Chapter 122: Deal With The Beasts
Devil Fruit.
A number of Devil Fruits beyond imagination were laid out in front of him, the real items causing Kaido to fall silent for a moment. When did Devil Fruits start being sold by the basket? Such a scene was equally filled with an unusual impact for a Pirate Emperor.
Unbelievable.
Inconceivable.
Even for Kaido, the most Devil Fruits he had ever held at one time did not exceed ten. Yet now, the bamboo basket in front of him was piled with about thirty or forty Devil Fruits. The quantity did not seem exaggerated enough to make one silent, but the problem was that there were fully ten such baskets of the same size on this deck.
In other words, there were three or four hundred Devil Fruits here.
This massive number made one’s breathing quicken.
Just three minutes ago,
Elus asked Kaido if he could eat a large number of Devil Fruits. Kaido thought Elus had a problem with his head, but he still expressed his usual craving for Devil Fruits as always, and then—
Right in front of him,
basket after basket of Devil Fruits were carried out from the cabin and placed on the deck like goods for sale. No, they were the goods that Elus had prepared for trading with Kaido.
“These Devil Fruits… look a bit different!”
Kaido stared at the Devil Fruits in the basket for a good while before shifting his gaze to Elus. After suppressing the surprise and greed in his heart, he noticed the strangeness of the Devil Fruits in the basket. The varied colors were normal; what was abnormal was that all these Devil Fruits looked like ‘apples’.
Devil Fruits have all sorts of strange appearances.
Bananas, melons, pineapples, dragon fruits, pears, apples, mangoes, human heart fruits… and the patterns are also strange. Among all the Devil Fruits he had seen, no matter how strange the colors and shapes were, the patterns were always spiral patterns.
Not this kind of circle.
Of course, he was not suspecting Elus of deception. As an ability user, he could instinctively feel the devilish nature contained in the fruits—a feeling he had never encountered anywhere but in Devil Fruits. This stuff was indeed Devil Fruits; there was no mistake about that.
However, a subtle sense of strangeness lingered.
“That’s right, these are not naturally generated Devil Fruits. They are artificial Devil Fruits.” Elus stated bluntly.
“Artificial Devil Fruits?” Kaido’s eyes suddenly widened wide, and terrifying Conqueror’s Haki surged out like a tsunami, crushing toward all directions. Poor subordinates of Elus and many members of the Beasts Pirates were unfortunately struck by this sudden misfortune.
Those unlucky ones who fell down were not given a second thought by Kaido.
He was captivated by the wondrous phrase ‘artificial Devil Fruit’. The beating of his powerful heart sped up slightly, and his intuition told him that this thing might bring him a surprise?
“No mistake, this is artificial.”
Elus grabbed a round apple from the nearby bamboo basket—a deep purple apple with black-red circular ring patterns. His finger gently slid over the smooth skin of this apple. “Artificial. This thing is a man-made fake. It does have the power of a Devil Fruit, but it’s not complete. They are flawed creations.”
“Flawed?”
“Yes, honesty is a virtue in dealing with people. Deception may bring temporary gains, but in the long run, it is not worth it.” Elus toyed with the Devil Fruit in his hand, his tone utterly sincere as he proactively revealed the various defects of the artificial Devil Fruits.
First, no normal Zoan Devil Fruit ability to change between different forms.
Second, only parts of the body organs or limbs change.
Third, all manufactured Devil Fruits are Zoan types.
Third, consuming artificial Devil Fruits carries a risk of failure. If unlucky, not only will one fail to awaken the ability, but they will also lose the right to sadness, turning into a freak that can only laugh. If even unluckier, on-the-spot explosion is possible too. Moreover, due to limited experiment data, the success rate of consuming artificial Devil Fruits cannot yet be determined.
Each defect was carefully explained clearly.
In the end, Elus clapped his hands, and a maid pushed a prison cart made of a mix of steel and Seastone onto the deck. Through the railing, one could see a half-human, half-spider monster sitting in the prison cart: spider-like lower body with eight legs, and human male upper body.
“Urgh… mmph…”
The man in the prison cart violently pounded on it.
His eight legs frantically stomped the iron plate beneath his feet, but unfortunately, the Seastone sealed his strength. His seemingly frantic actions did not cause much damage to the prison cart. His tongue had been cut off for being too noisy, so he could not say a complete sentence.
All he could do was glare deathly at the maid guarding beside the prison cart with eyes as vicious as burning embers.
He had not even noticed Kaido and Elus.
Anger and hatred had drowned his reason, even keeping him from losing consciousness under the impact of Kaido’s Conqueror’s Haki. Instead, it stimulated him to become even more frenzied.
“This is an artificial Devil Fruit ability user.”
Elus pointed at the frenzied prisoner in the prison cart.
Kaido took a swig of wine, placed his empty wine cup on the deck, and cast a gaze as sharp as swords onto the half-human, half-spider man in the prison cart. Merely the gaze felt like tangible swords, instinctively alerting the man, who turned his head to meet Kaido’s eyes.
The flood bursting from the dam extinguished that small campfire.
The anger that had risen from becoming this inhuman monster was easily blown out under that gaze filled with terror beyond what his meager words could describe. The angry emotions receded, and his eight legs trembled from fear.
It’s Beasts!
After the anger in his mind extinguished and reason returned, the man immediately recognized who was staring at him.
Thus,
greater fear and despair overwhelmed him.
His entire being shrank lifelessly into the corner of the prison cart. He finally realized that his life was over.
“Pa!”
A peanut flew over, smashing through one of the man’s legs. The small peanut pierced the calf muscle, and fresh blood spurted out like a fountain in that instant, though only a few bursts before the bleeding quickly lessened. In everyone’s perception, the spider man’s injured area was slowly self-healing.
