Trial by beast: Haki and Blood

–Timeskip 1 year–

–Carter POV–

It was finally time. Our training had reached its peak. It was the time of the beast trial. Let me explain. There is an island in the calm belt very much like the island that luffy trailed on during the timeskip called Mega-ju island, the only difference between the two was that the one i'm talking about is about ten times larger than the other. There were beasts and plants that could kill you in an instant on this island. And this is where we will be left for a week.

For all Headquarters marines like my unit were subjected to this island as a last test before becoming full matines. Another explanation, if you are an HQ marine you start at a minimum rank of commander.

So now me and my unit were all sitting on the bow of teacher Zephyr's ship. This was also a tradition amongst the HQ marines. We watched the sunset together on our way to the island. We just enjoyed each other's company and waited.

I sat between Tari and Onyx with my arms slung over their shoulders as we all watched the silhouette of the island approaching in the distance. "See that guys we're almost there" Onyx said, directing everyone's attention to the growing shadow on the horizon. "We're almost there, just five days on that island and we'll be true and righteous marines!" he said with a smile.

"Yea we just have to survive." Tari said sarcastically, this earned a chuckle from Kujaku and I.

"Don't be like that. We'll be fine!" Michael said as he took a swig of the juice they had brought out on the ships deck with them.

"That's easy for you to say! You and Yuta are logias! Nothing on the island can even touch you if you don't want it to!" Tari roared. Onyx burst out laughing and I chuckled. Justice, who had grown from the size of a housecat to that of a Lion by now, let out an amused growl at Tari.

"Don't even start Justice! You're not even coming to the island!" we all got a kick out of that. Tari and Justice had a bit of a rivalry. Tari was always confused on how Justice always knew where everyone was and had come to the conclusion that the less than a year old dragon had mastered observation haki before her, I was NEVER going to tell her that Justice could just read minds.

"Don't worry about it, Tari. If any beasts try to mess with us, I'll just tame them with my beautiful Beethoven!" Kujaku declared loudly, pulling her whip taut.

Much to my dismay, vice admiral Tsuru had found the whip whip fruit four months ago and gifted it to her granddaughter. Now I had to be careful when we sparred because now she could make me do anything she wants if she manages to strike me.

"Thanks Kujaku, but I'm still not happy about this!" Tari made her emotions known and huffed.

We sat there for a while. Eventually the others dozed off as it became night. Onyx was sprawled out on the deck with Liz close nearby. Miachael and Yuta were leaning on each other and passed out. Kujaku was peacefully sleeping while she leaned against the ship's railing and Tari was asleep next to me. Justice was awake but he was starting to doze off.

I sat there for a while and watched the stars as the shadow of Mega-ju island became larger and larger. "Quite intimidating, isn't it?" a deep voice drew my attention.

I looked back and smiled when I saw that it was Zephyr. "A bit. How big are those trees? They've got to be at least 70 meters tall." I decided to make conversation.

"Ha! You're right! Those trees are 90 meters tall, ancient legend has it that a small clan of ancient giants used to live in those massive woods." the old admiral said as he sat down next to me. "Though no one knows for sure." he said as he pulled out a bottle of Jerez and took a swig.

"That's interesting." I said while in my mind I was actually very much celebrating. 'Finally! An excuse to use the blood I've waited a whole fucking year for this!!'

I stopped celebrating however when I noticed the fact that Zephyr's hand holding his alcohol was shaking. In fact he seemed very nervous, something I hadn't seen from him since... The incident.

My eyes widened in realization and I stared at my Sensei. Now it made sense, we were the first graduating class since the one that got massacred by Edward Weevil. Zephyr-sensei was afraid he would lose us just like he lost them.

I placed my hand on my teacher's shoulder and he stopped shaking. "I know you are worried, Zephyr-sensei, but you don't have to be."

"I-I Just can't stand the thought of losing you all," he admitted while looking at my comrades sleeping forms. "Carter, out of all of these guys you definitely have the most potential. You picked up armament, and observation haki faster than anyone I have ever seen. Promise me, promise me that you will look after them." he said with pleading eyes.

"I would have done it even if you hadn't asked Zephir-sensei." I told him honestly. I could see him visibly relax as he took another swig of his booze.

