It was a damn shame that Kaido, of all people, had taught Straw Hat Luffy the secrets of Conqueror's Haki coating and Devil Fruit Awakening like he was pouring water into a cup—freely and without reservation. Every conversation they had, Kaido practically handed out top-tier knowledge like candy.
Brook couldn't help but envy that. He wished he had a teacher like Kaido, someone willing to pour wisdom into him too. Instead, he was stuck with those two bastards, Diger and Rocks—completely useless as mentors. Especially Diger. Even when Saracha, his own comrade, asked him openly to teach, the guy flat-out refused. No ethics at all.
Kaido, though? He taught his enemy that kind of power. That's what a real teacher looks like.
The Beasts Pirates were a monster crew: Kaido himself, the powerhouse emperor, and the three top dogs—King, Queen the Plague, and Jack the Drought. Every one of them had awakened their Zoan Devil Fruits.
If even Jack—the youngest of the trio—had awakened his Ancient Zoan Mammoth Fruit, then there was no way in hell Queen and King hadn't awakened theirs too. Especially Queen. The guy could shoot out a freakin' snake-dragon neck and had cyborg upgrades built into his body without needing external transformation gear. That kind of biological manipulation? It had to be supported by awakened regeneration.
Queen carried all the combat tech of Germa 66 in his body—no raid suit required. It was all fully integrated.
Then there was King, Kaido's first crewmate from the lab days. If Kaido figured out how to awaken Zoans, King was no doubt the first to learn. Kaido didn't earn the title "Teacher Kaido" for nothing.
Jack, at just 28, earned his title as one of the top three after awakening his fruit. But among the Flying Six, no one took Jack seriously—not Foz-F, not Sasaki. Maybe it was because Jack's sudden rise came purely from awakening. No years of seniority, no respect. Just raw power.
---
That's why Brook couldn't rule out the possibility that Golden Lion Shiki might suddenly awaken his Float-Float Fruit during battle with Jack Sparrow. Under enough pressure—and with enough pride to refuse to lose—awakening could come in an instant.
Just look at Luffy. He awakened the Human-Human Fruit, Model: Nika at 19. Got beaten within an inch of his life in Wano. Passed out mid-fight and had to be protected by his crew. Then bam—awakened, stood up with new energy from who-knows-where, and took down Kaido.
Then there's Eustass Kid. Handcuffed with seastone for a year or two in Udon, no training with his Magnet-Magnet Fruit. But after escaping with Luffy, he awakened his fruit in just a few days and helped take down Big Mom.
Trafalgar Law? Dude got stomped by Doflamingo in Dressrosa—had his hand crushed. But just months later, in Wano, he awakened the Op-Op Fruit too, and went toe-to-toe with Big Mom alongside Kid. And just like that, the two of them knocked her into a volcano.
So yeah, Devil Fruit Awakening is damn mysterious. Kaido once said, "When your body, mind, and ability align—that's when a Devil Fruit awakens."
So if Shiki, during a desperate clash with Jack Sparrow, awakens his Float-Float Fruit… he might just pull off a miracle. A fully awakened Float-Float Fruit could allow him to make anything float—maybe even seawater. He could lift entire islands at will. The only things it couldn't affect were living beings.
Brook prayed that would happen. If Shiki awakened mid-battle, the Hell Pirates would gain a massive power boost. The strategic value of the Float-Float Fruit was insane. It could shift the balance of power across the whole New World.
Still, there was one concern: would Shiki get cocky again? Would he go rogue and try to form his own faction? Brook couldn't rule it out. But after the last Haki showdown last time Shiki seemed to look at him with true respect. He even called him "Brother Brook"—and it sounded sincere.
Instead of worrying about what others might do, Brook figured he should just focus on getting stronger. Power convinces everyone in the end.
That night, after dinner, Brook didn't go to spend time with Stussy. Instead, he climbed to the highest observation tower on the golden ship, staring at the moon in silence.
"If you're really conscious out there," Brook whispered, summoning the Underworld Reaper—his soul's manifestation—"then awaken my Devil Fruit. Give me all your power. If you want something in return, just tell me what it is!"
