NOVEL NEXT Chapter 28: Genius
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The air was filled with the sharp gasps and stunned silence of the Kuja Pirates. The scene felt surreal to them—watching three men, none of whom had ever even heard of Haki before, not only learning it but also perfecting it within mere hours.
The once confident Kuja warriors now looked at Kitaro as though he were a monster, their disbelief bordering on hysteria. Mastering hardening was impressive enough, but Kitaro's swift execution of its uses left them speechless.
"Is this... even possible?" one of the women murmured in awe.
Only one person in the entire Kuja Pirates, their captain Boa Hancock, had ever managed to achieve full mastery over Armament Haki's First form. Yet, here was a man who had just begun learning it, casually achieving what had taken them years.
The speed of hardening and the full control of it was something that took years for anyone to master.
Shisui, standing nearby, smiled as his arm hardened, glowing with a black coating. With a swift punch, a barrel in the distance exploded into splinters. He turned to Kitaro and asked, "Again?"
Kitaro chuckled and looked over at Itachi. "Itachi, how about you?"
Itachi, ever calm and collected, nodded. "I've got it," he said, wrapping his arm in Haki and demonstrating his mastery with the same ease as Kitaro and Shisui.
The Kuja Pirates fell into a shocked silence. They couldn't believe what they were seeing. It was as if Haki had suddenly become the easiest technique in the world, or—more alarmingly—they had been learning it wrong all along.
Hancock, though outwardly composed, was internally rattled. She couldn't help but ask, "You truly… have never trained in Haki before?"
Kitaro smiled, his eyes gleaming with amusement. "Of course not. If I had, why would I have asked for your instruction?"
"But how…" Hancock was flustered. "How could you learn so quickly? And not just learning, but having full mastery over it? This isn't something a beginner can just pick up!"
Kitaro explained, still smiling, "Though we've never encountered Haki before, we are very familiar with something called Ninjutsu. To use Ninjutsu, we must extract and manipulate Chakra, a form of energy created from the fusion of physical and mental energies. In comparison, Armament Haki feels quite simple to us. It's like manipulating the Nature Transformation of our body energy."
Haki is a mysterious power that allows individuals to harness their own spiritual energy for various superhuman feats. As this energy manifests from willpower, it is theoretically open to all of the world's living creatures; the vast majority, however, are either ignorant of how to unlock it or unable to achieve mastery.
He continued, "In our world, Chakra has seven elements: Water, Fire, Wind, Thunder, Earth, Yin, and Yang. Haki, on the other hand, only uses a single energy form. That's why we find it easy to grasp."
Though the Kuja Pirates didn't fully understand the intricacies of what Kitaro was talking about, they grasped the gist of it—his world's energy system was far more complex than Haki. Armament Haki, while formidable, was simple to them.
The truth was that while Haki seemed straightforward, learning and mastering it required an extraordinary amount of talent, willpower, and experience. What the Kuja Pirates didn't realize was that the three Uchiha in front of them weren't just ordinary warriors—they were geniuses among geniuses plus they were prepared.
"Armament Haki may looks simple," Kitaro added, "but the simpler something is, the more powerful it can become in the right hands. My respect goes to those who first developed it."
"Also the breathing technique we had was the core that made us master Haki this easily"
"Breathing technique?"
"What is that"
Kitaro wanted them to be curious about the Breathing technique as he had his plan for the Kuja.
So he didn't respond instead he coated his entire body in Armament Haki, his skin darkening into a sleek black armor. Moving his limbs, he noted that while his movements felt slightly restricted, it was manageable.
He quickly realized, though, that full-body hardening wasn't practical for every situation.
He began experimenting with partial hardening, switching between hardening his arms, legs, head, and torso. The transitions were seamless, and he found himself adapting to it rapidly.
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After some time.
Kitaro unsheathed his Nichirin Sword, a blade forged in the famed swordsmith village of Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba. It was an ancient craft that had been perfected over thousands of years, and his sword was no ordinary one. Like Tanjiro Kamado and Yoriichi Tsugikuni, Kitaro wielded a black blade.
Wrapping the sword in Armament Haki, the dark blade became even darker, glowing with an ethereal black sheen as if polished with liquid onyx.
Kitaro swung the blade powerfully. 'Whoosh!'
A massive, blackened slash tore through the air and sliced the ocean in half. The sea split apart, the waves forming a ravine that took several moments to fill back in as the waters rushed back together.
"Good," Kitaro said, nodding in satisfaction. "With Haki, my blade's slashes have reached an entirely new level. No more worries about my sword breaking from my own strength."
Meanwhile, Shisui and Itachi were also deep in practice, their proficiency in Armament Haki growing by the second. They could now harden their entire bodies, switch to partial hardening, and even imbue their weapons with Haki, all with impressive ease.
The women of the Kuja Pirates looked on, dumbstruck. They could hardly believe what they were seeing. Was this even the same technique, Imbuement, they had spent years mastering?
Marigold, who had been assigned to teach Kitaro, was at a loss for words. It hadn't even been long since they started, yet Kitaro had not only caught up but surpassed her in Haki usage. She was considered one of the elites of Amazon Lily, but this shattered her confidence. The blow to her pride was immense.
"Is this… a genius?" whispered Rindo, the best sniper of the Kuja Pirates, unable to contain her admiration. In just a short period, Kitaro and his companions had exceeded all of their expectations, surpassing the years of hard work that the Kuja Pirates had poured into mastering Haki.
As elite warriors of Amazon Lily, they were the strongest among many. But compared to Kitaro, Shisui, and Itachi, they were beginning to understand the true meaning of talent. This was genius in its purest, most terrifying form.
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