“The recovery seems about the same as a normal Devil Fruit.”
Kaido remarked softly.
The peanut was thrown by him.
It was to test the depths of the artificial Devil Fruit ability user.
Ignoring the spider man emitting low wails, Kaido continued experiments, testing the performance of artificial Devil Fruits from various angles. As the spider man’s aura gradually weakened, five of his eight legs were broken, the spilled fresh blood staining the iron plate at the bottom of the prison cart and dripping through the railing gaps onto the deck. Kaido finally stopped.
“How about my goods?”
“The artificial Devil Fruit technology, transfer…”
“Technology is not for sale. Let’s talk about trading the Devil Fruits instead!”
“Kid, won’t you hear my offer first?”
“Even if you packaged the entire Beasts Pirates for me, it wouldn’t work.”
“…How many artificial Devil Fruits can you provide?”
The trade went very smoothly.
As Elus had foreseen, Kaido could not resist the temptation brought by the artificial Devil Fruits. Even though artificial Devil Fruit ability users had innate defects and various shortcomings compared to genuine ability users, with many inadequacies and possible unknown risks.
However,
Compared to those strange abilities, what Kaido valued was the powerful vitality and recovery power of Zoan Devil Fruits. Enhancing vitality and recovery would undoubtedly greatly boost his subordinates’ strength. Plus, the number of ability users spawned by so many artificial Devil Fruits…
The dream of establishing a legion composed of ability users was now within reach.
“By the way, Kaido, the trade needs to be kept confidential.” Elus clinked glasses with Kaido and added a new condition.
“What? Kid, worried about being targeted for this technology? If you’re scared, why not just sell the technology to me directly!” Kaido was still persistent. Compared to acquiring artificial Devil Fruits, clearly mastering the manufacturing technology himself was better.
Unfortunately, Elus’s attitude was too firm.
Yet he could not use his most proficient martial power to force Elus to yield.
“This technology was stolen from inside the World Government.” Elus said. “If the news leaks, I will certainly be targeted by the World Government, but you can forget about buying more artificial Devil Fruits.”
“…World Government, huh? Tch! Troublesome thing.”
Kaido’s expression was not good.
He had indeed harbored such thoughts: spread news linking artificial Devil Fruits to Elus, use external force to pressure Elus into handing over or sharing the artificial Devil Fruit technology. But if this technology came from the World Government… the plan probably could not proceed.
As a Pirate Emperor of the New World, a fierce person who had single-handedly attacked the Navy and World Government multiple times, he knew full well how deep the World Government’s waters ran. The Three Admirals were merely the Navy Headquarters’ top combat power; he had never probed what trump cards the World Government held.
If he dared leak the connection between Elus and artificial Devil Fruits, Elus would definitely face big trouble, but he did not believe the World Government could eliminate Elus. That would only anger Elus and cut off his supply channel for artificial Devil Fruits.
“Increase the monthly Devil Fruit supply by ten percent.” Kaido proposed.
“Fine.”
Elus agreed readily.
Caesar’s research to improve the defective artificial Devil Fruits had not achieved a breakthrough yet. Without the miracle of the Hogyoku, artificial Devil Fruits remained this crude. But Caesar’s efforts over this period were not in vain.
He had improved the production efficiency of the current artificial Devil Fruits, lowered production costs, and could now mass-produce these defectives.
Precisely because the warehouse was piled high with too many defectives.
Leaving them to gather dust in the warehouse was not an option, so Elus planned to use these defectives to recover some funds. Initially, he thought of selling to the Revolutionary Army; the artificial dragon trade was booming, and they were familiar trading partners.
Unfortunately, the Revolutionary Army had little interest in these high-mortality artificial Devil Fruits.
Helplessly, Elus had to change targets.
Just then, news of Kaido’s movements arrived. He realized he could perhaps use artificial Devil Fruits to resolve this potential trouble of Kaido. He knew well that as the maritime transport network expanded, vying for limited interests would eventually draw targeting from Beasts and others like BIG·MOM.
The fact that BIG·MOM also moved to take advantage upon Kaido’s action was proof enough of the two Pirate Emperors’ malice.
Fortunately,
He had resolved this dangerous crisis with his own strength, then temporarily dispelled Kaido’s malice toward him with artificial Devil Fruits. With only BIG·MOM left as an enemy, it was much easier to handle—at least no worry of being attacked from both sides.
“Artificial Devil Fruits… The World Government really researched something interesting.”
Kaido’s big hand reached out, two fingers carefully pinching the artificial Devil Fruit that was a bit small for him, flipping it over to inspect. The ambition in his chest, suppressed for so long, swelled again. With artificial Devil Fruits, once he assembled his ability user legion, he could launch a massive war that would shake the entire world.
War!
He thirsted so much to start a grand war that would keep him from boredom.
“The World Government’s research yields more than just this.”
Elus tossed the artificial Devil Fruit in his hand back into the bamboo basket. “Compared to these defectives, the World Government holds better things!”
For example, the PX series Pacifistas.
This research had long been underway, but unfortunately, it was led by Vegapunk. Caesar, who had always clashed with Vegapunk, had no chance to learn about it, and Pacifista research was not on Punk Hazard.
Robots capable of firing laser attacks.
Just a few had beaten the Straw Hat Pirates, who lacked Haki, into utter rout. These standard Pacifistas might not threaten Elus’s level, but they were invincible for lower-level combat. If numerous enough, they could even concentrate fire to kill experts with Armament Haki.
The World Government is still very powerful.
He needed to work even harder to have any chance of overthrowing and replacing the World Government.
Elus motivated himself, firming his ambitious heart.