"Good, then I have nothing to worry about." I said as i looker at my stats, it was quite nice to see the progress i had made this year

[~Name: Carter Davil

Race: Human

Age: 15

Occupation: Marine

Titles: Breaker of chains, Kin of Devils,

Companions: Justice, Unnamed Lapras

{stats} {inventory} {shop}

Constitution: 25.9

Devil Fruit: Yugo Yugo no mi

Devil Fruit mastery: 12.7

Haki: 10.2

Free attribute points: 3.7

Additional skills: Devil fruit infusion skill, Poneglyph reading Skill, Devil fruit identification skill,

{stats} {inventory} {shop}

—Weapons—

Akuma-Ketsujin

Yoriichi

Gluttonous Feeder Ring

—Treasure—

Ancient Giant Blood

7xRandom otherworldly item token

Tokage Tokage no mi model: Drake

Ika Ika no mi

Lapras Pokeball

—Other Items—

Wapometal ingot

Impact dial

Journal of Erik Gunhild

Fossilized Tooth]

–the next morning–

A small feeling of unease washed over myself and my friends as we watched our marine ship sail away from the island they had dropped us on. They would not return for exactly seven days.

This was the Trial By Beast. For seven days and seven nights we will have to survive on this island. There are certain beasts that have points numbered to them. The amount of points each person has at the end of the seven days, as well as a two month pirate hunt later on determines our rank.

There are five extremely dangerous beasts on this island as well. These we were specifically warned to stay away from. The sapphire Eagle: a dark blue eagle 21 meters long with a wingspan of 40 meters, she keeps guard over the eastern mountains. The Ruby Ape: a blood red gorilla standing at 35 meters tall, he keeps guard over the western forest (where we were right now) The Citrine Tiger: a golden tiger 30 meters in length and 20 meters in height, she defends the southern savannah. The Emerald Serpent: a massive green seaking that lives in a cove in the center of the island. And finally the diamond tortoise: a brilliant white tortoise 40 meters tall, he lives on the northern shores.

As long as we steered clear of these five creatures and kept our guards up, we would be fine... or that is what we thought at least because immediately after we started to move on the beach something tried to kill us.

"Woah!"

Yuta shouted as the sand underneath her swelled up and a large claw burst from underground. The claw tried to swipe at her but it just passed through the gog that made up her body.

When the claw realized it couldn't harm Yuta it moved on to the rest of us. The claw dug back into the ground and charred towards us making a pattern in the sand. When it sprang back up it revealed itself as a massive hermit crab! It had a bright purple shell covered with jagged spikes, and the creature itself was a bright orange.

It lunged at Onyx but he quickly drew Orchid and deflected the strike.

"Hands off!" Liz shouted as she coated her hand in haki.

She slammed her fist into the shell of the creature and knocked it off balance. The creature let out panicked chiterring and scurried away.

We all huffed and caught our breath for a moment. "Not even ten minutes in, and we have already been attacked." I said, already done with this experience.

"Alright!" I was snapped out of my thoughts by Tari calling all of our attention to herself. "We are burning daylight. Let's get a bit further in and set up camp."

"Alright! Yuta and I will scout for a good campsite." Onyx declared as he shifted into hybrid form and took off, followed closely by Yuta who shifted into a cloud of fog.

That left the rest of us to follow on foot. I drew my blades and held them close. Oh yeah! I forgot to mention I had opened another of the otherworldly item tokens. This time I got a sword. Yoriichi's sword form Demon Slayer to be exact. The sword was the original form of the blade. Bright red. I had taken to simply calling the sword Yoriichi after its previous wielder. The system stated that it was equivalent to one of the 50 skillful grade blades.

I drew my blades and raised my guard. Tari did the same with her sword and she formed several ice spikes on her body as well. Michael released some oil in his palms and formed it into two pistols, it had actually been me to suggest this as he had learned to ignite the oil he produced and only ignite certain parts. Flaming oil bullets coated in haki did some major damage. Liz simply coated her fists in haki and prepared to punch anything that moved.

As we walked we were attacked by a few small beasts. I killed a boar, Lizz crushed the head of a snake that lunged at her, and Tari cut down an ostrich-like creature.

Eventually we stopped to take a break and we heard a loud buzzing . . . and screaming.

"Guys! Giant! Fucking! Wasps!" Onyx's voice called out as he and Yuta burst through the treeline. They were followed by absolutely massive green insects with stingers. "Help!!!"

Now here is another new development. Michael was TERRIFIED of insects. So the moment he saw the wasps. Let's just say. Common american name + oil fruit = AMERICA!!!

"AAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!!!!" Michael shrieked as he morphed completely into oil and shaped the pitch black liquid into two miniguns. Before you ask, NO I did not give the marines advanced modern weaponry. I just suggested that he could create firearms from his oil and combustion. He came up with the rotating barrels all on his own.

The oil cannons shot just about a thousand flaming rounds at the giant insects, punching and burning holes in their wings, bodies and heads. When he was done with them, Tari had to extinguish the small fire he had created with a sheet of ice.

