A post-GM Taylor finds herself transported into the One Piece world. Despite all the differences in her new surroundings she quickly learns that things are far more similar than she thought possible. Ruthless villains, corrupt government, outlaws, and superpowers are still a thing, they are just no longer called PRT, villains, and capes but Marines, Pirates, and DF users.
Tsuchigumo [AU ; ALT-Power ; Crossover ; Worm/One Piece]
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Intro
Like probably most of you interested in One Piece Fandom, I find it hard to find some original and daring fanfiction since a lot of them have the premise to change a few things during the childhood of ASL, giving one of them a different Devil-Fruit, another sibling (in most cases an SI) or are trained in Rokushiki and or Haki at an early age. Unfortunately, those Butterflies more often than not don´t result in some hurricane, retreading canon in part word for word, either because those changes are never intended to make great waves or take time to evolve in full and the fic dies before getting anywhere near this point, leaving us (readers) with a bitter taste.
It doesn´t help in this case that there are next to no variations in most works regarding the Crew members, something understandable given that all of the Strawhats enjoy great popularity. Furthermore, most of them have an important occupation, with next to no canon replacements of the same skill-level existing. Which in turn makes it hard to replace any one of them. At best we see an expanded crew with some more or less new faces joining the Strawhats.
I´m fully aware doing something different given the inherent nature of One Piece – travel from one Island to next – is hard and therefore the main reason for only a small number of stories deviating from that path.
Since I believe there are already more than enough stories in existence doing exactly that and because of my love for Worm specifically for Taylor. I decided to go another route.
This story was greatly inspired by Sailing From Your Past written by TangentWalker
and therefore will be a Post GM Taylor (Isekai)-story, she is dumped into the One Piece world shortly after the death of Gol D. Roger. (Died Sept 1500) and started the Great Age of Pirates (GaoP)
Because I hate having to read thousands of words to even get an inkling in which direction a story develops and I´m someone who has trouble accepting certain things in specific fanfiction-worlds, which can result in me dropping said fic. This being especially bothersome and to my great dislike, in cases when something comes completely out of the left-field like the fact that you are reading a crossover and the first mentioning of aspects/elements of another world turn up somewhere past the 100K word threshold without any further warning or tag, such things are in my opinion more than just unfair for the reader.
Therefore here a few of the major plot-points I think some might have problems accepting them.
See Spoiler Tag: Please refrain from discussing any of the points mentioned unless they come up in the story some might not want to be spoilered – please keep to this rule or if you can´t abide by it or have something to say use spoiler tags, that would be greatly appreciated.
I´m gonna keep my comments to the thread to an absolute minimum to reduce the alerts you have to suffer in hopes of an unscheduled update (provided should someone be willing to follow this story in the first place), but I promise I will read every comment and will most likely answer things in bulk on Sundays whenever I post a new chapter.
This story will be crossposted on Spacebattles and Fanfiction.net
Furthermore, since I´m no native speaker of the English language I would appreciate it if somebody would be willing to beta-read/edit my stuff to give it at least the semblance of readability.
It doesn´t help in this case that there are next to no variations in most works regarding the Crew members, something understandable given that all of the Strawhats enjoy great popularity. Furthermore, most of them have an important occupation, with next to no canon replacements of the same skill-level existing. Which in turn makes it hard to replace any one of them. At best we see an expanded crew with some more or less new faces joining the Strawhats.
I´m fully aware doing something different given the inherent nature of One Piece – travel from one Island to next – is hard and therefore the main reason for only a small number of stories deviating from that path.
Since I believe there are already more than enough stories in existence doing exactly that and because of my love for Worm specifically for Taylor. I decided to go another route.
This story was greatly inspired by Sailing From Your Past written by TangentWalker
and therefore will be a Post GM Taylor (Isekai)-story, she is dumped into the One Piece world shortly after the death of Gol D. Roger. (Died Sept 1500) and started the Great Age of Pirates (GaoP)
Worm is the property of Wildbow
One Piece is the property of Eiichiro Oda
One Piece is the property of Eiichiro Oda
Because I hate having to read thousands of words to even get an inkling in which direction a story develops and I´m someone who has trouble accepting certain things in specific fanfiction-worlds, which can result in me dropping said fic. This being especially bothersome and to my great dislike, in cases when something comes completely out of the left-field like the fact that you are reading a crossover and the first mentioning of aspects/elements of another world turn up somewhere past the 100K word threshold without any further warning or tag, such things are in my opinion more than just unfair for the reader.
Therefore here a few of the major plot-points I think some might have problems accepting them.
See Spoiler Tag: Please refrain from discussing any of the points mentioned unless they come up in the story some might not want to be spoilered – please keep to this rule or if you can´t abide by it or have something to say use spoiler tags, that would be greatly appreciated.
- Taylor is a Devil Fruit user – (Mythical Zoan – Spider Queen/Arachne)
- Taylor posses Haoushoki Haki ( how could she not )
- She for the most part retains an ability similar to her canon powers (with added benefits)
- Her middle name is most likely going to change to something starting with a D.
- Taylor and Brian never were together in worm (AU-element)
I never was a fan of how they got together and the form their relationship took – viewed in a positive light it always felt like some kind of bandaid for keeping Brian sane, in a negative light it can be constructed as Taylor taking advantage of him at his lowest ... using the only chance she ever had at a relationship with him ... (the truth most likely is somewhere in the middle – - Taylor will have an all-female Crew;
Should I decide for there to be any kind of pairing (which atm I don´t) it will be with a girl or girls.
I´m aware this might incite the whole straight/lesbian argument anew (it has been discussed to death and aside from WoG (and her outright stating it in her thoughts) there are a lot of insinuations that could be interpreted to point more for Taylor being a lesbian or being B than straight ) ... might be because the story is written by a man ...
in regards to this, my mind is made up - - Taylor will at one point be a Shichibukai atm I´m not sure if she is gonna keep that title... probably not.
- This story will have time-travel elements in the form of some kind of Bermuda Triangle effect ...
- Resulting in her having one Strawhat Crew member... (will be pretty much revealed in on of the first chapters who I´m talking about) for the most part, the rest of her crew members will be canon characters
with atm 3 OC mixed in – who all have ties to known characters of some kind. - I will change the devil fruits of some chars joining her, which in some cases means character from One Piece canon won´t have them ... or different fruits.
- This also means Taylor will meet no small amount of characters, years even decades before they were introduced in One Piece canon, for the most part when those characters are still children. Since most didn´t go through their life-altering experiences at that point I will take some liberties with developing their personality demeanor and nature ... which means in some cases they might not be recognizable and there might even be a large difference to their One Piece canon counter-parts.
I´m gonna keep my comments to the thread to an absolute minimum to reduce the alerts you have to suffer in hopes of an unscheduled update (provided should someone be willing to follow this story in the first place), but I promise I will read every comment and will most likely answer things in bulk on Sundays whenever I post a new chapter.
This story will be crossposted on Spacebattles and Fanfiction.net
Furthermore, since I´m no native speaker of the English language I would appreciate it if somebody would be willing to beta-read/edit my stuff to give it at least the semblance of readability.
Last edited:
Chapter 01 - A new start
This chapter was edited by Zcuron and creativeProcastinator.
Chapter 01: A new start (Spring 1504 – a little over 3 years since the start of GAoP)
I woke up with a start, heart racing. The last thing I remembered was being shot in the head, twice. It took me a while to calm down.
I instinctively reached for the point I had felt them impacting on the back of my head. I expected to find two bullet holes, or at least blood in my hair, but found neither.
It was only after I was finished inspecting the back of my head that I registered that the arm I used shouldn't be there be either. I clearly remember how I lost it and let Lung cauterize what was left of it. I stared, puzzled at my restored limb, trying my hardest to recall what happened.
With all that transpired during Scions rampage and the end of the world looming around the corner. I thought the time of the few healers still around was better spent supporting the ones with powers able to have an impact.
Which is why I never bothered to have my arm restored.
Not that I needed it restored for me to exercise my power. As a master, I could be reduced to a brain in a jar, and it wouldn't have made a difference where my power was concerned.
But feeling powerless once more was probably the one moment, where I came the closest to hating my powers. I thought those times in which I couldn't do anything, forced to just take it lying down, were over and done with when I triggered, despite my initial apprehension when it came to my specific power-set; controlling bugs not being the stuff of legends at first glance. It took me a while to recognize how great and versatile they truly were.
Having to watch from the sidelines as humanity fought for survival when the only thing I wanted was to participate; to do my part no matter how small was the hardest thing in my life.
It was in those moments I found my power left much to be desired, leaving me helpless while all around me countless people were being slaughtered.
The forced inaction nearly drove me mad, until I saw a way to do what had to be done.
While forming that thought, I was suddenly hit with the memories I had suppressed. I remembered how I got Amy to attempt to change my power. She succeeded in widening and shifting what it was able of controlling.
But that came with repercussions of its own. The range of my power was greatly reduced, and in some way, the connection between my passenger and I was ripped open.
The filter, the very walls erected to prevent one from having too much influence over the other were torn down, and my mind started to bleed into my passenger and vice versa. We started to become one, my passenger and I. But my passenger was so vast that what little there was of me paled in comparison. Unsurprisingly I lost myself in the endless expanse that was my passenger.
I struggled with all my might to anchor enough of myself to stay coherent long enough to use my altered powers to force them, all those splintered groups of parahumans, to cooperate. To create a united front against the one who sought to destroy us.
It didn't matter to me if they fought at one point and came to the conclusion it was a futile endeavor or if they were still fighting. It didn't matter if they were in the middle of reaching a safe harbor away from the fights or had reached them already. It also didn't matter if they were consolidating their power for the aftermath, or even going so far as to sabotage the efforts of others to end the threat Scion posed. I drafted them all, made them unwilling participants in the fight, soldiers in my army.
And in the process, I did things I judged Alec for. I stole the freedom of countless people made them prisoners in their own bodies - something I feared being done to me - I did to others.
I shuddered at that thought. No matter how much I would have liked to avoid it, I knew it was necessary, and if I had to do it all over again in order to save humanity, I would.
Those acts as vile and atrocious as they might have been, with me being the Chessmaster. The Ruler of life and death who chose which pawns to sacrifice to ensure the king's survival, to ensure the death of my enemy.
Yet, these weren't the regrets I mentioned in my talk with Contessa; they didn't even register as such.
For in those moments, confronted by Contessa I only ever regretted having followed the advice of a child, whom I risked my life to save from a cruel fate, only to be rewarded with such.
I left my friends, my family behind in order to increase the chances of humanity's survival. And I had to wonder if it was worth it? In the end, I think I didn't achieve much being away from them.
I made some allies and showed the Protectorate, proved to them that I could be trusted to have their backs. I prepared the Chicago Wards, made them into what they needed to be. Theo, in particular, was remade into someone capable of standing up against the Nine, against Jack.
In retrospect, there wasn't anything I was aware of that I did influence or set the ball rolling for. Something that turned out to be vital for our victory.
At the end of the day, all the work I invested in getting the villains and the Heroes to work together when it really counted was wasted. They had no interest in doing so. They ultimately had to be forced even with what was at stake. Simply because deep down, every human is selfish, they care about themselves, their family, and their friends in descending order.
Some might bring themselves to show some remnants of empathy to other people but ultimately? No one cared about a stranger and what happened to them. Everybody, not part of your small circle of people you interact with is just that, a stranger.
Who cares if some kid dies of starvation somewhere around the world as long as one is doing fine. Nobody does, and those few that do, those that act? Well, I'm fairly certain they don't do it to help, not really. They do it for themselves. For selfish reasons like lessening their guilt, feeling a sense of accomplishment, or repenting. Helping is just the side effect of what they are really after.
Following this line of thought, I really had to wonder why I was ready to sacrifice myself. Did I still have such a low-self esteem that I didn't care what happened to me, even though Lisa tried her hardest to get me to?
Was that the reason Dinah sent me away? So that when the time came, I was in the right mindset, with my relationships still highly valued but enraptured, enough with saving the world that I would risk myself and not seek counsel?
So that I wouldn't stop to consider what my death -my essential suicide- would do to Lisa, was that it? I wonder what would have happened if I had stayed in the Bay? What the response would have been to killing one of the Triumvirate? Would I have had to kill the other two, too? Until such a moment, they came to realize, that even if they did win in the end, it would be too costly a price to pay, and humanity would have to suffer for it.
Perhaps someday, I will get an answer to why I had to sacrifice being together with the few true friends I had in my life.
But that was way down on the list of my priorities. Far more pressing was the question of where I was. Contessa didn't leave much doubt about her intentions in finding me, and I didn't expect to survive our little conversation.
That I did opened up more than one can of worms. So she didn't mercy kill me. Was that her way of serving penance for all the atrocities she and her little club committed in their attempt to save the world? To not kill the one who did so by committing different kinds of atrocities?
Killing me for what I did and then continue on living would be a none before seen level of hypocrisy, but would she care? I didn't think so. That begged the question of why she didn't kill me. Was it her thanks for me doing her job, or something else entirely?
I pushed those thoughts aside for now. I suspected I would have more time on my hands than I would like to ponder all the implications of her actions, but first, I had to take stock of my situation.
I righted myself into a sitting position. Or at least I was in the process of doing it- when I heard a threatening hiss and immediately stopped midway with my eyes falling onto two tarantula-sized spiders sitting in my lap.
My best guess for their presence was them using me as a makeshift bed. As their red eyes were staring right back at me. I listened inside of me, accessing my passenger, thinking that my sudden awakening somehow prevented me from sensing those spiders and their sensory input.
I was so used to utilizing my power, my constant companion, that it worked perfectly on autopilot, doing exactly what I wanted it to do without any conscious thought wasted on it.
Imagine my surprise when instead of the thousands, hundreds of thousands, or millions of little voices serving me and sharing their senses, their very being with me to do as I wished with them, there was nothing but utter silence.
It was a new experience for me to label the spiders sitting on me as a threat. Considering that formerly all of them inside a radius hundreds of meters around me, and therefore every insect close enough to even attempt in harming me were an extension of my will.
Apparently, this no longer held true. I knew that letting Amy use her powers on me was a last resort, a desperate gamble and that there would be consequences. The passenger limits the powers they grant to their host. Not just for there not to be a power that is too strong without any means for others to counter it -robbing them of the opportunity to gather worthwhile data an otherwise ensuing struggle would be able to provide.
The human mind can only take so much.
Somehow I was of the view that I was special, that I could take it. Fight off the negative effects long enough to do what I deemed necessary. Not an untrue assumption, even when I came closer to losing myself than I would have liked. Where I struggled, my partner shared my burden. I, we were, after all, always about the mission, and we pulled through.
But what I really didn't expect was to wake up, having lost my power. If I was honest with myself, I expected to no longer have enough left in me to be called a person when the dust settled. There were flashes of doubt that I might fail, but in those instances, I pictured myself dying like so many other parahumans did before me, when they took to the field against Scion.
But I never pictured myself losing my power, something that came to define me more than anything else before in my life to a point where I myself found it hard to find a distinction between us. So deep was our connection -the partnership we shared- that we mixed to a point it was no longer possible to view us as individuals.
My eyes started getting wet, my heart ached, and I didn't have the slightest clue how Contessa or the ones who helped her did it. But they somehow were able to sever us, to rip apart what was meant to be together. I wondered what that meant for me, what part of me got lost in it, and what I retained, gained from my partner.
A train of thought I should probably shelve too. At least for the moment, there was no need to be worried about it. I was sure time would tell if there was a bleed-over between the two of us.
I should probably confront my more immediate problems, rather than pondering about what-ifs. Namely, the two spiders sitting in my lap, following my every move with their large clusters of eyes. Their behavior struck me as curious, but spiders weren't capable of displaying facial expressions. Nor could they express them any other way. Therefore I attributed my observation to my imagination.
Because I simply wasn't willing to accept the fact, that I could seemingly read their demeanor better than I could humans, and I definitely wasn't willing to compare this to the similar ability Rachel possessed.
But as hard as I tried to trick myself into believing that, I didn't succeed when evidence to the contrary was staring right back at me. So there apparently was some kind of bleed over between us, and I just hoped I got spared from the disadvantages that came in the same package for Rachel.
I inspected them closely while moving as little as possible, and I had to say I got no idea what kind of spiders they are.
Something that shouldn't be possible. In my two years in the wards, I intensively studied insects, especially the useful ones. Spiders fell into that category. I wouldn't go as far as to call myself an expert, but there shouldn't be a spider in existence that I couldn't at least tell what family they belong to, but I was unable to come up with anything regarding these two.
Everything I saw struck me as wrong. They were roughly palm-sized and completely black, lacking the common hair of spiders that size.
Furthermore, their exoskeleton seemed wrong. It looked more to me like some kind of armor and appeared to be composed of interlocked segments similar to some kind of plate armor.
Another thing I have never seen before. The legs of the spiders also possessed this armor, but their proportions were wrong. They were sturdier and thicker in relation to their length than they should be.
I doubted many not familiar with spiders would be able to notice, but to me, it stuck out like a sore thumb. But the most disturbing thing I could attribute to their legs was that the final link was oddly shaped, thinning on both sides and tapering off into some kind of curved razor-sharp leading edge.
Those legs had a greater resemblance to a forged two-edged blade with a tip for piercing than with any spider legs I have ever seen.
And then there were their fangs. There was no other word for their jaws that would fit. Looking at them, I doubted they were used to slurping up the goo web spiders transform their cocooned victims into. On the contrary, they resembled fangs you'd expect to find on spiders labeled predator.
Given their legs, they more than likely possessed an incredible amount of jumping power, and them being venomous would be just my luck. For a moment, I considered risk moving.
As far as I could see, I was wearing a spider silk under-suit. To be more exact, it seems to be awfully similar to my Skitter costume before all the bug-shells for better kinetic absorption were applied. It even had matching colors. The only thing that was missing was the gloves, footwear of any kind, a mask, as well as the additions of my later versions.
But I decided against it. If my fears proved to be correct, and they were venomous, the risk of them biting and somehow penetrating or even grazing my skin through my costume could be fatal. And unless I
exhausted all my options, I'd rather not risk being on the wrong side of their natural weapons.
Another thing that added to my precarious situation was the sack of spider web at the abdomen of one of those spiders.
I had to suppress a chuckle at seeing that. The universe must have it out for me, getting me into this situation, serving as a brooding stock for a newly hatched generation of super-spiders. Was that karma? I never even considered since the day I got my powers that insects could be the cause of my death.
I let my eyes wander in the hope of finding anything within reach that might help me, but unfortunately, I wasn't that lucky. The only thing I could find in this wooden indentation I was lying in under the clear sky was some strange-looking fruit next to the wall opposite of me. There was no weapon of any kind, not even a stick I could use to somehow pry them off of me.
Great, just great. If Contessa wouldn't already be on the top of my shit list, this, throwing me into a hole with a fruit and two potentially deadly spiders would promote her there instantly.
I focused my view back onto the spiders and sighed, more mumbling to myself than anything else
"You wouldn't happen to understand me, would you?"
Both spiders turned their heads slightly at my words. Holy... that couldn't be true. But that would explain this foreign vibe I got from those spiders and their unnerving gaze, dissecting me from the moment I opened my eyes. They are intelligent, and if my suspicion was correct, they could at least understand me.
I felt a cold shudder run along my spine. Intelligent spiders; that screamed Bonesaw to me. Until now, I suppressed this train of thought, hoping that the strange characteristics of those spiders could be explained by me just being dropped onto an alternate earth with some unfamiliar indigenous spider species. But this new discovery drastically reduced the chances for this being true.
I stopped myself there. It was no use to over-analyzing a situation. There were any number of plausible explanations for those spiders, and should it turn out to be Bonesaw, then that just meant I might get the chance to rectify the mistake of allowing her to live back in the day.
I once more addressed the spiders.
"Would you please be so kind as to get off me?"
Without any delay, the spiders followed my request and crawled off me. I waited until they were a few inches away from me until I sat upright. And what I saw when I did wasn't something I was happy about.
If I previously thought, that being in a wooden indentation with a strange fruit and two spiders, was bad. I had no idea what to call discovering that what I previously thought was a wooden indentation in the ground somewhere turned out to be a small boat in the fucking middle of an ocean with no land in sight.
And it really wasn't a surprise that I wasn't able to recognize this any faster because the water was completely undisturbed. There weren't any waves, no movement, nothing. The water was utterly calm.
Yeah, those were the moments, where you were made painfully aware of the English language's inability to express this cluster fuck of a situation I found myself in. Just to make an attempt would mean I had to make use of a comparative of a superlative, which simply didn't exist.
Perhaps I could use my last few days while dying of thirst to remedy this oversight. Nah, my time was better served in making plans, in how to best end Contessa in case I survived this and was granted the pleasure to meet her again. Because not even a godly intervention itself would be enough to save her, let alone her power when I get my hands on her.
It wouldn't all be so bad if this boat would at least have a sail, a motor, or some paddle that would allow me to row, not that I would know in what direction I should steer, but at least it would give me something to do aside from waiting to die.
Well, the situation was not all bad, while letting my vision travel the horizon, I took note that I saw sharp outlines of my surroundings. This meant not only that my arm got restored to pristine condition but apparently my eyes too. Therefore I could soothe myself in the knowledge that I won't see anything blurred in my final moments.
I laid back down my head against one side of the boat and turned my look back on the spiders.
"You wouldn't happen to know which way I can find land and how we can get out of this situation and not die cruel prolonged deaths?"
They answered with a shake of their head, which I interpreted as a no.
"Yeah, figured as much it would have been too easy otherwise, wouldn't it?"
Since the spiders looked somehow lost, standing in the middle of the boat, I said.
"If you like, you can come back here." I pointed at my lap.
At my words, they nearly went head over heels to get back to me, like some overeager puppies. I couldn't stop myself from smiling. Well, at least I wouldn't be dying alone.
They made themselves comfortable.
"May I touch you?"
Once again, they reacted to my question, in easy to understand motion by nodding with their heads. How intelligent were those spiders?
I reached for them. The first thing I noticed, their carapaces were cool to my touch, despite being black on a sunny and warm day. I would say they were too cold, perhaps this had something to do with the fact that their exoskeleton was interlinked similar to scales on a reptile.
Arthropods were ectothermic, commonly known as cold-blooded, so it made sense that they would be in need of the warmth I generated.
I could only speculate their intelligence, the only thing that really made them stand out, to be responsible for why I couldn't control them.
If not for this, I had no explanation. Still, I never got the vibe that any characteristic, no matter how out of place it might seem, would prevent my powers from working as long as the creature qualified as something my passenger had dominion over.
Even if I assumed I still retained my jailbroken powers, those two spiders should be under my control. They certainly were big enough for them not to fall under the creatures my widened and shifted powers no longer could affect because this pertained only to the smallest of bugs in my swarm, a size they definitely surpassed many times over.
Since my thoughts were clear, with me able to string together more than one coherent thought. The easiest explanation I could come up with for this was that I no longer held my jailbroken powers.
As a result, I theorized that I really must have lost my powers. My earlier conclusion was based upon thinking that I was on land, and there was just no way for there not to be any bugs within my reach. But on the ocean, it was another story;
If it weren't for this, in case, I still had my powers, I should be able to control my two new friends. Ergo, no control means no powers.
I closed my eyes. This would definitely prove to be an interesting turn of events. Should I ever set foot on land again and reach civilization - as unlikely as it seems given my predicament - it will be hard to survive without any advantages to my name. Because after what I did, I fully expect the whole world to be after me, for various reasons anything else would really surprise me.
I stopped myself again from going too deep into this particular rabbit hole until I had a better grasp of my situation. Every conclusion I drew here was done from incomplete and possibly faulty information and was nothing more than mere conjecture and speculation.
I should rest; conserve my strength; Something told me I was gonna need every ounce of it.
-----
The next time I awoke, it was in the middle of the night. I looked up at the stars. No matter how hard I tried, I wasn't able to make out any star constellation I was familiar with. I never thought the things I learned in summer camp would ever prove to be useful. But this discovery opened a whole new can of worms.
Because as far as I was aware, the existence of parallel earths created by the entities was a localized effect. Consequently, it should in no way affect other star-systems or even galaxies. For this reason very reason, I assumed that I would have no trouble recognizing at least a few of the constellations in the sky. At first, I considered just being in a different hemisphere, but even then, I was confident in identifying the most prominent ones.
This didn't bode well for me if I ever wanted to return home. Just where the hell was I dropped off to.
With those thoughts on my mind, I drifted back to sleep.
-----
I woke the next day, with dry lips and an even dryer mouth. The sun was standing on its peak on a cloudless day and was burning relentlessly down on me. With nothing on hand to shield myself from the sun to create some relieving shadow, I had to endure the full might of the sun-generated heat. This wouldn't be all too bad, if I could prevent my body from excreting sweat, wasting precious water, and reducing my already limited time further.
I slightly caressed my new pets. It took some soft prompting to wake them up, but I eventually succeeded. Given their affectionateness, they either came to like me a lot, or I was just that comfortable to lie on.
I carefully placed them next to myself and sat upright. I looked at my surroundings and saw exactly what I expected to see, water as far and wide as I could see in every direction. Combined with the fact that there still was not a single cloud in the sky meant only one thing; no water in the foreseeable future, at least water that didn't kill me faster like drinking the seawater would.
I was already dehydrated, and consuming the saltwater around my little boat, would just serve to aggravate this state. This just emphasized my earlier conclusion that I was going to die of thirst, and as a result, would be spared from dying of starvation, not sure what was the nicer way to perish.
I was sure someone, somewhere, debated the intricacies of both and came to a valid conclusion. Unfortunately, I didn't get to choose.
My eyes once more found this strange-looking fruit lying in the opposite corner of the boat. I already debated to eat it several times but didn't think of it as a good idea, simply because I had never seen anything even remotely like it. And thanks to globalization you could buy next to everything suitable for human consumption in a supermarket.
This could only mean because I haven't seen such a fruit at least once in my life, that the fruit was not something to be eaten.
In the time since I discovered that the constellations in the night sky didn't match any one of those, I learned of as a child.
Leading to the realization that I more than likely was no longer on earth or any variation thereof.
The consequence of that train of thought made this fruit rather interesting. Simply because my earlier data, I based my reasoning on was flawed. Therefore the conclusion I arrived at to not eat it was invalid too. Of course, that didn't mean the fruit would have no adverse effects on me. It might still be poisonous or detrimental in other ways, but it also meant there was a chance for it to be edible.
I crawled over to it, and for a single moment, I was confronted with doubt; With the question of whether attempting to eat it was the right thing to do. Because if it didn't accelerate my death, it would extend my life, and the outlook of that happening currently wasn't exactly the best. At worst, it would merely result in prolonging my suffering.
I suppressed those thoughts vehemently, because listening to them, considering them to be true, seemed like accepting defeat.
In the past, it never occurred to me to give up. After all, I went through with the longshots I attempted and succeeded in; I was not going to just roll over and die. If there was a chance, no matter how slim to live for just a second longer, I was gonna take it; I had no intention of dying here, I was going to live!
With this newfound conviction, I picked it up. The fruit the same size as a pineapple was strangely shaped, resembling a calyx, with eight half-opened petals surrounding the center, allowing for a look inside. The whole fruit had this eerie black color, which on second thought from a distance it could be mistaken with a spider pulling all her legs close to her body.
I looked back to my two spider companions, who attentively watched my every move. It couldn't be a coincidence waking up on a boat together with two spiders and a fruit that looks like one. I disregarded this thought. If you look at something long enough, you were always able to make out some kind of pattern. This was just my mind trying to play tricks on me.
I brought the fruit to my mouth and took a bite out of it. It had a similar texture as an orange, which was good because eating it would allow me to restore some water. I was about to rejoice at this until my dried-out taste buds started working again, and I had to force myself not to vomit and spit it out.
Until now, I had never encountered anything even remotely tasting as disgusting as this fruit, and I was on more than one grill party of the dockworkers. They managed to prove over and over again that they must have invented the word disgusting, considering some of their creations.
I shuddered at the mere memory.
I was not even able to describe the taste of the fruit. There simply didn't exist words for it. Would I still be on Earth Bet, and this fruit happened to be indigenous there; the taste alone would explain why I never heard of it.
No sane person would eat it as long as alternatives were available, and even then, I was not sure if most would eat it. Hell, I was considering throwing it overboard; and I was starving.
But I couldn't allow myself to waste any water, no matter how insignificant the amount. With no small amount of willpower expedited, I was finally able to overcome my gag reflex and swallowed it.
I looked back at the fruit, only a few hundred mouthfuls of it left to go. Grimacing, I took the next bite out of it.
It took me hours that felt like weeks of the most inhuman torture imaginable until I finished eating the whole fruit. During the whole process of consuming it, my two eight-legged friends never removed their eyes from me and practically started cheering me on.
The more I ate, the livelier and excited they got. For the most part, I tried to ignore them.
Some assumptions accompanied this observation, mostly because I didn't think it to be plausible that their delight stemmed from the fact that I was eating something deadly, thereby accelerating my demise and, as a result, the advent of their new breeding stock.
Unfortunately, other attempts to explain this behavior were even more inconclusive. Why should they be elated when I ate something? I put this question on my ever-growing list of things I would like answered should I survive and returned to my former sleeping place, where I lied down in an attempt to conserve energy and most of all water.
I didn't have enough time to even close my eyes when my two friends looked at me with their best imitation of a puppy dog's eyes.
I sighed and motioned them to get in my lap, which didn't necessitate further prompting. They scurried in it in the blink of an eye. But something was different, they sat there, and it looked like they wanted something from me, not sure of what it might be. I placed one hand on top of the male spider.
This simple touch without any cloth between the point of contact felt indescribable as if a circuit was closed for the first time allowing a current to run its course. I snap like withdrew my hand, not a second after I did, the tingling feeling that starting from my spread and tried to
encompass my whole body subsided.
What the... this didn't happen before, but the only thing different between then and now was, that I ate the fruit. There had to be a connection.
I saw the spider looking at me disappointed.
"You liked that, whatever it was?"
He nodded with his head in response, and I had a short debate with myself if I should risk it to try it again, whatever it was that just happened.
Ultimately I decided to do it again. Two reasons stood out. For one, my overall situation couldn't objectively get any worse, and second, my spider friends didn't strike me as having ulterior motives. Quite the opposite, to be honest. I got the feeling that our interests were aligned and that they had my well-being at heart.
The reason eluded me, sure it would be possible to narrow it down considerably, but there was only so much you can get out of someone with only being able to ask yes or no questions. For this reason, I thought it best to save my breath in a form the outset next to a hopeless and time-consuming endeavor when I could simply get the same answers in less time by undergoing a little risk.
At this point, it wouldn't matter anyway. Since I was already in free fall without a parachute, so nothing was preventing me from trying to fly... after all, I had nothing to lose.
I reached for the spider again. But this time, I was prepared for the sudden influx of this sensation. Allowing, me to get a full picture of what was going on.
My initial impression wasn't wrong, but it didn't convey it in the right context since I only caught a glimpse of the proceedings. As a result, it wasn't correct to describe it as completing a circuit. For the simple reason, that this metaphor implied, for there to be two parts of a whole getting reconnected again to once more complete each other.
This, however, was different, in the sense that it had two already complete components making contact with each other. One subsuming the willing other to create something else, something new, something so much more than their individual parts could ever have hoped to be, fusing and evolving both.
I lost myself in the myriad of impressions. By the time I came to, I couldn't help to notice that the sun had moved on to a quite considerable degree.
However, that wasn't the only thing different than before. Combined with my usual senses, I was seeing myself through eight eyes, from a position on my abdomen.
In addition, a whole new set of limbs and a new body joined my bodily awareness. It was a different feedback than the one I was used to from my late power; With it, the creatures under my control were just that under my control.
Of course, my power had informed me about their state of being. But for all that, there was never any doubt that I was only controlling something external. Sitting in the driver's seat of their bodies steering all of their actions. This, however, felt like the body of the spider was indistinguishable from my own that we were one, just apart.
It was a strange feeling suddenly being at two places, to be two beings at the same time.
In retrospect, my power back then compared to this new sensation as if there was at least one step of separation between them and me; sluggish, apart, and distant. A fissure that now with this new power got closed. What once was two connected with each other now became an us.
I could still feel the fading consciousness of the spider slowly molding and fusing with myself. The bliss he felt when he gave himself up to become part of something greater, of me.
The spider felt fulfillment as if its whole purpose in life lead it to this situation, and it could now fulfill its raison d´etre.
Experiencing the echo of his feeling was exhilarating, to say the least, as was this new state of being I embody. I felt strange but not in a bad way; I was not sure how to describe it. I withdrew into myself and listened to my body, tried to fathom the changes this brought upon me.
After some introspection, I came to the conclusion that the spider -or more accurately, his self- didn't vanish entirely in this merger. I could still sense parts of him, existing under the surface of our new self, ready to be called upon, waiting to serve.
When I reopened my eyes, the female spider sat on my torso on that body part other women would call their breasts and was demanding through her whole body language not to be left out.
"You want it, too?"
As a response, she made to steps towards my face and awkwardly attempted to hug my face with her front-legs.
"You are quite the impatient one, aren't you."
The response I received could be best described as the spider version of blushing. I reached for the spider and started the merging process, and suddenly everything went wrong. Instead of making the connection to one spider as I expected, I made it to hundreds, and by the time I realized my mistake -that I had forgotten about the egg sack- it was already too late to stop the merger.
This time, I didn't lose myself in a controlled myriad of impressions. This time, I was lost in a cataclysmic storm. It felt like I was ripped apart, forming hundreds of connections, fusing together with what was found at the end only to try and meld together as one.
With dread, I found out I overextended. It took more effort than anything else I've experienced only to prevent myself from shattering into hundreds of pieces.
Every time a part of me drifted away, fusing faster than one of the others it pulled at me. Attempting to draw out more of me and, as a result taking it away from all the other connections. By doing so, threatening to destroy the spider-net I found myself being made into disrupting the carefully maintained status quo.
It turned out to be a balancing act of the highest order to prevent myself from being severed into tiny little pieces while under the assault of all those sensory expressions.
Without my experience and me somehow retaining my multitasking ability, another thing the bleed over seemed to let me keep, I was able to prevail in this life and death struggle but not without cost.
The longer this merger took, the more I could feel myself getting weaker physically and mentally. By the time I was finished, there was next to nothing left.
I'd never felt exhaustion even close to this before, and my last thoughts before darkness took me pertained to the fact that I might never regain consciousness before dying.
I found myself confined to a dark haze, but sometimes there were flashes of awareness, for the most part, filtered through the eight eyes of a spider. I saw the sunset and rise more than once, and I noticed the more time elapsed, the more impenetrable the haze appeared to be.
I couldn't help, but wonder was this how dying was like? Slowly being dragged further, and further into a never-ending darkness?
It never came to that, me vanishing into the darkness. There was another flash. I saw, looking through the eyes of the adult spiders, as a hand reached over the edge of the boat.
A moment later, another hand was placed next to the first one, followed by a light jerk that set the whole boat into a swinging motion these hands hoisted a body over the edge.
I saw a middle-aged dark blonde well-built guy with a naked torso standing there, to which my spiders took exception. They hissed at him and took a defensive position upon my belly, ready to attack this person at a moment's notice.
I saw his lips move, but I heard no sound neither from him nor my spiders. The only reason that I even knew of their threatening gestures was owed to the fact that I also caught glimpses of the signal their brains sent to their bodies.
The man took a step forward, his arms raised in a non-threatening gesture, one I knew my spiders wouldn't heed, they decided to protect me, and they would or die trying.
When he took the next step, the male spider jumped towards the jugular of the man. I barely saw movement until I felt a searing pain on the same scale as I experienced by being bisected by Scion.
The next thing I saw, looking through the eyes of the female spider, was the two bisected halves of her male counterpart landing left and right on the ground next to the man; his fangs never even came close to reaching him. He gave the spider a glare with such intensity that I was sure a slight increase in it would evaporate everything in its path.
The message it contained was clear if you don't attack me, I would grant you the same courtesy. His lips moved again, and I started to hate the fact that I never learned how to lip-read. But whatever he said was enough to pacify the female spider, because shortly after he stopped talking, she lied down on me, still following his every move but no longer with hostile intent.
I wondered how he managed to kill my spider? He must have utilized some kind of power. The only ones I could think of able to that were either a form of air/wind manipulation or using the edge of the force field to garner this result. Either way, the ease with which he used it to dispose of the spider, who was not only fast but also quite sturdy, instantly bumped his threat rating to a high degree. Simply, because whatever it was he did, it didn't seem to be Manton-limited. Which made him a threat on the same level or greater than Narwhal.
The man, wearing the strangest goatee I have ever seen, looked around for some time and then jumped back into the water, my spider noticed that the ship was slightly askew, which could only mean that we moved. Given the angle of the ship, it had to be at quite the high-speed. Something, I only thought possible with the use of a motor.
At that point, I lost the connection to the awareness of my remaining spider. Hence I found myself back alone in the darkness.
To my surprise, I could still feel the male spider's presence. Never having left me despite what happened to his body, curious.
I noticed how he siphoned the last vestiges of power from the well representing it, which served to further weaken me. I tried to get him to stop, but all my effort were in vain.
I couldn't be sure if this was an automatic function of my new power, or I was just unable to influence it because of the condition I found myself in.
I decided to at least find out to what end my power was used and tried my best to examine this procedure. It seemed to be a reasonable endeavor to gather more information about it. After all, it was in the process of killing me, and I couldn't be sure it would halt before succeeding.
I followed the path the power took to its destination. To my astonishment, it was used to slowly rebuilding the body of my dead male spider. It finally all started to make sense why they were so keen on fusing with me. Apparently, we not only became one improved being, but it also served for them to gain some form of immortality.
Given what I knew some would do to reach even an incomplete version of it like I assumed this one to be, I could understand their actions.
However, there had to be more to this. The more I thought about it, the more I was certain of it. Because I doubted that everything I got out of it in return were a few loyal companions.
Unfortunately, I was in no state to pursue that question, at least until I woke again. If I ever did.
I felt myself weakening more and more until the darkness encompassed the last vestiges of my consciousness and was devoured by it. In my last coherent thought, I considered myself lucky in ending this way instead of the alternative and cruel way of dying by thirst would have been.
-----
I woke up with my whole body feeling exhausted and sluggish. My dark hair had fallen over my eyes. I had never thought raising my hand would ever create difficulties. With some effort, I managed to remove my hair from impeding my vision.
I found myself lying on a bed draped in a blanket. To my right, there was a small table; Placed on top of it was a glass of water and a plate filled with food.
I didn't waste any time and reached for the glass. With greedy gulps out of it, I quenched my thirst and only set it down again after emptying it to the last drop.
It was essential for the process of recovery to get back the lost liquid, I knew that my bodily awareness couldn't be accurate, not after it went through such an ordeal, but I could swear I already noticed a difference. The exhaustion and sluggishness were slowly receding and a resemblance of strength returning to my limbs.
But why did I wake up? My condition should have only gotten worse without any food or water intake. Aside from the water now in my belly, I was sure nothing found its way there since this disgusting fruit.
I didn't fail to note that I wasn't alone in my bed, my eight-legged companions were there, and if the empty bowls at the foot-end of my bed were any indication, they already gorged themselves on food and water and entered a digestive nap.
Not that I could fault them for that. I took some of the food from the table and let the hunger take over my actions. It felt incredible to eat something after the ordeal I went through.
While eating, my thoughts drifted back to the spiders. Were they the reason for my awakening? Then eating and somehow sharing what energy this provided? I would have loved to ask them about it. But if my hunch turned out to be true, I wouldn't want to disturb their sleep. Because then they would have more than earned it.
I devoured the food and only stopped when nothing was left on the once full plates.
I hadn't placed them back more than a few seconds ago when the door to the room I found myself in was opened. A tall dark-haired woman who wore a long-sleeved v-necked top that displayed her rather vast female assets stepped into the room.
I suppressed the envy my younger self would have felt at seeing her and focused on the important details. Her bare midriff was toned, not unlike what my stomach used to look like when I was in the wards.
I pegged her to be around forty forty-five, perhaps older, not because she looked the part but because she gave off an air of experience similar to the one I sensed from Miss Militia. Going solely by her outward appearance, she didn't look older than her mid-thirties, but I learned a long time ago to trust more than simply what my eyes perceived.
And this woman had far more depth to her than her looks, and this way perceived age could account for. Despite the obvious unhealthy lifestyle she must lead, judging by the burning cigarette between her lips. I still got the impression that in hand-to-hand combat she could crush me like a bug, which I doubted any none brute would be able to do even without my powers.
Of course, first impressions aren't suitable and sufficient to form an educated guess. But I had learned to trust my instincts, and they rarely disappointed me, especially in rating how dangerous my opposite is.
Behind her followed the man I remember seeing through my spiders. He was now wearing a loose shirt and glasses. I noticed that above and under one of his eyes he sported a vertical scar.
What set me on edge wasn't this injury driving the point home that he must be an experienced fighter or the fact that I saw him display a power, but the way he held himself, the presence he gave off.
I have met people like him, people who can step into a room and own it demands respect from the occupants without even trying, certain of themselves to such a frightening degree that they didn't just think they can take anyone in it. No, this level of assuredness is only present in the ones who are sure of it. People, who fought countless battles against overwhelming odds and came out on top.
I have met people like this in the past Contessa, Alexandria, Jack Slash, but also I came to mind. In my time in the Wards, I repeatedly watched video material of myself and what I could glimpse of his mannerism had a strong resemblance to the Skitter I saw in those videos. Strolling into the PRT headquarters without a care in the world and taking down their Capes and other personnel left and right as if they were nothing more than some annoying pest.
He was on a completely different level than the woman. He closed the door behind him, barring the sight I had outside, to what looked like the interior of a bar, according to the few people I could make out sitting at tables and drinking some beverages out of big glasses. They wore strange clothes and were armed with weapons; was that a cutlass?
Before I could think on it and come up with some reason aside from being Halloween as to why someone should have such weapons on them, both the man and the woman seated themselves on some chairs they moved next to the bed I occupied, and I heard the woman say:
"Oh, you are already up. That's unusual. I came here prepared to force-feed you while unconscious to get your body to regain enough strength for you to wake up."
She stared at me for a moment in deep thought until she continued.
"It wouldn't have anything to do with those spiders and their particular strong appetite, wouldn't it?"
She came to the same conclusion as me with fewer data points. She was sharp this one. Instead of confirming her suspicions, I asked.
"Who are you?"
She was caught flat-footed by this question and took a few moments to get back her bearings.
"How rude of me. I totally forgot to introduce ourselves. My name is Shakuyaku, but I'm usually called Shaky and this one."
She gestures towards her male companion.
"is called Ray, or as he is otherwise known as Silvers Rayleigh"
Authors Note: I considered for some time to introduce a language barrier. But ultimately decided against it. It would be cumbersome to get around it and slow down the pace in the next few chapters to a crawl...
Chapter 01: A new start (Spring 1504 – a little over 3 years since the start of GAoP)
I woke up with a start, heart racing. The last thing I remembered was being shot in the head, twice. It took me a while to calm down.
I instinctively reached for the point I had felt them impacting on the back of my head. I expected to find two bullet holes, or at least blood in my hair, but found neither.
It was only after I was finished inspecting the back of my head that I registered that the arm I used shouldn't be there be either. I clearly remember how I lost it and let Lung cauterize what was left of it. I stared, puzzled at my restored limb, trying my hardest to recall what happened.
With all that transpired during Scions rampage and the end of the world looming around the corner. I thought the time of the few healers still around was better spent supporting the ones with powers able to have an impact.
Which is why I never bothered to have my arm restored.
Not that I needed it restored for me to exercise my power. As a master, I could be reduced to a brain in a jar, and it wouldn't have made a difference where my power was concerned.
But feeling powerless once more was probably the one moment, where I came the closest to hating my powers. I thought those times in which I couldn't do anything, forced to just take it lying down, were over and done with when I triggered, despite my initial apprehension when it came to my specific power-set; controlling bugs not being the stuff of legends at first glance. It took me a while to recognize how great and versatile they truly were.
Having to watch from the sidelines as humanity fought for survival when the only thing I wanted was to participate; to do my part no matter how small was the hardest thing in my life.
It was in those moments I found my power left much to be desired, leaving me helpless while all around me countless people were being slaughtered.
The forced inaction nearly drove me mad, until I saw a way to do what had to be done.
While forming that thought, I was suddenly hit with the memories I had suppressed. I remembered how I got Amy to attempt to change my power. She succeeded in widening and shifting what it was able of controlling.
But that came with repercussions of its own. The range of my power was greatly reduced, and in some way, the connection between my passenger and I was ripped open.
The filter, the very walls erected to prevent one from having too much influence over the other were torn down, and my mind started to bleed into my passenger and vice versa. We started to become one, my passenger and I. But my passenger was so vast that what little there was of me paled in comparison. Unsurprisingly I lost myself in the endless expanse that was my passenger.
I struggled with all my might to anchor enough of myself to stay coherent long enough to use my altered powers to force them, all those splintered groups of parahumans, to cooperate. To create a united front against the one who sought to destroy us.
It didn't matter to me if they fought at one point and came to the conclusion it was a futile endeavor or if they were still fighting. It didn't matter if they were in the middle of reaching a safe harbor away from the fights or had reached them already. It also didn't matter if they were consolidating their power for the aftermath, or even going so far as to sabotage the efforts of others to end the threat Scion posed. I drafted them all, made them unwilling participants in the fight, soldiers in my army.
And in the process, I did things I judged Alec for. I stole the freedom of countless people made them prisoners in their own bodies - something I feared being done to me - I did to others.
I shuddered at that thought. No matter how much I would have liked to avoid it, I knew it was necessary, and if I had to do it all over again in order to save humanity, I would.
Those acts as vile and atrocious as they might have been, with me being the Chessmaster. The Ruler of life and death who chose which pawns to sacrifice to ensure the king's survival, to ensure the death of my enemy.
Yet, these weren't the regrets I mentioned in my talk with Contessa; they didn't even register as such.
For in those moments, confronted by Contessa I only ever regretted having followed the advice of a child, whom I risked my life to save from a cruel fate, only to be rewarded with such.
I left my friends, my family behind in order to increase the chances of humanity's survival. And I had to wonder if it was worth it? In the end, I think I didn't achieve much being away from them.
I made some allies and showed the Protectorate, proved to them that I could be trusted to have their backs. I prepared the Chicago Wards, made them into what they needed to be. Theo, in particular, was remade into someone capable of standing up against the Nine, against Jack.
In retrospect, there wasn't anything I was aware of that I did influence or set the ball rolling for. Something that turned out to be vital for our victory.
At the end of the day, all the work I invested in getting the villains and the Heroes to work together when it really counted was wasted. They had no interest in doing so. They ultimately had to be forced even with what was at stake. Simply because deep down, every human is selfish, they care about themselves, their family, and their friends in descending order.
Some might bring themselves to show some remnants of empathy to other people but ultimately? No one cared about a stranger and what happened to them. Everybody, not part of your small circle of people you interact with is just that, a stranger.
Who cares if some kid dies of starvation somewhere around the world as long as one is doing fine. Nobody does, and those few that do, those that act? Well, I'm fairly certain they don't do it to help, not really. They do it for themselves. For selfish reasons like lessening their guilt, feeling a sense of accomplishment, or repenting. Helping is just the side effect of what they are really after.
Following this line of thought, I really had to wonder why I was ready to sacrifice myself. Did I still have such a low-self esteem that I didn't care what happened to me, even though Lisa tried her hardest to get me to?
Was that the reason Dinah sent me away? So that when the time came, I was in the right mindset, with my relationships still highly valued but enraptured, enough with saving the world that I would risk myself and not seek counsel?
So that I wouldn't stop to consider what my death -my essential suicide- would do to Lisa, was that it? I wonder what would have happened if I had stayed in the Bay? What the response would have been to killing one of the Triumvirate? Would I have had to kill the other two, too? Until such a moment, they came to realize, that even if they did win in the end, it would be too costly a price to pay, and humanity would have to suffer for it.
Perhaps someday, I will get an answer to why I had to sacrifice being together with the few true friends I had in my life.
But that was way down on the list of my priorities. Far more pressing was the question of where I was. Contessa didn't leave much doubt about her intentions in finding me, and I didn't expect to survive our little conversation.
That I did opened up more than one can of worms. So she didn't mercy kill me. Was that her way of serving penance for all the atrocities she and her little club committed in their attempt to save the world? To not kill the one who did so by committing different kinds of atrocities?
Killing me for what I did and then continue on living would be a none before seen level of hypocrisy, but would she care? I didn't think so. That begged the question of why she didn't kill me. Was it her thanks for me doing her job, or something else entirely?
I pushed those thoughts aside for now. I suspected I would have more time on my hands than I would like to ponder all the implications of her actions, but first, I had to take stock of my situation.
I righted myself into a sitting position. Or at least I was in the process of doing it- when I heard a threatening hiss and immediately stopped midway with my eyes falling onto two tarantula-sized spiders sitting in my lap.
My best guess for their presence was them using me as a makeshift bed. As their red eyes were staring right back at me. I listened inside of me, accessing my passenger, thinking that my sudden awakening somehow prevented me from sensing those spiders and their sensory input.
I was so used to utilizing my power, my constant companion, that it worked perfectly on autopilot, doing exactly what I wanted it to do without any conscious thought wasted on it.
Imagine my surprise when instead of the thousands, hundreds of thousands, or millions of little voices serving me and sharing their senses, their very being with me to do as I wished with them, there was nothing but utter silence.
It was a new experience for me to label the spiders sitting on me as a threat. Considering that formerly all of them inside a radius hundreds of meters around me, and therefore every insect close enough to even attempt in harming me were an extension of my will.
Apparently, this no longer held true. I knew that letting Amy use her powers on me was a last resort, a desperate gamble and that there would be consequences. The passenger limits the powers they grant to their host. Not just for there not to be a power that is too strong without any means for others to counter it -robbing them of the opportunity to gather worthwhile data an otherwise ensuing struggle would be able to provide.
The human mind can only take so much.
Somehow I was of the view that I was special, that I could take it. Fight off the negative effects long enough to do what I deemed necessary. Not an untrue assumption, even when I came closer to losing myself than I would have liked. Where I struggled, my partner shared my burden. I, we were, after all, always about the mission, and we pulled through.
But what I really didn't expect was to wake up, having lost my power. If I was honest with myself, I expected to no longer have enough left in me to be called a person when the dust settled. There were flashes of doubt that I might fail, but in those instances, I pictured myself dying like so many other parahumans did before me, when they took to the field against Scion.
But I never pictured myself losing my power, something that came to define me more than anything else before in my life to a point where I myself found it hard to find a distinction between us. So deep was our connection -the partnership we shared- that we mixed to a point it was no longer possible to view us as individuals.
My eyes started getting wet, my heart ached, and I didn't have the slightest clue how Contessa or the ones who helped her did it. But they somehow were able to sever us, to rip apart what was meant to be together. I wondered what that meant for me, what part of me got lost in it, and what I retained, gained from my partner.
A train of thought I should probably shelve too. At least for the moment, there was no need to be worried about it. I was sure time would tell if there was a bleed-over between the two of us.
I should probably confront my more immediate problems, rather than pondering about what-ifs. Namely, the two spiders sitting in my lap, following my every move with their large clusters of eyes. Their behavior struck me as curious, but spiders weren't capable of displaying facial expressions. Nor could they express them any other way. Therefore I attributed my observation to my imagination.
Because I simply wasn't willing to accept the fact, that I could seemingly read their demeanor better than I could humans, and I definitely wasn't willing to compare this to the similar ability Rachel possessed.
But as hard as I tried to trick myself into believing that, I didn't succeed when evidence to the contrary was staring right back at me. So there apparently was some kind of bleed over between us, and I just hoped I got spared from the disadvantages that came in the same package for Rachel.
I inspected them closely while moving as little as possible, and I had to say I got no idea what kind of spiders they are.
Something that shouldn't be possible. In my two years in the wards, I intensively studied insects, especially the useful ones. Spiders fell into that category. I wouldn't go as far as to call myself an expert, but there shouldn't be a spider in existence that I couldn't at least tell what family they belong to, but I was unable to come up with anything regarding these two.
Everything I saw struck me as wrong. They were roughly palm-sized and completely black, lacking the common hair of spiders that size.
Furthermore, their exoskeleton seemed wrong. It looked more to me like some kind of armor and appeared to be composed of interlocked segments similar to some kind of plate armor.
Another thing I have never seen before. The legs of the spiders also possessed this armor, but their proportions were wrong. They were sturdier and thicker in relation to their length than they should be.
I doubted many not familiar with spiders would be able to notice, but to me, it stuck out like a sore thumb. But the most disturbing thing I could attribute to their legs was that the final link was oddly shaped, thinning on both sides and tapering off into some kind of curved razor-sharp leading edge.
Those legs had a greater resemblance to a forged two-edged blade with a tip for piercing than with any spider legs I have ever seen.
And then there were their fangs. There was no other word for their jaws that would fit. Looking at them, I doubted they were used to slurping up the goo web spiders transform their cocooned victims into. On the contrary, they resembled fangs you'd expect to find on spiders labeled predator.
Given their legs, they more than likely possessed an incredible amount of jumping power, and them being venomous would be just my luck. For a moment, I considered risk moving.
As far as I could see, I was wearing a spider silk under-suit. To be more exact, it seems to be awfully similar to my Skitter costume before all the bug-shells for better kinetic absorption were applied. It even had matching colors. The only thing that was missing was the gloves, footwear of any kind, a mask, as well as the additions of my later versions.
But I decided against it. If my fears proved to be correct, and they were venomous, the risk of them biting and somehow penetrating or even grazing my skin through my costume could be fatal. And unless I
exhausted all my options, I'd rather not risk being on the wrong side of their natural weapons.
Another thing that added to my precarious situation was the sack of spider web at the abdomen of one of those spiders.
I had to suppress a chuckle at seeing that. The universe must have it out for me, getting me into this situation, serving as a brooding stock for a newly hatched generation of super-spiders. Was that karma? I never even considered since the day I got my powers that insects could be the cause of my death.
I let my eyes wander in the hope of finding anything within reach that might help me, but unfortunately, I wasn't that lucky. The only thing I could find in this wooden indentation I was lying in under the clear sky was some strange-looking fruit next to the wall opposite of me. There was no weapon of any kind, not even a stick I could use to somehow pry them off of me.
Great, just great. If Contessa wouldn't already be on the top of my shit list, this, throwing me into a hole with a fruit and two potentially deadly spiders would promote her there instantly.
I focused my view back onto the spiders and sighed, more mumbling to myself than anything else
"You wouldn't happen to understand me, would you?"
Both spiders turned their heads slightly at my words. Holy... that couldn't be true. But that would explain this foreign vibe I got from those spiders and their unnerving gaze, dissecting me from the moment I opened my eyes. They are intelligent, and if my suspicion was correct, they could at least understand me.
I felt a cold shudder run along my spine. Intelligent spiders; that screamed Bonesaw to me. Until now, I suppressed this train of thought, hoping that the strange characteristics of those spiders could be explained by me just being dropped onto an alternate earth with some unfamiliar indigenous spider species. But this new discovery drastically reduced the chances for this being true.
I stopped myself there. It was no use to over-analyzing a situation. There were any number of plausible explanations for those spiders, and should it turn out to be Bonesaw, then that just meant I might get the chance to rectify the mistake of allowing her to live back in the day.
I once more addressed the spiders.
"Would you please be so kind as to get off me?"
Without any delay, the spiders followed my request and crawled off me. I waited until they were a few inches away from me until I sat upright. And what I saw when I did wasn't something I was happy about.
If I previously thought, that being in a wooden indentation with a strange fruit and two spiders, was bad. I had no idea what to call discovering that what I previously thought was a wooden indentation in the ground somewhere turned out to be a small boat in the fucking middle of an ocean with no land in sight.
And it really wasn't a surprise that I wasn't able to recognize this any faster because the water was completely undisturbed. There weren't any waves, no movement, nothing. The water was utterly calm.
Yeah, those were the moments, where you were made painfully aware of the English language's inability to express this cluster fuck of a situation I found myself in. Just to make an attempt would mean I had to make use of a comparative of a superlative, which simply didn't exist.
