The coastline of Iron Fang Island has already been stained a dark red with blood.
The originally azure seawater now has a strange dark red tint under the moonlight, the product of countless corpses thrown into the sea, where blood and virus mixed and fermented.
Fifty meters below the sea surface.
A dark shadow floats in the water like a ghost.
There is no diving equipment, and no bubbles are exhaled.
Mordred is bare-chested, with black cuticles covering his skin like armor; as the current flows, these cuticles ripple slightly as if they were alive.
"The greatest treasures of the One Piece world, besides Devil Fruits, are these monsters filled with vitality."
Mordred mutters in his heart, his red and black eyes radiating a predator's light in the deep sea.
For other experts, the sea is a forbidden zone, especially for Devil Fruit users; once they fall into the water, they are like lambs waiting for the slaughter.
But for Mordred, who possesses the Blacklight Virus Prototype, this place is a buffet more abundant than land.
He doesn't need to breathe or require oxygen; as long as there is biomass, he can survive indefinitely.
Gurgle—
A dull sound of churning water comes from the distance.
A Sea King over thirty meters long—a Tiger-Striped Giant Shark—is swimming over, following the scent of blood flowing from Iron Fang Island.
Its giant mouth, filled with sharp teeth, opens and closes slightly, greedily inhaling the seawater tainted with the virus, a blood-red light shining in its cloudy fish eyes.
It sees Mordred.
In the eyes of this behemoth, a human is nothing more than a tiny snack to pick between its teeth.
The Tiger-Striped Giant Shark swings its tail fin, its massive body instantly cutting through the water as it opens a mouth large enough to swallow a small boat, biting down hard on that tiny human.
"Just in time, an appetizer."
A cruel arc spreads across the corner of Mordred's mouth.
He doesn't dodge.
At the exact moment the giant shark closes its mouth, Mordred's arms suddenly explode, transforming into countless thick black-red tentacles.
Puchi!
The tentacles pierce into the giant shark's upper jaw, tongue, and gills like spears.
The intense pain causes the Tiger-Striped Giant Shark to roll frantically in the deep sea, stirring up a massive vortex.
But all of this is in vain.
The erosion of the Blacklight Virus is overbearing and irreversible.
"Consume."
Mordred shouts coldly in his heart.
Those tentacles that pierced into the giant shark's body instantly swell, acting like countless straws, and begin to frantically extract the life essence of this behemoth.
The originally full and sturdy body of the shark shrivels at a rate visible to the naked eye.
Muscles dissolve, bones soften, and blood is drained dry.
In just ten short seconds.
The thirty-meter-long deep-sea beast is left with only a thin fish skin, which slowly sinks toward the seabed with the undercurrent.
[Ding! Successfully consumed a Sea King (Small), gained 500 points of Biomass Energy.]
[Host's physical strength has slightly increased; underwater mobility has evolved.]
"Too little."
Mordred clenched his fist, feeling a trace of warm current surging within his body.
For him now, the improvement from a sea beast of this level is no longer obvious.
He turned his gaze toward the deeper, darker depths of the trench.
Diving two thousand meters.
The surrounding light has completely vanished, leaving only the faint fluorescence occasionally emitted by deep-sea creatures.
"Boom—!!"
A violent water impact hits from the side front, stirring up mud and sand on the seabed.
Mordred steadies himself, a ferocious smile on his face.
Found it.
In the deep-sea canyon five hundred meters ahead, two behemoths are engaged in a life-and-death struggle.
On the left is a Giant Sea Eel over a hundred meters long, its entire body covered in grey-green hard scales, its massive mouth filled with hooked teeth; every swing of its tail kicks up a murky vortex on the seabed.
Its opponent is a Giant Armored Crab like a moving fortress; its claws are like two small mountains, and its shell is covered in parasitic barnacles and seaweed, so thick it inspires despair.
"Roar—!!"
The sea eel lets out a dull low roar, using its flexible body to tightly coil around the giant crab's right claw, attempting to wring it off.
The giant crab frantically swings its left claw, smashing deep wounds into the sea eel's smooth body, and blood instantly stains this area of the sea red.
This is the most primitive, most barbaric slaughter.
No Haki, no Devil Fruit abilities, only the collision of pure power and flesh.
"This is... such a waste."
An untimely thought vibrates through the water.
The two Sea Kings in the middle of their death match suddenly freeze.
As predators at the top of the food chain, they keenly sensed an extremely dangerous aura approaching.
It wasn't the pressure of physical size, but a tremor coming from the genetic level.
As if they had encountered their natural enemy.
Mordred's figure is as tiny as a speck of dust before them, but the black-red blood qi radiating from him is spreading frantically through the seawater, like ink dropped into clear water.
"Fighting so hard, why don't I help you?"
Mordred floats between the two giant beasts, his right hand slowly rising.
Countless black-red tentacles explode from his palm, instantly swelling and splitting in the seawater like a giant dreamcatcher, enveloping the two Sea Kings.
The Giant Sea Eel senses something wrong and releases the giant crab, wanting to flee.
But those tentacles seem to have a life of their own, predicting its trajectory and instantly piercing through its hard scales.
"Puchi! Puchi!"
The sound of entering flesh is exceptionally dull in the deep sea.
The sea eel, which was struggling frantically, suddenly stiffens.
Blacklight Virus, injected.
"Roar... clack clack..."
The sea eel's roar turns into a strange sound of bones rubbing together.
Under its grey-green skin, it looks as if countless rats are running wild; muscles swell, tear, and then reorganize at a visible rate.
The originally smooth skin instantly hardens, growing a layer of black cuticle armor, and a row of razor-sharp bone spurs erupts from its back.
Its eyes turn from cloudy yellow to bloodshot crimson vertical pupils.
In just over ten seconds.
This deep-sea overlord's genes were forcibly rewritten, turning it into a puppet of the Blacklight Virus.
"Go, that's your dinner."
Mordred waves his finger lightly, pointing at the still-dazed Giant Armored Crab.
The mutated sea eel lets out a sharp hiss, its speed twice as fast as before, turning into a black lightning bolt as it instantly crashes into the giant crab.
"Crack!"
The originally indestructible crab shell actually split open with a massive crack under the impact of the mutated sea eel's reinforced bone spurs.
The giant crab, in pain, swings its giant claw to counterattack.
But the mutated sea eel doesn't care about getting hurt; it opens its even more exaggerated mouth, filled with three layers of sharp teeth, and bites the giant crab's eye stalk.
"Rip"
Green juice explodes in the seawater.
This is a complete slaughter.
The sea eel, reinforced by the Blacklight Virus, completely crushes its previous opponent in strength, speed, and ferocity.
The giant crab's struggle grows weaker and weaker, finally stopping completely under that terrifying biting.
Mordred swims over, his palm pressed against the giant crab's broken body.
Countless black-red flesh tentacles instantly wrap around the mountain-like corpse.
[Ding! Detected high concentration of high-quality biological energy... absorbing...]
[Obtained gene fragment: Deep Sea Crustacean Hardening]
[Obtained gene fragment: Colossal Strength Muscle Fiber]
[Physical attributes greatly increased!]
A warm current flows through the tentacles into Mordred's body.
The feeling of every cell cheering and jumping makes him want to groan out loud.
Refreshing!
So refreshing!
The energy contained in this Sea King is equivalent to the carnage of thousands of ordinary human soldiers!