Shadow left the VERY noisy room.
Things had been going great for a while, for the last few… Weeks? Months?
However long it had taken to earn 3,228 gumballs and 1,338 lollipops, plus the various odd Snacks and Candy tips.
Shadow had helped out around the Candy Shop, Gem had taught the White Lady how to call out to their siblings on Earth and Soul Society and Hueco Mundo and some really hot location and… A few other places?
One that had felt very confused and lonely and empty, which nearly jumped for joy when called by the Masked and had flooded the Darkness with odd Blank Souls that happily floated through the forest and chimed in the Light.
Anyway, those guys were doing great. Some of the Masked had started growing odd spirit energy crops in the roots of the White Lady which were like her solidified love, and did amazing stuff for the Souls that wandered there that were able to feel hunger.
Other Masked had begun opening stalls trading stuff they crafted or formed using their energy and powers, or had organized plays and choirs and puppet shows and things.
And of course, the endless number of battle crazy Hollows continued to stalk the Forest of Bone for more siblings to save, so they were happy like a big ball of clams.
Locally, things had been going pretty good too… Until recently.
Ichigo's human-Quincy form had fully healed and then began to refine his mortal body into something like a spirit particle weapon. Anything without supernatural power couldn't even tickle the kid now, hitting him with a truck might bounce him down the street but he wouldn't even scrape a knee.
It had allowed him to begin having 'Spars', or 'Basically Battles To The Death', with his Spirit Form for the last few weeks… And both halves of his personality had relished the chance with a passion.
Sure, the adults also kicked their shit in a lot or tried to force knowledge into their skulls, but while the Quincy half easily absorbed the various spells and chants and such, his Spirit Form found out fairly quickly that Shinigami magic relied on precision, focus, and calm dedication.
Passion actively caused the energy to explode.
So uh… Half his existence was rapidly becoming a prodigy at magic, while the other half was rapidly becoming an accidental suicide bomber.
That said, in actual combat or when fighting a war of attrition… Well, the Spirit Form was dominating hands down. He could literally WILL himself to fight harder, longer, to live despite impossible injuries…
And while the Mortal Form could now easily control energy of all types with growing levels of skill, his Spirit Form had found that he could rapidly shift and manufacture solid bone like constructs.
Armor, weapons, tools… Even an awesome mask that helped him better synchronize with his emotions to a much deeper degree, even if it made his pink eyes glow much brighter.
Sure, they both ran their mouths and insulted each other like they were mortal enemies half the time… But with each half focused on their own strengths, their gains had been astounding.
Now when Ichigo reunited, his powerfully reinforced body actually managed to contain his own energy generation. Mostly.
His body might look sculpted by the gods, his muscles able to lift a car accidentally, his skin unable to burn or tear or become irritated… But as far as power was concerned, Ichigo only gave off an air of command, of restrained power.
Not the endless screams of battle and the titanium will to dominate.
It was a vast improvement! And combining raw power generation with astounding energy control, he certainly wasn't a push over even if the crazy old people surrounding him still trounced him like a child during his training sessions.
If anything, the teachers themselves were becoming a bit concerned that it actually required some level of effort to punt the boy around these days.
No, the recent problems were due to Tatsuki.
Ichigo had frantically ran into the Candy Shop carrying the girl, who was also freaking out a bit, because she had suddenly shifted into some sort of sexy half dragon lady with glowing spirit flames coating her intangible crown of horns.
It uh.
It had caused a commotion.
Shadow was trying to stay out of it.
Apparently, and again, he wasn't getting involved in this shit, there is a big difference from 'Hanging out with Ichigo and being exposed to his excess spiritual energy' to 'Frantic night encounters with the man for weeks while he dramatically enhances his own powers'. And they helped the shocked girl learn how to shift into something more human shaped while maybe accidentally stumbling into how to theoretically go full dragon and...
Yeah, Tatsuki's situation only distracted the group for so long.