'Nice shootin Tex' I thought looking at the smoking bodies of the massive insects.

As Michael calmed down I turned to Onyx. "Please for the Love of Nika, tell me you found a good campsite."

"Yea we found a clearing with some weird rock formations that act like a wall around it," Onyx said as he stood up, "it's about an hour walk from here but if I fly you guys one by one it'll cut that time in half."

"Well then let's do that," Tari said as she walked over to us. "This jungle gives me the creeps."

So that is what we did, Tari was carried to the campsite first, Yuta went as well. While we waited we continued walking in the direction of the campsite to shorten our time between pickups. Michael was next, about halfway through the walk Kujaku spotted a large bird and tamed it with her devil fruit. She had taken Liz with her to the campsite and left me to be taken by Onyx.

When we arrived I saw that there really was a wall-like rock formation surrounding the clearing. I walked over to the wall and examined it. "Damnit!" I shouted as I realized what the rock actually is.

"Whoa! What is it man?" Michael asked concerned.

"This rock is hardened magma." I grimaced. "That bastard Sakazuki made this when he was here."

'Why of all people did my team's survival have to give gratitude to that bastard!?'

A look of realization flashed on Michael's face. While they never understood my hatred for the red dog they had stopped questioning it as well. "Well he made this a long time ago so he's probably forgotten all about it." Michael said and I will admit that it helped ease my hatred.

"Whatever, let's just set up camp."

And that is what we did. It took a few hours to build a suitable structure and a water proof fire pit but because of my devil fruit it was pretty easy. Yuta had surrounded the camp in a shroud of fog to keep us hidden during the night and Kijaku had set her new bird friend on watch duty.

Before we slept we gathered our points for the night. We had been attacked by a few more creatures when we were sitting up so we took those as ours as well. Kujaku pulled out a book that contained the points for each creature and we tallied them up.

Me: 3 boars, 5 points each. 2 lizards 10 points each, total: 35 points

Tari: Terror bird, 10 points. 1 boar, 5 points. 1 lizard, 10 points: total: 35 points

Yuta: giant wasp 15 points, boar, five points each: total: 20 points

Michael: 3 giant wasps, 15 points each: total: 45 points

Onyx: 2 giant wasps, 15 points each: total: 30 points

Kujaku: 2 serpents, 10 points each. Boar 5 points each: 25 points total

Liz: serpent, 10 points. 2 boars, five points each: 20 points total

When the sun started setting we gathered firewood and used a small bit of Michaels flaming oil to light a bonfire. Onyx and I cleaned and cleaned the boars and we roasted them on the open flame.

We went to sleep with Onyx taking the first watch of the night.

---------------

The next day I woke up with a start as Tari had shrieked and had frozen the entire camp because when she woke up, there was a large beetle on her chest. So yeah, that was fun, and an extra 2 points on Tari's count.

"Sorry sorry sorry sorry-!" she desperately apologized while I brushed the frost out of my hair with my finders.

"It's fine, Tari," I said as I stood up.

"S-s-speak f-for y-youself!" the voice of Onyx sounded from behind us as he shivered. I had to hold in my laughter as I saw that there were icicles hanging from his nose.

"Cmon Onyx, we have work to do." Liz said as she smashed the Ice around the camp.

We all got up and went to get the fire going again to cook tari's terror bird and the serpents for breakfast.

Not much happened on this day besides the fact that Onyx was attacked by a large tiger while in his beast form. I'll tell you, the face that Onyx made when the creature pounced on him while he was airborn was on parr with Enel.

I took down the tiger and got 20 points added to my score.

The third day we found the Hive of the giant wasps. Needless to say that when Michael was done with it he was leading in terms of points by a VERY large margin.

However, the fourth day... That is when everything changed.

—Third POV—

The seven marines on the island were sleeping peacefully. Completely unaware of the danger that slowly lumbered towards their camp. The massive creature towered over the walls of the camp and was able to just peer through the veil of fog created by Yuta.

The creature watched them with a mix of curiosity and anger. These little creatures dared to invade its territory? What a joke!

The creature sneered and related back its massive fist and with a roar that made the trees quake, it slammed its hand into the center of the Camp.

The ground underneath cracked instantly and the marines within were jared awake by the tremor and roar.

Carter was the first one ready for battle, however when he looked and saw the beast as well as a new task that had popped up he knew he was screwed.

[ Notice: New task available

Description: You have angered the guardian of this forest by encroaching on its territory, defend yourself.

