8. Preparations Complete

( One year later )

It's been 8 years since I came to this world, and one year since I awakened my devil fruit. During my last year in this island I trained myself harder that before as uninterrupted training is going to be scarce from now on. 'Let's see the results, Stats'

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[Stats]

[strength: 5582]

[vitality: 5563]

[stamina: 6124]

[agility: 5875]

[intelligence: 2871]

[will: 8159]

[money: 5 billion beli]

[Skills]

[plant - plant fruit control lvl 150 awakened]

[boxing lvl 150 max]

[sword mastery lvl 150 max]

[gun mastery lvl 150 max]

[fishman karate lvl 150 max]

[hasshoken lvl 150 max]

[technological expertise lvl 142]

[architecture lvl 140]

[gardening lvl 115]

[wood working lvl 143]

[blacksmithing lvl 145]

[cooking lvl 128]

[navigation lvl 70]

[Techniques]

[Rokushiki]

☆ soru lvl 150 max

☆ geppo lvl 150 max

☆ rankyaku lvl 150 max

☆ shigan lvl 150 max

☆ kami-e lvl 150 max

☆ tekkai lvl 150 max

☆ rokuogan lvl 150 max

[Seimei Kikan lvl 79]

[Haki]

☆ Observation Haki lvl 150 max

☆ Armament Haki lvl 150 max

☆ Conqueror's Haki lvl 150 max

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In the body training aspect I concentrated on increasing my stamina to better use my devil fruit power (bigger the stamina longer the duration I can use it). Weights have become useless in my body training, so with Vegapunks expertise I created a belt that increases the gravity on my body without affecting the surroundings. It seems Kizaru's laser is not the only devil fruit power Vegapunk managed to replicate. I have been wearing the gravity belt everytime except for sparring and sleeping. Spending time in increased gravity helped increase my stamina more than other attributes.

I used this year to get used to the increased capabilities after I awakened my devil fruit. Contrary to other moves the maximum toughness of my wood didn't increase, it is still at the level of steel. But as I can already use armanent haki through the wood that is connected to me that is not much of a setback.

After experimenting with my powers I descovered some very useful abilities. The first one makes it very convinient for me to visit places I have been to. The prerequisite for this is I need to grow a special tree on the places I want to visit again. The tree don't need look any different from other normal trees but I can only make one per island. The way it works is I walk up one of the trees and merge with it and walk out of another tree in a different island, I call it the tree network. I plan to have one of these trees on every island I visit. Another useful ability I discovered is that I can merge with a tree and completely hide my presence even from observation haki. I can still observe my surroundings in this state. Even though I don't have to hide due to my power, sometimes it is better to avoid unnecessary trouble.

The most terrifying ability I have developed is an ability to extract devil fruits from others. For this to work first I have to knock out the devil fruit holder first, then grow a tree around the unconscious person completely encasing them except the head. Then the tree will extract the essence of the devil fruit and form a suitable fruit for the essence to reside in recreating the devil fruit. They need not be unconscious for this but it's a precaution so they don't damage the tree and interupt the transfer process. Though this ability should work in theory, I have yet to use it on a devil fruit user as I am the only candidate in the island.

In this one year I was able to integrate all my combat skills together. I am now able to seamlessly transition from one fighting style to another without inrerrupting the flow of battle. I can also for example use my sword attacks to send the shockwaves from Hasshoken or fishman karate to my oppenent's bodies. My storage ring helps with this too as I can switch between weapons without any lag.

The only new skill I learned is Seimei Kikan or Life Return. It is a technique used by members of Cypher Pol. With this technique I can control my body to a greater degree like, elongating and controlling my hair, change the shape and size of my body, rapidly digesting food etc. It is the ability to rapidly digest food that got me intrested in learning this skill. With my ability to produce any plants from my body I can grow highly nitritious fruits to consume during mid battle and digest them rapidly with seimei kikan thus restoring my stamina. Discounting the mental fatique I can fight for days like this. With enough mastery of this technique I can disguise myself effectively.

Even though I mastered Haki I still daily train it as it increases my will stat and the more 'will' I have the longer I can use Haki and the stronger it will be.

When my blacksmithing level crossed 140, I was able to make Supreme grade swords. So I made myself a Supreme grade sword, the only one I have made so far. It involved months of work and this was with the help of clones. For a master blacksmith it will take years and even then it may not turn out as expected. My sword is a one sided sword with a slightly curved blade. The blade is midnight black, the guard and pommel are golden with various decorations. I was even able to permanently imbue armament haki into the blade. Usally that is done by using the blade for years, but I was able to add haki during forging thus imbuing the blade with it. As I have have a terrible naming sense I haven't named my sword, a supreme grade sword deserves a better name than what I named my first swords.

