After crushing the Yonko Kaido and demonstrating a host of bizarre abilities, Luffy’s Gear 5 has become the most “ridiculous” power in One Piece history.
Toward the end of the Wano arc, Luffy successfully awakened his Devil Fruit. In Chapter 1044, the Five Elders revealed that Luffy had actually eaten the Mythical Zoan Devil Fruit known as the Hito Hito no Mi, Model: Nika. This Devil Fruit possesses an extraordinarily powerful ability that the World Government has spent centuries trying to obtain, only to fail every time.
After its full awakening, the Devil Fruit was immediately labeled the most “ridiculous” power ever to exist, granting Luffy unprecedented abilities that astonished the entire world.
1. Turning Everything Around Him Into Rubber
One of the most fascinating aspects of Luffy’s Devil Fruit is its ability to turn everything around him into rubber. Normally, this is a characteristic of awakened Paramecia-type Devil Fruits. For example, Doflamingo can turn his surroundings into strings, while Katakuri can transform everything around him into mochi. However, despite being a Zoan user, Luffy can also display awakening abilities similar to those of Paramecia-type Devil Fruits.
The reason behind this remains unexplained, and even the Yonko Kaido was astonished by it. In fact, Luffy takes this ability to another level by changing the properties of living creatures, as demonstrated when he used it against Kaido himself. No one had previously shown the ability to apply an awakening effect to the body of a living person in this way.
2. Granting Its User an Overpowered Transformation
As a Mythical Zoan Devil Fruit, its awakening grants the user an exceptionally powerful transformation. According to Kaido, all users of awakened Zoan-type Devil Fruits acquire a special form. Luffy demonstrated this when he achieved an entirely white appearance, widely known among fans as Gear 5.
In this state, Luffy experiences an enormous increase in power, allowing him to fight the Yonko Kaido on equal terms and ultimately defeat him in a life-or-death battle. The mere fact that he defeated the “World’s Strongest Creature” is enough to establish this ability as an extraordinarily overpowered and “ridiculous” power.
3. Instantly Transforming His Body Into a Giant
The rubbery nature of Luffy’s body allows him to change his shape freely. Unlike the days when he had to painstakingly inflate his body to activate Gear 3, Luffy in Gear 5 could transform into an actual giant within seconds during the battle on Onigashima.
His body was even much larger than that of an ordinary giant, towering over Kaido’s already enormous dragon form. Luffy also used this gigantic form in Elbaf.
4. Turning the User Into a Walking Natural Disaster
The Hito Hito no Mi, Model: Nika is “ridiculous” in many different ways. It does not merely affect the surrounding environment and nearby people; it can also turn Luffy into a walking natural disaster. Luffy can transform everything around him into rubber, including natural phenomena.
While airborne, Luffy can apparently give a violent thunderstorm rubber-like properties and manipulate it at will. By the same logic, it is possible that he could impose similar properties on other natural disasters and control them as he pleases.
5. Granting the Power to Flatten Entire Islands
The Nika Devil Fruit also gives Luffy the ability to unleash enough destructive force to devastate an entire island. At the end of his battle with Kaido, Luffy unleashed his full potential to bring down the Yonko. After ascending into the air, he created a fist as large as Onigashima itself, coating it with both Armament Haki and Conqueror’s Haki.
The fist was so enormous that Luffy had to ask Momonosuke to move Onigashima out of the way before he delivered the devastating blow to Kaido. Although the Yonko attempted to counter the attack using his most powerful transformation, he was still unable to withstand the overwhelming force of the Hito Hito no Mi, Model: Nika.
6. Bringing Things Into Existence Through Imagination
Another “ridiculous” ability granted by the Hito Hito no Mi, Model: Nika is the apparent power to create objects out of thin air. This was recently demonstrated during the Egghead Island arc when Luffy fought Rob Lucci. In the middle of the battle, Luffy somehow produced a pair of goggles from a lock of his cloud-like hair and used them to land a precise blow on his opponent.
He did something similar while fighting the Five Elders. Later, in Elbaf, he continued to demonstrate bizarre abilities, including transforming into a genie-like figure. The exact mechanics behind these powers remain unexplained, but they suggest that almost anything Luffy can imagine might become reality through this extraordinary ability.
7. The Only Limit Is the User’s Imagination
The Nika Devil Fruit appears to be limited only by Luffy’s imagination. Its potential could be significantly reduced in the hands of someone who lacks creativity, but it could become virtually unrivaled when wielded by someone with an exceptionally vivid imagination. There seems to be almost nothing this Devil Fruit cannot do, making it one of the most “ridiculous” powers ever seen in the world of One Piece.
Although it may not be the absolute strongest power in a purely literal sense, in the hands of someone like Luffy, who constantly discovers unusual and creative ways to use it, the Nika Devil Fruit is more than capable of standing alongside the most formidable abilities in the series.
Sources: gamek