After his physical training hit a bottleneck, the growth of Bellamy's Armament Haki also began to slow down. This was an inevitable outcome; no power could maintain such a high-speed growth state indefinitely. By forcing his body to a point where it could no longer advance, Bellamy had already saved an untold amount of time and effort.
Haki was a unique form of energy that could only be polished step by step over time. With his current physique, the amount of Haki he could refine each day was at least ten times what it was before he arrived on the island. This was one of the main reasons he was willing to overdraft his own life and potential to push his physical limits so desperately.
Improving Haki was the most time-consuming process. The strongest fighters typically reached the peak of their Haki mastery around the age of forty. Were these powerhouses not strong enough? Was their talent lacking? Of course not.
Bellamy had done the math himself. He was only twenty years old. At his current rate of improvement, it would take about twenty more years for his two forms of Haki to reach a state of overflow—a point where they could advance no further.
But that was twenty years! After two decades, would he still have the same drive he had now? Even Bellamy couldn't be sure.
So, could Haki training be accelerated? This was a question he had been pondering for a long time. His Observation Haki had taken a massive leap forward through a stroke of luck, surpassing that of many old pirates who had trained diligently for decades. But the conclusion Bellamy ultimately reached was: almost certainly not. Such a fortunate encounter was impossible to replicate. The sea was too vast, and it held too many hidden secrets. The information Bellamy knew and could confirm was not even a drop in the ocean. The probability of encountering a similar event that just so happened to enhance his Haki was practically zero.
When one path was blocked, Bellamy naturally considered others. The one he was most likely to achieve, and the one he hoped for the most, was Devil Fruit Awakening!
What abilities would the Spring-Spring Fruit have after awakening?
There was almost no answer to this question. Bellamy was fairly certain that he was the strongest user of the Spring-Spring Fruit in its entire history. No exceptions. This was evident from the Five Elders' dismissiveness of him and the Marines' lax attitude. The Spring-Spring Fruit had virtually no presence in the world. Before Bellamy, it was a useless fruit that the Devil Fruit encyclopedias couldn't even be bothered to record.
No one but Bellamy himself could figure out what abilities the Spring-Spring Fruit would gain upon awakening. He was the person closest to this secret.
And, of course, Bellamy had plenty of his own theories about his ultimate ability.
For example, assimilation. This was one of the most common abilities for an awakened Paramecia. He could assimilate his surroundings, turning everything enveloped by his power—soil, air, vegetation—into springs. This ability had numerous potential applications. Just turning the air into springs would allow Bellamy to develop a super-powerful ability: an "Air Spring."
Assimilating the ground would be even more brutal. Imagine compressing an entire island and then launching it in an instant. The spectacle would be second only to the Float-Float Fruit.
But these weren't the abilities Bellamy truly wanted. The Air Spring was somewhat redundant with his body compression techniques—he was already incredibly durable and didn't need to push further in that direction. And while launching an island at someone was a grand spectacle with terrifying destructive power, it would be largely useless against the true top-tier fighters. Which of the Four Emperors or Three Admirals couldn't fly? Trying to kill them by throwing islands was just a fool's dream.
The ability Bellamy hoped for most was closely related to Haki. He hoped that after his fruit awakened, he would gain the ability to store Haki.
That's right. Bellamy wanted to capture Haki energy, wind it up like a clockwork spring, and store it within his body. If such an ability could be realized, Bellamy himself could hardly imagine how strong he would become. As long as he prepared in advance, he could essentially become a perpetual motion machine for an extended period. Inexhaustible stamina, endless Haki, fighting for dozens of days without sleep or rest.
Could Kaido, the so-called immortal monster, do that? Could Big Mom, born with the constitution of a giant king, do that? Bellamy didn't know, but he thought it was unlikely. Even if they were monsters, they couldn't go for dozens of days without sleep or food. The stronger the physique, the more energy required to sustain it. This was a law of nature that no one could change.
Of course, Bellamy couldn't defy this law either. He would simply be compressing the energy his body needed in advance, ready to be used whenever he wanted. This seemingly simple ability would have an almost incalculable impact in battle. If Bellamy were shameless enough, he could wear down a whole host of powerful opponents through sheer attrition.
To capture Haki, he would undoubtedly need a thorough understanding of this energy. This was a necessary condition, whether his fruit was awakened or not. But so far, Bellamy's knowledge of Haki was still very superficial. He didn't even know the specific principles behind this special energy—why it appeared and why it disappeared. Haki was simply too mysterious, a unique energy system of this world.
Perhaps in the World Government's secret research facilities, one could find a wealth of research data on Haki. But if you were to ask who in the world understood Haki the best, it would undoubtedly be Vegapunk. If Bellamy could find Vegapunk and ask him in person, he might be able to uncover all the secrets of Haki.
And now, Bellamy had earned the right to do so. If he could find the Marine Science Unit's deep-sea research institute, it wasn't entirely impossible for him to meet Vegapunk personally. Kizaru couldn't be squatting in the lab 24/7. If Bellamy planned it carefully, he'd have a fifty-fifty chance of success.
Of course, if he actually did it, the Five Elders would go insane.
But without finding Vegapunk, conducting his own in-depth research on Haki would be even more difficult for Bellamy than breaking through his physical bottleneck. Research was a completely different beast from training and fighting. Without a transcendent intellect, it was impossible to thoroughly study such a special form of energy.
And so, a plan to meet Vegapunk was placed on Bellamy's agenda, scheduled for after his trip to Dressrosa. As for the consequences of such a meeting, he couldn't be bothered to think about them. Fearing this and that had never been Bellamy's style.