Perhaps I could use my last few days while dying of thirst to remedy this oversight. Nah, my time was better served in making plans, in how to best end Contessa in case I survived this and was granted the pleasure to meet her again. Because not even a godly intervention itself would be enough to save her, let alone her power when I get my hands on her.
It wouldn't all be so bad if this boat would at least have a sail, a motor, or some paddle that would allow me to row, not that I would know in what direction I should steer, but at least it would give me something to do aside from waiting to die.
Well, the situation was not all bad, while letting my vision travel the horizon, I took note that I saw sharp outlines of my surroundings. This meant not only that my arm got restored to pristine condition but apparently my eyes too. Therefore I could soothe myself in the knowledge that I won't see anything blurred in my final moments.
I laid back down my head against one side of the boat and turned my look back on the spiders.
"You wouldn't happen to know which way I can find land and how we can get out of this situation and not die cruel prolonged deaths?"
They answered with a shake of their head, which I interpreted as a no.
"Yeah, figured as much it would have been too easy otherwise, wouldn't it?"
Since the spiders looked somehow lost, standing in the middle of the boat, I said.
"If you like, you can come back here." I pointed at my lap.
At my words, they nearly went head over heels to get back to me, like some overeager puppies. I couldn't stop myself from smiling. Well, at least I wouldn't be dying alone.
They made themselves comfortable.
"May I touch you?"
Once again, they reacted to my question, in easy to understand motion by nodding with their heads. How intelligent were those spiders?
I reached for them. The first thing I noticed, their carapaces were cool to my touch, despite being black on a sunny and warm day. I would say they were too cold, perhaps this had something to do with the fact that their exoskeleton was interlinked similar to scales on a reptile.
Arthropods were ectothermic, commonly known as cold-blooded, so it made sense that they would be in need of the warmth I generated.
I could only speculate their intelligence, the only thing that really made them stand out, to be responsible for why I couldn't control them.
If not for this, I had no explanation. Still, I never got the vibe that any characteristic, no matter how out of place it might seem, would prevent my powers from working as long as the creature qualified as something my passenger had dominion over.
Even if I assumed I still retained my jailbroken powers, those two spiders should be under my control. They certainly were big enough for them not to fall under the creatures my widened and shifted powers no longer could affect because this pertained only to the smallest of bugs in my swarm, a size they definitely surpassed many times over.
Since my thoughts were clear, with me able to string together more than one coherent thought. The easiest explanation I could come up with for this was that I no longer held my jailbroken powers.
As a result, I theorized that I really must have lost my powers. My earlier conclusion was based upon thinking that I was on land, and there was just no way for there not to be any bugs within my reach. But on the ocean, it was another story;
If it weren't for this, in case, I still had my powers, I should be able to control my two new friends. Ergo, no control means no powers.
I closed my eyes. This would definitely prove to be an interesting turn of events. Should I ever set foot on land again and reach civilization - as unlikely as it seems given my predicament - it will be hard to survive without any advantages to my name. Because after what I did, I fully expect the whole world to be after me, for various reasons anything else would really surprise me.
I stopped myself again from going too deep into this particular rabbit hole until I had a better grasp of my situation. Every conclusion I drew here was done from incomplete and possibly faulty information and was nothing more than mere conjecture and speculation.
I should rest; conserve my strength; Something told me I was gonna need every ounce of it.
-----
The next time I awoke, it was in the middle of the night. I looked up at the stars. No matter how hard I tried, I wasn't able to make out any star constellation I was familiar with. I never thought the things I learned in summer camp would ever prove to be useful. But this discovery opened a whole new can of worms.
Because as far as I was aware, the existence of parallel earths created by the entities was a localized effect. Consequently, it should in no way affect other star-systems or even galaxies. For this reason very reason, I assumed that I would have no trouble recognizing at least a few of the constellations in the sky. At first, I considered just being in a different hemisphere, but even then, I was confident in identifying the most prominent ones.
This didn't bode well for me if I ever wanted to return home. Just where the hell was I dropped off to.
With those thoughts on my mind, I drifted back to sleep.
-----
I woke the next day, with dry lips and an even dryer mouth. The sun was standing on its peak on a cloudless day and was burning relentlessly down on me. With nothing on hand to shield myself from the sun to create some relieving shadow, I had to endure the full might of the sun-generated heat. This wouldn't be all too bad, if I could prevent my body from excreting sweat, wasting precious water, and reducing my already limited time further.
I slightly caressed my new pets. It took some soft prompting to wake them up, but I eventually succeeded. Given their affectionateness, they either came to like me a lot, or I was just that comfortable to lie on.
I carefully placed them next to myself and sat upright. I looked at my surroundings and saw exactly what I expected to see, water as far and wide as I could see in every direction. Combined with the fact that there still was not a single cloud in the sky meant only one thing; no water in the foreseeable future, at least water that didn't kill me faster like drinking the seawater would.
I was already dehydrated, and consuming the saltwater around my little boat, would just serve to aggravate this state. This just emphasized my earlier conclusion that I was going to die of thirst, and as a result, would be spared from dying of starvation, not sure what was the nicer way to perish.
I was sure someone, somewhere, debated the intricacies of both and came to a valid conclusion. Unfortunately, I didn't get to choose.
My eyes once more found this strange-looking fruit lying in the opposite corner of the boat. I already debated to eat it several times but didn't think of it as a good idea, simply because I had never seen anything even remotely like it. And thanks to globalization you could buy next to everything suitable for human consumption in a supermarket.
This could only mean because I haven't seen such a fruit at least once in my life, that the fruit was not something to be eaten.
In the time since I discovered that the constellations in the night sky didn't match any one of those, I learned of as a child.
Leading to the realization that I more than likely was no longer on earth or any variation thereof.
The consequence of that train of thought made this fruit rather interesting. Simply because my earlier data, I based my reasoning on was flawed. Therefore the conclusion I arrived at to not eat it was invalid too. Of course, that didn't mean the fruit would have no adverse effects on me. It might still be poisonous or detrimental in other ways, but it also meant there was a chance for it to be edible.
I crawled over to it, and for a single moment, I was confronted with doubt; With the question of whether attempting to eat it was the right thing to do. Because if it didn't accelerate my death, it would extend my life, and the outlook of that happening currently wasn't exactly the best. At worst, it would merely result in prolonging my suffering.
I suppressed those thoughts vehemently, because listening to them, considering them to be true, seemed like accepting defeat.
In the past, it never occurred to me to give up. After all, I went through with the longshots I attempted and succeeded in; I was not going to just roll over and die. If there was a chance, no matter how slim to live for just a second longer, I was gonna take it; I had no intention of dying here, I was going to live!
With this newfound conviction, I picked it up. The fruit the same size as a pineapple was strangely shaped, resembling a calyx, with eight half-opened petals surrounding the center, allowing for a look inside. The whole fruit had this eerie black color, which on second thought from a distance it could be mistaken with a spider pulling all her legs close to her body.
I looked back to my two spider companions, who attentively watched my every move. It couldn't be a coincidence waking up on a boat together with two spiders and a fruit that looks like one. I disregarded this thought. If you look at something long enough, you were always able to make out some kind of pattern. This was just my mind trying to play tricks on me.
I brought the fruit to my mouth and took a bite out of it. It had a similar texture as an orange, which was good because eating it would allow me to restore some water. I was about to rejoice at this until my dried-out taste buds started working again, and I had to force myself not to vomit and spit it out.
Until now, I had never encountered anything even remotely tasting as disgusting as this fruit, and I was on more than one grill party of the dockworkers. They managed to prove over and over again that they must have invented the word disgusting, considering some of their creations.
I shuddered at the mere memory.
I was not even able to describe the taste of the fruit. There simply didn't exist words for it. Would I still be on Earth Bet, and this fruit happened to be indigenous there; the taste alone would explain why I never heard of it.
No sane person would eat it as long as alternatives were available, and even then, I was not sure if most would eat it. Hell, I was considering throwing it overboard; and I was starving.
But I couldn't allow myself to waste any water, no matter how insignificant the amount. With no small amount of willpower expedited, I was finally able to overcome my gag reflex and swallowed it.
I looked back at the fruit, only a few hundred mouthfuls of it left to go. Grimacing, I took the next bite out of it.
It took me hours that felt like weeks of the most inhuman torture imaginable until I finished eating the whole fruit. During the whole process of consuming it, my two eight-legged friends never removed their eyes from me and practically started cheering me on.
The more I ate, the livelier and excited they got. For the most part, I tried to ignore them.
Some assumptions accompanied this observation, mostly because I didn't think it to be plausible that their delight stemmed from the fact that I was eating something deadly, thereby accelerating my demise and, as a result, the advent of their new breeding stock.
Unfortunately, other attempts to explain this behavior were even more inconclusive. Why should they be elated when I ate something? I put this question on my ever-growing list of things I would like answered should I survive and returned to my former sleeping place, where I lied down in an attempt to conserve energy and most of all water.
I didn't have enough time to even close my eyes when my two friends looked at me with their best imitation of a puppy dog's eyes.
I sighed and motioned them to get in my lap, which didn't necessitate further prompting. They scurried in it in the blink of an eye. But something was different, they sat there, and it looked like they wanted something from me, not sure of what it might be. I placed one hand on top of the male spider.
This simple touch without any cloth between the point of contact felt indescribable as if a circuit was closed for the first time allowing a current to run its course. I snap like withdrew my hand, not a second after I did, the tingling feeling that starting from my spread and tried to
encompass my whole body subsided.
What the... this didn't happen before, but the only thing different between then and now was, that I ate the fruit. There had to be a connection.
I saw the spider looking at me disappointed.
"You liked that, whatever it was?"
He nodded with his head in response, and I had a short debate with myself if I should risk it to try it again, whatever it was that just happened.
Ultimately I decided to do it again. Two reasons stood out. For one, my overall situation couldn't objectively get any worse, and second, my spider friends didn't strike me as having ulterior motives. Quite the opposite, to be honest. I got the feeling that our interests were aligned and that they had my well-being at heart.
The reason eluded me, sure it would be possible to narrow it down considerably, but there was only so much you can get out of someone with only being able to ask yes or no questions. For this reason, I thought it best to save my breath in a form the outset next to a hopeless and time-consuming endeavor when I could simply get the same answers in less time by undergoing a little risk.
At this point, it wouldn't matter anyway. Since I was already in free fall without a parachute, so nothing was preventing me from trying to fly... after all, I had nothing to lose.
I reached for the spider again. But this time, I was prepared for the sudden influx of this sensation. Allowing, me to get a full picture of what was going on.
My initial impression wasn't wrong, but it didn't convey it in the right context since I only caught a glimpse of the proceedings. As a result, it wasn't correct to describe it as completing a circuit. For the simple reason, that this metaphor implied, for there to be two parts of a whole getting reconnected again to once more complete each other.
This, however, was different, in the sense that it had two already complete components making contact with each other. One subsuming the willing other to create something else, something new, something so much more than their individual parts could ever have hoped to be, fusing and evolving both.
I lost myself in the myriad of impressions. By the time I came to, I couldn't help to notice that the sun had moved on to a quite considerable degree.
However, that wasn't the only thing different than before. Combined with my usual senses, I was seeing myself through eight eyes, from a position on my abdomen.
In addition, a whole new set of limbs and a new body joined my bodily awareness. It was a different feedback than the one I was used to from my late power; With it, the creatures under my control were just that under my control.
Of course, my power had informed me about their state of being. But for all that, there was never any doubt that I was only controlling something external. Sitting in the driver's seat of their bodies steering all of their actions. This, however, felt like the body of the spider was indistinguishable from my own that we were one, just apart.
It was a strange feeling suddenly being at two places, to be two beings at the same time.
In retrospect, my power back then compared to this new sensation as if there was at least one step of separation between them and me; sluggish, apart, and distant. A fissure that now with this new power got closed. What once was two connected with each other now became an us.
I could still feel the fading consciousness of the spider slowly molding and fusing with myself. The bliss he felt when he gave himself up to become part of something greater, of me.
The spider felt fulfillment as if its whole purpose in life lead it to this situation, and it could now fulfill its raison d´etre.
Experiencing the echo of his feeling was exhilarating, to say the least, as was this new state of being I embody. I felt strange but not in a bad way; I was not sure how to describe it. I withdrew into myself and listened to my body, tried to fathom the changes this brought upon me.
After some introspection, I came to the conclusion that the spider -or more accurately, his self- didn't vanish entirely in this merger. I could still sense parts of him, existing under the surface of our new self, ready to be called upon, waiting to serve.
When I reopened my eyes, the female spider sat on my torso on that body part other women would call their breasts and was demanding through her whole body language not to be left out.
"You want it, too?"
As a response, she made to steps towards my face and awkwardly attempted to hug my face with her front-legs.
"You are quite the impatient one, aren't you."
The response I received could be best described as the spider version of blushing. I reached for the spider and started the merging process, and suddenly everything went wrong. Instead of making the connection to one spider as I expected, I made it to hundreds, and by the time I realized my mistake -that I had forgotten about the egg sack- it was already too late to stop the merger.
This time, I didn't lose myself in a controlled myriad of impressions. This time, I was lost in a cataclysmic storm. It felt like I was ripped apart, forming hundreds of connections, fusing together with what was found at the end only to try and meld together as one.
With dread, I found out I overextended. It took more effort than anything else I've experienced only to prevent myself from shattering into hundreds of pieces.
Every time a part of me drifted away, fusing faster than one of the others it pulled at me. Attempting to draw out more of me and, as a result taking it away from all the other connections. By doing so, threatening to destroy the spider-net I found myself being made into disrupting the carefully maintained status quo.
It turned out to be a balancing act of the highest order to prevent myself from being severed into tiny little pieces while under the assault of all those sensory expressions.
Without my experience and me somehow retaining my multitasking ability, another thing the bleed over seemed to let me keep, I was able to prevail in this life and death struggle but not without cost.
The longer this merger took, the more I could feel myself getting weaker physically and mentally. By the time I was finished, there was next to nothing left.
I'd never felt exhaustion even close to this before, and my last thoughts before darkness took me pertained to the fact that I might never regain consciousness before dying.
I found myself confined to a dark haze, but sometimes there were flashes of awareness, for the most part, filtered through the eight eyes of a spider. I saw the sunset and rise more than once, and I noticed the more time elapsed, the more impenetrable the haze appeared to be.
I couldn't help, but wonder was this how dying was like? Slowly being dragged further, and further into a never-ending darkness?
It never came to that, me vanishing into the darkness. There was another flash. I saw, looking through the eyes of the adult spiders, as a hand reached over the edge of the boat.
A moment later, another hand was placed next to the first one, followed by a light jerk that set the whole boat into a swinging motion these hands hoisted a body over the edge.
I saw a middle-aged dark blonde well-built guy with a naked torso standing there, to which my spiders took exception. They hissed at him and took a defensive position upon my belly, ready to attack this person at a moment's notice.
I saw his lips move, but I heard no sound neither from him nor my spiders. The only reason that I even knew of their threatening gestures was owed to the fact that I also caught glimpses of the signal their brains sent to their bodies.
The man took a step forward, his arms raised in a non-threatening gesture, one I knew my spiders wouldn't heed, they decided to protect me, and they would or die trying.
When he took the next step, the male spider jumped towards the jugular of the man. I barely saw movement until I felt a searing pain on the same scale as I experienced by being bisected by Scion.
The next thing I saw, looking through the eyes of the female spider, was the two bisected halves of her male counterpart landing left and right on the ground next to the man; his fangs never even came close to reaching him. He gave the spider a glare with such intensity that I was sure a slight increase in it would evaporate everything in its path.
The message it contained was clear if you don't attack me, I would grant you the same courtesy. His lips moved again, and I started to hate the fact that I never learned how to lip-read. But whatever he said was enough to pacify the female spider, because shortly after he stopped talking, she lied down on me, still following his every move but no longer with hostile intent.
I wondered how he managed to kill my spider? He must have utilized some kind of power. The only ones I could think of able to that were either a form of air/wind manipulation or using the edge of the force field to garner this result. Either way, the ease with which he used it to dispose of the spider, who was not only fast but also quite sturdy, instantly bumped his threat rating to a high degree. Simply, because whatever it was he did, it didn't seem to be Manton-limited. Which made him a threat on the same level or greater than Narwhal.
The man, wearing the strangest goatee I have ever seen, looked around for some time and then jumped back into the water, my spider noticed that the ship was slightly askew, which could only mean that we moved. Given the angle of the ship, it had to be at quite the high-speed. Something, I only thought possible with the use of a motor.
At that point, I lost the connection to the awareness of my remaining spider. Hence I found myself back alone in the darkness.
To my surprise, I could still feel the male spider's presence. Never having left me despite what happened to his body, curious.
I noticed how he siphoned the last vestiges of power from the well representing it, which served to further weaken me. I tried to get him to stop, but all my effort were in vain.
I couldn't be sure if this was an automatic function of my new power, or I was just unable to influence it because of the condition I found myself in.
I decided to at least find out to what end my power was used and tried my best to examine this procedure. It seemed to be a reasonable endeavor to gather more information about it. After all, it was in the process of killing me, and I couldn't be sure it would halt before succeeding.
I followed the path the power took to its destination. To my astonishment, it was used to slowly rebuilding the body of my dead male spider. It finally all started to make sense why they were so keen on fusing with me. Apparently, we not only became one improved being, but it also served for them to gain some form of immortality.
Given what I knew some would do to reach even an incomplete version of it like I assumed this one to be, I could understand their actions.
However, there had to be more to this. The more I thought about it, the more I was certain of it. Because I doubted that everything I got out of it in return were a few loyal companions.
Unfortunately, I was in no state to pursue that question, at least until I woke again. If I ever did.
I felt myself weakening more and more until the darkness encompassed the last vestiges of my consciousness and was devoured by it. In my last coherent thought, I considered myself lucky in ending this way instead of the alternative and cruel way of dying by thirst would have been.
-----
I woke up with my whole body feeling exhausted and sluggish. My dark hair had fallen over my eyes. I had never thought raising my hand would ever create difficulties. With some effort, I managed to remove my hair from impeding my vision.
I found myself lying on a bed draped in a blanket. To my right, there was a small table; Placed on top of it was a glass of water and a plate filled with food.
I didn't waste any time and reached for the glass. With greedy gulps out of it, I quenched my thirst and only set it down again after emptying it to the last drop.
It was essential for the process of recovery to get back the lost liquid, I knew that my bodily awareness couldn't be accurate, not after it went through such an ordeal, but I could swear I already noticed a difference. The exhaustion and sluggishness were slowly receding and a resemblance of strength returning to my limbs.
But why did I wake up? My condition should have only gotten worse without any food or water intake. Aside from the water now in my belly, I was sure nothing found its way there since this disgusting fruit.
I didn't fail to note that I wasn't alone in my bed, my eight-legged companions were there, and if the empty bowls at the foot-end of my bed were any indication, they already gorged themselves on food and water and entered a digestive nap.
Not that I could fault them for that. I took some of the food from the table and let the hunger take over my actions. It felt incredible to eat something after the ordeal I went through.
While eating, my thoughts drifted back to the spiders. Were they the reason for my awakening? Then eating and somehow sharing what energy this provided? I would have loved to ask them about it. But if my hunch turned out to be true, I wouldn't want to disturb their sleep. Because then they would have more than earned it.
I devoured the food and only stopped when nothing was left on the once full plates.
I hadn't placed them back more than a few seconds ago when the door to the room I found myself in was opened. A tall dark-haired woman who wore a long-sleeved v-necked top that displayed her rather vast female assets stepped into the room.
I suppressed the envy my younger self would have felt at seeing her and focused on the important details. Her bare midriff was toned, not unlike what my stomach used to look like when I was in the wards.
I pegged her to be around forty forty-five, perhaps older, not because she looked the part but because she gave off an air of experience similar to the one I sensed from Miss Militia. Going solely by her outward appearance, she didn't look older than her mid-thirties, but I learned a long time ago to trust more than simply what my eyes perceived.
And this woman had far more depth to her than her looks, and this way perceived age could account for. Despite the obvious unhealthy lifestyle she must lead, judging by the burning cigarette between her lips. I still got the impression that in hand-to-hand combat she could crush me like a bug, which I doubted any none brute would be able to do even without my powers.
Of course, first impressions aren't suitable and sufficient to form an educated guess. But I had learned to trust my instincts, and they rarely disappointed me, especially in rating how dangerous my opposite is.
Behind her followed the man I remember seeing through my spiders. He was now wearing a loose shirt and glasses. I noticed that above and under one of his eyes he sported a vertical scar.
What set me on edge wasn't this injury driving the point home that he must be an experienced fighter or the fact that I saw him display a power, but the way he held himself, the presence he gave off.
I have met people like him, people who can step into a room and own it demands respect from the occupants without even trying, certain of themselves to such a frightening degree that they didn't just think they can take anyone in it. No, this level of assuredness is only present in the ones who are sure of it. People, who fought countless battles against overwhelming odds and came out on top.
I have met people like this in the past Contessa, Alexandria, Jack Slash, but also I came to mind. In my time in the Wards, I repeatedly watched video material of myself and what I could glimpse of his mannerism had a strong resemblance to the Skitter I saw in those videos. Strolling into the PRT headquarters without a care in the world and taking down their Capes and other personnel left and right as if they were nothing more than some annoying pest.
He was on a completely different level than the woman. He closed the door behind him, barring the sight I had outside, to what looked like the interior of a bar, according to the few people I could make out sitting at tables and drinking some beverages out of big glasses. They wore strange clothes and were armed with weapons; was that a cutlass?
Before I could think on it and come up with some reason aside from being Halloween as to why someone should have such weapons on them, both the man and the woman seated themselves on some chairs they moved next to the bed I occupied, and I heard the woman say:
"Oh, you are already up. That's unusual. I came here prepared to force-feed you while unconscious to get your body to regain enough strength for you to wake up."
She stared at me for a moment in deep thought until she continued.
"It wouldn't have anything to do with those spiders and their particular strong appetite, wouldn't it?"
She came to the same conclusion as me with fewer data points. She was sharp this one. Instead of confirming her suspicions, I asked.
"Who are you?"
She was caught flat-footed by this question and took a few moments to get back her bearings.
"How rude of me. I totally forgot to introduce ourselves. My name is Shakuyaku, but I'm usually called Shaky and this one."
She gestures towards her male companion.
"is called Ray, or as he is otherwise known as Silvers Rayleigh"
Authors Note: I considered for some time to introduce a language barrier. But ultimately decided against it. It would be cumbersome to get around it and slow down the pace in the next few chapters to a crawl...
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Chapter 02 - The Pirate Kings Right Hand
Chapter 02: The Pirate Kings Right Hand (Spring 1504)
The way she emphasized his name made it clear to me that his name was of some importance, which can only mean that she was gauging my reaction to hearing it, probably as some kind of test. Was she trying to use the reputation this man undoubtedly had in some way, to cave me, to get me to behave? For what purpose I could only guess. Could she be aware of me being Khepri? Or what I think was by far more likely, this guy is so huge not knowing him would indicate that I was not from around here, whatever here in this context means.
Considering, that she displayed a smug grin, which would undoubtedly have won any Lisa impersonation completion, hands down. I feared she might have already gotten the answer to her question without me actually saying anything.
Hence I just asked him,
"what do you want ?"
"Oh, You think us not worthy of receiving an answer to our question. You are a quite bold and ungrateful young Lady aren't you ?"
She said playfully.
"Please, we both know that you already got what you were after. So why don't we cut this game short and you tell me what it is you want ?"
I said annoyed.
She smiled at that and turned to the other occupant of the room.
"Oh, you hear that Ray she is not only sharp with her tongue but also with her mind. I like her already. You always come across the most intriguing things," She said.
The response of this Ray person was a hearty laugh. I somehow got the impression I was not privy to some kind of inside joke.
"To answer your question, we want you to relieve our boredom," she said turning back to me holding my gaze challenging.
I expected a lot of things, with being blackmailed making the top of my list should they have recognized me. Simply deduced from the fact, that I wasn't already dead. What was by no means an unrealistic assumption, why else should they even talk to me since I was pretty sure that the whole world, no scratch that more than one world would love nothing more than to see me dead. And I was sure there are a lot of people out and about leaving no stone unturned to find me with the intention to either see to my untimely end or enslave me.
But reliving boredom, that definitely wasn't something that came to mind. And my face probably gave away my disbelief and outrage, because she saw the need to explain her statement.
"You see, we both had to give up our way of life as a consequence of circumstances out of our control, not that we regret our timely retirement. But we weren't exactly allowed to ease into it, one day we were still pirates sea-wind blowing in our faces adventure an island away and the next day we were lying in the sun with so much time on our hands that we didn't know what to do with it."
Did she just say Pirates, with a short glance I tried to spot a Hospital Wristband, unfortunately, I didn't find one and according to her facial expression, she was serious and wasn't trying to deceive me.
But Pirates on Earth Bet with Leviathan around, would be an unprofitable profession, solidifying my suspicion of no longer being there to almost fact.
"So we came up with ways to satisfy our need for excitement."
"And I'm the recent means toward that end if I understand you correctly." I tried to clarify.
"See, I told you she was smart." was the response I received, mostly aimed at Ray.
I wasn't willing to participate in some kind of sick pastime of those two and I had every intention of making that clear without fail.
"Then I'm sorry to inform you, that you have to search elsewhere for whatever it is you are searching. I'm neither willing nor do I have the time to take part in it. I have better things to do, first of all, finding a way to get home. I'm grateful for you saving my life. "
I then channeled my inner Skitter and made my next words as threatening as possible.
"But make no mistake, my gratefulness only goes so far, and if you dare to stand in my way you are gonna regret it."
I was fed up with being thought of as the plaything of others, Emma, Sophia, Coil, Dinah, Tagg, Alexandria, Jack and Contessa came to mind. All in their own way trying to remove my agency, manipulating attempting to use me. I had enough and my frustration at not being able to really change that in the past must have found its way into my statement, those feelings somehow gave more weight to my words, they felt heavier on my tongue, and speaking them took a lot more effort and energy than it should have.
Suddenly I felt drained the whole progress I made towards my recovery was reset and I felt far weaker than when I woke, but that wasn't the only change I noticed I gained access to the senses of a lot spiders, in quite some distance all around me. Not just that, my access wasn't limited to their perception I could control them all, similar to how I was able to, in the past.
It even felt similar to give them commands and receive their sensory perception, completely different in comparison to how two spiders at my side were a part of me, indistinguishable from one of my limbs. No, this felt similar to using my old power.
But that wasn't all my little outbreak accomplished, through the eyes of one spider, who built her net in the corner of the bar I was in, I saw everyone in it being unconscious. Shakky and Ray were looking at me without a hint of playfulness left in their facial expression, instead they displayed a seriousness I last saw in the faces of capes seconds before taking the field against an Endbringer.
"Was that ..."
Shakky started to ask but is interrupted by Ray before she got the opportunity to finish her question.
"Yeah, it was. But I never came across a similar coloration, this was unique."
He started to crawl his goatee for a moment lost in thought before he said.
"Shakky you should take care of our esteemed customers, while our guest and I have to talk."
His tone didn't allow any objection. She left the room without a word.
The exhaustion got to me, I started to feel dizzy and had to use the bedrest to lean against in order to keep sitting upright.
Meanwhile, more questions wanted to be answered, why now? I was already days on this planet why did I regain my old powers now and not days ago? Were they somehow suppressed? Drugs came to mind, given the duration a mental barrier that I just broke seemed also plausible.
But those theories couldn't explain why the people out in the bar are now drooling on the tables in their unconscious state, even if I gained some aspects of my Khepri power set this couldn't be explained by it, I was never able to let people faint and why were neither Ray and Shakky affected by it? But most puzzling was the fact, that they seemed to have recognized what I did, but if I credited this to my powers this should be impossible. Powers are unique sure there are overlaps and sometimes from an observers' perspective different powers can have the same result and therefore can be mistaken for each other, but this didn't seem to be the case here.
Shakky and Ray seem to have come across my exact power set, or if I gave weight to his words the same power set with a minor alteration. I decided to stop asking myself all those questions and instead tried to get some answers from the man sitting next to me.
"Where are you from ?" he asked taking me by surprise before I could voice one of my own.
I was considering not to answer, lying would require having a modicum of an idea of where I was to make it believable. The other option would be to fake amnesia, but for one I didn't think he would believe me after my stunt a few seconds ago and it might sour the already strained relation we had, and I didn't want to repeat the mistakes that got me in this situation in the first place.
Of course, I didn't go from unhealthy paranoia to helplessly naive, with those spiders falling under my control I got an excellent idea of my surroundings and was already in the process of mapping it. You might never know when it might come in handy, but I was a realist I didn't think me capable to get away from Ray, let alone win a fight against him given the limited resources at my disposal and my condition.
I was sure if Lisa was here with me, she would have given me the worlds longest lecture about my inability to trust and shouldering all alone. So for once in my recent life, I gave a person the benefit of the doubt. I just hoped I wouldn't come to regret it.
"Earth Bet, Brockton Bay Massachusetts United States of America," I recited.
He pondered my answer for a moment and then said.
"I have never heard of an Island by that name."
And with this simple sentence, I finally got confirmation, of me being on a different Earth, or was it planet? Worst of all the term Earth Bet seemed to have no meaning for him.
"It isn't the name of an Island Earth Bet is the denotation given the Planet I'm from. Brockton Bay is the name of the town I grew up in, which is located in the state by the name Massachusetts located in the country called the United States of America."
I clarified and as I suspected his incredulous expression said enough.
"You never came across any of those names?" I asked, "Do you perhaps know the location of any portals connecting to different worlds ?"
"No, I don't." those three words he calmly said casually crushed a lot of my hopes.
"Great, just great." I couldn´t help myself from exclaiming.
That meant getting home wouldn't be easy, but when was anything I did ever easy?
"Tell me, how do you know to use Haoshoku Haki ?" he asked in response.
"Hao what?" I wondered.
"The ability you used to knock out the people on the other side of the door is known as Haoshoku Haki or the color of intimidation, some call it Conqueror Haki." He explained. "I've come across people who could utilize it many times, but I never felt anything like yours. Something was different when you used it."
"Can this ability, this Haoshoku Haki be used to do something besides knock people out?" I asked," and how exactly does this work ?"
"I doubt it." he said "I've only ever seen it used in a form of intimidation it allows you to overpower the will of others, depending on the difference between the user of the power and the recipients this power can be used to intimidate them, in a roundabout way it serves to declare yourself their better. Most animals and beasts react particularly strongly to this, festering the belief of you being their alpha. And if the gulf is wide between you and them it allows you to knock them out, their willpower just not being enough to stand in your very presence."
"Except for people like you and Shakky, I'm guessing possessing an incredible strong will prevents one from being affected by it." I expanded upon his explanation.
"Exactly" he confirmed.
Whoa, wait what, the way he described this ability he made it sound as if everybody could learn how to use it. Did this mean it wasn't a parahuman power?
"So everybody with strong Will can use this color of Intimidation?"
He laughed at my question.
"No, of course not." He said. "You have to been born with the ability. It is said that only one in over a million has it, but even then most never awaken the ability or learn to utilize it during their lifetime."
My curiosity piqued I questioned,
"How do you awaken this power ?"
"It varies," he said, "some do it in stressful situations and others through rigorous training."
Stressful situations wasn't that in a roundabout way the very description of a trigger event, but training? I have never heard of a para-human claiming getting powers through training. His other comments were implying, that he met people possessing this Haoshoku Haki, which meant more than one person having the exact same power. It sounded more and more like something different than a power granted by a passenger. What was going on? That was when I remembered how he took out my spider.
"If this Haki can only do that, how did you kill my spider?" I prodded "what kind of power was that?"
Meanwhile, the spider in the bar watched Shakky searching all of her unconscious customers for their valuables and money, piling it in the center of the room.
"Oh, that was me projecting a wind blade with the tip of my fingers," he said.
"So you do have a power, a special ability?" I asked.
"Of course not, how else could I have been able to swim."
He said matter of fact.
I was confused.
"What has the ability to swim to do with the powers you demonstrated?"
He looked at me as if I just said the dumbest thing he ever heard.
"Every user of an Akuma no Mi losses his ability to swim, isn't that common knowledge where you are from?"
"What is an Akuma no Mi?" I wondered.
"You really have never heard of it?" he asked.
"No," I said.
"Akuma no Mi or as they are otherwise known as Devil Fruits provides every person who ate one of them with special abilities. They are divided into three major classes, Logia, Zoan, and Paramecia. A Logia devil fruit transforms the body of the person having eaten it into a certain element like fire, giving them the ability to create and control this element. Furthermore, by transforming in said element it allows the user to become intangible. They are by most regarded as the strongest fruit type because it takes special means to nullify the intangibility they grant and not everybody can do that, which makes the wielder of such a fruit power an invincible foe to all those lacking such an ability."
That sounded like some kind of Breaker state, curious. I wondered if those special measures he alluded to were other such powers or was it something else.
"Then there are the Zoan type fruit," he continued to explain "they allow the user to transform into a certain creature type like a wolf or lion and a mixed form of this creature and the form the consumer of the fruit possessed before eating it. Those fruits are for the most part straight forward boosting the physical capabilities of the user base form when transformed. It is even said that there doesn't exist a limit for the physical peak a Zoan user can reach. There are also ancient and mythical Zoan type fruits out there, they are even scarcer and said to be more powerful than Logia by granting the special abilities those creatures are known for adding other advantages."
So in essence they grant a changer and brute rating linked to a certain species mythological or not, the most interesting part of them seemed to be the fact, that they seem to work as a multiplier of the physical capabilities of its user and if it is true they remove the ceiling on such, they sound really interesting. A power allowing for growth always is, after all.
"And last there are the Paramecia class of fruits, they encompass everything that doesn't fit in the other two categories. Be it transforming you into steel, allowing you to shoot beams with special characteristics to bestowing other kinds of abilities."
That was really vague, not sure what to think of such a broad classification. Even the PRT classification with all its pitfalls and inaccuracy was leagues better than this.
"And everybody who has eaten such a fruit losses his or her ability to swim?" I asked him.
After Shakky was done with relieving everybody of anything worth something she grabbed those people and dragged them outside, two or more at a time. Men who were at least twice as heavy as her, and she carried them like I would a newborn kitten, without any visible effort.
Whenever she reached the entrance she threw them outside like a bag of trash without a care in the world, and they flew a dozen meters away. To be able to do that you at least need to have a mid-tier brute rating.
If her customers are usually treated this way the name of this establishment, "Shakky Rip of Bar" is awfully accurate. And I wondered what had to possess you to entertain the idea to use an establishment named like that.
"Yes, this is the one common weakness all the Devil Fruits share with each other. Seawater in general can be used to weaken devil fruit users, but only complete submersion robs them of the ability to move. There also exist Seastone, a stone imbued with the characteristics of the sea, which can do the same with a simple touch, there are people out there using weapons made out of it to be able to fight against fruit users." Rayleigh told me.
"That means this wind blade attack is something everybody can learn how to do?" I asked.
"With dedication, yes."
He made it sound like it was no big deal, that apparently everybody had the potential to learn abilities, which would be declared super-powers on Earth Bet. And then there were those Devil Fruits able to impart powers without the recipient having to go through a trigger event, aside from this no swimming weakness that came with consuming them they came across awfully similar to what a passenger might grant his host. Could they be this Planets' version of it? A different approach from the Entities? After all, Cauldron sold powers in a bottle, as a drinkable liquid therefore powers to eat were close in concept.
"Those devil fruits didn't just appear on this world from one day to the next after one or two strange beings made their appearance. Beings who had a multitude of strange abilities at their disposal?" I asked.
"No, those fruits were around since a long time ago, why do you ask?"
He narrowed his eyes at this question.
"The powers granted by these Devil Fruits are they specific to the Fruit or is there some process tying the power to the circumstances in which they are consumed or to the person eating it?" I dug deeper.
My spiders witnessed Shakky storing the last of her loot under a loose floorboard behind the bar before she made her way back to us. She came wordlessly back through the door and sat down on her chair, crossed her legs, and started listening to the ongoing conversation as if she was never away.
"No," he said, "One fruit always grants the very same power, but of course the application greatly varies from person to person ?"
She must have heard the tail end of what I said when she entered the room.
"How can you know that?" I questioned.
"When a devil fruit user dies, the fruit he or she has consumed reappears shortly after. Ready to be consumed again." Shakky said.
"reappears?" I interjected.
"Yes, it is rumored that the closest fruit the devil fruit was originally based on transforms into the devil fruit again, waiting to be consumed. So if the base was an apple when the user dies the nearest apple turns into devil fruit again, distance doesn´t seem to play a part in it."
"I see," I said, this still didn´t rule out the Entities. Granting different people the same power and observe how the use differs, is something I could see them do. "Wait are those Devil Fruits distinctive from each other and does this mean there exists a register on what fruit bestows which power."
"Yes on both accounts, Shakky said "of course, the register isn't complete, far from it. There a lot of devil fruits undiscovered to this day and others, despite being in use in the past, unknown what they look like. Aside from those who have eaten them, but they never shared that information and why should they?"
Why indeed, if they had to die for the fruit to remerge telling someone what they looked like could be counterproductive to their health.
"You haven't answered my question." Rayleigh accused, thinking back on it I asked.
"You want to hear the long or the short version? "
"The short version will suffice for now." He said.
"Okay, the world I'm from didn't have special powers or anything resembling this Haki or wind blade thing at least until a golden man made his appearance. And with his arrival more and more people gained powers through a so-called trigger event. Basically, you had to go through the worst experience of your life and as a result, you were granted powers, how they manifested was largely dependent on your mindset and the general situation that lead to this trigger event. As it later turned out this golden man, responsible for those powers didn't give them away for free. He was a member of an alien species who lacked creativity and by giving powers to humans, broken humans was his species way to evolve those powers."
They listened mesmerized to my explanation until I reached that part and their expression turned strange, I couldn't quite place them.
"The users of such powers were attracted to conflict, either by the power forcing the recipient or the person was seeking it. After all, the powers only latched onto broken people and most of those needn´t any prodding.
In the ensuing battles, the powers were inevitably used, but since they were static in their nature. The recipients were forced to come up with new ways to utilize them, thereby refining and strengthening those powers. This also served to make the golden man stronger as the source of those powers. Originally he intended, after collecting enough data to destroy our world and consume what was left of it as sustenance."
"Planet eating golden man ..." Shakky mumbled under her breath
"But something went wrong and his partner died at their arrival, disrupting their plans." I told them, "it put him in a grieving state, in which he for the most part just existed until he was instigated, by one of the worst murderers in the history of my world, to kill everyone. And he did that with great efficiency killing billions across a multitude of worlds until I eventually ended up killing him."
"And pray tell me how did you accomplish such a thing," Shakky inquired the disbelief clearly displayed, "because if all you said is true then this golden man held power akin to a God and I doubt he would give anybody a power able to best, let alone kill him."
"He didn't," I said," he kept all the strongest powers for himself."
"Then how did you do it? What did your power do?"
She was scarily perceptive, I didn't say I had a power, but she instantly concluded I had to have one without a need to think about it.
"My power allowed me to control bugs, and the short version is, I bullied him until he decided to take his own life. The longer version would take quite some time to explain."
Both of them looked at me completely incredulous until Ray started laughing. He laughed himself to tears, it took minutes until he regained a modicum of composure.
"So how come, after you killed this God you ended up in the calm belt on a lifeboat with only two spiders as companions?" He asked.
"I honestly don't know." I said, "after the fight, I was injured not just physically but mentally in a way I don't think I would have been able to recover from without help. I was found by another strong Para-human."
They looked at me puzzled.
"Para-human are what we call the people holding a special ability where I come from, she had one of the strongest powers out there allowing her to succeed at everything she attempts to do so without fail. We talked and she shot me, twice. The next thing I know was waking up in the boat together with those two spiders and a strange fruit."
That got their attention.
"What fruit?" Shakky asked.
"I don't know." I said, "I've never seen anything like it, which was the reason I hesitated and didn't eat it at first. But at one point it meant either risk consuming a potentially poisonous fruit or die of hunger and thirst, given those options, I chose to eat it."
"It wouldn't have happened to be the most disgusting fruit you ever ate." Shakky wondered.
"Yeah, why?"
Before I finished voicing the question it hit me like a brick, strange-looking fruit - fuck - that couldn't have been a devil fruit, could it? I mean what are the odds? A short look in the faces of Shakky and Ray and yes, apparently it could. The question regarding the taste of the fruit was far too specific to be anything else.
Ray laughed again.
"That´s hilarious, you have found and eaten a Devil Fruit within your first day here, something most others search their whole life for without success. Unbelievable little anchor." He teased.
"But I didn't get any ..." I was about to say when my gaze fell onto my eight-legged friends and the words died in my mouth. Shakky seemed to misinterpret my reaction because she said bemusedly
"It takes time to find out what they are and even more time to get a handle on how to use them. The more esoteric fruits are difficult to pin down on what they do, so no surprise there if you didn't notice anything different."
The events of past days finally caught up to me as I failed to suppress
a yawn.
"Why don´t you rest a bit," Shakky suggested as she took notice of the table with the empty plates. "I´m gonna bring you some more food, and we continue this discussion tomorrow after a good nights rest and see where we are going from there."
"Yeah, that seems like a good idea." I agreed.
They both were about to leave when Shaky turned around and said.
"Oh and before the false impression you might have gotten of us through this misunderstanding from before festers, perhaps I should clarify what we meant."
It took me a moment to comprehend what she is referring to. I was far too tired, it felt like an eternity until my mind made the connection and I concluded, that she must be hinting at me relieving their boredom.
"We for the most part help those in need, as a means to satisfy our amusement and in doing, so we are even able to improve on the ease in which we can sleep at night. You should know, Pirates like us carry a lot of baggage around with us."
Yeah tell me about it, you aren´t the only ones having regrets. Is that why you sent me here Contessa? To give me a second chance a clean slate in another world or was there something else at play? A guilty conscience maybe?
With those parting words, Shakky closed the door behind her. I laid down and within seconds of it sleep overwhelmed me.
Authors Note: I had quite some trouble with this chapter, first of all, there isn´t very much known about the characters of either Shaky or Ray. Then there is the fact that Taylor is in dire need of someone getting her up to speed, but getting the help of those two for the goodness of their heartfelt wrong. They are pirates and even if they are good pirates in the sense of not being opposed to helping ones in need and not going out of their way to make others suffer because they can, I was unable to imagine them helping Taylor for free.
I know they did it for the Straw hats without recompensation but that was different, that was at least in Rays case ensuring the "Legacy" of his best friend and Captain somehow continues living on, and he wasn´t the only one who saw the similarities between those two, Shanks did a long time ago ...
Therefore I needed something different and I think them being bored isn´t that far out that it breaks my SOD.
Then there was the added difficulty of Taylor Paranoia, it can be argued and rightfully so, that it was out of character of her to disclose anything about her, that Taylor more than likely would have used the first opportunity to flee, to make her own way in this new world.
I considered exactly this for quite some time, I have seen it done in some fics...
But I consciously decided against doing this. My reason is the following in such stories she usually leaves the place behind, where she could have gotten all her answers only to end up in a fight, finding some resources she could have found without leaving in the first place only to subsequently be returned to the exact same or similar place/situation she was in before she left ... being at the mercy of others while having lost part of her agency (for having broken the trust of those she was in the custody of) ... without anything worth the hassle she went through to her name, just to essentially end up at the starting line once again (just in a more complicated situation ... with reduced options/agency for no net gain).
I didn't find this, let's say compelling and neither was a Taylor faking amnesia, a rational Taylor could as easily justify the first getting answers and then just leave, what was shown here. Of course, she can't be sure she isn´t manipulated in any way or isn´t told false information, but the same problem is true if she gets her information elsewhere.
The main problem I have with those other options is that she gives up a reasonably good position (place to sleep, eat — the ability to ask questions without giving away too much) for the hope of gaining something else, something better just because. I never got the impression throughout worm, that canon Skitter (cape name is used intentionally here) would reject any advantage, that could further her goals without a reason, being it strings attached to the help she receives or something else and if so it wouldn´t be the first time she severed such a connection rather forcefully if she got the impression of being played used and lied at ...
And then there were the reasons Taylor herself gave in this chapter, particularly that most of her problems in canon stemmed from the very fact that she never really accepted help, wanted to do everything alone only ever asked if there was no other option ... and I always thought that this was one of the regrets she spoke about in her talk with Contessa ...
Of course, there are bunches of other reason, mainly the abrupt end this story would have had with a dead Taylor, should she have had the misfortune to cross paths with a celestial dragon or come across the auction house at this point in time ... she atm is just a baseline human, who has eaten an unknown devil fruit and has unlocked Haki she doesn't know how to use ... she can´t hope to defend herself in this world against most, and I'm not talking admiral I'm talking fooder marines ...
The way she emphasized his name made it clear to me that his name was of some importance, which can only mean that she was gauging my reaction to hearing it, probably as some kind of test. Was she trying to use the reputation this man undoubtedly had in some way, to cave me, to get me to behave? For what purpose I could only guess. Could she be aware of me being Khepri? Or what I think was by far more likely, this guy is so huge not knowing him would indicate that I was not from around here, whatever here in this context means.
Considering, that she displayed a smug grin, which would undoubtedly have won any Lisa impersonation completion, hands down. I feared she might have already gotten the answer to her question without me actually saying anything.
Hence I just asked him,
"what do you want ?"
"Oh, You think us not worthy of receiving an answer to our question. You are a quite bold and ungrateful young Lady aren't you ?"
She said playfully.
"Please, we both know that you already got what you were after. So why don't we cut this game short and you tell me what it is you want ?"
I said annoyed.
She smiled at that and turned to the other occupant of the room.
"Oh, you hear that Ray she is not only sharp with her tongue but also with her mind. I like her already. You always come across the most intriguing things," She said.
The response of this Ray person was a hearty laugh. I somehow got the impression I was not privy to some kind of inside joke.
"To answer your question, we want you to relieve our boredom," she said turning back to me holding my gaze challenging.
I expected a lot of things, with being blackmailed making the top of my list should they have recognized me. Simply deduced from the fact, that I wasn't already dead. What was by no means an unrealistic assumption, why else should they even talk to me since I was pretty sure that the whole world, no scratch that more than one world would love nothing more than to see me dead. And I was sure there are a lot of people out and about leaving no stone unturned to find me with the intention to either see to my untimely end or enslave me.
But reliving boredom, that definitely wasn't something that came to mind. And my face probably gave away my disbelief and outrage, because she saw the need to explain her statement.
"You see, we both had to give up our way of life as a consequence of circumstances out of our control, not that we regret our timely retirement. But we weren't exactly allowed to ease into it, one day we were still pirates sea-wind blowing in our faces adventure an island away and the next day we were lying in the sun with so much time on our hands that we didn't know what to do with it."
Did she just say Pirates, with a short glance I tried to spot a Hospital Wristband, unfortunately, I didn't find one and according to her facial expression, she was serious and wasn't trying to deceive me.
But Pirates on Earth Bet with Leviathan around, would be an unprofitable profession, solidifying my suspicion of no longer being there to almost fact.
"So we came up with ways to satisfy our need for excitement."
"And I'm the recent means toward that end if I understand you correctly." I tried to clarify.
"See, I told you she was smart." was the response I received, mostly aimed at Ray.
I wasn't willing to participate in some kind of sick pastime of those two and I had every intention of making that clear without fail.
"Then I'm sorry to inform you, that you have to search elsewhere for whatever it is you are searching. I'm neither willing nor do I have the time to take part in it. I have better things to do, first of all, finding a way to get home. I'm grateful for you saving my life. "
I then channeled my inner Skitter and made my next words as threatening as possible.
"But make no mistake, my gratefulness only goes so far, and if you dare to stand in my way you are gonna regret it."
I was fed up with being thought of as the plaything of others, Emma, Sophia, Coil, Dinah, Tagg, Alexandria, Jack and Contessa came to mind. All in their own way trying to remove my agency, manipulating attempting to use me. I had enough and my frustration at not being able to really change that in the past must have found its way into my statement, those feelings somehow gave more weight to my words, they felt heavier on my tongue, and speaking them took a lot more effort and energy than it should have.
Suddenly I felt drained the whole progress I made towards my recovery was reset and I felt far weaker than when I woke, but that wasn't the only change I noticed I gained access to the senses of a lot spiders, in quite some distance all around me. Not just that, my access wasn't limited to their perception I could control them all, similar to how I was able to, in the past.
It even felt similar to give them commands and receive their sensory perception, completely different in comparison to how two spiders at my side were a part of me, indistinguishable from one of my limbs. No, this felt similar to using my old power.
But that wasn't all my little outbreak accomplished, through the eyes of one spider, who built her net in the corner of the bar I was in, I saw everyone in it being unconscious. Shakky and Ray were looking at me without a hint of playfulness left in their facial expression, instead they displayed a seriousness I last saw in the faces of capes seconds before taking the field against an Endbringer.
"Was that ..."
Shakky started to ask but is interrupted by Ray before she got the opportunity to finish her question.
"Yeah, it was. But I never came across a similar coloration, this was unique."
He started to crawl his goatee for a moment lost in thought before he said.
"Shakky you should take care of our esteemed customers, while our guest and I have to talk."
His tone didn't allow any objection. She left the room without a word.
The exhaustion got to me, I started to feel dizzy and had to use the bedrest to lean against in order to keep sitting upright.
Meanwhile, more questions wanted to be answered, why now? I was already days on this planet why did I regain my old powers now and not days ago? Were they somehow suppressed? Drugs came to mind, given the duration a mental barrier that I just broke seemed also plausible.
But those theories couldn't explain why the people out in the bar are now drooling on the tables in their unconscious state, even if I gained some aspects of my Khepri power set this couldn't be explained by it, I was never able to let people faint and why were neither Ray and Shakky affected by it? But most puzzling was the fact, that they seemed to have recognized what I did, but if I credited this to my powers this should be impossible. Powers are unique sure there are overlaps and sometimes from an observers' perspective different powers can have the same result and therefore can be mistaken for each other, but this didn't seem to be the case here.
Shakky and Ray seem to have come across my exact power set, or if I gave weight to his words the same power set with a minor alteration. I decided to stop asking myself all those questions and instead tried to get some answers from the man sitting next to me.
"Where are you from ?" he asked taking me by surprise before I could voice one of my own.
I was considering not to answer, lying would require having a modicum of an idea of where I was to make it believable. The other option would be to fake amnesia, but for one I didn't think he would believe me after my stunt a few seconds ago and it might sour the already strained relation we had, and I didn't want to repeat the mistakes that got me in this situation in the first place.
Of course, I didn't go from unhealthy paranoia to helplessly naive, with those spiders falling under my control I got an excellent idea of my surroundings and was already in the process of mapping it. You might never know when it might come in handy, but I was a realist I didn't think me capable to get away from Ray, let alone win a fight against him given the limited resources at my disposal and my condition.
I was sure if Lisa was here with me, she would have given me the worlds longest lecture about my inability to trust and shouldering all alone. So for once in my recent life, I gave a person the benefit of the doubt. I just hoped I wouldn't come to regret it.
"Earth Bet, Brockton Bay Massachusetts United States of America," I recited.
He pondered my answer for a moment and then said.
"I have never heard of an Island by that name."
And with this simple sentence, I finally got confirmation, of me being on a different Earth, or was it planet? Worst of all the term Earth Bet seemed to have no meaning for him.
"It isn't the name of an Island Earth Bet is the denotation given the Planet I'm from. Brockton Bay is the name of the town I grew up in, which is located in the state by the name Massachusetts located in the country called the United States of America."
I clarified and as I suspected his incredulous expression said enough.
"You never came across any of those names?" I asked, "Do you perhaps know the location of any portals connecting to different worlds ?"
"No, I don't." those three words he calmly said casually crushed a lot of my hopes.
"Great, just great." I couldn´t help myself from exclaiming.
That meant getting home wouldn't be easy, but when was anything I did ever easy?
"Tell me, how do you know to use Haoshoku Haki ?" he asked in response.
"Hao what?" I wondered.
"The ability you used to knock out the people on the other side of the door is known as Haoshoku Haki or the color of intimidation, some call it Conqueror Haki." He explained. "I've come across people who could utilize it many times, but I never felt anything like yours. Something was different when you used it."
"Can this ability, this Haoshoku Haki be used to do something besides knock people out?" I asked," and how exactly does this work ?"
"I doubt it." he said "I've only ever seen it used in a form of intimidation it allows you to overpower the will of others, depending on the difference between the user of the power and the recipients this power can be used to intimidate them, in a roundabout way it serves to declare yourself their better. Most animals and beasts react particularly strongly to this, festering the belief of you being their alpha. And if the gulf is wide between you and them it allows you to knock them out, their willpower just not being enough to stand in your very presence."
"Except for people like you and Shakky, I'm guessing possessing an incredible strong will prevents one from being affected by it." I expanded upon his explanation.
"Exactly" he confirmed.
Whoa, wait what, the way he described this ability he made it sound as if everybody could learn how to use it. Did this mean it wasn't a parahuman power?
"So everybody with strong Will can use this color of Intimidation?"
He laughed at my question.
"No, of course not." He said. "You have to been born with the ability. It is said that only one in over a million has it, but even then most never awaken the ability or learn to utilize it during their lifetime."
My curiosity piqued I questioned,
"How do you awaken this power ?"
"It varies," he said, "some do it in stressful situations and others through rigorous training."
Stressful situations wasn't that in a roundabout way the very description of a trigger event, but training? I have never heard of a para-human claiming getting powers through training. His other comments were implying, that he met people possessing this Haoshoku Haki, which meant more than one person having the exact same power. It sounded more and more like something different than a power granted by a passenger. What was going on? That was when I remembered how he took out my spider.
"If this Haki can only do that, how did you kill my spider?" I prodded "what kind of power was that?"
Meanwhile, the spider in the bar watched Shakky searching all of her unconscious customers for their valuables and money, piling it in the center of the room.
"Oh, that was me projecting a wind blade with the tip of my fingers," he said.
"So you do have a power, a special ability?" I asked.
"Of course not, how else could I have been able to swim."
He said matter of fact.
I was confused.
"What has the ability to swim to do with the powers you demonstrated?"
He looked at me as if I just said the dumbest thing he ever heard.
"Every user of an Akuma no Mi losses his ability to swim, isn't that common knowledge where you are from?"
"What is an Akuma no Mi?" I wondered.
"You really have never heard of it?" he asked.
"No," I said.
"Akuma no Mi or as they are otherwise known as Devil Fruits provides every person who ate one of them with special abilities. They are divided into three major classes, Logia, Zoan, and Paramecia. A Logia devil fruit transforms the body of the person having eaten it into a certain element like fire, giving them the ability to create and control this element. Furthermore, by transforming in said element it allows the user to become intangible. They are by most regarded as the strongest fruit type because it takes special means to nullify the intangibility they grant and not everybody can do that, which makes the wielder of such a fruit power an invincible foe to all those lacking such an ability."
That sounded like some kind of Breaker state, curious. I wondered if those special measures he alluded to were other such powers or was it something else.
"Then there are the Zoan type fruit," he continued to explain "they allow the user to transform into a certain creature type like a wolf or lion and a mixed form of this creature and the form the consumer of the fruit possessed before eating it. Those fruits are for the most part straight forward boosting the physical capabilities of the user base form when transformed. It is even said that there doesn't exist a limit for the physical peak a Zoan user can reach. There are also ancient and mythical Zoan type fruits out there, they are even scarcer and said to be more powerful than Logia by granting the special abilities those creatures are known for adding other advantages."
So in essence they grant a changer and brute rating linked to a certain species mythological or not, the most interesting part of them seemed to be the fact, that they seem to work as a multiplier of the physical capabilities of its user and if it is true they remove the ceiling on such, they sound really interesting. A power allowing for growth always is, after all.
"And last there are the Paramecia class of fruits, they encompass everything that doesn't fit in the other two categories. Be it transforming you into steel, allowing you to shoot beams with special characteristics to bestowing other kinds of abilities."
That was really vague, not sure what to think of such a broad classification. Even the PRT classification with all its pitfalls and inaccuracy was leagues better than this.
"And everybody who has eaten such a fruit losses his or her ability to swim?" I asked him.
