Chapter 329
Is Lord Im really that steady?
Chapter 329 Is Lord Im really that steady?
"Are government officials coming to take over?"
Sabaody Archipelago, Star Hunting Force Headquarters.
Loy, who had just returned to headquarters, heard the news from Far and Hans.
"Yes—it was someone from CP0 who notified us."
At this moment, Hans and Fal also looked very unhappy.
They all bore considerable scars, and standing beside them was a man—Ranley, a former Marine Rear Admiral who had also joined the Starhunter Force.
"That 'Surgeon of Death' is terrifyingly powerful. It took the three of us a lot of effort, including some underhanded tactics, to capture him. And these government scumbags just steal the credit like that."
Hans muttered to himself.
"Don't worry, no one can take the credit that belongs to you—by the way, where is Terfalga Law?"
Roy said this thoughtfully.
"In the temporary prison."
While Hans and Far were answering, Roy had already stepped into the temporary prison of the headquarters.
Sure enough, a group of people were already imprisoned in the prison cells.
The most eye-catching one was a polar bear Mink Tribe member dressed in crew clothes—Roy immediately recognized him as Bepo, a member of the Heart Pirates.
And next to the polar bear.
A wounded pirate, wielding a nodachi, leaned casually against the side of the prison.
His clothes were still covered in seawater, and his face was full of resentment.
Roy could understand the other party's resentment—because he had already learned the whole process of capturing Roy from Hans and others.
In fact, this surgeon of death was actually stronger than Hans and Farr, and even after Major General Lanley came to his aid, he was able to fight and retreat.
Relying on his unique ability to teleport, he was almost about to escape Hans and the others' pursuit.
However, the problem is that after the Golden Lion incident, Hans and Far had already prepared a set of tactics for dealing with ability users like Law.
The specific tactics are as follows: Hans will swallow a cola bottle filled with seawater into his stomach using the power of the "Satiety Fruit," while Fal will take Hans into his stomach using the power of the "Freshness Fruit."
In that instant, Hans released his Devil Fruit power, releasing the seawater.
Because seawater has a restraining effect on Devil Fruit users, Fal's Fresh-Fresh Fruit cannot store this seawater—this seawater will appear out of thin air and form a tsunami anywhere.
"This is our perfect combination technique!"
Law was hit by this attack—he successfully cut Hans and Far in half with the power of the 'Op-Op Fruit', but was hit by the surging seawater and was captured.
"Still young."
Looking at Rona's face, which was even younger than in the original story, Roy couldn't help but sigh.
Because in this world's timeline, Doflamingo, who was originally Law's target for revenge, had already been killed by Shen Hou beforehand.
Under the butterfly effect, Luo also seems to have chosen to go to sea ahead of schedule.
This directly resulted in him being relatively young—compared to the deeply troubled and wary character in the original work, he was clearly much less mature.
However, Roy had no interest in paying attention to Luo's frustration at the moment.
The user of the fruit, 'Terfalgar D. Water Law', has been identified, and it has been confirmed that the fruit he consumed was the 'Op-Op Fruit'.
[Devil Fruit Ability: Can deploy an operating room and control everything within it]
[Analyzing the fruit]
[The essence of the fruit: the wish for immortality of soul and body]
[LV3: Gains all Devil Fruit abilities, can deploy the operating room (ROOM), can sever the body of a creature with a knife within the operating room, and can freely swap the positions of any object and creature, but consumes a lot of stamina, and creatures severed within the operating room will not die.]
[LV4: Can transplant and transfer 'personality', can generate electric current and gamma rays in the ROOM, and use them as 'healing materials' to cause massive damage to enemies]
【LV5: Fruit Awakening - K/R-ROOM】
[Fruit Awakening Effect: Unlocks Special K-ROOM and R-ROOM]
[K·ROOM possesses a true sharpness capable of 'cutting through everything,' even seastone and the ocean itself. Enemies cut through it will be paralyzed and unable to resist for a short period. It can also transmit 'waves' through a scalpel to directly inflict massive damage on the enemy's body.]
R·ROOM can control more things inside the operating room, such as various natural phenomena like light, sound, and airflow. At the same time, R·ROOM can perform surgery outside the operating room in a short time.
At this moment, the information from the Fruit Encyclopedia was Roy's top priority.
As he knew, the fruit Law consumed was the Op-Op Fruit, which was considered one of the strongest Paramecia-type Devil Fruits.
Defensive attack, special effects. If this fruit's ability existed in the past, Roy would have been extremely excited about it.
However, for Roy now, no Devil Fruit ability can attract his attention too much.
What he really cares about is...
【Fruit Awakening - Unique - Immortality Surgery】
[After the fruit awakens, the user, who is proficient in medicine, can sacrifice their own soul to perform an 'immortality surgery' on themselves or any other creature.]
After the surgery, the Devil Fruit user's soul will be shattered into pieces.
In exchange, the current life and soul state of the 'patient' undergoing the surgery will be fixed; their physical body will not age and cannot be killed, and their soul cannot leave the body through death.
"."
Looking at the description of the Op-Op Fruit in the Devil Fruit Encyclopedia, Roy felt a chill run down his spine.
"This is it!"
That's right.
This is why he immediately chose to come here after hearing that Hans and the others had captured Luo.
He knew very well that the Surgery Fruit was a very special fruit.
Its special feature lies not only in its powerful abilities, but also in...
"It is the key to sealing Im, the key that Lox and Queen Lily possessed."
Roy carefully observed the unique awakening effect of the Ope Ope no Mi and understood this point clearly.
In the distant past, Queen Lily 'bound' Im.
