"Enliven: Homunculus!"
Cross closed his eyes, his voice deep and powerful. His entire body suddenly emitted a shimmering emerald green light, instantly bathing the entire office in a vibrant, natural green.
The color of life!
At this moment, countless emerald green light particles emanated from his body, like dandelions, but they all converged into the shadow beneath him.
Immediately, the mysterious power of the Devil Fruit took effect. The dark shadow seemed to come alive, writhing on the ground like a fish, sometimes losing its human shape, then returning to it.
"Heavens! A ghost!!!"
"Meow! Meow!"
Inside a sturdy cat cage, a small, adorable black cat suddenly arched its back, fur bristling, letting out sharp, terrified shrieks.
"Shut up, Bastet!" Cross turned his head, shot a displeased glance at the little black cat that could speak human words, and sternly rebuked it. At the same time, the emerald green glow emanating from him gradually dimmed.
Fortunately, the Marine Headquarters offices were very soundproof; otherwise, people outside might think he had some sadistic tendencies.
Cats are so cute, who could bear to abuse them!
Bastet abruptly stood on its hind legs, its pair of emerald green, amber vertical pupils wide with fright. Its two front paws covered its mouth in a very human-like gesture, not daring to make another sound.
Pop!
Suddenly, the soft sound of a popping bubble.
The twisting shadow in front of Cross actually stood up from the ground, utterly opaque and pitch black, yet possessing human-like facial features. It rapidly swelled up as if inflated, transforming from a two-dimensional plane into a three-dimensional form.
It was almost like… the Shadow Man from Detective Conan, or like the Doppelman created by Gecko Moria from his own shadow.
However, this Shadow Man looked identical to Cross, or more precisely, it was Cross's own shadow.
"It succeeded?!" Cross looked at the completely black shadow, almost identical to himself, and couldn't help but reveal a pleasantly surprised smile.
He had holed himself up in his office for several months. Apart from necessary missions, he barely stepped out, even having the mess hall cook deliver his three meals a day. Because of this, he had racked up quite a few "delivery fees."
But these months had not been in vain. He had successfully used the Live-Live Fruit's ability to imbue his own shadow with life, transforming it into a unique life form that was both dependent on him and capable of independent existence.
Cross's smile remained as he circled this "Shadow Man" twice, carefully scrutinizing it. Then, he suddenly said with a touch of dissatisfaction, "My shadow's appearance doesn't seem to have any unique characteristics… Let's change the look!"
With that, Cross gazed intently at this "Shadow Man," using his own consciousness to replace its consciousness, controlling its body to change form.
The next moment, this "Shadow Man," whose appearance resembled Cross, immediately began to deform, twisting like some kind of black liquid. Soon, it transformed into a female "Shadow Man" with an oval face, a voluptuous figure, and long hair.
Or, to put it another way, a gender-bent Cross???
Pah—how could that be!
Even if I, Cross, were beaten to death and jumped off the roof of the Marine Headquarters fortress, I would never be gender-bent!
"Excellent. From now on, you are my first Apostle, named—Scáthach!" Cross nodded in satisfaction, bestowing a legendary name upon it.
Just imagine, his shadow, trailing him everywhere, was a female figure. How startling and memorable would that be?
Unconventional!
Unique!
At this moment, Scáthach knelt silently on one knee, adopting a posture of submission.
"Hahaha—" Cross chuckled with delight, then revealed a mischievous grin, shifting his gaze to Bastet.
"Meow—"
From its beastly instincts, Bastet instinctively sensed a malicious intent in Cross's gaze. It immediately glared at Cross with wary eyes, adopting a bristling, "I'm fierce" stance.
Cross smiled, completely unfazed. He then pointed at Bastet and directly commanded, "Scáthach, grab that black cat for me!"
Scáthach didn't hesitate, immediately turning and walking towards Bastet's cage.
"Two-legged beast, what do you want to do? Meow—EE!" Bastet's face drained of color. Its emerald green, amber vertical pupils spun rapidly as it shrieked in terror, "Don't let it come near! Meow~ Someone's killing a cat! Quick, save the cat! Meow—"
The next moment, amidst Bastet's terrified screams, the unhearing Scáthach reached the cage and directly grabbed towards Bastet, its hand passing through the steel bars as if phantom-like.
"Don't come near me! Meow—!"
Bastet was terrified, its sharp claws extended from its front paws, flailing wildly in front of it, moving so fast they left afterimages.
However, Scáthach's hand passed through Bastet's wildly flailing front paws, passed through Bastet's body… and grabbed nothing!
"Meow meow meow??"
Bastet watched wide-eyed as the shadow monster's hand entered its body, yet it felt no sensation whatsoever. It instinctively stopped flailing its front paws and started frantically touching itself all over its body in terror.
Then the little cat realized that nothing seemed to be wrong with it!
Scáthach withdrew its hand, staring blankly at its empty palm.
At this moment, Cross was also dumbfounded.
'What just happened?'
'Could it be that even after his shadow came to life, it was still a phantom shadow?'
Cross quickly walked forward, disbelieving, and reached out to touch Scáthach's body, but his hand passed straight through it as if touching air.
Next, he coated his right hand in Armament Haki, but still couldn't touch Scáthach's body.
Finally, he used the Live-Live Fruit's ability and genuinely touched Scáthach's shadowy body.
At this point, Cross understood.
A shadow was a shadow; even after being given life, it remained a shadow.
Because its true form was a shadow, it naturally had no physical substance. It was like a blob of shadow; no matter what, it couldn't touch others, and naturally, it couldn't be touched by others.
It was similar to Sun Prometheus, one of Charlotte Linlin's three high-level Homies. Its essence was fire; it could burn others, but it was difficult to harm with attacks other than water, even with Armament Haki.
A fist couldn't kill fire.
Unless you could, like Saitama, throw a punch that generated a storm powerful enough to extinguish Sun Prometheus, who was a life form of fire, only then would it be possible to kill it.
And Scáthach was the same, only harder to kill. But precisely because of this, it completely lacked a physical form, so it couldn't be attacked, and it also seemed unable to attack others.
Unless Scáthach possessed an ability similar to the Paramecia-type Shadow-Shadow Fruit, which could solidify shadows… otherwise, it had absolutely no combat capability!
At most, it could serve as a scout, like a 'Shadow Fiend'?!
After realizing this, Cross was instantly dumbfounded. 'So, all that effort I put in, painstakingly creating a high-level animated creature, resulted in something utterly useless!'
'No wonder, no wonder it hadn't uttered a single word in the several minutes since its birth.'
'What could a blob of shadow possibly say?!'
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Scáthach: a hero from Irish mythology, a warrior from the Ulster Cycle. She resides in the Land of Shadows, one of the Celtic Otherworlds, and is considered the queen of the underworld who receives the dead and departed souls. She is also known as 'The Shadow' and 'The Beautiful Warrior,' a famous god-level slayer of gods, a queen who entered the divine realm in human form!
Homunculus: refers to artificial life created by European alchemists, and also to the work of creating such artificial life itself.
Apostle: generally refers to the 12 disciples originally chosen and given a missionary mission by Jesus Christ, derived from the Greek word Apostolos, meaning 'one who is sent.' However, here it refers to the unknown life forms from Neon Genesis Evangelion!
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