The next day.
Lister woke early.
After five hundred practice swings, he enjoyed a hearty breakfast Michelin had prepared with care.
He then introduced Nami to all his men and warned them that when he wasn't around, they were to obey her.
After helping Nami establish authority, he returned alone to the captain's cabin to begin experiments.
First on the list was accelerated healing.
He drew a slow line across his fingertip with a dagger. Blood quickly welled from the cut. At that moment Lister focused the Quick-Quick Fruit's power on the wound to speed it up.
Pssht—
What had been a silent trickle became a spray under acceleration.
Seeing it, Lister's face went pale. He immediately canceled the fruit's boost.
"No. That's not it. I was too shallow. I only sped up the surface of the wound. I need to push the acceleration deeper into the cellular tissue…"
By noon, Lister shoved open the cabin door, white as a sheet.
"Bring me meat!" he barked.
The shout reached every ear. Michelin snapped orders and set everyone moving. Before long, ten platters of meat, five jin each, were delivered to the captain's room.
Lister grabbed skewers and wolfed them down. Then inspiration struck.
"Speeding up self-healing is hard right now. But after a morning of testing, I understand the fruit's acceleration better. If I apply it to my stomach and intestines, can I speed up digestion?"
He tried it at once.
Focusing the Quick-Quick Fruit on his gut, he clearly felt his stomach and intestines race into motion. The meat he had just eaten seemed to vanish. A fierce hunger hit him. He seized more skewers and tore into them. The more he ate, the stronger he felt.
Where before he could manage at most five jin, he cleared all ten platters—fifty jin in total.
A wave of satisfaction washed over him. Color returned to his cheeks. His energy surged.
He opened Goldfinger to check his stats.
[Host: Lister]
[Physique: 2.3]
[Spirit: 1.2]
[Midas Index: 0]
"Strange. I feel stronger than before, but the numbers haven't moved. Didn't I eat enough?"
He had them bring ten more platters.
He ate while accelerating digestion. After finishing the second round, he felt stronger again. He checked Goldfinger.
[Host: Lister]
[Physique: 2.3]
[Spirit: 1.2]
[Midas Index: 0]
"No change?" He frowned.
"Maybe because it's too soon. The food restored my spirit to a peak state, but strengthening the body needs more time."
"That's it. Accelerated digestion helps, and meat can build the body, but it takes steady accumulation."
"Also, speeding up the gut burns some stamina. I just didn't notice because I was eating nonstop and the meat kept topping it up. So each portion's energy actually absorbed is only seventy to eighty percent. You can't bulk up in a short time by eating alone."
"Even so, this is no small gain."
He had aimed for accelerated healing and instead discovered hyper-digestion. Plant the flower and it won't bloom; stick a willow and it grows into shade. With one successful case, he felt more confident about developing hyper-healing and even hyper-thought.
Time flew; three days passed.
In those three days, Lister was rigorously disciplined. Every morning he rose before the crew, finished three hundred practice swings, ate Michelin's careful breakfast, then returned to the captain's cabin to experiment.
Now, once again, he opened a cut on his finger. As the blood welled, he directed the Quick-Quick Fruit into the regenerative cells at the wound.
The fresh cut began to seal at speed.
"I did it?"
"Haha, I did it!"
Hyper-healing was crucial for what came next, especially for developing hyper-thought. He didn't know what would happen when he pushed the fruit's power into the brain's thought processes. Hyper-healing would be the final safeguard, the thing that could keep him alive if something went wrong. Hyper-thought was the ability he valued most: with it, he could craft the strongest techniques in the shortest time and become truly powerful.
With hyper-healing achieved, he was already halfway down the road to success. No wonder he was so happy.