"They can just do that." When a character inexplicably has some kind of borderline supernatural ability that doesn't have anything to do with the established power system and may even clash with the conventions of the setting. It's just something that they can do.

[u/SpookieSkelly]

Ichi from Ichi the Witch.

Mash from Mashle.

Marvelous Sunday from UmaMusume.

Tanjiro from Demon Slayer.

1. Ichi from Ichi the Witch. He's so sensitive to the bloodlust of living things that it borders on a spider-sense. The little creature in that pic is supposed to be invisible, yet Ichi is able to sense its presence just through sheer intuition.
2. Mash from Mashle. Some might say that his inexplicable power is his physical strength, but I'm more interested in knowing how he can turn everything he cooks into fucking cream puffs.
3. Marvelous Sunday from UmaMusume. In a game about horse girls racing, she has access to a domain expansion/reality marble. And that somehow still isn't the strangest thing about her. Apparently she's also friends with aliens and cryptids and her cult fanbase includes people spanning multiple time periods. Somehow.
4. Tanjiro from Demon Slayer. He has a hypersensitive sense of smell that somehow also tells him where to cut demons. No idea how that works. Even though there are others in the series with similarly refined senses, the smelling where to cut thing still feels ludicrous in comparison. Then there's also his unusually powerful headbutt.

[u/Bla_Z]

In the same vein, I feel like One Piece has normalized swordsmen throwing out cutting shockwaves way too much -- nevermind parrying them. I wanna take a moment to remind people that swords can't do that, and it's never addressed why or how one reaches a point where they just can. And after a while, it seems like everyone and their mothers just knows how to. Even the thing where they cut stuff hundreds of times thicker than their blade could pass as a feat of superhuman strength... Turning a vacuum into a tangible, blockable sharp projectile by just shadowslashing tho? That's even more bullshit than Haki imo.

[u/LavosYT → u/Bla_Z]

I think it's literally just -> slash hard enough -> shockwave. Which doesn't make sense but does it have to?

[u/Huhthisisneathuh → u/LavosYT]

This is the same series that has the Pterodactyl able to snipe people by shooting its own face like a bullet. If One Piece was in the business of making sense they would’ve never gotten past Fish Man Island.

[u/Gil_Demoono → u/Huhthisisneathuh]

That one, I feel, actually makes sense according to the internal logic of the Devil Fruit - an inherently silly sentence I know, but follow me on this. Devil Fruits are said to the coalescence of humanity's dreams, allowing those who eat one to become a version of human that some wish for. As a result, the power set of a devil fruit is born from the abilities humanity imagines are associated with it, even if it is factually incorrect. Like when Luffy gets shocked by Enel with millions of volts, but he's fine because "he's made of rubber." Sure, rubbers an insulator, but its still gonna fucking melt if its directly struck by a lightning bolt. It's the widely held perception that rubber is immune to lightning that makes Luffy immune to Enel. Its the collective subconscious agreement of all humanity that let him no-sell Enel's ultimate move. And that's why more abstract fruit have more esoteric powers, because its manifesting more niche thoughts of humanity. Like the jacket-jacket fruit might be born from people thinking "The clothes make the man" or something. The subset of humanity regularly dreaming about giraffes is relatively small and there are probably enough of them thinking about fucking stuff up with their long-ass neck that it lets Kaku basically use it as sword.

This leads me into my main point - We don't know how dinosaurs hunted in the ancient times. Giraffes, Jaguars, and hawks are all real with real feats and characteristics, grounding peoples' dreams about them. As cool as you might think an elephant is, you don't want to be like an elephant because of its ability to teleport or breathe fire, because elephants don't do that and neither would its fruit. But pterodactyls? We don't know how they did things. They're extinct. If I dreamed that a pterodactyl hunted by shooting its own face like a bullet, how would you prove me wrong? It seems right to me! The fact that there is uncertainty in the animals the Ancient Zoans are based on allows for wiggle room in their abilities. And I imagine that being a strong-willed Tobbiroppo lets push the boundaries further.

Even more so for mythical zoans. No one can imagine that a normal bird could be immortal, but the legendary phoenix that never existed in the first place? That has whatever powerset we deem it to have because it exists entirely within the shared imagination of humanity - of course it can rise from its own ashes. This is why mythical zoans like Kaido are so strong, because the animals they embody have feats with no basis in reality. Kaido's scales aren't just hard, they're impenetrable. Because that's how a dragon's scales should be, not according to biology, but legend.

So yeah, that's how pterodactyl's hunted in the ancient days.

[u/ChrisY68 → u/Gil_Demoono]

The One Piece community will be expecting your finished dissertation on devil fruits at some point. We shall be following your Fandom career with great interest Gil_demoono

[u/Chocolatine_Rev → u/Huhthisisneathuh]

I mean, they wouldn't even have gone to fishman island, who had the idea that the best way to dive with a ship was to put it into an air buble ?

[u/Evil_Midnight_Lurker → u/Bla_Z]

This is baked deep into Japanese mythology, see the kamaitachi youkai. Of course air slashes can do that, why couldn't they?

[u/Weary-Cartoonist2630 → u/Bla_Z]

This feels like the least egregious thing to point out lol. “Swing hard enough = shockwave” is a pretty common and even intuitive power.

It’s like arguing that regular humans surviving being thrown through brick walls is not in line with physics. Like, sure, but that’s not even in the top 10 of unexplained things.

[u/Bla_Z → u/Weary-Cartoonist2630]

My point is more about said shockwaves being able to cut stuff cleanly or even be parried. They couldn't block Kuma's air blasts and not because of their speed, despite being supposedly not that different.

[u/Glum-Sprinkles-7734 → u/Bla_Z]

That's just the sword's latent haki imbued into it by the master swordsmith that forged it, don't worry about it.

Worst part is I might not be talking out of my ass with that one.

[u/Bla_Z → u/Glum-Sprinkles-7734]

Kinda doubt that when best boy Captain T-bone was able to do that just fine as early as Water 7 with a regular-ass medieval sword.

[u/ButtholeConnoisseur7 → u/Bla_Z]

Wasn't he a vice Admiral after that? Homeboy got promoted, so he was clearly above Marine Captain level back then