Chapter forty four- Gabriel Vs Buggs bunny trio

A second before his fist hit Gabriel had to withdraw as he felt his vibration sense warn him about the other two Lapahns coming at him, he disappeared with a burst of Soru and had to use it again and again as the Lapahn's kept up with him as he began to retreat, he didn't dare stop as he had seen how powerful their claws were when he dodged beside on of the trees only for it to be crushed beneath on of their huge paws.

The dodging went on for ten minutes straight as Gabriel couldn't seem to find an opening to launch a counter attack while he was dodging, the three of them keeping him on his toes at all times, every time one attacked giving him an opening one of the others attacked him to keep him from taking advantage of the opening.

'damn annoying fuzzballs' Gabriel growled mentally as he rolled off to the side to avoid another trio of attacks, 'to hell with this' he growled again as he launched himself at them phasing as he went, the first lashed out at him but he passed through the attack and then continued on through the large mass of fur and muscle and came out the other side with his fist drawn back, "Shatter fist!" he yelled as he rammed his shaking fist into the second Lapahn's gut.

The Lapahn had tried to tense up before the attack hit but it proved to be useless as Gabriel's fist hit home, the impact originally of Gabriel's shatter fist was that of his regular punch multiplied all on the one spot, and since his increase in strength after his latest burst of points the impact of his attack has increased greatly, the result… The Lapahn's eyes bulged as its defences were torn apart as the fist continued forward and its massive body doubled over from the impact before it was launched backwards like a missile and hit the trunk of the great tree like a dart, slamming into it with its arms outstretched and its eyes rolled back to the top of its head.

The attack made the other two Lapahn's pause to stare at the sight of one of their number being blasted back by one so small, given they stood a good twenty feet tall and Gabriel barely came up to their stomachs their reaction was understandable.

Gabriel smirked as he saw how strong his attack had become and looked to the other two alphas, "so who's next?"

That seemed to enrage the pair of them as they lunged at him with speed, but Gabriel was ready using Soru to dodge and keep dodging as they came at him, it was nowhere near as challenging as before with only the two of them and they left far more openings with only two of them, Gabriel capitalised on them as he lashed out with his staff when an opening was there longer than a few seconds, putting the Lapahn's on the defensive a few times as he countered their assaults with his own.

If anyone from outside was watching the fight they would just see bursts of snow and clashes of impacts as the three blurs did battle in the clearing and in the air above it utilising the entire terrain to their advantage.

The regular Lapahn's watching on were cowering around the outsides of the clearing and in the burrow under the tree, they knew better than to get involved in a fight of this calibre, their instincts were screaming at them that this was a fight between alphas and all of them knew they weren't strong enough to match their levels of strength.

Another twenty minutes passed as the fighting continued as the blurs shot through the air above the clearing before a yell sounded out in the frigid air, "Shatter fist!"

Gabriel had begun to tire the huge rabbits out and made an opening where he could get in close to deliver his attack, the next second one of the two Lapahn alpha's was shot out of the air like a canon ball from a canon and hit the ground with a great thud of impact, the snow doing nothing to soften its landing as snow was shook free from the trees surrounding the clearing from the shockwave that the impact had caused.

The final Lapahn incensed by the defeat of its brothers came at Gabriel with a vengeance ready to cleave his head off, but Gabriel ducked in mid air spinning around he thrust both his legs up at the Laphan's jaw as he channelled his devil fruit powers into his legs, "Shatter Spear!" he yelled as the attack landed.

But Gabriel had miscalculated a part of his actions, forgetting that every action had an equal and opposite reaction, and that focusing all that energy to attack up at the Laphan meant that that same amount of energy would be transferred down to him as well, so when the Alpha was launched up into the air from his kick, Gabriel was launched the other way.

Luckly the attack had been at an angle and instead of hitting the ground straight down Gabriel hid the ground and skidded back through the snow cutting a furrow through it coming to a stop just shy of the outskirts of the clearing.

The final Alpha Lapahn landed with a thud at the other side of the clearing in front of the burrow under the great evergreen unmoving after having its brain rattled by the double kick to its jaw.

Gabriel for his part groaned as he got up rubbing his shoulders which had taken most of the impact as he slowly stood up, 'fuck I hate physics' he mentally groaned as he began to walk forward once again heading towards the great tree.

The regular Lapahn's coward as he neared them but much to their surprise, he didn't touch them and simply passed by them as he continued down into the burrow. The burrow went far deeper under ground than he suspected, very deep in fact.

