Chapter 38

"That's the intruder!"

"Get him!"

The soldiers that spotted Ace just casually walking along the hallways of the main building of Espa's military garrison didn't even get close to him. Ace still had the dense fireball in his hand.

With a casual throw, the fireball Ace was playing with flew towards the soldiers. Even when they were wearing steel plate armor, the fireball easily melted through it and their bodies.

Ace was masterfully controlling the fireball. Having full control over your Devil Fruit powers is a step towards attaining mastery over it, and inevitably, its Awakening. Ace was confident that his mind and body was strong enough for an awakening. It was only his control over his Devil Fruit power that is lacking.

Once he had full grasp of his fruit's potential, Ace was confident that he would awaken his Flare-Flare Fruit. He was curious to know what the Awakening of his fruit would specifically be.

Again, Ace left one soldier alive. He walked up to him. The soldier fell on his butt in fright at seeing Ace's power.

"D-D-Demon! You're a demon!" the soldier screamed at Ace as he pointed at him.

"I guess you don't read the paper much, huh?" Ace chuckled before questioning the soldier. "Where's your commander's office?"

"I… I'll never tell you!"

With a shout of indignation, the soldier gathered all his courage and shot Ace in the face with the rifle in his hand. Of course, Ace easily dodged it by manipulating his form and creating an opening where the bullet would hit him.

"Hey, I was only asking a question."

"Step back, you!"

The soldier fired again and again. Ace dodged again and again the same way he did the first time. Eventually, the soldier ran out of bullets.

"Great, you're out of bullets. Now do you wanna talk?"

"There he is!"

Another set of soldiers spotted Ace. He looked at them before turning back to the previous guard with a devilish grin.

"Great. Maybe I could ask them instead."

Ace melted the guard's head off with the fireball he was playing with in his hands. He wanted to go wild and burn down the building so much, but Ace held himself back. The money could be caught in his flames and burn which would be a shame, really.

'Wait, I'm stupid! I could just use Observation Haki!'

Ace threw the fireball in his hand and killed the newly arrived guards. Every single one of them. They would only distract him. Ace then reached out with his senses to try and see where the commander was.

With his Observation Haki, Ace's vision spread out and covered the whole building. There, on the top floor, was a rather big and lavish room. There were a dozen men who were facing a man sitting on his chair. That man felt angry. He also felt the most powerful.

'Bingo! That must be the commander!'

Even after spotting the commander, Ace didn't stop using his Haki. He tried peering through the walls. That was where vaults were usually kept in offices. In the end, he found it as well. The commander's personal vault was behind an oil painting of himself.

'Talk about loving yourself.'

Ace ran through the corridors and up the stairs with the fireball in his hand. After killing two more sets of soldiers, he noticed the fireball get weaker. So, when the next set of soldiers came, Ace threw the fireball at them and made it explode.

The fireball's explosion created more flames than it originally had. Ace called out to the flames and condensed it into a fireball once more. Then he realized something.

Not all the flames came from his power. Some flames were the result of something burning after touching the flame that he made. In the past, Ace couldn't fully command flames that he himself didn't create.

"I'm getting better! HAHAHAHA! Let's go!"

Ace kicked down a door to a room out of delight. Then, he threw the fireball in his hands inside the room and made it explode. The whole room caught fire as a result.

With two hands outstretched, Ace called to the flames in front of him. The flames obeyed. The fire engulfing the room immediately condensed in Ace's hands, making two fireballs of equal heat and power as the same one he threw just now.

Then, Ace breathed deeply. He pushed the fireballs in his hands together, condensing them even further into one fireball.

"Come on, come on! Obey me!"

Ace felt the flames in his hands fight back. That, or he's not good enough to control flames as powerful as the ones in his hands. Originally, the flames of his Devil Fruit power were yellowish in color like the fire in a candle.

Now, Ace's flames had more of an orange tint like that of a campfire's. The fireball Ace was trying to condense right now had a slightly deeper hue than that. The heat coming off it was strong enough for even Ace, a fire human, to feel it.

Ace persisted and kept condensing the ball of fire even smaller. He succeeded, but holding its shape was proving to be rather difficult. The fireball was currently as small as his fingertip. The effort Ace was exerting to maintain its small shape was akin to a heavy workout. He was sweating heavily.

"Okay, this is good. This is like a workout. Workout builds strength. Doing this should make my Devil Fruit stronger, I think…"

With the fireball on the tip of his forefinger, Ace continued on his way to the room he saw with his Observation Haki. He ascended a step of stairs and came face to face with two squads of soldiers rushing to where he was last spotted.

"Fire Lord's Beam!"

Ace quickly thought up a new move using the fireball on his fingertip. He pointed at the soldiers. From the small fireball on his fingertip, a small beam of fire that was condensed enough to look like a laser shot at the soldiers. It pierced through a head as well as another soldier behind him.