After Shakky was done with relieving everybody of anything worth something she grabbed those people and dragged them outside, two or more at a time. Men who were at least twice as heavy as her, and she carried them like I would a newborn kitten, without any visible effort.
Whenever she reached the entrance she threw them outside like a bag of trash without a care in the world, and they flew a dozen meters away. To be able to do that you at least need to have a mid-tier brute rating.
If her customers are usually treated this way the name of this establishment, "Shakky Rip of Bar" is awfully accurate. And I wondered what had to possess you to entertain the idea to use an establishment named like that.
"Yes, this is the one common weakness all the Devil Fruits share with each other. Seawater in general can be used to weaken devil fruit users, but only complete submersion robs them of the ability to move. There also exist Seastone, a stone imbued with the characteristics of the sea, which can do the same with a simple touch, there are people out there using weapons made out of it to be able to fight against fruit users." Rayleigh told me.
"That means this wind blade attack is something everybody can learn how to do?" I asked.
"With dedication, yes."
He made it sound like it was no big deal, that apparently everybody had the potential to learn abilities, which would be declared super-powers on Earth Bet. And then there were those Devil Fruits able to impart powers without the recipient having to go through a trigger event, aside from this no swimming weakness that came with consuming them they came across awfully similar to what a passenger might grant his host. Could they be this Planets' version of it? A different approach from the Entities? After all, Cauldron sold powers in a bottle, as a drinkable liquid therefore powers to eat were close in concept.
"Those devil fruits didn't just appear on this world from one day to the next after one or two strange beings made their appearance. Beings who had a multitude of strange abilities at their disposal?" I asked.
"No, those fruits were around since a long time ago, why do you ask?"
He narrowed his eyes at this question.
"The powers granted by these Devil Fruits are they specific to the Fruit or is there some process tying the power to the circumstances in which they are consumed or to the person eating it?" I dug deeper.
My spiders witnessed Shakky storing the last of her loot under a loose floorboard behind the bar before she made her way back to us. She came wordlessly back through the door and sat down on her chair, crossed her legs, and started listening to the ongoing conversation as if she was never away.
"No," he said, "One fruit always grants the very same power, but of course the application greatly varies from person to person ?"
She must have heard the tail end of what I said when she entered the room.
"How can you know that?" I questioned.
"When a devil fruit user dies, the fruit he or she has consumed reappears shortly after. Ready to be consumed again." Shakky said.
"reappears?" I interjected.
"Yes, it is rumored that the closest fruit the devil fruit was originally based on transforms into the devil fruit again, waiting to be consumed. So if the base was an apple when the user dies the nearest apple turns into devil fruit again, distance doesn´t seem to play a part in it."
"I see," I said, this still didn´t rule out the Entities. Granting different people the same power and observe how the use differs, is something I could see them do. "Wait are those Devil Fruits distinctive from each other and does this mean there exists a register on what fruit bestows which power."
"Yes on both accounts, Shakky said "of course, the register isn't complete, far from it. There a lot of devil fruits undiscovered to this day and others, despite being in use in the past, unknown what they look like. Aside from those who have eaten them, but they never shared that information and why should they?"
Why indeed, if they had to die for the fruit to remerge telling someone what they looked like could be counterproductive to their health.
"You haven't answered my question." Rayleigh accused, thinking back on it I asked.
"You want to hear the long or the short version? "
"The short version will suffice for now." He said.
"Okay, the world I'm from didn't have special powers or anything resembling this Haki or wind blade thing at least until a golden man made his appearance. And with his arrival more and more people gained powers through a so-called trigger event. Basically, you had to go through the worst experience of your life and as a result, you were granted powers, how they manifested was largely dependent on your mindset and the general situation that lead to this trigger event. As it later turned out this golden man, responsible for those powers didn't give them away for free. He was a member of an alien species who lacked creativity and by giving powers to humans, broken humans was his species way to evolve those powers."
They listened mesmerized to my explanation until I reached that part and their expression turned strange, I couldn't quite place them.
"The users of such powers were attracted to conflict, either by the power forcing the recipient or the person was seeking it. After all, the powers only latched onto broken people and most of those needn´t any prodding.
In the ensuing battles, the powers were inevitably used, but since they were static in their nature. The recipients were forced to come up with new ways to utilize them, thereby refining and strengthening those powers. This also served to make the golden man stronger as the source of those powers. Originally he intended, after collecting enough data to destroy our world and consume what was left of it as sustenance."
"Planet eating golden man ..." Shakky mumbled under her breath
"But something went wrong and his partner died at their arrival, disrupting their plans." I told them, "it put him in a grieving state, in which he for the most part just existed until he was instigated, by one of the worst murderers in the history of my world, to kill everyone. And he did that with great efficiency killing billions across a multitude of worlds until I eventually ended up killing him."
"And pray tell me how did you accomplish such a thing," Shakky inquired the disbelief clearly displayed, "because if all you said is true then this golden man held power akin to a God and I doubt he would give anybody a power able to best, let alone kill him."
"He didn't," I said," he kept all the strongest powers for himself."
"Then how did you do it? What did your power do?"
She was scarily perceptive, I didn't say I had a power, but she instantly concluded I had to have one without a need to think about it.
"My power allowed me to control bugs, and the short version is, I bullied him until he decided to take his own life. The longer version would take quite some time to explain."
Both of them looked at me completely incredulous until Ray started laughing. He laughed himself to tears, it took minutes until he regained a modicum of composure.
"So how come, after you killed this God you ended up in the calm belt on a lifeboat with only two spiders as companions?" He asked.
"I honestly don't know." I said, "after the fight, I was injured not just physically but mentally in a way I don't think I would have been able to recover from without help. I was found by another strong Para-human."
They looked at me puzzled.
"Para-human are what we call the people holding a special ability where I come from, she had one of the strongest powers out there allowing her to succeed at everything she attempts to do so without fail. We talked and she shot me, twice. The next thing I know was waking up in the boat together with those two spiders and a strange fruit."
That got their attention.
"What fruit?" Shakky asked.
"I don't know." I said, "I've never seen anything like it, which was the reason I hesitated and didn't eat it at first. But at one point it meant either risk consuming a potentially poisonous fruit or die of hunger and thirst, given those options, I chose to eat it."
"It wouldn't have happened to be the most disgusting fruit you ever ate." Shakky wondered.
"Yeah, why?"
Before I finished voicing the question it hit me like a brick, strange-looking fruit - fuck - that couldn't have been a devil fruit, could it? I mean what are the odds? A short look in the faces of Shakky and Ray and yes, apparently it could. The question regarding the taste of the fruit was far too specific to be anything else.
Ray laughed again.
"That´s hilarious, you have found and eaten a Devil Fruit within your first day here, something most others search their whole life for without success. Unbelievable little anchor." He teased.
"But I didn't get any ..." I was about to say when my gaze fell onto my eight-legged friends and the words died in my mouth. Shakky seemed to misinterpret my reaction because she said bemusedly
"It takes time to find out what they are and even more time to get a handle on how to use them. The more esoteric fruits are difficult to pin down on what they do, so no surprise there if you didn't notice anything different."
The events of past days finally caught up to me as I failed to suppress
a yawn.
"Why don´t you rest a bit," Shakky suggested as she took notice of the table with the empty plates. "I´m gonna bring you some more food, and we continue this discussion tomorrow after a good nights rest and see where we are going from there."
"Yeah, that seems like a good idea." I agreed.
They both were about to leave when Shaky turned around and said.
"Oh and before the false impression you might have gotten of us through this misunderstanding from before festers, perhaps I should clarify what we meant."
It took me a moment to comprehend what she is referring to. I was far too tired, it felt like an eternity until my mind made the connection and I concluded, that she must be hinting at me relieving their boredom.
"We for the most part help those in need, as a means to satisfy our amusement and in doing, so we are even able to improve on the ease in which we can sleep at night. You should know, Pirates like us carry a lot of baggage around with us."
Yeah tell me about it, you aren´t the only ones having regrets. Is that why you sent me here Contessa? To give me a second chance a clean slate in another world or was there something else at play? A guilty conscience maybe?
With those parting words, Shakky closed the door behind her. I laid down and within seconds of it sleep overwhelmed me.
Authors Note: I had quite some trouble with this chapter, first of all, there isn´t very much known about the characters of either Shaky or Ray. Then there is the fact that Taylor is in dire need of someone getting her up to speed, but getting the help of those two for the goodness of their heartfelt wrong. They are pirates and even if they are good pirates in the sense of not being opposed to helping ones in need and not going out of their way to make others suffer because they can, I was unable to imagine them helping Taylor for free.
I know they did it for the Straw hats without recompensation but that was different, that was at least in Rays case ensuring the "Legacy" of his best friend and Captain somehow continues living on, and he wasn´t the only one who saw the similarities between those two, Shanks did a long time ago ...
Therefore I needed something different and I think them being bored isn´t that far out that it breaks my SOD.
Then there was the added difficulty of Taylor Paranoia, it can be argued and rightfully so, that it was out of character of her to disclose anything about her, that Taylor more than likely would have used the first opportunity to flee, to make her own way in this new world.
I considered exactly this for quite some time, I have seen it done in some fics...
But I consciously decided against doing this. My reason is the following in such stories she usually leaves the place behind, where she could have gotten all her answers only to end up in a fight, finding some resources she could have found without leaving in the first place only to subsequently be returned to the exact same or similar place/situation she was in before she left ... being at the mercy of others while having lost part of her agency (for having broken the trust of those she was in the custody of) ... without anything worth the hassle she went through to her name, just to essentially end up at the starting line once again (just in a more complicated situation ... with reduced options/agency for no net gain).
I didn't find this, let's say compelling and neither was a Taylor faking amnesia, a rational Taylor could as easily justify the first getting answers and then just leave, what was shown here. Of course, she can't be sure she isn´t manipulated in any way or isn´t told false information, but the same problem is true if she gets her information elsewhere.
The main problem I have with those other options is that she gives up a reasonably good position (place to sleep, eat — the ability to ask questions without giving away too much) for the hope of gaining something else, something better just because. I never got the impression throughout worm, that canon Skitter (cape name is used intentionally here) would reject any advantage, that could further her goals without a reason, being it strings attached to the help she receives or something else and if so it wouldn´t be the first time she severed such a connection rather forcefully if she got the impression of being played used and lied at ...
And then there were the reasons Taylor herself gave in this chapter, particularly that most of her problems in canon stemmed from the very fact that she never really accepted help, wanted to do everything alone only ever asked if there was no other option ... and I always thought that this was one of the regrets she spoke about in her talk with Contessa ...
Of course, there are bunches of other reason, mainly the abrupt end this story would have had with a dead Taylor, should she have had the misfortune to cross paths with a celestial dragon or come across the auction house at this point in time ... she atm is just a baseline human, who has eaten an unknown devil fruit and has unlocked Haki she doesn't know how to use ... she can´t hope to defend herself in this world against most, and I'm not talking admiral I'm talking fooder marines ...
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Chapter 03 - A new Dawn
Chapter 03: A New Dawn (Spring 1504)
I opened my eyes to a room lit in the morning sun shining through the windows on the left side of my bed. I rolled on my back and stared at the ceiling, while I listened to the chorus of chirping the indigenous birds were performing.
Apparently, the events of yesterday didn't stem from my imagination since I was still here, despite secretly hoping for the opposite. To awaken in a bed at a place I could allow myself to call home, where all the people I care about would be present. Lisa, Rachel, Brian, Charlotte, Sierra, the Kids, and Aisha. I missed them all so much and when I finally saw them again it was a repeat of what happened before I left them. One problem after the other without any pause, no time to just be together to enjoy each other's company.
And now it seemed like it will be an even longer time until I can see them again. In my mind, there was no doubt of our reunion to occur eventually. I deliberately denied myself any thoughts to the contrary and buried them deep inside my consciousness.
I really didn't expect anything for saving or at least consolidating the parahumans in an attempt to save the world, no medal, no recognition no nothing, since it was something that just had to be done, hell I didn't even expect to have a mind let alone powers when it was all over and done. But that I was even denied being with my friends and my Dad, was ... was something I should have known would never come to pass, happy endings after all only happen in old movies.
I only hoped that my actions didn't impact them negatively and that they were all well. Who was I kidding? With me being no longer around they might face the repercussion originally directed at me.
Fuck, and I can't do anything to help them, thanks a lot Contessa you Bitch.
My two spiders woke when my hands clenched into fists slammed into the mattress. I looked at them apologetically, but they obviously didn't care that I interrupted their sleep. They immediately scurried to my side in an attempt to comfort me, something only possible because I gave their original minds free reign over those bodies.
Despite that, it felt strange to have access to their feelings, to experience concern expressed by an extension of yourself for yourself. This was gonna be the one aspect of my newfound powers that was gonna take a lot of time getting used to.
And I better get the hang of them and their limitations fast, since I sincerely doubted finding a way back will be a journey without any trouble waiting for me to find it. If I learned anything as a cape, it was that there existed no smooth sailing.
I paused for a moment at the phrase I used, it seemed like even my mind had accepted that I was stranded in a world with pirates. I chuckled at that. Well, there was no use in prolonging neither my stay in this world nor in this bed.
I sat up and couldn't help myself noticing, that I felt a lot stronger than I did yesterday. Something that shouldn't have been possible this fast without the aid of powers.
I should know I pushed my body on numerous occasions past its limits, which gave me a pretty good idea of its capabilities, especially how long it usually takes for it to recover from certain things.
With the condition of my body having been worse, than most of what I did to it in the past. There was just no way for it to be already in such good shape. Was this somehow swift recovery somehow connected to the fruit I consumed? Didn´t Ray imply that those Zoan type fruits enhance the bodies somehow, does this include healing? Does this mean I ate one of those fruits? Something I should probably keep in mind and ask him about later.
For now, I sat my bare feet on the cold wooden floor and walked over to one of the chairs stacked with clothes. On top of it I found a note:
Take what you like.
The bathroom is the first door to your left.
- Shakky
I took the bundle of clothes and made my way to the door. My two little friends jumped down from the bed and were following me, with one hand on the door handle and the other clutching the clothes I turned to them and ordered.
"Stay here, I won't be away long."
They weren't pleased but followed my instructions nevertheless, by jumping the roughly 4 meters back onto the bed from a standing position with an ease that made it clear doing this took absolutely no effort for them. I marveled once more at their capabilities, if I would have had access to such spiders back in the day my life as a cape would have been so much easier. I watched them lying down on top of the pillow closing their eyes my gaze lingered on them a moment longer until I stepped outside.
The moment I left the room and closed the door behind me, I was surprised to see through the eyes of one of my spider in the corner of the bar, that both Ray and Shakky turned their heads my way. How did they know I was up? Are they some kind of Thinkers, because I didn't make enough noise for them to be able to hear me through the closed door and roughly the dozen feet separating us, even their line of sight towards the door was obstructed since they chose to eat their breakfast in the right corner of the bar.
Something else I had to add to their threat rating. As I reached the bathroom I was surprised at what I found there. I already got a good look at it through a spider, but seeing it for myself was different.
After I stepped through the door I found myself in front of a metal bathtub standing on four metal feet, which elevated it about two dozen inches above the fireplace under it. Allowing the flames to flicker unobstructed at its bottom and heat the water it was filled with.
I didn't see any valve, which spoke volumes about the technological advancement of this world. I walked to the small ladder standing next to the breast-high tub allowing for easier access to the hot water inside. I dipped my fingers inside and after verifying that the temperature was just right stripped out of my spider-silk undersuit and plunged myself in the water.
I was instantly overcome with the feeling of all my strength being sapped away. I felt so weak I doubted I would have been able to keep myself from drowning or had any chance at mustering the necessary strength to heave myself out of the tub if it wouldn't have allowed me to sit in it without my head being submerged.
Even so, it took a lot out of me to just sit upright. I was not sure I would have been able to keep standing inside a tub if my body had been submerged up to my head, which would have been necessary in order not to drown. Well, if I wasn't sure the strange fruit I ate was a devil fruit before, this all but confirmed it for me. I had to say I would have preferred to find it out another way.
It was highly disturbing to suddenly have gained such a glaring weakness, according to Rayleigh everybody in this world is privy to. It somehow reminded me of those old comic books Greg couldn't shut up about and how the heroes depicted in there for the most part had something similar to contend with.
It was gonna take time, to rewire my brain into seeing water as being a real threat to me. But it wouldn't be the first time I had to adapt, and I was sure it won't be the last. With some luck, the ability I got out of it will make up for it.
I leaned back and tried to enjoy the bath, it did wonders to help me feel like a human being again. I usually wasn't a great fan of bathing, seething in water soiled with the grime and sweat you want to get rid of, which was why I preferred to shower. It just washes it all away. But I had to say after the ordeal I went through, despite the water sapping my power it somehow rejuvenated me. I slowly started to feel alive again no longer like a walking corpse.
While in there I took great care of my hair, I already dreaded it being a lost cause since it was exposed to those harsh conditions of salt-breeze and an unrelenting sun, but as it turned out my fears were misplaced. I was quite delighted at this fact, not having lost the one visual feature I shared with my mother, a reminder of her every time I look in the mirror.
I enjoyed soaking in the hot water, which meant by the time I finally alighted from the tub the skin on my hands was already pruney. It felt really strange when the power that was sapped away started to return nearly instantly after I was no longer submerged in water. It felt like being injected with pure energy an effect energy drinks promise but can't keep.
I dried myself and was confronted with the difficult task of picking out what to wear from the selection Shakky provided me with. Not only was it owed to her strange sense of fashion, but to the fact that a lot of the clothes didn't fit me and I doubted they ever would. Which left me with little choice in what to wear if I didn't want to risk losing the clothes to various malfunction while walking. I eventually settled for some pants, made out of cloth reminding me of linen, and a loose T-shirt one of the few items that would work with my lack of bust.
Not the greatest outfit but it would do until I was able to clean the spider silk undersuit and had some time to weave some things in my size. I returned to the room I slept in and placed the clothes I didn't use on the same spot I found them. My cute little spiders had opened their eyes the moment I stepped inside the room and were following my every move in anticipation. I reached for them with my outstretched arm, which they used to skitter alongside and then settled on my left and respectively right shoulder. With them situated there, I made way to Rayleigh and Shakky.
On the short way to them, I decided I needed to name my spiders. I couldn't keep referring to them as male and female spider all the time. The problem this presented me with since I was notoriously bad at naming things. None of the names I was known by during my tenure as a cape really clicked with me despite Weaver being one I actually chose myself, but even that name never felt right it was more like the best option out of a lot of bad ones. I thought on it for a moment and decided to not cause myself a headache by coming up with fitting names for them and just used the names that I recently came across.
I looked at the female spider and said to her "your name will be Lilith", then I turned to the male spider and said, "and your name will be Kain".
If I remembered right those were the names of the two main characters out of some vampire story Narwhal recommended. She had a predilection for those epic fantasy romances, not something I usually read, but on occasion, they could be an enjoyable pastime. Unfortunately, I never got past the first few chapters and I doubted I was gonna find a copy of this book anywhere around here.
Shakky and Rayleigh both stayed in the bar while I was in the bathroom. What irritated me to no end was that they spoke not a single word let alone sentence to each other throughout the whole time. I was hoping to at least glimpse some more information about them, the place I was at, and their real intentions regarding me through a conversation they might have held. It would have helped me greatly in the talks to follow if I had more of an idea of what I'm dealing with. But I had no such luck, well wouldn't be the first time things didn't go my way, and if I'm good at something it is improvisation.
When I stepped through the door and entered the bar section of the house Rayleigh was sitting with crossed legs and a newspaper in his hands on a corner bench. Shakky sat next to him with a steaming cup of coffee in her hands. The table in front of them, both was filled with all kinds of food.
I seated myself on the lone chair on the opposite side of the table.
"You must be hungry, go ahead we can talk while you eat."
Shakky didn't have to say this twice. I was hungry and the exquisite smell of all the dishes in front of me didn't help diminish the feeling on the contrary my mouth started to water. I took a plate and filled it with the various things placed on the table.
I started the conversation with the question.
"So what can you tell me about this world?"
"What would you like to hear?" was the counter-question I received from Shakky.
"For now geographics - where on this world am I? Who are the major powers? That should suffice for a start. Then you mentioned Pirates, where I´m from it is a term used to describe theft, violence and other crimes committed by ship. And you already admitted to having been one, which makes you criminals in the eyes of the authorities right?"
I wasn't able to identify all the dishes. But for the moment I didn't really care to find my new favorite food or being able to name what I ate. Such frivolities weren't even on the list of my priorities. But I also couldn't help my curiosity which is why I took a sample from everything. I had my first bite when Shakky started to talk.
"Well, aren't you interesting? One would usually expect of someone being confronted with criminals - even former ones — for it to elicit some kind of distrust, even fear. I can somewhat understand why you didn't react in such a way, yesterday. You were tired, exhausted, and possibly overwhelmed, but now you are neither. I'm certain of it and I'm also sure you aren't schooling your reactions. So would you mind telling me why there is no reaction to the fact you are sitting at the same table as two cutthroat Pirates?"
I swallowed what I had in my mouth and calmly answered.
"Where I'm from criminal, villain are just labels you get attached with by the government, I have met villains who did more good than the ones calling themselves Heroes and I met Heroes who committed atrocities. Therefore I don't take much stock in those labels I tend to form my own opinions about those I interact with. And to be honest you both don't exactly strike me as people I have to fear if I don't give you reason to or am I wrong in my assessment?"
I raised my eyebrow questioning at Shakky. Rayleighs response consisted of snickering at my statement.
"No, you aren't." she said bemusedly "Where to start ?" She glanced at Rayleigh for a moment. He didn't react to her cue, which she seemed to interpret as permission to continue.
"Let´s see." she picked up some documents which to this moment were lying next to her on the bench and therefore out of my sight and placed them on the table. She was digging through them in search of something specific, while she was doing that I got a glimpse of some of those papers. No small part consisted of pictures of people with numbers on them, it took me a few moments to connect the dots of those partial papers I saw to puzzle together the words written on them meant `Dead or Alive´, which made it clear those were wanted poster.
I had no reference but the high numbers on some of them must mean someone really wants to see those people taken out apparently by any means necessary. My musings were interrupted when Shakky found what she was after.
"Ahh here it is," she exclaimed and put all the other documents out of the way and most of the plates with food followed and then unfolded the one document she kept in her hands and placed it in the middle of the table.
As it turned out it was a map, I'm really no expert but what I saw stroke me as odd. She gave me no real-time to take it in its entirety, which meant I barely had time to come to a premature conclusion before she started to explain what I was looking at. But what I could conclude at the first glance, that it had to be some kind of world map. One of those where the surface area of the planet is peeled of like the skin of a fruit and spread across a flat surface.
"This is a map representing the world we live in. This here is the Redline." She pointed to a landmass that stretched as a line from the bottom of the map to the top of the map halving it in the process. The landmass further extended along the edges of and encircled the whole map.
"It is the largest connected landmass in existence it encompasses the whole world."
It was a strange way to depict a landmass that goes around the world as a line. If I interpreted the map in front of me correctly. "Combined with the Grandline" she pointed at a perpendicular to the red-line arranged sea corridor enclosed on both sides with a different type of sea. " The world is separated into 4 seas which are called East, West North, and South Blue."
At this, I took a look at the map legend and noticed that the naming of the four sea was accurate. At least according to the compass rose the right corner of the map was shifted 45 degrees to the left in relation to the Red-line. Therefore making the sea in top right into the East Blue the one in the lower right side into the South Blue and the one on the top left side into North Blue which left the low left to be named West Blue.
"Those lines you see here" she was pointing at the identical light blue colored water enclosing the Grandline "are called calm belts, it is an area of the sea without any stream and wind."
Is that where I found myself after waking up in the small boat, it would fit in all the time I happened to be there I felt not a single drought, the air was absolute unmoving as was the water surrounding me.
"I assume that makes crossing the calm belt a tedious endeavor?" I asked.
"No, it is in fact a near-impossible enterprise." She said "The reason for this isn't the lack of wind, ships can be moved by rowing, after all, but because of the Sea Kings calling those regions their home. Trying to cross the Calm Belt is a surefire way to have a run-in with them, and they don't react well to being disturbed."
"Sea Kings?" I wondered aloud I had an inkling given the name of what they are. A memory of Leviathan flashed before my mind's eye.
"Huge aquatic creatures, the largest of them hundreds of feet in size, able to swallow the biggest of ships whole and their strength is on the very same scale. There aren't many who can claim to have survived an encounter with them let alone crossed the belt. Even the strongest and experienced crews don't attempt it lightly. The risk is just too great. This is exactly why to reach the Grandline most use reverse mountain."
She pointed at the very center of the map, where the Redline is cut apart and five thin lines of water converge. Four emerge from the 4 great blues and the last one leads to the right side of the grand line. The whole thing looked like some kind of junction.
"There is a stream flowing up the mountain from every of the Blues. This stream allows for ships to cross over to the other seas and even to reach the Grand-line. Of course, this isn't without its own risks but it is far less dangerous than attempting to cross the calm-belt."
Her hand moved right to the outer right edge where she pointed at a small island just a small distance away from the Red-line. "We are here," which meant pretty much on the opposite side of the world from Reverse Mountain "Sabaody Archipelago a massive mangrove forest a top of merman Island, which is located at the bottom of the ocean. The final Island before the New World."
I looked at her in a questioning manner not familiar with this term.
"It is the term used nowadays for the second half of the Grand-Line, which can be reached by traversing a hole through the Red-Line. It is the only way for those not working for the government to get from here to here." She moved her finger from the right edge to the very left.
"Some claim the second half was named New World because the influence of the world government they have over that region is waning. With vast stretches being ruled uncontested by the most powerful pirates others say it got it's name because it is full of wonders and unexplored things, no one knows for certain but the name stuck. "
"So it is some kind of lawless zone?" I inquired.
"In a sense, it depends on whom you ask. But the same can be said about the first half of the Grand-line, it rests upon which definition of lawless zone you employ."
Rayleigh sighed,
"What she tries to say without actually saying it, is that 4 years ago Gol. D. Roger the so-called Pirate King was executed after he surrendered himself to the World Government. Before they actually took his head they allowed him some last words. The Marines were probably expecting him to beg for his life or show remorse for his actions, but that just showed how little they knew about him. Instead of scoring their greatest victory in history by executing the Pirate King in front of a crowd, he turned the tables on them and instead dealt them the greatest defeat by uttering a few simple words."
He reminisced for a moment.
"I can still hear him say them. `You want my treasure? You can have it! I left everything I gathered together in one place. Now you'll just have to find it!´ With those words, he started the so called Age of pirates. Fortune-hunters and outlaws around the world followed his calling and set out to sea."
There was some barely hidden pain and regret in his voice.
"You knew him didn't you?"
"I did," he confirmed, "Roger was my best friend, my captain."
"Why did he give himself up? After everything you said he must have held great power to be titled pirate king, surely he could have fought them?" I wondered.
"Yes he could have, and if he did they would have never been able to catch him. But he was ill even during our voyage, at the end, he kept going by will alone, it was all that held his dying body together. He disbanded the crew shortly after we set foot on the last island of the grand-line and from there made his own way. A few months later, I heard he surrender himself to the Marines. Why he did it, I never knew. There could have been any number of reasons for doing that ranging from him not wanting to die sickly in a bed or him just wanting to have one last laugh at the expense of the marines. To be honest, I have no idea, even those close to him were never able to fully understand his motives." He said with a pained expression on his face.
Something regarding this whole thing seemed strangely familiar.
"It takes a special kind of person to turn one's fading flames of life into a huge fire that enveloped the world. The day he died, I have never laughed, never cried, and never drank more in my life. He was a magnificent man, our late captain. He had to be for us to follow him to hell and back."
He said while I saw him wipe a tear from the corner of his eyes at uttering those words. And I wondered if I would be missed in a similar fashion, have I impacted the lives of those who knew me, knew of me, my friends allies would they shed tears remembering me? After all, if I can't find my way back to them I'm as good as dead to them anyway.
Shakky had no intention to let Rayleigh nor myself recede to our own minds and pushed on with her introduction of the world.
"The seven major players of today, are the Yonkou. The four most powerful and influential Pirates residing in the second half of the Grandline. Together they control the majority of the Islands there. It is said that a single one of them can bring the same power to bear as the World Government, which is the 5th Power with their executive arm called the Marines who operate in all the 5 Seas. After Rogers's proclamation, the Marines started to lose more and more ground against all those new groups of Pirates emerging from thin air. Backed into a corner they had no other choice and offered seven of the most powerful Pirates amnesty and granted them an extensive list of privileges in exchange for their cooperation in exterminating Pirates. For most of those Shichibukai or 7 Warlords of the Sea, that meant business as usual since most Pirate crews are in conflict with each other either way."
So the life of a Pirate is pretty similar to life as a villain on Bet, being in permanent conflict with other Pirates and the Marines the law enforcement agency of this world.
"By accepting to work with the government, the Shichibukai at least had one less powerful enemy. I take it since those Shichibukai are essentially granted immunity from prosecution they abuse their position." I guessed. If it could be called such, human nature made this pretty much a certainty.
"Yes, most do in some way or another." Shakky confirmed, "But the World Government doesn't really care in their eyes it is a small price to pay in order to essentially take them from the board and pointing them at other Pirates. They are deemed useful and since their inception, they turned out to be a vital part of the newly established equilibrium of powers. So their atrocities are overlooked or straight out swept under the rug since news about such events would also damage the reputation of the ones who instated them in the first place."
"Am I right in to assume that the world government as a whole, doesn't only consist of paragon of virtue?"
"Oh goods no," Shakky scoffed "I think earlier you pretty much found the right words to sum it up, let me rephrase it. Pirates and Marine or what else people call themselves are just labels, but that in no way is an apt and sufficient description of a person or group in order to know exactly who and what you are dealing with. There are Marines spouting words about Justice to indulge in the killing of people then there are Pirates who have helped more people than they can count."
This doesn't seem so different from what I was used to. I wondered if corruption was an inherent problem of large organizations or it is owed to the plain and simple human condition.
So to summarize this government is most likely an even more corrupt institution than the PRT, -going by the lack of means to supervise them in a meaningful manner- following some abstract concept of justice to validate their actions no matter what they might be, charming. Then there are the Shichibukai strong pirates and their crews that are exempt from being pursued by the Marines for various concessions granted to them, for hunting other pirates and other obligations they had to fulfill. This construct of government-sanctioned pirates strongly reminded me of the very status I intended for the Undersiders to achieve when I surrendered myself to the PRT, and they eventually got out of the whole ordeal.
In essence, they are Pirates, that on some level acknowledged the necessity of there being an Umbrella organization of some sort for not everything falling into total anarchy or even just to use the government to hide behind. While still preserving their most of their independence, by being kept outside the Marines chain of command. Therefore they retained their ability to interact with other Pirates, because they are still Pirates themselves.
Then there are those Yonkou ruling over this so-called New World, at first glance they look like Insurgent or Rebels of some kind. But on second glance they seem to be a stabilizing factor there. Consolidating other groups under their banner, who otherwise might have caused mayhem and chaos, more than they do now.
I wondered what was their reason for claiming territory in the first place? Was it a hunger for power, riches or were they more basic in nature? After all, I myself took over a city because those in charge were a bunch of incompetent bureaucrats more interested in maintaining the status quo than to change things for the better. Did some of those Yonkou start out in a similar way? Having taken control from those originally in power in order to protect their turf from other pirates and the marines?
"The last major power, which I'm unsure I can even call it that are the Revolutionaries." Shaky concluded, "They are newly minted group that so far was able to successfully wring a few islands from the world governments control. It is unclear if they are gonna last, they have great ambitions but those aiming high can fall a far way down. Only time will tell if they can weather the storm that is coming their way. "
So they are a group given their name is directly opposing the world government, no mere Warlords, but a resistance attempting to change the system. In my own experience, for you to get people to fight against the system in such a manner, required the system to be intolerable ...
"Okay - " I said, "I think I've got a feel for the general situation. As you already said you aren't aware of any portals or ways to reach different worlds. So either they don't exist, to begin with, or you just don't possess knowledge of such. Since I'm not willing to accept the fact that I'm stranded here, I'm gonna operate on the premise that there is a way for me to get back home. Which means I need to find them or a source of information that can point me in the right direction."
"Well, let´s assume for a moment such portals or means to travel between worlds do indeed exist. Then I'm pretty sure the only organization that might know about them is the World government." She concluded, something I grudgingly had to agree with "It wouldn't be the first time they buried something and I doubt they would react kindly to anyone trying to unearth their secrets."
"Yeah, no surprise there. I'm really not keen to find myself in the middle of another conspiracy. The last few I stumbled across were more than enough for one lifetime. I'm more interested in different means to get my hands on such information?"
It would be so easy with access to the internet the rumors alone would probably point me in the right direction.
"Don't you have some kind of hoard of knowledge," I asked, "a place where books are stored to every topic or a person dealing in esoteric information ?"
Someone like Lisa would be godsent in the situation I found myself in.
"Unfortunately you arrived a tad bit too late," she regretfully informed me "we had something like this not too long ago. An Island in West Blue is called Ohara. It was a place of knowledge and was said to house the greatest library in the entire world. Rumor had it that every book ever written could be found there. One of the Archaeologists guild founded and operating out of Hara made extensive use of the library and was quite eager to add to the funds of knowledge."
That seemed to be exactly what I was looking for, somehow I sensed a bit coming which I doubted was gonna please me.
"What happened?"
"The Island was destroyed, according to the official version the people tried not only to secede from the world government but were seeking out forbidden knowledge with the intent to destroy the world. Therefore they were declared criminals and a fleet was dispatched to take care of them. In the ensuing fight, the island and all its inhabitants were killed in some kind of unmentioned accident."
"Which presumably means their accumulated knowledge was either destroyed or taken by the government." I sadly added.
"Most likely," confirmed Shakky.
"Were there any survivors?" I wondered because going to the World Government and kindly ask them for such information wouldn't work, that I was sure of.
With a smile on her lips, she said
"Funny you would ask that. According to the Marines, there actually was a single survivor."
She searched through the stack of papers next to her and took out a bounty poster which she then put on the table in front of me.
"One little girl, by the name of Nico Robin was somehow able to flee the Island in the tumult of the attack and it is even said she sunk 5 Marine Battleships in the process. Which was the justification given for the large bounty placed on her head." Shakky said.
I was stupefied, I only saw a frightened little child no older than 10 — probably even younger and was reminded of those little kids I had the pleasure of getting to know on Bet. Dinah and Bonesaw were at the forefront of my mind and in most aspect complete opposites of each other.
But no matter what, I really couldn't picture that girl in front of me being able to do what was said about her. For me, she strongly reminded me of Dinah a child being the victim of circumstances out of her control. Well on second thought didn't that apply for Bonesaw - Riley, too in some fashion. Being essentially formed into the perfect little tool by a psychopathic killer wasn't her fault either.
In the case of the girl whose picture laid in front of me did seem to still be innocent, but there was no telling how long she could stay that way being forced into a life on the run.
I had trouble suppressing my rising anger, unfair treatment of kids was still a trigger for me, and if there was just a bit of truth in the statement of the marines this child´s situation wasn't much different from Dinahs, she had something others will no doubt be after, with the sole difference her continued survival wasn´t a requirement to get it. Fuck, and I can apparently count myself among those after her, but for entirely different reasons.
I read 79 Million Belly written under her name.
"Sorry, I lack comparables how much are 79 Million Belly, exactly?" I asked.
"A freshly made loaf of bread costs around 50 bellies, meaning the bounty on her head is far more than a good earning job nets you in several decades of work."
That meant the conversion from belly to dollar is roughly ten to one.
Not sure someone would have paid that amount of money for my head even after the Undersiders took over the Bay.
"And the amount on itself, is it irregular?" I followed up on my previous question.
"Yes - Outstanding Captains of Pirate crews, who started out in one of the Blues usually have bounties in the low one-hundred million belly range when they arrive here at the half-way point of the grand-line. But you have to keep in mind, that their bounty is the sum they earned after countless life and death battles and over a long amount of time.
Therefore her bounty is unprecedented in two ways, for one this is the highest starting bounty placed on anyone in one of the Blues and the highest amount ever placed on a child her age." Shakky explained.
I sighed, this was not exactly what I had hoped for to find as my first clue to getting home, but it couldn't be helped. At least in finding her I would be able to protect her from the more unsavory and dangerous elements crawling this planet. My decision made I asked.
"You wouldn't happen to know where best to start my search for this girl?"
I'm not exactly sure what I did, surely it couldn't have been my question. But Shakky beamed at me with a wide smile, as if she just won the lottery. And Rayleigh filled the bar with a booming laughter as if I just told the best joke he ever heard.
Confused at their obvious amusement I looked back and forth between them in the hopes to be inducted in whatever had them react this way.
I had to wait until Rayleigh resumed control over his shaking body and wiped another tear from the corner of his eye, this time one originating from mirth.
"And what exactly gave you the impression you might succeed in this endeavor let alone live long enough to capitalize on the knowledge the girl might impart you with? Perhaps you have already forgotten, but you are in the middle of the grand-line, the most dangerous sea in existence swarming with countless strong Pirates, furthermore this girl has a substantial bounty on her head. You will be lucky to keep yourself alive as you are now, but protecting someone, a little girl at that is absolutely out of the question. Hell, it would surprise me if you would even make it to reverse mountain." He lectured.
It really irritated me to get dismissed in such a fashion, what were Alexandria words - she forged her reputation over years not only participating but being in the midst of all the major incidents for more than two decades. I did the same, not for the same amount of time of course, but since my first day as a cape the rest of her statement — being constantly in the midst of things- applied to me too. And it bugged me, that I apparently had to start all over again.
"I get underestimated all the time," I said with a dangerous undertone.
"Perhaps, and perhaps you will even surprise me, but I'm an excellent judge not only of character but of strength and you don´t possess what it takes to succeed. Lucky for you I´m willing to help, to teach you."
He offered, for a moment I was surprised until I remembered what little I was told about the source of his power and if what he said means, that you really can be trained to do that. I might have need of it especially if he isn't some outlier in this world. After all, I was never one to deny myself an advantage, but the more gnawing question was undoubtedly
"Why? Why would you do that, surely whatever you intend to teach me isn't something that can be learned in a short amount of time. Why invest it in someone you barely know and let´s be clear I don't buy into your `we are bored´ story."
"You are right, it isn't the whole truth." Shaky admitted, "but it isn't a lie either, we just omitted a few things. We are truly bored, you have to understand we were once at the very forefront of the events that happened in the world. We were the protagonist in those stories the people talked about, we were those facing impossible odds and beat them time and time again. We made history."
I can understand the sentiment, I'm not sure if I could have been content with surviving fighting Scion, and then for some reason or another being forced to retire. There would have always been the itch to get back into the thick of things.
"Oh don't misunderstand we have no particular desire to come back out of retirement, we enjoy the current state of our lives. But what we also enjoy is to have a hand in events to come and if we limit ourselves from not actively participating then we thought we at least can guide the new generation and be part of the world-changing events by proxy." She cheerfully said.
"Choose champions in order for them to carry on your torch your legacy, to be the ones having forged the weapon fighting for a new world." I retorted dryly.
"I wouldn't put it in such a dramatic way, but essentially yes -" she confirmed.
"You see the last kid, we mentored is a rising star in this day and age and quite successful in his endeavor. I'm sure he will carve a place for himself in this world and by doing so will give those in power an even greater headache than he already does. And to say I enjoy watching that come to pass quite a lot is a huge understatement. To be honest you struck me as someone cut to be from similar cloth, someone who wouldn't allow yourself to be confined by rules and regulations made by others, only to be subservient to your own goals." He approvingly said.
"Which makes me into a perfect fit, if you are searching for someone to stir the pot, to make trouble," I concluded.
"Yes, but above all, I think you not only can do that but live to tell the tale. From what I've gathered from you in the small amount of time you seem to possess an indomitable will, you are smart and apparently used to conflict, I would even go so far and say I suspect you are one of the few out there genuinely thriving in it. And what we offer is something you will profit from as well." He stated.
"What do you propose?" I asked despite my misgivings of being the amusement of two retired pirates.
"Well, as you are now. You won't survive for long, not if you have the misfortune to run into someone actually knowing how to throw a punch and survive on the grand-line. And you don't strike me as someone able to evade trouble on the contrary you seem more like the trouble magnet kind of girl. Therefore I offer to train you, to get you to a point where you easily will be a match for the best. I can't promise you that you will win against them, but even if you should lose you will be able to make them pay dearly. It has been quite some time since I put some green kids through their paces — Ahh the good old times."
He laughed to himself out of nowhere at this statement and for some reason, it gave me shivers.
Well, I couldn't dismiss how advantageous this would be for me, becoming stronger will not only increase my chances of survival if those seas are truly as dangerous as they are made out to be by those two. And going along with them might also help me in other ways.
"What you offer is tempting, but allow me another question. How long do you think this girl can survive on her on if you think me unable to do the same?" I inquired.
That seemed to give them pause.
"A very good question, one I can't answer. Before you go ahead and reject our offer you should probably know that the destruction of Ohara happened close to two years ago, and there is no guarantee that the girl is even still alive. But what I can guarantee you is that if you go now in a foolhardy attempt to save her, not only will you more than likely die a long time before you even get close to finding her, but you won't be any use in protecting her. And should the worst case occur with you dying, she will have no one not now not ever trying to find, help, and protect her. So if this kid is still alive after 2 years of being on the run, chances are she might live another few years. But if she isn't you accepting our proposal at least will secure your own survival." She appealed at my common sense.
I didn't like it, knowing that my best chance a little girl is out there at the mercy of who knows who, but as much as it pains me to say what she said made sense. What help am I for her if I'm dead in a ditch somewhere? This was Dinah all over again and I hated it, not being able to immediately act, having to bide my time.
"How long will it take to get to the level you think I need to be at?" I questioned.
"Well, that mostly will depend upon yourself. A few years would be enough to get you up to speed." Rayleigh said, "A fair warning I don't do things half-assed and I won't allow you to stop midway in the training."
"I'm no quitter," I stated.
"That´s good to hear." He said intrigued.
"So when do we start?" I asked his sole response consisted of a wide grin.
Authors Note: After making myself familiar with the One Piece world especially its geographic I couldn't stop but wonder how does everybody travel from one Blue to another.
We are told to reach the Grand-Line from one of the Blues you have to traverse Reverse Mountain which basically is a stream flowing upwards to the mountain and then flows downwards in the Grandline. But how do people from the Grand-Line travel into the Blues?
Surely they can't cross the Calm-Belt only the Marines the Pirates of Amazon Lily have the means to do so without fighting their way through an Army of Sea Kings. So how do they do it?
You can't just sail up a mountain against the stream, that can't just be done — on the other hand, Don Krieg fled from the Grand-Line back into East Blue, and Sanji born in South Blue found his way in the Grand-Line and from there ended up in East Blue — but how exactly did they manage to do that? Does Anybody have some ideas and insight you want to share? Because I'm at a loss -
Regarding the conversion of Belly to Dollar — The truth is, it is more than likely not a ten to one conversion but something a bit more complex, where you have to factor in a lot of different things ... availability of food ... technological advancement ... the weird way something in One Piece are priced ... — but I think my estimate isn't that far off and I chose it in a way that calculating the amount in one's head doesn't result in a headache ...
I opened my eyes to a room lit in the morning sun shining through the windows on the left side of my bed. I rolled on my back and stared at the ceiling, while I listened to the chorus of chirping the indigenous birds were performing.
Apparently, the events of yesterday didn't stem from my imagination since I was still here, despite secretly hoping for the opposite. To awaken in a bed at a place I could allow myself to call home, where all the people I care about would be present. Lisa, Rachel, Brian, Charlotte, Sierra, the Kids, and Aisha. I missed them all so much and when I finally saw them again it was a repeat of what happened before I left them. One problem after the other without any pause, no time to just be together to enjoy each other's company.
And now it seemed like it will be an even longer time until I can see them again. In my mind, there was no doubt of our reunion to occur eventually. I deliberately denied myself any thoughts to the contrary and buried them deep inside my consciousness.
I really didn't expect anything for saving or at least consolidating the parahumans in an attempt to save the world, no medal, no recognition no nothing, since it was something that just had to be done, hell I didn't even expect to have a mind let alone powers when it was all over and done. But that I was even denied being with my friends and my Dad, was ... was something I should have known would never come to pass, happy endings after all only happen in old movies.
I only hoped that my actions didn't impact them negatively and that they were all well. Who was I kidding? With me being no longer around they might face the repercussion originally directed at me.
Fuck, and I can't do anything to help them, thanks a lot Contessa you Bitch.
My two spiders woke when my hands clenched into fists slammed into the mattress. I looked at them apologetically, but they obviously didn't care that I interrupted their sleep. They immediately scurried to my side in an attempt to comfort me, something only possible because I gave their original minds free reign over those bodies.
Despite that, it felt strange to have access to their feelings, to experience concern expressed by an extension of yourself for yourself. This was gonna be the one aspect of my newfound powers that was gonna take a lot of time getting used to.
And I better get the hang of them and their limitations fast, since I sincerely doubted finding a way back will be a journey without any trouble waiting for me to find it. If I learned anything as a cape, it was that there existed no smooth sailing.
I paused for a moment at the phrase I used, it seemed like even my mind had accepted that I was stranded in a world with pirates. I chuckled at that. Well, there was no use in prolonging neither my stay in this world nor in this bed.
I sat up and couldn't help myself noticing, that I felt a lot stronger than I did yesterday. Something that shouldn't have been possible this fast without the aid of powers.
I should know I pushed my body on numerous occasions past its limits, which gave me a pretty good idea of its capabilities, especially how long it usually takes for it to recover from certain things.
With the condition of my body having been worse, than most of what I did to it in the past. There was just no way for it to be already in such good shape. Was this somehow swift recovery somehow connected to the fruit I consumed? Didn´t Ray imply that those Zoan type fruits enhance the bodies somehow, does this include healing? Does this mean I ate one of those fruits? Something I should probably keep in mind and ask him about later.
For now, I sat my bare feet on the cold wooden floor and walked over to one of the chairs stacked with clothes. On top of it I found a note:
Take what you like.
The bathroom is the first door to your left.
- Shakky
I took the bundle of clothes and made my way to the door. My two little friends jumped down from the bed and were following me, with one hand on the door handle and the other clutching the clothes I turned to them and ordered.
"Stay here, I won't be away long."
They weren't pleased but followed my instructions nevertheless, by jumping the roughly 4 meters back onto the bed from a standing position with an ease that made it clear doing this took absolutely no effort for them. I marveled once more at their capabilities, if I would have had access to such spiders back in the day my life as a cape would have been so much easier. I watched them lying down on top of the pillow closing their eyes my gaze lingered on them a moment longer until I stepped outside.
The moment I left the room and closed the door behind me, I was surprised to see through the eyes of one of my spider in the corner of the bar, that both Ray and Shakky turned their heads my way. How did they know I was up? Are they some kind of Thinkers, because I didn't make enough noise for them to be able to hear me through the closed door and roughly the dozen feet separating us, even their line of sight towards the door was obstructed since they chose to eat their breakfast in the right corner of the bar.
Something else I had to add to their threat rating. As I reached the bathroom I was surprised at what I found there. I already got a good look at it through a spider, but seeing it for myself was different.
After I stepped through the door I found myself in front of a metal bathtub standing on four metal feet, which elevated it about two dozen inches above the fireplace under it. Allowing the flames to flicker unobstructed at its bottom and heat the water it was filled with.
I didn't see any valve, which spoke volumes about the technological advancement of this world. I walked to the small ladder standing next to the breast-high tub allowing for easier access to the hot water inside. I dipped my fingers inside and after verifying that the temperature was just right stripped out of my spider-silk undersuit and plunged myself in the water.
I was instantly overcome with the feeling of all my strength being sapped away. I felt so weak I doubted I would have been able to keep myself from drowning or had any chance at mustering the necessary strength to heave myself out of the tub if it wouldn't have allowed me to sit in it without my head being submerged.
Even so, it took a lot out of me to just sit upright. I was not sure I would have been able to keep standing inside a tub if my body had been submerged up to my head, which would have been necessary in order not to drown. Well, if I wasn't sure the strange fruit I ate was a devil fruit before, this all but confirmed it for me. I had to say I would have preferred to find it out another way.
It was highly disturbing to suddenly have gained such a glaring weakness, according to Rayleigh everybody in this world is privy to. It somehow reminded me of those old comic books Greg couldn't shut up about and how the heroes depicted in there for the most part had something similar to contend with.
It was gonna take time, to rewire my brain into seeing water as being a real threat to me. But it wouldn't be the first time I had to adapt, and I was sure it won't be the last. With some luck, the ability I got out of it will make up for it.
I leaned back and tried to enjoy the bath, it did wonders to help me feel like a human being again. I usually wasn't a great fan of bathing, seething in water soiled with the grime and sweat you want to get rid of, which was why I preferred to shower. It just washes it all away. But I had to say after the ordeal I went through, despite the water sapping my power it somehow rejuvenated me. I slowly started to feel alive again no longer like a walking corpse.
While in there I took great care of my hair, I already dreaded it being a lost cause since it was exposed to those harsh conditions of salt-breeze and an unrelenting sun, but as it turned out my fears were misplaced. I was quite delighted at this fact, not having lost the one visual feature I shared with my mother, a reminder of her every time I look in the mirror.
I enjoyed soaking in the hot water, which meant by the time I finally alighted from the tub the skin on my hands was already pruney. It felt really strange when the power that was sapped away started to return nearly instantly after I was no longer submerged in water. It felt like being injected with pure energy an effect energy drinks promise but can't keep.
I dried myself and was confronted with the difficult task of picking out what to wear from the selection Shakky provided me with. Not only was it owed to her strange sense of fashion, but to the fact that a lot of the clothes didn't fit me and I doubted they ever would. Which left me with little choice in what to wear if I didn't want to risk losing the clothes to various malfunction while walking. I eventually settled for some pants, made out of cloth reminding me of linen, and a loose T-shirt one of the few items that would work with my lack of bust.
Not the greatest outfit but it would do until I was able to clean the spider silk undersuit and had some time to weave some things in my size. I returned to the room I slept in and placed the clothes I didn't use on the same spot I found them. My cute little spiders had opened their eyes the moment I stepped inside the room and were following my every move in anticipation. I reached for them with my outstretched arm, which they used to skitter alongside and then settled on my left and respectively right shoulder. With them situated there, I made way to Rayleigh and Shakky.
On the short way to them, I decided I needed to name my spiders. I couldn't keep referring to them as male and female spider all the time. The problem this presented me with since I was notoriously bad at naming things. None of the names I was known by during my tenure as a cape really clicked with me despite Weaver being one I actually chose myself, but even that name never felt right it was more like the best option out of a lot of bad ones. I thought on it for a moment and decided to not cause myself a headache by coming up with fitting names for them and just used the names that I recently came across.
I looked at the female spider and said to her "your name will be Lilith", then I turned to the male spider and said, "and your name will be Kain".
If I remembered right those were the names of the two main characters out of some vampire story Narwhal recommended. She had a predilection for those epic fantasy romances, not something I usually read, but on occasion, they could be an enjoyable pastime. Unfortunately, I never got past the first few chapters and I doubted I was gonna find a copy of this book anywhere around here.
Shakky and Rayleigh both stayed in the bar while I was in the bathroom. What irritated me to no end was that they spoke not a single word let alone sentence to each other throughout the whole time. I was hoping to at least glimpse some more information about them, the place I was at, and their real intentions regarding me through a conversation they might have held. It would have helped me greatly in the talks to follow if I had more of an idea of what I'm dealing with. But I had no such luck, well wouldn't be the first time things didn't go my way, and if I'm good at something it is improvisation.
When I stepped through the door and entered the bar section of the house Rayleigh was sitting with crossed legs and a newspaper in his hands on a corner bench. Shakky sat next to him with a steaming cup of coffee in her hands. The table in front of them, both was filled with all kinds of food.
I seated myself on the lone chair on the opposite side of the table.
"You must be hungry, go ahead we can talk while you eat."
Shakky didn't have to say this twice. I was hungry and the exquisite smell of all the dishes in front of me didn't help diminish the feeling on the contrary my mouth started to water. I took a plate and filled it with the various things placed on the table.
I started the conversation with the question.
"So what can you tell me about this world?"
"What would you like to hear?" was the counter-question I received from Shakky.
"For now geographics - where on this world am I? Who are the major powers? That should suffice for a start. Then you mentioned Pirates, where I´m from it is a term used to describe theft, violence and other crimes committed by ship. And you already admitted to having been one, which makes you criminals in the eyes of the authorities right?"
I wasn't able to identify all the dishes. But for the moment I didn't really care to find my new favorite food or being able to name what I ate. Such frivolities weren't even on the list of my priorities. But I also couldn't help my curiosity which is why I took a sample from everything. I had my first bite when Shakky started to talk.
"Well, aren't you interesting? One would usually expect of someone being confronted with criminals - even former ones — for it to elicit some kind of distrust, even fear. I can somewhat understand why you didn't react in such a way, yesterday. You were tired, exhausted, and possibly overwhelmed, but now you are neither. I'm certain of it and I'm also sure you aren't schooling your reactions. So would you mind telling me why there is no reaction to the fact you are sitting at the same table as two cutthroat Pirates?"
I swallowed what I had in my mouth and calmly answered.
"Where I'm from criminal, villain are just labels you get attached with by the government, I have met villains who did more good than the ones calling themselves Heroes and I met Heroes who committed atrocities. Therefore I don't take much stock in those labels I tend to form my own opinions about those I interact with. And to be honest you both don't exactly strike me as people I have to fear if I don't give you reason to or am I wrong in my assessment?"
I raised my eyebrow questioning at Shakky. Rayleighs response consisted of snickering at my statement.
"No, you aren't." she said bemusedly "Where to start ?" She glanced at Rayleigh for a moment. He didn't react to her cue, which she seemed to interpret as permission to continue.
"Let´s see." she picked up some documents which to this moment were lying next to her on the bench and therefore out of my sight and placed them on the table. She was digging through them in search of something specific, while she was doing that I got a glimpse of some of those papers. No small part consisted of pictures of people with numbers on them, it took me a few moments to connect the dots of those partial papers I saw to puzzle together the words written on them meant `Dead or Alive´, which made it clear those were wanted poster.
I had no reference but the high numbers on some of them must mean someone really wants to see those people taken out apparently by any means necessary. My musings were interrupted when Shakky found what she was after.
"Ahh here it is," she exclaimed and put all the other documents out of the way and most of the plates with food followed and then unfolded the one document she kept in her hands and placed it in the middle of the table.
As it turned out it was a map, I'm really no expert but what I saw stroke me as odd. She gave me no real-time to take it in its entirety, which meant I barely had time to come to a premature conclusion before she started to explain what I was looking at. But what I could conclude at the first glance, that it had to be some kind of world map. One of those where the surface area of the planet is peeled of like the skin of a fruit and spread across a flat surface.
"This is a map representing the world we live in. This here is the Redline." She pointed to a landmass that stretched as a line from the bottom of the map to the top of the map halving it in the process. The landmass further extended along the edges of and encircled the whole map.
"It is the largest connected landmass in existence it encompasses the whole world."
It was a strange way to depict a landmass that goes around the world as a line. If I interpreted the map in front of me correctly. "Combined with the Grandline" she pointed at a perpendicular to the red-line arranged sea corridor enclosed on both sides with a different type of sea. " The world is separated into 4 seas which are called East, West North, and South Blue."
At this, I took a look at the map legend and noticed that the naming of the four sea was accurate. At least according to the compass rose the right corner of the map was shifted 45 degrees to the left in relation to the Red-line. Therefore making the sea in top right into the East Blue the one in the lower right side into the South Blue and the one on the top left side into North Blue which left the low left to be named West Blue.
"Those lines you see here" she was pointing at the identical light blue colored water enclosing the Grandline "are called calm belts, it is an area of the sea without any stream and wind."
Is that where I found myself after waking up in the small boat, it would fit in all the time I happened to be there I felt not a single drought, the air was absolute unmoving as was the water surrounding me.
"I assume that makes crossing the calm belt a tedious endeavor?" I asked.
