"Jie jie jie, I am a Brain Brain Fruit user! Hand over your brain obediently!"
His consciousness finally fixated on the cold front of a hundred-ton truck.
Boom!
Who understands, my family?
He seemed to hear the unique electronic music of a Cybertronian, and it was a loli voice!
"I thought it was a speed bump."
"Go tell my insurance company."
"We are all living with effort."
Damn it, I'm so unwilling, my 512GB of study materials on my USB drive are still…
Then, there was boundless darkness and a bone-deep tearing sensation.
When he opened his eyes again, it was a completely foreign world.
Salty sea breeze, carrying the savage scent of the primeval jungle, roughly filled his nostrils.
Giant, never-before-seen trees blocked out the sky, and strange bird calls and beast roars rose and fell.
Beneath him was rough gravel, digging painfully into his skin.
"What the hell, where did you bring me? Is this still China?"
A tender and weak child's voice emerged. Kyle sat up in a panic, feeling himself all over.
Good, good, his small arms and legs, kidneys, and little brother were all intact…
What good, you big dummy! A roughly three-year-old kid stranded on a deserted island, no matter how you think about it, it's not good!
His past life's memories were like broken glass, unable to piece together a complete picture, and his original body's memories were also chaotic, only vaguely remembering that he had been in a shipwreck.
Amidst the chaotic thoughts, hunger was the first to sound the alarm.
Following closely was the cold; the sea breeze pierced through his thin, tattered clothes of unknown material.
And then there were those unsettling sounds coming from the forest.
Kyle shivered; the instinct for survival overwhelmed all the confusion and unwillingness.
He scrambled and crawled, finding a low, shallow cave half-hollowed out by the waves, barely able to provide shelter from the wind and rain.
The cave emitted a foul, damp smell, but Kyle couldn't care less.
He huddled in the deepest part of the cave, listening to the roar of the waves crashing against the rocks outside, and the faint chewing sounds from the jungle.
"System?"
"Ring Grandpa?"
"…"
His tentative inquiries were swallowed by the sound of the waves. Kyle completely calmed down.
Good news: he transmigrated!
Bad news: a hellish start!
"I am Kyle Grylls (not really), and I'm going to show you how to survive in some of the most extreme and dangerous places!"
Deng ~ deng ~ deng deng ~
As a couch potato in an era of peace, Kyle's most daring act was to keyboard warrior "I can do it too!" under wilderness survival videos. But now, only Kyle's mouth was tough.
Using the puddle in the cave, Kyle examined himself: black hair, golden eyes, a small face that, though thin and childish, hinted at a handsome appearance in the future, comparable to the esteemed readers.
To avoid an early demise, there was only one goal now—survive!
…
Three years.
Three whole years, do you know how I've lived?
His body grew at an incredible rate, becoming stronger and more agile.
It even far surpassed the physical qualities a child should have according to his past life's memories, which made Kyle realize this world was not ordinary.
Years of running, climbing, and fighting had made his muscles smooth and firm, full of explosive power.
"Hi, hey, hey, got food again, brothers!"
Kyle deftly processed the wild rabbit in his hands, muttering to himself, occasionally letting out a bizarre cackle.
"Today's lunch is roasted rabbit, unfamiliar small fruits, Q-piled, let's eat, brothers!"
"Ah, sugoi, burp~" After devouring the adorable rabbit, Kyle sat on a rock, preparing to enjoy an unknown fruit he had picked from the island.
This fruit was entirely white, its surface covered in layers of concentric circular patterns.
"Hiss~ I feel like I've seen this somewhere? What was this called, never mind, delicious or not, your brother Kyle will know with one bite!"
The moment the first bite of the fruit entered his stomach, Kyle's face turned green then white, his stomach churning as if ten thousand goblins were having an impact party.
"Ugh~"
Even with Kyle's extensive experience, he had never eaten something so unpalatable. He "spat, spat, spat" a few more times, trying to dispel the despair-inducing taste.
"The taste is like fermented stinky socks that haven't been washed for a month in summer, paired with a three-month-dead stinky rat, stewed for forty-nine days over a high fire, barely reaching a quantum level of stench."
Kyle grimaced, feeling as though his taste buds had been violently assaulted.
He shook his head vigorously, trying to shake the demonic taste and the fruit's strange appearance out of his mind.
There was something more important waiting for him—the sun was still high, and his daily "required class" hadn't begun yet.
For three whole years, this was how he lived. Now six years old, Kyle's small body contained strength and agility utterly disproportionate to his age.
A beautiful day begins with a naked run on the beach.
Kyle's bare feet stepped on the slightly damp sand, each step sinking deep then powerfully springing out, his speed astonishing, leaving a trail of small footprints behind him that were quickly smoothed by the incoming tide.
Next was strength training. He had long since familiarized himself with this jungle and found an ideal "gym"—a place scattered with rocks of various sizes and shapes that were fairly easy to handle.
Lifting, carrying, throwing, tossing—these monotonous movements were repeated day after day. His muscles, far surpassing those of his peers, were firm and well-defined, long accustomed to this burning soreness.
During training, he would occasionally curse using some national quintessence from his past life, and sometimes, when the mood struck him, he would hum a few pop songs dug up from some forgotten corner of his memory.