After that, they had to discuss the cause of all this... Something about being 'heavily dosed' with Ichigo's 'spiritual energy', and yes he had used protection, but those weren't spiritual condoms or anything, and while pregnancy wasn't an issue (THAT had caused both kids to freak out), there may have been some Soul mingling and…
Point is, Shadow was going to not get involved.
The other room was already full of embarrassment, rants, frantic denials, fast MORE frantic COUNTER denials, bystanders chiming in, sisters awkwardly giving approval/pretending they were deaf, and so on and so forth.
Isshin himself, as the father, was bouncing between 'Ecstatic declarations to the Heavens and his wife' and being 'Pounded into the floor' by his blazing red faced son. Two of them, one efficiently and solemnly kicking ass while the other one cursed up a storm and interrupted himself mid combat to constantly apologize to Yuzu for his language.
Point is, it felt like a family moment.
Apparently, it had almost been a LITERAL family moment, but again: Shadow wasn't going to get involved.
Whatever a supernaturally gifted young man or pair of young man did with his enthusiastic girlfriend and an attractive Death Reaper part time cat-lady, that was up to them.
Though Shadow wasn't sure they were surprised, after a few weeks of doing that eventually SOME consequences would pop up. Right?
Again, not his problem.
Well… Half not his problem.
Shadow stood next to himself, one remaining his Luchador half Alien Irish Mexican self with festive pink bone pants, decorative pink chains, and colorful mask… The other just a normal Heartless.
He waved himself off, while Shadow grumbled his own hand signs back to his lucky half.
They both had benefits from this.
One got a steady Candy supply and could hang out with all these new friends…
While he himself got to escape this hormone chaos.
There were more important things to life than sexy threesomes and spewing spiritual energy until your hot girlfriend becomes a dragon!
Like Candy!
And Snacks!
And as a man with a plan, Shadow had a GOAL this time!
See, he had been doing this all wrong the whole time. Looking for food? Meh, hit or miss. Searching for familiar senses or Snacks? Could go great or just be some asshole!
No, the issue is he needed to know his target.
To understand his goal! To be one with its inner workings, to immerse himself in its mind!
To BECOME the Snack!
This time, Shadow was going to find the path to munchies the best mostest logical way: By BECOMING a munchie!
It was brilliant!
Gem pulsed a sigh, but she would see how smart this was.
They would ALL see!
Shadow Consumed
Inwards…
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
Shadow… Uh. Woke up? Sort of.
Uh… Right.
This was confusing.
First of all, he wasn't Candy, which… Well, honestly a bit disappointing. But he WAS a Snack, so that was something.
Unlike his previous forms however, this one was… Very stationary.
No limbs, no innate abilities of communication, no ability to interact with the world… Mostly.
Shadow was apparently an odd fruit now.
But not just any old fruit! No sir!
A SOUL fruit!
Interesting shit here. It was sort of like a ghost, but not? If it's host died, it would simply find a new fruit body and be reborn, problem solved.
Not sure how this was possible though.
Or what the point was.
He didn't need to be attached to a vine or tree or whatever, once his Soul had a new fruit home that was it. Job done.
He wouldn't rot or spoil, because the fruit sort of became like an undead creature.
He didn't need to absorb water or nutrients or sunlight, because he was sort of an undead creature.
He didn't even really become more powerful over time, or consume Spirit energy or Soul energy or whatever to grow bigger or stronger or whatever either.
Nope, he just… He just was a fruit.
Specifically, he was a strange purple bunch of grapes. Or maybe a really freaky purple pineapple, it was a bit hard to tell, but he was CERTAINLY purple.
Gem herself felt a bit confused about the situation, but unlike Shadow (Who currently didn't have eyes or hands or whatever), SHE was easily able to confirm: Yes, he be purple.
Neat!
It really resonated with Darkness too, although it felt super odd. Like, you know, odd for being a reincarnating ghost that converts grapes into zombie fruits.
No, this one felt… Hmm.
He didn't have memories, not really. But the history of past possessed produce was there in his mind anyway, not that he had one right now.