Looking at the result of his new move, Ace grinned. Holding the flames together and condensing them into a small ball created a great pressure within it. Ace's effort to hold the shape was just him trying to hold that pressure.

Easing his control for a brief moment on the outer cap of the sphere where his enemies were at would obviously be a path for the flames to escape. With the great pressure and heat it possessed, the flames that would escape would shoot out at an incredible speed. Ace was glad his idea didn't blow up in his face.

Using the same move, Ace took out all the soldiers in front of him. He figured out how to control it better. By the end of it, Ace grasped the timing. If he wants his beam to penetrate through two or more soldiers, he can do it. If he wants his beam to just stop at one soldier, he can do it.

Ace proceeded on his way. He was already at the floor where the room he saw was at. He quickly recognized which room it was through the look of the doors, and barged in. What greeted him were the same men he saw earlier with his Haki.

"It's you!"

"You're Fire Lord Ace!"

"The son of the King of Pirates!"

Ace was glad someone finally recognized him from the little stunt he did at Loguetown. So, he decided to treat the men in front of him with respect first. After that, it'll be their choice…

"The one and only!" Ace put a hand on his hat and tipped it downwards in greeting. "It's nice to meet you, gentlemen!"

"Commander, he ate a Devil Fruit! He's an untouchable demon!"

"I know. How else could he have just walked up to where we are?" The commander stepped out and faced Ace, his closest subordinates behind him. "What do you want, pirate?"

"Two things, really. One, the password of your vault behind that painting of yours." Ace jutted his chin out at the oil painting of the commander where the vault was hidden behind. "Second, I was wondering if you have an Eternal Pose to your kingdom. Espa, was it?"

"How'd you even-?" The commander was first surprised that Ace knew where his vault was when not even one soldier in the garrison knew it. Then, he quickly focused after registering Ace's second demand. "What do you want with our kingdom?"

"For one, I absolutely love adventures!" Ace chuckled. He wasn't lying. "It's also because I wanna see just how great of a kingdom yours truly is. You've been bragging about it to the locals, I heard! It must be a nice one!"

"Espa has no place for you, filthy pirate!" The commander drew his sword from its sheath. His subordinates followed his example.

"Tell me, commander," Ace said, his eyes shadowed by the brim of his hat. Only his devilish grin was there to be seen. "You stand in front of your subordinates. You don't want them to die, do you?"

The men in front of Ace gulped. They tentatively took slow steps forward. Seeing them do that only made Ace grin wider. He threw the fireball on his finger. It arced around the room and exploded at the side of the commander and his subordinates, throwing them to the other side of the room.

The fireball's explosion unleashed hot flames that quickly engulfed the room. The commander and half of his subordinates were still alive, albeit injured by the fire and the hot air released by the explosion.

"N-No!"

The commander saw the fate that befell half of his closest subordinates. There were six charred bodies on the floor in front of Ace. The commander and his remaining men looked back at Ace who was still sporting a grin.

Ace called to the flames. The flames obeyed their master and gathered in Ace's outstretched hand. Again, the flames slowly turned into a harmless looking little fireball. Ace was slowly getting the hang of handling his flames.

The men in front of Ace looked around at the room. The fire came and went, but the damage they did was left behind. The wooden furniture were charred as black as the six corpses on Ace's feet. Smoldering ashes gathered on the floor.

"If you don't want this to happen to your remaining men," Ace said, gesturing at the corpses. "Tell me the password."

The commander and his subordinates looked at each other and resolutely nodded.

"Go to hell, demon!"

They all charged at Ace with reckless abandon. It was clear they knew they were about to die. The expressions on their faces weren't of warriors. They were just weak men resigning to their fate.

"So be it."

Ace threw the fireball on his finger again. It exploded in front of the dying men, instantly killing them. The flames engulfed the room, and Ace called them back. He then looked at the little fireball on his finger.

'I wonder… can I really not absorb flames?'

From what Ace knew about the Flare-Flare Fruit, it gave its eater the ability to create, control, and transform into fire at will. It didn't say anything about absorbing fire. But then again, the strength and limits of a Devil Fruit depends on the user.

'Crocodile managed to dehydrate the ground around him by placing his hand on it. That doesn't sound like sand at all. It doesn't make any sense. Which means, Devil Fruits have some sense of… freedom.'

Ace looked at the fireball on his finger resolutely. He was now certain that he should be able to absorb flames somehow.

'The question is… how do I absorb you?'

Ace tried calling the fireball to go back to his body, but it didn't work. Ace tried spreading it out to surround his body for him to absorb, but it didn't work.

Finally, Ace decided to do something that sounded crazy. But, he figured that compared to the things he'll be able to see in the world, what he's thinking wasn't that crazy in comparison.

'Can I… eat fire?'