I always wondered how my stats stack up against powerful people of this world. The system gave me a rough comparison of the average of the attributes points except intelligence, the Yonko have an average of 5000 and Fleet Admiral 4500, Admiral 4000, vice Admiral 2500 etc.

I may have more attribute points than any Yonko but in a fight it may be an even match. I may have good fighting experience sparring against humandrills but I haven't faced any opponents near my level. My strength is not that high to ignore the lack of experience and beat them. But against Admirals, I can beat them with some effort. With a few fights agaist some strong individuals I can negate this weakness. But even then defeating a Yonko will take some effort.

The progress of humandrills during this year have been exceptional too. Their boxing skill is betweel level 125 and 135 , Rokushiki is between level 120 to 130, sword and gun mastery between level 120 to 125, Haki is also between level 120 to 125 and their Hasshoken and Fishman Karate between level 115 and 120. Their previous leader is a cut above the rest as his skill levels are better than them at about lvl 140 in boxing, lvl 136 in rokushiki, lvl 130 in sword and guns, lvl 130 in haki and lvl 125 in hasshoken and fishman karate. During the last five years I had them train using a simplified version of the excercises in my body training manual. I can't have them do the original excercises because they are tailored for the high potential body I wished from God, their bodies aren't adaptable enough to endure that kind of stress.

Due to living together for 8 years I can understand their language and they can understand mine, but due to vocal chord limitations we can't speak the other's language. This helped greatly in giving them instructions and training them.

Their attributes are between 2600 and 3300, and they can give any ordinary Vice Admiral a good fight. But their leader with an average attributes of 3800 can content against Yonko's top commanders and is only a little weaker than an Admiral. What makes these humandrils tough to fight against is the multitude of fighting styles they are proficient in. They each have modern guns with supersonic ammo and and Skillfull grade swords with the leader dual weilding Great grade swords.

I had years ago decided to take some of these humandrills as my crew when I set off. What I have been undecided on were the number of them I take. With the completion of my ship approaching I decided to take 20 of the100 adults and the previous leader. The rest of them will take care of the island.

Since I can come back anytime through my tree network, I have decided to make this island my base. I have grown special underwater plants around the seas of the island that produce strong fog that can't be dissipated easily and another set of plants to produce microscopic spores that contains hallucinogenic agents to knock out those who got past the fog. The apes will then apprehend the trespassers and contact me through a den den mushi to decide on their fate. If they are just curious bystanders they will be made to forget what they saw by some hypnotic agents I developed and will be left adrift away from the island. Though these hypnotic agents are not strong enough to make someone unconditionally obey me, making someone forget something is easy. If the tresspassers are hostile then they will join my experimental subjects (though there are none right now, I don't have a problem experimenting on some cruel pirates or celestial dragons). If the apes can't deal with someone, I can always hop over and subdue them. When I'm sailing some of my clones will continue my many researches.

As I have already mentioned, my ship is almost complete. Only some finishing touches are left, so it will be ready in a week. I started the design six months ago. The ship's appearance is based on the ship Black Pearl from Pirates of the Caribean. The ship is made of the toughest wood I can make which is as tough as steel. The ship has a length of 90 meters as opposed to the original's length of 50 meters, this is because most of the crew is on average 3 meters tall. The maximun width is 25 meters and maximum height is 35 meters without including the masts. The hull and sails are pitch black. I have kept the figure head of the maiden with a dove in her hand.

It has three masts, they can be rolled up or spread, individually or all once by a series of levers from the quarter deck. Though most of the time the ship will move by twin propellers that come out of the stern stem (An: I hope that's the correct term). They can be retracted into the stern when not in use. There are 32 cannons in total on the ship, 16 on each side of the gun deck and none on the main deck. These are advanced cannons that I made that fire projectiles at supersonic speeds. When they are extended from the gun port they have a range of motion of 150°. They can be individually controlled from the gun deck or aimed from the captain's quarters. There are also two rotating laser cannons, one each on the forecastle deck and poop deck. These can shoot straight through a calm belt sea king (I tested it) and have a range of 5 kilometers. This ship also has thrusters on the stern and bottom of the ship for flight. All of this is powered by a large Cold Fusion Reactor and a smaller CFR for backup. The ship does not have a crows nest as that is replaced by a periscope with videofeed to the navigators room.

There is a small tree on the poop deck which is 10 meter tall, it has white bark and red leaves. This tree is connected to my tree network.

Now I'm in the process of stockpiling goods for setting sail. Tonns of food stuff, spare parts for the ship, ammunition both for the cannons and the crew's firearms etc.

Only one week to go till I set sail.