Gabriel had to swint to see for a few minutes as he went deeper inside, and his vision started to adjust once more before it suddenly began to grow brighter once again. Looking around Gabriel saw crystals on the walls that seemed to be glowing.

Walking over he touched them and discovered they weren't crystals but shards of ice, he chipped away at the wall and found that the ice continued up through the walls, if he had to guess they went all the way up to the surface and it was the light from the surface that was trickling down through the ice, it was extremely strange to see.

Using the light filtering through the ice as a way to see Gabriel continued forward and down the burrow until he came to a dead end and frowned, according to his mini map the fruit was right in front of him. Looking around all he could see was large chunks of ice.

Going to the largest one he looked closer at it and blinked, he could make out a shape inside it and grinned, 'Bingo' he thought to himself as he drew back his fist and channelled his devil fruit powers before bringing it forward to shatter the ice and with a loud crunch the ice shattered revealing the shape within to be exactly what he expected, a devil fruit.

It was in the shape of a pear, blue with silver swirls and black lining. Gabriel smiled as he reached for it and pulled it free from the ice holding it in his hand, it was freezing cold, the air around it seemed to shimmer and he knew then that it wasn't due to the cold climate, it was the fruit itself.

"let's see just what you are," Gabriel mused as he opened his inventory and put it inside before tapping on it's icon to bring up the name of the fruit.

"Fuyu-Fuyu no mi" Gabriel muttered as he tried to think for a moment before it clicked with him, "the winter-winter fruit, is this a logia type" he muttered before bringing up the description of the fruit before sighing when he read the typing, no only a paramecia type.

"damn, oh well still a reasonably powerful fruit" he muttered looking over the details of the fruit, "damn had I gotten this fruit first it would have definitely been my first choice for a devil fruit, temperature control, weather control, ice powers, this would be a huge step up in terms of power" he sighed regretting his choice to eat the first devil fruit he came across.

"well I do have the option for that system update to eat a second devil fruit," he muttered before shaking his head, "Na, I had better master my first devil fruit before I take on a second one, I'll keep this as a possibility" he said before turning to leave the burrow.

As he came out of the burrow once again he paused in his steps to see all of the Lapahns from before standing in front of him, with the three alphas between them, he tensed ready to fight again but froze when he saw the three Alpha's bow down to him and he blinked when the others followed their example.

'great, they see me as their leader' he shook his head and walked forward again, "relax, I'm was only looking for a fight, not any more, I got what I wanted, go about your business" he told them and continued walking heading past them as they rose and watched him go.

As he left he heard the familiar bell chime in his head and smirked, 'wild beasts will always respect the strong, guess that means they respect me now,' he mused and brought up the quest screen.

Hidden Quest Completed: Lapahn: Friend or Enemy

Goals:

Option1: Defeat and befriend 50 Lapahn (completed)

Option2: Kill 50 Lapahn (NA)

Reward: Zoan Devil fruit (Usagi- Usagi no mi), 1 Gold raffle token

Gabriel paused in his steps again as he saw he had gotten a devil fruit as a reward and laughed shaking his head, 'Usagi… well apparently I have an ironic thinking System, the Zoan type Rabbit devil fruit for beating a bunch of Lapahns' he thought to himself before he continued on.

The devil fruit wasn't really much use to him, nor anyone on his crew at present but a devil fruit was a devil fruit, if he didn't find someone who he thinks would fit it he could always sell it on for some cash or trade it for something else. Speaking of which he now had two Golden Raffle tokens to use and happily used them to see what he would get.

A few second later his reward screens came up and he stopped stock still when he saw the screens a grin threatening to split his face when he saw what he got.

Congratulations you have won 7 Gold AP tokens from the Gold raffle

Congratulations you have won 1 Logia devil fruit from the Gold raffle

Talk about a score, the best level AP tokens that raffle could give and a Logia class devil fruit on top of that, this had to be his best spin yet.

Going into his inventory he looked for the devil fruit and wasn't disappointed in what he saw.

The devil fruit was the Kumo-Kumo no mi, the cloud-cloud devil fruit, a more versatile version of the devil fruit that Smoker had. Well it wasn't the most powerful type Logia he could have gotten but a Logia was still a Logia, in the right hands it would make anyone powerful, though he didn't think any of his current crew could use it and with his current skills it wasn't all that useful to him.

Well today had certainly proved to be a very profitable day, three devil fruits wasn't bad for a day's work

'well time to get back, Luffy should have taken care of that fatso by now' Gabriel thought to himself before crouching down and shooting himself up into the air and began to ascend the Drum Rockies once again.