"No, it is in fact a near-impossible enterprise." She said "The reason for this isn't the lack of wind, ships can be moved by rowing, after all, but because of the Sea Kings calling those regions their home. Trying to cross the Calm Belt is a surefire way to have a run-in with them, and they don't react well to being disturbed."
"Sea Kings?" I wondered aloud I had an inkling given the name of what they are. A memory of Leviathan flashed before my mind's eye.
"Huge aquatic creatures, the largest of them hundreds of feet in size, able to swallow the biggest of ships whole and their strength is on the very same scale. There aren't many who can claim to have survived an encounter with them let alone crossed the belt. Even the strongest and experienced crews don't attempt it lightly. The risk is just too great. This is exactly why to reach the Grandline most use reverse mountain."
She pointed at the very center of the map, where the Redline is cut apart and five thin lines of water converge. Four emerge from the 4 great blues and the last one leads to the right side of the grand line. The whole thing looked like some kind of junction.
"There is a stream flowing up the mountain from every of the Blues. This stream allows for ships to cross over to the other seas and even to reach the Grand-line. Of course, this isn't without its own risks but it is far less dangerous than attempting to cross the calm-belt."
Her hand moved right to the outer right edge where she pointed at a small island just a small distance away from the Red-line. "We are here," which meant pretty much on the opposite side of the world from Reverse Mountain "Sabaody Archipelago a massive mangrove forest a top of merman Island, which is located at the bottom of the ocean. The final Island before the New World."
I looked at her in a questioning manner not familiar with this term.
"It is the term used nowadays for the second half of the Grand-Line, which can be reached by traversing a hole through the Red-Line. It is the only way for those not working for the government to get from here to here." She moved her finger from the right edge to the very left.
"Some claim the second half was named New World because the influence of the world government they have over that region is waning. With vast stretches being ruled uncontested by the most powerful pirates others say it got it's name because it is full of wonders and unexplored things, no one knows for certain but the name stuck. "
"So it is some kind of lawless zone?" I inquired.
"In a sense, it depends on whom you ask. But the same can be said about the first half of the Grand-line, it rests upon which definition of lawless zone you employ."
Rayleigh sighed,
"What she tries to say without actually saying it, is that 4 years ago Gol. D. Roger the so-called Pirate King was executed after he surrendered himself to the World Government. Before they actually took his head they allowed him some last words. The Marines were probably expecting him to beg for his life or show remorse for his actions, but that just showed how little they knew about him. Instead of scoring their greatest victory in history by executing the Pirate King in front of a crowd, he turned the tables on them and instead dealt them the greatest defeat by uttering a few simple words."
He reminisced for a moment.
"I can still hear him say them. `You want my treasure? You can have it! I left everything I gathered together in one place. Now you'll just have to find it!´ With those words, he started the so called Age of pirates. Fortune-hunters and outlaws around the world followed his calling and set out to sea."
There was some barely hidden pain and regret in his voice.
"You knew him didn't you?"
"I did," he confirmed, "Roger was my best friend, my captain."
"Why did he give himself up? After everything you said he must have held great power to be titled pirate king, surely he could have fought them?" I wondered.
"Yes he could have, and if he did they would have never been able to catch him. But he was ill even during our voyage, at the end, he kept going by will alone, it was all that held his dying body together. He disbanded the crew shortly after we set foot on the last island of the grand-line and from there made his own way. A few months later, I heard he surrender himself to the Marines. Why he did it, I never knew. There could have been any number of reasons for doing that ranging from him not wanting to die sickly in a bed or him just wanting to have one last laugh at the expense of the marines. To be honest, I have no idea, even those close to him were never able to fully understand his motives." He said with a pained expression on his face.
Something regarding this whole thing seemed strangely familiar.
"It takes a special kind of person to turn one's fading flames of life into a huge fire that enveloped the world. The day he died, I have never laughed, never cried, and never drank more in my life. He was a magnificent man, our late captain. He had to be for us to follow him to hell and back."
He said while I saw him wipe a tear from the corner of his eyes at uttering those words. And I wondered if I would be missed in a similar fashion, have I impacted the lives of those who knew me, knew of me, my friends allies would they shed tears remembering me? After all, if I can't find my way back to them I'm as good as dead to them anyway.
Shakky had no intention to let Rayleigh nor myself recede to our own minds and pushed on with her introduction of the world.
"The seven major players of today, are the Yonkou. The four most powerful and influential Pirates residing in the second half of the Grandline. Together they control the majority of the Islands there. It is said that a single one of them can bring the same power to bear as the World Government, which is the 5th Power with their executive arm called the Marines who operate in all the 5 Seas. After Rogers's proclamation, the Marines started to lose more and more ground against all those new groups of Pirates emerging from thin air. Backed into a corner they had no other choice and offered seven of the most powerful Pirates amnesty and granted them an extensive list of privileges in exchange for their cooperation in exterminating Pirates. For most of those Shichibukai or 7 Warlords of the Sea, that meant business as usual since most Pirate crews are in conflict with each other either way."
So the life of a Pirate is pretty similar to life as a villain on Bet, being in permanent conflict with other Pirates and the Marines the law enforcement agency of this world.
"By accepting to work with the government, the Shichibukai at least had one less powerful enemy. I take it since those Shichibukai are essentially granted immunity from prosecution they abuse their position." I guessed. If it could be called such, human nature made this pretty much a certainty.
"Yes, most do in some way or another." Shakky confirmed, "But the World Government doesn't really care in their eyes it is a small price to pay in order to essentially take them from the board and pointing them at other Pirates. They are deemed useful and since their inception, they turned out to be a vital part of the newly established equilibrium of powers. So their atrocities are overlooked or straight out swept under the rug since news about such events would also damage the reputation of the ones who instated them in the first place."
"Am I right in to assume that the world government as a whole, doesn't only consist of paragon of virtue?"
"Oh goods no," Shakky scoffed "I think earlier you pretty much found the right words to sum it up, let me rephrase it. Pirates and Marine or what else people call themselves are just labels, but that in no way is an apt and sufficient description of a person or group in order to know exactly who and what you are dealing with. There are Marines spouting words about Justice to indulge in the killing of people then there are Pirates who have helped more people than they can count."
This doesn't seem so different from what I was used to. I wondered if corruption was an inherent problem of large organizations or it is owed to the plain and simple human condition.
So to summarize this government is most likely an even more corrupt institution than the PRT, -going by the lack of means to supervise them in a meaningful manner- following some abstract concept of justice to validate their actions no matter what they might be, charming. Then there are the Shichibukai strong pirates and their crews that are exempt from being pursued by the Marines for various concessions granted to them, for hunting other pirates and other obligations they had to fulfill. This construct of government-sanctioned pirates strongly reminded me of the very status I intended for the Undersiders to achieve when I surrendered myself to the PRT, and they eventually got out of the whole ordeal.
In essence, they are Pirates, that on some level acknowledged the necessity of there being an Umbrella organization of some sort for not everything falling into total anarchy or even just to use the government to hide behind. While still preserving their most of their independence, by being kept outside the Marines chain of command. Therefore they retained their ability to interact with other Pirates, because they are still Pirates themselves.
Then there are those Yonkou ruling over this so-called New World, at first glance they look like Insurgent or Rebels of some kind. But on second glance they seem to be a stabilizing factor there. Consolidating other groups under their banner, who otherwise might have caused mayhem and chaos, more than they do now.
I wondered what was their reason for claiming territory in the first place? Was it a hunger for power, riches or were they more basic in nature? After all, I myself took over a city because those in charge were a bunch of incompetent bureaucrats more interested in maintaining the status quo than to change things for the better. Did some of those Yonkou start out in a similar way? Having taken control from those originally in power in order to protect their turf from other pirates and the marines?
"The last major power, which I'm unsure I can even call it that are the Revolutionaries." Shaky concluded, "They are newly minted group that so far was able to successfully wring a few islands from the world governments control. It is unclear if they are gonna last, they have great ambitions but those aiming high can fall a far way down. Only time will tell if they can weather the storm that is coming their way. "
So they are a group given their name is directly opposing the world government, no mere Warlords, but a resistance attempting to change the system. In my own experience, for you to get people to fight against the system in such a manner, required the system to be intolerable ...
"Okay - " I said, "I think I've got a feel for the general situation. As you already said you aren't aware of any portals or ways to reach different worlds. So either they don't exist, to begin with, or you just don't possess knowledge of such. Since I'm not willing to accept the fact that I'm stranded here, I'm gonna operate on the premise that there is a way for me to get back home. Which means I need to find them or a source of information that can point me in the right direction."
"Well, let´s assume for a moment such portals or means to travel between worlds do indeed exist. Then I'm pretty sure the only organization that might know about them is the World government." She concluded, something I grudgingly had to agree with "It wouldn't be the first time they buried something and I doubt they would react kindly to anyone trying to unearth their secrets."
"Yeah, no surprise there. I'm really not keen to find myself in the middle of another conspiracy. The last few I stumbled across were more than enough for one lifetime. I'm more interested in different means to get my hands on such information?"
It would be so easy with access to the internet the rumors alone would probably point me in the right direction.
"Don't you have some kind of hoard of knowledge," I asked, "a place where books are stored to every topic or a person dealing in esoteric information ?"
Someone like Lisa would be godsent in the situation I found myself in.
"Unfortunately you arrived a tad bit too late," she regretfully informed me "we had something like this not too long ago. An Island in West Blue is called Ohara. It was a place of knowledge and was said to house the greatest library in the entire world. Rumor had it that every book ever written could be found there. One of the Archaeologists guild founded and operating out of Hara made extensive use of the library and was quite eager to add to the funds of knowledge."
That seemed to be exactly what I was looking for, somehow I sensed a bit coming which I doubted was gonna please me.
"What happened?"
"The Island was destroyed, according to the official version the people tried not only to secede from the world government but were seeking out forbidden knowledge with the intent to destroy the world. Therefore they were declared criminals and a fleet was dispatched to take care of them. In the ensuing fight, the island and all its inhabitants were killed in some kind of unmentioned accident."
"Which presumably means their accumulated knowledge was either destroyed or taken by the government." I sadly added.
"Most likely," confirmed Shakky.
"Were there any survivors?" I wondered because going to the World Government and kindly ask them for such information wouldn't work, that I was sure of.
With a smile on her lips, she said
"Funny you would ask that. According to the Marines, there actually was a single survivor."
She searched through the stack of papers next to her and took out a bounty poster which she then put on the table in front of me.
"One little girl, by the name of Nico Robin was somehow able to flee the Island in the tumult of the attack and it is even said she sunk 5 Marine Battleships in the process. Which was the justification given for the large bounty placed on her head." Shakky said.
I was stupefied, I only saw a frightened little child no older than 10 — probably even younger and was reminded of those little kids I had the pleasure of getting to know on Bet. Dinah and Bonesaw were at the forefront of my mind and in most aspect complete opposites of each other.
But no matter what, I really couldn't picture that girl in front of me being able to do what was said about her. For me, she strongly reminded me of Dinah a child being the victim of circumstances out of her control. Well on second thought didn't that apply for Bonesaw - Riley, too in some fashion. Being essentially formed into the perfect little tool by a psychopathic killer wasn't her fault either.
In the case of the girl whose picture laid in front of me did seem to still be innocent, but there was no telling how long she could stay that way being forced into a life on the run.
I had trouble suppressing my rising anger, unfair treatment of kids was still a trigger for me, and if there was just a bit of truth in the statement of the marines this child´s situation wasn't much different from Dinahs, she had something others will no doubt be after, with the sole difference her continued survival wasn´t a requirement to get it. Fuck, and I can apparently count myself among those after her, but for entirely different reasons.
I read 79 Million Belly written under her name.
"Sorry, I lack comparables how much are 79 Million Belly, exactly?" I asked.
"A freshly made loaf of bread costs around 50 bellies, meaning the bounty on her head is far more than a good earning job nets you in several decades of work."
That meant the conversion from belly to dollar is roughly ten to one.
Not sure someone would have paid that amount of money for my head even after the Undersiders took over the Bay.
"And the amount on itself, is it irregular?" I followed up on my previous question.
"Yes - Outstanding Captains of Pirate crews, who started out in one of the Blues usually have bounties in the low one-hundred million belly range when they arrive here at the half-way point of the grand-line. But you have to keep in mind, that their bounty is the sum they earned after countless life and death battles and over a long amount of time.
Therefore her bounty is unprecedented in two ways, for one this is the highest starting bounty placed on anyone in one of the Blues and the highest amount ever placed on a child her age." Shakky explained.
I sighed, this was not exactly what I had hoped for to find as my first clue to getting home, but it couldn't be helped. At least in finding her I would be able to protect her from the more unsavory and dangerous elements crawling this planet. My decision made I asked.
"You wouldn't happen to know where best to start my search for this girl?"
I'm not exactly sure what I did, surely it couldn't have been my question. But Shakky beamed at me with a wide smile, as if she just won the lottery. And Rayleigh filled the bar with a booming laughter as if I just told the best joke he ever heard.
Confused at their obvious amusement I looked back and forth between them in the hopes to be inducted in whatever had them react this way.
I had to wait until Rayleigh resumed control over his shaking body and wiped another tear from the corner of his eye, this time one originating from mirth.
"And what exactly gave you the impression you might succeed in this endeavor let alone live long enough to capitalize on the knowledge the girl might impart you with? Perhaps you have already forgotten, but you are in the middle of the grand-line, the most dangerous sea in existence swarming with countless strong Pirates, furthermore this girl has a substantial bounty on her head. You will be lucky to keep yourself alive as you are now, but protecting someone, a little girl at that is absolutely out of the question. Hell, it would surprise me if you would even make it to reverse mountain." He lectured.
It really irritated me to get dismissed in such a fashion, what were Alexandria words - she forged her reputation over years not only participating but being in the midst of all the major incidents for more than two decades. I did the same, not for the same amount of time of course, but since my first day as a cape the rest of her statement — being constantly in the midst of things- applied to me too. And it bugged me, that I apparently had to start all over again.
"I get underestimated all the time," I said with a dangerous undertone.
"Perhaps, and perhaps you will even surprise me, but I'm an excellent judge not only of character but of strength and you don´t possess what it takes to succeed. Lucky for you I´m willing to help, to teach you."
He offered, for a moment I was surprised until I remembered what little I was told about the source of his power and if what he said means, that you really can be trained to do that. I might have need of it especially if he isn't some outlier in this world. After all, I was never one to deny myself an advantage, but the more gnawing question was undoubtedly
"Why? Why would you do that, surely whatever you intend to teach me isn't something that can be learned in a short amount of time. Why invest it in someone you barely know and let´s be clear I don't buy into your `we are bored´ story."
"You are right, it isn't the whole truth." Shaky admitted, "but it isn't a lie either, we just omitted a few things. We are truly bored, you have to understand we were once at the very forefront of the events that happened in the world. We were the protagonist in those stories the people talked about, we were those facing impossible odds and beat them time and time again. We made history."
I can understand the sentiment, I'm not sure if I could have been content with surviving fighting Scion, and then for some reason or another being forced to retire. There would have always been the itch to get back into the thick of things.
"Oh don't misunderstand we have no particular desire to come back out of retirement, we enjoy the current state of our lives. But what we also enjoy is to have a hand in events to come and if we limit ourselves from not actively participating then we thought we at least can guide the new generation and be part of the world-changing events by proxy." She cheerfully said.
"Choose champions in order for them to carry on your torch your legacy, to be the ones having forged the weapon fighting for a new world." I retorted dryly.
"I wouldn't put it in such a dramatic way, but essentially yes -" she confirmed.
"You see the last kid, we mentored is a rising star in this day and age and quite successful in his endeavor. I'm sure he will carve a place for himself in this world and by doing so will give those in power an even greater headache than he already does. And to say I enjoy watching that come to pass quite a lot is a huge understatement. To be honest you struck me as someone cut to be from similar cloth, someone who wouldn't allow yourself to be confined by rules and regulations made by others, only to be subservient to your own goals." He approvingly said.
"Which makes me into a perfect fit, if you are searching for someone to stir the pot, to make trouble," I concluded.
"Yes, but above all, I think you not only can do that but live to tell the tale. From what I've gathered from you in the small amount of time you seem to possess an indomitable will, you are smart and apparently used to conflict, I would even go so far and say I suspect you are one of the few out there genuinely thriving in it. And what we offer is something you will profit from as well." He stated.
"What do you propose?" I asked despite my misgivings of being the amusement of two retired pirates.
"Well, as you are now. You won't survive for long, not if you have the misfortune to run into someone actually knowing how to throw a punch and survive on the grand-line. And you don't strike me as someone able to evade trouble on the contrary you seem more like the trouble magnet kind of girl. Therefore I offer to train you, to get you to a point where you easily will be a match for the best. I can't promise you that you will win against them, but even if you should lose you will be able to make them pay dearly. It has been quite some time since I put some green kids through their paces — Ahh the good old times."
He laughed to himself out of nowhere at this statement and for some reason, it gave me shivers.
Well, I couldn't dismiss how advantageous this would be for me, becoming stronger will not only increase my chances of survival if those seas are truly as dangerous as they are made out to be by those two. And going along with them might also help me in other ways.
"What you offer is tempting, but allow me another question. How long do you think this girl can survive on her on if you think me unable to do the same?" I inquired.
That seemed to give them pause.
"A very good question, one I can't answer. Before you go ahead and reject our offer you should probably know that the destruction of Ohara happened close to two years ago, and there is no guarantee that the girl is even still alive. But what I can guarantee you is that if you go now in a foolhardy attempt to save her, not only will you more than likely die a long time before you even get close to finding her, but you won't be any use in protecting her. And should the worst case occur with you dying, she will have no one not now not ever trying to find, help, and protect her. So if this kid is still alive after 2 years of being on the run, chances are she might live another few years. But if she isn't you accepting our proposal at least will secure your own survival." She appealed at my common sense.
I didn't like it, knowing that my best chance a little girl is out there at the mercy of who knows who, but as much as it pains me to say what she said made sense. What help am I for her if I'm dead in a ditch somewhere? This was Dinah all over again and I hated it, not being able to immediately act, having to bide my time.
"How long will it take to get to the level you think I need to be at?" I questioned.
"Well, that mostly will depend upon yourself. A few years would be enough to get you up to speed." Rayleigh said, "A fair warning I don't do things half-assed and I won't allow you to stop midway in the training."
"I'm no quitter," I stated.
"That´s good to hear." He said intrigued.
"So when do we start?" I asked his sole response consisted of a wide grin.
Authors Note: After making myself familiar with the One Piece world especially its geographic I couldn't stop but wonder how does everybody travel from one Blue to another.
We are told to reach the Grand-Line from one of the Blues you have to traverse Reverse Mountain which basically is a stream flowing upwards to the mountain and then flows downwards in the Grandline. But how do people from the Grand-Line travel into the Blues?
Surely they can't cross the Calm-Belt only the Marines the Pirates of Amazon Lily have the means to do so without fighting their way through an Army of Sea Kings. So how do they do it?
You can't just sail up a mountain against the stream, that can't just be done — on the other hand, Don Krieg fled from the Grand-Line back into East Blue, and Sanji born in South Blue found his way in the Grand-Line and from there ended up in East Blue — but how exactly did they manage to do that? Does Anybody have some ideas and insight you want to share? Because I'm at a loss -
Regarding the conversion of Belly to Dollar — The truth is, it is more than likely not a ten to one conversion but something a bit more complex, where you have to factor in a lot of different things ... availability of food ... technological advancement ... the weird way something in One Piece are priced ... — but I think my estimate isn't that far off and I chose it in a way that calculating the amount in one's head doesn't result in a headache ...
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Chapter 04 - Island of Monsters
Chapter 04: Island of Monsters (Spring 1504)
The little boat we were in bumped against the shore of the Island in front of me. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Rayleigh putting the paddle away he used to propel us through the vast stretch of the calm belt we had to traverse to arrive at this destination.
He jumped into the shallow water and pulled the boat with me still in it further onshore. He dragged the boat a good few dozen feet away from the edge of the furthest point the waves reach on land.
It was astounding every time I saw his physical capabilities, the boat must have weighed a few hundred kilos without me, and he moved it like would an empty cardboard carton. A feat, according to him is nothing special and something he assured me a lot of people are capable of. And if what he promised is true, I will be one of those people in due time.
I couldn't wait for it. How often did I wish myself capable of being able to match some of my enemies blow for blow instead of having to be creative with my power. Don't get me wrong. I had loved my power, it was incredibly versatile, and it allowed me to put my mind to use. To constantly come up with new ways to utilize it, it forced me to think. In my opinion, the most important thing in any fight was to think. The moment you stopped doing it was the moment you lost.
Nevertheless, there are situations where it is just satisfying to just pummel your opponent's face until it is just a bloody mess. Oh, what would I have given for the opportunity to wipe the smile off the faces of the likes of Alexandria and Jack Slash with a well-aimed punch.
I took the small bag, filled with a few clothes and essentials I was given by Shakky slung it over my shoulders, and jumped onto dry land. I wasn't one to get sea-sick. But being on board of a boat, small enough to be called a large nutshell for over a week, was enough, even for me to long for steady ground under my feet.
The hardest part was not being able to move about. Especially after my last involuntary stay on a boat and the negative connotations it had. Therefore think it is understandable I wasn't exactly eager for a trip by boat so shortly after this experience.
Nonetheless, I was a far cry away from falling to my knees and praying for my good fortune to be on land again, but I couldn't deny that some apprehension left me standing here. A glance at Lilith and Kain, who jumped from the boat in my wake, told me they shared my feelings.
In my case, it mostly had to do with the parting words of Shakky aimed at Rayleigh, in which she told him to take care of his boat for once since they can't well afford it for him to get them sunk every time he leaves the island.
At first, I thought she was joking, but the way he reacted, embarrassed to be called out on it, and scratched the back of his head while trying to laugh it away told a different story entirely. Well, at least it answered the question of why Rayleigh was swimming through the calm-belt when he came across me and at that moment I started to regret agreeing to this whole endeavor.
It would really have been just my luck to capsize and drown on my way to get stronger in order to survive this world.
His halfhearted reassurances, that Shakky was exaggerating didn't exactly help soothe my worries. Nevertheless, my path had already been set and I had no intention of abandoning it before it even started.
At least I safely arrived at our destination, and for my peace of mind, I would just ignore the fact, that at one time I would have to set forth on the return trip.
During my musings, Rayleigh already had reached the outskirts of the dense forest and was turning back towards me. He lifted one of his eyebrows in a questioning manner as if to say are you coming.
This prompted me to follow him. I made one step when I felt some soft impacts on my backpack. I needn't turn my head to know my spiders intended to use me as their taxi.
We made our way through thick vegetation, with seemingly no end in sight for some time. I was about ready to accept the fact that this must be some kind of endless forest Island when at one point, the vegetation started to get thinner, and we ended up in a clearing.
It was nothing special, just the foot of a large rock formation. Rocks clustered around the area, and undoubtedly the reason the vegetation halted at the very edges. The trees stood far enough away to allow the sunlight near unhindered access to clearing.
I noticed a small thin stream of water emerging atop the largest rock, creating a small waterfall as it rained down from it. The water hitting the ground gathered in a small dent at the foot of that rock, before it drained off along a small trench in the stones towards the treeline vanishing there.
I couldn't help but think this to be a near-perfect place to set up our camp. We had access to freshwater a waterfall even, which could be used as a shower. The area was overseeable making it near impossible for any wild animals to sneak upon us. The lack of plants, except for the occasional moss formation, wouldn't make this area attractive for most animals either.
Not sure about the water though, it might be used by some to appease their thirst, but I didn't think that likely the strong vegetation indicated an abundance of drinkable water on this island. Therefore most animals would avoid a clearing with nothing in it that could be used as cover.
Well, time will tell. Either way, I doubted many are courageous enough to get anywhere near Rayleigh. He walked over to a knee-high rock and placed his bag next to it. I followed his example and placed mine near a rock too close to where I was standing.
Despite the bag being rather light, no more than thirty pounds, it was liberating to no longer having to carry it on my shoulders. Lilith and Kain shared the enthusiasm with the now absent straps it meant more space for them.
He turned around and walked past me in the direction we came from. He stopped near the edge of the forest and faced me.
"We are gonna use this clearing as camp. When we don't train you shouldn't stray from it", he warned. "As you are now you won't survive an encounter with most of the creatures living on this island."
His words though vague, made it clear he had to possess some kind of Thinker power. Was it the same power that allowed them to know when I was leaving the room back on Sabaody?
"The way you say this, the certainty you aren't guessing you know. How?"
I tried to get a confirmation for my assumption out of him.
"We come to that. For now, let's talk," he said as he looked at me emphasizing the importance of what he was about to tell me.
"In this world, there are three major sources of a person's strength. First, there is the body the physical abilities." His thumb on his right hand went up.
"Second, there is the Mind, Willpower, or as most came to call it Haki," he said and his index finger joined his thumb.
"And the last source of power, something not everyone possesses are Devil Fruit powers," he listed with his middle finger raised.
"Everything else from the use of weapons to strategies are in essence subcategories of those three."
I nodded along, as he continued,
"In the time we are here together I will focus on the first two, I can train your body and mind, but I can't help you with the third. Probably no one can since every Devil Fruits is unique in its own way. Even among Zoan-type fruits, the category with the greatest overlap, it isn't guaranteed that something that works for one necessarily translates to another."
"Which just means I have to get a handle on it by myself," I concluded. I was confident I could handle it. It wouldn't be the first time I had to get a grip on a new power. Worthwhile experience, which combined with the remnants of memories as my time as Khepri will come in handy.
"Pretty much," he agreed. "The fact that I haven't eaten one doesn't exactly help matters. But I fought my fair share of them, so I at least will be able to impart some tips and observations that might help you along the way. But this won't be our priority, no matter what type of fruit-type you consumed. In the long run, you will benefit more from training the other two categories."
Yeah, I can see why. If I ate a Zoan type and it somehow amplified my physical capabilities having a strong base is essential and in turn, will boost my overall power when using the fruit. I don't think there are many Paramecia-type fruit not able to profit from strong physical and mental faculties. For Logia-types if it really is possible to overcome the breaker state, that grants a user intangibility the same holds true. And for some reason, I suspect the secret in overcoming it is somehow connected to this Haki.
"Both are equally important and mastery over both is necessary if you want to fully realize your potential," He said. Of course, by focusing on one, you can cover up weaknesses in the other categories to a certain extent. But in order to get truly powerful, you need both, unified they are boosting each other to new heights. Even the Marines recognize this fact."
"What do you mean?" I asked unsure what he was alluding to.
"A few decades back the Marines developed a training program for their officer candidates. It was based upon the combination of a few different martial arts. They called the end product Rokushiki, it was designed to train their bodies and served a double purpose. To teach them discipline and also to give them a basis, it can later be built upon. When they are ready to learn the use of Haki."
"Are you gonna teach me this Rokushiki?" apprehension found its way into my voice.
Learning a new martial arts usually means having to unlearn all things previously learned about fighting. Since every martial art is different, with different foci, not surprising since every single one was a result of the time of their conception, the culture, the weapons used, and the ones intended to learn all differ.
In such a way, that they don't mesh well with each other. The more ingrained a martial artist is, the different style, its stances, and kata are, the more difficult it would be to reverse the habits this resulted in.
Habits are hard to unlearn in the best circumstances and with me having done little else than constantly trained the two years spent in the Wards. With experts in their chosen martial art, I could only dread what it would mean to learn this Rokushiki.
"At first I didn't intend to," he said. Since for everybody with a strong enough body techniques similar to theirs are easy enough to learn, but I changed my mind." With a thoughtful expression, he added. "I think it would be for the best to have some milestones you can aspire to reach. Allowing you to get a measure of your own progress, seeing with your own eyes what is possible with dedication and iron discipline. It will keep you motivated, to challenge yourself every day anew."
I smiled at that - and the dread of unlearning what fighting instincts I ingrained in myself started to disappear. The way he made it sound this Rokushiki sounded less like a formal martial art, but more like some kind of special attack.
"Don't get your hopes up too much," he said. "I was never formally trained in their methods so I only know the basics. The things I picked up while fighting Marines using Rokushiki. Like with every other skill those too can be improved and customized to better fit the user. What you also have to keep in mind. There is a huge difference between a novice and a master. And I'm certainly no master of this."
In other words, if I should start to fancy some elements of this Rokushiki it meant I had to improve upon the basics he picked up on by myself. Since he more than likely won't be able to help me.
"Let's postpone talking about that for later. I think you might find hearing about Haki more interesting."
I doubted he was aware of how right he was with this assessment. Mostly because I had trouble picturing something being described as Willpower to be useful in a fight. Of course, I would like to know more about this Haoshouki Haki I apparently possess.
"Haki is a power that lies dormant in every single living organism. Most people don't notice or fail to awaken it throughout their lives. The term Haki is generally split into three categories called presence, fighting spirit, and intimidation. Out of the three presence and fighting spirit can be learned by anyone, with intimidation being the exception in so far that only a few around the world are in possession of it with you being amongst them."
While listening to his explanation, I noticed a set of slit eyes in the shadow of a tree behind Rayleigh. I was immediately alarmed before I got the chance to warn him I saw half a dozen sets of eyes more, spread out in the bushes all around him.
Unfazed by the clear stiffening of my posture and my spiders moving towards my shoulder ready to jump he said, "the best way to introduce you to them is to show you, don't interfere!"
And at those words, eight large wild-cats jumped out of their hiding places, their jaws full of sharp teeth and claws at the ready to rip him to pieces.
One immediately went after his back. Without even looking, he ducked under the attack. The cat missed him completely, and carried by its momentum tumbled over the ground and came to a stop two meters in front of me.
The cat, who was easily as large as a full-grown lion, righted itself and turned its attention back towards Rayleigh. This turned out to be the start signal for the others to attack him, too.
I noticed Rayleigh had his eyes closed. But that seemed in no way impair him or his ability to sense them. He effortlessly danced around them, using the least amount of movement possible to evade all their attacks at the last moment. Not one even came close to touch, let alone injure him.
Rayleigh, even though the cats coordinated their attacks and left him nearly no room to maneuver, gave them no chance to land a single hit on him. The last time I saw someone display a similar feat, was when I picked a fight with Contessa.
My own variation of doing something similar, by sensing my opponents with the bugs I tagged them with, didn't even come close. To say I was impressed seeing him do that was the understatement of the century.
"Presence or Kenbunshoku Haki allows one to sense and predict the spiritual energy of other life forms. This not only means you know the exact location of every single one of them within your range but also what they are doing at every moment. Furthermore, if an accomplished user of Kenbunshoku Haki can even predict their future actions."
Meaning this Kenbunshoku Haki is a form of limited omniscience with the possibility of becoming a limited precognition. In short, a combat thinker power.
"Can you hide your own presence from someone else able to sense people via Kenbunshoku Haki?" I asked him.
I was curious about his answer. With the help of this ability, tracking others over long distances would be child's play. It would be impossible to hide or escape from someone Kenbunshoku Haki.
Assuming, of course, it is possible to differentiate between different signatures creatures or people emit.
And if it was true, what Rayleigh said about me being weaker than most of the creatures currently residing on this island. It also means his range is more than likely encompassing the whole island. An island that I would guess is dozens if not a hundred of kilometers in diameter.
Not only that, but he apparently can also gauge the strength of those within his range. Otherwise, he couldn't have concluded that I was weaker than most of the indigenous species. This means a method to avoid being detected in such a fashion is an absolute necessity. Not only to be able to hide yourself, but also your strength.
"Yes, there is. You can learn to suppress your presence. Not many bother to learn how it is done."
"Why?" I wondered.
"Because like most things in life it is not foolproof. The veil you shroud yourself in can be penetrated by those better at Kenbunshoku Haki than yourself. The prevalent preconception under Haki users is that those stronger are also better at Haki. So why waste any time learning a skill that only allows you to hide from those weaker than you. Idiots ..." I could only agree with his assessment "It is quite useful, to not be disturbed when you are retired." He noted smirking.
Ah, that would explain why he can enjoy a peaceful life. Although he was a member of the crew of the late Pirate King and isn't constantly harassed by marines capable of sensing strong presences.
I returned my attention to the fight still in progress in front of me. The cats were slowing down having spent most of their energy in their failed attacks on Rayleigh. Some had their tongues hanging out of their mouth and were breathing heavily, while Rayleigh wasn't even winded. After another perfect evasive maneuver that let the cats only hit empty air, there was a short lull in the fight. The cats probably reconsidering their approach to this fight.
"I think that is enough of that."
With this declaration, he stopped in his tracks. Feet planted firmly on the ground. The cats seeing the changes in the way he held himself renewed their attacks with vigor.
This time Rayleigh didn't move from the spot he anchored himself. But for some reason, the cats were still unable to hit him. Instead of dodging and sidestepping their attacks, it looked like his body was flowing around those attacks using a flexibility more akin to a liquid than what a human body should be able to do.
"What you see me currently using, is one of the six basic techniques making up the Rokushiki called Kami-E. It follows the same principle as a leaf dancing through the air. The moment you move to reach for it your very movement creates an air current strong enough to divert its flight path away from your hand, making you miss it by a hairsbreadth. You essentially are trying to emulate the leaf by making your body incredible flexible and flow around the enemies attacks."
The cats made a few more passes at him while he explained the technique to me.
After another failed attack. One of the cats seemed to have recognized the futility of their endeavor and was looking my way. Instinctively I took a step back. Without any power to my name, I wasn't keen on finding out how I would fare against 250 kg of pure feline muscles. Despite the urge to turn around and run, I resisted remembering my own experiences in handling other types of monsters, which boiled down to - never show your fear and let them walk all over you. If you act like prey, you get treated as such.
I really despised having to take a page out of Sophia's book, and no matter how I denied the fact, in a sense, she had her hands in shaping me, just not in the way she intended. But I couldn't deny this simple logic was successful, at least against creatures ruled by instincts. The cat hesitated for a moment, getting second thoughts until something clinched it for him — hunger most likely, and he went through with his attack.
The cat bent his legs and lowered his center of gravity, and with one strong push, ejected himself from the ground jumping right at me. He stretched his forelegs in front of him razor-sharp claws bearing, their danger paling compared to the long and numerous teeth in his mouth that neared my throat. I wasn't given the opportunity to react, and neither were Lilith or Kain when my sight of the cat was obstructed by the back of Rayleigh, who suddenly appeared in front of me.
Fearing the worst, him getting injured. As a consequence of throwing himself in the way of the attack. I moved my head to the side, to get a good look at what transpired. I barely saw the huge cat hanging from Rayleigh's left forearm its teeth closed around it. Suddenly his other hand moved, and his outstretched index finger vanished in between the cat's eyes. When he pulled his finger back out. The until this moment at Rayleigh's arm gnawing cat immediately slackened and drifted lifelessly down to the ground.
I could make out blood and brain matter staining the finger that penetrated the skull of the cat as if it were a bullet fired by a high-caliber rifle.
Rayleigh used his orange shirt to clean off his fingers as he muttered,
"I really forgot how messy it is to use this technique, having your fingers buried in the intestines of your enemies is really unpleasant." Imagine how unpleasant it is for the one being on the receiving end of it. "Which is why I really prefer the sword, it leaves your hands clean."
I slightly turned his head my way, while his gaze seemed to halt the remaining cats in their tracks.
"To answer your unspoken questions. I used another Rokushiki technique called Soru to move in front of the cat. It is a movement technique, that allows you by kicking the ground many times in the blink of an eye to build up momentum before it starts to propel you, therefore allowing for incredible movement speeds."
What the - such a thing shouldn't even be possible. Completely unfazed as my mind rejected the very idea of such a technique, he continued with his explanation.
"In order to block the cat's attack, I tensed my muscles and hardened them in the process. If done right, you can get your muscles to a level resembling iron in its resilience to damage.
All but nullifying the damage I would have otherwise taken from the jaw and claws. This technique is called Tekkai and has the disadvantage, that it doesn't allow for movement while active, well at least for most."
My eyes traveled to the now cleaned finger, which has left red and yellow stains on his shirt. He held the finger in the air.
"The technique I used to kill him is called Shigan, the poke of death" he laughed at his own joke.
"Quite deadly and a real pain to learn, but far too messy for my taste."
Yeah, that's what everybody would care about after seeing someone putting down an opponent weighing a quarter of a ton with just a finger, that it gets your clothes dirty.
I turned my attention back to the remaining cats, who seemed to have overcome their indecisiveness after seeing one of theirs, being taken out with seemingly no effort, and decided this calls for retribution.
I could practically see it in the way they moved. There was anger, rage, the prior hesitation gone. Two of them took a running start towards us, bridging the distance between us in mere moments. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed Rayleigh lifted his right leg from the ground, his knee bent, and held it there. At the same time, as the cats left the ground his leg swished through the empty air in an arc.
On my skin, I suddenly felt an air current, and the next thing I saw was the airborne cats being sliced cleanly in half, separating their upper torso from the rest of their bodies. Not a second later, the trees behind them were cut apart in the same way, and a long gash appeared in the forest.
The attack was slightly angled towards the sky, therefore limiting the damage done to it down to a few dozen meters. Still, it was imposing. This must be the attack or a variant thereof, he used to dispose of my spider back when we first meet, the wind blade attack.
"What you just witnessed is called Rankyaku, it allows the user to generate a flying wind blade attack by swiftly slashing the air, the longer the limb or weapon used, the more devastating it becomes." That made sense; the angular speed would increase with the length of the limb or weapon.
Without further ado, he vanished and reappeared directly next to a hissing cat and kicked its side. Even half a dozen meters away, I could hear the bones break and saw the left half of its torso being crushed, while it was flung through the clearing. When the cat finally stopped skidding on the ground, no longer moving, leaving a trench in its wake.
A short glance confirmed its rib cage indented to a bloody mess, that looked like someone stepped on an orange.
"This was me using a kick of moderate strength."
He immediately vanished afterward, saying those words only to reappear next to another cat; he kicked this one, too.
The huge gust of wind caused by the displaced air knocked me on my ass, quite painfully, I might add. Lilith and Kain teetered on my shoulders but managed to find enough purchase to not be thrown off.
I was shrouded in a dust cloud obstructing my vision, not that I needed to see to know that there was no way the cat could have survived that.
What I saw when the cloud settled after a few seconds just served to reaffirm what I already suspected, the cat was crushed to smithereens in the center of a few meter deep crater that wasn't there a moment ago.
"This was an application of fighting spirit or Busoshoku Haki to a normal kick. By using your will-power you can essentially create an invisible armor and shroud parts of your body or your weapon in it. This allows one to strengthen your offensive and defensive capabilities, greatly reinforcing what is already there.
As an added bonus, it allows you to deal damage or protect yourself from attacks you otherwise would be unable to. For example, by using Busoshoku Haki it is possible to overcome the intangibly granted by Logia-type devil fruits."
I wasn't the only one from whom this casual display of unadulterated power garnered a new wave of respect for the man. The three remaining cats surrounding Rayleigh suddenly grew too apprehensive, to continue their onslaught, finally realizing just how far out of their league they were.
Two of them even started to slowly retreat away from him, inching backward, not daring to turn their backs on him. The last one had no such scruples as it turned around and started running, leaving behind the others.
Rayleigh jumped up and in the air, where he kicked his feet downwards. It wasn't the resulting boom of his action that held my attention. But that he somehow was able to keep himself from falling to the ground. Stepping on thin air, every time he repeated this the air itself acted as a solid platform for him which allowed him to traverse through it.
It wasn't flying, more air hoping. But I had no trouble seeing the potential uses of this technique, especially for a devil-fruit user like myself. It could mean the difference between a slow death by drowning and reaching a ship or land again.
The running cat was stopped when a from the sky falling Rayleigh stepped on her head and crushed it between his foot and the floor below into a red slush. He half-turned his head in the direction of the frightened remaining two cats.
"And this," he said as for a single short-lived moment his expression turned serious "is the so-called Haoshoku Haki." the effects of him using it were immediate. The two cats still standing fell down to the ground unconscious.
It was interesting to witness the usage of this power, not just the aftereffects. I couldn't help myself from getting goose-bumps at the prospect of me learning how to do that.
It took me a moment to process what I had just witnessed and to accept the fact, that if his words were true, it could be me who could do the same to such predators with ease in the near future.
Unperturbed of having dispatched a band of cats, Bitch would have needed to boost her dogs to achieve the same outcome. He walked to the two by Hashouki Haki downed cats and picked them, one hand each, and placed them on his shoulders.
I stood up and dusted myself off. "What are you planning to do with those cats?" I wondered.
He just halted his movement and gave me an incredulous look that clearly as he just said in a deadpan voice
"dinner" as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. His face conveyed as much. He just turned around and walked away.
"R... Right" was all I managed to say as I fell into his steps.
Authors Note: Taking a wild guess ... Some might actually not like Rayleigh being able to use Rokushiki. To be honest, I was unsure if this was the right thing to do. I weighed the pros and cons and for more than just a fleeting moment. Considered of having either have Shakky tag along and have her teaching the Rokushiki to Taylor ... since there is not much known about her least about her way of fighting ... reason for this existed in abundance. Stepping away from canon introducing Shakky as a teacher ... it fits with the theme of an all-female crew etc
But ultimately, decided against it. For one, I had no intention of giving her Haoshoki Haki, clearly a necessity for teaching Taylor who possesses this power (the Data books already dispense the conqueror disposition like candy to pretty much everybody - so I really needn't add to this) or have Rayleigh go with them. But that would have begged the question of why should both of them go when Rayleigh alone would have sufficed.
Let's just say the reasons I came up with left me unsatisfied... so we end up with this situation similar to canon... with the difference that Rayleigh has some insight into their techniques.
Something that I didn't find unreasonable. After all, Luffy was able to grasp Soru after having seen it used a few times. Rayleigh, throughout his career, must have seen those techniques hundreds of times, as he was fighting against and with the Marines. So I thought if Paradies Luffy can manage to replicate/reverse engineer one of those moves by observation with no extra training and little trouble surely the Pirate Kings right-hand man should be able to do the same.
The little boat we were in bumped against the shore of the Island in front of me. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Rayleigh putting the paddle away he used to propel us through the vast stretch of the calm belt we had to traverse to arrive at this destination.
He jumped into the shallow water and pulled the boat with me still in it further onshore. He dragged the boat a good few dozen feet away from the edge of the furthest point the waves reach on land.
It was astounding every time I saw his physical capabilities, the boat must have weighed a few hundred kilos without me, and he moved it like would an empty cardboard carton. A feat, according to him is nothing special and something he assured me a lot of people are capable of. And if what he promised is true, I will be one of those people in due time.
I couldn't wait for it. How often did I wish myself capable of being able to match some of my enemies blow for blow instead of having to be creative with my power. Don't get me wrong. I had loved my power, it was incredibly versatile, and it allowed me to put my mind to use. To constantly come up with new ways to utilize it, it forced me to think. In my opinion, the most important thing in any fight was to think. The moment you stopped doing it was the moment you lost.
Nevertheless, there are situations where it is just satisfying to just pummel your opponent's face until it is just a bloody mess. Oh, what would I have given for the opportunity to wipe the smile off the faces of the likes of Alexandria and Jack Slash with a well-aimed punch.
I took the small bag, filled with a few clothes and essentials I was given by Shakky slung it over my shoulders, and jumped onto dry land. I wasn't one to get sea-sick. But being on board of a boat, small enough to be called a large nutshell for over a week, was enough, even for me to long for steady ground under my feet.
The hardest part was not being able to move about. Especially after my last involuntary stay on a boat and the negative connotations it had. Therefore think it is understandable I wasn't exactly eager for a trip by boat so shortly after this experience.
Nonetheless, I was a far cry away from falling to my knees and praying for my good fortune to be on land again, but I couldn't deny that some apprehension left me standing here. A glance at Lilith and Kain, who jumped from the boat in my wake, told me they shared my feelings.
In my case, it mostly had to do with the parting words of Shakky aimed at Rayleigh, in which she told him to take care of his boat for once since they can't well afford it for him to get them sunk every time he leaves the island.
At first, I thought she was joking, but the way he reacted, embarrassed to be called out on it, and scratched the back of his head while trying to laugh it away told a different story entirely. Well, at least it answered the question of why Rayleigh was swimming through the calm-belt when he came across me and at that moment I started to regret agreeing to this whole endeavor.
It would really have been just my luck to capsize and drown on my way to get stronger in order to survive this world.
His halfhearted reassurances, that Shakky was exaggerating didn't exactly help soothe my worries. Nevertheless, my path had already been set and I had no intention of abandoning it before it even started.
At least I safely arrived at our destination, and for my peace of mind, I would just ignore the fact, that at one time I would have to set forth on the return trip.
During my musings, Rayleigh already had reached the outskirts of the dense forest and was turning back towards me. He lifted one of his eyebrows in a questioning manner as if to say are you coming.
This prompted me to follow him. I made one step when I felt some soft impacts on my backpack. I needn't turn my head to know my spiders intended to use me as their taxi.
We made our way through thick vegetation, with seemingly no end in sight for some time. I was about ready to accept the fact that this must be some kind of endless forest Island when at one point, the vegetation started to get thinner, and we ended up in a clearing.
It was nothing special, just the foot of a large rock formation. Rocks clustered around the area, and undoubtedly the reason the vegetation halted at the very edges. The trees stood far enough away to allow the sunlight near unhindered access to clearing.
I noticed a small thin stream of water emerging atop the largest rock, creating a small waterfall as it rained down from it. The water hitting the ground gathered in a small dent at the foot of that rock, before it drained off along a small trench in the stones towards the treeline vanishing there.
I couldn't help but think this to be a near-perfect place to set up our camp. We had access to freshwater a waterfall even, which could be used as a shower. The area was overseeable making it near impossible for any wild animals to sneak upon us. The lack of plants, except for the occasional moss formation, wouldn't make this area attractive for most animals either.
Not sure about the water though, it might be used by some to appease their thirst, but I didn't think that likely the strong vegetation indicated an abundance of drinkable water on this island. Therefore most animals would avoid a clearing with nothing in it that could be used as cover.
Well, time will tell. Either way, I doubted many are courageous enough to get anywhere near Rayleigh. He walked over to a knee-high rock and placed his bag next to it. I followed his example and placed mine near a rock too close to where I was standing.
Despite the bag being rather light, no more than thirty pounds, it was liberating to no longer having to carry it on my shoulders. Lilith and Kain shared the enthusiasm with the now absent straps it meant more space for them.
He turned around and walked past me in the direction we came from. He stopped near the edge of the forest and faced me.
"We are gonna use this clearing as camp. When we don't train you shouldn't stray from it", he warned. "As you are now you won't survive an encounter with most of the creatures living on this island."
His words though vague, made it clear he had to possess some kind of Thinker power. Was it the same power that allowed them to know when I was leaving the room back on Sabaody?
"The way you say this, the certainty you aren't guessing you know. How?"
I tried to get a confirmation for my assumption out of him.
"We come to that. For now, let's talk," he said as he looked at me emphasizing the importance of what he was about to tell me.
"In this world, there are three major sources of a person's strength. First, there is the body the physical abilities." His thumb on his right hand went up.
"Second, there is the Mind, Willpower, or as most came to call it Haki," he said and his index finger joined his thumb.
"And the last source of power, something not everyone possesses are Devil Fruit powers," he listed with his middle finger raised.
"Everything else from the use of weapons to strategies are in essence subcategories of those three."
I nodded along, as he continued,
"In the time we are here together I will focus on the first two, I can train your body and mind, but I can't help you with the third. Probably no one can since every Devil Fruits is unique in its own way. Even among Zoan-type fruits, the category with the greatest overlap, it isn't guaranteed that something that works for one necessarily translates to another."
"Which just means I have to get a handle on it by myself," I concluded. I was confident I could handle it. It wouldn't be the first time I had to get a grip on a new power. Worthwhile experience, which combined with the remnants of memories as my time as Khepri will come in handy.
"Pretty much," he agreed. "The fact that I haven't eaten one doesn't exactly help matters. But I fought my fair share of them, so I at least will be able to impart some tips and observations that might help you along the way. But this won't be our priority, no matter what type of fruit-type you consumed. In the long run, you will benefit more from training the other two categories."
Yeah, I can see why. If I ate a Zoan type and it somehow amplified my physical capabilities having a strong base is essential and in turn, will boost my overall power when using the fruit. I don't think there are many Paramecia-type fruit not able to profit from strong physical and mental faculties. For Logia-types if it really is possible to overcome the breaker state, that grants a user intangibility the same holds true. And for some reason, I suspect the secret in overcoming it is somehow connected to this Haki.
"Both are equally important and mastery over both is necessary if you want to fully realize your potential," He said. Of course, by focusing on one, you can cover up weaknesses in the other categories to a certain extent. But in order to get truly powerful, you need both, unified they are boosting each other to new heights. Even the Marines recognize this fact."
"What do you mean?" I asked unsure what he was alluding to.
"A few decades back the Marines developed a training program for their officer candidates. It was based upon the combination of a few different martial arts. They called the end product Rokushiki, it was designed to train their bodies and served a double purpose. To teach them discipline and also to give them a basis, it can later be built upon. When they are ready to learn the use of Haki."
"Are you gonna teach me this Rokushiki?" apprehension found its way into my voice.
Learning a new martial arts usually means having to unlearn all things previously learned about fighting. Since every martial art is different, with different foci, not surprising since every single one was a result of the time of their conception, the culture, the weapons used, and the ones intended to learn all differ.
In such a way, that they don't mesh well with each other. The more ingrained a martial artist is, the different style, its stances, and kata are, the more difficult it would be to reverse the habits this resulted in.
Habits are hard to unlearn in the best circumstances and with me having done little else than constantly trained the two years spent in the Wards. With experts in their chosen martial art, I could only dread what it would mean to learn this Rokushiki.
"At first I didn't intend to," he said. Since for everybody with a strong enough body techniques similar to theirs are easy enough to learn, but I changed my mind." With a thoughtful expression, he added. "I think it would be for the best to have some milestones you can aspire to reach. Allowing you to get a measure of your own progress, seeing with your own eyes what is possible with dedication and iron discipline. It will keep you motivated, to challenge yourself every day anew."
I smiled at that - and the dread of unlearning what fighting instincts I ingrained in myself started to disappear. The way he made it sound this Rokushiki sounded less like a formal martial art, but more like some kind of special attack.
"Don't get your hopes up too much," he said. "I was never formally trained in their methods so I only know the basics. The things I picked up while fighting Marines using Rokushiki. Like with every other skill those too can be improved and customized to better fit the user. What you also have to keep in mind. There is a huge difference between a novice and a master. And I'm certainly no master of this."
In other words, if I should start to fancy some elements of this Rokushiki it meant I had to improve upon the basics he picked up on by myself. Since he more than likely won't be able to help me.
"Let's postpone talking about that for later. I think you might find hearing about Haki more interesting."
I doubted he was aware of how right he was with this assessment. Mostly because I had trouble picturing something being described as Willpower to be useful in a fight. Of course, I would like to know more about this Haoshouki Haki I apparently possess.
"Haki is a power that lies dormant in every single living organism. Most people don't notice or fail to awaken it throughout their lives. The term Haki is generally split into three categories called presence, fighting spirit, and intimidation. Out of the three presence and fighting spirit can be learned by anyone, with intimidation being the exception in so far that only a few around the world are in possession of it with you being amongst them."
While listening to his explanation, I noticed a set of slit eyes in the shadow of a tree behind Rayleigh. I was immediately alarmed before I got the chance to warn him I saw half a dozen sets of eyes more, spread out in the bushes all around him.
Unfazed by the clear stiffening of my posture and my spiders moving towards my shoulder ready to jump he said, "the best way to introduce you to them is to show you, don't interfere!"
And at those words, eight large wild-cats jumped out of their hiding places, their jaws full of sharp teeth and claws at the ready to rip him to pieces.
One immediately went after his back. Without even looking, he ducked under the attack. The cat missed him completely, and carried by its momentum tumbled over the ground and came to a stop two meters in front of me.
The cat, who was easily as large as a full-grown lion, righted itself and turned its attention back towards Rayleigh. This turned out to be the start signal for the others to attack him, too.
I noticed Rayleigh had his eyes closed. But that seemed in no way impair him or his ability to sense them. He effortlessly danced around them, using the least amount of movement possible to evade all their attacks at the last moment. Not one even came close to touch, let alone injure him.
Rayleigh, even though the cats coordinated their attacks and left him nearly no room to maneuver, gave them no chance to land a single hit on him. The last time I saw someone display a similar feat, was when I picked a fight with Contessa.
My own variation of doing something similar, by sensing my opponents with the bugs I tagged them with, didn't even come close. To say I was impressed seeing him do that was the understatement of the century.
"Presence or Kenbunshoku Haki allows one to sense and predict the spiritual energy of other life forms. This not only means you know the exact location of every single one of them within your range but also what they are doing at every moment. Furthermore, if an accomplished user of Kenbunshoku Haki can even predict their future actions."
Meaning this Kenbunshoku Haki is a form of limited omniscience with the possibility of becoming a limited precognition. In short, a combat thinker power.
"Can you hide your own presence from someone else able to sense people via Kenbunshoku Haki?" I asked him.
I was curious about his answer. With the help of this ability, tracking others over long distances would be child's play. It would be impossible to hide or escape from someone Kenbunshoku Haki.
Assuming, of course, it is possible to differentiate between different signatures creatures or people emit.
And if it was true, what Rayleigh said about me being weaker than most of the creatures currently residing on this island. It also means his range is more than likely encompassing the whole island. An island that I would guess is dozens if not a hundred of kilometers in diameter.
Not only that, but he apparently can also gauge the strength of those within his range. Otherwise, he couldn't have concluded that I was weaker than most of the indigenous species. This means a method to avoid being detected in such a fashion is an absolute necessity. Not only to be able to hide yourself, but also your strength.
"Yes, there is. You can learn to suppress your presence. Not many bother to learn how it is done."
"Why?" I wondered.
"Because like most things in life it is not foolproof. The veil you shroud yourself in can be penetrated by those better at Kenbunshoku Haki than yourself. The prevalent preconception under Haki users is that those stronger are also better at Haki. So why waste any time learning a skill that only allows you to hide from those weaker than you. Idiots ..." I could only agree with his assessment "It is quite useful, to not be disturbed when you are retired." He noted smirking.
Ah, that would explain why he can enjoy a peaceful life. Although he was a member of the crew of the late Pirate King and isn't constantly harassed by marines capable of sensing strong presences.
I returned my attention to the fight still in progress in front of me. The cats were slowing down having spent most of their energy in their failed attacks on Rayleigh. Some had their tongues hanging out of their mouth and were breathing heavily, while Rayleigh wasn't even winded. After another perfect evasive maneuver that let the cats only hit empty air, there was a short lull in the fight. The cats probably reconsidering their approach to this fight.
"I think that is enough of that."
With this declaration, he stopped in his tracks. Feet planted firmly on the ground. The cats seeing the changes in the way he held himself renewed their attacks with vigor.
This time Rayleigh didn't move from the spot he anchored himself. But for some reason, the cats were still unable to hit him. Instead of dodging and sidestepping their attacks, it looked like his body was flowing around those attacks using a flexibility more akin to a liquid than what a human body should be able to do.
"What you see me currently using, is one of the six basic techniques making up the Rokushiki called Kami-E. It follows the same principle as a leaf dancing through the air. The moment you move to reach for it your very movement creates an air current strong enough to divert its flight path away from your hand, making you miss it by a hairsbreadth. You essentially are trying to emulate the leaf by making your body incredible flexible and flow around the enemies attacks."
The cats made a few more passes at him while he explained the technique to me.
After another failed attack. One of the cats seemed to have recognized the futility of their endeavor and was looking my way. Instinctively I took a step back. Without any power to my name, I wasn't keen on finding out how I would fare against 250 kg of pure feline muscles. Despite the urge to turn around and run, I resisted remembering my own experiences in handling other types of monsters, which boiled down to - never show your fear and let them walk all over you. If you act like prey, you get treated as such.
I really despised having to take a page out of Sophia's book, and no matter how I denied the fact, in a sense, she had her hands in shaping me, just not in the way she intended. But I couldn't deny this simple logic was successful, at least against creatures ruled by instincts. The cat hesitated for a moment, getting second thoughts until something clinched it for him — hunger most likely, and he went through with his attack.