Objectives: survive, keep your teammates alive, earn the Ruby ape's respect (optional),

Rewards: +10 skill points, 5x tier 3 item box, random skill token, ????? (optional)]

"Oh Shit." he said as the massive ape once again attempted to crush him with its massive fist.

He jumped away and yelled at the top of his lungs "CODE RED!!! EVAC NOW!" This shout caused the other marines to snap out of their daze at seeing the massive beast and start moving.

Onyx and Yuta immediately transformed and grabbed Tari, and Liz while Michael covered the entire area in oil to try and slow the ape down. Kujaku summoned her bird and grabbed Michael and I and we all took off in the opposite direction.

"What the hell is going on!" Tari screamed as the abe pursued them. "The Ruby ape was supposed to be on the other side of the forest! What the hell is he here now!?"

"No idea!" Carter shouted back as he sent a few Haki infused air slashes towards the ape, only to have them do nothing at all. "But he is here now, and he is seriously pissed off!"

The ape let out a roar and hurled a boulder the size of a small seaking at them.

The group would have been crushed if it wasn't for Carter jumping onto the boulder before it hit them.

"Decombine!"

The moment his hand made contact with the boulder it crumbled into dust as his devil fruit separated most of the molecular bonds holding the chunk of earth together. For a moment Carter was relieved. That was until he realized he was now falling straight towards the massive ape that had raised its arm to swat him away.

'This is gonna hurt!' he said as he raised his arms to shield his head. He coated his entire body in haki as the massive hand made contact with his comparatively tiny body.

It made zero difference. 'FUCK!' he thought as the impact sent a massive wave of pain across the entire right side of his body. He could physically feel his bones shatter as he was launched far into the forest at near terminal velocity.

"Carter!" his team shouted in horror.

They could do nothing but stare and hope he had survived as the Ruby abe continued its relentless pursuit.

"Damn You!!!" Michael shouted as he began firing flaming bullets at the ape which did nothing more than make it annoyed.

Tari followed his example as she began firing shards of ice at the creature. One Of the shards actually managed to hit the ape's eye but all it did was make it even more mad.

"ROOOOAAARRRR!!!"

The creature roared in anger as it ripped a tree from the ground and threw it at the small group.

"Watch out!" Tari called to Onyx.

Unfortunately even with the warning it was not enough as the tree slammed into onyx's avian form, he managed to drop trow Liz to Yuta but he fell to the forest floor.

"Quickly, turn around we have to get Onyx!" Michael shouted at Kujaku. She did as such and just managed to snatch the unconscious black haired boy in time to save him from getting crushed by their pursuer's massive fist.

"Where the hell are we supposed to go!?" yuta shouted.

"If we can make it into the territory of another of the five, then it will most likely leave us alone!" Kujaku shouted back.

Their hopes were all dashed however, as they were overcome by a mauve shadow. With horror and despair in their eyes they turned around and saw the Ruby Ape...

Had LEAPED towards them.

'So this is it huh?' Tari thought to herself. The figure of the abe ever approaches to crush them all.

'Well.' the thoughts in Liz's minds slowed down. 'It was nice while it lasted.'

'This is so unfair.' Kujaku thought. 'Damnit, sorry granny. Looks like I won't be following in your footsteps after all.''

Yuta and Michael had no thoughts in their minds as their instincts simply demanded them to try and save their companions.

Their time was up. This was all they could do. That was what they thought. From the coroner of their eyes however, a flash of blue invaded their sights.

"RAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!"

The roar of a massive blue figure snapped the marines out of her stupor as the massive figure slammed itself into the ape.

Yuta and Kujaku pulled their teammate onto a branch of a giant tree and watched as the blue figure and the ape crashed through the forest.

'W-what is that?" Liz asked in a whisper as if she raised her voice it would turn on her.

The figure and ape pulled themselves off the ground and a mix of confusion, relief, and happiness passed through the heads of the marines as they saw the face of the blue figure.

"Carter!"

-Small Flash Back-

Carter's scenes were all overwhelmed with white hot pain as he crashed through a few massive trees, before finally coming to a stop when he slammed into a more particularly large tree trunk.

He dropped to the ground and tried to breathe only for his body to start coughing up blood from the internal damage various impacts had caused him.

When he finally stopped expelling blood, he had took deep breaths and when he opened his eyes it became abundantly clear that something was wrong as he couldn't see out of his right eye.

'System, give me a rundown of the damage done to my body.'

[Affirmative. Running diagnostic. . . diagnostic complete.

List of damage:

Head: minor skull fracture, caved in right eye socket, ruptured right eye, shattered jaw.

Torso: 5 cracked ribs, semi-collapsed right lung, cracked lower vertebrae.