Logically, this reaper was part of his own spirit. If he wanted to awaken his fruit, he needed to align his body, mind, and soul. But how the hell did you do that?
Under the pale moonlight, Brook looked like a madman, talking to his own soul on the tower. If any crewmate had walked in on him, they'd have thought he'd lost it completely.
The Revive-Revive Fruit. Who the hell even came up with that name? It was said to let its user resurrect once after death. But after resurrection, Brook could still manipulate soul energy, freeze enemies with underworld frost, and even snatch souls. This was way beyond a "one-time resurrection" ability.
Could it be that Brook's soul had been contaminated with ghost energy from the Underworld itself? Was the fruit just a trigger? Or was he no longer even a Devil Fruit user at all?
He had no real answer.
So Brook rushed to the storage room, grabbed a pair of pure seastone cuffs, and clamped them on. He instantly felt weak.
"Still a Devil Fruit user, huh..." he muttered.
So the Revive-Revive Fruit was still inside him. Resurrection was just the passive trigger—the price of entry. Everything else came afterward.
Thinking back, he remembered Sabaody. When Luffy fell into the sea, both Chopper and Brook jumped in after him. But because of their fruits, they both lost strength and nearly drowned. That had been his proof all along.
Now, with the growing power of his crew's top fighters, Brook couldn't lie to himself. He was nervous.
"Devil of the Revive-Revive Fruit," he whispered, "If you really have a will of your own... then stop testing me. See me. Look at the strength of my spirit—my ambition!"
BOOM!
Brook's aura exploded.
His eyes turned blood-red. Crimson lightning crackled around him. The seastone box shattered. The golden ship trembled from the shockwave. Cracks split across the hull.
Crewmembers across the ship collapsed in fear. Down on O'Hara Island, people fell flat in shock. Even the four elite fighters on board stared wide-eyed at the source of the power surge.
Brook had finally taken a step into the unknown—into true awakening.
--------------------------
At this moment, Brook's pupils were no longer the deep blue they had been after his resurrection via the Revive-Revive Fruit. Instead, they burned a violent, blood-red hue. The cold blood in his body began to heat up, his pale skin slowly regaining its rosy tone.
Brook's will had completely overpowered the Revive-Revive Fruit. He had returned to a true state of resurrection—no longer an undead, but a living, breathing human being.
The Brook who once relied solely on underworld and ghost energy now radiated a fierce, domineering aura.
"You brought me back to life once, I'll give you that," Brook muttered coldly, addressing the fruit's power. "But you think you can turn me into your puppet? Make me fully dependent on your strength? Hell no."
He clenched his fist.
"Starting now—I'm the one in charge. I'll use the Revive-Revive Fruit's power only when I choose to!"
With a sharp breath, Brook drew the Seven Star Sword (Shichiseiken). His body, now fully restored, surged with life force. He coated the blade in Armament Haki and swung, releasing raw sword energy—stripped of any ghostly enhancement. Just pure, primal force.
For the longest time, Brook had assumed that his resurrection left him tied permanently to ghost and underworld energy. But now, he realized something that flipped everything upside down—his resurrection wasn't temporary. It was a passive trait of the Revive-Revive Fruit.
Even without tapping into its active powers, he was alive. Human.
He only came to this realization after touching seastone for the first time since his resurrection. When he felt his life force unaffected by its energy-canceling properties, he made the bold decision to stop using the Revive-Revive Fruit's power altogether—willing to risk death to find the truth.
And the truth hit hard.
He was alive. Truly alive.
"Hah… makes sense," Brook muttered. "Even Logia users can use Haki when they're in elemental form. There's no reason I shouldn't be able to use Armament or Observation while channeling ghost energy. The Revive-Revive Fruit was just too damn aggressive."
He thought back to Smoker and his Smoke-Smoke Fruit. Even in his smoke form, Smoker could punch with a hardened, Haki-infused fist that flew through the air.
If a Logia could pull that off, why couldn't he?
The more he thought about it, the clearer it became—the problem wasn't the Devil Fruit. It was him.