The cat bent his legs and lowered his center of gravity, and with one strong push, ejected himself from the ground jumping right at me. He stretched his forelegs in front of him razor-sharp claws bearing, their danger paling compared to the long and numerous teeth in his mouth that neared my throat. I wasn't given the opportunity to react, and neither were Lilith or Kain when my sight of the cat was obstructed by the back of Rayleigh, who suddenly appeared in front of me.
Fearing the worst, him getting injured. As a consequence of throwing himself in the way of the attack. I moved my head to the side, to get a good look at what transpired. I barely saw the huge cat hanging from Rayleigh's left forearm its teeth closed around it. Suddenly his other hand moved, and his outstretched index finger vanished in between the cat's eyes. When he pulled his finger back out. The until this moment at Rayleigh's arm gnawing cat immediately slackened and drifted lifelessly down to the ground.
I could make out blood and brain matter staining the finger that penetrated the skull of the cat as if it were a bullet fired by a high-caliber rifle.
Rayleigh used his orange shirt to clean off his fingers as he muttered,
"I really forgot how messy it is to use this technique, having your fingers buried in the intestines of your enemies is really unpleasant." Imagine how unpleasant it is for the one being on the receiving end of it. "Which is why I really prefer the sword, it leaves your hands clean."
I slightly turned his head my way, while his gaze seemed to halt the remaining cats in their tracks.
"To answer your unspoken questions. I used another Rokushiki technique called Soru to move in front of the cat. It is a movement technique, that allows you by kicking the ground many times in the blink of an eye to build up momentum before it starts to propel you, therefore allowing for incredible movement speeds."
What the - such a thing shouldn't even be possible. Completely unfazed as my mind rejected the very idea of such a technique, he continued with his explanation.
"In order to block the cat's attack, I tensed my muscles and hardened them in the process. If done right, you can get your muscles to a level resembling iron in its resilience to damage.
All but nullifying the damage I would have otherwise taken from the jaw and claws. This technique is called Tekkai and has the disadvantage, that it doesn't allow for movement while active, well at least for most."
My eyes traveled to the now cleaned finger, which has left red and yellow stains on his shirt. He held the finger in the air.
"The technique I used to kill him is called Shigan, the poke of death" he laughed at his own joke.
"Quite deadly and a real pain to learn, but far too messy for my taste."
Yeah, that's what everybody would care about after seeing someone putting down an opponent weighing a quarter of a ton with just a finger, that it gets your clothes dirty.
I turned my attention back to the remaining cats, who seemed to have overcome their indecisiveness after seeing one of theirs, being taken out with seemingly no effort, and decided this calls for retribution.
I could practically see it in the way they moved. There was anger, rage, the prior hesitation gone. Two of them took a running start towards us, bridging the distance between us in mere moments. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed Rayleigh lifted his right leg from the ground, his knee bent, and held it there. At the same time, as the cats left the ground his leg swished through the empty air in an arc.
On my skin, I suddenly felt an air current, and the next thing I saw was the airborne cats being sliced cleanly in half, separating their upper torso from the rest of their bodies. Not a second later, the trees behind them were cut apart in the same way, and a long gash appeared in the forest.
The attack was slightly angled towards the sky, therefore limiting the damage done to it down to a few dozen meters. Still, it was imposing. This must be the attack or a variant thereof, he used to dispose of my spider back when we first meet, the wind blade attack.
"What you just witnessed is called Rankyaku, it allows the user to generate a flying wind blade attack by swiftly slashing the air, the longer the limb or weapon used, the more devastating it becomes." That made sense; the angular speed would increase with the length of the limb or weapon.
Without further ado, he vanished and reappeared directly next to a hissing cat and kicked its side. Even half a dozen meters away, I could hear the bones break and saw the left half of its torso being crushed, while it was flung through the clearing. When the cat finally stopped skidding on the ground, no longer moving, leaving a trench in its wake.
A short glance confirmed its rib cage indented to a bloody mess, that looked like someone stepped on an orange.
"This was me using a kick of moderate strength."
He immediately vanished afterward, saying those words only to reappear next to another cat; he kicked this one, too.
The huge gust of wind caused by the displaced air knocked me on my ass, quite painfully, I might add. Lilith and Kain teetered on my shoulders but managed to find enough purchase to not be thrown off.
I was shrouded in a dust cloud obstructing my vision, not that I needed to see to know that there was no way the cat could have survived that.
What I saw when the cloud settled after a few seconds just served to reaffirm what I already suspected, the cat was crushed to smithereens in the center of a few meter deep crater that wasn't there a moment ago.
"This was an application of fighting spirit or Busoshoku Haki to a normal kick. By using your will-power you can essentially create an invisible armor and shroud parts of your body or your weapon in it. This allows one to strengthen your offensive and defensive capabilities, greatly reinforcing what is already there.
As an added bonus, it allows you to deal damage or protect yourself from attacks you otherwise would be unable to. For example, by using Busoshoku Haki it is possible to overcome the intangibly granted by Logia-type devil fruits."
I wasn't the only one from whom this casual display of unadulterated power garnered a new wave of respect for the man. The three remaining cats surrounding Rayleigh suddenly grew too apprehensive, to continue their onslaught, finally realizing just how far out of their league they were.
Two of them even started to slowly retreat away from him, inching backward, not daring to turn their backs on him. The last one had no such scruples as it turned around and started running, leaving behind the others.
Rayleigh jumped up and in the air, where he kicked his feet downwards. It wasn't the resulting boom of his action that held my attention. But that he somehow was able to keep himself from falling to the ground. Stepping on thin air, every time he repeated this the air itself acted as a solid platform for him which allowed him to traverse through it.
It wasn't flying, more air hoping. But I had no trouble seeing the potential uses of this technique, especially for a devil-fruit user like myself. It could mean the difference between a slow death by drowning and reaching a ship or land again.
The running cat was stopped when a from the sky falling Rayleigh stepped on her head and crushed it between his foot and the floor below into a red slush. He half-turned his head in the direction of the frightened remaining two cats.
"And this," he said as for a single short-lived moment his expression turned serious "is the so-called Haoshoku Haki." the effects of him using it were immediate. The two cats still standing fell down to the ground unconscious.
It was interesting to witness the usage of this power, not just the aftereffects. I couldn't help myself from getting goose-bumps at the prospect of me learning how to do that.
It took me a moment to process what I had just witnessed and to accept the fact, that if his words were true, it could be me who could do the same to such predators with ease in the near future.
Unperturbed of having dispatched a band of cats, Bitch would have needed to boost her dogs to achieve the same outcome. He walked to the two by Hashouki Haki downed cats and picked them, one hand each, and placed them on his shoulders.
I stood up and dusted myself off. "What are you planning to do with those cats?" I wondered.
He just halted his movement and gave me an incredulous look that clearly as he just said in a deadpan voice
"dinner" as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. His face conveyed as much. He just turned around and walked away.
"R... Right" was all I managed to say as I fell into his steps.
Authors Note: Taking a wild guess ... Some might actually not like Rayleigh being able to use Rokushiki. To be honest, I was unsure if this was the right thing to do. I weighed the pros and cons and for more than just a fleeting moment. Considered of having either have Shakky tag along and have her teaching the Rokushiki to Taylor ... since there is not much known about her least about her way of fighting ... reason for this existed in abundance. Stepping away from canon introducing Shakky as a teacher ... it fits with the theme of an all-female crew etc
But ultimately, decided against it. For one, I had no intention of giving her Haoshoki Haki, clearly a necessity for teaching Taylor who possesses this power (the Data books already dispense the conqueror disposition like candy to pretty much everybody - so I really needn't add to this) or have Rayleigh go with them. But that would have begged the question of why should both of them go when Rayleigh alone would have sufficed.
Let's just say the reasons I came up with left me unsatisfied... so we end up with this situation similar to canon... with the difference that Rayleigh has some insight into their techniques.
Something that I didn't find unreasonable. After all, Luffy was able to grasp Soru after having seen it used a few times. Rayleigh, throughout his career, must have seen those techniques hundreds of times, as he was fighting against and with the Marines. So I thought if Paradies Luffy can manage to replicate/reverse engineer one of those moves by observation with no extra training and little trouble surely the Pirate Kings right-hand man should be able to do the same.
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Chapter 05 - The Itsy-Bitsy Spider
Chapter 05: The Itsy-Bitsy Spider (Summer 1504)
During the next few weeks, we settled into a routine. The day started with breakfast then I trained my body to its limits and beyond, running, squats, sit-ups, and push-ups. I started doing them on knuckles and graduated to doing them on my outstretched fingers in order to strengthen them.
A necessary requirement I had to fulfill before the real shigan training could start. I dragged and carried rocks of increasing sizes around the clearing. There wasn't much we didn't do to strengthen my body.
On most days this meant I collapsed from exhaustion before we had lunch. To give me some time to let my strained muscles rest. Dinner was followed up by Haki training. At least Rayleigh calls hitting me with a stick while blindfolded such.
He keeps emphasizing, that at the start it will be easier to access ones Haki while the body is depleted of its strength. A nice way to say being unable to lift a finger.
Despite that, it was slow going even after a little over three months I wasn't able to evade the stick with any regularity.
So the few times I wasn't hit I attributed to chance and not me finally grasping the underlying concept of Kenbunshoku Haki. He certainly hit me enough times, that it sounded plausible to have dodged a few times by luck alone.
Unfortunately, my progress if you could call it that, for Busoshoku Haki wasn't much better. The lack of any noticeable improvement really started to irritate me.
Especially since Rayleigh didn't understand why I was having trouble with both of those forms of Haki. Usually, everybody seemed to have a knack for one of them, which is then usually learned comparatively easy, and most end up specializing in. But for some reason, this didn't seem to be the case when it came to me.
The hours of Haki training are then followed up by another workout when my body has sufficiently recovered. When I'm done with that, I eat something and give in to my exhaustion and enter a dreamless sleep, rinse and repeat.
Since this routine turned out to be mind-numbing dumb, we thought it prudent to now and then have a day off from this. This vacation day was mostly spent with Rayleigh trying to impart some knowledge to me, from how to survive in the wild, what you can and can't eat to the basics of sailing.
For those lessons in seafaring, we always ventured to his boat, where I could put his teachings to practice.
Since I was a fast learner when it came to everything else than what I was actually here for, he ended up running out of things to teach me a week ago. This was the reason he started to instruct me in swordsmanship, his preferred choice of fighting.
Currently, we used carved wooden swords to spar. He already warned me that the moment I get the basics of Busoshoku Haki down, sword fighting will encompass it. Having me reinforce my sword throughout the whole lesson without waning in doing so, because the moment I do he would shatter my sword and the lessons would only be resumed when I carved myself another sword.
I questioned the reasoning behind it, his response consisted of telling me, that for one, it helps to get a better feel for the sword if I made it myself. It would be easier, seeing the sword as a part of yourself and the other reason was to stress, that in a regular sword fight you lost the moment your sword is destroyed.
Meaning your very life depends on not letting it get that far, and what better way is there to drive this lesson home than to have you spent countless hours to remake what you couldn't protect.
Rayleigh was a good but strict teacher, which was doubly cringe-worthy because the lack of tangible progress couldn't be laid down at his feet.
The only bright spot was, that all this rigorous physical training I did started showing results at least. But according to Rayleigh, it was still too early to attempt learning even one of the six forms of the Rokushiki since my body couldn't handle it, yet.
Which meant the time I didn't spend training. I was spending wishing for the moment I was ready for it.
I halfheartedly chewed on the bite of stew in my mouth when my musings were interrupted.
"What's wrong, not hungry?" Rayleigh asked.
I grimaced.
"Just thinking."
"What about?" He wondered, "If it is about your progress don't sweat it. The first step in learning to use your Haki is the most difficult one. It just takes time."
"Yeah, I'm aware. You are constantly telling me that. But that's the thing, while I might have time, the girl, my only chance in getting home, probably doesn't, which means I can't waste a second."
"You aren't wasting any time. You spend every single moment awake training. You probably the most driven person I have ever met. But such things take time. You can't rush your training. Only partially mastered skills are fickle and dangerous." He lectured.
I deeply sighed.
"I know. Gods above, I know. I hate the uncertainty, not knowing if I will reach her in time."
This was worse than biding my time with deposing Coil and preparing for the reemergence of the Slaughterhouse Nine combined. Instead of fearing that Coil learned of our betrayal, I was fearing for the well-being of a little kid I have never met. Instead of having an exact date, the Nine gave for their return.
I only had the word of my teacher that I was coming along just fine. His reassurances were as meaningful as a bureaucrat telling someone it's done when it's done. It was driving me nuts.
"It is probably best if you take a walk. A disturbed mind won't benefit your Haki training. Center yourself, and when you have regained your equilibrium we will continue."
Having said his piece. He stood up and walked over to his hammock and lied down in it.
I felt burning anger for my own stupidity, getting upset about my lack of progress now had the exact opposite effect of what I wanted. This forced break only served to further delay me in reaching my goals.
There was no point in crying over spilled milk. I sighed and stood up, my two spiders nibbling on some meat immediately lost their interest in their meal and scurried to me. With a short jump, they landed safely on my shoulders.
I started walking towards the forest. I didn't leave the clearing often. My schedule just didn't leave me with the time to do so. But once or twice I accompanied Rayleigh on a hunt for our meal. Shortly after we settled here it started to take him longer, and he had to travel further away to find some game.
The situation didn't seem to become better the longer we stayed. On the contrary, the wildlife tended to steer clear of our camp.
This is why I expected those instances I needed to accompany him to steadily increase with time. Rayleigh didn't want to leave my side for prolonged times. My mind told me it was a necessary precaution, but my pride took a hard hit to be babied in such away.
The forest wasn't easy terrain to travel through. Veins and roots were lingering all over the floor, and low hanging branches everywhere. At least my spider-silk under suit protected me from getting scratches in addition to all the other sores I ended up with through my training.
I didn't care where I ended up and just kept walking further and further into the forest. I didn't know why I kept going and didn't lie down somewhere. Probably, because walking through a forest was the only progress I was currently capable of making, a cynic voice in my head proclaimed.
I really would have liked nothing more than to give a harsh retort. Unfortunately, it was true. Since I still hadn't gotten the slightest clue what a devil fruit I ate.
Considering, that I once wielded a superpower, which gave me quite a bit of trouble to get the hang of at the beginning. I assumed it wouldn't be too different from learning to control whatever power I gained by eating the devil fruit as it turned out, I couldn't be more wrong.
I didn't make any headway in that regard since the day we arrived. Of course, I had my suspicions. I learned to fuse my spiders in my body and summon them forth from it.
I even collected and fused with all the spiders on Sabaody that found themselves under my control, which definitely makes for an interesting ability. Back home, I would have killed for something like this to complement my already existing power set.
There really wasn't much imagination necessary to see how I could have benefitted from this.
But for some reason, I got the feeling I was not even scratching the surface of what I could be capable of with a deeper understanding of my devil fruit powers.
This was exactly the source of my true frustration, that the one avenue of power I was pursuing. I originally was the most confident about to get somewhere. The one avenue I had to explore for myself, where Rayleigh couldn't help me with, was the one I was stuck at.
I hit the tree to my right to vent some steam and took a deep breath. I was about to turn around and walk back when I felt the sudden need to duck.
I was not sure what it was that forewarned me. The senses of the spiders sitting on my shoulders I unconsciously used or a short glimpse of the impending future via Kenbunshoku Haki. But whatever it was, it saved my life when something got caught in the tree I just hit moments before, barely missing my upper torso in the process.
Wooden splinters rained down on me from the force of the attack that wrecked the tree.
I scrambled to my feet and started running through the eyes of my spiders, I consciously used this time to look back. I saw a huge spider perched in the tree crowns, one of its front legs stuck in the now dissected tree. The creature removed the leg with a strong jerk that uprooted what was left of it.
I tried to take stock of the spider who had its eyes on me, and what I saw didn't inspire confidence in my ability to escape its maws.
The first thing I couldn't help but notice was that the spider blended in perfectly with its surroundings. This ability became even clearer when it slightly moved and the pattern on its skin shifted camouflaging the spider anew. Making it nearly invisible to the naked eye, similar to a chameleon ability to adjust the color of its skin to its surroundings, but far better.
It also explained how such a huge creature, more than 15 m long completely escaped my notice until it stroke. A skill set quite fitting for an ambush predator. But what had me concerned were the legs of the spider they seemed to be tailored to allow for great speeds and jumping.
A fact accentuated by the comparatively huge eyes. Good eyesight is one of the requirements needed to accurately estimate distances for the jump to end up on the prey and not elsewhere.
An insight that saved my life, because I recognized in the way the spider crouched down that it was about to jump. This little a fraction of a second advance warning allowed me to hit the floor just in time for the spider to miss me.
It crashed into the trees in front of me. The spider left a swath of destruction along the path of its jump. Trees left and right went down like ninepins.
I struggled to my feet and was about to run in a different direction, banking on the fact that my pursuer might need a moment to reorient itself. Suddenly I received a glancing blow from a leg swipe.
I was thrown a good two dozen feet against a tree. The heavy impact pushed the air out of my lungs. My whole torso and right arm, where I was hit, consisted of only one feeling, pain.
I tried to breathe, but my, from pain constricted, muscles wouldn't allow me to take in any air.
My eyes started to tear. While I laid on the ground gasping to fill my lungs with oxygen.
I felt like a fish on dry land, fighting not to suffocate.
Through the eyes of my cute little spiders, who apparently had more of a talent for landings than myself, I saw the big spider stalking towards my position. They both moved in a defensive position arraying themselves between the creature and me.
I appreciated what they tried to do, I really did, but I doubted they would be anything more than a small irritation, even if they should manage to bite and penetrate the thick armor plates of it and their venom turns out to be able of affecting it.
Body-Mass, after all, is a non-negligible factor when it comes to poison. I needed something more to survive here. I asked myself where the hell was Rayleigh? How was it possible for this spider to get so close to our camp?
He should have sensed its approach, something that shouldn't have been hard with the lack of wildlife around our camp, as a consequence of our very presence around these parts.
Under great effort, I could bring my lungs in my aching rib cage to accept some air. This halted the propagation of the black spots I started to see. A second forced to inhale, and they receded out of my field of vision. With the additional oxygen in my blood, my brain finally made the connection.
A chameleon spider, a species adapted to stalk and creep up on its prey would, of course, have a predisposition to hide itself, its very presence via Haki.
Fuck — another thought popped up in my mind — Was Rayleigh being here really responsible for the wildlife to avoid the area or could it have been this spider.
I had no time to ponder this thought. When the spider lunged for me. I navigated Lilith and Kain out of the way, sacrificing them for nothing wouldn't do, and tried to do the same.
I was about to evade one of the creature's legs, only for the sudden movement dodging required to inflict a sharp spike of pain from my already hurting ribs. The wince this elicited from me slowed me down just enough for the creature attack to graze my shoulder. My momentum was shifted strong enough, that I stumbled.
I could only watch through a multitude of eyes my own included, how the follow-up attack neared my body while I was struggling to get it back under control, to dodge the incoming attack. I only managed to turn my torso slightly to the side in the hope to reduce the damage, so I wouldn't die immediately upon being hit.
The pain, when the sharp tip of the spider's leg pierced my left abdomen and pinned me to the ground was indescribable, until this moment I thought losing my arm and have the stumped cauterized by Lung was bad, but it didn't even register in comparison.
I would have screamed if I had the luxury of the time to do so. But I knew I couldn't allow myself to give in to do so, letting the world know about the pain I felt. I had to keep moving, the next attack was about to come and I needed to get out of the way.
Meanwhile, I directed my spiders. They jumped up on the creature's head and started to fervently attacking it, in their efforts to buy me just a little bit of time.
Their vicious attacks proved mostly harmless. Their fangs were unable to penetrate the exoskeleton, so they started hacking away at it with their sharp front legs. While they made some progress, I suspected they wouldn't be able to succeed before they were inevitably thrown loose by the thrashing creature or were hit themselves by a hind-leg, trying to sweep them away.
Despite the creature's best efforts, to lose its passengers. The leg pinning me wasn't moved a single inch.
I struggled on the ground, trying to get the sharp spider-leg in my intestines to slice through the last bit of flesh and skin, which was keeping me in place and prevented me from escaping. I tried to support my efforts with my hands pushing at the leg for my flesh to sever.
I felt it as Lilith's body was crushed between a hind leg and the hard exoskeleton making up its armor. She was dead before her dislodged body hit the ground.
My struggles only increased in their intensity. With only Kain remaining, I needed to get loose — dammit move. I chanted over and over in my mind.
Suddenly I was loose. My last jerk had me freed from the spider-leg. A short glance didn't show me what I was expecting — shredded flesh hanging from my side where the leg hit me, but instead an uncountable number of small black dots in which my flesh around the leg dissolved into moving around.
The dots rearranged themselves and, without further ado condensed back into my flesh, in the process closing the hole that should gape there.
Next to me, encircling the spider leg. That a moment ago held me in place still stuck in the ground. I saw a few dozen small spiders lying there, dead and slowly dispersing into black tendriled mist.
I moved my hand to my abdomen, and my sense of touch reaffirmed what my eyes already told me. I was all better. I went from being a shashlik meat side-dish to whole again. Even my clothes were restored to pristine condition by this effect.
It reminded me of the power of some capes I encountered — a breaker effect. But shouldn't the only devil-Fruit-type granting a breaker state to avoid damage be those logia-types?
I couldn't be that lucky to have eaten one of those, said to be the strongest?
My train of thought came to a sudden stop when Kain was flung from the creature's head. But not before he was able to bite once through the from his legs weakened chitin-armor.
I jumped to my feet and started running, not a moment too early. Two legs descended upon the ground where I sat not a second ago and split it with the incredible power behind them.
I immediately noticed something changed within my body. You simply can't train yourself to exhaustion every single day and not learn the limits of it by heart. It was weaker than it should be. I was lacking in strength.
Similar to the time Kain was killed by Rayleigh — of course, it all makes sense. I didn't avoid the attack. Flowed around it like a Logia is supposed to — I actually suffered the damage. I just transferred it from my body to those spiders instead. No, this didn't feel right - My body was made up of those spiders.
But why was it necessary to sacrifice more than one?
Could it be the amount of spider necessary to restore my scales with the damage I received? If yes, given how weak I felt. I couldn't allow myself to get hit anymore by such a debilitating attack. Otherwise, there wouldn't be much left to fuel my running. Even now, I could sense how the strength I lost; was used to rebuild the bodies of the spiders that died in my stead.
I had Kain, who was able to avert injury, follow behind the creature at a measured distance. Apparently, not only cats always land on their feet. This time I made full use of his eyes, thanks to which I saw the next lunge coming. I dived to my right and felt the wind with the hairs on my skin when the creature missed me by a hair's breadth.
A moment later, I heard how trees broke apart when it landed with such force that the ground vibrated, and the leaves all around me shook.
I righted myself and sprinted in between the thick vegetation, intent on using it to my advantage by hampering the creature's speed. I knew full well that the effect would be minimal. Given its strength, it could plow through the forest without much resistance, but every little bit helped.
I only needed the distance between us to increase. I needed just a moment to be entirely out of its sight, to have a chance at losing it in the thick vegetation.
My breathing started to get heavier. Running at top speed through the forest took a lot out of me. Having to continuously be on the lookout for roots to avoid tripping over them, dodging branches jumping over and under fallen trees with near-zero vision as a result of the cramped forest wasn't easy at the best of times.
Doing so while a monstrous spider is in pursuit just bulldozing through all those obstacles definitely complicated things.
However, my plan seemed to come together nicely. During the last minute, I was able to gain an increasing lead. The creature was still hot on my heels, pushing through anything in its way, its superior eyesight keeping track of me.
Just a little bit more and I was gonna get my chance — was the dominant thought in my mind when my hand pushed a low hanging branch out of the way and my feet suddenly lost their connection to the ground.
I felt weightless for a moment until gravity started pulling me down. I barely had enough time to curse, before I had to diminish the force of my impact on the ground by rolling it off. I used the momentum to get right back on my feet when I saw the creature leap over my head into the clearing I found myself in.
It was not unlike the one Rayleigh and I decided to use as a base camp. An area whose ground was entirely covered with gravel, with nearly no vegetation, no cover for me to hide behind. A short glance over my shoulder confirmed my worst fear. The area was a long lane of an old riverbed. The only way out of it, without having to climb, was a ramp right in front of me.
The only problem, being the huge spider perched on a lone rock in the middle of the lane hissing my way. It only took a second, and its skin adapted to its surrounding, its formerly green and brown camouflage pattern similar to leaves and bark shifting to mimic the gravel on the floor. It was giving off the impression of being built out of it like some twisted Lego construct.
Shit — the chances of me getting past it were basically zero. The creature was faster and stronger than me and, not to forget had much more limbs with greater reach. I needed a distraction - oh how I wished of having my old powers. A bug clone would be exactly what could get me out of here.
Wait a minute. I had bugs at my disposal — spiders, to be exact. If I could shift damage to them and could summon Kain and Lilith, could I do the same with my own body? Since the hundred baby spiders of theirs and the few hundred spiders from Sabaody by now, a part of me wouldn't be nearly enough to make it work.
I tried to remember what I did not a few moments ago in order to recreate it, dissolving my body into spiders. I was angling for it in my mind. For a second, my left arm transformed into a black mass consisting of thousands of small crawling bodies when it slipped away from me, resetting the changes.
In my second attempt, I could hold onto it, my mind splitting in ten-thousands of instances. My opponent was alarmed by this and readied itself for another attack.
I separated all the spiders making up my body into two equally sized parts and moved them away from each other. With a little prodding, I created two masses, and just in time with the creature hunting me taking to the air, I finished.
Instead of there being one of me, the two masses of crawling black creatures reformed, and each became me, both diving for cover.
The chameleon spider hesitated for just a moment, undecided of where to strike, that when it finally did strike. It was in vain, missing both of me by a huge margin. It even served to unbalance its leap through the air. The attacking limb scrapped the ground, and as a direct consequence, the creature landed in an uncoordinated tumble and came to stop flipped on its back.
It would have been the perfect opportunity to run away. The path to escape was clear, and even though spiders had far fewer problems to flip themselves onto their legs from lying on their back than other bugs, it would take a moment for it to do so. Time, I used, not to run, but to think.
Because one thing became clear to me, those devil-fruits weren't instinctual in the same way as my former powers. They relied on instincts — survival instinct, to be exact. Oh, I was sure it is possible to discover its secret through training, eventually. But right here, right now, I was given a chance, one I didn't intend to waste.
During all this introspection, I kept the eyes of Kain trained on my opponent -
Kain - Of course, how didn't I see it earlier. Those spiders became part of myself, but the opposite is also true. I'm also part of them. Reaching out along the net connecting me to all those spiders being part of me, I pushed a little bit more of me into Kain.
And as I suspected, he transformed into one more iteration of me. This third me was fully clothed, too. I decided to think about that one later when my life wasn't in danger.
I couldn't help but smile when I noticed the lack of a core, a center inhabited by me being present in any one of them. I was split, but whole in every instance across them. I existed at three places at once. The only difference was how my power was distributed, upon each iteration. Kain had barely 2 percent of what was me while the two standing in the clearing had half each of what was left.
Given what I already knew, what happened if a part of me gets destroyed. I suspected it was only a temporary state during which I'm weakened until I had regenerated what was lost. The conclusion I drew from this was simple, as long as just a tiny part of me survives I could make a full recovery given time. No matter, if I inhabited this part at the time or not.
This was incredible — I immediately sent my Kain iteration back to camp. And let my other two beings touch each other and reforged them back into one being.
Let's see what else I can do with this power.
I didn't think I could win against it for a single moment, probably not even hurt it when Lilith and Kain with their sharp claws and fangs couldn't. But I could push myself against it to see what else a life and death struggle could unravel.
I stooped down and picked up some of the stones lying around my feet. When I came back up, I ran towards it and hurled them at the spider still struggling on the floor. I tried to hit its eyes. The only part of its body I was confident I could injure. One or two blind spots in its vision would only make it easier for me.
The first stone was deflected by a thrashing leg that just happened to be in the way. The second stone I threw, on the other hand, was a bullseye. It hit one of the four biggest eyes facing directly forwards. The effect was immediate.
The spider retracted its four front legs close to its body and used them to shield its eyes while the remaining legs redoubled their efforts to flip it back upright. With my avenue of attack closed.
I rounded the spider outside the reach of its legs to its lower abdomen if only I wouldn't lack the means to damage it. It was a gamble, but I thought if I was able to change a spider in myself.
Perhaps I could do the opposite — with Kain and Lilith able to penetrate the exoskeleton only lacking the reach and the power to have had a truly devastating effect. I thought it might be worth a try.
I focused and tried to conjure the image and feeling of wielding one of those razor-sharp front legs Lilith and Kain have at their disposal. It was hard to combine it with me, something was fighting me every step of the way, but the closer I got, the more the resistance weakened until it vanished completely.
I sensed some kind of satisfaction at my success. I couldn't locate the source of the feeling, but I was sure it wasn't a figment of my imagination.
I gave the new addition to my body a good look. Out of the spiders that make up my body, I crafted a new limb replacing my own. It consisted of four segments that originated near my right shoulder blade, connected by joints.
The one at my shoulder was the one allowing me the greatest range of movement similar to what is granted by a ball joint, while the others had a greater similarity to ginglymoid joints. The segments themselves had roughly the same diameter as my arms.
Only the last segment, was different. It tapered off towards the edges, becoming razor-sharp slightly curved, and ended in a tip ideal for piercing, which, to be honest, reminded me more of a sword than actual parts of a limb.
Like with every new toy, it had to be put to the test. I took a running start and closed upon the abdomen of the spider, a few meters away while still out of its range. I jumped as high and as far as I could.
With its hind legs pushing on the ground, I hoped to not only avoid them in their entirety but also for the momentum of my descent to amplify the piercing power of my new grown weapon that I rammed down into the creature with all my might.
My attack penetrated the exoskeleton and sunk deep in the guts of the spider. The reaction followed without delay, an ear-piercing scream sounded through the clearing, and the spider abandoned any and all defensive action, its limbs only aimed for one goal, to kill whatever was responsible for hurting it.
I originally had no intention to stay around long enough to suffer the retaliation for my actions. But to get away as fast as possible immediately after I executed my attack, unfortunately through the pain induced thrashing around of the creature, the tip of my limb got caught in between the penetrated exoskeleton, and I was dragged with it.
I lost my balance on the slippery bloodstained belly and fell to my knee, which robbed me of any chance to avoid one of those whirling limbs.
Even though I was only grazed, it felt like being hit by a truck. And once more, I was flung through the air, this time against the huge rock present within the riverbed, and bounced off from it. I landed hard on my belly. Every bone in my body sent signals of pain to my brain. With a groan, I pushed my body from the ground, just in time to see the spider getting back on its feet again.
I considered shifting the damage I suffered away from my body but thought better of it. Despite the pain, my injuries weren't impairing my movement as far I could tell, and weakening myself to spare me some discomfort didn't seem worth it.
The spider charged at me, and to be honest, I was getting irritated by being treated like a rag doll. I was barely on my feet when she was upon me with fervor hacking away at me. I could evade the first few attacks each time by taking a step back to get outside its range until my back was firmly pressed against the rock behind me.
It had me cornered, and it was aware of it. Instead of fully taking advantage of the situation and taking me out with an overwhelming force, I couldn't evade or block, it cut back on them. It began to probe my reactions, my defenses. Attacking just strong enough to have me struggle to fend them off without dealing the finishing blow.
From there, the creature steadily increased the frequency, strength, and speed of its attacks. Slowly but surely, I felt myself tire, the conclusion of our fight predetermined.
It was, therefore, no surprise that it didn't take long under this constant assault for my one spider limb, the only limb I had at my disposal strong and durable enough to block, to reach its limit. With it alone, I just couldn't keep up with the assault, with all those unrelenting attacks coming my way.
I blocked an overhead strike from one of its limbs. Since the creature put a lot of weight behind it, it ended up occupying my own, as another strike came from my left and was aimed at my torso.
I had no doubt that should it connect, my rib cage would be crushed. I would survive, of course, but the loss of power this would have as a consequence would spell my doom.
I was fed up with this, being played with. And I didn't come to this island to be killed by a spider. A creature, who by all rights, should obey my every command and not try to kill me.
At those thoughts, I felt a throbbing in my mind, a force building up, about to carve its way through in order to come out. I didn't try reigning it in, trying to suppress it. On the contrary, I released it and pushed it out with everything I had.
Two things happened simultaneously, a new spider limb identical to the one on my right shoulder blade emerged from my left and stopped the attack aimed at my left side dead in its tracks.
In addition, my mind leashed out in a devastating onslaught and crashed against the mind of the creature, it didn't stop there. My onslaught reached further and overwhelmed more and more creatures, with their mental-defenses shattered, their bodies fell under my control.
Within moments, I had eyes everywhere on the island. I noticed a pattern, the closer their proximity to my location, the stronger the minds of those who fell under my sway could be.
The creature in front of me locked in a struggle of life and death hissed. It was trying to fight against me, trying to keep its defenses from following all those others I cast into oblivion.
I could sense how it used every ounce of willpower it had to strengthen the barrier surrounding and protecting its mind from being submerged under the unrelenting waves crashing against it.
The barrier held. I started to push harder and harder against it. I was aware I needed to bring it down. It was the only way I could see me defeating it.
The strain I put on myself became unbearable, my mental strength being sapped away with every wave I sent out. I was about to give up, acknowledging that my efforts were futile when a single crack appeared in the barrier. It was small and insignificant. However, it made it clear to me I wasn't the only one struggling.
In response, I felt the strength used by its limbs pressing against mine increase manifold, I stemmed myself against it with every ounce of strength my body could muster. Although I was already losing the contest of strength before it doubled down.
My limbs were barely able to keep the sharp claws away from my vitals. They simply weren't strong enough to prevent them from inching closer and closer to my body with every second that went by. My knees started to buckle under the weight of the limb pressing down on me.
I couldn't help but smirk. The spider finally began to see me as a threat. I missed that.
I pushed myself further and further, mobilized the last vestiges of mental and physical strength I had. As a result, more cracks started to appear, they spread but not fast enough. At the rate this was going my body would be overwhelmed and skewered long before I succeeded in penetrating the spider's mental barrier.
I needed more, more powerful physical and mental I dug deeper in order to unearth a new source of power I could reach. I didn't shy away from taking what I found at the junctions making up all the spiders I fused with, the very net that made up my hive mind. I siphoned everything and sucked it within myself adding it to my own strength.
The effects on my body were immediate, pushed far beyond its limits it finally showed its true self. It surged with power, my body from the hip downwards transformed into a sleek and graceful body of a spider. I lost my human legs and instead gained eight spider legs combined with those sprouting from my back brought the number of limbs I possessed up to twelve.
My whole body was clad in black, consisting of hard overlapping chitin armor-plates making up my exoskeleton. In addition to that, I could feel bones throughout every one of my limbs. Thereby further increasing the resilience of my body.
I felt rejuvenated as if, for the first time in my life, my body wasn't impeded. Only now allowed to unleash its full potential. I no longer had any problems keeping the creature's legs at bay. On the contrary, it barely was trouble at all. With the power of eight legs, I had no trouble lifting myself up to a standing position and in the process pushed the creature back half a meter without even trying.
I marveled at my new body. When I touched my face, I noted I no longer had a nose. To compensate, I gained additional eyes, two below and above, where a human had its eyes. It greatly increased my field of vision and the sharpness with which I perceived my surroundings.
This was the reason I noticed my hair turned silver and considerably increased in length falling straight below my bellybutton.
I turned my head away from marveling at my body and looked back into the eyes of my opponent. Which had turned from a threat to my life to just an inconvenience.
Through one of the cracks in its mental defenses, I got a short glimpse inside its head — I saw how the chameleon-spider the uncontested King of this island, the creature at the very top of the food chain felt threatened when two newcomers set their foot on the island.
I saw the spider stalking Rayleigh and myself, watching us from the depths of the forest. I felt the fear it experienced at seeing Rayleigh, the certainty in being outclassed, but it was nothing compared to what it felt when it laid eyes on me.
It was more than just dread at its life being threatened. There was something more primal to it, as if my very existence was something disturbing unnatural, harboring everything it was scared of to the very core of its being.
There was also a familiarity present a subtle craving to subject itself to me, the feeling something the creature abhorred like nothing else ever did. It was even disgusted at the notion of having felt such a thing.
Meanwhile, I could sense the fear myself, how it permeated every pore of the creature. It reared one last time in an attempt to push my will closing in on it back, to get some breathing room. Only to be utterly annihilated and fragmented under the next wave I sent against its mental defenses.
I didn't even feel any resistance. The barrier was just gone from one moment to the next. I suffused its mind and took control over it, its body followed exactly as I did with so many others just moments ago.
I ordered it a step back, and it followed my directions like any insect would have under the influence of my old power. I touched its head with my human hand and the spider succumbed to me and became a part of me.
The changes were immediate, my whole body experienced an evolution. I felt pure power flowing through my veins. I could practically taste how my body received a considerable boost.
There were other visible changes. I watched in slow motion as a thin membrane grew over my exoskeleton, which started to mimic the colors of my surroundings.
I also noticed my sight improving even further. I saw heat emanating from myself and even the surroundings where the sun hit the ground. It made sense for my eyes to see my own body even when camouflaged, and seeing into the infrared spectrum of the light allowed for just that.
I was pretty sure it was the opposite of detrimental for the chameleon spider to be able to see heat sources when out hunting.
To say this was impressive was an understatement, which made it even harder to find a word to classify the other change this fusion brought with it. I could suddenly sense the presence of all the lifeforms on the island and beyond with absolute clarity. In my mind's eye, I pictured them as multicolored flames all around me.
Their size varied, with the strongest getting close to my other iteration nearing our camp. That had to be Rayleigh. I also became aware of how I could hide my presence, to make it disappear completely.
No wonder this spider was able to remain undetected. It was a master of Kenbunshoku Haki good enough to hide itself from Rayleigh.
This wasn't the only conclusion I drew. With me having made the first step in becoming a Haki user it was easy to notice, that my own talent neither lied with Kenbunshoku or Busoshoku but Haoshoku Haki.
After having used it in this fight, it became clear it was as easy as breathing to me, but something held me back from accessing it.
Given my history with controlling others, be it insects or people, I shouldn't be surprised. And here I hoped I could leave the atrocity of taking over another sentient being body and mind behind me.
I sighed and returned to my human form. Even changed back, the differences in my body were impossible to overlook. My strength easily dwarfed what I possessed just a few moments ago. There was also a new awareness of it as if it was muted before. All my senses were sharper, my movements more precise and graceful.
I ordered every creature across the island to come to me. There weren't many presences left, not obliging me. Most of those I could sense were on the outskirts of the island. The further away from where I used my Haoshoku Haki, the weaker the presences I managed to overwhelm.
From this observation, I deduced the wave of Haki lost potency over long distances. It didn't take long for the first few animals to break through the treeline and appear before me.
Some sort of jungle cat, belonging to different species than those that made up the first meal I had here. The other animal was resembling a bear with the difference of it being bigger than a bear had any right to be. I waited for them to reach me when they did. I attempted to do the same I did with the spider, make them a part of me.
But this time, nothing happened. I couldn't fuse with either of them like it was possible with the spider. I wasn't disappointed by this revelation, of course, this meant I couldn't just add their strength to my own. On the other hand, it would prevent my changer form from growing too monstrous.
I didn't feel the urge to end up as Echidna's ugly twin, a chimera of sorts, or possibly something worse. Furthermore, I actually came to like this Arachnid look. I totally blame my old power for that by the way.
I must have eaten some kind of spider or Arachne Zoan-type fruit, it would explain all the abilities I have shown so far. Drawing this conclusion was standing to reason, was it the right one, however?
I ate the fruit and before I even had an inkling I fused with Spiders. What if the Fruit isn't some kind of Spider Zoan, but something more malleable instead? What if I could have chosen any kind of animal and the fruit could have imprinted on the species it belonged to?
Not sure it mattered at this point. What else could I have chosen in case I happened to be right in my assumption instead of spiders? There weren't many choices to pick from with more useful abilities. Sure flying would have been nice, and since mythical creatures are a thing in this world, I could have picked one of those.
One major benefit would have been that the individual strength of another species should have been higher by a large margin. Therefore by absorbing them, I could have grown a lot stronger by now. This would also explain why I didn't notice this augmenting effect earlier.
When I found Kain and Lilith I wasn't exactly in a position to monitor myself and the few hundred spider on Sabaody I made a part of me, aside from their unique abilities didn't make a noticeable difference.
What makes insect special is the fact that they are ahead of all other species when it comes to diversity, an advantage I intend to make good use of.
I didn't regret having eaten this fruit. Ending up the way I did. It gave me a powerful ability one which I already had some ideas on how to make the best use of.
I bent down and picked up a little spider, I studied it extensively and noted that it belonged to species I have never come across. Which just helped to drive the point home that I had absolutely no idea what spiders this world had in store for me. It is quite likely for there to exist spiders who are even more impressive than dragons, I just have to find them.
I absorbed my little dotted friend and added its biological distinctiveness to my own. I then split myself apart into 31 instances of myself, 30 of which spread out in every direction to collect all the spiders under my control while I started the trek back to camp. I had a lot of breeding and training doing.
Authors Note: I hope this chapter wasn't as boring to read as it stressed me to write it.
Chases ... not gonna do that again if I can help it.
Kenbunshoku Haki — There is nothing in canon directly supporting the statements of this chapter, namely that it is possible for someone to suppress his presence or even to make it disappear completely, to make detection via Haki impossible.
On the other hand, canon has a multitude of events occurring that can't be explained without such a skill not being a thing -
On the top of my head:
I mean you only have to think back on what Enel could do with his Haki ... something everybody with a certain level in it should be able to do.
In order to have a "rule-set" in place, I decided to go with the idea that Haki can be suppressed and certain people (Taylor) can even stop it entirely from being detected by this 6th sense. She will use this extensively in fights and outside of them.
So with this Taylor has finally discovered what a devil fruit-power she possesses. It grants her a changer rating. I was debating quite a long time about the question of what happens to her clothes, ultimately I decided to go with the unexplained clothes count as part of one's body version One Piece has going on (the unexplained Breaker effect).
With this, at least, I can avoid some awkward scenes with cloth malfunction, and Taylor is gonna save a lot of time and money since she won't have to constantly replace her wardrobe.
The disadvantage of this approach on the other hand is quite clear it diminishes "realism" to a certain degree — if you are even allowed to call it that in a fic such as this — but I really don't like unexplained world-mechanics — therefore this effect only pertains to her clothes to nothing else she carries/has on her person.
The ability Taylor displays here splitting herself into a countless number of Spiders is loosely based on the Ability called Crawlerling of the Ananasi (Were spiders) of the White Wolf Pen& Paper setting Werewolf the Apocalypse.
During the next few weeks, we settled into a routine. The day started with breakfast then I trained my body to its limits and beyond, running, squats, sit-ups, and push-ups. I started doing them on knuckles and graduated to doing them on my outstretched fingers in order to strengthen them.
A necessary requirement I had to fulfill before the real shigan training could start. I dragged and carried rocks of increasing sizes around the clearing. There wasn't much we didn't do to strengthen my body.
On most days this meant I collapsed from exhaustion before we had lunch. To give me some time to let my strained muscles rest. Dinner was followed up by Haki training. At least Rayleigh calls hitting me with a stick while blindfolded such.
He keeps emphasizing, that at the start it will be easier to access ones Haki while the body is depleted of its strength. A nice way to say being unable to lift a finger.
Despite that, it was slow going even after a little over three months I wasn't able to evade the stick with any regularity.
So the few times I wasn't hit I attributed to chance and not me finally grasping the underlying concept of Kenbunshoku Haki. He certainly hit me enough times, that it sounded plausible to have dodged a few times by luck alone.
Unfortunately, my progress if you could call it that, for Busoshoku Haki wasn't much better. The lack of any noticeable improvement really started to irritate me.
Especially since Rayleigh didn't understand why I was having trouble with both of those forms of Haki. Usually, everybody seemed to have a knack for one of them, which is then usually learned comparatively easy, and most end up specializing in. But for some reason, this didn't seem to be the case when it came to me.
The hours of Haki training are then followed up by another workout when my body has sufficiently recovered. When I'm done with that, I eat something and give in to my exhaustion and enter a dreamless sleep, rinse and repeat.
Since this routine turned out to be mind-numbing dumb, we thought it prudent to now and then have a day off from this. This vacation day was mostly spent with Rayleigh trying to impart some knowledge to me, from how to survive in the wild, what you can and can't eat to the basics of sailing.
For those lessons in seafaring, we always ventured to his boat, where I could put his teachings to practice.
Since I was a fast learner when it came to everything else than what I was actually here for, he ended up running out of things to teach me a week ago. This was the reason he started to instruct me in swordsmanship, his preferred choice of fighting.
Currently, we used carved wooden swords to spar. He already warned me that the moment I get the basics of Busoshoku Haki down, sword fighting will encompass it. Having me reinforce my sword throughout the whole lesson without waning in doing so, because the moment I do he would shatter my sword and the lessons would only be resumed when I carved myself another sword.
I questioned the reasoning behind it, his response consisted of telling me, that for one, it helps to get a better feel for the sword if I made it myself. It would be easier, seeing the sword as a part of yourself and the other reason was to stress, that in a regular sword fight you lost the moment your sword is destroyed.
Meaning your very life depends on not letting it get that far, and what better way is there to drive this lesson home than to have you spent countless hours to remake what you couldn't protect.
Rayleigh was a good but strict teacher, which was doubly cringe-worthy because the lack of tangible progress couldn't be laid down at his feet.
The only bright spot was, that all this rigorous physical training I did started showing results at least. But according to Rayleigh, it was still too early to attempt learning even one of the six forms of the Rokushiki since my body couldn't handle it, yet.
Which meant the time I didn't spend training. I was spending wishing for the moment I was ready for it.
I halfheartedly chewed on the bite of stew in my mouth when my musings were interrupted.
"What's wrong, not hungry?" Rayleigh asked.
I grimaced.
"Just thinking."
"What about?" He wondered, "If it is about your progress don't sweat it. The first step in learning to use your Haki is the most difficult one. It just takes time."
"Yeah, I'm aware. You are constantly telling me that. But that's the thing, while I might have time, the girl, my only chance in getting home, probably doesn't, which means I can't waste a second."
"You aren't wasting any time. You spend every single moment awake training. You probably the most driven person I have ever met. But such things take time. You can't rush your training. Only partially mastered skills are fickle and dangerous." He lectured.
I deeply sighed.
"I know. Gods above, I know. I hate the uncertainty, not knowing if I will reach her in time."
This was worse than biding my time with deposing Coil and preparing for the reemergence of the Slaughterhouse Nine combined. Instead of fearing that Coil learned of our betrayal, I was fearing for the well-being of a little kid I have never met. Instead of having an exact date, the Nine gave for their return.
I only had the word of my teacher that I was coming along just fine. His reassurances were as meaningful as a bureaucrat telling someone it's done when it's done. It was driving me nuts.
"It is probably best if you take a walk. A disturbed mind won't benefit your Haki training. Center yourself, and when you have regained your equilibrium we will continue."
Having said his piece. He stood up and walked over to his hammock and lied down in it.
I felt burning anger for my own stupidity, getting upset about my lack of progress now had the exact opposite effect of what I wanted. This forced break only served to further delay me in reaching my goals.
There was no point in crying over spilled milk. I sighed and stood up, my two spiders nibbling on some meat immediately lost their interest in their meal and scurried to me. With a short jump, they landed safely on my shoulders.
I started walking towards the forest. I didn't leave the clearing often. My schedule just didn't leave me with the time to do so. But once or twice I accompanied Rayleigh on a hunt for our meal. Shortly after we settled here it started to take him longer, and he had to travel further away to find some game.
The situation didn't seem to become better the longer we stayed. On the contrary, the wildlife tended to steer clear of our camp.
This is why I expected those instances I needed to accompany him to steadily increase with time. Rayleigh didn't want to leave my side for prolonged times. My mind told me it was a necessary precaution, but my pride took a hard hit to be babied in such away.
The forest wasn't easy terrain to travel through. Veins and roots were lingering all over the floor, and low hanging branches everywhere. At least my spider-silk under suit protected me from getting scratches in addition to all the other sores I ended up with through my training.
I didn't care where I ended up and just kept walking further and further into the forest. I didn't know why I kept going and didn't lie down somewhere. Probably, because walking through a forest was the only progress I was currently capable of making, a cynic voice in my head proclaimed.
I really would have liked nothing more than to give a harsh retort. Unfortunately, it was true. Since I still hadn't gotten the slightest clue what a devil fruit I ate.
Considering, that I once wielded a superpower, which gave me quite a bit of trouble to get the hang of at the beginning. I assumed it wouldn't be too different from learning to control whatever power I gained by eating the devil fruit as it turned out, I couldn't be more wrong.
I didn't make any headway in that regard since the day we arrived. Of course, I had my suspicions. I learned to fuse my spiders in my body and summon them forth from it.
I even collected and fused with all the spiders on Sabaody that found themselves under my control, which definitely makes for an interesting ability. Back home, I would have killed for something like this to complement my already existing power set.
There really wasn't much imagination necessary to see how I could have benefitted from this.
But for some reason, I got the feeling I was not even scratching the surface of what I could be capable of with a deeper understanding of my devil fruit powers.
This was exactly the source of my true frustration, that the one avenue of power I was pursuing. I originally was the most confident about to get somewhere. The one avenue I had to explore for myself, where Rayleigh couldn't help me with, was the one I was stuck at.
I hit the tree to my right to vent some steam and took a deep breath. I was about to turn around and walk back when I felt the sudden need to duck.
I was not sure what it was that forewarned me. The senses of the spiders sitting on my shoulders I unconsciously used or a short glimpse of the impending future via Kenbunshoku Haki. But whatever it was, it saved my life when something got caught in the tree I just hit moments before, barely missing my upper torso in the process.
Wooden splinters rained down on me from the force of the attack that wrecked the tree.
I scrambled to my feet and started running through the eyes of my spiders, I consciously used this time to look back. I saw a huge spider perched in the tree crowns, one of its front legs stuck in the now dissected tree. The creature removed the leg with a strong jerk that uprooted what was left of it.
I tried to take stock of the spider who had its eyes on me, and what I saw didn't inspire confidence in my ability to escape its maws.
The first thing I couldn't help but notice was that the spider blended in perfectly with its surroundings. This ability became even clearer when it slightly moved and the pattern on its skin shifted camouflaging the spider anew. Making it nearly invisible to the naked eye, similar to a chameleon ability to adjust the color of its skin to its surroundings, but far better.
It also explained how such a huge creature, more than 15 m long completely escaped my notice until it stroke. A skill set quite fitting for an ambush predator. But what had me concerned were the legs of the spider they seemed to be tailored to allow for great speeds and jumping.
A fact accentuated by the comparatively huge eyes. Good eyesight is one of the requirements needed to accurately estimate distances for the jump to end up on the prey and not elsewhere.
An insight that saved my life, because I recognized in the way the spider crouched down that it was about to jump. This little a fraction of a second advance warning allowed me to hit the floor just in time for the spider to miss me.
It crashed into the trees in front of me. The spider left a swath of destruction along the path of its jump. Trees left and right went down like ninepins.
I struggled to my feet and was about to run in a different direction, banking on the fact that my pursuer might need a moment to reorient itself. Suddenly I received a glancing blow from a leg swipe.
I was thrown a good two dozen feet against a tree. The heavy impact pushed the air out of my lungs. My whole torso and right arm, where I was hit, consisted of only one feeling, pain.
I tried to breathe, but my, from pain constricted, muscles wouldn't allow me to take in any air.
My eyes started to tear. While I laid on the ground gasping to fill my lungs with oxygen.
I felt like a fish on dry land, fighting not to suffocate.
Through the eyes of my cute little spiders, who apparently had more of a talent for landings than myself, I saw the big spider stalking towards my position. They both moved in a defensive position arraying themselves between the creature and me.
I appreciated what they tried to do, I really did, but I doubted they would be anything more than a small irritation, even if they should manage to bite and penetrate the thick armor plates of it and their venom turns out to be able of affecting it.
Body-Mass, after all, is a non-negligible factor when it comes to poison. I needed something more to survive here. I asked myself where the hell was Rayleigh? How was it possible for this spider to get so close to our camp?
He should have sensed its approach, something that shouldn't have been hard with the lack of wildlife around our camp, as a consequence of our very presence around these parts.
Under great effort, I could bring my lungs in my aching rib cage to accept some air. This halted the propagation of the black spots I started to see. A second forced to inhale, and they receded out of my field of vision. With the additional oxygen in my blood, my brain finally made the connection.
A chameleon spider, a species adapted to stalk and creep up on its prey would, of course, have a predisposition to hide itself, its very presence via Haki.
Fuck — another thought popped up in my mind — Was Rayleigh being here really responsible for the wildlife to avoid the area or could it have been this spider.
I had no time to ponder this thought. When the spider lunged for me. I navigated Lilith and Kain out of the way, sacrificing them for nothing wouldn't do, and tried to do the same.
I was about to evade one of the creature's legs, only for the sudden movement dodging required to inflict a sharp spike of pain from my already hurting ribs. The wince this elicited from me slowed me down just enough for the creature attack to graze my shoulder. My momentum was shifted strong enough, that I stumbled.
I could only watch through a multitude of eyes my own included, how the follow-up attack neared my body while I was struggling to get it back under control, to dodge the incoming attack. I only managed to turn my torso slightly to the side in the hope to reduce the damage, so I wouldn't die immediately upon being hit.
The pain, when the sharp tip of the spider's leg pierced my left abdomen and pinned me to the ground was indescribable, until this moment I thought losing my arm and have the stumped cauterized by Lung was bad, but it didn't even register in comparison.
I would have screamed if I had the luxury of the time to do so. But I knew I couldn't allow myself to give in to do so, letting the world know about the pain I felt. I had to keep moving, the next attack was about to come and I needed to get out of the way.
Meanwhile, I directed my spiders. They jumped up on the creature's head and started to fervently attacking it, in their efforts to buy me just a little bit of time.
Their vicious attacks proved mostly harmless. Their fangs were unable to penetrate the exoskeleton, so they started hacking away at it with their sharp front legs. While they made some progress, I suspected they wouldn't be able to succeed before they were inevitably thrown loose by the thrashing creature or were hit themselves by a hind-leg, trying to sweep them away.
Despite the creature's best efforts, to lose its passengers. The leg pinning me wasn't moved a single inch.
I struggled on the ground, trying to get the sharp spider-leg in my intestines to slice through the last bit of flesh and skin, which was keeping me in place and prevented me from escaping. I tried to support my efforts with my hands pushing at the leg for my flesh to sever.
I felt it as Lilith's body was crushed between a hind leg and the hard exoskeleton making up its armor. She was dead before her dislodged body hit the ground.
My struggles only increased in their intensity. With only Kain remaining, I needed to get loose — dammit move. I chanted over and over in my mind.
Suddenly I was loose. My last jerk had me freed from the spider-leg. A short glance didn't show me what I was expecting — shredded flesh hanging from my side where the leg hit me, but instead an uncountable number of small black dots in which my flesh around the leg dissolved into moving around.
The dots rearranged themselves and, without further ado condensed back into my flesh, in the process closing the hole that should gape there.
Next to me, encircling the spider leg. That a moment ago held me in place still stuck in the ground. I saw a few dozen small spiders lying there, dead and slowly dispersing into black tendriled mist.
I moved my hand to my abdomen, and my sense of touch reaffirmed what my eyes already told me. I was all better. I went from being a shashlik meat side-dish to whole again. Even my clothes were restored to pristine condition by this effect.
It reminded me of the power of some capes I encountered — a breaker effect. But shouldn't the only devil-Fruit-type granting a breaker state to avoid damage be those logia-types?
I couldn't be that lucky to have eaten one of those, said to be the strongest?
My train of thought came to a sudden stop when Kain was flung from the creature's head. But not before he was able to bite once through the from his legs weakened chitin-armor.
