Dragon Rising - 1

"This is amazing!" Kaden whooped in joy ten minutes later as he soared through the sky.

Dragons did not fly like a mere bird flapping their wings.

Dragons created clouds and ran through the sky as they pleased as if it were their garden to play in.

Orange clouds glinted around his clawed hands and feet as he tore through the sky, soaring higher and higher until he broke through the clouds themselves and hung there staring up at the giant, bright moon that shone down upon him.

It had taken a few minutes and a few tries to generate the flame clouds, but after he did, it was almost like second nature to him.

His heart thundered in his currently scaled chest and a whooping laughter left Kaden's throat. There was lightness to him he hadn't felt since he ended up in this world.

No…he'd never felt a lightness like this before.

"I get it now Luffy, I understand what you were on about all those times," a giggle left Kaden's maw filled with razor sharp teeth, "This is freedom isn't it? To have nothing chaining you down, to be able to go and do whatever you want. This is what you've always been about huh?"

All his life he'd been chained down. As an unloved orphan with nobody who cared for him. As a struggling orphan working multiple part time jobs and attending school to make something of himself. Then the oppressive weight he felt over himself the last few months after he ended up here and was practically jumping at shadows expecting monster pirates to burs tout of the woodwork and tear him apart, which only got worse when he found out the true origin of how he ended up here, where he felt like the whole world was against him somehow.

With this power though, he had broken his chains and all that tethered him down was now gone.

He could go anywhere he wanted now.

Do anything he wanted.

"…Mostly." Kaden grimaced. Even with this fruit it wasn't like he could fly off to Wano right now and stick it to Kaido and free all those poor people like Tama from the oppression they suffered under through Orochi's inept pathetic rule.

That disgusting freak.

"I could kill him pretty easily, he's trash…." Kaden mused, "One Blast Breath and he's gone for sure."

And if he remembered right, that buck toothed freaks fruit was based on a pineapple. Get in, snipe him in the face with a Blast Breath with a pineapple on hand and then fly away after getting his fruit.

It wouldn't do anything much for the people of Wano, but Yamato would refuse to be Shogun for sure still and then maybe somebody who actually cared about the people would come to power?

Kaden shook his head, "No, no that'd probably get me on Kaido's shit list," he snorted, if he got caught he was fucked, he was already gonna be a public enemy with marines, "It's a nice thought though, besides I've not even tried out the Blast Breath yet."

He cast a look above him, hanging onto the very sky itself between glittering orange clouds, before a grin formed over his large crimson red maw and he opened it wide, "BLAST BREATH!" he roared out with all his might.

A tiny puff of black smoke puffed into existence before fizzling away.

Kaden nodded, "Pretty impressive if I do say so myself!" he beamed at the pathetic little display.

After all, it was better than nothing.

If nothing else, he wanted to get the Blast Breath down before he moved on from Punk Hazard.

It would be perfect for taking out Smiley.

He originally just planned on throwing a few sticks of dynamite in, blowing the huge slime up and high tailing it out of the blast range when it exploded.

Now he could just Blast Breath from above, take it the fuck out and keep safe away from the blast range and with how decrepit the island was, he would definitely have the closest apples to where Smiley was and the fruit should reincarnate in one of his apples.

Granted, there were other things to work on. Like the azure dragon fruit allowed the user to generate lightning, wind and even ice attacks according to one of the games, not just fire. But the fire one was what he needed most right now.

Now to try again!

"BLAST BREATH!" Kaden roared, mouth opening wide and unleashing….another tiny puff of black smoke.

He was totally on the right path.

_____________________________________________

The next morning, Kaden awoke with a content sigh, eyes blinking open slowly he stared up at the ceiling of the alcove he had camped out in.

"Oh yeah…" he groaned, rolling over and snuggling into his bed for moment, "That was probably the best sleep I ever had."

His bed through the night?

None other than the soft, jiggly, luscious, snuggly, bouncy doughy vibrant orange flame cloud floating a few feet above the ground that he could produce now thanks to his shiny new devil fruit powers.

Flat out, his devil fruit was the best devil fruit in the history of ever, from this ability alone.

'Hmm?' he noticed something as well as he rolled over. He felt no pain at all. Sitting up, Kaden yawned as he felt across his body and stretched out a bit.

But…nope.

No pain at all.

Even without regeneration the recovery ability zoan users had was nothing to sneeze at, at all huh?

Smacking his lips, Kaden reached over to the large sack carrying all his possessions and pulled out a bottle of water.

He took a deep drink of it, before frowning as his stomach rumbled.

Loudly.

So loudly in fact it echoed audibly and sounded almost like a lion or some other big cat growling out loud.

…His stomach had never rumbled like that before, ever. Not in his last body, and not in this other either.

He was so god damn hungry he could eat a fucking Big Mom right now. not sexually though, because she was fucking ugly as sin.

But yeah he'd never felt this hungry before.