The life cycle of this zombie Soul plant was fascinating!
Not sure how he was born or grown or created or whatever, but from what fragments he could gather his life was an odd sort of endless journey. Which was neat, and resonated with Shadow on a personal level.
While like this, as a fruit, his undead nature protected his existence pretty damned well. He could survive burning, heavy impacts, unexpected stabbings, inconvenient slashings, awkward crushings, energy attacks, you name it.
The only thing that could really change his nature was when he found good soil to work with.
In other words, a Soul.
When something with a Soul came in contact with him, Shadow could abandon his form if accepted by the new Host and grow his roots in their spirit.
In return for a new home and a certain level of protection, the fruit would share the spiritual power it had gained over its endless existence and a symbiosis would grow from there.
The host would gain power, either able to convert themselves into elements or powerful past hosts or partially alter their capabilities, and the fruit would gain something more important: Context.
If the user explored the fruits power enough, reached a certain level of enlightenment, the Soul Fruit could blossom! Become a fully Awakened fruit!
Though apparently none of the existing Soul fruits cared about HOW their user reached enlightenment. Or what steps they took to accomplish it.
Kind of earned the whole family of fruit a rough reputation, not that the zombie vegetation cared.
Still, it was interesting! Even if Shadow couldn't really move right now!
Right uh… His nature, of course, was related to Darkness.
From what he could feel, his Host would gain a certain control of the Domain, become something like a Avatar for this one world.
One who ate the
Yami Yami no Mi would become a 'Darkness Human', assuming their Soul was Human of course.
If an animal or spiritually powerful object became the Host, they'd still become humanoid due to the vast majority of previous users being Humans, but it was a bit species to just call ALL of them Darkness Humans, right? What if they were a sword or something first?
Point being, Shadow was now a
Logia-type
Devil Fruit
There were three types:
Paramecia, or random superpowers focused around one concept like string or rubber;
Zoan, granting the ability to become a partially or fully transformed conceptual animal with various skills and benefits; and
Logia, where one became an Avatar of a concept or element or whatever.
Despite what one would think, ANY 'Devil Fruit' could make their Host ridiculously powerful. It had to do with Concepts and Understanding though… A simple fruit that granted the concept of 'Springs' might be able to transform your legs into awesome locomotion options, sure… But the same fruit could ALSO be used in more abstract ways, like 'coiling' your potential or power for a powerful 'spring' effect.
And that was BEFORE the fruit could fully awaken in your Soul!
At that point, you could convert other materials or buildings or islands or PEOPLE into Springs, or generate 'Springs' of water or beer, or craft training equipment that would help new followers 'Spring' forward in their ability to train, or be able to 'Spring' a surprise attack despite reality and logic saying you had no ability to do so…
Point was: Any Soul fruit was freaking awesome.
Shadow's was just the best!
Sure, as a Logia fruit Shadow was a bit biased. Maybe.
For example, his category of fruit would allow his Host to shift body parts into Darkness to avoid any attack that wasn't touched by the power of the Sea or the raw conviction of the Soul,
Because of course, as a Soul, Soul attacks would still work pretty freaking well.
Plus, some forms could be manipulated by reality to become weak to other stuff too… Like dumping chemicals into someone who transforms into acid or whatever.
As for the issue with the Sea…
Shadow shuddered.
The Sea felt alive here. She was a wild mistress, and her Soul ran far too deep. Anyone who touched it would freeze in awe and possibly horror and… Yeah.
No Soul fruit would work in the Sea, or touching her blessed. They couldn't even consider the concept… If Shadow wasn't so different from a normal Devil Fruit, he himself wouldn't have even thought the issue was worth mentioning in the first place!
Even if it isn't focused on you, standing next to a planet feels overwhelming. Near mindless Soul fruit, zombie or not, had no possibility of resisting that. At all.
If he or his user fell into the Sea, he'd probably pull them both into the Darkness despite knowing she had no issue with either of them. Which… Well, it was more than most Soul fruits could accomplish.
