After repeatedly witnessing the various bizarre and mysterious techniques displayed by Lin Xuan, Admiral Aokiji had even lost his confidence in defeating Lin Xuan head-on and was now considering a sneak attack.
Of course, if he were to ambush Lin Xuan, he would inevitably have to face the consequences of three Celestial Dragons dying.
However, in Aokiji's view, if he could eliminate a major threat like Lin Xuan for the Marines and the World Government, sacrificing three Celestial Dragons would be worth it! Even if he were to suffer severe punishment afterward, he believed it would be justified!
But just as he steeled himself for this self-sacrifice, he noticed that both Uchiha Madara and Senju Hashirama were staring at him calmly, their eyes clearly filled with vigilance.
Aokiji had no doubt that the slightest suspicious move on his part would provoke a joint attack from Uchiha Madara and Senju Hashirama!
He couldn't understand why two such powerful individuals were so unquestioningly loyal to Lin Xuan.
What he didn't know was that, with Lin Xuan deliberately withholding the true ending of the Naruto world's story, both Uchiha Madara and Senju Hashirama now regarded Lin Xuan as their world's only hope!
They were counting on Lin Xuan to help them resurrect the Sage of Six Paths and his brother via the Impure World Reincarnation to deal with Kaguya Ōtsutsuki. Moreover, they looked forward to Lin Xuan taking them to explore even more worlds in the future. How could they possibly let anything happen to him now?
In fact, Master Roshi was in a similar position, though he didn't yet understand the exact relationship between Aokiji and Lin Xuan, which was why he hadn't been wary of Aokiji.
As for Lin Xuan, he was completely immersed in his training, oblivious to the outside world—or rather, he was lost in the exhilaration of his rapidly growing power.
Following the breathing techniques of the Turtle Hermit School as taught by Master Roshi, combined with various exercises, he was essentially absorbing "ki."
However, what Lin Xuan was absorbing wasn't ordinary ki but the far more volatile energy of lightning—which, in his case, worked even better.
Of course, this didn't mean others could replicate his method. Without the ability to refine lightning energy, attempting this would be pure suicide.
After all, Lin Xuan had spent 50 million reputation points to acquire the necessary tools, and even then, he needed Sage Mode to pull it off.
Naturally, he now felt this expenditure was entirely worth it, as his power was skyrocketing at a rate a hundred times faster than before during this training session!
As a result, once he started, he couldn't stop.
Uchiha Madara and Senju Hashirama stood guard over him, shielding him from outside interference while continuing their own studies of this world's three types of Haki.
Then, the worst-case scenario Aokiji had feared came to pass:
Uchiha Madara awakened Conqueror's Haki!
In truth, ever since witnessing Silvers Rayleigh's Conqueror's Haki on Sabaody Archipelago, Madara had been deeply intrigued. However, he hadn't encountered anyone else with this ability since then, leaving him no opportunity for further study.
Now, with Senju Hashirama having mastered it first, and driven by his competitive spirit, Madara dragged Hashirama into joint research—even coercing Aokiji into helping—until he, too, successfully awakened Conqueror's Haki!
Aokiji felt utterly disheartened and couldn't help but worry about the Marines' upcoming battle against Lin Xuan's group.
When he saw that, after mastering Conqueror's Haki, Madara and Hashirama had turned their attention to Observation Haki, Aokiji didn't hesitate—he fled immediately!
He had no intention of accidentally enabling those two to master Observation Haki as well.
Master Roshi and old man Gan Fall had actually left even before Aokiji.
Since Lin Xuan seemed occupied for the time being, Roshi decided to explore the wonders of Skypiea, particularly its beautiful female angels.
Gan Fall, meanwhile, needed to stabilize Skypiea's situation and prevent chaos.
Perhaps because both Roshi and Gan Fall were elderly, they hit it off immediately. Gan Fall warmly hosted Roshi, while Roshi assisted Gan Fall in reclaiming his position as "God."
Under their arrangements, Skypiea's residents gradually returned to Upper Yard. Moreover, just like in the original storyline, Gan Fall and the Shandians reconciled, accepting each other as part of the same community.
The entire Upper Yard was now filled with celebration, rejoicing in the end of Enel's tyrannical rule and the Shandians' official integration into Skypiea!
The only disappointment was that, despite scouring all of Upper Yard, the Shandians couldn't find the Golden Bell they had been searching for, leaving them deeply disheartened.
Five full days later, after exhausting all the lightning energy extracted from Enel, Lin Xuan reluctantly ended his training session.
Assessing his current physical condition, he was astonished to find that his strength had doubled. If not for running out of Enel's lightning energy, he could have kept training indefinitely!
In fact, he even felt the urge to chase Enel into space and drag him back to continue supplying lightning energy!
Once his training concluded, Lin Xuan began pondering a new idea:
"If I use the Impure World Reincarnation to bring Minato Namikaze back, extract the Nine-Tails' chakra from him, could I cultivate a Tailed Beast in this world? Then use the Tailed Beast to provide me with an endless supply of energy for training?"
When he shared this thought with Uchiha Madara and Senju Hashirama, both were momentarily stunned.
But soon, their eyes lit up with excitement.
Uchiha Madara said, "That doesn't sound impossible!" He was practically itching to try it out immediately.
Senju Hashirama was equally enthusiastic.
However, Lin Xuan wasn't about to spend more reputation points to buy Minato's DNA. This experiment would have to wait until after he helped resolve the Ninja World War and obtained Minato's DNA for free.
Besides, timing-wise, it was almost about to happen!
Glancing at his reputation points balance, Lin Xuan saw that over the past five days, he had accumulated another 20 million points.
Adding this to the 70 million he had previously spent, he was just a few million short of reaching 100 million!
Excited, he prepared to stir up some more trouble to push past the final hurdle!
"Has anything noteworthy happened recently?" Lin Xuan asked Uchiha Madara and Senju Hashirama.
When he heard that Skypiea's citizens and the Shandians were still searching everywhere for the Golden Bell, Lin Xuan couldn't help but smirk.
"Looks like the last few million reputation points are within reach!"
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T/N:
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