I jumped to my feet and started running, not a moment too early. Two legs descended upon the ground where I sat not a second ago and split it with the incredible power behind them.
I immediately noticed something changed within my body. You simply can't train yourself to exhaustion every single day and not learn the limits of it by heart. It was weaker than it should be. I was lacking in strength.
Similar to the time Kain was killed by Rayleigh — of course, it all makes sense. I didn't avoid the attack. Flowed around it like a Logia is supposed to — I actually suffered the damage. I just transferred it from my body to those spiders instead. No, this didn't feel right - My body was made up of those spiders.
But why was it necessary to sacrifice more than one?
Could it be the amount of spider necessary to restore my scales with the damage I received? If yes, given how weak I felt. I couldn't allow myself to get hit anymore by such a debilitating attack. Otherwise, there wouldn't be much left to fuel my running. Even now, I could sense how the strength I lost; was used to rebuild the bodies of the spiders that died in my stead.
I had Kain, who was able to avert injury, follow behind the creature at a measured distance. Apparently, not only cats always land on their feet. This time I made full use of his eyes, thanks to which I saw the next lunge coming. I dived to my right and felt the wind with the hairs on my skin when the creature missed me by a hair's breadth.
A moment later, I heard how trees broke apart when it landed with such force that the ground vibrated, and the leaves all around me shook.
I righted myself and sprinted in between the thick vegetation, intent on using it to my advantage by hampering the creature's speed. I knew full well that the effect would be minimal. Given its strength, it could plow through the forest without much resistance, but every little bit helped.
I only needed the distance between us to increase. I needed just a moment to be entirely out of its sight, to have a chance at losing it in the thick vegetation.
My breathing started to get heavier. Running at top speed through the forest took a lot out of me. Having to continuously be on the lookout for roots to avoid tripping over them, dodging branches jumping over and under fallen trees with near-zero vision as a result of the cramped forest wasn't easy at the best of times.
Doing so while a monstrous spider is in pursuit just bulldozing through all those obstacles definitely complicated things.
However, my plan seemed to come together nicely. During the last minute, I was able to gain an increasing lead. The creature was still hot on my heels, pushing through anything in its way, its superior eyesight keeping track of me.
Just a little bit more and I was gonna get my chance — was the dominant thought in my mind when my hand pushed a low hanging branch out of the way and my feet suddenly lost their connection to the ground.
I felt weightless for a moment until gravity started pulling me down. I barely had enough time to curse, before I had to diminish the force of my impact on the ground by rolling it off. I used the momentum to get right back on my feet when I saw the creature leap over my head into the clearing I found myself in.
It was not unlike the one Rayleigh and I decided to use as a base camp. An area whose ground was entirely covered with gravel, with nearly no vegetation, no cover for me to hide behind. A short glance over my shoulder confirmed my worst fear. The area was a long lane of an old riverbed. The only way out of it, without having to climb, was a ramp right in front of me.
The only problem, being the huge spider perched on a lone rock in the middle of the lane hissing my way. It only took a second, and its skin adapted to its surrounding, its formerly green and brown camouflage pattern similar to leaves and bark shifting to mimic the gravel on the floor. It was giving off the impression of being built out of it like some twisted Lego construct.
Shit — the chances of me getting past it were basically zero. The creature was faster and stronger than me and, not to forget had much more limbs with greater reach. I needed a distraction - oh how I wished of having my old powers. A bug clone would be exactly what could get me out of here.
Wait a minute. I had bugs at my disposal — spiders, to be exact. If I could shift damage to them and could summon Kain and Lilith, could I do the same with my own body? Since the hundred baby spiders of theirs and the few hundred spiders from Sabaody by now, a part of me wouldn't be nearly enough to make it work.
I tried to remember what I did not a few moments ago in order to recreate it, dissolving my body into spiders. I was angling for it in my mind. For a second, my left arm transformed into a black mass consisting of thousands of small crawling bodies when it slipped away from me, resetting the changes.
In my second attempt, I could hold onto it, my mind splitting in ten-thousands of instances. My opponent was alarmed by this and readied itself for another attack.
I separated all the spiders making up my body into two equally sized parts and moved them away from each other. With a little prodding, I created two masses, and just in time with the creature hunting me taking to the air, I finished.
Instead of there being one of me, the two masses of crawling black creatures reformed, and each became me, both diving for cover.
The chameleon spider hesitated for just a moment, undecided of where to strike, that when it finally did strike. It was in vain, missing both of me by a huge margin. It even served to unbalance its leap through the air. The attacking limb scrapped the ground, and as a direct consequence, the creature landed in an uncoordinated tumble and came to stop flipped on its back.
It would have been the perfect opportunity to run away. The path to escape was clear, and even though spiders had far fewer problems to flip themselves onto their legs from lying on their back than other bugs, it would take a moment for it to do so. Time, I used, not to run, but to think.
Because one thing became clear to me, those devil-fruits weren't instinctual in the same way as my former powers. They relied on instincts — survival instinct, to be exact. Oh, I was sure it is possible to discover its secret through training, eventually. But right here, right now, I was given a chance, one I didn't intend to waste.
During all this introspection, I kept the eyes of Kain trained on my opponent -
Kain - Of course, how didn't I see it earlier. Those spiders became part of myself, but the opposite is also true. I'm also part of them. Reaching out along the net connecting me to all those spiders being part of me, I pushed a little bit more of me into Kain.
And as I suspected, he transformed into one more iteration of me. This third me was fully clothed, too. I decided to think about that one later when my life wasn't in danger.
I couldn't help but smile when I noticed the lack of a core, a center inhabited by me being present in any one of them. I was split, but whole in every instance across them. I existed at three places at once. The only difference was how my power was distributed, upon each iteration. Kain had barely 2 percent of what was me while the two standing in the clearing had half each of what was left.
Given what I already knew, what happened if a part of me gets destroyed. I suspected it was only a temporary state during which I'm weakened until I had regenerated what was lost. The conclusion I drew from this was simple, as long as just a tiny part of me survives I could make a full recovery given time. No matter, if I inhabited this part at the time or not.
This was incredible — I immediately sent my Kain iteration back to camp. And let my other two beings touch each other and reforged them back into one being.
Let's see what else I can do with this power.
I didn't think I could win against it for a single moment, probably not even hurt it when Lilith and Kain with their sharp claws and fangs couldn't. But I could push myself against it to see what else a life and death struggle could unravel.
I stooped down and picked up some of the stones lying around my feet. When I came back up, I ran towards it and hurled them at the spider still struggling on the floor. I tried to hit its eyes. The only part of its body I was confident I could injure. One or two blind spots in its vision would only make it easier for me.
The first stone was deflected by a thrashing leg that just happened to be in the way. The second stone I threw, on the other hand, was a bullseye. It hit one of the four biggest eyes facing directly forwards. The effect was immediate.
The spider retracted its four front legs close to its body and used them to shield its eyes while the remaining legs redoubled their efforts to flip it back upright. With my avenue of attack closed.
I rounded the spider outside the reach of its legs to its lower abdomen if only I wouldn't lack the means to damage it. It was a gamble, but I thought if I was able to change a spider in myself.
Perhaps I could do the opposite — with Kain and Lilith able to penetrate the exoskeleton only lacking the reach and the power to have had a truly devastating effect. I thought it might be worth a try.
I focused and tried to conjure the image and feeling of wielding one of those razor-sharp front legs Lilith and Kain have at their disposal. It was hard to combine it with me, something was fighting me every step of the way, but the closer I got, the more the resistance weakened until it vanished completely.
I sensed some kind of satisfaction at my success. I couldn't locate the source of the feeling, but I was sure it wasn't a figment of my imagination.
I gave the new addition to my body a good look. Out of the spiders that make up my body, I crafted a new limb replacing my own. It consisted of four segments that originated near my right shoulder blade, connected by joints.
The one at my shoulder was the one allowing me the greatest range of movement similar to what is granted by a ball joint, while the others had a greater similarity to ginglymoid joints. The segments themselves had roughly the same diameter as my arms.
Only the last segment, was different. It tapered off towards the edges, becoming razor-sharp slightly curved, and ended in a tip ideal for piercing, which, to be honest, reminded me more of a sword than actual parts of a limb.
Like with every new toy, it had to be put to the test. I took a running start and closed upon the abdomen of the spider, a few meters away while still out of its range. I jumped as high and as far as I could.
With its hind legs pushing on the ground, I hoped to not only avoid them in their entirety but also for the momentum of my descent to amplify the piercing power of my new grown weapon that I rammed down into the creature with all my might.
My attack penetrated the exoskeleton and sunk deep in the guts of the spider. The reaction followed without delay, an ear-piercing scream sounded through the clearing, and the spider abandoned any and all defensive action, its limbs only aimed for one goal, to kill whatever was responsible for hurting it.
I originally had no intention to stay around long enough to suffer the retaliation for my actions. But to get away as fast as possible immediately after I executed my attack, unfortunately through the pain induced thrashing around of the creature, the tip of my limb got caught in between the penetrated exoskeleton, and I was dragged with it.
I lost my balance on the slippery bloodstained belly and fell to my knee, which robbed me of any chance to avoid one of those whirling limbs.
Even though I was only grazed, it felt like being hit by a truck. And once more, I was flung through the air, this time against the huge rock present within the riverbed, and bounced off from it. I landed hard on my belly. Every bone in my body sent signals of pain to my brain. With a groan, I pushed my body from the ground, just in time to see the spider getting back on its feet again.
I considered shifting the damage I suffered away from my body but thought better of it. Despite the pain, my injuries weren't impairing my movement as far I could tell, and weakening myself to spare me some discomfort didn't seem worth it.
The spider charged at me, and to be honest, I was getting irritated by being treated like a rag doll. I was barely on my feet when she was upon me with fervor hacking away at me. I could evade the first few attacks each time by taking a step back to get outside its range until my back was firmly pressed against the rock behind me.
It had me cornered, and it was aware of it. Instead of fully taking advantage of the situation and taking me out with an overwhelming force, I couldn't evade or block, it cut back on them. It began to probe my reactions, my defenses. Attacking just strong enough to have me struggle to fend them off without dealing the finishing blow.
From there, the creature steadily increased the frequency, strength, and speed of its attacks. Slowly but surely, I felt myself tire, the conclusion of our fight predetermined.
It was, therefore, no surprise that it didn't take long under this constant assault for my one spider limb, the only limb I had at my disposal strong and durable enough to block, to reach its limit. With it alone, I just couldn't keep up with the assault, with all those unrelenting attacks coming my way.
I blocked an overhead strike from one of its limbs. Since the creature put a lot of weight behind it, it ended up occupying my own, as another strike came from my left and was aimed at my torso.
I had no doubt that should it connect, my rib cage would be crushed. I would survive, of course, but the loss of power this would have as a consequence would spell my doom.
I was fed up with this, being played with. And I didn't come to this island to be killed by a spider. A creature, who by all rights, should obey my every command and not try to kill me.
At those thoughts, I felt a throbbing in my mind, a force building up, about to carve its way through in order to come out. I didn't try reigning it in, trying to suppress it. On the contrary, I released it and pushed it out with everything I had.
Two things happened simultaneously, a new spider limb identical to the one on my right shoulder blade emerged from my left and stopped the attack aimed at my left side dead in its tracks.
In addition, my mind leashed out in a devastating onslaught and crashed against the mind of the creature, it didn't stop there. My onslaught reached further and overwhelmed more and more creatures, with their mental-defenses shattered, their bodies fell under my control.
Within moments, I had eyes everywhere on the island. I noticed a pattern, the closer their proximity to my location, the stronger the minds of those who fell under my sway could be.
The creature in front of me locked in a struggle of life and death hissed. It was trying to fight against me, trying to keep its defenses from following all those others I cast into oblivion.
I could sense how it used every ounce of willpower it had to strengthen the barrier surrounding and protecting its mind from being submerged under the unrelenting waves crashing against it.
The barrier held. I started to push harder and harder against it. I was aware I needed to bring it down. It was the only way I could see me defeating it.
The strain I put on myself became unbearable, my mental strength being sapped away with every wave I sent out. I was about to give up, acknowledging that my efforts were futile when a single crack appeared in the barrier. It was small and insignificant. However, it made it clear to me I wasn't the only one struggling.
In response, I felt the strength used by its limbs pressing against mine increase manifold, I stemmed myself against it with every ounce of strength my body could muster. Although I was already losing the contest of strength before it doubled down.
My limbs were barely able to keep the sharp claws away from my vitals. They simply weren't strong enough to prevent them from inching closer and closer to my body with every second that went by. My knees started to buckle under the weight of the limb pressing down on me.
I couldn't help but smirk. The spider finally began to see me as a threat. I missed that.
I pushed myself further and further, mobilized the last vestiges of mental and physical strength I had. As a result, more cracks started to appear, they spread but not fast enough. At the rate this was going my body would be overwhelmed and skewered long before I succeeded in penetrating the spider's mental barrier.
I needed more, more powerful physical and mental I dug deeper in order to unearth a new source of power I could reach. I didn't shy away from taking what I found at the junctions making up all the spiders I fused with, the very net that made up my hive mind. I siphoned everything and sucked it within myself adding it to my own strength.
The effects on my body were immediate, pushed far beyond its limits it finally showed its true self. It surged with power, my body from the hip downwards transformed into a sleek and graceful body of a spider. I lost my human legs and instead gained eight spider legs combined with those sprouting from my back brought the number of limbs I possessed up to twelve.
My whole body was clad in black, consisting of hard overlapping chitin armor-plates making up my exoskeleton. In addition to that, I could feel bones throughout every one of my limbs. Thereby further increasing the resilience of my body.
I felt rejuvenated as if, for the first time in my life, my body wasn't impeded. Only now allowed to unleash its full potential. I no longer had any problems keeping the creature's legs at bay. On the contrary, it barely was trouble at all. With the power of eight legs, I had no trouble lifting myself up to a standing position and in the process pushed the creature back half a meter without even trying.
I marveled at my new body. When I touched my face, I noted I no longer had a nose. To compensate, I gained additional eyes, two below and above, where a human had its eyes. It greatly increased my field of vision and the sharpness with which I perceived my surroundings.
This was the reason I noticed my hair turned silver and considerably increased in length falling straight below my bellybutton.
I turned my head away from marveling at my body and looked back into the eyes of my opponent. Which had turned from a threat to my life to just an inconvenience.
Through one of the cracks in its mental defenses, I got a short glimpse inside its head — I saw how the chameleon-spider the uncontested King of this island, the creature at the very top of the food chain felt threatened when two newcomers set their foot on the island.
I saw the spider stalking Rayleigh and myself, watching us from the depths of the forest. I felt the fear it experienced at seeing Rayleigh, the certainty in being outclassed, but it was nothing compared to what it felt when it laid eyes on me.
It was more than just dread at its life being threatened. There was something more primal to it, as if my very existence was something disturbing unnatural, harboring everything it was scared of to the very core of its being.
There was also a familiarity present a subtle craving to subject itself to me, the feeling something the creature abhorred like nothing else ever did. It was even disgusted at the notion of having felt such a thing.
Meanwhile, I could sense the fear myself, how it permeated every pore of the creature. It reared one last time in an attempt to push my will closing in on it back, to get some breathing room. Only to be utterly annihilated and fragmented under the next wave I sent against its mental defenses.
I didn't even feel any resistance. The barrier was just gone from one moment to the next. I suffused its mind and took control over it, its body followed exactly as I did with so many others just moments ago.
I ordered it a step back, and it followed my directions like any insect would have under the influence of my old power. I touched its head with my human hand and the spider succumbed to me and became a part of me.
The changes were immediate, my whole body experienced an evolution. I felt pure power flowing through my veins. I could practically taste how my body received a considerable boost.
There were other visible changes. I watched in slow motion as a thin membrane grew over my exoskeleton, which started to mimic the colors of my surroundings.
I also noticed my sight improving even further. I saw heat emanating from myself and even the surroundings where the sun hit the ground. It made sense for my eyes to see my own body even when camouflaged, and seeing into the infrared spectrum of the light allowed for just that.
I was pretty sure it was the opposite of detrimental for the chameleon spider to be able to see heat sources when out hunting.
To say this was impressive was an understatement, which made it even harder to find a word to classify the other change this fusion brought with it. I could suddenly sense the presence of all the lifeforms on the island and beyond with absolute clarity. In my mind's eye, I pictured them as multicolored flames all around me.
Their size varied, with the strongest getting close to my other iteration nearing our camp. That had to be Rayleigh. I also became aware of how I could hide my presence, to make it disappear completely.
No wonder this spider was able to remain undetected. It was a master of Kenbunshoku Haki good enough to hide itself from Rayleigh.
This wasn't the only conclusion I drew. With me having made the first step in becoming a Haki user it was easy to notice, that my own talent neither lied with Kenbunshoku or Busoshoku but Haoshoku Haki.
After having used it in this fight, it became clear it was as easy as breathing to me, but something held me back from accessing it.
Given my history with controlling others, be it insects or people, I shouldn't be surprised. And here I hoped I could leave the atrocity of taking over another sentient being body and mind behind me.
I sighed and returned to my human form. Even changed back, the differences in my body were impossible to overlook. My strength easily dwarfed what I possessed just a few moments ago. There was also a new awareness of it as if it was muted before. All my senses were sharper, my movements more precise and graceful.
I ordered every creature across the island to come to me. There weren't many presences left, not obliging me. Most of those I could sense were on the outskirts of the island. The further away from where I used my Haoshoku Haki, the weaker the presences I managed to overwhelm.
From this observation, I deduced the wave of Haki lost potency over long distances. It didn't take long for the first few animals to break through the treeline and appear before me.
Some sort of jungle cat, belonging to different species than those that made up the first meal I had here. The other animal was resembling a bear with the difference of it being bigger than a bear had any right to be. I waited for them to reach me when they did. I attempted to do the same I did with the spider, make them a part of me.
But this time, nothing happened. I couldn't fuse with either of them like it was possible with the spider. I wasn't disappointed by this revelation, of course, this meant I couldn't just add their strength to my own. On the other hand, it would prevent my changer form from growing too monstrous.
I didn't feel the urge to end up as Echidna's ugly twin, a chimera of sorts, or possibly something worse. Furthermore, I actually came to like this Arachnid look. I totally blame my old power for that by the way.
I must have eaten some kind of spider or Arachne Zoan-type fruit, it would explain all the abilities I have shown so far. Drawing this conclusion was standing to reason, was it the right one, however?
I ate the fruit and before I even had an inkling I fused with Spiders. What if the Fruit isn't some kind of Spider Zoan, but something more malleable instead? What if I could have chosen any kind of animal and the fruit could have imprinted on the species it belonged to?
Not sure it mattered at this point. What else could I have chosen in case I happened to be right in my assumption instead of spiders? There weren't many choices to pick from with more useful abilities. Sure flying would have been nice, and since mythical creatures are a thing in this world, I could have picked one of those.
One major benefit would have been that the individual strength of another species should have been higher by a large margin. Therefore by absorbing them, I could have grown a lot stronger by now. This would also explain why I didn't notice this augmenting effect earlier.
When I found Kain and Lilith I wasn't exactly in a position to monitor myself and the few hundred spider on Sabaody I made a part of me, aside from their unique abilities didn't make a noticeable difference.
What makes insect special is the fact that they are ahead of all other species when it comes to diversity, an advantage I intend to make good use of.
I didn't regret having eaten this fruit. Ending up the way I did. It gave me a powerful ability one which I already had some ideas on how to make the best use of.
I bent down and picked up a little spider, I studied it extensively and noted that it belonged to species I have never come across. Which just helped to drive the point home that I had absolutely no idea what spiders this world had in store for me. It is quite likely for there to exist spiders who are even more impressive than dragons, I just have to find them.
I absorbed my little dotted friend and added its biological distinctiveness to my own. I then split myself apart into 31 instances of myself, 30 of which spread out in every direction to collect all the spiders under my control while I started the trek back to camp. I had a lot of breeding and training doing.
Authors Note: I hope this chapter wasn't as boring to read as it stressed me to write it.
Chases ... not gonna do that again if I can help it.
Kenbunshoku Haki — There is nothing in canon directly supporting the statements of this chapter, namely that it is possible for someone to suppress his presence or even to make it disappear completely, to make detection via Haki impossible.
On the other hand, canon has a multitude of events occurring that can't be explained without such a skill not being a thing -
On the top of my head:
- Jesus Burgess hiding on Sabo ship to find the headquarters of the revolutionary.
- Silvers Rayleigh not being brought to justice while living on Sabaody, which is right next to Marine HQ.
- Ivankov hiding in Impel Down
- Every chase on Wano-island where someone tries to apprehend the Strawhats etc
I mean you only have to think back on what Enel could do with his Haki ... something everybody with a certain level in it should be able to do.
In order to have a "rule-set" in place, I decided to go with the idea that Haki can be suppressed and certain people (Taylor) can even stop it entirely from being detected by this 6th sense. She will use this extensively in fights and outside of them.
So with this Taylor has finally discovered what a devil fruit-power she possesses. It grants her a changer rating. I was debating quite a long time about the question of what happens to her clothes, ultimately I decided to go with the unexplained clothes count as part of one's body version One Piece has going on (the unexplained Breaker effect).
With this, at least, I can avoid some awkward scenes with cloth malfunction, and Taylor is gonna save a lot of time and money since she won't have to constantly replace her wardrobe.
The disadvantage of this approach on the other hand is quite clear it diminishes "realism" to a certain degree — if you are even allowed to call it that in a fic such as this — but I really don't like unexplained world-mechanics — therefore this effect only pertains to her clothes to nothing else she carries/has on her person.
The ability Taylor displays here splitting herself into a countless number of Spiders is loosely based on the Ability called Crawlerling of the Ananasi (Were spiders) of the White Wolf Pen& Paper setting Werewolf the Apocalypse.
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Chapter 06 - Slave Auction
Chapter 06: Slave Auction (Late Winter 1505 — roughly two years since Arrival)
We arrived in Rayleigh's little boat at Sabaody Archipelago without incident, something I was really glad for. I still couldn't get Shakky comment about Rayleigh's sailing skills out of my head. I started to wonder if she was just joking and I worried the whole time for nothing.
He jumped onshore and tied the boat to the small pier, at the edge of grove 13. From here it was barely a few minutes walk to Shakky's bar. I took my backpack and threw the other one towards Rayleigh.
"Thank you," was his short response. I followed him on dry land.
"Shouldn't I be thanking you? For training me and you know all the other stuff." I asked him.
"Don't worry about that. As long as you topple the world there is nothing to thank me for."
I didn't acknowledge his words. Since I really had no intention to topple anything. I just wanted to find the girl, get the information on how to get home, and be done with this world.
Rayleigh just laughed at me.
Sometimes I got the impression he could read my mind, like right now, and is mocking me for my thoughts. I just shrugged. I was more than used to his antics by now.
"Come, Shakky is probably anticipating our return." I was about to turn his invitation down, even though I owed them both a lot. I saw no need to increase my debt by imposing on their hospitality when I heard him say. "I bet she is dying to see you and you better don't think you can refuse."
Which complicated matters, and I decided to just go along with this request. It surely wouldn't kill me, at least I hoped so.
"Sure, I'd like to see her, too," I said diplomatically.
It wasn't a lie per se, I was of an ambivalent mind, on the one hand, she was an intriguing person, smart, quick-witted, and I really liked her. Probably because on some level she reminded me of Lisa, but that was also the very reason I was not keen on being close to her. Despite all the similarities, Shakky wasn't Lisa, and I had no intention of substituting her with someone else.
He smiled at me and walked ahead, and I followed a few steps behind. We took a direct route towards a strong presence a few hundred meters away.
This had to be Shakky, she didn't have the strongest presence on the island by far, but I suspected she was proficient in suppressing it to a certain degree, not too dissimilar to what Rayleigh could do. But as it turned out, even he had trouble hiding it completely, he easily got it down to what the usual small animal looked to my sixth-sense, but no further unlike me.
The chameleon-spider really had reached uncanny mastery of that skill, which made for the perfect assassin. Not that Rayleigh had need of it, he declined after I offered to teach him the finer intricacy of that particular skill. According to him, what he could do was entirely sufficient for his needs. Aside from a person with years of familiarity with his presence searching for him, he would not be found, if he didn't allow for it to happen.
As it turned out, the chameleon spider was one of its kind on that island. I would have really liked to find another specimen, the benefits of getting my hands on just one were incredible and I couldn't help myself from imagining what more could have done for me.
This was one of the reasons why I invested no small amount of time in searching for one. Unfortunately, after scurrying all over the island and collecting all the various spiders I wasn't able to find any trace of another chameleon spider ever having been present. Therefore I suspected it was somehow brought there, perhaps even onboard a ship as a blind passenger.
This only left me with one real alternative, in order to make full use of the capabilities of my devil fruit; breeding spiders with the sole intent to supply myself with them, to add their strength to my own.
Of course, I tested it beforehand, if it was a viable method to get stronger in the first place. It would have been an incredible waste of time if I would have only profited from the first spider of a certain type and all following would have had diminishing returns or none at all. As it turned out, by separating myself into two equally strong versions and allow one to absorb a great many spiders of types I already had made part of me prior to this, neither was the case. My other self-fusing with the spiders experienced an increase in power in direct proportion to the number of spiders consumed.
Therefore nothing stood in the way to breed spiders for the sole purpose of me to `feed´ on them. And feed on them I did. I lost track of the numbers while it lasted, and the only thing that prevented me from having them exponentially increase their numbers was owed to the lack of resources to be found on the island to do so. As a result, I skirted the edge of what was possible quite close. The effects I had on the ecosystem would be felt for quite some time, even after our departure.
But I couldn't be considerate of that. It could be a long while before I had another opportunity to do something similar, after all, it required being in one place for a prolonged time just to get started and the resources required to do so. Besides, the spiders had to reach a suitable maturity to maximize the effect. A baby spider was worth just a fraction of an adult one when my power was concerned.
I cast those thoughts aside and looked about me, focused on the current situation. We arrived at Shakky Rip of Bar, and as far as I could tell nothing has outwardly changed during our absence.
Rayleigh opened the door and I followed him inside.
This finally allowed me to look at those presences I felt inside since we neared the island. I wasn't impressed by what I sensed from them and seeing them first hand didn't change that impression in the slightest.
It was a group of twelve men their age spanning from as early as 18 to 40, given their attire their disheveled appearance I was quite confident about calling them, Pirates. Of course, the sabers and flintlocks at their hips, various tattoos and beards just served to reinforce that impression, not to forget their drunken bawling.
I wondered if there was a cliche about pirates Hollywood instilled into me, that they weren't trying to fulfill. I decided to follow Rayleigh's example and ignored them, they weren't a threat anyway.
We both sat down on a barstool in front of the grinning Shakky.
"You look good, I hope you didn't have to swim back here." She said in a serious tone eyeing Rayleigh suspiciously. I decided to come to his rescue.
"We were able to return the boat in pristine condition."
"Good -" she scrutinized me for a moment and then reached over to touch my hand. She turned it in hers and examined the fabric on my palm, one of the very few places where she had direct access to the spider silk without any bug-shell armor plates in the way.
"What interesting texture, where did you get clothes like this? I thought you two were out training and not shopping for fancy clothes," she said mischievously.
"We were," I placated her. "I made them with my power. Which reminds me." I reached for my backpack I placed too next to my feet and took out some clothes I handed Shakuyaku.
"I made those for you as recompense for the clothes you gave me since they didn't survive the trip." She traced them carefully.
"They are made from spider silk, comfortable to wear but highly resistant to wear of any kind and therefore quite durable."
"Spider silk, hmm" she murmured to herself. "Thank you, but you really didn't have to."
"I know," was my short response.
"So, I hope you did more during your time away than tailor some nice presents for me," she said smiling.
"Of course we did, whom do you take me for?" Rayleigh protested with a grin.
"I better, not answer that." she sternly said to Rayleigh, while she filled him a mug with ale.
"Touche," he reciprocated and took a huge gulp from his ale. When he set the mug back down, he said. "I'm just gonna store this inside, I'll be back in a minute." while he pointed at his backpack and left us alone.
Shakuyaku turned her attention back to me.
"I kept my ears to the ground while you both were away. I was especially interested in everything that had to do with a certain girl, based on the assumption, that you still intend to find her upon your return."
"What did you hear?" I asked.
"First of all, you should take everything I say with a grain of salt. Most of what I learned is based on rumors, the kind of which were repeated over and over again. It is not uncommon for the information to change in the process and get distorted Sabaody isn't exactly close to West Blue," she cautioned.
I nodded at that.
"The good news is that she is still alive. No one has collected the bounty on her head, and given the waves the Ohara incident made, the newspapers would all be over it if the Devil-child had been captured or killed. The bad news, she disappeared. The last time she was seen, it was in the company of Trident Pirates, a notorious Pirate Crew from West Blue, with a long history there. I'm not privy to the details, but rumor has it they were exterminated, a short time after associating with the girl."
I didn't like hearing that at all. I was not sure what was worse, not knowing what happened to her and have my imagination, which was rather vivid, fill in the blanks or not knowing.
"Unfortunately, it doesn't stop there. I was informed, that certain groups from the New World made inquiries of their own into that girl. It is said that the girl can read Poneglyphs," Shakky told me.
I looked at her puzzled.
"Oh right, I still forget you aren't from around here. Poneglyphs are large steles said to be indestructible with history inscribed on them via ancient letters. And my guts are telling me, that the fate of Ohara is intertwined with them. It can't be a coincidence that the only island harboring people capable of reading Poneglyphs got wiped out and erased from the map."
"And why is that important?" I asked, "I doubt pirates are interested in forgotten history."
"You are right about that," she conceded. "According to Rayleigh, there is a certain subgroup of Poneglyphes called the Road Poneglyphes. There exist four of them and every single one contains part of the information necessary to find Raftel, the final hidden island on the Grand Line."
"Where Gol D. Roger claimed he buried his treasure," I added. "Meaning everyone after it will at one point need Robin services to decipher those Poneglyphes."
"Exactly, I think the threat isn't acute for now. Since the location of those Road-Poneglyphs isn't known. So it is reasonable to assume, that those groups won't allocate many resources in finding the girl, but this could change at the drop of a hat."
This meant Robin was a target of opportunity for pretty much every Pirate and Slave trader there was. Fantastic -
"It is always better to be aware of threats that might come your way. Thanks, I appreciate the information." I said.
"Do you have a plan on how to find the girl?" Shakky couldn't help but inquire.
"Not really, my first step consists of making my way to West Blue and from there I will just have to retrace her steps."
"I see." She contemplated my words for a moment before she added. "I don't think there is much else you could do."
She reached under the bar and put a small sack full of cold coins in front of me. "Here, take it. It isn't overly much but should allow for comfortable travel to West Blue. I suggest you find the Sailors Lament a merchant ship that is headed for Water 7, from there it will be easier to find a passage to West Blue than it is from here. Especially since most ships arriving on Sabaody are headed in the opposite direction, the New World. The ship anchored in Grove 51. Last I heard, they plan to set sail tomorrow at daybreak."
I was reluctant to accept the money. Since it would mean increasing my debt, something I tried to prevent. But what were the alternatives? I needed funds or a ship or even both to set out. Depending on what I was willing to do, it would take me a while to get the necessary funds, time I might not have. And lingering here longer than absolutely necessary would mean the haste and effort I invested in order to keep the time I spent training as short as possible to be hypocritical, defeating the whole purpose.
In the end, I took the money, I can think of ways to pay her back when I found the girl.
"Thank you," I said when Rayleigh returned to us holding a long cylindrical object.
"One last thing - Here"
With those words, he threw the object at me. I caught it out of the air.
It turned out to be a scabbard, a look at it was enough to recognize the great craftsmanship that went into making it. The scabbard was black-crested with fine lines of golden threads along its length that I automatically associated with spider webs.
The handle of the sword held within was black as the night. The crossguard was barely existent. What immediately attracted my attention to the sword was its slightly curved blade being longer by more than twice the usual length of a Katana.
I slowly drew the sword a short bit out from its scabbard. A single-edged black blade emerged. Seemingly sucking in all the light it came in contact with. Along its length, I could see an inscription I was unable to decipher.
Even with my quite limited knowledge about swords, I could tell I held a magnificent sword in my hands.
"The sword type she belongs to is called Nodachi. It is particularly well suited for being wielded from horseback, where the longer reach, compared to a katana, can be utilized to its full potential. Of course, this doesn't mean she is useless in any other situation, she just needs a little getting used to."
I immediately understood his meaning. This sword would be able to manifest its true potential when I wielded it fully transformed. In a sense, I would be mounted then, where the short range of a normal Katana might be near useless.
"You can't mean to give her away," a surprised Shakuyaku said.
Rayleigh just shrugged with his shoulders.
"Sure, it is better this way. If I hold onto her, she would just gather dust and I might be tempted to sell her to finance my gambling." Shakky reluctantly nodded at his reasoning, but it was easy to see she wasn't fully agreeing with it.
"Besides, it is tradition for the master to provide his pupil with a fitting weapon of their own. So Taylor, the beauty in your hands is called Izanami, named after the goddess of creation and death. May she be as good a companion for you as she was for me. Take good care of her for me."
"I will. You can be sure of it," I promised and strapped the sword, which length surpassed me in height, on my back with the handle over my right shoulder.
Shakky turned her head several times from looking at Rayleigh and back to me several times until she incredulous asked.
"That's it? Are you going senile on me in your old days, Ray? You can't just give away one of the Saijo O Wazamono, one of the best 12 swords in existence without a word of warning. There were fought wars over those things in the past."
Rayleigh's response consisted of sheepishly scratching the back of his head. Shakuyaku narrowed her eyes at him.
One of the best 12 swords in existence, I had trouble accepting the money but to accept a priceless weapon was absolutely out of the question. I reached for the weapon in order to give it back when I suddenly found myself on the other end of Shakky stare.
"Don't you dare!" She hissed. I stopped mid-motion.
"It is considered the greatest form of disrespect you can inflict upon your master by not accepting his gifts."
It seemed like I had no choice but to accept my fate. I allowed my hand to drop to my side.
Having been raised in a town with a strong Asian influence, I am aware of some of their customs, and since my time here with Rayleigh, I noticed some overlap. The fact that Katanas were a thing just amplified this notion.
Therefore, I knew how to thank someone. I bend down my head.
"Thank you, both of you. I won't forget what you have done for me."
I turned around and without looking back left the bar. I took a moment to orient myself, something that was rather easy on Sabaody. Since every of the 79 mangrove trees, the Archipelago is made up of were marked with a number.
They were separated into 8 districts with each counting 10 trees each, the two center districts contained the trees numbered 1 to 20, which were surrounded by the other districts. Each district was sort of a floating mass of trees connected to neighboring districts through bridges. The so-called lawless zone I found myself in extended up from Groove 1 to 29.
Meaning I just had to find the direction of Groove numbered 50 that shouldn't be too hard. Especially not with the advantages Haki provides one with; It was easy to sense the coming and going of ships by the number of people confined to a small area quite some distance away from where the other presences stopped.
Of course, I didn't sense, the so-identified ships in just one direction. After all, there was a marine base with a harbor located in the area of Groove 60-69. I could imagine some Pirates weren't keen on being found by them and therefore avoided the official shipyards. Nevertheless, the majority of the maritime traffic should happen there.
Which was why I started to walk towards the greatest accumulation of ships I could sense.
What struck me as odd was, that I could sense no small number of ships sinking below sea level without the auras of the crew being extinguished.
Given the otherwise witnessed technological standard, I didn't think it would possible for submarines of some kind to exist. This just meant there was much to learn about this world.
Seeing someone fly above me enclosed within a soap bubble and using some sort of amalgamation of a tricycle but without the wheels and instead sported a fan to propel it forward. Just served to drive the point home.
It didn't take long for me to reach one of the huge bridges connecting the different parts districts with each other. As I was about to cross over. A short guy, handing out flyers, came running my way and thrust one of those in my hand. Without pausing he set off and ran to the other people on the bridge and also handed flyers.
With bold letters on top of the flyer was written the word `auction´, in on itself nothing bad, what followed on the other hand was. The flyer had starting prizes listed for slaves by race. Wasn't there a Marine base on this Island? How could the Authorities allow this to happen right under their noses?
Rayleigh warned me that some shady things were happening on Sabaody with the marines either turning a blind eye or being a part of it. But this, open slavery was not what I expected he hinted at.
I balled my hand holding the flyer into a fist and scrunched up the flyer in the process. Damn, could I really bring myself to look away?
No, I couldn't. Not back then when I was working for Coil and I wouldn't start now. I smoothed out the Flyer and memorized the description written on the backside on how to reach the Human auctioning house. Given the name, they weren't even trying to hide what they were doing there.
I threw the flyer away and started my trek towards Groove 1. Standing on top of a hill I had my first glance at the human auctioning house. It was a large circular building with the word human written on it.
I could make out no small number of armed guards around the perimeter, and I could sense more people from deep within the building. Given the low numbers I must have arrived prior to the beginning of the auction, this gave me some options.
First of all, I needed some reconnaissance, for this I emitted a Wave of Haoshoki Haki. It was weak enough that no human, not even accomplished Haki users should be able to detect what I did, but it was strong enough to crush the will of every insect within the vicinity and put them under my control.
By accessing their senses, I was able to get a complete picture of the layout of the building and its surroundings. I made out a second entrance on the backside of the building. It was mostly out of view and only protected by two guards; with them was a man with long silver hair, a cleft chin, a short stubble beard, and mustache. He wore a purple coat, pink scarf, and a tall yellow hat with a flower pattern and was walking up and down irritated.
He was apparently an impatient fellow and the way his company stiffened, whenever his head turned their way, made me suspect he was the one in charge and probably prone to lashing out in some fashion.
I grinned at that — Seems like I found the one I needed to have a little chat with.
I reached into my bag and took out my mask. The last missing part to complete my late Skitter costume, armored bug shell panels all over to protect my vitals. I had forgone the small cape I used to hide my bugs under and replaced it with a heavy hooded coat that reached down to my ankles. I put the mask on and pulled the hood over my head.
I felt a moment of reminiscence standing there clad in a costume seconds away from entering the stage. I hope my debut in this world goes better than it did in the last. With this thought in mind, I vanished on top of the hill and reappeared carried by short Soru assisted movement in the middle of them.
A short and targeted burst of Haki later and the three people were under my control. Usually, I would have shown more restraint in using this, in essence, master power on sentient beings. But I couldn't bring myself to think of people facilitate and conducting human trafficking as such. They had it coming if you asked me.
I withdrew just enough of my control from the guy with the funny hat, to allow his personality to surface and him to regain a semblance of control over his faculties and his body. Just enough to answer questions and follow orders but not enough for him to regain his agency. The state I put him in had some similarities to hypnosis and for all intents and purposes, he was nothing but a slave to serve my every whim until I saw fit to release him from my control.
A fitting fate to end up this way for someone like him. There was some temptation to turn the tables on him; to leave him in this state but ultimately thought better of it. It was prudent to hide the real scope of my abilities for as long as possible, something in hindsight I should have done when I started out as a cape. I could have gotten away with pretending to be a changer for quite some time, hiding my squishy self like Manton did. My shortcomings when it came to understanding and generating speech could have been overcome with the generous use of modern technology.
But here right now, this meant I couldn't allow for there to be any witnesses. Not only to hide my abilities but also to fly under the radar, it wouldn't be advantageous to earn a bounty on my first day back.
"What is your name?" I demanded to know from him.
"Disco," he uttered.
"Open the door and send all the guards outside. Tell them you don't want to be disturbed," I ordered. He took out some keys and opened the door. I heard him through my bugs inside repeating what I assigned him to do verbatim. He wasn't questioned once, one of the drawbacks if you surround yourself with yes-men unable to think for themselves.
Not that I could complain in this situation, since it makes it all so much easier and I don't need to soil my hands.
When I was sure they were all gone I followed him inside.
"Give me a summary of everything you have here aside from the slaves, starting with the most valuable items in descending order," I said.
"We have acquired four unidentified devil-fruits, a few crates of sea-stone, and a large assortment of jewels." He said and then started to list things considered contraband. He eventually came to rare species his suppliers got their hands on; nothing held my interest until he said in his monotone voice bar of any feeling "Fate-Spider".
"Hold on," I interjected. "What is a Fate-Spider?"
"According to legend, this spider has the power to change fate itself, until now, its existence could never be confirmed. But its appearance matches those found in an ancient tome depicting mythical creatures." He explained.
"Show it to me," I said and followed him into a spacious room full of crates. On top of some of them were cages filled with all kinds of different animals. He brought me to the back of the room and removed a white cloth from a cage.
I was immediately entranced by whatever it was I laid my eyes upon. The Spider was just a few centimeters in length perched in the middle of its net, which had the same silver coloration as the spider itself. She had eight eyes arrayed on her head with another eye of a different color and shape sitting at the center of its head. The deep crimson color of this ninth eye observed me carefully, and I couldn't shake the feeling that it looked at much more than just my outward appearance.
We stared at each other for quite some time until suddenly the red-eye closed and the shiver than ran down my spine disappeared.
The spider crawled towards the edges of the cage and stuck out one of its legs. I interpreted it as an invitation and removed the glove of my right hand and touched it with my no longer protected finger.
I had done this millions of times, fusing with a spider. For some reason, this time was different, like none before. I was thrown in a whirlpool of memories coalescing into utter chaos, overlapping and bleeding into each other.
I saw Alexandria pouring juice over my head, Emma fighting against Behemoth, and many more confusing scenes. But there was more; I saw a case 53 that reminded me of a manta-ray destroying ships with water acting at her behest. A group of girls crowding and laughing at - no - with me. Before I could make more sense of what I saw, it was over, and the only thing that remained was a burning sensation on my forehead.
What was that? Could it be that the ability of this spider was something (else) than advertised? What did it even mean the spider can change fate? What was fate? Was it not a mental construct created to help us cope and explain unlikely or unwanted events that happen in our lives and accredit those a greater meaning?
Going a step further with this, wouldn't we inevitably end up believing our lives to be predetermined? Despite my experiences with precognition, I couldn't subscribe to such a world view. What would be the point of life in such a case?
But then what was it that I just witnessed, a prophecy? A view of a potential future of just my mind playing tricks on me by hashing many different memories together into something I wasn't able to identify and distinguish the various sources it originated from?
I took stock of my surroundings with my bugs. I noticed how different groups of people slowly started converging on the building. I lost more time than I thought.
I refrained from moving the bugs into a better position to get a look at the people. I didn't want to risk someone with acute senses to pick up on their unusual behavior and left them in place.
Still, some groups were close enough that I could overhear some snippets of what they said to each other.
"Come on Marco, don't be such a downer. You always said you wouldn't mind a devil fruit. And at the first real shot to get one you try chicken out? What's wrong with you?" The owner of a deep voice said.
"That's not it, I just wanted to earn it, not buy it in an auction." was the response he received from someone I duped Marco in my head.
"Hahaha," the deep-voiced man sheepishly laughed. "The money you buy it with was hard-earned wasn't it?"
You see - then there is no difference, and you are in luck the devil fruits on auctioned off aren't identified. So it is pretty much the same as if you had found it on some lone island."
At the same time, I overheard another group talking.
"So sister, what kind of slave do you want this time? Another Merfolk or more Humans perhaps even a pirate?" a muffled male voice asked.
"No, they bore me too much," was the answer he received by an equally muffled female voice. "Especially Pirates at first they always think so highly of themselves, but after you amputated a few limbs they lose all bite and just vegetate all day. For once, I want some toys which aren't so easily broken and last me for a while. It is such a waste of my time having to replace them constantly instead of actually playing with them."
Disgusting -
I was about to leave when my gaze fell upon a chest. I felt drawn to it. I pointed at it.
"What's in there?" I demanded to know from Disco.
"The Devil Fruits."
"Open it," I commanded.
After I heard the lock clack open Disco stepped back. I saw four fruits lying on soft cushions in front of me, and every single one of them was emitting a different colored aura, something which I had never seen before. Neither had Disco since this aura was completely absent from his senses, I piggybacked on.
Was the fate-spider responsible for this? Some kind of thinker ability?
I decided it could wait for the question to be answered and took the fruits out of the chest and carefully placed them into my backpack.
I had a nagging feeling; that I was overlooking something; not everything I noticed did add up. When my thoughts returned to the slaves, the missing part became obvious, who was responsible for capturing them? What I sensed from some of the prisoners made it awfully clear that all the Guards combined wouldn't have stood a chance against some of them.
So this whole operation must be under the patronage of someone or an organization capable of getting the slaves but with enough political cloud for the marines to look the other way. How else could it be explained for this to happen on an island with a marine base in broad daylight? They handed out flyers, or is the connection even closer than that?
For just a moment I wished, that there would be PRT instead of the Marines here. At least they, for the most part, were just incompetent and not accomplices.
"Who is the one behind this slave auction?" I asked.
"We operate under the aegis of Joker the alter ego of the Pirate Donquixote Doflamingo." was the answer provided by Disco.
A pirate - then why wasn't this business closed a long time ago.
Flaunting this slave auction on a Marine controlled island should bring you the undivided attention of the law, which the Marines are tasked to enforce.
The only way this could be explained, was by them turning a blind eye - The question was why?
What did they gain by allowing this right in their backyard? - Surely, bribing only the local Marine commander that close to their HQ couldn't be sufficient to hide an operation of that magnitude.
The possible answers were endless - even back home, the Protectorate and PRT and police turned a blind eye to the human-trafficking Lung was involved in.
In a roundabout way, this confirmed everything Shakky told me about the world-government. On one hand preaching about justice and on the other, turning a blind eye to when it suited them.
What significance had the misfortune of a few weighted against the greater good? It is always the same old story, every action, no matter how cruel or vicious, could be justified for the greater good.
It was one thing to be told about it, but to witness it first hand was something else. It was time to make my displeasure known.
"I want you to release all the Slaves," I ordered. Disco turned around and left towards the prison cells.
I slung the bag over my shoulder and took another look around. I suspected, given the average strength of the slaves I sensed, that the Human auction house would be out of business in a few more minutes. Therefore I decided, they wouldn't have any need for their funds contrary to me.
I found pretty much everything imaginable in those crates. It wasn't an easy choice to make on what to take with me. I settled on the jewels, gold and other items were just too cumbersome and large to carry around in large quantities. Not to forget that leaving with a huge bag full of stuff would look suspicious and I wanted to avoid scrutiny not attract it. This was exactly why I took the jewels and left the rest behind. Since I was fairly certain they were worth the most in relation to their size and weight.
I was about finished with stuffing the 3rd satchel bag full of precious gems when the huge slave Disco just freed from his collar punched him hard. Given the lack of sensory input I received from him and the disappearance of his aura, I doubted he survived it.
With all three satchel bags slung over my shoulder, I returned into the hallway. The previously silent area was vibrant with activity, with all the former slaves being free and I found myself in the middle of a crowd.
From what I observed, it could be divided into three categories.
There were the ones hesitant and frightened, not trusting the whole situation suspecting a trap, thinking themselves a moment away to be ushered back into their cells. They barely set a foot outside, not even willing to hope in fear of ending up disappointed.
Another group was exhilarated to be out of their cells, their newly regained freedom conjuring smiles on their faces.
Then there was the third group, most of them battle-hardened, carefully taking in the situation and already planning their next move. It was easy to see that they fought an internal battle asking themselves should they flee or risk their new won freedom for payback.
I also noticed, that not all the slaves had been freed from their shackles. I could make out some still in the process to remedy this situation.
Although I didn't hide, was armed, masked and my clothes weren't in tatters, I wasn't given a second thought, despite more than one person taking notice of me. No one reacted to my presence, something that had had to change. I needed them to listen but was unwilling to shout over the volume they generated.
I would have whistled if I weren't so bad at it. Therefore a sharp clap of my hands had to suffice to get the attention of everyone present. It was loud, like a gunshot, and echoed throughout the hallway. Suffice to say it had the intended effect. All eyes ended up trained on me, with every sound being silenced in the wake of it. Most even stilled all their movement, not knowing what to expect from me.
"Listen - As we speak the auction house is filling with potential buyers. On my way in, I took out the guards at the back entry. If you want to get out of here without being seen, take that as an exit. If you then keep walking straight away from the building, it will serve as cover and block the view of your escape from them. On your way out, I recommend making a stop in the big room down the hallway, it happens to be full of weapons and gold. Take with you what you like, but I suggest you do it fast, and only as much as you can comfortably carry because it is just a matter of time until it is discovered that you all are free."
After I said my piece there was a slight pause, in which they probably tried to process the information I relayed. Until finally one of them built up enough courage to speak.
"Who are you?" He asked.
Good question, I was masked up so giving out my real name was out of the question and would defeat the whole purpose of the mask. The cape names I called myself at one point or another didn't feel right now more so than ever. Since I was notoriously bad at naming things and being put on the spot like that didn't exactly inspire my creativity, I simply said.
"Call me Queen, if you must call me something."
On second thought, it wasn't so bad a name, not only because it emphasized my power without really doing so, but was similar to Rayleigh epithet the Dark King. If I couldn't reasonably repay the debt I owed them, at least with this name association I could express my thanks, in a roundabout way honoring my teacher. I was sure they would like that - quite a lot in fact.
It helped, that I never really cared about, which name I was given and went by and neither do most others. What was important was the reputation you forged while wearing it, nothing else.
"How did you get Disco to free us?" Another one asked, hiding behind some others.
"Let's just say I convinced him, that it was in his best interest to do exactly what I asked of him." I nonchalantly answered with a shrug.
Immediately talking across broke out with most of them following my advice and moving down the hallway to take some riches with them before leaving. Apparently, not everybody was happy with the turn of events, because someone else shouted above the noise, trying to drown it out.
He was a well-built guy a head taller than me. Tattoos littered his hairless body and head. He possessed one of the strongest presences in the room and it was clear he was used to giving orders.
"That's it, they drag you out of your homes, kidnap you from your ships, defeated you in battle humiliated you, and your response to this is to chicken out, to run away like fucking cowards."
He paused for effect.
"Go ahead - But remember the only one to blame come tomorrow is you; When you wake up screaming from a nightmare when you end up constantly asking yourself will they come for me again. When you end up scared of your own shadows for the rest of your lives. Because on the day you were given the opportunity to pay them back, to make sure they won't ever come after you or anyone ever again, you chose to run away like the cowards you are instead of fighting against them, to make them pay for what they did to you."
I looked into their faces, and I saw no small number of them hesitating, pondering his words.
"So who is with me?" he roared.
I really didn't like where this was going, but seeing the newly inspired conviction on the majority of them I doubted I could dissuade them from their undertaking, not in a timely manner. I frankly had no intention of being around when this situation inevitably got out-of-control and I wasn't willing to save them from their own stupidity, I restored their freedom, and this included allowing them to make their own decisions. Idiotic as they may be.
All of them passed me on their way to the storage room, most of them to fetch weapons.
I was about to turn around and leave the way I came when I noticed that three presences in one of the cells hadn't moved the whole time. There was a fourth one nearing them, with every inch it got closer the other three grew more agitated. I cursed the fact, that I used most of the bugs to tag or stay near the guards in the other rooms, and what little I had left here were slow ones with bad senses.
I frowned, I walked towards the end of the hallway and came upon an opened heavy steel door. When I reached the door hinges, I came to a stop behind a man of average height. He was brandishing a weapon in one hand and in the other he held one of the keys. His focus was entirely centered upon the occupants of the room, which was why he didn't notice my arrival despite me not even attempting to hide it.
"I knew it," he said with a sickening voice" the real beauties wouldn't be confined with the rest of us." He gave of a demented chuckle and took a step forward while taking a lick from his knife. Clearing my view of three scared to death girls no older than twelve.
"Lucky me, I get to taste you first."
What I saw then was something I hoped of never having to witness again - children cowering in fear - unpleasant memories tried to make themselves known. I suppressed them as good as I could and used the guy in front of me as a momentary relief of my anger.
I moved closer and put my right fist through his torso. He had enough time to lower his gaze to take a look at my fist protruding out the place his heart should have been located until he slumped down like a puppet with its string cuts. I extracted my hand and let him fall down in a lifeless heap at my feet. I reached down and ripped his shirt from him to have something to clean the blood and viscera from my costume.
I took a step forward, and they backed off from me, trying their best to get away even though the wall they were backed against didn't allow for it. I stopped, knowing full well what effects my appearance had on people after Glenn made it clear; by showing me a video of myself during a fight against the PRT and outright compared me to one of the Slaughterhouse 9.
Back then, I didn't fully believe him. After all, no one ran away from me screaming, and neither were they shitting their pants. What I overlooked was that those I confronted were trained professionals and other capes who constantly saw battles. Seeing what reaction I elicited from others was an eye-opener.
I couldn't blame them. I was a scary figure; A bug-themed mask, a huge sword strapped to my back, I didn't even need to make use of to dispose of this guy. Standing before them in a bad lit cell, with the only lighting coming from the hallway giving me an aura of brightness increasing the contrast to my dark costume, I probably looked like a monster right out of a Horror Movie to them.
No wonder, they panicked.
With my left hand, I removed my hood and then my mask. My black curly hair fell free and framed my face. I waited a few seconds to allow their eyes to adjust to the new brightness of their cell and then slowly got closer to them, my hands raised, showing them the palms of my hands in a de-escalating manner.
The three girls were huddled together, the face of the girl closest to me was framed by two pigtails formed from her straight black, and I was certain would grow up to be a real beauty. Hiding behind her, grabbing onto for dear life were two other girls. They had by close inspection similar facial characteristics. The girl to her right was slim with brown-orange curled hair, and the girl to her right with a head slightly out of proportion sported green curly hair.
When I was a meter away from them, I used my left hand and angled the sword on my back horizontal in order to crouch down without it scraping against the ground.
With my eyes now level with theirs, I softly said.
"You don't have to be afraid. I'm here to help you."
I slowly tried to reach for the shackles of the black-haired girl and all three of them flinched back. I halted my movement immediately and reassured them.
"I won't hurt you I promise."
Only after they heard me say that they slowly started to relax. They were still alert but most of the fear left their bodies.
I resumed my hand motion and this time they didn't shy away and held their ground. I enclosed my hands around her iron shackles and with the exertion of a little strength, it crumbled under my grip freeing the black-haired girl's wrist first.
Their eyes became wide like saucers until they schooled their expressions and offered up their remaining shackles without prompting to me. After I removed them also I stood up again.
There was something pleading in their eyes I couldn't deprive myself of. My hesitation prompted the black-haired girl to speak.
"You are strong. Are you a Pirate Onee-sama?" She asked.
Being called Onee-sama how did that happen? Then I saw the admiration they held for me in their faces.
"Depends on your definition of a Pirate, I would say." I certainly was no law-abiding citizen.
She grinned at my response.
"That's what a Pirate would say." She paused for a moment thinking about something. "Can we come with you? Please. We will be good I promise."
Why would she want to associate with a Pirate even going so far as to want to accompany them? Sure I saved them, but that alone couldn't be the reason. She gave off the vibe of an intelligent girl and her request wasn't spontaneous there was some thought behind it. I was about to get to the bottom of this when I sensed how most of the revenge obsessed former slaves broke down the door to the audience and started to attack them.
This solidified my decision not to try to stop those slaves from walking to their deaths. If taking revenge was more important to them than rescuing those girls - at least some, if not all of them had to know they were still here - they didn't deserve to be saved.
I pondered the situation, could I take them with me? They were just kids, even under the assumption they no longer had a home to return to should I? They might slow me down, draw attention. Considering the alternatives, I also couldn't leave them on their own. I could bring them to Shakky, surely she would help them, and they would be safer with her than with me.
But then there was Robin to consider; She might appreciate some company the same age when I found her. I doubted she will have an easy time trusting me, an adult for that matter. So they could come in handy.
I stopped myself there; seeing people, even young girls as assets was something I really should stop doing didn't I learn anything with Dinah. I was tempted to continue what earned Coil a bullet between the eyes and, now I was doing it again.
Besides, there was something else I disregarded till now. The three girls each had a similar colored aura than three of the devil fruits I had with me. I didn't think I could ignore it, even though I would have liked nothing more. It had to mean something, and it might not be the best of ideas to separate from them before I knew what it was.