Shadow hummed silently as he focused on cooler things.
New tricks! New ideas!
The fragmented memories of past powerful Hosts had all sorts of stuff in here!
The most basic bit was shifting into a Soul Form crafted from Darkness, to use the basic abilities with far greater efficiency and also easily avoid normal damage by allowing the impact to pass through the Darkness instead of one's flesh.
Many Hosts would train this in various ways for various benefits, as the basic ideas of how to use the new powers would be granted but each person would train them in different ways or for varying levels of effectiveness.
Some would focus entirely on avoiding combat, becoming an assassin or thief. Others would go the opposite route, creating a sturdy form that could better apply the other abilities the fruit had even at some personal cost.
Anyway, once one trained how to easily and instantly shift from Soul Form to Human and back, they could unconsciously and automatically shift bone and flesh out of existence when under threat, allowing blades and bullets and worse to just be ignored as worthless attempts at distraction.
The other most common feature Hosts would train up was Shadow's new ability to absorb. The concept of Gravity, which, now that it was pointed out, was also a magic that the Heartless employed in THEIR Realm of Darkness!
Shadow could allow his Host to easily create vortexes, to absorb energy or matter or even conceptual or Soul attacks… And to store them for later use or expel them violently in a savage eruption.
Harsh practice would be needed to shift quickly from absorption to expulsion, from defense to offense, and Soul attacks or assaults empowered by conceptually strong determination or willpower could still be an issue, but anything could be overcome with enough training and effort in this world.
After that though, the Hosts splintered. Some focused on the ability to nullify opposing Devil Fruit users, others on being able to fully absorb the restrictions of gravity to fly or, in the most extreme case, absorbing the time or 'age' of a foe to grow younger.
That woman had ended up causing QUITE a commotion before her maniacal fight to the death. She had just been touching the ability to absorb the power of others and was trying to learn how to 'erupt' that potential into herself when some orphan she created while slaughtering others managed to take her down.
The fruit had to reincarnate a few islands away, since the combat had destroyed anything remotely closer than that… Including all the war ships and armadas.
Shadow mentally winced.
Yeah, maybe Soul fruits had EARNED the name Devil Fruit.
Offering raw power to anyone who gets hungry and can handle a nasty tasting fruit was a bit lackadaisical and carelessly damaging to society, and it… It…
Shadow didn't blink in confusion.
Wait, he tasted nasty?
HE. TASTED. NASTY!?
WHY!?
What kind of fucking SNACK doesn't taste AMAZING!?
Shadow began frantically forcing the power of Darkness into his fruity Host. What the HELL was going on here!? Why would someone as awesome as SHADOW be a NASTY tasting Snack!?
He had standards, damn it!
More and more raw energy soaked the odd purple grapes as he carefully began to examine himself.
Fuck, it had to do with being a Ghost, and how Shadow infected random fruit and turned them into a zombie host.
No wonder he tasted like shit, people were biting into a damned undead zombie! Unacceptable!
Did he NEED to possess a dead fruit!? Why couldn't he pick something LIVING as a Host?
The memories cleared up the issue and just made him MORE angry!
The damned Soul fruit ghost was just fucking LAZY!
It was EASIER to grab any random vegitative corpse nearby, and took less effort to instantly 'kill' any new plant Host on the vine or stem or whatever!
Apparently, allowing the Soul fruit to trade that wonderful innate flavor and deliciousness for the enhanced durability and longevity of being a near invincible zombie was worth not taking the time to do things right!
Unacceptable!
Decisively, Shadow exploded himself and cast his delicious Snack soul into the winds of Reincarnation.
If he was going to be a Snack, he was going to be the BEST Snack!
Onwards! To flavor country!
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
Shadow reincarnated… And was frustrated.
First of all, he had been a pear this time. For a moment.
Then his automatic zombifying process had kicked in, shifted that fruit purple, and twisted it into a zombie grape/pineapple thing we all knew and hated.
