Although it had only been three days, Kaya's physical condition had already improved drastically—so much so that she now far surpassed the average person in strength and resilience. Naturally, the problems that once plagued her body were no longer an issue.
When Luo Lan asked what she wanted to study next, her answer caught him slightly off guard.
He had originally assumed Kaya would want to pursue medicine and become a doctor one day. But perhaps, due to missing out on the two years of suffering she experienced in the original timeline, or because she now fully understood the root of her illness, her perspective had shifted.
She said she wanted to study knowledge—specifically, the mysteries of the human body.
Well, that still had something to do with medicine, but it wasn't limited to it.
In fact, there was now another profession that seemed even more fitting for her.
That profession was…
---
"Luo Lan! You bastard, I'm gonna kill you!!"
No sooner had Luo Lan stepped out of the hospital than a furious voice rang out.
He didn't even need to look.
Of course, it was baby5.
After all, this woman had made a daily routine of ambushing him.
And the reasons were always absurd.
For example, she once got mad because he had kept Ian in a meeting all the way into the afternoon, not letting him go home.
Another time she raged, "You actually make Ian work over ten hours a day?! From now on, it must be reduced to one hour!"
Basically, baby5 couldn't stand Luo Lan no matter what he did.
And whenever she got upset, she'd attack him.
Though…
She always failed.
Dodging her latest sneak attack with practiced ease, Luo Lan sighed. "Okay, what's the reason this time?"
"You forcibly separated a pair of newlyweds for an entire month and you ask why?!" baby5 snapped, attacking again.
Ah, so it was about what happened earlier this morning.
Luo Lan was thoroughly speechless.
"Alright, I'll make you a deal. You answer one question for me, and I'll let you accompany Ian."
"Really?!"
Her six-barreled Gatling gun arm instantly reverted to normal in under a second. Her face lit up with joy.
"Of course it's true."
"Alright! Ask away—whatever it is, I promise to answer!"
"It's nothing difficult," Luo Lan replied. "I just want to ask you something."
"About life paper…"
"I know that already! Didn't you ask me this before we came back to Branch 157? I told you I don't have any!" she interrupted before he could finish.
"I'm not asking if you have life paper—I want to know how it's made."
To be honest, even though Luo Lan was a transmigrator, he still had no idea how life paper was created. After all, the original One Piece plot never explained it.
All he knew was that it involved fingernails and some mysterious materials.
"Oh, that? Yeah, I've heard about it. Apparently, in the New World, there's a special type of tree. If you use its wood along with a person's fingernails, you can combine them to make life paper."
"And the reason fingernails are used instead of other body parts is because..."
"Other materials mess with the paper-making process."
So that's the reason, huh?
Well, it did make sense.
Just like you wouldn't toss a slab of meat into the pulp when making regular paper—of course that wouldn't work.
But grinding fingernails into powder and mixing it in? That's fine, apparently.
If Luo Lan was understanding correctly, that was probably how it worked.
Still…
"If the process is that straightforward, why is it that only the powerful seem to possess life paper in the New World?" he asked.
Because in the original story, every person with life paper was a strong individual.
And supposedly, all it took was fingernails and a visit to a specialty shop to get one made.
Which meant the materials and method weren't particularly rare.
So why did only elite fighters have them?
"Isn't it obvious?" baby5 said. "Life paper is essentially a way to lock onto a person's life force via Conqueror's Haki. In other words, if someone hasn't awakened Haki, they can't have life paper made."
"Haki… So that's the key!"
Now it made perfect sense to Luo Lan.
That's why everyone who had life paper in the original story was a powerful individual.
Of course—how many weaklings could awaken Haki?
And that probably explained why baby5 didn't have any life paper of her own—she hadn't awakened Haki.
"Let me confirm: if you haven't awakened Haki, you definitely can't have life paper, right?"
"Definitely! ...Although," she added, "maybe not entirely."
Luo Lan was speechless.
You could've said that before I made a whole conclusion!
"I once overheard Doflamingo say that, if you're willing to pay a heavy price, even someone without Haki can have life paper made."
"But the price… is something ordinary people could never afford. Supposedly, at least a billion Berries!"
"As for whether that's true, and how it actually works—I've got no clue!"
Luo Lan nodded thoughtfully.
That was valuable information… though not critical.
At least now he knew the standard way to produce life paper.
Turns out the difficulty wasn't in the method, but in the materials.
Specifically, that special tree only found in the New World.
Unfortunately, baby5 had no idea where that tree grew. In fact, it seemed like no one did.
Only certain specialized shops had access to it, and occasionally, minuscule quantities of the material would pop up on the black market—at astronomical prices.
Aside from that, there were no other options.
Why was Luo Lan so interested in life paper?
The reason was simple.
Used properly, it was basically a form of black-tech GPS!
And not just any GPS—target-locked and pinpoint accurate.
Imagine getting ahold of someone's fingernail, producing a batch of guided missiles, and then—
It didn't matter where they ran. You'd just launch the missiles.
Boom. Zero margin of error.
Of course, this was just Luo Lan's fantasy. Whether it could actually work would depend on what Seras could come up with in research.
But without the tree material, there was nothing to research in the first place...
"Alright, Luo Lan. Anything else you want to ask? If not, I'm going with Ian tomorrow!"
"Fine, fine. The two of you go wreak havoc on Smoker. Better him than me!"
He waved her off irritably.
But baby5 just skipped away happily, beaming.
"Even though baby5 doesn't know where to find the tree... I bet the World Government or the Navy does," Luo Lan muttered, gazing up at the sky.
A storm of complicated thoughts swirled in his mind.
---
A/N: If you want an early updates, you can visit my Ko-Fi as I update there much early.
Currently at Chapter 78 for free chapters on my Ko-Fi and at Chapter 280 for advance chapters.
https:// ko-fi.com/sami27