"I might be inclined to allow you to come with me, but only if you promise to do exactly what I tell you to do when I do," I impressed upon them. In response, they just eagerly nodded their heads.
"Good, in that case. My name is Taylor. What are yours?" I inquired.
"My name is Boa Hancock." said the black-haired girl she then pointed to her left at the green-haired girl "and this is my little sister Boa Sandersonia" and then pointed to her right at the brown-orange girl "and this is our youngest sister Boa Marigold."
Authors Note:
Izanami: she is the first female as well as the goddess of creation and death.
Some of my thoughts regarding:
Human Auction Building: Via canon we know, that it is under the protectorate of Doflamingo, and in the Wiki, it is stated, that he withdrew his direct involvement after establishing it a few years later. I can only guess this happened around the time he conquered Dressrossa -
For the timeline — Doflamingo at this point is 21 years old. He attacks Dressrossa when he is 31, and 41 by the time he is taken down by Luffy in canon.
Since he operated under the name Joker, whenever he did something the World Government might take exception, too. It probably wasn't widely known, even in the early days, that he had something to do with the auctions.
And I suspect, most of his occupation during that time had something to do with acquiring the slaves in some fashion and protecting the operation overall, and not have direct contact with the buyers. (would defeat the whole Joker identity-thing)
Furthermore, I think, that after he had established to the world for there to be consequences for anyone interfering in this business, it is more than likely he wasn't around all the time ... he had other things to do as underworld broker ...
We arrived in Rayleigh's little boat at Sabaody Archipelago without incident, something I was really glad for. I still couldn't get Shakky comment about Rayleigh's sailing skills out of my head. I started to wonder if she was just joking and I worried the whole time for nothing.
He jumped onshore and tied the boat to the small pier, at the edge of grove 13. From here it was barely a few minutes walk to Shakky's bar. I took my backpack and threw the other one towards Rayleigh.
"Thank you," was his short response. I followed him on dry land.
"Shouldn't I be thanking you? For training me and you know all the other stuff." I asked him.
"Don't worry about that. As long as you topple the world there is nothing to thank me for."
I didn't acknowledge his words. Since I really had no intention to topple anything. I just wanted to find the girl, get the information on how to get home, and be done with this world.
Rayleigh just laughed at me.
Sometimes I got the impression he could read my mind, like right now, and is mocking me for my thoughts. I just shrugged. I was more than used to his antics by now.
"Come, Shakky is probably anticipating our return." I was about to turn his invitation down, even though I owed them both a lot. I saw no need to increase my debt by imposing on their hospitality when I heard him say. "I bet she is dying to see you and you better don't think you can refuse."
Which complicated matters, and I decided to just go along with this request. It surely wouldn't kill me, at least I hoped so.
"Sure, I'd like to see her, too," I said diplomatically.
It wasn't a lie per se, I was of an ambivalent mind, on the one hand, she was an intriguing person, smart, quick-witted, and I really liked her. Probably because on some level she reminded me of Lisa, but that was also the very reason I was not keen on being close to her. Despite all the similarities, Shakky wasn't Lisa, and I had no intention of substituting her with someone else.
He smiled at me and walked ahead, and I followed a few steps behind. We took a direct route towards a strong presence a few hundred meters away.
This had to be Shakky, she didn't have the strongest presence on the island by far, but I suspected she was proficient in suppressing it to a certain degree, not too dissimilar to what Rayleigh could do. But as it turned out, even he had trouble hiding it completely, he easily got it down to what the usual small animal looked to my sixth-sense, but no further unlike me.
The chameleon-spider really had reached uncanny mastery of that skill, which made for the perfect assassin. Not that Rayleigh had need of it, he declined after I offered to teach him the finer intricacy of that particular skill. According to him, what he could do was entirely sufficient for his needs. Aside from a person with years of familiarity with his presence searching for him, he would not be found, if he didn't allow for it to happen.
As it turned out, the chameleon spider was one of its kind on that island. I would have really liked to find another specimen, the benefits of getting my hands on just one were incredible and I couldn't help myself from imagining what more could have done for me.
This was one of the reasons why I invested no small amount of time in searching for one. Unfortunately, after scurrying all over the island and collecting all the various spiders I wasn't able to find any trace of another chameleon spider ever having been present. Therefore I suspected it was somehow brought there, perhaps even onboard a ship as a blind passenger.
This only left me with one real alternative, in order to make full use of the capabilities of my devil fruit; breeding spiders with the sole intent to supply myself with them, to add their strength to my own.
Of course, I tested it beforehand, if it was a viable method to get stronger in the first place. It would have been an incredible waste of time if I would have only profited from the first spider of a certain type and all following would have had diminishing returns or none at all. As it turned out, by separating myself into two equally strong versions and allow one to absorb a great many spiders of types I already had made part of me prior to this, neither was the case. My other self-fusing with the spiders experienced an increase in power in direct proportion to the number of spiders consumed.
Therefore nothing stood in the way to breed spiders for the sole purpose of me to `feed´ on them. And feed on them I did. I lost track of the numbers while it lasted, and the only thing that prevented me from having them exponentially increase their numbers was owed to the lack of resources to be found on the island to do so. As a result, I skirted the edge of what was possible quite close. The effects I had on the ecosystem would be felt for quite some time, even after our departure.
But I couldn't be considerate of that. It could be a long while before I had another opportunity to do something similar, after all, it required being in one place for a prolonged time just to get started and the resources required to do so. Besides, the spiders had to reach a suitable maturity to maximize the effect. A baby spider was worth just a fraction of an adult one when my power was concerned.
I cast those thoughts aside and looked about me, focused on the current situation. We arrived at Shakky Rip of Bar, and as far as I could tell nothing has outwardly changed during our absence.
Rayleigh opened the door and I followed him inside.
This finally allowed me to look at those presences I felt inside since we neared the island. I wasn't impressed by what I sensed from them and seeing them first hand didn't change that impression in the slightest.
It was a group of twelve men their age spanning from as early as 18 to 40, given their attire their disheveled appearance I was quite confident about calling them, Pirates. Of course, the sabers and flintlocks at their hips, various tattoos and beards just served to reinforce that impression, not to forget their drunken bawling.
I wondered if there was a cliche about pirates Hollywood instilled into me, that they weren't trying to fulfill. I decided to follow Rayleigh's example and ignored them, they weren't a threat anyway.
We both sat down on a barstool in front of the grinning Shakky.
"You look good, I hope you didn't have to swim back here." She said in a serious tone eyeing Rayleigh suspiciously. I decided to come to his rescue.
"We were able to return the boat in pristine condition."
"Good -" she scrutinized me for a moment and then reached over to touch my hand. She turned it in hers and examined the fabric on my palm, one of the very few places where she had direct access to the spider silk without any bug-shell armor plates in the way.
"What interesting texture, where did you get clothes like this? I thought you two were out training and not shopping for fancy clothes," she said mischievously.
"We were," I placated her. "I made them with my power. Which reminds me." I reached for my backpack I placed too next to my feet and took out some clothes I handed Shakuyaku.
"I made those for you as recompense for the clothes you gave me since they didn't survive the trip." She traced them carefully.
"They are made from spider silk, comfortable to wear but highly resistant to wear of any kind and therefore quite durable."
"Spider silk, hmm" she murmured to herself. "Thank you, but you really didn't have to."
"I know," was my short response.
"So, I hope you did more during your time away than tailor some nice presents for me," she said smiling.
"Of course we did, whom do you take me for?" Rayleigh protested with a grin.
"I better, not answer that." she sternly said to Rayleigh, while she filled him a mug with ale.
"Touche," he reciprocated and took a huge gulp from his ale. When he set the mug back down, he said. "I'm just gonna store this inside, I'll be back in a minute." while he pointed at his backpack and left us alone.
Shakuyaku turned her attention back to me.
"I kept my ears to the ground while you both were away. I was especially interested in everything that had to do with a certain girl, based on the assumption, that you still intend to find her upon your return."
"What did you hear?" I asked.
"First of all, you should take everything I say with a grain of salt. Most of what I learned is based on rumors, the kind of which were repeated over and over again. It is not uncommon for the information to change in the process and get distorted Sabaody isn't exactly close to West Blue," she cautioned.
I nodded at that.
"The good news is that she is still alive. No one has collected the bounty on her head, and given the waves the Ohara incident made, the newspapers would all be over it if the Devil-child had been captured or killed. The bad news, she disappeared. The last time she was seen, it was in the company of Trident Pirates, a notorious Pirate Crew from West Blue, with a long history there. I'm not privy to the details, but rumor has it they were exterminated, a short time after associating with the girl."
I didn't like hearing that at all. I was not sure what was worse, not knowing what happened to her and have my imagination, which was rather vivid, fill in the blanks or not knowing.
"Unfortunately, it doesn't stop there. I was informed, that certain groups from the New World made inquiries of their own into that girl. It is said that the girl can read Poneglyphs," Shakky told me.
I looked at her puzzled.
"Oh right, I still forget you aren't from around here. Poneglyphs are large steles said to be indestructible with history inscribed on them via ancient letters. And my guts are telling me, that the fate of Ohara is intertwined with them. It can't be a coincidence that the only island harboring people capable of reading Poneglyphs got wiped out and erased from the map."
"And why is that important?" I asked, "I doubt pirates are interested in forgotten history."
"You are right about that," she conceded. "According to Rayleigh, there is a certain subgroup of Poneglyphes called the Road Poneglyphes. There exist four of them and every single one contains part of the information necessary to find Raftel, the final hidden island on the Grand Line."
"Where Gol D. Roger claimed he buried his treasure," I added. "Meaning everyone after it will at one point need Robin services to decipher those Poneglyphes."
"Exactly, I think the threat isn't acute for now. Since the location of those Road-Poneglyphs isn't known. So it is reasonable to assume, that those groups won't allocate many resources in finding the girl, but this could change at the drop of a hat."
This meant Robin was a target of opportunity for pretty much every Pirate and Slave trader there was. Fantastic -
"It is always better to be aware of threats that might come your way. Thanks, I appreciate the information." I said.
"Do you have a plan on how to find the girl?" Shakky couldn't help but inquire.
"Not really, my first step consists of making my way to West Blue and from there I will just have to retrace her steps."
"I see." She contemplated my words for a moment before she added. "I don't think there is much else you could do."
She reached under the bar and put a small sack full of cold coins in front of me. "Here, take it. It isn't overly much but should allow for comfortable travel to West Blue. I suggest you find the Sailors Lament a merchant ship that is headed for Water 7, from there it will be easier to find a passage to West Blue than it is from here. Especially since most ships arriving on Sabaody are headed in the opposite direction, the New World. The ship anchored in Grove 51. Last I heard, they plan to set sail tomorrow at daybreak."
I was reluctant to accept the money. Since it would mean increasing my debt, something I tried to prevent. But what were the alternatives? I needed funds or a ship or even both to set out. Depending on what I was willing to do, it would take me a while to get the necessary funds, time I might not have. And lingering here longer than absolutely necessary would mean the haste and effort I invested in order to keep the time I spent training as short as possible to be hypocritical, defeating the whole purpose.
In the end, I took the money, I can think of ways to pay her back when I found the girl.
"Thank you," I said when Rayleigh returned to us holding a long cylindrical object.
"One last thing - Here"
With those words, he threw the object at me. I caught it out of the air.
It turned out to be a scabbard, a look at it was enough to recognize the great craftsmanship that went into making it. The scabbard was black-crested with fine lines of golden threads along its length that I automatically associated with spider webs.
The handle of the sword held within was black as the night. The crossguard was barely existent. What immediately attracted my attention to the sword was its slightly curved blade being longer by more than twice the usual length of a Katana.
I slowly drew the sword a short bit out from its scabbard. A single-edged black blade emerged. Seemingly sucking in all the light it came in contact with. Along its length, I could see an inscription I was unable to decipher.
Even with my quite limited knowledge about swords, I could tell I held a magnificent sword in my hands.
"The sword type she belongs to is called Nodachi. It is particularly well suited for being wielded from horseback, where the longer reach, compared to a katana, can be utilized to its full potential. Of course, this doesn't mean she is useless in any other situation, she just needs a little getting used to."
I immediately understood his meaning. This sword would be able to manifest its true potential when I wielded it fully transformed. In a sense, I would be mounted then, where the short range of a normal Katana might be near useless.
"You can't mean to give her away," a surprised Shakuyaku said.
Rayleigh just shrugged with his shoulders.
"Sure, it is better this way. If I hold onto her, she would just gather dust and I might be tempted to sell her to finance my gambling." Shakky reluctantly nodded at his reasoning, but it was easy to see she wasn't fully agreeing with it.
"Besides, it is tradition for the master to provide his pupil with a fitting weapon of their own. So Taylor, the beauty in your hands is called Izanami, named after the goddess of creation and death. May she be as good a companion for you as she was for me. Take good care of her for me."
"I will. You can be sure of it," I promised and strapped the sword, which length surpassed me in height, on my back with the handle over my right shoulder.
Shakky turned her head several times from looking at Rayleigh and back to me several times until she incredulous asked.
"That's it? Are you going senile on me in your old days, Ray? You can't just give away one of the Saijo O Wazamono, one of the best 12 swords in existence without a word of warning. There were fought wars over those things in the past."
Rayleigh's response consisted of sheepishly scratching the back of his head. Shakuyaku narrowed her eyes at him.
One of the best 12 swords in existence, I had trouble accepting the money but to accept a priceless weapon was absolutely out of the question. I reached for the weapon in order to give it back when I suddenly found myself on the other end of Shakky stare.
"Don't you dare!" She hissed. I stopped mid-motion.
"It is considered the greatest form of disrespect you can inflict upon your master by not accepting his gifts."
It seemed like I had no choice but to accept my fate. I allowed my hand to drop to my side.
Having been raised in a town with a strong Asian influence, I am aware of some of their customs, and since my time here with Rayleigh, I noticed some overlap. The fact that Katanas were a thing just amplified this notion.
Therefore, I knew how to thank someone. I bend down my head.
"Thank you, both of you. I won't forget what you have done for me."
I turned around and without looking back left the bar. I took a moment to orient myself, something that was rather easy on Sabaody. Since every of the 79 mangrove trees, the Archipelago is made up of were marked with a number.
They were separated into 8 districts with each counting 10 trees each, the two center districts contained the trees numbered 1 to 20, which were surrounded by the other districts. Each district was sort of a floating mass of trees connected to neighboring districts through bridges. The so-called lawless zone I found myself in extended up from Groove 1 to 29.
Meaning I just had to find the direction of Groove numbered 50 that shouldn't be too hard. Especially not with the advantages Haki provides one with; It was easy to sense the coming and going of ships by the number of people confined to a small area quite some distance away from where the other presences stopped.
Of course, I didn't sense, the so-identified ships in just one direction. After all, there was a marine base with a harbor located in the area of Groove 60-69. I could imagine some Pirates weren't keen on being found by them and therefore avoided the official shipyards. Nevertheless, the majority of the maritime traffic should happen there.
Which was why I started to walk towards the greatest accumulation of ships I could sense.
What struck me as odd was, that I could sense no small number of ships sinking below sea level without the auras of the crew being extinguished.
Given the otherwise witnessed technological standard, I didn't think it would possible for submarines of some kind to exist. This just meant there was much to learn about this world.
Seeing someone fly above me enclosed within a soap bubble and using some sort of amalgamation of a tricycle but without the wheels and instead sported a fan to propel it forward. Just served to drive the point home.
It didn't take long for me to reach one of the huge bridges connecting the different parts districts with each other. As I was about to cross over. A short guy, handing out flyers, came running my way and thrust one of those in my hand. Without pausing he set off and ran to the other people on the bridge and also handed flyers.
With bold letters on top of the flyer was written the word `auction´, in on itself nothing bad, what followed on the other hand was. The flyer had starting prizes listed for slaves by race. Wasn't there a Marine base on this Island? How could the Authorities allow this to happen right under their noses?
Rayleigh warned me that some shady things were happening on Sabaody with the marines either turning a blind eye or being a part of it. But this, open slavery was not what I expected he hinted at.
I balled my hand holding the flyer into a fist and scrunched up the flyer in the process. Damn, could I really bring myself to look away?
No, I couldn't. Not back then when I was working for Coil and I wouldn't start now. I smoothed out the Flyer and memorized the description written on the backside on how to reach the Human auctioning house. Given the name, they weren't even trying to hide what they were doing there.
I threw the flyer away and started my trek towards Groove 1. Standing on top of a hill I had my first glance at the human auctioning house. It was a large circular building with the word human written on it.
I could make out no small number of armed guards around the perimeter, and I could sense more people from deep within the building. Given the low numbers I must have arrived prior to the beginning of the auction, this gave me some options.
First of all, I needed some reconnaissance, for this I emitted a Wave of Haoshoki Haki. It was weak enough that no human, not even accomplished Haki users should be able to detect what I did, but it was strong enough to crush the will of every insect within the vicinity and put them under my control.
By accessing their senses, I was able to get a complete picture of the layout of the building and its surroundings. I made out a second entrance on the backside of the building. It was mostly out of view and only protected by two guards; with them was a man with long silver hair, a cleft chin, a short stubble beard, and mustache. He wore a purple coat, pink scarf, and a tall yellow hat with a flower pattern and was walking up and down irritated.
He was apparently an impatient fellow and the way his company stiffened, whenever his head turned their way, made me suspect he was the one in charge and probably prone to lashing out in some fashion.
I grinned at that — Seems like I found the one I needed to have a little chat with.
I reached into my bag and took out my mask. The last missing part to complete my late Skitter costume, armored bug shell panels all over to protect my vitals. I had forgone the small cape I used to hide my bugs under and replaced it with a heavy hooded coat that reached down to my ankles. I put the mask on and pulled the hood over my head.
I felt a moment of reminiscence standing there clad in a costume seconds away from entering the stage. I hope my debut in this world goes better than it did in the last. With this thought in mind, I vanished on top of the hill and reappeared carried by short Soru assisted movement in the middle of them.
A short and targeted burst of Haki later and the three people were under my control. Usually, I would have shown more restraint in using this, in essence, master power on sentient beings. But I couldn't bring myself to think of people facilitate and conducting human trafficking as such. They had it coming if you asked me.
I withdrew just enough of my control from the guy with the funny hat, to allow his personality to surface and him to regain a semblance of control over his faculties and his body. Just enough to answer questions and follow orders but not enough for him to regain his agency. The state I put him in had some similarities to hypnosis and for all intents and purposes, he was nothing but a slave to serve my every whim until I saw fit to release him from my control.
A fitting fate to end up this way for someone like him. There was some temptation to turn the tables on him; to leave him in this state but ultimately thought better of it. It was prudent to hide the real scope of my abilities for as long as possible, something in hindsight I should have done when I started out as a cape. I could have gotten away with pretending to be a changer for quite some time, hiding my squishy self like Manton did. My shortcomings when it came to understanding and generating speech could have been overcome with the generous use of modern technology.
But here right now, this meant I couldn't allow for there to be any witnesses. Not only to hide my abilities but also to fly under the radar, it wouldn't be advantageous to earn a bounty on my first day back.
"What is your name?" I demanded to know from him.
"Disco," he uttered.
"Open the door and send all the guards outside. Tell them you don't want to be disturbed," I ordered. He took out some keys and opened the door. I heard him through my bugs inside repeating what I assigned him to do verbatim. He wasn't questioned once, one of the drawbacks if you surround yourself with yes-men unable to think for themselves.
Not that I could complain in this situation, since it makes it all so much easier and I don't need to soil my hands.
When I was sure they were all gone I followed him inside.
"Give me a summary of everything you have here aside from the slaves, starting with the most valuable items in descending order," I said.
"We have acquired four unidentified devil-fruits, a few crates of sea-stone, and a large assortment of jewels." He said and then started to list things considered contraband. He eventually came to rare species his suppliers got their hands on; nothing held my interest until he said in his monotone voice bar of any feeling "Fate-Spider".
"Hold on," I interjected. "What is a Fate-Spider?"
"According to legend, this spider has the power to change fate itself, until now, its existence could never be confirmed. But its appearance matches those found in an ancient tome depicting mythical creatures." He explained.
"Show it to me," I said and followed him into a spacious room full of crates. On top of some of them were cages filled with all kinds of different animals. He brought me to the back of the room and removed a white cloth from a cage.
I was immediately entranced by whatever it was I laid my eyes upon. The Spider was just a few centimeters in length perched in the middle of its net, which had the same silver coloration as the spider itself. She had eight eyes arrayed on her head with another eye of a different color and shape sitting at the center of its head. The deep crimson color of this ninth eye observed me carefully, and I couldn't shake the feeling that it looked at much more than just my outward appearance.
We stared at each other for quite some time until suddenly the red-eye closed and the shiver than ran down my spine disappeared.
The spider crawled towards the edges of the cage and stuck out one of its legs. I interpreted it as an invitation and removed the glove of my right hand and touched it with my no longer protected finger.
I had done this millions of times, fusing with a spider. For some reason, this time was different, like none before. I was thrown in a whirlpool of memories coalescing into utter chaos, overlapping and bleeding into each other.
I saw Alexandria pouring juice over my head, Emma fighting against Behemoth, and many more confusing scenes. But there was more; I saw a case 53 that reminded me of a manta-ray destroying ships with water acting at her behest. A group of girls crowding and laughing at - no - with me. Before I could make more sense of what I saw, it was over, and the only thing that remained was a burning sensation on my forehead.
What was that? Could it be that the ability of this spider was something (else) than advertised? What did it even mean the spider can change fate? What was fate? Was it not a mental construct created to help us cope and explain unlikely or unwanted events that happen in our lives and accredit those a greater meaning?
Going a step further with this, wouldn't we inevitably end up believing our lives to be predetermined? Despite my experiences with precognition, I couldn't subscribe to such a world view. What would be the point of life in such a case?
But then what was it that I just witnessed, a prophecy? A view of a potential future of just my mind playing tricks on me by hashing many different memories together into something I wasn't able to identify and distinguish the various sources it originated from?
I took stock of my surroundings with my bugs. I noticed how different groups of people slowly started converging on the building. I lost more time than I thought.
I refrained from moving the bugs into a better position to get a look at the people. I didn't want to risk someone with acute senses to pick up on their unusual behavior and left them in place.
Still, some groups were close enough that I could overhear some snippets of what they said to each other.
"Come on Marco, don't be such a downer. You always said you wouldn't mind a devil fruit. And at the first real shot to get one you try chicken out? What's wrong with you?" The owner of a deep voice said.
"That's not it, I just wanted to earn it, not buy it in an auction." was the response he received from someone I duped Marco in my head.
"Hahaha," the deep-voiced man sheepishly laughed. "The money you buy it with was hard-earned wasn't it?"
You see - then there is no difference, and you are in luck the devil fruits on auctioned off aren't identified. So it is pretty much the same as if you had found it on some lone island."
At the same time, I overheard another group talking.
"So sister, what kind of slave do you want this time? Another Merfolk or more Humans perhaps even a pirate?" a muffled male voice asked.
"No, they bore me too much," was the answer he received by an equally muffled female voice. "Especially Pirates at first they always think so highly of themselves, but after you amputated a few limbs they lose all bite and just vegetate all day. For once, I want some toys which aren't so easily broken and last me for a while. It is such a waste of my time having to replace them constantly instead of actually playing with them."
Disgusting -
I was about to leave when my gaze fell upon a chest. I felt drawn to it. I pointed at it.
"What's in there?" I demanded to know from Disco.
"The Devil Fruits."
"Open it," I commanded.
After I heard the lock clack open Disco stepped back. I saw four fruits lying on soft cushions in front of me, and every single one of them was emitting a different colored aura, something which I had never seen before. Neither had Disco since this aura was completely absent from his senses, I piggybacked on.
Was the fate-spider responsible for this? Some kind of thinker ability?
I decided it could wait for the question to be answered and took the fruits out of the chest and carefully placed them into my backpack.
I had a nagging feeling; that I was overlooking something; not everything I noticed did add up. When my thoughts returned to the slaves, the missing part became obvious, who was responsible for capturing them? What I sensed from some of the prisoners made it awfully clear that all the Guards combined wouldn't have stood a chance against some of them.
So this whole operation must be under the patronage of someone or an organization capable of getting the slaves but with enough political cloud for the marines to look the other way. How else could it be explained for this to happen on an island with a marine base in broad daylight? They handed out flyers, or is the connection even closer than that?
For just a moment I wished, that there would be PRT instead of the Marines here. At least they, for the most part, were just incompetent and not accomplices.
"Who is the one behind this slave auction?" I asked.
"We operate under the aegis of Joker the alter ego of the Pirate Donquixote Doflamingo." was the answer provided by Disco.
A pirate - then why wasn't this business closed a long time ago.
Flaunting this slave auction on a Marine controlled island should bring you the undivided attention of the law, which the Marines are tasked to enforce.
The only way this could be explained, was by them turning a blind eye - The question was why?
What did they gain by allowing this right in their backyard? - Surely, bribing only the local Marine commander that close to their HQ couldn't be sufficient to hide an operation of that magnitude.
The possible answers were endless - even back home, the Protectorate and PRT and police turned a blind eye to the human-trafficking Lung was involved in.
In a roundabout way, this confirmed everything Shakky told me about the world-government. On one hand preaching about justice and on the other, turning a blind eye to when it suited them.
What significance had the misfortune of a few weighted against the greater good? It is always the same old story, every action, no matter how cruel or vicious, could be justified for the greater good.
It was one thing to be told about it, but to witness it first hand was something else. It was time to make my displeasure known.
"I want you to release all the Slaves," I ordered. Disco turned around and left towards the prison cells.
I slung the bag over my shoulder and took another look around. I suspected, given the average strength of the slaves I sensed, that the Human auction house would be out of business in a few more minutes. Therefore I decided, they wouldn't have any need for their funds contrary to me.
I found pretty much everything imaginable in those crates. It wasn't an easy choice to make on what to take with me. I settled on the jewels, gold and other items were just too cumbersome and large to carry around in large quantities. Not to forget that leaving with a huge bag full of stuff would look suspicious and I wanted to avoid scrutiny not attract it. This was exactly why I took the jewels and left the rest behind. Since I was fairly certain they were worth the most in relation to their size and weight.
I was about finished with stuffing the 3rd satchel bag full of precious gems when the huge slave Disco just freed from his collar punched him hard. Given the lack of sensory input I received from him and the disappearance of his aura, I doubted he survived it.
With all three satchel bags slung over my shoulder, I returned into the hallway. The previously silent area was vibrant with activity, with all the former slaves being free and I found myself in the middle of a crowd.
From what I observed, it could be divided into three categories.
There were the ones hesitant and frightened, not trusting the whole situation suspecting a trap, thinking themselves a moment away to be ushered back into their cells. They barely set a foot outside, not even willing to hope in fear of ending up disappointed.
Another group was exhilarated to be out of their cells, their newly regained freedom conjuring smiles on their faces.
Then there was the third group, most of them battle-hardened, carefully taking in the situation and already planning their next move. It was easy to see that they fought an internal battle asking themselves should they flee or risk their new won freedom for payback.
I also noticed, that not all the slaves had been freed from their shackles. I could make out some still in the process to remedy this situation.
Although I didn't hide, was armed, masked and my clothes weren't in tatters, I wasn't given a second thought, despite more than one person taking notice of me. No one reacted to my presence, something that had had to change. I needed them to listen but was unwilling to shout over the volume they generated.
I would have whistled if I weren't so bad at it. Therefore a sharp clap of my hands had to suffice to get the attention of everyone present. It was loud, like a gunshot, and echoed throughout the hallway. Suffice to say it had the intended effect. All eyes ended up trained on me, with every sound being silenced in the wake of it. Most even stilled all their movement, not knowing what to expect from me.
"Listen - As we speak the auction house is filling with potential buyers. On my way in, I took out the guards at the back entry. If you want to get out of here without being seen, take that as an exit. If you then keep walking straight away from the building, it will serve as cover and block the view of your escape from them. On your way out, I recommend making a stop in the big room down the hallway, it happens to be full of weapons and gold. Take with you what you like, but I suggest you do it fast, and only as much as you can comfortably carry because it is just a matter of time until it is discovered that you all are free."
After I said my piece there was a slight pause, in which they probably tried to process the information I relayed. Until finally one of them built up enough courage to speak.
"Who are you?" He asked.
Good question, I was masked up so giving out my real name was out of the question and would defeat the whole purpose of the mask. The cape names I called myself at one point or another didn't feel right now more so than ever. Since I was notoriously bad at naming things and being put on the spot like that didn't exactly inspire my creativity, I simply said.
"Call me Queen, if you must call me something."
On second thought, it wasn't so bad a name, not only because it emphasized my power without really doing so, but was similar to Rayleigh epithet the Dark King. If I couldn't reasonably repay the debt I owed them, at least with this name association I could express my thanks, in a roundabout way honoring my teacher. I was sure they would like that - quite a lot in fact.
It helped, that I never really cared about, which name I was given and went by and neither do most others. What was important was the reputation you forged while wearing it, nothing else.
"How did you get Disco to free us?" Another one asked, hiding behind some others.
"Let's just say I convinced him, that it was in his best interest to do exactly what I asked of him." I nonchalantly answered with a shrug.
Immediately talking across broke out with most of them following my advice and moving down the hallway to take some riches with them before leaving. Apparently, not everybody was happy with the turn of events, because someone else shouted above the noise, trying to drown it out.
He was a well-built guy a head taller than me. Tattoos littered his hairless body and head. He possessed one of the strongest presences in the room and it was clear he was used to giving orders.
"That's it, they drag you out of your homes, kidnap you from your ships, defeated you in battle humiliated you, and your response to this is to chicken out, to run away like fucking cowards."
He paused for effect.
"Go ahead - But remember the only one to blame come tomorrow is you; When you wake up screaming from a nightmare when you end up constantly asking yourself will they come for me again. When you end up scared of your own shadows for the rest of your lives. Because on the day you were given the opportunity to pay them back, to make sure they won't ever come after you or anyone ever again, you chose to run away like the cowards you are instead of fighting against them, to make them pay for what they did to you."
I looked into their faces, and I saw no small number of them hesitating, pondering his words.
"So who is with me?" he roared.
I really didn't like where this was going, but seeing the newly inspired conviction on the majority of them I doubted I could dissuade them from their undertaking, not in a timely manner. I frankly had no intention of being around when this situation inevitably got out-of-control and I wasn't willing to save them from their own stupidity, I restored their freedom, and this included allowing them to make their own decisions. Idiotic as they may be.
All of them passed me on their way to the storage room, most of them to fetch weapons.
I was about to turn around and leave the way I came when I noticed that three presences in one of the cells hadn't moved the whole time. There was a fourth one nearing them, with every inch it got closer the other three grew more agitated. I cursed the fact, that I used most of the bugs to tag or stay near the guards in the other rooms, and what little I had left here were slow ones with bad senses.
I frowned, I walked towards the end of the hallway and came upon an opened heavy steel door. When I reached the door hinges, I came to a stop behind a man of average height. He was brandishing a weapon in one hand and in the other he held one of the keys. His focus was entirely centered upon the occupants of the room, which was why he didn't notice my arrival despite me not even attempting to hide it.
"I knew it," he said with a sickening voice" the real beauties wouldn't be confined with the rest of us." He gave of a demented chuckle and took a step forward while taking a lick from his knife. Clearing my view of three scared to death girls no older than twelve.
"Lucky me, I get to taste you first."
What I saw then was something I hoped of never having to witness again - children cowering in fear - unpleasant memories tried to make themselves known. I suppressed them as good as I could and used the guy in front of me as a momentary relief of my anger.
I moved closer and put my right fist through his torso. He had enough time to lower his gaze to take a look at my fist protruding out the place his heart should have been located until he slumped down like a puppet with its string cuts. I extracted my hand and let him fall down in a lifeless heap at my feet. I reached down and ripped his shirt from him to have something to clean the blood and viscera from my costume.
I took a step forward, and they backed off from me, trying their best to get away even though the wall they were backed against didn't allow for it. I stopped, knowing full well what effects my appearance had on people after Glenn made it clear; by showing me a video of myself during a fight against the PRT and outright compared me to one of the Slaughterhouse 9.
Back then, I didn't fully believe him. After all, no one ran away from me screaming, and neither were they shitting their pants. What I overlooked was that those I confronted were trained professionals and other capes who constantly saw battles. Seeing what reaction I elicited from others was an eye-opener.
I couldn't blame them. I was a scary figure; A bug-themed mask, a huge sword strapped to my back, I didn't even need to make use of to dispose of this guy. Standing before them in a bad lit cell, with the only lighting coming from the hallway giving me an aura of brightness increasing the contrast to my dark costume, I probably looked like a monster right out of a Horror Movie to them.
No wonder, they panicked.
With my left hand, I removed my hood and then my mask. My black curly hair fell free and framed my face. I waited a few seconds to allow their eyes to adjust to the new brightness of their cell and then slowly got closer to them, my hands raised, showing them the palms of my hands in a de-escalating manner.
The three girls were huddled together, the face of the girl closest to me was framed by two pigtails formed from her straight black, and I was certain would grow up to be a real beauty. Hiding behind her, grabbing onto for dear life were two other girls. They had by close inspection similar facial characteristics. The girl to her right was slim with brown-orange curled hair, and the girl to her right with a head slightly out of proportion sported green curly hair.
When I was a meter away from them, I used my left hand and angled the sword on my back horizontal in order to crouch down without it scraping against the ground.
With my eyes now level with theirs, I softly said.
"You don't have to be afraid. I'm here to help you."
I slowly tried to reach for the shackles of the black-haired girl and all three of them flinched back. I halted my movement immediately and reassured them.
"I won't hurt you I promise."
Only after they heard me say that they slowly started to relax. They were still alert but most of the fear left their bodies.
I resumed my hand motion and this time they didn't shy away and held their ground. I enclosed my hands around her iron shackles and with the exertion of a little strength, it crumbled under my grip freeing the black-haired girl's wrist first.
Their eyes became wide like saucers until they schooled their expressions and offered up their remaining shackles without prompting to me. After I removed them also I stood up again.
There was something pleading in their eyes I couldn't deprive myself of. My hesitation prompted the black-haired girl to speak.
"You are strong. Are you a Pirate Onee-sama?" She asked.
Being called Onee-sama how did that happen? Then I saw the admiration they held for me in their faces.
"Depends on your definition of a Pirate, I would say." I certainly was no law-abiding citizen.
She grinned at my response.
"That's what a Pirate would say." She paused for a moment thinking about something. "Can we come with you? Please. We will be good I promise."
Why would she want to associate with a Pirate even going so far as to want to accompany them? Sure I saved them, but that alone couldn't be the reason. She gave off the vibe of an intelligent girl and her request wasn't spontaneous there was some thought behind it. I was about to get to the bottom of this when I sensed how most of the revenge obsessed former slaves broke down the door to the audience and started to attack them.
This solidified my decision not to try to stop those slaves from walking to their deaths. If taking revenge was more important to them than rescuing those girls - at least some, if not all of them had to know they were still here - they didn't deserve to be saved.
I pondered the situation, could I take them with me? They were just kids, even under the assumption they no longer had a home to return to should I? They might slow me down, draw attention. Considering the alternatives, I also couldn't leave them on their own. I could bring them to Shakky, surely she would help them, and they would be safer with her than with me.
But then there was Robin to consider; She might appreciate some company the same age when I found her. I doubted she will have an easy time trusting me, an adult for that matter. So they could come in handy.
I stopped myself there; seeing people, even young girls as assets was something I really should stop doing didn't I learn anything with Dinah. I was tempted to continue what earned Coil a bullet between the eyes and, now I was doing it again.
Besides, there was something else I disregarded till now. The three girls each had a similar colored aura than three of the devil fruits I had with me. I didn't think I could ignore it, even though I would have liked nothing more. It had to mean something, and it might not be the best of ideas to separate from them before I knew what it was.
"I might be inclined to allow you to come with me, but only if you promise to do exactly what I tell you to do when I do," I impressed upon them. In response, they just eagerly nodded their heads.
"Good, in that case. My name is Taylor. What are yours?" I inquired.
"My name is Boa Hancock." said the black-haired girl she then pointed to her left at the green-haired girl "and this is my little sister Boa Sandersonia" and then pointed to her right at the brown-orange girl "and this is our youngest sister Boa Marigold."
Authors Note:
Izanami: she is the first female as well as the goddess of creation and death.
Some of my thoughts regarding:
Human Auction Building: Via canon we know, that it is under the protectorate of Doflamingo, and in the Wiki, it is stated, that he withdrew his direct involvement after establishing it a few years later. I can only guess this happened around the time he conquered Dressrossa -
For the timeline — Doflamingo at this point is 21 years old. He attacks Dressrossa when he is 31, and 41 by the time he is taken down by Luffy in canon.
Since he operated under the name Joker, whenever he did something the World Government might take exception, too. It probably wasn't widely known, even in the early days, that he had something to do with the auctions.
And I suspect, most of his occupation during that time had something to do with acquiring the slaves in some fashion and protecting the operation overall, and not have direct contact with the buyers. (would defeat the whole Joker identity-thing)
Furthermore, I think, that after he had established to the world for there to be consequences for anyone interfering in this business, it is more than likely he wasn't around all the time ... he had other things to do as underworld broker ...
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Chapter 07 - Off to the Sea
Chapter 07: Off to the Sea (Late Winter 1505)
"Stay close," I said to my new companions, and they did just that. Hancock took my left hand in her right, and with her left hand, dragged her sister Sandersonia along with us. Sandersonia followed the example set by her big sister and did the same with Marigold. Outwardly we must have looked like a strange duck-family, I the mother with my three little ducklings.
I lead our procession outside, past plundered storage rooms.
I was glad, that not all of those I had freed sought revenge against their would-be buyers, against those People supporting the practice of slavery with their money.
We saw more than just one small group of people carrying bags of riches away from the building. Heeding my warnings, they walked away from the building in a straight line, cautious to keep it in between them and those who could see them.
Not that it mattered anyway since all the Guards were running inside
to combat the insurrection.
I refrained from putting my mask back on. The majority of those fleeing were otherwise occupied and wouldn't waste a second thought on me.
Besides, I banked on being with the girls would help dissuade the notion to associate my unmasked self with my masked one, even though I was carrying the same oversized weapon and wore the same clothes.
I was careful to keep our walking speed steady and slow, to not convey the impression we have done something wrong. Only those fearing repercussions run, after all.
Despite us being quite a distance away from the building and the sounds of all the fighting was only reaching us muffled. The three sisters still winced at irregular intervals coinciding with an aura being extinguished. Marigold even tried to cover her ears in an attempt to keep the sensory impressions away.
"You can feel them." I stated, "the voices being silenced."
The two younger sisters nodded.
"Not always," Sandersonia said. "We are still learning how to do that all time. At times it is unreliable what we sense."
So they are in the beginning stages of their Kenbunshoku Haki training. Who were these kids?
I had to do something. First, they were enslaved and now had to witness deaths more intimately, than looking into one's eyes when life left them could ever be. Were they spared nothing -
"Close your eyes and concentrate on my voice, only mine. Forget about all the others. They don't matter."
I looked at their faces, strained with concentration. "Can you feel the calm and steady flow?"
"Yes, but there is something else beneath the surface," Sandersonia said.
"Don't go looking below the top layer," I cautioned. "Slow your breathing... Good, now start withdrawing your attention from your surroundings, focus only on yourself - ignore everything else. Try to feel your own aura, the uncontrolled ebbs, and spikes and slowly but surely try to soften the surface. Take control of the flow and pacify the raging."
I could sense their aura calm. "Yes, just like that. Keep it that way." They did a remarkable job. "Now, open your eyes slowly without losing the control you established. Good, very good you are all naturals at this." I wasn't exaggerating in the slightest.
I met all their eyes in turn and was satisfied to notice their newly found hold on their Haki. It should keep them occupied, and hopefully, they would miss the worst of it.
There was an explosion, smoke went up from the building, but they didn't waver. Good, I slightly increased our pace. As I was trying to make some sense out of the scraps of talking, my fast dwindling numbers of insects in the building could make out.
"Kill those Fuckers, leave none of them alive." A big and burly man barked out while skewering one of the guards I controlled. When the weapon was pulled free, blood started to splatter on the ground, and moments later, his vision darkened. The other guard under my control had died earlier in the explosion.
That meant no loose ends.
The leader of an organized group of the few remaining guards shouted.
"Surrender Prisoners, and you won't be harmed," mumbling, under his breath, he added "much." While they encircled a few of the slaves.
"Where the hell is Disco?" Another guard mumbled, moments before his brain was splatter over the mostly empty seats in the auction hall.
"Look a Tenryūbito." remarked a scar littered man among a group of slaves. They immediately jumped over the few rows separating them and disposed of his personal guard.
One of his companions roughly grabbed the fishbowl wearing man - which apparently was a Tenryūbito, a world noble or as they are also called a celestial Dragon; The descendants of the former royal families who founded the world government - and pushed him down into a seat.
"Without us in shackles, surrounded by guards you suddenly aren't so high and mighty."
"Yeah, where has all the bravado gone." taunted a one-eyed slave.
"We are gonna show you exactly how it feels to looked down upon," said the scarred man with a wide grin, he held out his sword, and the others around him reacted to his cue. Two grabbed the shoulders of the fishbowl man and held him in place. He then pressed the sword against the plump stomach of fishbowl-guy, and slowly increased the strength he put into the sword.
"What do you think you are doing ... you commoner scum ... how dare you to touch me." he threatened, he didn't notice the smiles on their faces growing larger at hearing his words. Knowing full well all his threats, at this moment, were empty.
"I will have your heads," he said panicked, the situation slowly he found himself in slowly dawning on him. He reached for one of his pockets - an action the ones holding him in a place deemed not important enough that it warranted their interference - and then pressed something, a button perhaps?
I couldn't be sure with only access to Kenbunshoku Haki and a few bugs. But I had a bad feeling about this.
"I doubt it, and even if you should manage it, you certainly won't be alive to witness it," he promised, his voice overflowing with glee. Any response fishbowl guy might have had, died on his lips when the sword penetrated his suit and was buried to the hilt in his guts.
"Oioi Marco we should go right now shit is about to hit the fan." said a middle-aged tattoed man to the person beside him.
"What do you mean?" asked Marco, whose head a combined with his haircut had a strong resemblance to a pineapple.
"Shit, they really dared," Marco's middle-aged companion said as he pointed at the corpse of the fishbowl guy.
"Fuck" was the mumbled response from Marco and his other companion - those three being the most powerful guys present in the auction hall.
After a short silent conversation, they sprung into action. They stood up and were about to run when several fighting groups of Slaves and Guards moved into their way. This slowed down their progress considerably, even though they were stronger than their opposition it took them time to fight their way through them.
Time that had just run out, at the edges of my range which extended far beyond the island I sensed a very strong presence closing in fast on our position. It would be here long before the mobilizing marines would be moving out from their base.
I stopped on a small hill over a kilometer away from the building. I turned around and looked in the direction of the nearing presence. The three sisters followed my gaze.
For a short while, we squinted our eyes in the hopes to get a clearer picture of the small dot that got bigger with every second. Until we finally could make out a black-haired man, wearing white clothes adorned with insignia flapping in the wind was a white Haori, the most defining feature was the braided goatee that reached down to his mid-section.
Moments later, I sensed Marco and his friends tense within the building, but there were others, including the most powerful non-suppressed presence on the island doing the same and then sprinting at high speeds towards the human auction building.
The man, clearly a marine, if his attire was anything to go by, stopped midair. Using Geppou, he was hovering in the air right above the building - as if searching or waiting for something - only to suddenly launching himself with glass shattering Geppo down on it. He went through the ceiling like it was wet tissue paper, and the resounding impact blasted the whole building to pieces, which were flung them across the entire stretch of green surrounding it.
We weren't left unscathed either. I had to steady the girls, or they would have landed on their assess when the shockwave reached us. Many of the fleeing slaves weren't so lucky, and in part, fell down hard.
After the dust had settled, Marco and his two friends were lying buried under chunks of debris. They were the only ones with the means to protect themselves. Everybody else had just died. What was left of their bodies was mingled with the debris littering the area.
The marine was crouched over a sole body lying on the floor, left untouched by his impact with the ground. He cradled it in his arms and proceeded to lower it to the ground, which allowed me to identify it as the fishbowl guys corpse.
He slowly rose to his full height zeroing in on the place Marco and his friends excavated themselves and pushed the last part of debris away to free themselves.
A booming voice resounded through the area.
"YOU!" originating from the marine.
He disappeared in a Soru only to be stopped inches away from pounding Marco head into the ground by a new arrival on the scene. The resulting shockwave was of their clash was even stronger than the previous one, splitting the ground around their position in a clear divide. This time the girls were prepared and weathered it by themselves.
He was a hulking bare-chested guy, with a large tattoo on his back facing us. The tattoo depicted a skull with an upwards curved large mustache with crossed bones behind the skull. - Clearly a Jolly Roger -
Whitebeards if I remembered Rayleigh's who is who of the most important figures right.
The newcomer screamed something to Marco, and his companies, something I couldn't make out. Since non of my bugs survived the house being blasted to kingdom come. During all this, the marine started to overpower him despite him being no smaller in statue.
He had visible trouble until he slowly transformed. He got bigger and stronger. His skin turned black, and he grew a Y-shaped horn atop of his slightly bowed head. The horn grew around the torso of the marine, and before he could overcome his surprise, the Whitebeard pirate tossed him over his head with the horns help.
The marine twisted around in midair and landed unharmed.
Marco tried to argue back until another harsh response silenced him. Without further delay, he and his friends scrambled to their feet and ran.
There was a small lull in the fight, during which the two remaining talked to each other. It ended the moment the marine tossed his Haori away and ripped the buttons of his jacket open, and fastened it around his waist.
He then started to grow in size, too. There was a glow as his whole body became golden, and the proportions of his body changed. His torso and arms became larger, oversized in comparison to the rest of his body.
When he finished his transformation. He looked like a golden Budha statue, another Zoan-type user, a mythical one.
I had seen enough, the conclusion of the battle foregone.
"Let's go," I said to the girls.
"But Onee-sama, what about the fight?" Sandersonia asked with big eyes, clearly wanting to see how it would end. Her sisters shared the sentiment.
"The marine will win," I said fully convinced of my words. "He is far stronger, there wasn't even a need for him to use his devil fruit to secure his victory."Crestfallen of having the outcome of the battle spoiled. They reluctantly turned away from the fight. "The Kabuto-Bug guy is clearly buying time for his friends to escape, and it is in our best interest to be far away from here by the time they are finished. I'm really not keen on answering any questions."
"Right, you are a pirate after all," Marigold said.
We weren't the only ones, thinking it a good idea to be anywhere but here. The remaining slaves still in the process of fleeing increased their speed; in fact, some started to leave behind gold and other riches to that end.
"Where are we going Onee-sama?" Sandersonia wondered.
"To the shipyards," I answered. "Hopefully, we can get a passage to another island, or should the opportunity arise, buy a ship for ourselves."
"You don't have a ship?" Hancock asked incredulously. "But you are a pirate." She squinted her eyes, trying to get the two facts to make sense to her.
"Clearly, it must have been heavily damaged in a battle, so she had to abandon it." was the stern conclusion Marigold, the youngest of them, drew.
The other two accepted her statement with an "ahh" - that to me sounded like `why didn't we think of that.´
"Good guess but wrong," I said and burst their bubble.
All three of them looked at me bewildered.
"Did someone steal it?" Sandersonia asked.
In response, she received a light smack on her head by her oldest sister.
"Stupid! Who do you think could manage to steal from Onee-Sama." Sandersonia looked apologetic at me and Hancock, who chastised her as if she wanted to atone for a grave sin she committed.
"No one stole my ship," I dryly stated. "Because I never owned one, to begin with."
I received three deadpan stares as a result.
"But... but what about your crew? How did they, did you come to this island?" Sandersonia asked churning.
"A friend took me with him on his way back to the island, and I don't have a crew," I explained.
"No ship, no crew you are no pirate at all," Marigold said matter of fact.
"Well, I never said I'm pirate, just that some might call me that," I noted. "If you think a pirate needs a crew and a ship, then I'm not one. At least not yet. We are, after all, on our way to rectify one if not both of your requirements."
I paused for a moment and wondered,
"you are aware, that having a crew and a ship alone does not make you a pirate?"
"Of course," Marigold remarked. "You also have to be strong. Everybody knows that." Her sisters vigorously nodded her heads to back up this statement.
"Which means you are gonna be full-fledged pirate, in a few minutes." Hancock swooned, and I could have sworn her eyes sparkled with excitement while she said that. I shook my head at that thought must have been the light.
"Say Onee-sama since you haven't got a crew can we..." she peered at her two younger sisters and received a nod from them. "You know, since you already took us away from those bad people," she pussyfooted around, obviously not sure how to word whatever she wanted to ask of me.
She paused one last moment nervously twirling one of her braids only and suddenly blurted out.
"canwejoinyourpiratecrewprettyplease? – Onee-sama."
"Can we, please!" her two sisters pleaded in unison.
"We will be the bestest crew the grand-line has ever seen." Hancock added full of conviction.
"Not so fast," I tried to slow down their enthusiasm. "What about your family, your home? I'm sure they are worried about you."
The three sisters abruptly stopped in their tracks.
"We will never get back home." Marigold said, "we don't know how."
"I'm sure we can find out together." I tried to placate them.
Tearing up Sandersonia said
"You don't understand, only the ship of the Empress can reach Amazon Lily."
"Why?" I asked, "what is so special about her ship?"
"It is pulled by venomous sea snakes ensuring that no Sea Kings dares to come near them," Hancock explained. "This way the Kuja pirates traversed the calm-belt since ancient times."
I could see why that would be a problem. It didn't just mean we would need to find an eternal pose for the island - something that given the near impossibility to reach the island was beyond rare or didn't exist in the first place.
Rayleigh said, that in order to create an eternal pose - a compass that always points in the direction of a specific island - required minerals from the island it was pointing towards.
Another option might be to seek out this Empress when she is out and about. Since the Empress and her people were pirates, I didn't think it would be an easy endeavor. The island was clearly used as their base of operation, depending on their numbers. They wouldn't want to have it exposed, and the easiest way to ensure that was to keep the location a secret to the best of their abilities.
If I were in their shoes, every time I left the island; I would travel quite a distance through the calm belt in one direction and emerge from there into the grand-line. It would make the undertaking to discover their island a lot harder. Because this way, they could warp the data others could gather by reported sightings of their ship.
So that any attempt in using this data to narrow down the possible area where to find the island would be more than just faulty. Furthermore, with a little luck, the Sea-Kings would take care of those searching long before they even get close to the correct location.
After all, just because somebody could win one fight against them, did not automatically mean the same would be true for ten or a hundred of such engagements. Engagements such a prolonged search would ultimately lead to.
It also meant, for those rare crews who were able to traverse the calm-belt in relative safety that finding the island without help could take years on end. You would need to have a serious grudge against them, possess near-unlimited resources, or be determined some other way to attempt such a thing.
"Do you know about an island the Empress frequently visits or an area she likes to sojourn in?" I asked them.
Hancock vehemently shook her head.
"Empress Onee-sama always said, to never take a route twice, that to protect our tribe, we had to keep the enemies guessing."
"I suspected as much," I said. Somebody knew what she was doing. "Still, this doesn't mean you won't see your home again. It just means we have to work for it. Until then, I would like to offer you three spots in my pirate crew."
With that, my decision was made. I would take them with me.
Three beaming smiles adorned their faces.
"Come on, we've got a ship to catch." I put out my hand, and Hancock didn't hesitate to reach for it.
We resumed our trek to the docks. I could sense the fightback at the auction building came to a close with the outcome I predicted. Marines given the orderly way the people I sensed moved, streamed there. Meanwhile, Marco and his friends were leaving the island in great haste. With no one pursuing them, not even that Mythical Zoan type user, content with the unconscious body at his feet.
"Can I be the Vice-Captain of our Crew?" Hancock asked.
Her question surprised me, I didn't even consider the position to be filled when I accepted them as part of the crew more at a (power-induced) whim than an actual plan. But it made sense to split the responsibilities up between us. It might do them some good to have something else to do than, to reminiscence about the events that brought them here and that they might never meet their family again. Something for them to do that kept them occupied, and could take their minds off those things, which was why I decided to play along.
"I don't know, do you think you are qualified? After all such a position comes with great responsibility." I questioned her, trying my best to hide a smirk.
"Of course, Vice-captain is like being the big sister of the crew, taking care of them and protect them. I'm good at being a big sister, Onee-sama. You can leave it all to me." She voiced determined.
"It is true," Marigold interjected. "Without our big sister, we would have drowned. If not for her keeping us over water when the strength left us and later on finding the driftwood we clung onto wouldn't be here."
Hancock's mood soured at her sister's good-intentioned attempt to back up her claim. Understandable, because her greatest achievement saving her sister was directly tied to her greatest failing. She couldn't protect them from being captured and nearly being sold into slavery.
"I can do it, you have to believe me Onee-sama." the black-haired girl pleaded with me.
"I know you can, Vice-captain," I said and ruffled her hair.
She beamed at me and proudly and declared.
"I won't disappoint you, Onee-sama."
"As long as you try your best, you won't be able to." I said and turned to her sisters and asked, "what positions do you two intent to fill?"
The question caused them to smile radiantly.
"I always dreamed about becoming a Navigator. To be responsible to bring the ship and the crew safely to their destination. No matter the wind and weather," the green-haired girl proclaimed only to add with more fervor directed at me.
"I will get us wherever you want us to go and back without fail, to every known and unknown place and sea and if nobody has gone there before us I will just find a way. After all, the journey is its own adventure and I will make sure it is an enjoyable one," she promised.
"Oh, we have an explorer in our midst." I grinned at her. "I don't have a problem with naming you our Navigator, but it's a strenuous job, demanding permanent attention to the weather, the course an occupation in which a single mistake can spell the doom of the ship and everybody on it," I warned. "Are you sure you are up for it?"
"Don't worry Onee-sama, Sandersonia Onee-san can read the wind better than even Kagome," Marigold proudly proclaimed.
At my questioning look, Hancock interjected.
"Kagome is the Navigator of Kuja-Pirates. She always said nee-san is a natural-born navigator, a pro-degy."
"Prodigy" I corrected her. "Okay, then I will leave us in your capable Hands, Mrs. Navigator."
My eyes found the youngest of the three sisters, a soft tap from Sandersonia on her back was urge enough to get her to speak.
"I was longing for the day when I was old enough to join the Kuja Pirates. Since the first time, I was given an exotic fruit, which didn't grow on amazon Lily. I couldn't stop wondering what else is out there. What other fruits, vegetables, and animals, and in what way can they be turned into a delicious dish. I wanted to taste cuisine from all over the world and learn to cook the best meals ever." She enthusiastically declared.
This was the most emotions she showed all day, well aside from the fear, that was clearly displayed on her face when we first met. I already suspected them to be stunted somehow. But as it seemed my initial assessment was wrong. It just took her talking about something she genuinely cared about for her to come out of her shell, in which she immediately retreated back after her outburst.
"Oh, we got ourselves a gourmet, too. Well, in that case, you will be responsible for the meals of the crew, and fill the position of chef on our future ship." I declared.
"Understood, Captain." was Marigold curt response.
Shortly after that was settled, we reached the docks. They were busy with activity. Dozen of ships were tethered at the piers extending as far as the eye could see. Goods were loaded on and from the ships by hundreds of people swarming about.
It would have taken us hours to ask our way to the ship, that Shakky recommended I take. The question was, did I still want to. With the girls, I now had a crew, a small one but a crew nonetheless. Furthermore, my visit to the human auction also provided me with the financial means to buy a ship, which would allow for far more autonomy in comparison to being a passenger.
Moreover, I already anticipated that, at one point, probably sooner than later, my own means of transportation would be an absolute necessity in order to retain the flexibility needed to follow the leads to find Robin.
The answer was no – I used a for humans unnoticeable burst of Haoshoki Haki and hijacked all the insects throughout the grove. With access to their senses, I listened in to thousands of conversations, mostly consisting of worthless chatter, hoping to gain the information I was after.
"Why are we waiting here Onee-sama?" Hancock inquired.
