Time was certainly sufficient. Right now, there were still more than twenty years before that straw hat guy set out to sea. And honestly, there wasn't necessarily a need to use Luffy's departure as the standard for whether time was abundant or not.
That guy might be the protagonist of the One Piece manga, but he wasn't the protagonist of this world. Even without him, the world would keep on turning. Even if Luffy eventually became the Pirate King and the World Government collapsed, it wouldn't have much impact on Ren.
The eternal Inazuma would endure forever in this world!
Just as Ren was about to leave Research Institute Number Thirty-Seven, the originally unconscious Jin seemed to be on the verge of waking up. His mind hadn't fully regained consciousness yet, but his expression had become somewhat unstable, as if he were caught in a less-than-pleasant nightmare.
The instruments beside him began to beep.
"His heart rate is increasing!" Keiko rushed to the monitor, exclaiming in surprise.
"How is this possible? I already increased the anesthetic dosage."
"Even a Sea King wouldn't show signs of waking for at least three days."
"He's a Lunarian after all. The fact that we've kept him unconscious this long already surprises me." Ren said.
He even suspected that Jin's blood vessels were practically filled with anesthetic at this point.
"I'll increase the dosage again..."
"No need. I don't think continuing with the anesthetic will have much effect anymore."
"He's basically becoming immune to the stuff."
Ren stopped Keiko, then added, "It doesn't matter if he's awake."
"He's bound head to toe in high-purity Seastone anyway, so he can't muster any strength."
To be honest, Jin eating a Devil Fruit had actually given him an unnecessary weakness. The Lunarian race already possessed physiques that could rival or even surpass certain Zoan-type ability users.
The Ancient Zoan Pteranodon form didn't add much to Jin's combat strength. If it had been a Paramecia-type fruit instead, combined with Jin's monstrous body, it might have made him even stronger.
But that wasn't Ren's concern. He only cared about whether he could complete the artificial human series through his research on Jin. After all, the cyborg projects like Musket and Thunder Hammer were still in the planning stages.
Without lingering any longer at Research Institute Number Thirty-Seven, Ren and Keiko turned and left.
After the mechanical doors closed, Keiko glanced around. Seeing no one else in the corridor, the normally shy Keiko gathered her courage and wrapped her arms around Ren's arm, whispering, "Want to come to my office and try?"
...
"Where is..."
A man named Abel slowly opened his exhausted eyelids, his eyeballs immediately met with a sensation of pressure. But this feeling quickly faded.
He discovered that his vision had taken on a faint green tint, and his body had become weak and powerless.
Abel struggled to move his eyes, surveying the environment before him.
Silver-white instruments were lined up neatly like iron boxes. Just looking at this scene filled him with dread.
"A laboratory..."
Was he back in that place of nightmares again?
This tall but still young man began to tremble all over. The memories that had once tormented him came flooding back into his mind once more.
He recalled his wretched past, recalled the man named Abel who had been so weak.
He quickly realized that he had to get out of here and escape.
But...
"My body won't cooperate... These things are, Seastone?"
Jin quickly discovered the source of his inability to muster strength. But he didn't give up struggling.
His body moved through the nutrient solution, his fists hammering at the glass barrier in front of him.
Though he couldn't muster strength, he wasn't without options. Seastone was said to be the hardest substance in the world. Perhaps he could use its own hardness to shatter the glass before him!
However, as for what he'd do after breaking the glass, he hadn't given that any thought yet.
And in truth, Jin couldn't even crack the glass at all. This wasn't ordinary glass but another type of crystalline material that had Seastone components mixed into it. The amount was minimal, but it made the substance extremely durable.
It couldn't compare to high-purity Seastone, of course, but with Jin completely drained of strength, it was absolutely impossible for him to break through this barrier.
He hadn't even lasted long before he had to give up. His blood vessels felt as though someone had pumped molten lead into them, making them incredibly heavy, and even his fists had gone soft and feeble.
Weightless. His entire body felt as though he were stepping on fluffy clouds.
...
Keiko leaned against the wall, her face flushed red enough to drip blood, her weak legs trembling.
The stockings she had originally been wearing had long since disappeared, and the tight-fitting skirt pressed against her body had become terribly wrinkled.
"Hah... I can't stand, help me." Keiko panted, reaching out to steady herself against Ren, but he simply scooped her up by the waist.
She didn't exercise often, so her stomach wasn't as toned as Yukiko's or Mari's. Instead, there was a little bit of softness there.
Keiko wrapped her legs around his waist, clinging to him like an octopus.
Then the two of them started talking about recent events.
Ren told Keiko that he had caught a giant black python, but the massive serpent had slithered into a damp cavern.
"It's probably a seabed cavern leading underwater. When standing at the entrance, the wind blowing out from inside felt like seawater, a bit salty and fishy."
Keiko initially said she didn't know Kuri had such caves.
But later she changed her tune and said she had also seen that giant python monster.
"It has several caves, you know. It goes in and out of them countless times every day, probably for hunting."
"After all, the larger the creature, the more it needs to eat."
In the end, Keiko suggested that Ren either go find Ayame, the head of the Tenryou Commission, to capture the giant python, or talk to Saori, the beast-taming master, about how to tame it. Either way, she told him not to come looking for her, a helpless scientist who couldn't fight her way out of a paper bag.
She pressed a hand to her lower abdomen, looking utterly exhausted.
...
By the time the two of them returned to the Daimyo's mansion, it was already past ten at night.
Keiko had fallen asleep, exhausted from guiding Ren through Enkanomiya's development during the day. Ren had carried her back.
"Did you really spend that long looking at the laboratory?" Tenraku Toki had been soaking in the hot springs with Yukiko and the others. When she saw Ren walk in midway, she eyed him suspiciously.
"There were knowledge-related matters to discuss, and we lost track of time before we knew it." Ren said without so much as a change in expression.
"Really? You weren't sneaking a snack?" Tenraku Toki leaned in close and sniffed him.
Ren pulled her directly into his arms and fired back.
"Since when do I need to sneak?"
I eat what I want!
[
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