Back when he was stuck in Underworld, the realm of the dead, he'd absorbed way too much ghost and underworld energy. So much that, when he returned, his life force was completely drowned out by those dark energies.
Every move he used, every burst of strength, was tainted by ghostly power.
As he became more skilled with the Revive-Revive Fruit, Brook unknowingly reinforced that imbalance. He started relying on it like a crutch, not realizing he was suppressing his natural life force the entire time.
But once he awakened his Conqueror's Haki, something shifted. His willpower, his flesh and blood, his soul—they all came back into balance. He wasn't just a vessel of death anymore. He was human. Alive. Whole.
In the world of pirates, even flesh and hair carry willpower. The technique Life Return lets fighters channel their will into any body part—CP9's Kumadori used it to manipulate his hair like deadly tentacles.
That's when it hit him.
"Other people can switch off their fruit abilities at will… I just assumed mine was always on!"
He laughed bitterly. "This damn fruit's been hijacking my life for nearly two years…"
Turns out, the reason Brook had been stuck in his undead form for so long was simple—he'd absorbed way more underworld energy than he should have. It was like an animal-type Devil Fruit user staying in their full beast form for two straight years. Or a Logia user constantly remaining elemental.
That's just not normal.
Normally, using fruit powers costs stamina. But Brook had such an overload of stored energy from Underworld, he'd been running on a massive reserve—like an unlimited battery pack. He could activate all his techniques without draining his own body.
The downside? He never realized just how much he'd come to depend on it.
From now on, though? That reserve was running dry.
Without the Underworld energy buffer, Brook would need to power everything himself. That meant burning his own stamina to create ghost energy for his attacks—just like any normal Devil Fruit user.
And that explained something else—why he'd grown so fast in the early stages.
While the other four top fighters had to train and exhaust themselves, Brook had been cruising on Underworld energy fuel. He didn't need rest. He didn't need food. His strength skyrocketed.
But that era was over.
The cheat code was expiring.
"Guess it's time to man up," he muttered. "No one weak ever makes it to the top."
In the world of One Piece, that's the rule—using fruit powers drains stamina, and Haki can be used alongside them. The two don't clash.
Brook finally saw the whole picture.
All his complaints about the Revive-Revive Fruit stealing his life… were just nonsense.
It wasn't the fruit's fault. It was his. He'd absorbed so much dark energy in underworld that the fruit just did what it was designed to do—keep him in the undead state as long as he had fuel to burn.
And he did gain a ton from it. For over a year, he used ghost energy freely without even thinking. He'd complain about not being able to use Haki, but the truth? He didn't even need it with the sheer power he had.
At the start, though, he couldn't fully control the energy.
He had all this dense underworld power stored up, but his body was too weak to handle it properly. It was like being gifted hundreds of pounds of gold… but only being strong enough to chip off a few flakes at a time.
Looking back on his past self, he couldn't help but laugh.
He remembered the original Brook—drifting alone on a ghost ship, no food, no water, just a skeleton wasting away with a dying soul. That version of him probably never even had the stamina to generate ghost energy.
Meanwhile, he'd been walking around with infinite ammo from the start.
And yet, he'd spent so long fighting… nothing.
"I really was arguing with thin air," he said, a hand over his face.
He'd been furious at this invisible demon called the Revive-Revive Fruit. He shouted things like "I'm the master!" or "I use you when I want!" like he was in some dramatic shonen anime.
But in the end?
The fruit never talked back. It never resisted. It was just there—waiting for him to understand how it worked.
His awakening of Conqueror's Haki? That was born from misunderstanding. A paranoid burst of overwhelming willpower… against absolutely nothing.
"…So what does that make me?" he muttered. "The Emperor of Paranoia?"
He smirked.
"Doesn't matter. I'm awake now."
He clenched his fist and looked toward the sea.
"Thanks, Ainz Ooal Gown," he said with a grin. "Didn't know fighting the air could be so damn effective."
(TL: There You go the real reason why he can't use haki. I didn't expect this is the reason the heck hahahah)
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