3 First Contact

Have you ever tried to listen from just one ear even when both your ears work just fine? Sounds difficult right?

Trying to release the explosive energy within my body from a single point proved to be just as difficult a task.

The energy was so volatile, it always escaped right before it was about to be released from the point where I was focusing on.

I got into a right punch forward stance, just in case there is any recoil, and focused on releasing the energy from my right hand.

BOOM

I went skidding behind as my entire right arm exploded. It was a good idea I prepared beforehand otherwise I would have been sent flying. This oddly resembled bakugou's quirk, which gives me enough ideas to work with, but before I start working on them, I'll need to perfect my control.

I take the same stance again, this time going slowly trying to get the energy out from my hand.

BOOM

"Fuck!" A groan escapes my mouth even as I tried to suppress it.

"This is going to take a while."

< --------------------------FTS--------------------------->

I felt my battered body relax as I stared towards the vast ocean. The sun was almost about to touch the horizon, painting the whole sky in various shades of orange and red. Smidgen of clouds in whites and gray covered the entire sky haphazardly. With the whole thing reflecting on the calm ocean surface, it painted an aesthetically beautiful picture. It made anyone who watched it fall into a calming notion of peace.

It's been such a long time since I had ever felt so relaxed. I was in the Marine forces in my last life, constantly at war or sea voyages. Even though I had sailed a numerous times, I had never stopped just to take in the sea's beauty. And after joining the RedHawks Mercenary group, I never got the chance again.

"I hope John and others passed without any pain. Ah Sophia would have loved to get born or transmigrated into this world."

I missed Sophia. She was a fellow anime fan from the RHM. We had spent a lot of nights together discussing anime theory… amongst many other things. It was a sad thing-

CAWWW

The cries of a colony of seagulls stop my train of thought as I look up towards them.

"Welp. Beggars can't be choosers I guess."

Remembering and focusing on the familiar feeling, I will the energy to be released from my feet this time instead of my hands

IGNITE.

BOOM.

From a single release I propel myself up in the air, flying towards the seagulls, and within a single blink of an eye I'm right in front of them. I grab two of the squawking birds at the base of their necks and with a twist of my hand, snap the vertebrae present in that location.

In a second or two, my upward momentum is arrested and as I'm about start free falling towards the sea, with another BOOM, I find myself aligned and above the island.

As I keep falling down and was about to hit the ground, I create a small muffled explosion at my feet, this time to reduce my tempo and land on the ground softly.

"Dinner acquired"

I mutter under my breath as I ponder on the absurdity of the situation.

"Maybe I am being punished for something." I absentmindedly start removing the feathers present on the birds in order to prepare them for skinning. Once both the feathers and the leathery skin were removed, I focus the energy on my hands, but instead of releasing the energy I will it to remain just at the threshold of my skin.

It takes me a considerable amount effort to just stall the energy from escaping. Soon the skin on my hands start turning red and smoke is generated as the blood and gore on my hands starts burning and evaporating. My hands looked similar to metal freshly removed from the smithy, red and blistering hot.

"At the very least I'll never feel cold again." I think aloud.

Today's training gave me some insight on the nature of my power. The devil fruit which I consumed was not the bomb bomb fruit.

Mr. Five was a bomb man. Any and all parts of his body were similar to that of a bomb. And although my powers seemed to work in a similar way, they were slightly different but much more versatile. Mr. Five threw around boogers which burst on contact. My body parts on the other hand, including spit and *shudder* boogers, while capable of exploding need not explode right on contact. They remained as they were unless I will them to explode, after which they go out in a bang.

Maybe I'm way off my conclusions, but until I'm proven wrong, I'll just go with these assumptions. I still did not have any method to check whether it was Paramecia or a Logia class Devil fruit.

I hold the seagull meat in my hands and slowly start cooking it. I overdo it a little as the meat becomes slightly black. I wonder how long I will have to survive like this. I really hope someone comes along soon enough.

"Bon Appetit."

< --------------------------FTS--------------------------->

After I finish eating my bland dinner, I sit back in the meditation pose and start focusing within my body. Earlier I had realized that the energy within my body, although resembling explosions, were actually a combination of myriad of different energies. The most distinguishable ones were Heat, Light, Pressure and something that oddly felt like sound.

What I was trying to do now, is to allow energy of just a single kind to discharge out of my body. And the energy I chose to try this on was the one that felt like sound. Since I did not know how this would turn out, and the energy being used is related to sound, I decided to play it safe by releasing the energy through my ears.

As I felt the energy being charged up, I concentrated only on my ears.

[Silentium]

PING!

As soon as the energy was emitted, an incredible thing happened. As the sound waves traveled further away, they… started bouncing off of present objects.

And as the sound waves bounced off objects, I learned that I could feel them. No wait, not feel, I could HEAR them.

