to mythological standards, it was a limitation.
Compared to the Pirate World, it was absurdly powerful.
As for the True Fire of the Sun, its current theoretical cap was ten thousand degrees.
In practice, Ash could only output around three thousand degrees safely.
Even so, the molten rock scattered across the clearing was proof enough.
That temperature already exceeded Akainu's magma in raw destructive output.
The final two transformations were the most striking.
The Three-Legged Golden Crow form was breathtaking.
Ash's entire body became cloaked in golden flames, radiant and domineering.
And most importantly, his clothes transformed with him.
They turned into blazing golden fire, wrapping seamlessly around his form.
Not a single tear, not a shred burned away.
Ash had to admit it.
Devil Fruit clothing assimilation was a miracle.
Somewhere out there, a green-skinned brute who tore his pants every time he transformed would be shedding tears of envy.
Then there was the Sun transformation.
That one was outright ridiculous.
When fully released, Ash became the center of a massive sphere of fire nearly a hundred meters in diameter.
The inner ten meters consisted of pure golden flames formed from the True Fire of the Sun.
Beyond that, waves of scorching heat at roughly three thousand degrees radiated outward.
The sea beneath him evaporated violently.
Steam filled the sky.
And his stamina plummeted at an alarming rate.
The sudden drain had startled even him, forcing Ash to immediately cancel the transformation.
After extensive testing, he finally reached a conclusion that truly satisfied him.
The Sun transformation possessed a second mode.
An Inner Containment State.
Rather than releasing heat and energy outward, all solar energy circulated slowly within Ash's body.
In this state, stamina consumption dropped to almost nothing.
At the same time, the core solar energy continued to accumulate, gradually raising his limits.
Was the flame temperature itself important?
No.
What mattered was saturation.
Ash wanted every cell of his body infused with solar power.
The moment he achieved Inner Containment, his Iron Body entry reacted.
His status panel updated instantly.
"Open status panel."
[Devil Fruit Editor]
[Host Personal Panel]
[Name: Ash]
[Age: 13]
[Physique: 83]
[Spirit: 57]
[Abilities: Iron Body LV1 (Expandable), Observation Haki (Expandable)]
[Energy: 0]
[Devil Fruit Ability: Zoan Type, Human-Human Fruit, Mythical Zoan Type, Di Jun Form]
[Subordinate Devil Fruit Abilities: None]
[Status: Stellar Inner Containment / Physique Enhancement]
Everything was clear at a glance.
Under the combined effects of the Devil Fruit and Stellar Inner Containment, his physique increased by another three points in less than half a day.
Three points.
Half a day.
The efficiency was terrifying.
Compared to this, sunbathing felt like primitive nonsense.
If he maintained Inner Containment constantly, Ash estimated a gain of five physique points per day.
That was equivalent to the initial growth bonus of Iron Body Level One every six days.
Even better, recovery became absurd.
Despite exhausting himself through nonstop testing, a few deep breaths were enough for stamina to surge back endlessly.
Ash laughed quietly.
A perpetual engine.
Strength fueled by the sun.
And he was the sun.
This was not power.
This was cheating.
As hunger finally set in, Ash recognized the cause immediately.
Iron Body and Stellar Inner Containment were both newly acquired, and solar energy consumption far outpaced his current reserves.
Accumulation required fuel.
Food was fuel.
Solar energy was fuel.
Naturally, he would take both.
Ash planned to head closer to the Calm Belt, catch a couple of smaller Sea Kings, and share them with the village while accelerating his own growth.
But before he could move, something caught his attention.
Ash straightened and turned his head.
On a distant tree branch stood Pini.
Frozen.
Staring.
His mouth hung open wide enough to fit Ash's fist.
Ash raised an eyebrow.
"What's wrong, Brother Pini?"
"Did you come all this way just to watch?"
___
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