Right arm: all bones shattered, shredded tendons and shredded muscles.

Left arm: fully functional

Right leg: all bones shattered, shredded tendons and shredded muscles.

Left leg: fully functional]

'Shiiiiiiittttttt.'

This was a very bad situation. Carter now had a broken body, was stranded on an island filled with predators and his comrades were being chased by one of the strongest creatures on thei island.

'System, how can I fix my body?'

[Answer: the scenario that provides the most optimal recovery of the physical body of the user: user assimilates with -[ancient giant blood]-. Assimilation will repair all physical damage in the transformation however will not repair the missing eye.]

'Alright then,' he thought without wasting a second. He pulled the vial from his inventory and prepared to drink it. 'Now or never!'

He poured the blood into his mouth and almost immediately he was overwhelmed by pain as his body began to grow and shift.

-back to present–

Carter's new massive body stood up and the marines marveled at his new attributes. While normal ancient giants are usually more heavy set, Carter's form was much slimmer, he was also not as tall as a normal ancient giant, only being about 35 meters tall instead of their usual 50-60 meter height. Both of these were the result of his original human genes.He did however have the horns, teeth and bright colored skin of the ancient giants. His obviously being a light shade of blue.

"Not so fun to pick on someone your own size is it!?" Carter asked the beast.

The creature looked perplexed at its new opponent for a moment before it roared and charged at Carter. The ape swung its arms downward towards the young marine; however, Carter took hold of the creature's wrists.

The two then began grappling with each other. While this was happening the other marines were watching their comrade.

"Ok im just gonna say it, How the fuck did carter turn into That!?" Michael asked as he watched Carter headbutt the ape.

"No idea." Liz said, just as gobsmacked as him.

"I think I know," the heads of the others whipped towards Tari. "I overheard Zephyr-sensei tell Carter that ancient giants used to live in these woods. He might have found a bone of something and fused himself with it with his devil fruit." she deduced.

"That makes sense." Kujaku said, winsing as the ape decked Carter in the face.

They watched as Carter slowly got up from the strike and charged at the beast. However something caught Yuta's eye. "Uh-oh."

"Yuta? What's wrong?" Kujaku asked.

"Take a closer look at Carter" she said, staring intently at her giant comrade.

The others all turned back to the form of their gargantuan comrade and began to observe his body more closely. It was only then that they realized something very bad.

'He's completely exhausted!'

Indeed, when they took a closer look at him they noticed that his movement had become sluggish, his one remaining eye was completely bloodshot, and he was sweating profusely.

"This isn't good." Tari voiced the group's collective thoughts.

"He's completely exhausted!" Michael shouted, very concerned for his friend.

Indeed Carter was feeling the toll that his transformation had taken on his energy reserves. Now, he was near collapsing while still in the middle of a fight with one of the most dangerous creatures on this entire island.

'I have to end this now.' Carter thought as had just barely dodged a swipe that would have taken his remaining eye out. He grabbed the Ape's arm and swung the beast to the ground.

"It's about time we finish this, *huff* So why don't you get lost?"

The creature let out a roar as it began to charge at him. Clearly disregarding Carter's proposal.

Carter, seeing this, raised his arm for a final strike. Unfortunately as he tried to coat his fist in haki he found his energy reserves too depleted to even create a thin coating. This was not a problem for the reincarnator as he had lucked out the year prior.

'Al, Chanel, all available armament haki.'

'Rightio partner! The voice of a spectral shadow came from his ring.

From the ring on his finger a coating of armament haki so potent it seemed to turn the covered area into a black void came over Carter's entire arm. The combined absorbed haki from a year of sparring with black arm Zephyr and the occasional drop in from Garp was undoubtedly powerful.

He raised his void-like arm and prepared to strike the beast bearing towards him. "I said-" the beast threw itself into the air towards carters gargantuan form coming mere meters from his body.

"GET-"

Just as the Rub ape came within range he threw his Haki coated Right hook.

"LOST!!!"

The first made contact. And for a moment, nothing moved. Carter could just barely sense that when he made his final shout, a burst of golden energy had flowed from his body. Black lightning and golden aura flowed through the surrounding jungle. So dense that even Zephyr sensed his haki from kilometers away on his ship.

When time started to move again, Carter's blow finalized and the ruby ape was sent flying back... completely unconscious.

As his vision blurred, Carter could just barely make out the sound of his comrades calling his name before everything fades to black.

——————-

Yo! Author here. Sorry this took so long. Preparing for finals are killing me. I'll hopefully be back to a more consistent update schedule in like 2 weeks.

Thanks.