That bondage caused Im to become what he is today—He, who should have been the 'god' of the world, was forced to hide behind the scenes.
In addition, thirty years ago, Rocks ultimately chose to go to Mary Geoise to die, and he should have used his abilities to accomplish something.
These two heroes, whose names will undoubtedly be etched in history, share a common thread: the power of surgery. Roy is over 90% certain that the way these two will ultimately pose a 'threat' to Im will be through the 'immortality surgery'.
"The current life and soul state of the 'patient' who undergoes the surgery will be fixed; their physical body will not age and cannot be killed, and their soul cannot leave the body through death."
Roy's eyes sharpened as he carefully studied the description of this ability in the Devil Fruit Encyclopedia.
"That's right. If you think about it carefully, since the establishment of the World Government eight hundred years ago, the existence of the 'Abyss' has officially been given a name, and it is called 'Lord Im'."
"And coincidentally—among the original twenty kings of the World Government, there was one named Nerona Imsa?"
This is a question that Roy has always found very puzzling.
Because he has now completely understood Im's true nature—He is not human at all, but a reflection of the Pillars of Creation, a 'God of the Abyss' formed from all malice.
Such an existence shouldn't even have a name, let alone the name of a real person.
At this moment, after witnessing the only awakened effect of the Op-Op Fruit, 'Immortality Surgery', Roy had a bold guess in his mind.
"Judging from the murals on the Abyss, when Im made the pact with Davy Jones, his true form should have been inside the 'tree'."
“At that time, the real world leader was Davy Jones, and Im was just a ‘collaborator’ who provided him with power.”
"But things changed after the initial twenty kings betrayed the world and made a 'contract' with Im."
Based on current intelligence, each of the twenty kings should have obtained a unique 'contract' and each embodies a part of Im's essence, similar to the current 'Abyss Contract'.
But
“Given Im’s character, He would likely desire to truly rule the world, rather than merely act as a provider of ‘power’.”
"So—perhaps the essence of that contract means that Im will periodically transfer his soul and consciousness into one of the twenty kings?"
Just like during the Battle of God Valley, Im descended through the body of Saint Satan.
The contracts held by the initial twenty kings of the World Government were clearly more complete and powerful, and the time, power, and completeness of Im's presence upon them were obviously greater.
Roy could even boldly speculate that this arrival should be on a rotating basis.
Every so often, Im would change the body of a king to serve as his vessel, thus ensuring that the twenty Celestial Dragon families could rule the world around him.
But
"An accident occurred 800 years ago, during the first World Conference."
Roy could almost see what had happened back then.
"The World Conference is a 'key moment' for declaring Im's dominion over the world, and He will not miss it."
When the consciousness of the 'Abyss' once again chose one of the initial twenty kings as its vessel to descend upon the human world.
That long-hidden, courageous rebel, with the abilities he had long prepared, and with the resolve to die, completed that 'binding' of God.
"The king possessed by the abyss is Narona Imsa.
"At that time, Queen Lily sacrificed her own soul—she sealed the soul and will of the abyss within the body of Im Saint."
“From then on, the abyss became ‘Im’.”
Based on the current situation, even if the Abyss can create Devil Fruits at will, as long as the 'wish' and 'essence' represented by the fruit itself still exist in this world, it cannot truly erase the power of a particular fruit.
The awakening effect of the Operation Fruit is to 'fix the current state of the soul and body'.
This means that Im, who embodies the Abyss, cannot die, so even the soul and consciousness of the Abyss cannot leave Im's body.
Indeed—that desire for immortality became the chains that bound the gods.
This is undoubtedly the most reasonable explanation, and it can even explain why Im's power has declined to such an extent.
"It's equivalent to the Abyss now only possessing the power of the contract it bestowed upon 'Nerona Imsa'."
Thinking of this, Roy couldn't help but sigh.
If his guess is true, then it means that Im now possesses at most one-twentieth or even less of his power at his peak.
Even so, His power remains so immense—which is enough to show that if He were truly at His peak, the world would be absolutely unable to resist Him.
"Queen Lily, you have done something wonderful."
Muttering to himself, Roy then became curious about Lox again.
"If my guess is correct, Queen Lily sealed and bound Im by performing surgery on Im's body."
"So what did Lox do?"
This was the question that piqued his curiosity—since Rocks insisted on choosing to die in the end, there must have been something he had to do.
"Perhaps knowing he was doomed, he did everything in his power to reinforce Im's restraints. Hmm, very likely."
Roy pondered this in his heart, but felt that it couldn't be that simple.
Given Lox's modus operandi, he always felt that the other party had likely done something else as well.
Especially considering the Life Card he had recently received in Elbaf, which Loki had passed on to him.
In Roy's mind, a bold guess had formed.
"That guy, Rocks, could he be..."
He frowned slightly.
But before he could finish thinking it over...
"You're the 'Black Xie'?"
He then heard the voice coming from behind him.
Roy turned around.
Then we saw several figures dressed in white armor, who had also entered the temporary prison at some point.
The marks on their bodies were naturally very familiar to Roy.
That is the mark of 'God's Blade'.
"They're actually using the Blade skill; they won't even send one of the God Knights?"
Seeing this, Roy secretly complained to himself.
He wasn't surprised that the government sent people over—especially after seeing the effects of the Op-Op Fruit and roughly guessing what Queen Lily and Rocks had done back then, he understood even more what the Op-Op Fruit meant to Im.
Even he was somewhat surprised.
Such a crucial fruit, yet Im isn't even willing to send a single Divine Knight?
Lord Im, are you being so steady now?
(End of this chapter)