*POV: Navy Captain Lavern Letori*
*1st POV*
I rocked back and forth in my little hammock as my subordinates cleaned and mopped the deck. Surprisingly, it's been an easy day so far. Honestly, you'd think I'd get more pirates this close to the Grand Line. Surprisingly, though, most pirates avoid this part of the sea. I think it was a bit too close to the calm belt for their taste, or was it? I can't remember, and I was too lazy to check.
That's when I heard distant banging. I tried to ignore it at first, but it just kept on getting louder and louder. Grumbling, I got up, taking the magazine I was reading the previous night off my face, and went to the front of the ship, making sure my navy coat wouldn't be blown by the wind. Didn't want to go through the effort of ordering another one, and right now I wanted to sleep, so here's to hoping it was just some lost merchant ship.
But it seems like luck wasn't on my side, as while the ship was plenty old, and I did at first think it was perhaps some old ship drifting off into the sea, if not for the fact that there was one man aboard it. A pirate, if I had ever seen one, if I was being honest, alongside the flag flowing overhead that, while a bit damaged, still flapped in the wind. So while I probably did have to do some work today, well, it would probably be easy based on the fact that it was just one pirate.
*POV: ???/Leon Calrus*
*1st POV*
As I hit the metallic punching bag over and over, I could feel my knuckles bleeding and my new prosthetic arm cracking a bit, clearly needing repairs now. It didn't matter, I needed to keep training for as long as I could, only stopping to eat and rest, that plus doing some push-ups, sit-ups, running, and all the classics. I did everything I could to get used to this body and make sure I was prepared in case I ever got into a fight or the eventual fight in the case of this little adventure.
Then the system screen came back again, this time with a different request entirely.
[Quest: Navy Fight]
[Type: Combat Quest]
[Description: The Navy has recognized your flag as a pirate. Prepare for a fight.
[Difficulty: Easy-to-Medium]
[Rewards: 2 Common Healing Potions, +random tool proficiency]
Whilst the rewards weren't that good, they were pretty decent for what amounted to a beginner's quest, probably. I smiled as I stopped hitting the punching bag and looked towards the front, seeing another ship, this one with the World Government flag atop it, or was it the navy flag? Either one worked as they all led to the same conclusion: an enemy was dead ahead and was gearing up for a fight. At least that's what I could tell based on the fact that the small crew was gathering in the front with small guns, with their captain pulling their sleeves.
I smiled as I charged toward the front, with parts of the ship shifting around me as though it too was getting ready for a fight. As our two ships got closer and closer together, I began to inhale, taking in all the air I could, preparing for a Breath of the Dragon attacking, more specifically, a lightning one, as that would probably be the most useful here.
Coruse the standard straight line, one had a range of 30 ft, but it should work well enough. As their ship came closer, I let out a loud roar of lightning straight towards the edge of the ship, destroying a large section f the wooden ship, plus causing a small fire that began to tip towards the side surprising most of the marines except stangely enough their captain who had a lazy look on his face as their ship began to go down.
Seeing this, the crew began to throw lifeboats overboard, probably not expecting that little trick of mine with the captain using the fact that the navy ship was tipping forward to launch himself forward. It was almost lazy-looking, and he landed with a small thud.
"Well, that was surprising, didn't think I'd be so unlucky, I mean, encountering a devil-fruit user on a calm day like today got to be bad luck." He said as he scratched his head, and I was able to get a good look at the guy now.
He had longish blond hair, and he was a bit skinnier than you'd think a marine would be, but it didn't matter as I got into a combat stance. I held my fist out in an open palm, with my other hand held back in an open palm, with my legs spread apart evenly, ready for a fight, choosing one of the more basic stances Leon knew. Once I was done, the Marine Captain began to scratch his head as something strange began to happen.
"I really don't like fighting, but seeing you get all serious, and since I have no backup, well,l looks like I'll have to put this power to use."
His body began to grow larger, and his hands began to grow large claws, replacing the fingers he once had. Slowly, he began to grow short strands of brown and white hair around his face, becoming a bit more..derpy in appearance, in all honesty, like a sloth, I think.
"The Sloth-Sloth fruit allows me to double my strength and durability, with some *yawn* unfortunate side effects." He said as he yawned, covering his mouth just as his body grew a tiny bit larger, with his hands growing exponentially bigger than before.
"You can still surrender if you want, but I'm guessing we're going to fi-" I didn't give him a chance to finish as I launched myself forward, surrounding my fist with acid as I used draconic strike, going for a double strike. The acid fist collided with his skin, pushing him back thanks to the crusher feat attached to my character.
"Cruel." I whispered to myself, automatically adding the damage die to it, not knowing if the damage I just dealt was significant or not.
I then took a few steps back, letting the captain fall down a little as acid dripped down from his freshly burnt skin.
"Well now...that was just mean *yawn* at least let a guy finish his sentence before attacking, whatever the name is, Lavern Letori, a navy captain."
"You don't have to tell me your name, though." He then charged forward with his claw overhead.
I put my arms over my head just as the strike came down and I could easily feel the power behind it, but the way he fought, whilst his speed wasn't anything impressive, his strength was as whole different story alongside his durability based on how the acid punch alongside cruel didn't seem to do a whole lot, at least on the surface.
I used my strength to push them off me, and stepped to the side getting ready to deliver a rapid series of poison punches, hoping it would do a bit more damage than the acid.