I scrambled out of my hollowed-out base just in time to see a ship opening fire.
Fluttering in the wind was a jolly roger with a bear motif—Bear King's ship. I guess his subordinates hadn't quite learned their lesson yet.
I sighed, watching the cannonballs splash in the surf. I could use Geppo to fly over and board them, but maybe I should just blow the whole ship away from here. I did have a pile of "scavenged" swords nearby, after all.
I picked up a mass-produced katana and raised it overhead. Right. Don't break it this time. Just a gentle swing.
WHOOSH!
The blade sliced through the air with a clean whistle, but... nothing happened. No flying slash. I guess I didn't use enough speed.
WHAM!
"Seriously...?"
This time, the slash flew, but the sword shattered instantly. Worse, my aim was off, and the pirates were still merrily lobbing cannonballs at me.
I picked up the next sword. This one had a weird, curvy blade.
Swing. Slash flies. The sword breaks.
Next. Swing. No slash.
Next. Swing. Slash flies. Sword snaps.
Swing. Nothing. ... Swing. Nothing.
SWING. A massive shockwave erupts, the pirate ship is sliced perfectly in half, and the katana turns into glitter.
"One or the other, huh?!" I yelled at the sky. "The swords in this world are junk!" (Totally ignoring the fact that it was my own monstrous strength doing the breaking.)
Since the ship was now two pieces of driftwood and the crew was swimming for their lives, I decided to wait until morning to go beachcombing for supplies. I headed back to my hole.
Months Later
Fast forward a few months, and the jungle had a new king. A 2-meter-tall gorilla of a man wearing nothing but a makeshift loincloth, sprinting through the underbrush.
Actually, it was just me, Krieg, living my best life.
During my time in isolation, I'd been busy. I recovered anything useful from the shipwrecks, buried the presumed Kachi Kachi no Mi in a sturdy treasure chest, and neatly folded my Marine uniform so it wouldn't get ruined. Then, I picked fights with every apex predator on the island.
Without my armor or my five-ton mace, I focused on my senses. I refined my movements, sharpening my Observation Haki until I could literally feel the breath of the forest.
Whenever a pirate ship with a skull flag wandered too close to "my" island, I used them for target practice.
I'd test out a "Cannon Fist" or a "Flying Slash," usually resulting in a very confused, very sunken pirate ship, from which I would then "requisition" necessary supplies.
I was essentially a one-man border patrol/wildman.
Finally, a ship with a dog-shaped figurehead and a Marine flag appeared on the horizon. Seeing that familiar vessel after months of solitude, my brain finally rebooted.
"Oh... right. I'm a Marine."
The Rescue
Garp stepped onto the beach, looking at me with the expression of a man who had just found a stray dog eating a sofa.
"Brat... what in the world have you been doing for the last few months?"
He pointed to the "monuments" littered across the beach. There were mountains of broken hilts, snapped blades, and the skeletal remains of at least a dozen pirate ships.
I had even used the shipwrecks to build a massive hut, which I had—in a moment of jungle-induced madness—decorated with twenty-six different pirate flags.
"Skill refinement... and public safety activities, sir," I muttered, looking anywhere but at the pirate-flag-covered shack I'd been living in.
I had definitely overdone it. A Marine living in a house decorated with the enemy's colors? Not a great look.
Garp chuckled, though his eyes remained sharp. "The seas are getting rowdier, Krieg. It's only going to get busier from here. Bogard, do you recognize any of these flags?"
The silent man in the trench coat adjusted his hat. "Of the twenty-six flags here, five belonged to crews with active bounties: the 'Hunting Scissors,' 'Karatakia,' 'Drunken Bird,' 'Trump Pirates,' and 'Tordereete.' The Trump Pirates' captain was a confirmed Ability User."
Damn, Bogard actually memorized all of them?
"Bwahaha! Impressive," Garp barked. "Taking down an Ability User with raw strength is no small feat. I'll contact Headquarters and push for your promotion. Is there anything you want as a reward, Krieg?"
This was it. A golden opportunity.
"Vice Admiral! Please teach me the combat techniques of those who don't rely on Devil Fruits!"
I wanted to know the secrets. Garp's "Fist of Love," the sword techniques of men like Vice Admiral Momonga, who could slice Sea Kings in half—I needed to raise my ceiling. Even if I couldn't master them all, knowing how they worked was vital.
"Hoh? Just that? Fine, I'll write up a list for you later. But I can show you one of my own right now."
Garp picked up a stray cannonball from the wreckage of my "house."
"You take this... and you do THIS!"
He wound up and hurled the iron ball toward a distant hill.
BOOOOOOOM!!!!
The hilltop simply ceased to exist.
"I call it the Genkotsu Meteor (Fist Meteor). It's not just a throw, boy. There's a trick to the grip, the wind-up, and the exact millisecond you let go. Here, you try."
He handed me a fresh cannonball. I took a deep breath, visualizing the "Storm Flash" I'd used with the sword. I wound up, gave it everything I had—
"RYAAAH!"
CRUNCH!
The cannonball disintegrated in my hand before it even left my palm.
"WHY DOES THAT ALWAYS HAPPEN?!" Garp roared.
WHACK!
He punctuated his question with a fist to my head.
"I'M THE ONE WHO WANTS TO KNOW!" I yelled back, rubbing the massive lump forming on my skull.