But this time, his flavor would be even WORSE than last time!
Previously, he had been trapped in some sort of chest or something. But years ago, that fruit had at LEAST been naturally born and grown, in a location where it interacted heavily with local animals, people, and weather.
In other words, it was able to grow up exposed to Souls and Nature, which (Before the Soul Fruit killed itself and zombified) had made him pretty delicious!
THIS time, he was in one of those artificial farms.
It was here in his memories, as many of his previous incarnations had spawned in places like this. Secret underground facilities with heavily medicated produce, all with calculated artificial lighting and water supplies to ensure the cheapest possible operating costs with the highest levels of security and the least amount of effort required for the overseers.
The drugs that soaked these plants would slow growth, slow ripening, slow decay, and more: Partially preserving the fruit itself to the point where he was basically a half corpse mummy thing before even altering the stupid thing.
These facilities were nearly fully automated, with no outside connections other than hidden entrances, and the only source of Soul would be the trusted personnel who came by once a year to check for any lucky lottery hits of newly reborn Devil Fruits and to harvest all the over ripened fruits that might go rotten if left alone.
In fact, he hesitated to even call this thing a pear.
It was the size and shape of a small wrinkled plum. Starved from spiritual contact, hungry for light and nutrients, half dead, all chemicals and… Eugh.
And that was BEFORE Shadow had twisted it into a zombie host.
Yeah, no.
This was not remotely an improvement, nor was it acceptable.
Right, he had a grasp on the parts of his Soul that controlled reincarnation, let's try this again… But this time, see if Shadow could suppress the necrotic 'enhancement' process.
He summoned the Darkness and prepared to respawn.
…Huh, it took a lot more energy this time for some reason.
Maybe because there was so little Soul to work with in this vegetation?
Meh, whatever. Here we go!
As he detonated, he focused on his Soul and observed much more closely this time.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
He was an apple this time, but in a different underground farm. Same chemical cocktail though.
Had these places been this common the last time he had been reborn? Back before these recent rebirth attempts, he meant. And by 'He', Shadow meant 'The Fruit', not his current self.
Good news: Managed to prevent maybe a third of the zombification process!
Still turned purple, still had those strange swirls and markings on his peel that seemed to resonate with Nature and enforce the zombification process and corpse defense enhancement measures, but he was still roughly apple shaped!
Which was progress!
Shadow summoned the Darkness and… Man that takes a long time.
There we go!
He detonated for another attempt.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
A strawberry, in another hidden farm, but Shadow had messed up somehow and was now the size of a watermelon AND still purple with swirls.
Dang it. This was tricky!
Detonation and rebirth, he'd figure this out.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
A pear again, still in an underground farm, but Shadow had stumbled onto something that sort of counted as progress!
It had to do with POWER density and duration!
The faster he injected his Soul into a new fruit, the quicker the zombification changes occurred!
If he sort of forced himself to only grip onto his new fruit host with the tips of his existence, the thing only shifted to purple! No swirls or shape shifting, no zombification!
For a moment. A very very short moment.
Then he sort of collapsed into the pear, destabilizing the entire process, half mushing it into pulp…
Sigh. Oh well.
That one had been close though!
Detonation.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
Oh, a grape! Not a whole big bunch, just an individual grape in a cluster, and it was still in one of those damned farms again, but he had managed the 'slow reincarnation' trick and got a MUCH better examination of the process!
Now he just had to figure out how to DIRECT his reincarnation process, so he would stop ending up in these facilities every time.
At least his luck was holding strong, he hadn't been reborn in any of the same farms twice yet!
Right, let's see if we can figure this 'rebirth' stuff out and make it a bit more consistent.
Detonation.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
It took… Shadow wasn't sure, a thousand tries? Maybe a hundred times that?
But sometimes 'Research' takes time, Gem says so.
Plus, he somehow kept losing track of his previous locations after each rebirth, so clearly he was missing SOMETHING about this whole process that just kept frustrating him on a fundamental level.
