"Wait, I remember now," Bellamy recalled suddenly. "In the original story... didn't Bege use this castle form to tank hits directly from Big Mom?" If that was the case, then this 'Big Father' fortress was ridiculously durable. "But... doesn't that make this the perfect opportunity to test just how wide the gap is between my current strength and that of a Yonko?"
At the thought, Bellamy's eyes lit up with dangerous excitement. Honestly, Bege's offensive capabilities in this form seemed underwhelming to Bellamy. Not enough heavy cannons, and mere firearms couldn't penetrate his defenses now. Without Haki-imbued sniper rounds, bullets simply weren't a threat to him anymore. Considering all this, there really couldn't be a better, more durable 'training dummy' to test his limits against.
"Oi, Castle-man! Stand still for me, alright? Don't move." Bellamy deactivated his First Gear state, taking a moment to regulate his breathing and gather his strength.
"What do you mean, 'don't move'?!" Bege's voice boomed from within the castle. "Bellamy! You can't possibly break through my fortress!" Clearly, Bege was supremely confident in the defensive power of his castle form.
Even better. That confidence was exactly what Bellamy wanted. An enemy cowering in fear? There was no satisfaction in crushing that.
"Alright, first up: pure taijutsu." Since he was testing his strength, might as well be thorough. "Maximum Power! Iron Body: Steel Kick!"
Capone Bege's massive castle form was essentially immobile in mid-air. For Bellamy, it was nothing more than a giant, stationary target. Not even bothering with Shave for positioning, Bellamy simply launched himself directly at the base of the floating castle. This kick utilized none of his Spring Fruit powers, nor was it coated in Haki. Just pure, unadulterated physical strength channeled through his Six Powers technique.
At first, Bege couldn't comprehend what Bellamy was trying to achieve. But the moment the kick landed, he felt a titanic force slam into the castle's underside, sending the entire structure tilting violently upwards. "What the--?!" came Bege's startled roar from within. "I'm flying upwards!" The colossal stone fortress, weighing well over two hundred tons, had been kicked bodily further into the sky by Bellamy's single blow. Bege couldn't fathom how a human could possess such monstrous physical power.
Close-quarters combat was all about maintaining relentless pressure, a continuous rhythm of attacks. After delivering the kick, Bellamy used the recoil and a burst of aerial maneuverability to instantly reposition himself. The second kick followed without pause. As the castle tilted wildly, the thousands of men trapped inside Bege's body were thrown about like dice in a cup, completely unable to maintain footing, let alone mount any kind of coordinated defense. The castle form itself possessed no real means of counter-attacking while airborne. Bellamy's second kick struck the castle's 'back' squarely, sending it tumbling even higher.
Yet, these two powerful consecutive kicks had merely chipped small craters into the castle's incredibly durable walls. The damage was superficial, like ant bites on a mountain. But witnessing this incredible defensive resilience firsthand didn't discourage Bellamy in the slightest. Instead, his fighting spirit surged even higher.
"Again!" The third kick launched without hesitation. "Rokushiki Ogi: Hundred Strike Kick!" Fourth kick! Fifth! Sixth! Kick after relentless kick hammered against the castle, Bellamy unleashing a continuous barrage in mid-air, delivering well over a hundred powerful strikes in rapid succession. The massive castle, nearly a hundred meters tall and tens of meters wide, was battered relentlessly higher and higher by this display of pure taijutsu, ascending thousands of meters into the sky.
At this altitude, Bellamy didn't even need to do anything else. A fall from this height would surely kill Bege if he couldn't fly independently. But waste such a perfect strength-testing apparatus? Bellamy wouldn't dream of it.
Taijutsu assessment: complete. Glancing at the numerous, but relatively shallow, pits pockmarking the castle walls, Bellamy gave his pure physical technique a barely passing grade. The raw power was sufficient, but the technique, the application... still severely lacking refinement compared to true masters. In the realm of pure physical martial arts, he clearly still had much to learn.
"Next up: Devil Fruit abilities." Bellamy halted his ascent, activating his Second Gear 'Flyer' mode briefly to catch his breath. Deprived of the upward momentum from Bellamy's kicks, the massive castle began to plummet rapidly back towards the sea.
Compared to the intricacies of taijutsu, Bellamy's application of his Devil Fruit powers was currently much simpler. Pure Spring Fruit techniques, used without integration into his martial arts, amounted to only four or five basic moves at this stage. Spring Fist and Spring Leg were his most basic applications.
Positioning himself directly beneath the falling castle, Bellamy's arms rapidly coiled into spring shapes. "Spring Fist!" Both fists shot upwards like pistons, breaking the sound barrier with sharp cracks, slamming fiercely into the underside of the descending castle. The impact gouged out craters slightly larger than those left by his pure taijutsu kicks.
"The power amplification from a Devil Fruit... truly terrifying." A single, casual Spring Fist delivered more raw impact force than one of his full-power taijutsu kicks. This test provided a clear, direct comparison, giving Bellamy a better intuitive grasp of his own power sources.
"Now for Spring Leg." His legs, already coiled tightly, shot downwards with explosive force upon his mental command. The power generated by his legs was clearly much greater than that from his arms. Assessing the resulting crater size, Bellamy estimated the Spring Leg's impact was roughly thirty percent greater than the Spring Fist's. A thirty percent difference might not sound huge, but at higher combat levels, even a ten percent advantage could be decisive. A thirty percent difference represented a significant disparity in raw power during actual combat.
"If I used the 'Blood Energy Bubble' technique... could it blast this thing apart directly?" That technique, imbued with Armament Haki... Bellamy himself couldn't fully predict how devastating its power would be against such a target. Better save that one for last. His ground-based 'Super Spring Jump' wasn't usable in mid-air. So, next... "Spring Gatling again, then."
Bellamy's fists coiled once more, then unleashed another torrential downpour of punches. Evaluating the effect of this move—his imitation of Luffy's Gatling—left him unsatisfied. The impacts were too dispersed, too chaotic. The resulting damage wasn't efficiently focused. No point testing the Spring Kick equivalent then. First Gear and Second Gear were primarily amplifiers; no need to test them independently here.
Devil Fruit assessment: complete. Bellamy's conclusion: his development of pure Devil Fruit applications was still in its infancy.
Finally: the combination of Taijutsu and the Spring-Spring Fruit. This was where the real potential lay, where the possibilities multiplied exponentially. Bellamy was constantly striving to integrate all aspects of his power into a cohesive whole. This battle provided an excellent opportunity to test those integrated techniques.
"Alright then. Let's see just how far my power can reach when I truly unleash everything."
By this point, he and Bege's colossal castle form had been kicked and punched nearly into the upper atmosphere. The air around them was growing noticeably thin and cold. Fighting in such an environment... this was a first for Bellamy across both his lifetimes. The sensation was... utterly bizarre, strangely exhilarating. Back on Earth, he couldn't have even dreamed of such a fantastical scene. Who could have imagined that one day, he would literally punch and kick a man—inside a castle—clear into the stratosphere?