"Did I just fucking unlock my Observation Haki?" I questioned myself bewildered.

No, that was not Haki. This felt different. Although I could hear the objects, that was possible only at that instant. As the waves started travelling further and further away, the voices from the objects stopped transmitting. As I tried to capture the feeling once again, it eluded me.

I once again concentrate on my ears and try the move again, only this time –

[Silentio Deinde.]

PING! PING!

I released two consecutive bursts, instead of just one, in succession. As the two consecutive bursts traveled, I could hear the objects for a longer time than earlier. So this is how Enel felt when he used his 'Mantra'! Similar to how he picked up the electromagnetic waves, which led him to discover and gain high mastery over Observation Haki or Mantra, I could pick up the sound through the sound waves created through my explosions. Though it seemed that I'm only limited to the sound waves created by my power, unlike Enel's, and I'll have constantly keep on releasing the energy in order to get the effect similar to that of Mantra. This may allow me to discover my Mantra faster and help me train in it as well. Not to mention once I have discovered Mantra, it'll be much easier for me to discover the other forms of Haki.

That is of course, if I even have the Conqueror's Haki.

Nonetheless this is fucking overpowered. Sound waves traveled at the speed of 343 m/s with air as its medium. This allows me grasp things faster than they are actually visible. This completely eliminates any chances of getting tunnel vision while moving at faster speeds as well as changes my perception of people physically faster than myself.

I close my eyes as I stand up and start running towards the sea.

[Silentio Seriem]

I run for a few seconds as I keep firing [Silentium] every 5 seconds. And when I stop and open my eyes, I'm standing right at the edge where the sea waves crash. I could not keep the smile off my face as I went back to my previous position and started training some more.

< --------------------------FTS--------------------------->

*somewhere on the East Blue*

Dylan stretches his body to get the blood circulating faster. They had pillaged a village on one of the unnamed islands of East Blue yesterday, so last night their captain had thrown a party for the entire crew.

He had allowed Dylan and some of the more loyal and powerful members of the crew free reign over the women captured for the captain's…. Entertainment purposes. It's safe to say that everyone went to the town last night with their celebration.

Dylan was the First Mate of Big Dad Pirates. A significantly large group of pirates on the East Blue with about 2 Galleons and a crew that numbered up to 150 men. Their captain was called Big Daddy. Nobody knew his first name but he was a half giant with a bounty of 12 million Beli on his head for all the crimes he had committed.

Big Daddy's dream was to sail the Grandline, become one of the Four Emperors of the Sea, and marry Big Mom. Hence his as well as the crew's name was Big Dad Pirates

Abso – Fucking – Lutely Crazy. But nobody in the crew ever complained because as long as you stayed loyal to him and never did anything to insult him, he allowed the members of the crew to do whatever the fuck they wanted to do, live as barbarically as they dared to. And with the periodical raids conducted on various villages, they never seemed to be short on cash, booze or women.

Life in Big Dad Pirates was Good.

Currently Dylan was travelling towards one such village on another unnamed island on the East Blue. Although this time he was moving under his captain's orders to check on the village instead of raiding it. Apparently someone told the captain that there was some kind of disturbance on the island 2 days ago. How much of that was true he did not know, but when Big Daddy asked you to do something, you do it, otherwise you get your head crushed with his bare hands like a watermelon.

"Boss! We will be reaching our destination in 3 hours if the wind favors us!" a man from the navigation unit informed him.

"Alright. Let's just get this over with. I still have to finish playing with Sara" Dylan grumbles as the crew started laughing around raunchily.

'Ahhhh! Sara my dear, wait for me. I'll be back soooon!'

< --------------------------FTS--------------------------->

A huge black ship around the size of a galleon neared an island that looked completely bare.

"Boss we have reached our destination but…" The man trails off from what he was about to say as he tries to wrap his head around the situation.

"Ugh. What is it now? Speak clearly!" Dylan ordered the man.

"As I said boss, we have reached at the target island, but there is no village or any such thing present."

Dylan goes off towards the edge of the galleon to look up on the island and it indeed proved what his men were saying.

"What the fuck is happening around here. Men! Ready the row boats, we are disembarking!"

Soon, around fifty men could be seen wading through the waves towards the beach on five medium sized row boats. They arrive at the beach in a few minutes and start inspecting the surrounding areas.

The entire place had become a barren land. Not even a single tree or a bush was visible on the beach. Though the whole place was covered with something that oddly looked like ash or soot.

"Did the entire island get bombarded by the marines or something?" Dylan wondered aloud.

"Congratulations."

Everyone looked upwards at direction of the foreign voice. And to everyone's bewilderment, there was a young child about the age of 10 jumping in the air, with occasional muffled 'booms' along with heat and smoke exploding from beneath his feet.

"You have initiated First Contact."