Fever!

Late at night, the snow had stopped falling.

Above the night sky, the waning moon hung, casting endless silvery white light.

"198!...199!"

Sephiroth placed his hands on the ship's deck, executing push-ups one after another.

"200!"

As he completed the last one, he resembled a deflated rubber ball, lying on the cold deck, breathing heavily.

The silver-haired boy wasn't originally physically strong, and due to a prolonged lack of exercise, he could be considered weak.

Even with his body strengthened by the vampire devil fruit, without activating vampire transformation, it merely heightened his strength beyond that of ordinary adults.

Speaking of which, the Zoan-type Devil Fruit allowed the eater to gain the unique wildness of beasts, improving physical fitness and acquiring corresponding bestial characteristics.

Simultaneously, Zoan users underwent three stages of transformation: human form, human-beast hybrid form, and complete beast form.

The human form of the vampire devil fruit represented Sephiroth's current state.

In the human-beast form, he transformed into a vampire, with increased speed and strength, and wings that could fly grew on his back.

Regarding the beast form, the actuality was that he split his body into a group of bats, transforming into the beast form.

In that state, if most of the bats were killed, as long as he was willing to consume his vitality, he could resurrect his complete body.

Generally speaking, this was a potent life-saving ability.

In addition to maintaining eternal youth and life by absorbing the life force of others, Sephiroth also possessed the ability of rapid healing.

Before his life force was completely exhausted, it was quite challenging to completely eradicate him, except for seastones and the ocean, as long as he refrained from suicide.

As he depleted a bit of the vitality stored in his body, his fatigue, muscle damage, and other problems caused by push-ups were swiftly swept away, and he once again became a young man full of energy and motivation.

After standing up from the deck, Sephiroth wiped the sweat from his forehead and carefully assessed his situation. He couldn't help but murmur to himself:

"This ability is beneficial, but it's somewhat wasteful of life force."

"Just to recover physical strength and damage, three days of vitality were consumed."

"However, mental fatigue still exists, and it seems that quick recovery is not a panacea."

After finishing the push-ups, Sephiroth picked up the long sheathed sword leaning against the edge of the ship and drew it out with a clang sound.

Parry, slash, dodge, strike, stab, lunge, feint, sweep, block, advance, blade, guard, grip, hilt, handle, edge, pommel, pivot, retreat, stance, tip, and attack.

Each move, a basic move, was ordinary and nothing fancy.

According to Marigold, who taught him sword skills, no matter how powerful the moves were, they all evolved from the basics. Only by practicing the basics to the extreme could one lay the foundation to learn advanced skills.

Since the three girls were all qualified female warriors on Amazon Lily Island, awakening armament Haki at a young age, and becoming official members of the Kuja Pirates, Sephiroth could only choose to believe in their suggestions as a combat newbie.

Therefore, Sephiroth set himself a daily task of rapidly swinging the sword a thousand times for each move, striving to turn these moves into his instincts as soon as possible.

Initially, when he swung the sword quickly, the silver-haired boy felt in good condition.

But gradually, the long sword in his hand felt heavier, his arms more sore and weak, and even pain in the joints.

This forced him to use his lifespan to restore his physical condition and relieve fatigue, maintaining the high-speed sword swing.

Even so, it took him more than eight hours to complete the training of practicing each sword move a thousand times.

In fact, if an average person conducted ultra-high-intensity sword training, unless their hands were made of titanium alloy, within a month, their hands would undoubtedly suffer.

At the very least, to complete the sword-wielding training, Sephiroth consumed half a month of his vitality.

The silver-haired boy sheathed the long sword, wiped the sweat from his forehead, took out a silver pocket watch from his pocket, and checked the time.

Early in the morning, four thirty-six.

He and Hancock had agreed that the shift change time was four o'clock in the morning, and it was now thirty-six minutes later, but she had not yet come out.

Sephiroth sighed helplessly and had no choice but to walk off the deck and enter the cabin, preparing to wake up the black-haired girl.

After some high-intensity training, although his physical condition was not bad, he was mentally exhausted.

Now, he just wanted to take a good bath, go to bed, and fall asleep.

In the corridor of the cabin, Sephiroth, holding a kerosene lamp in his left hand, stood at the door of the captain's bedroom, raised his hand, knocked lightly on the door, but received no response from inside.

The silver-haired boy reached out, pushed open the agar wooden door, and found Hancock still lying on the bed covered with a quilt. Her eyes were closed, as if she was still sleeping.

"Hancock, wake up! It's your turn to keep vigil."

The young man stretched out his hand to push the long-straight-black-haired girl across the quilt. She immediately responded vaguely in a weak tone:

"Good…."

"Um?"

After Sephiroth noticed something was wrong with the girl's tone, he subconsciously reached out and touched her forehead.

However, the next second, he remembered that he had just finished exercising, and his body temperature was high, providing no reference at all.

So, he stretched out his right hand, got under the quilt, picked up Hancock's hand, and checked the pulse.

"You actually have a fever...didn't you say that you've never been sick?"

The silver-haired boy looked at the girl lying on the bed with a speechless expression.

He thought that she was not only wet from the rain but also wore wet clothes for half a day.

If she doesn't catch a cold doing this, that would be outrageous!

Hancock supported her upper body with her right hand and said weakly:

"Sorry, I overslept. I will go to the deck to keep vigil now..."

"When you are sick, take a good rest and forget about anything else. I will talk to Sandersonia and Marigold about it..."

As he spoke, the silver-haired boy pushed Hancock back onto the bed and wrapped her in the quilt.

There was a first aid kit on the desk in the bedroom. Sephiroth opened the kit and looked at the contents under the light of the kerosene lamp. Gauze, alcohol, anti-inflammatories, needles and threads, and anesthetics were all medical supplies for treating injuries. But there were no medicines for colds and fevers.

Seeing this situation, Sephiroth couldn't help but curse:

"What foolish people!"

Don't those people worry about getting sick if they don't prepare enough common medicines when sailing on the sea...?

The silver-haired boy picked up the anti-inflammatory medicine in the box and took a look at it, frowning slightly.

Anti-inflammatory drugs are effective for fever symptoms caused by inflammation, but Boa Hancock's fever was caused by a cold, and bacterial infection cannot be ruled out due to the injury on her forehead.

He thought for a while and poured out an anti-inflammatory medicine, ready to give it to the girl with long black hair.

Without symptomatic drugs, it would be impossible to prepare saline solution and give her an infusion without the equipment, right?

Water!

By the way, how could he forget this!

With this in mind, Sephiroth walked to the kitchen, lit the gas stove, and boiled a pot of hot water with a kettle.

If there is no suitable medicine, sometimes a pot of hot water is also a good choice.

After the hot water boiled, Sephiroth walked into the captain's cabin again with hot water in the kettle, came to Hancock's side, poured a cup of hot water in front of her bedside table, and put the anti-inflammatory medicine next to it.

"You have a fever; you will sweat a lot and need to drink more hot water! This way you can get better faster."

"Um!"

Boa Hancock got up from the bed in a daze, slowly drank the hot water, and swallowed the anti-inflammatory medicine.

Finally, Sephiroth brought a quilt from another cabin and covered her. He wanted her to have a good rest and get better quickly.