6 Training

The next day Asahi found himself in a secluded area he never even knew existed. Standing in front of him was Rayleigh, his grandfather, with a serious expression on his face.

"For the foreseeable future this is where you will be training. I'm warning you now, I won't go easy on you. I will be putting you through the harshest training regiment that I know of. Are you sure you want this?" Rayleigh asked him.

"Yes" came the response from Asahi. It was a short and simple answer, but it was spoken with one hundred percent certainty. Rayleigh smirked at the boy's confidence. 'He has no idea of what I've got planned for him.' Rayleigh inwardly chuckled. But he knew if there was anyone who could get through this training it was his grandson.

"Before we start, let me tell you something about devil fruits." the white-haired man said. Rayleigh, seeing he had Asahi's full attention, continued. "The devil fruit you ate is classified as a Logia. Yours specifically allows you to transform your body's composition into magma, as well as create and control it." Rayleigh told him. Asahi of course already knew of this information but he didn't let it show on his face so as to not raise any suspicion. "But do not fall into the trap of believing this makes you invincible." Rayleigh continued his explanation. "In fact it puts you in more danger as powerful people will come after you in search of the fruit. The fruit is only as strong as its user. Training your body's physical capabilities and as well as your combat skills are just as important. With that being said, you should still practice to perfect the use of your devil fruit." Rayleigh said, thus finishing the explanation.

"Gramps, do you know how to train my devil fruit?" Asahi asked in a curious tone. While Asahi might remember all the One Piece lore, he only knows what has been said in the manga, and the readers aren't exactly told how to most efficiently train your devil fruit. Due to this, Asahi is relying on Rayleigh's experience to help him train in the most efficient way possible.

"Hmm, while no one on our crew possessed a Logia devil fruit I have encountered previous users and I remember some unique techniques which you can find useful. As for training your devil fruit, it will come with experience and hard work like everything else. The more you use it the more you improve." Rayleigh answered with a thoughtful expression on his wrinkled face.

Asahi understood. 'There needs to be a balance between your devil fruit capabilities and your physical ones. You shouldn't rely too much on either of them, rather you should make your abilities complement each other, like yin and yang.' Asahi thought to himself.

"All I know is that training with me will only take you so far, to truly become strong you have to fight your equals and you have to win by surpassing your limits" Rayleigh said inspirationally.

"Enough chatting," Rayleigh said. "The first start of your training regimen is to sit down in a quarter lotus position." he finished.

"Uhm okay" Asahi replied back in a confused tone. This wasn't what he had in mind for training.

"Now sit there with your eyes closed and clear your mind. You will do so until I come back." Said Rayleigh as he turned away from him and began to walk away.

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'How long has it been? Days? Weeks? Months? No, I think it's been multiple years at this point.' thought Asahi to himself.

His butt was sore from sitting so long. But he had to endure it, he didn't want to fail to live up to his grandfather's expectations. So he sat and waited, not moving a single muscle, until he heard footsteps that he recognized as his grandfathers.

"Well done," his grandfather said, prompting him to open his eyes.

"Ugh, how long did I sit here?" asked Asahi in an annoyed tone. He had expected sparring, physical exercise and devil fruit training. Not sitting on his ass for three hours straight. 'Calm down Asahi told himself, gramps knows what he's doing. I'm sure there's a reason for this,' Asahi thought to himself.

"I left three hours ago," Rayleigh responded in a light-hearted tone. "Now for the second part of training, we will focus on the physical aspects. Because of your young age it would be detrimental to use weights or to exercise too much. We will focus more on that when you're older. But that doesn't mean you can't improve your martial arts or devil fruit capabilities. So before you start, tell me what type of fighter you wish to be.'

Asahi didn't spend much time thinking about it considering he had seen how Sakazuki had fought in tandem with his devil fruit. 'Even though I wasn't the biggest fan of his in the show, I have to admit, the way Sakazuki uses his devil fruit and physical capabilities in a fight may be simple, but they're goddamn effective.'

Sakazuki's strategy was to simply turn his arms into magma which added an incredible amount of firepower on top of his monstrous physical strength. If you add haki into the mix it makes for an almost unstoppable attack unless you have a direct counter to it.

"I want to be a relentless fighter, I want to be able to fight for days at a time. The way I fight may not be pretty but it will cause damage," I tell him. "I want my punches to be able to destroy islands yet I also want to be able to take hits. I wish to be able to go toe to toe with the strongest man in the world!" I finish.

Rayleigh just smirked. "Let's get to it then," he responded.

AN: Thanks for reading. There will be a timeskip next chapter where we will see the result of his training. Please review the story if you have the time, criticism is appreciated.