"That day's squid~ squid up!"
He let out a low roar, his arms bulging slightly with veins, easily lifting a rock almost twice his height, then he threw it violently, smashing it onto the sand in the distance with a dull thud.
Agility training relied more on the jungle itself; this perilous primeval jungle was his natural obstacle course.
Kyle leaped between fallen giant trees, swung through the forest by grasping thick vines, and nimbly dodged small fierce beasts that darted out from the shadows to ambush him.
His senses had long been honed like the sharpest blade; every rustle of wind, every subtle friction of leaves, quickly formed a judgment in his mind.
As for combat techniques, there were no exquisite moves, just life-saving skills honed through countless brushes with death: simple, direct, and deadly.
He would use his self-made spear to practice thrusting, chopping, and sweeping against thick tree trunks, striving for speed, accuracy, and ruthlessness in every movement.
"Take this, a monkey stealing peaches… bah bah bah, what am I practicing! Be serious, Kyle, you're going to be the man who punches Bear Grylls and kicks Ed Stafford!"
He would occasionally stop, panting heavily, wiping sweat from his forehead, a glint of cunning unbefitting his age flashing in his eyes, then he would straighten his face and return to the monotonous training.
The setting sun began to cast a layer of light and shadow over the sky and sea. Kyle sat on his exclusive "observation deck"—the edge of a towering cliff, overlooking the boundless blue waves.
The fatigue from intense exercise arrived as expected, a strange satisfaction mixed with the soreness.
This meant he had lived another day, pushing his limits just a little further.
Kyle subconsciously flexed his arm, a solid biceps bulging, completely disproportionate to his slender frame. These muscles were truly built through hard training, not something a certain pointy-headed gentleman could claim to have!
"Homelander? No, no, I don't eat beef." Kyle muttered, "Bad news from the fitness world: Six-year-old Superman lifts weights online with the power of Nine Dragons!"
These slightly mischievous fantasies were his antidote to loneliness; in the day-to-day monotony of survival, one had to find some fun, didn't he?
But beneath these jokes, there was also confusion about his own body. His growth rate, his strength, his recovery ability—none of it seemed like what a normal human child should have.
Even if the food on this island was "unique" and the environment "survival of the fittest," it shouldn't have catalyzed him into his current state, right?
The last ray of sunset completely sank below the horizon. In the night sky, scattered cold stars began to twinkle.
Kyle stretched, preparing to return to his simple but safe cave.
As night deepened, the waves gently lapped the sand, making rhythmic "whooshing" sounds, occasionally interspersed with the chirps of unknown night insects.
Kyle lay in the depths of the cave, beneath him several layers of dried broad leaves, barely qualifying as a "bed."
Normally, after a full day of high-intensity physical exertion, he would almost fall into a dead sleep the moment his head touched the "pillow." But tonight, it was unusual.
Disordered thoughts, like a receding tide on a beach, brought up all sorts of miscellaneous ideas and images.
The jungle's shadows, the ocean's vastness, those bizarre yet real creatures… and that damned white fruit whose taste was comparable to a pile of excrement.
That taste… Kyle couldn't help but shiver at the thought, his stomach subtly churning again.
But what tormented him was not just the torturous taste, but also the patterns on the fruit's skin. Circle after circle, like ripples spreading out in concentric spirals.
Spiral patterns…
He seemed to have seen this unique pattern somewhere before?
Like a broken jigsaw puzzle, the most crucial piece remained hidden behind a mist of memory, faintly visible, making him itch with impatience and a strange sense of irritation.
Wait!
Spiral patterns? Extremely unpalatable?
A lightning bolt, without warning, struck his mind, dispelling all the mist!
A long-buried, yet incredibly vivid memory, surged forth like a floodgate opening.
That was a memory from his past life, a bizarre and fantastical world, full of passionate adventures, fierce battles, pirates of various personalities, Marines who swore to defend justice, and… a fruit with magical powers.
Those fruits usually had unique spiral patterns. They could grant the eaters various incredible superpowers, but as a price, the eaters would be hated by the sea, becoming landlubbers, and the most widely known and memorable point—they tasted as if all the world's most unpalatable things were mixed together, then concentrated eighty-one times!
Devil Fruit!
Kyle, on the verge of death, sat up abruptly, his eyes wide in the dark cave.
Spiral patterns… an appalling taste… and his own body, which even before eating that suspected "Devil Fruit," had already shown extraordinary strength and recovery speed… all of this, reflected against the concept of "Devil Fruit," seemed so… logical, yet so unbelievable!
Countless clues were strung together like scattered pearls.
The large, strange creatures on this island; this boundless, seemingly endless ocean; and that subtle sense of incongruity he had always felt—this world seemed to follow a set of physical laws and power systems completely different from what he knew.
He recalled the scene when he first transmigrated, that sudden shipwreck, the vague memory fragments of his original body… a world full of endless oceans and countless islands…
"Damn it… it's a Devil Fruit!" This sentence was practically squeezed from between his teeth, carrying an uncontrollable tremor and a hint of excitement he hadn't even realized.
"Here…" His voice was as faint as a mosquito's buzz, yet it carried the absurdity of "destiny."
"This… is the world of One Piece!"