But in the end, after becoming most of a grocery store's mummy fruit section, he managed to wrangle some level of control over the rebirthing process. Finally. After all that annoyance.
Apparently, not having most of his senses, lacking the ability to directly interact with reality, AND having to study something super hard and tricky with a high failure rate? It made Shadow a bit twitchy.
He felt his Soul prepare for a final rebirth as Gem chimed in.
Hmm?
Sure, you can direct us.
Just aim for somewhere with some damned sunlight!
She pulsed with assurance, plus something about searching for loving Hearts, and Shadow was fine with all that.
Though apparently the connection she felt would require quite a bit more Darkness to fuel his reincarnation this time, as it was quite a ways away if one stayed in a single World instead of moving through Darkness.
Meh, no problem. Shadow had power to spare.
D͜͏̛̣̞͈͈̩͍̘̩̘̰̫͠e͢͟͏͏̸̼͉̘͉͇̯̹̪̹̞̠̺͔t̻̺̘̬͓̞̙̼̱͍͈͘͜͠o͎̟̫̟̻̥̩̤͙͜͟ͅn̡͍̰͈̬̪̼̹̣̲̰͠͝á̡͔̭̟̭̬̩̜͚̥̰͎̜̟̕t̬̣̤̬̟̫͉̠̝̜̙̰͚͜͝i̸̶̛̝̮͍̗̣͓͠ͅo̷̦̠̲͚͓̬̰n̵̨̙̲̞̙̰̹͈͓̫̘̞̙̟̬͓͓͙͙͢͝.
.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
He was going to die.
They were ALL going to die.
Hopefully quickly.
Another Marine officer with the highest of security clearances kept trying to restart the equipment, to deny reality. "This isn't possible. It can't be happening. This was supposed to be a cushy assignment, just getting paid to simp for those damned World Nobles!"
He absently corrected him. "Make sure to only call them the respectable
Celestial Dragons or you will lose your head or worse."
His coworker SNARLED at him! "THOUSANDS of their Devil Fruit collection facilities have gone off the grid! In only a few HOURS! We still haven't gotten confirmation of the site from the FIRST emergency survey group! They are still redirecting their ship, and that's assuming they live long enough to even contact us via
Den Den Mushi! You KNOW how dangerous the
Grand Line can be!"
True, the deadly ocean was a threat even to the enhanced Marine ships that had protective
seastone coatings on the underside to repel the massive monsters that swam out there.
Even with the disrespect and insubordination, he couldn't force himself to care right now. "It may not matter."
The room got quiet.
True.
It may not matter.
Even if nothing at all was wrong at those locations, the best case scenario being that something was wrong with THIS hidden monitoring facility, Celestial Dragons wouldn't care.
They weren't exactly logical, forgiving, reasonable, or concerned about actual issues or faults.
Something went wrong, no matter what scale, and people would now die.
He quietly stood. "I will be in my room, contact me if anything changes."
One of the others shifted. "Can we… Call someone? Ask our officers for support? Someone to plead for us?"
He calmly shook his head. "I've reported up the chain as standard operations demanded. We have been given our orders: We are to wait until contacted again."
Some still looked hesitant. "But…"
He glared at the men. "We will follow orders. Is that understood?"
""""
SIR! YES SIR!""""
As it should be.
He left.
This hadn't been how he thought his life would end up. Working for political gods, slave owners and pompous fat fools, rather than protecting innocents from those merciless pirates.
Being 'rewarded' after all his harsh training and self restraint and endless effort with this post, being granted a 'cushy job' watching hidden facilities casually collect items of world shattering power. Items that would be casually distributed for more political power and authority, or stolen by pirates and thieves.
It hurt his pride to be given such tasks. To not be allowed to kill his more cowardly coworkers anymore, to be forced to allow such obvious and public insubordination without complaint.
Still, he didn't complain. He had orders, he followed them.
He always had.
For good or bad, understandable or not, none of it mattered.
In the end, even if he died, he had done it for Absolute Justice.
That would have to be enough.
