Upper Yard: The Edge of the Cloud Beach.
A high-altitude breeze swept across the pure white White-White Sea, fluttering the edges of a massive nautical chart spread across a wooden table. Carina sat before it, her violet eyes scanning the dense markings that covered the first half of the Grand Line. Beside her lay a heap of over a hundred specially treated ancient gold coins.
"Berries! Have the third squad of seagulls head to the offshore routes of Jaya. Drop these coins precisely into the blind spots on the decks of passing merchant ships!"
Carina marked a red 'X' on a shipping lane.
"Received! Caw! Drop! Get rich!"
The macaw, Berries, let out a spirited cry and took flight. With a sharp whistle, dozens of large Sky Island birds of prey took to the air, clutching the "bugs" in their talons. They dove through the cloud layer like a bomber formation, heading toward the Blue Sea ten thousand meters below.
Ace, his toned upper body slick with sweat from a brutal weight-training session, walked over to the table, wiping his neck with a towel.
"How is the deployment, Intelligence Officer?" Ace pulled out a chair and poured a glass of water.
"Progressing smoothly, Captain." Carina rubbed her aching temples. "As long as those coins land on a ship or get pocketed by a pirate, I can track them in real-time. But... the noise, Ace. Monitoring hundreds of audio channels at once is turning my brain into mush."
"You don't need to monitor everything." Ace set down his glass, his gaze steady. "Set a 'filter' in your mind. Block the white noise. Only trigger an alert when the devices capture specific keywords."
Carina's eyes lit up. "Using my Avis-Net to set a frequency lock? That would cut the mental load by ninety-nine percent! So, what are the 'trigger words'?"
Ace leaned back and began rattling off a list of high-priority targets—information that could cause tsunamis in the world's power structure:
Dark purple, pineapple-patterned Devil Fruit (The Yami Yami no Mi).
Trafalgar Law or the Ope Ope no Mi.
Floating islands in the East Blue (Shiki the Golden Lion).
Supreme Grade Sword, Ace (Roger's blade).
A blind swordsman addicted to gambling (Fujitora).
Celestial Dragons.
Carina scribbled the words into an encrypted notebook, her mind racing. She didn't ask how Ace knew these names; she had long since accepted that her Captain possessed an information channel that defied logic.
"That's the net," Ace stood up. "Let me know the moment the web twitches."
The Forest Training Ground.
The dull thud of a physical collision echoed through the trees.
BANG!
Enel stumbled back through the air, crashing into a pile of fallen leaves.
"Your movements are too easy to read, Enel," Sabo said, retracting a soot-black, Haki-clad fist. "Your Mantra sees the attack, but your body is too slow to react to it."
Enel snarled, climbing to his feet. "Less talk, Blue Sea dweller! If I could use my full voltage—"
"Even at 200 million volts, lightning is meaningless if you can't hit the target," Ace's voice cut through the air as he entered the clearing.
Ace looked at the frustrated "God" and pointed to his chest. "You rely on your Logia instinct to turn into lightning after you're hit. Against Haki users, that makes you a sitting duck. Haki grabs your 'truth.' You need to use Mantra to evade before the contact."
"Evade in advance?" Enel paused.
"Don't wait for the fist to touch you. See where Sabo's strike will land, then actively move that part of your body out of the way. Shift your form so the Haki hits nothing but empty air."
Sabo's eyes widened at the concept—it was the ultimate evolution of a Logia user's defense. If Enel could master "Active Elementalization" through Mantra, he would become virtually untouchable.
"Don't just be a battery," Ace advised. "Control every spark."
On the other side of the clearing, Buggy was wearing Sea Prism Stone knuckle dusters, performing deep squats while trembling like a leaf.
"Captain... my legs... they're breaking..."
"Physicality is the foundation, Buggy," Ace said, ignoring the theatrics. "But your Fruit development is lagging. Tell me, what's the smallest you can split right now?"
Buggy held out a hand. With a thought, his palm fractured into dozens of fingernail-sized pieces. "About this big. Any smaller and I get dizzy."
"Too big," Ace countered. "If you can split, why stop at pieces? Why not grains of sand? Why not... dust?"
Buggy froze.
"You're immune to slashing. But blunt force still hurts you," Ace painted a terrifying blueprint. "But if you can turn your body into a cloud of dust, what physical attack could touch you? A mountain could fall on you, and it would simply pass through the gaps between your particles. You wouldn't just be a Paramecia; you'd be a ghost."
Buggy's jaw dropped. If he reached that level, he'd be practically immortal. The "Chop-Chop" fruit wouldn't just be a gimmick; it would be a nightmare.
Noon: Mess Hall.
The scent of roasting meat filled the air as Shandia warriors carried in massive Sky-Boars. Leona, the "Ferocious Cook," was a blur of steel. Her bone-chopping cleavers danced, preparing high-calorie meals for Ace and delicate Sky-Fish sashimi for the crew.
"Your blades are faster," Ace noted, swallowing a piece of sashimi.
Leona sat opposite him, frowning at her twin knives. "The speed is there, Captain. But that 'Breath of All Things'... the ability to cut steel... I can't find the threshold."
"Everything has a 'breath,' Leona," Ace said seriously. "Trees, rocks, steel. You dissect beasts by following the grain of their muscle. Now, you must listen to the grain of the metal."
Ace tapped her blade. "When you can feel the will of the sword and hear the weak point of the object, the steel will part for you. But first, stabilize your Observation Haki. It shouldn't just trigger in life-or-death moments; it must be your sixth sense, always on."
Leona looked at her hands, her vertical pupils narrowing. "I understand."
High above the world, protected by the clouds and Ace's absolute strength, the Eclipse Pirates were no longer just a crew. They were a crucible, refining themselves into the monsters that would one day tear the New World asunder.
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