"I'm searching for a suitable ship for us," I responded.
"Make sure the ship is fore-and-aft rigged," Sandersonia said.
She had a point, Rayleigh explained the difference between square-rigged and fore-and-aft rigged ships. While square-rigged sails usually allow for higher speeds while running downwind, the fore-and-aft rigged ships with their sails set alongside the keel allowed for a closer haul to the wind. Therefore they provided more maneuverability in general, and also allowed for sailing in no go-zone - where the angle between the wind blowing and the ship steering was too steep - and square-rigged ships just couldn't follow.
This meant our ship needn't necessarily be faster. It just had to be able to sail where others couldn't to lose possible pursuers. I took stock of the ships anchored and to my surprise, most of the ships were square-rigged and if I remembered Rayleigh lectures right such rigged ships were far more common, especially when it came to ships used by the world government manned by marines.
A small smile tucked my lips.
"Seems like it was a good choice to make you the Navigator, Sandersonia. Without you, I might not have thought about it."
Given my ambivalent success in training a team, I learned about positive reinforcement the hard way. And I was not keen on making the same mistakes with them as I did with Theo.
One of my bugs heard "Did you load up all of the supplies?" being asked to a sailor coming from a gaff-rigged cutter. A few bugs confirmed to me that the ship's cargo hold was empty, which was good, because this indicated they weren't expected to return with any.
This meant buying the ship wasn't belated by removing it beforehand and since it was already stooked with supplies it was ready to go.
I didn't know how much time we had until one of the marines got the idea to barricade the island in order to search it for people, who might have some information on what happened back in the auction house. Since I really had no intention of finding out, nor to fight my way from the island. My choice made I gave the ship in question a closer look.
It was sleek, roughly thirty meters long lying low above the water.
It had a mainsail, the so-called gaff sail, that spanned from the boom the horizontal fixture up to the gaff an angled fixture, making the sail a large trapeze above is mounted to the mast it had an additional triangle sail, combined with the first it became a huge triangle.
The mast was situated two thirds the length of the boat away from the stern of the ship, it had two staysails also fixed to it. The first one was fixed halfway to the bow of the ship with another forestay sail fixed all the way to the bow.
The ship had no superstructure placed on deck, no obstacle hindering the wind in any way. It was clear at first glance that it was designed for one thing only - speed and maneuverability.
Despite those being properties I sought in a ship, I was reluctant. The ship was designed to lean into the wind, and all that prevented someone from going overboard was a railing made out of rope that was at knee-height.
If I would have been alone, there would have been no hesitation to make the ship mine. But with the kids and my inability to swim, I was wavering in my decision. They already went overboard once, the very reason they were in this mess in the first place.
Could I risk it? I took my time to take a look at the other ships present. None other was an option; they either were loaded with freight, just arrived and therefore were depleted of provisions, required a lot more manpower to sail than we had, or were simply square-rigged ships. I didn't even consider the scarce few ones, that were outright safety hazards with woodworms drilling holes in their wooden bodies.
With the lack of alternatives, I had no other choice. I had to take this one - well this just meant I had to be vigilant to prevent a repeat of events.
"I found a ship." I reluctantly admitted. "Let's go."
I lead us along a Pier towards the Ship and couldn't help but be glad about how I was able to recreate my old powers with my new ones. Otherwise, I would have never been able to find this ship, hidden behind all those other ships overtowering it, lying meters high above the water with structures and cargo placed on their decks further obstructing sight.
I walked up to a middle-aged white-haired man with leathery skin and deep lines in his features. He was the one overseeing the final preparations the crew undertook to leave port, while he was writing in a small book placed on a wooden crate he was leaning over.
"I want to speak with the captain of this vessel. Do you know where I can find him or her?" I asked him.
"You are speaking with him, names Jack." He said as he gave me, and my companions a once over. "Before you ask we don't take passengers"
"Good to know, but not why I'm here," I said.
"In that case, what can I do for you, Lady?" He asked.
"I want to buy your ship." I simply stated.
"The Sakura isn't for sale." He asserted.
"I doubt that there isn't much not for sale as long as the price is right." I responded, "so what is the price for the ship."
"You are serious," he gruffly stated.
"Yes, indeed I am," I said.
"Why, this one?" He asked "I can see the appeal she is something special one if not the fastest ship docked here at the moment and she is new, this being her second voyage since she was built back in Water 7. But she certainly isn't special enough that she would warrant the interest you show her."
"True, but she is the only ship ready to set sail." He narrowed his eyes at hearing my statement, his suspicion aroused.
"We are in a hurry." I emphasized, "so what does it cost to separate you from her?"
He started to caress his not existent chin beard while thinking over my proposal.
"Well, she was costly to build after a design not often used. There isn't much of value onboard aside from the personal effects of the Crew. But there is the time to consider we undoubtedly will lose finding a new ship or a passage home."
"Nothing, I'm sure which will prevent us from reaching an agreement. Given the right price."
"Right," Jack said, stretching the word. "The Ship cost us two-hundred million, so for two-fifty it's yours."
I removed one Satchel bag full of jewels from my shoulder and showed him the contents.
"Will that be enough?" I asked.
His eyes nearly popped out from their sockets when he saw what was in it. He reached inside the bag and burrowed his hands in the riches. I assumed to verify not only the top layer consisted of genuine articles. After he was satisfied, he removed on gem and bit on it. His eyes immediately lit up and a smile formed on his lips.
"Yes, Yes that will suffice." He said greedily. I closed the bag and handed it over to him. "Men" he shouted, "Clear out all the cabins we are handing over the Sakura to those people."
One of his crew-members probed irritated "Captain?"
"Something wrong with your ears?" He barked.
"No Captain" he stammered back "So you heard my order, why aren't you following it?" He stressed with a dangerous undertone in his voice.
His Crewman knew better than to question it and disappeared below deck following the others.
Jack returned his attention back to me.
"The ship is fully stocked with supplies, tools for replacements sails a few eternal ports. A log pose and a few maps are onboard the ship."
"Good -" was my curt response. It took only a minute for his Crew to return all of them having a seabag slung over their shoulders. One of his Crew carried two, which he placed after he left the ship in front of his Captain. He opened it took a short look and then nodded pleased.
"The ship with everything on is yours, safe travels Stranger, and good luck." Jack wished us and then left together with his Crew, who was still too cowed to ask what just happened.
I turned towards my crew.
"Sandersonia I want you to take a look at the maps and the eternal ports on the ship, make sure they are the real deal. If you are finished with that, take a look at the sails and how to operate them."
"Aye, Aye Captain Onee-sama." She saluted. I shook my head at her antics.
"Marigold, you do the same with the supplies. Check the food, the water, and make sure it is enough to last us to the next stop."
She nodded and went on board the Ship to do just that.
"Hancock I want you to make a list of the other things you find onboard and make sure we have everything that you deem necessary. When you are done I want you to check, that your sisters didn't miss anything."
"Of course, Onee-sama." she beamed at me, pleased to be given the responsibility to oversee the work of the others.
When she also left, I mentally made my own list by watching them with my bugs, of what they found onboard. Not because I didn't trust them, but on the sea, our lives depend on them not doing a half-assed job. I still could quite vividly remember what dying of thirst felt like and I had no intention to suffer it again nor for them to share this experience.
Marigold found more than enough food to last us a long time no wonder the crew we replaced was three times our numbers all adults and Sandersonia found every tool required to navigate a ship under deck. She even strapped the log pose to her wrist, before she returned above deck to join my taking a look at how the ropes are affixed to the sails and to get an idea of how to sail the ship.
A few minutes later the other joined us. Hancock without prompting handed me an extensive list of everything she found on board. I browsed it briefly and was impressed with her love for detail.
"Seems like we are ready to go." I walked over to the helm and ordered.
"Hancock untether the ship, Sandersonia set sail, and while doing so explain to your sisters how it is done."
The response I received was a Unison "Aye, Aye Captain" from the mouths of those three girls.
Sandersonia did a remarkable job in teaching her sisters how to operate the ship and after barely a few minutes the sails were set and I steered the ship out to the sea.
They were a bit slow to follow her directions, but that was nothing some practice, and a few drills couldn't overcome. I was sure to get them to work in perfect tandem in no time. But at least for today, I allowed them to enjoy the warm sun and the pleasant breeze of wind.
Tomorrow on the other hand ...
Authors note:
The Whitebeard crew member with the Kabuto-Bug Zoan-devil Fruit is called Rai "The Kabuto" Amano and is one of the Division commanders of Whitebeard at this time.
I have no sailing experience so everything about sail types etc is something I have solely from Wikipedia research and I honestly got no clue how accurate my description is.
According to One Piece chapter, 331 – second-hand ships bigger than Flying Lamb can easily be bought with a hundred million belly. Therefore I assume a ship like the Sakura, being an unusual design similar to a racing yacht, being longer but sleeker than the Flying Lamb to have a price tag of around 200 Million seems reasonable. Especially since she is essentially brand new.
"Stay close," I said to my new companions, and they did just that. Hancock took my left hand in her right, and with her left hand, dragged her sister Sandersonia along with us. Sandersonia followed the example set by her big sister and did the same with Marigold. Outwardly we must have looked like a strange duck-family, I the mother with my three little ducklings.
I lead our procession outside, past plundered storage rooms.
I was glad, that not all of those I had freed sought revenge against their would-be buyers, against those People supporting the practice of slavery with their money.
We saw more than just one small group of people carrying bags of riches away from the building. Heeding my warnings, they walked away from the building in a straight line, cautious to keep it in between them and those who could see them.
Not that it mattered anyway since all the Guards were running inside
to combat the insurrection.
I refrained from putting my mask back on. The majority of those fleeing were otherwise occupied and wouldn't waste a second thought on me.
Besides, I banked on being with the girls would help dissuade the notion to associate my unmasked self with my masked one, even though I was carrying the same oversized weapon and wore the same clothes.
I was careful to keep our walking speed steady and slow, to not convey the impression we have done something wrong. Only those fearing repercussions run, after all.
Despite us being quite a distance away from the building and the sounds of all the fighting was only reaching us muffled. The three sisters still winced at irregular intervals coinciding with an aura being extinguished. Marigold even tried to cover her ears in an attempt to keep the sensory impressions away.
"You can feel them." I stated, "the voices being silenced."
The two younger sisters nodded.
"Not always," Sandersonia said. "We are still learning how to do that all time. At times it is unreliable what we sense."
So they are in the beginning stages of their Kenbunshoku Haki training. Who were these kids?
I had to do something. First, they were enslaved and now had to witness deaths more intimately, than looking into one's eyes when life left them could ever be. Were they spared nothing -
"Close your eyes and concentrate on my voice, only mine. Forget about all the others. They don't matter."
I looked at their faces, strained with concentration. "Can you feel the calm and steady flow?"
"Yes, but there is something else beneath the surface," Sandersonia said.
"Don't go looking below the top layer," I cautioned. "Slow your breathing... Good, now start withdrawing your attention from your surroundings, focus only on yourself - ignore everything else. Try to feel your own aura, the uncontrolled ebbs, and spikes and slowly but surely try to soften the surface. Take control of the flow and pacify the raging."
I could sense their aura calm. "Yes, just like that. Keep it that way." They did a remarkable job. "Now, open your eyes slowly without losing the control you established. Good, very good you are all naturals at this." I wasn't exaggerating in the slightest.
I met all their eyes in turn and was satisfied to notice their newly found hold on their Haki. It should keep them occupied, and hopefully, they would miss the worst of it.
There was an explosion, smoke went up from the building, but they didn't waver. Good, I slightly increased our pace. As I was trying to make some sense out of the scraps of talking, my fast dwindling numbers of insects in the building could make out.
"Kill those Fuckers, leave none of them alive." A big and burly man barked out while skewering one of the guards I controlled. When the weapon was pulled free, blood started to splatter on the ground, and moments later, his vision darkened. The other guard under my control had died earlier in the explosion.
That meant no loose ends.
The leader of an organized group of the few remaining guards shouted.
"Surrender Prisoners, and you won't be harmed," mumbling, under his breath, he added "much." While they encircled a few of the slaves.
"Where the hell is Disco?" Another guard mumbled, moments before his brain was splatter over the mostly empty seats in the auction hall.
"Look a Tenryūbito." remarked a scar littered man among a group of slaves. They immediately jumped over the few rows separating them and disposed of his personal guard.
One of his companions roughly grabbed the fishbowl wearing man - which apparently was a Tenryūbito, a world noble or as they are also called a celestial Dragon; The descendants of the former royal families who founded the world government - and pushed him down into a seat.
"Without us in shackles, surrounded by guards you suddenly aren't so high and mighty."
"Yeah, where has all the bravado gone." taunted a one-eyed slave.
"We are gonna show you exactly how it feels to looked down upon," said the scarred man with a wide grin, he held out his sword, and the others around him reacted to his cue. Two grabbed the shoulders of the fishbowl man and held him in place. He then pressed the sword against the plump stomach of fishbowl-guy, and slowly increased the strength he put into the sword.
"What do you think you are doing ... you commoner scum ... how dare you to touch me." he threatened, he didn't notice the smiles on their faces growing larger at hearing his words. Knowing full well all his threats, at this moment, were empty.
"I will have your heads," he said panicked, the situation slowly he found himself in slowly dawning on him. He reached for one of his pockets - an action the ones holding him in a place deemed not important enough that it warranted their interference - and then pressed something, a button perhaps?
I couldn't be sure with only access to Kenbunshoku Haki and a few bugs. But I had a bad feeling about this.
"I doubt it, and even if you should manage it, you certainly won't be alive to witness it," he promised, his voice overflowing with glee. Any response fishbowl guy might have had, died on his lips when the sword penetrated his suit and was buried to the hilt in his guts.
"Oioi Marco we should go right now shit is about to hit the fan." said a middle-aged tattoed man to the person beside him.
"What do you mean?" asked Marco, whose head a combined with his haircut had a strong resemblance to a pineapple.
"Shit, they really dared," Marco's middle-aged companion said as he pointed at the corpse of the fishbowl guy.
"Fuck" was the mumbled response from Marco and his other companion - those three being the most powerful guys present in the auction hall.
After a short silent conversation, they sprung into action. They stood up and were about to run when several fighting groups of Slaves and Guards moved into their way. This slowed down their progress considerably, even though they were stronger than their opposition it took them time to fight their way through them.
Time that had just run out, at the edges of my range which extended far beyond the island I sensed a very strong presence closing in fast on our position. It would be here long before the mobilizing marines would be moving out from their base.
I stopped on a small hill over a kilometer away from the building. I turned around and looked in the direction of the nearing presence. The three sisters followed my gaze.
For a short while, we squinted our eyes in the hopes to get a clearer picture of the small dot that got bigger with every second. Until we finally could make out a black-haired man, wearing white clothes adorned with insignia flapping in the wind was a white Haori, the most defining feature was the braided goatee that reached down to his mid-section.
Moments later, I sensed Marco and his friends tense within the building, but there were others, including the most powerful non-suppressed presence on the island doing the same and then sprinting at high speeds towards the human auction building.
The man, clearly a marine, if his attire was anything to go by, stopped midair. Using Geppou, he was hovering in the air right above the building - as if searching or waiting for something - only to suddenly launching himself with glass shattering Geppo down on it. He went through the ceiling like it was wet tissue paper, and the resounding impact blasted the whole building to pieces, which were flung them across the entire stretch of green surrounding it.
We weren't left unscathed either. I had to steady the girls, or they would have landed on their assess when the shockwave reached us. Many of the fleeing slaves weren't so lucky, and in part, fell down hard.
After the dust had settled, Marco and his two friends were lying buried under chunks of debris. They were the only ones with the means to protect themselves. Everybody else had just died. What was left of their bodies was mingled with the debris littering the area.
The marine was crouched over a sole body lying on the floor, left untouched by his impact with the ground. He cradled it in his arms and proceeded to lower it to the ground, which allowed me to identify it as the fishbowl guys corpse.
He slowly rose to his full height zeroing in on the place Marco and his friends excavated themselves and pushed the last part of debris away to free themselves.
A booming voice resounded through the area.
"YOU!" originating from the marine.
He disappeared in a Soru only to be stopped inches away from pounding Marco head into the ground by a new arrival on the scene. The resulting shockwave was of their clash was even stronger than the previous one, splitting the ground around their position in a clear divide. This time the girls were prepared and weathered it by themselves.
He was a hulking bare-chested guy, with a large tattoo on his back facing us. The tattoo depicted a skull with an upwards curved large mustache with crossed bones behind the skull. - Clearly a Jolly Roger -
Whitebeards if I remembered Rayleigh's who is who of the most important figures right.
The newcomer screamed something to Marco, and his companies, something I couldn't make out. Since non of my bugs survived the house being blasted to kingdom come. During all this, the marine started to overpower him despite him being no smaller in statue.
He had visible trouble until he slowly transformed. He got bigger and stronger. His skin turned black, and he grew a Y-shaped horn atop of his slightly bowed head. The horn grew around the torso of the marine, and before he could overcome his surprise, the Whitebeard pirate tossed him over his head with the horns help.
The marine twisted around in midair and landed unharmed.
Marco tried to argue back until another harsh response silenced him. Without further delay, he and his friends scrambled to their feet and ran.
There was a small lull in the fight, during which the two remaining talked to each other. It ended the moment the marine tossed his Haori away and ripped the buttons of his jacket open, and fastened it around his waist.
He then started to grow in size, too. There was a glow as his whole body became golden, and the proportions of his body changed. His torso and arms became larger, oversized in comparison to the rest of his body.
When he finished his transformation. He looked like a golden Budha statue, another Zoan-type user, a mythical one.
I had seen enough, the conclusion of the battle foregone.
"Let's go," I said to the girls.
"But Onee-sama, what about the fight?" Sandersonia asked with big eyes, clearly wanting to see how it would end. Her sisters shared the sentiment.
"The marine will win," I said fully convinced of my words. "He is far stronger, there wasn't even a need for him to use his devil fruit to secure his victory."Crestfallen of having the outcome of the battle spoiled. They reluctantly turned away from the fight. "The Kabuto-Bug guy is clearly buying time for his friends to escape, and it is in our best interest to be far away from here by the time they are finished. I'm really not keen on answering any questions."
"Right, you are a pirate after all," Marigold said.
We weren't the only ones, thinking it a good idea to be anywhere but here. The remaining slaves still in the process of fleeing increased their speed; in fact, some started to leave behind gold and other riches to that end.
"Where are we going Onee-sama?" Sandersonia wondered.
"To the shipyards," I answered. "Hopefully, we can get a passage to another island, or should the opportunity arise, buy a ship for ourselves."
"You don't have a ship?" Hancock asked incredulously. "But you are a pirate." She squinted her eyes, trying to get the two facts to make sense to her.
"Clearly, it must have been heavily damaged in a battle, so she had to abandon it." was the stern conclusion Marigold, the youngest of them, drew.
The other two accepted her statement with an "ahh" - that to me sounded like `why didn't we think of that.´
"Good guess but wrong," I said and burst their bubble.
All three of them looked at me bewildered.
"Did someone steal it?" Sandersonia asked.
In response, she received a light smack on her head by her oldest sister.
"Stupid! Who do you think could manage to steal from Onee-Sama." Sandersonia looked apologetic at me and Hancock, who chastised her as if she wanted to atone for a grave sin she committed.
"No one stole my ship," I dryly stated. "Because I never owned one, to begin with."
I received three deadpan stares as a result.
"But... but what about your crew? How did they, did you come to this island?" Sandersonia asked churning.
"A friend took me with him on his way back to the island, and I don't have a crew," I explained.
"No ship, no crew you are no pirate at all," Marigold said matter of fact.
"Well, I never said I'm pirate, just that some might call me that," I noted. "If you think a pirate needs a crew and a ship, then I'm not one. At least not yet. We are, after all, on our way to rectify one if not both of your requirements."
I paused for a moment and wondered,
"you are aware, that having a crew and a ship alone does not make you a pirate?"
"Of course," Marigold remarked. "You also have to be strong. Everybody knows that." Her sisters vigorously nodded her heads to back up this statement.
"Which means you are gonna be full-fledged pirate, in a few minutes." Hancock swooned, and I could have sworn her eyes sparkled with excitement while she said that. I shook my head at that thought must have been the light.
"Say Onee-sama since you haven't got a crew can we..." she peered at her two younger sisters and received a nod from them. "You know, since you already took us away from those bad people," she pussyfooted around, obviously not sure how to word whatever she wanted to ask of me.
She paused one last moment nervously twirling one of her braids only and suddenly blurted out.
"canwejoinyourpiratecrewprettyplease? – Onee-sama."
"Can we, please!" her two sisters pleaded in unison.
"We will be the bestest crew the grand-line has ever seen." Hancock added full of conviction.
"Not so fast," I tried to slow down their enthusiasm. "What about your family, your home? I'm sure they are worried about you."
The three sisters abruptly stopped in their tracks.
"We will never get back home." Marigold said, "we don't know how."
"I'm sure we can find out together." I tried to placate them.
Tearing up Sandersonia said
"You don't understand, only the ship of the Empress can reach Amazon Lily."
"Why?" I asked, "what is so special about her ship?"
"It is pulled by venomous sea snakes ensuring that no Sea Kings dares to come near them," Hancock explained. "This way the Kuja pirates traversed the calm-belt since ancient times."
I could see why that would be a problem. It didn't just mean we would need to find an eternal pose for the island - something that given the near impossibility to reach the island was beyond rare or didn't exist in the first place.
Rayleigh said, that in order to create an eternal pose - a compass that always points in the direction of a specific island - required minerals from the island it was pointing towards.
Another option might be to seek out this Empress when she is out and about. Since the Empress and her people were pirates, I didn't think it would be an easy endeavor. The island was clearly used as their base of operation, depending on their numbers. They wouldn't want to have it exposed, and the easiest way to ensure that was to keep the location a secret to the best of their abilities.
If I were in their shoes, every time I left the island; I would travel quite a distance through the calm belt in one direction and emerge from there into the grand-line. It would make the undertaking to discover their island a lot harder. Because this way, they could warp the data others could gather by reported sightings of their ship.
So that any attempt in using this data to narrow down the possible area where to find the island would be more than just faulty. Furthermore, with a little luck, the Sea-Kings would take care of those searching long before they even get close to the correct location.
After all, just because somebody could win one fight against them, did not automatically mean the same would be true for ten or a hundred of such engagements. Engagements such a prolonged search would ultimately lead to.
It also meant, for those rare crews who were able to traverse the calm-belt in relative safety that finding the island without help could take years on end. You would need to have a serious grudge against them, possess near-unlimited resources, or be determined some other way to attempt such a thing.
"Do you know about an island the Empress frequently visits or an area she likes to sojourn in?" I asked them.
Hancock vehemently shook her head.
"Empress Onee-sama always said, to never take a route twice, that to protect our tribe, we had to keep the enemies guessing."
"I suspected as much," I said. Somebody knew what she was doing. "Still, this doesn't mean you won't see your home again. It just means we have to work for it. Until then, I would like to offer you three spots in my pirate crew."
With that, my decision was made. I would take them with me.
Three beaming smiles adorned their faces.
"Come on, we've got a ship to catch." I put out my hand, and Hancock didn't hesitate to reach for it.
We resumed our trek to the docks. I could sense the fightback at the auction building came to a close with the outcome I predicted. Marines given the orderly way the people I sensed moved, streamed there. Meanwhile, Marco and his friends were leaving the island in great haste. With no one pursuing them, not even that Mythical Zoan type user, content with the unconscious body at his feet.
"Can I be the Vice-Captain of our Crew?" Hancock asked.
Her question surprised me, I didn't even consider the position to be filled when I accepted them as part of the crew more at a (power-induced) whim than an actual plan. But it made sense to split the responsibilities up between us. It might do them some good to have something else to do than, to reminiscence about the events that brought them here and that they might never meet their family again. Something for them to do that kept them occupied, and could take their minds off those things, which was why I decided to play along.
"I don't know, do you think you are qualified? After all such a position comes with great responsibility." I questioned her, trying my best to hide a smirk.
"Of course, Vice-captain is like being the big sister of the crew, taking care of them and protect them. I'm good at being a big sister, Onee-sama. You can leave it all to me." She voiced determined.
"It is true," Marigold interjected. "Without our big sister, we would have drowned. If not for her keeping us over water when the strength left us and later on finding the driftwood we clung onto wouldn't be here."
Hancock's mood soured at her sister's good-intentioned attempt to back up her claim. Understandable, because her greatest achievement saving her sister was directly tied to her greatest failing. She couldn't protect them from being captured and nearly being sold into slavery.
"I can do it, you have to believe me Onee-sama." the black-haired girl pleaded with me.
"I know you can, Vice-captain," I said and ruffled her hair.
She beamed at me and proudly and declared.
"I won't disappoint you, Onee-sama."
"As long as you try your best, you won't be able to." I said and turned to her sisters and asked, "what positions do you two intent to fill?"
The question caused them to smile radiantly.
"I always dreamed about becoming a Navigator. To be responsible to bring the ship and the crew safely to their destination. No matter the wind and weather," the green-haired girl proclaimed only to add with more fervor directed at me.
"I will get us wherever you want us to go and back without fail, to every known and unknown place and sea and if nobody has gone there before us I will just find a way. After all, the journey is its own adventure and I will make sure it is an enjoyable one," she promised.
"Oh, we have an explorer in our midst." I grinned at her. "I don't have a problem with naming you our Navigator, but it's a strenuous job, demanding permanent attention to the weather, the course an occupation in which a single mistake can spell the doom of the ship and everybody on it," I warned. "Are you sure you are up for it?"
"Don't worry Onee-sama, Sandersonia Onee-san can read the wind better than even Kagome," Marigold proudly proclaimed.
At my questioning look, Hancock interjected.
"Kagome is the Navigator of Kuja-Pirates. She always said nee-san is a natural-born navigator, a pro-degy."
"Prodigy" I corrected her. "Okay, then I will leave us in your capable Hands, Mrs. Navigator."
My eyes found the youngest of the three sisters, a soft tap from Sandersonia on her back was urge enough to get her to speak.
"I was longing for the day when I was old enough to join the Kuja Pirates. Since the first time, I was given an exotic fruit, which didn't grow on amazon Lily. I couldn't stop wondering what else is out there. What other fruits, vegetables, and animals, and in what way can they be turned into a delicious dish. I wanted to taste cuisine from all over the world and learn to cook the best meals ever." She enthusiastically declared.
This was the most emotions she showed all day, well aside from the fear, that was clearly displayed on her face when we first met. I already suspected them to be stunted somehow. But as it seemed my initial assessment was wrong. It just took her talking about something she genuinely cared about for her to come out of her shell, in which she immediately retreated back after her outburst.
"Oh, we got ourselves a gourmet, too. Well, in that case, you will be responsible for the meals of the crew, and fill the position of chef on our future ship." I declared.
"Understood, Captain." was Marigold curt response.
Shortly after that was settled, we reached the docks. They were busy with activity. Dozen of ships were tethered at the piers extending as far as the eye could see. Goods were loaded on and from the ships by hundreds of people swarming about.
It would have taken us hours to ask our way to the ship, that Shakky recommended I take. The question was, did I still want to. With the girls, I now had a crew, a small one but a crew nonetheless. Furthermore, my visit to the human auction also provided me with the financial means to buy a ship, which would allow for far more autonomy in comparison to being a passenger.
Moreover, I already anticipated that, at one point, probably sooner than later, my own means of transportation would be an absolute necessity in order to retain the flexibility needed to follow the leads to find Robin.
The answer was no – I used a for humans unnoticeable burst of Haoshoki Haki and hijacked all the insects throughout the grove. With access to their senses, I listened in to thousands of conversations, mostly consisting of worthless chatter, hoping to gain the information I was after.
"Why are we waiting here Onee-sama?" Hancock inquired.
"I'm searching for a suitable ship for us," I responded.
"Make sure the ship is fore-and-aft rigged," Sandersonia said.
She had a point, Rayleigh explained the difference between square-rigged and fore-and-aft rigged ships. While square-rigged sails usually allow for higher speeds while running downwind, the fore-and-aft rigged ships with their sails set alongside the keel allowed for a closer haul to the wind. Therefore they provided more maneuverability in general, and also allowed for sailing in no go-zone - where the angle between the wind blowing and the ship steering was too steep - and square-rigged ships just couldn't follow.
This meant our ship needn't necessarily be faster. It just had to be able to sail where others couldn't to lose possible pursuers. I took stock of the ships anchored and to my surprise, most of the ships were square-rigged and if I remembered Rayleigh lectures right such rigged ships were far more common, especially when it came to ships used by the world government manned by marines.
A small smile tucked my lips.
"Seems like it was a good choice to make you the Navigator, Sandersonia. Without you, I might not have thought about it."
Given my ambivalent success in training a team, I learned about positive reinforcement the hard way. And I was not keen on making the same mistakes with them as I did with Theo.
One of my bugs heard "Did you load up all of the supplies?" being asked to a sailor coming from a gaff-rigged cutter. A few bugs confirmed to me that the ship's cargo hold was empty, which was good, because this indicated they weren't expected to return with any.
This meant buying the ship wasn't belated by removing it beforehand and since it was already stooked with supplies it was ready to go.
I didn't know how much time we had until one of the marines got the idea to barricade the island in order to search it for people, who might have some information on what happened back in the auction house. Since I really had no intention of finding out, nor to fight my way from the island. My choice made I gave the ship in question a closer look.
It was sleek, roughly thirty meters long lying low above the water.
It had a mainsail, the so-called gaff sail, that spanned from the boom the horizontal fixture up to the gaff an angled fixture, making the sail a large trapeze above is mounted to the mast it had an additional triangle sail, combined with the first it became a huge triangle.
The mast was situated two thirds the length of the boat away from the stern of the ship, it had two staysails also fixed to it. The first one was fixed halfway to the bow of the ship with another forestay sail fixed all the way to the bow.
The ship had no superstructure placed on deck, no obstacle hindering the wind in any way. It was clear at first glance that it was designed for one thing only - speed and maneuverability.
Despite those being properties I sought in a ship, I was reluctant. The ship was designed to lean into the wind, and all that prevented someone from going overboard was a railing made out of rope that was at knee-height.
If I would have been alone, there would have been no hesitation to make the ship mine. But with the kids and my inability to swim, I was wavering in my decision. They already went overboard once, the very reason they were in this mess in the first place.
Could I risk it? I took my time to take a look at the other ships present. None other was an option; they either were loaded with freight, just arrived and therefore were depleted of provisions, required a lot more manpower to sail than we had, or were simply square-rigged ships. I didn't even consider the scarce few ones, that were outright safety hazards with woodworms drilling holes in their wooden bodies.
With the lack of alternatives, I had no other choice. I had to take this one - well this just meant I had to be vigilant to prevent a repeat of events.
"I found a ship." I reluctantly admitted. "Let's go."
I lead us along a Pier towards the Ship and couldn't help but be glad about how I was able to recreate my old powers with my new ones. Otherwise, I would have never been able to find this ship, hidden behind all those other ships overtowering it, lying meters high above the water with structures and cargo placed on their decks further obstructing sight.
I walked up to a middle-aged white-haired man with leathery skin and deep lines in his features. He was the one overseeing the final preparations the crew undertook to leave port, while he was writing in a small book placed on a wooden crate he was leaning over.
"I want to speak with the captain of this vessel. Do you know where I can find him or her?" I asked him.
"You are speaking with him, names Jack." He said as he gave me, and my companions a once over. "Before you ask we don't take passengers"
"Good to know, but not why I'm here," I said.
"In that case, what can I do for you, Lady?" He asked.
"I want to buy your ship." I simply stated.
"The Sakura isn't for sale." He asserted.
"I doubt that there isn't much not for sale as long as the price is right." I responded, "so what is the price for the ship."
"You are serious," he gruffly stated.
"Yes, indeed I am," I said.
"Why, this one?" He asked "I can see the appeal she is something special one if not the fastest ship docked here at the moment and she is new, this being her second voyage since she was built back in Water 7. But she certainly isn't special enough that she would warrant the interest you show her."
"True, but she is the only ship ready to set sail." He narrowed his eyes at hearing my statement, his suspicion aroused.
"We are in a hurry." I emphasized, "so what does it cost to separate you from her?"
He started to caress his not existent chin beard while thinking over my proposal.
"Well, she was costly to build after a design not often used. There isn't much of value onboard aside from the personal effects of the Crew. But there is the time to consider we undoubtedly will lose finding a new ship or a passage home."
"Nothing, I'm sure which will prevent us from reaching an agreement. Given the right price."
"Right," Jack said, stretching the word. "The Ship cost us two-hundred million, so for two-fifty it's yours."
I removed one Satchel bag full of jewels from my shoulder and showed him the contents.
"Will that be enough?" I asked.
His eyes nearly popped out from their sockets when he saw what was in it. He reached inside the bag and burrowed his hands in the riches. I assumed to verify not only the top layer consisted of genuine articles. After he was satisfied, he removed on gem and bit on it. His eyes immediately lit up and a smile formed on his lips.
"Yes, Yes that will suffice." He said greedily. I closed the bag and handed it over to him. "Men" he shouted, "Clear out all the cabins we are handing over the Sakura to those people."
One of his crew-members probed irritated "Captain?"
"Something wrong with your ears?" He barked.
"No Captain" he stammered back "So you heard my order, why aren't you following it?" He stressed with a dangerous undertone in his voice.
His Crewman knew better than to question it and disappeared below deck following the others.
Jack returned his attention back to me.
"The ship is fully stocked with supplies, tools for replacements sails a few eternal ports. A log pose and a few maps are onboard the ship."
"Good -" was my curt response. It took only a minute for his Crew to return all of them having a seabag slung over their shoulders. One of his Crew carried two, which he placed after he left the ship in front of his Captain. He opened it took a short look and then nodded pleased.
"The ship with everything on is yours, safe travels Stranger, and good luck." Jack wished us and then left together with his Crew, who was still too cowed to ask what just happened.
I turned towards my crew.
"Sandersonia I want you to take a look at the maps and the eternal ports on the ship, make sure they are the real deal. If you are finished with that, take a look at the sails and how to operate them."
"Aye, Aye Captain Onee-sama." She saluted. I shook my head at her antics.
"Marigold, you do the same with the supplies. Check the food, the water, and make sure it is enough to last us to the next stop."
She nodded and went on board the Ship to do just that.
"Hancock I want you to make a list of the other things you find onboard and make sure we have everything that you deem necessary. When you are done I want you to check, that your sisters didn't miss anything."
"Of course, Onee-sama." she beamed at me, pleased to be given the responsibility to oversee the work of the others.
When she also left, I mentally made my own list by watching them with my bugs, of what they found onboard. Not because I didn't trust them, but on the sea, our lives depend on them not doing a half-assed job. I still could quite vividly remember what dying of thirst felt like and I had no intention to suffer it again nor for them to share this experience.
Marigold found more than enough food to last us a long time no wonder the crew we replaced was three times our numbers all adults and Sandersonia found every tool required to navigate a ship under deck. She even strapped the log pose to her wrist, before she returned above deck to join my taking a look at how the ropes are affixed to the sails and to get an idea of how to sail the ship.
A few minutes later the other joined us. Hancock without prompting handed me an extensive list of everything she found on board. I browsed it briefly and was impressed with her love for detail.
"Seems like we are ready to go." I walked over to the helm and ordered.
"Hancock untether the ship, Sandersonia set sail, and while doing so explain to your sisters how it is done."
The response I received was a Unison "Aye, Aye Captain" from the mouths of those three girls.
Sandersonia did a remarkable job in teaching her sisters how to operate the ship and after barely a few minutes the sails were set and I steered the ship out to the sea.
They were a bit slow to follow her directions, but that was nothing some practice, and a few drills couldn't overcome. I was sure to get them to work in perfect tandem in no time. But at least for today, I allowed them to enjoy the warm sun and the pleasant breeze of wind.
Tomorrow on the other hand ...
Authors note:
The Whitebeard crew member with the Kabuto-Bug Zoan-devil Fruit is called Rai "The Kabuto" Amano and is one of the Division commanders of Whitebeard at this time.
I have no sailing experience so everything about sail types etc is something I have solely from Wikipedia research and I honestly got no clue how accurate my description is.
According to One Piece chapter, 331 – second-hand ships bigger than Flying Lamb can easily be bought with a hundred million belly. Therefore I assume a ship like the Sakura, being an unusual design similar to a racing yacht, being longer but sleeker than the Flying Lamb to have a price tag of around 200 Million seems reasonable. Especially since she is essentially brand new.
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Chapter 08 - At Sea
Chapter 08: At Sea (Late Winter 1505)
"Again," I ordered.
"Onee-sama," Hancock moaned. "Why do I have to participate in the drills, too? I'm the Vice-captain shouldn't I oversee them instead."
"You have to take part because you are the Vice-Captain. Everyone in a Leadership position should know exactly what it is you demand from your subordinates, and what better way is there than to experience it yourself," I lectured. "Besides, as small as our crew is, every one of us has to know exactly how to sail the ship."
"I see," Hancock said and went back to help her sisters unfold the sails of our ship. An activity I had them do the whole morning, so far I was impressed with what I was seeing, their dedication and teamwork was something many could learn from. They managed to reduce the time it took them to get it done by half in a single morning of concentrated effort.
While I had them running around on deck, I had some spiders I separated from my body weaving silk in my cabin to get them something to wear that did more than just cover their bodies but also protected them.
I didn't want to make the same mistake that nearly cost me, my whole team, twice. I learned this lection from not providing the Undersiders with Spider-silk costumes at the earliest opportunity the hard way. Furthermore, they were in dire need of clothes. Since they only had the rags they wore at the moment, onboard this ship.
I waited for them to set the sails and decided, to stop this here for the moment. With the wind starting to intensify, ending the calm, I tried to make use of by doing some drills with them.
After all, if we did this the whole day, we would never arrive anywhere. All the sailing we did yesterday, despite done under favorable conditions only brought us so far.
"Good job," I praised. "We will continue this another time. Now let's start your training."
"Training Onee-sama? But didn't we do that just now?" Hancock wondered.
"No, those were drills." I clarified. "For you to internalize every single movement required to be able to sail the ship. So that you don't have to think about what you are doing because eventually, we will get in a situation where we won't have the luxury to think; A situation in which our lives might depend on for you to be able to do all that blindfolded."
"Then what else do you want us to train," Sandersonia asked.
"To Fight obviously," I said, "didn't you all want to become strong Pirates?"
"We are going to be strong Pirates, Onee-Sama," Marigold informed us with unwavering conviction of her statement to become a reality.
"Strength is something you have to work for in order to achieve it, not something you are entitled to." I said, "which is why we are gonna train."
"Are we gonna get as strong as you Onee-Sama?" Hancock asked hopeful.
"Eventually you might," I conceded. "It depends on how far you are willing to go."
"What do we have to do?" Hancock eagerly wanted to know.
"Let's start with some push-ups," I said.
At least for now, I was holding back from telling them, what I ultimately planned to teach them. Given their readiness to do everything I asked of them, without a single complaint. To please me, their Onee-Sama, suited me just fine. And I had every intention to take full advantage of it while it lasted.
The minds of children are fickle. I fully expected them, at one point, to start to question the purpose of this training, my methods and showing off the Rokushiki techniques might be the one thing to keep them interested in it. Given my lack of prior experience with girls their age, their attention span, and how long their devotion to reach a goal would last, I thought proceeding this way to be a good idea.
After all, it wouldn't do me any good to shoot off all my ammunition at the very beginning, and seeing a demonstration of the Rokushiki when their motivation is about to hit a low point might be enough to turn it around. I just hoped the six incentives the Rokushiki was able to provide would be enough in that regard.
"How ... many ... do ... you ... want ... us ... to ... do?" Hancock inquired in between doing her push-ups.
"Keep it up until your arms feel like jelly, and you are no longer able to lift yourself from the ground," I said. "Then I want you to do knee bends until your thighs feel the same, following that sit-ups, running... and when you are done, with those exercises; you are to repeat them over and over again. Until there is not a single muscle in your body left not aching."
"Did ... you ... do ... all ... that ... to get ... so ... strong ... Onee-sama?" Sandersonia asked one word at a time whenever she reached the peak of a push-up.
"Yes" I confirmed, and I happened to eat a devil fruit, that allowed me to cheat, which probably saved me years it would have otherwise taken to get anywhere near my current strength. But that is something you didn't need to know about. At least not until you could use Geppou. I really wouldn't want to risk them to crave for a Devil Fruit, while they were unable to keep themselves from falling into the sea.
I was still on the fence on telling them about the four devil Fruits hidden under the planks, in the hidden compartment of my cabin. Let alone letting them eat any, despite there clearly being a connection between three of those fruits and the girls doing their exercises right in front of me.
Did I really trust this newly gained ability to bet the lives of those kids on it? A devil fruit wasn't something that could just be taken back. It was a life-altering event to eat one of those, and I had no idea what abilities those fruits might grant them. What if it turned out to be a useless or unwanted ability? Would they hold it against me having traded their ability to swim for what they might end up with?
A question that didn't need answering today. Even with Soru and Geppou considered as the two easier to learn techniques out of the six, it would take them weeks to get anywhere with them. Though I had to admit I was impressed with them. Their bodies were in excellent condition, stronger by quite an enormous margin compared to mine, when I first had arrived here.
Considering the headstart they had in regards to Haki. They undoubtedly would be a force to be reckoned with within a few years. I wondered how strong those Kuja Pirates were when all the children living on Amazon Lily received the same training.
If Rayleigh was to be believed, and I had no reason to doubt anything he had said, Haki users in the First Half of the grand-line were nearly unheard of. But right in front of me were three kids, being living proof that there are exceptions to every rule.
I had my fun watching them exhaust themselves and calling them out when they started to slack off or got slower. For now, it was enough to remind the girls of their goals. Telling them, `If they stop now, they will never become a strong Pirate´ was more than enough to keep them going.
I watched and spurred them on for quite some time, the wind blowing in my hair on this sunny day, the sisterly japing from my cute little fosterlings, and I started to really enjoy, to feel at home. My thoughts drifted to Lisa... I stopped them from going any further; the memory that crept its way into my thoughts immediately souring my mood.
I wasn't sure if I gave something away. Either through my face or my Aura since I was lax in reigning it in, controlling what feelings it displayed since we left Sabaody behind. For a reason unknown, Sandersonia stopped in the middle of a set of push-ups at exactly that moment my thoughts drifted and flipped herself on her back.
She gave me the strangest of looks with her cheeks reddened her breathing heavily, all the while sweating profusely. Her clothes were clinging to her skin as if she just arose from the water she took a swim in.
While she was still trying to regain her breath in order to have enough air to voice whatever it was, she wanted to share with us. Her stomach started to growl, and by this, I meant roar. It drowned out the wind and the heavy breathing of her and her sister effortlessly.
Hancock and Sandersonia, unable to suppress their laughter at their sister's plight, could no longer sustain the body tension necessary for their push-ups and joined their sister on the ground.
Marigold looked bewildered at them for a moment only to join in with them, and I couldn't hide the smirk that sneaked on my lips.
"Let's stop here for today," I said. "Why don't you all go and wash yourselves, and after you are done. Sandersonia can show us her skills as a cook and prepare a delicious meal for us? We wouldn't want any of you to go hungry, now would we?"
I threw to each of them a water flask yet again. Since I stressed how important drinking during strenuous physical activity was. They didn't hesitate, and each took a huge gulp from the flasks to quench their thirst...
"I have prepared you a bath in the cargo hold," I said.
Their joy at the end of the torturous training session only lasted till they tried to move under deck.
"I can't feel my feet," complained Sandersonia.
"Au, au, au" were the sounds Hancock made with every step she took.
The only one making their way down in silence was Marigold, but she couldn't hide the grimace her face turned into with every other step.
They took their sweet time to get themselves cleaned up, soaking in the three-barrel of seawater I had prepared in advance. The empty cargo hold was ideal for that, the only room not allocated a purpose and spacious enough to hold the barrels. Since the rest of the ship with the three rather small cabins was rather spartan in regards to free space or fulfilled another purpose like the kitchen or the toilet it was also the only room that could reasonably be used for that.
And the three cabins split made a certain sense, allowing for the day and night shift crews to have their own cabins. It would help to reduce the chance of disturbing the others during their sleep. The designers of the ship even went so far as to have them on the opposing sides of the ship. One cabin was located backboard and the other starboard only separated by the hallway the staircases lead down to.
The last cabin was being placed aft, giving its size with only one large hammock in it, clearly the one intended for the captain. The first time noticing the lack of a cot or bed I was surprised, thinking about it, it made a lot of sense given what type of ship the Sakura was. She was built to lean into the wind, which meant the ship wouldn't be horizontal most of the time. On the contrary, tilted will be her default state during travels, and no one wants to fall out of a bed mid-sleep, something a cot couldn't prevent from happening a hammock, however, could, by leaning the same way the ship did at any time.
I took advantage of their lack of vigilance and replaced their discarded clothes with the first set of spider-silk ones I finished. Weaving them kept me awake the previous night, and only during their training was I able to finish them. I had my spiders steal the rags they wore. They wouldn't be needed any longer.
It was quite funny to listen in to their chatter when they finally decided after their skin had turned pruney to emerge only to find their clothes they had strewn about the room in a straight line to the barrels missing.
"Onee-san someone stole my clothes," Marigold exclaimed surprised.
"Mine are missing, too," Hancock said.
"Who could have done this, aren't we the only ones on board?" Sandersonia wondered.
"Of course we are," Hancock reassured them "Onee-sama would know otherwise and would have taken care of any stowaway and I didn't sense anybody else onboard either."
On the one hand, the trust they obviously had in me was adorable. On the other hand, somewhat disturbing. If they kept this up, I might think of myself as a sect leader.
"What is that?" Sandersonia asked and pointed to the three bundles of clothes marked with their names lying on a small bench next to some towels.
They all approached the Bench dripping wet, leaving puddles in their wake. Sandersonia was the first to reach for a bundle of clothes with her name attached.
"Clothes" she confirmed and held them up "the fabric is so soft" she mused while caressing it with her fingers and even went as far as to bury her face in it. This served as the go-ahead for her sisters to overcome their initial reluctance and moved to touch their own bundles.
"So soft and tender" acknowledged Marigold while rubbing her cheek against the clothes in her hand.
Hancock tried her hardest to keep her dignity intact as the older sister and refused to give in to her desire to do the same. My bugs could see her eyes twitch, occasionally when she looked at her sisters snuggling with their clothes.
Hancock was more reserved in how she made her observations, acting the big sister. Nonetheless, she clearly was impressed, if her diligence and caution with which she traced the clothes were anything to go by.
"I'm never going to wear anything else in my life If I can help it." She suddenly declared only to receive passionate nods from her sisters. They took the towels and dried themselves in record time and nearly fell over themselves more than once in an attempt to put on their clothes.
I had their outfits designed with their previous ones in mind. No easy task, with all those missing pieces in those torn shreds, that at one point might have qualified for clothing. I did the only thing, they could still be used for and had my spiders throw them overboard.
I had to rely on guesswork and no small amount of imagination to reach the conclusion, that the rags I found them in, might have been qipao dresses or some variation thereof.
Of course, I made some adjustments. My first priority was the continued physical integrity of the girls, which is why I regretted not having any hard bug-shells at hand to reinforce the clothes around the vital parts of the wearer. It was something I planned to rectify at the earliest convenience. That meant, for now, the multilayer spider-silk-weave their clothes were made of had to suffice in safeguarding them.
I fashioned them after piqao dresses and made them high-collared to protect their throats and body-hugging, contrary to how they are usually designed. I made them longsleeved down to their wrists. Combined with the gloves I prepared, it would allow them to enclose the entirety of their arms in slash and piercing resistant fiber.
For completion's sake, I added pants more resembling stockings. Since they also extended over their vulnerable feet. With the difference of the fiber being a thick multi-weave more resembling to what one would use for pants. The soles were further reinforced to last a long time, even if worn without footwear.
The dresses themselves were slit up, up to their thighs in order to not impede the movement of their legs. I took great care in ensuring the hem of the dress wasn't long enough for them to accidentally step on it in a stressful situation and lose their balance or worse, trip over it.
That left only their heads unprotected; the reason for this once more was the lack of suitable materials to make anything that wouldn't just end looking like fancy headwear without any real protective-properties. Like so many other lessons, I had to learn the hard way how important a wholly enclosed helmet is. Because of this, I had every intention to have some made for all of them as soon as possible.
I already had started with another set of clothes but was determined to wait a few more days to make any more. The reason for this was two-fold. First, I wanted to observe if the clothes didn't impede them in any way to adjust the following designs to accommodate their preferences. Furthermore, I had to make sure the measurements I took of them while they slept were accurate, as it turned out it was no easy task to do so with bugs.
They thrashed around and turned constantly. In addition, I had to dodge their attempts to swat away my little crawlies while they slept. It nearly became an exercise in futility.
But since I didn't want to wake them from their more than deserved rest. Also, because I couldn't be sure of how they would have reacted to be swarmed by spiders for measurements. I thought it prudent to proceed without their knowledge, and to a lesser degree, I wanted them kept in the dark about my devil-fruit powers to avoid them becoming an issue.
For the most part, I intended to prevent them from seeking one of their own, just to be more like me. My mind wasn't made up in this regard, nor did I want to lie to them.
When they finished putting on their new attire, the girls converged. Each one of the three making up the apex of an equilateral triangle. Grim-faced, looking at each other until they all started to smirk and began chanting.
"Deadly like Cobra-Venom,
fast like a black mambas strike,
strong and unrelenting like a constrictor,
sharp like a snake Fang"
During all this, they performed a silly dance mimicking certain aspects of the behavior of snakes.
I felt a knot in my chest at seeing this, remembering a young Emma and I doing something similar, a dance we made up once upon a time to cement our friendship. I pushed those memories down before the two years of abuse I suffered at her hand had time to resurface, too. I didn't want to give them the opportunity to taint their display of genuine affection and sisterhood.
The determination to preserve not only their lives but their childlike innocence, their naivety strengthened as I watched them. Even though I knew how futile such an endeavor would be. There was just no way to succeed; this world and my old had far too much in common, and my path would undoubtedly lead me right into the heart of the darkness of this world.
When they were done with their dance Hancock asked.
"Who is gonna become a super-strong Pirate?"
"We are!"
They all yelled, which was followed up by giggling, that soon was accompanied by stomach grumbling from all of them. Awkwardly rubbing their bellies.
"We better start cooking," Hancock noted, which her sister agreed with, given their nods and made their way towards the kitchen.
Aspiring to follow in their role models footsteps was commendable. But I was sure they romanticized the life as a Pirate even more so than I had done with the life of a Hero, something I couldn't fault them for doing. After all, they were a few years younger than I had been when I first set out and should have known better.
Which, to be honest, had me in a bind. Do I correct their worldview and prepare them for the reality that awaits them, or would it be better if they experience what it was really like for themselves?
How would I have reacted, if Lisa wouldn't have soft sold me what it was like with her whole cops and robbers spiel, to diminish that being a cape was a life and death struggle most of the time.
Knowing myself, not well in the slightest, I more than likely would have gone my own separate way, without a team at my back and people who knew what they were doing. Given what I know now and what events ultimately transpired in Brockton Bay. It was not unreasonable to think I wouldn't have made it, someone or something would have gotten me sooner or later, and the list of possible culprits was a long one.
Despite my faults and the destination, my journey was gonna take me. I had to admit to myself that they would be safer and more prepared for what was to come if they stayed close to me instead of allowing them to follow their own path.
In the kitchen, Marigold took out pots and put them over the small fireplace.
"Nee-San can you light the fire?" she asked Sandersonia, who proceeded to place some logs under the pots and lighted them.
Meanwhile, Marigold started to slice vegetables and meat into small pieces, which was understood by her sister as an invitation to attempt stealing food from her in order to take the edge of their hunger. At least this was how I interpreted their hands slowly sneaking closer and closer to the food, carefully trying to avoid detection.
"Au, don't be mean." Hancock cried out when her sister stopped her attempt to spirit some food away by slapping her hand.
Perhaps hide and seek should be added to their routine, for them to get a feel for covert stuff, because this was just pathetic. They wouldn't even manage to steal a soother from a baby.
"Then don't go stealing food until it is properly cooked." Marigold chided.
"But that is gonna take forever, I'm hungry," Hancock whined. Apparently, no longer caring about her older sister role when it came to still her hunger.
"The more you interfere with my cooking, the longer it is gonna take." Marigold deadpanned.
"Moah, Mari don't be that way. Give me just a little something to last." Hancock begged.
"No, as this crews cook, food dispensation is under my purview. And you get your share when I'm done not before." Marigold had barely closed her mouth saying that. When Sandersonia coming from the other side, took advantage of the distraction Hancock provided her with and successfully stole some food and stuffed her mouth with it.
Marigold narrowed her eyes and grabbed Sandersonia and Hancock by their earlobes, and dragged them out of the kitchen. She was ignoring the protest and pleading of Hancock the whole way, whereas Sandersonia was occupied chewing the contents in her mouth, that had her look like some greedy hamster with her stuffed cheeks. Marigold closed the door behind them and returned to her task.
"That is an unfair treatment. As Vice-Captain I order you to let us back in." Hancock pleaded in front of the closed-door, hammering against it.
"Why are you so cruel to your sisters, withholding food. Don't you love us? ... Mari?" her pleading became more desperate but had no effect whatsoever. Marigold on the other side of the door ignored her completely.
A fact Hancock seemed to recognize too, her focus shifted to the sister who was banished together with her. Her eyes narrowed at the still chewing Sandersonia.
"This is all your fault, couldn't you have worked in concert with me distracting her alternating so both of us could claim some spoils?" She said angered while continuously poking the chest of her sister, who seemed to ignore her sister's rant, still occupied with chewing.
Hancock evidently became aware of the futility of what she was doing and literally tried to tear her hair out to relieve her frustration but gave it up before it could come to that and instead just stomped away frustrated.
If this was their usual behavior, then I was in for a fun ride.
Hancock marched into one of the storage rooms and started rummaging through the crates she found there. It was obvious, that she didn't do this just to still her curiosity. On the contrary, she was out on a mission and was searching for something specific.
It took her a few minutes in which the pile of items she gathered rose in height until she finally seemed to be satisfied when she found a stack of books deep down in a crate. She skimmed through it and a content grin formed on her lips.
She climbed down from shelve and refastened all the crates she opened and then took her spoils and made her way past Sandersonia, who watched this proceeding with great interest and started to follow her big sister.
They both came up on deck shortly after. Hancock placed the items on the ground near the entrance minus the book she found and approached me at the helm holding it close to her chest.
She moved to my side and presented me with the book at the end of her outstretched arms, grinning she said.
"Here Onee-Sama, for you."
With raised eyebrows, not knowing what to expect, I accepted it from her. I skimmed through it, fully suspecting the book to contain a printed story of some kind. Even a handwritten journal wouldn't have surprised me given the general technological level of this world. But seeing a completely empty book with only white, untouched, sheets of paper in it certainly was a surprise.
I closed the book and looked at her.
"It is empty," I stated.
"Of course it is," she said smirking. "Our journey has only just begun." Understanding dawned on me when she continued to explain. "It is logbook, for the captain to record all the adventures the crew is experiencing."
I didn't actually share her enthusiasm. I was never a fan of paperwork of any kind; working two years for the government just reinforced that notion.
It was probably something she thought Pirates or, to be more precise, the captain, had to do.
"I see," I remarked emotionless. Immediately, Hancock picked up on my apathy, and her smile faltered, which compelled me to add. "I will treasure it, and I will be sure to write down everything that happened to us on our journey. Thank you."
Which, as it turned out, was the right thing to say. Given by her reaction jumping up and down like a little energizer bunny.
I looked down on the book I held in my hands and sighed. Well, keeping a logbook shouldn't be so bad, and if it kept her happy, why not. Inwardly I hoped the entries would turn out to be more positive, than those my last diary was filled with.
When I looked up, Hancock had returned to her pile and with Sandersonia started to spread the items out. This was the first time I laid my own eyes on them.
She placed the color cartridges aside and flattened the cloth piece she used as an improvised pouch to carry all the items up here. She then inspected all the writing utensils she brought with her brushes and the like. When she was satisfied with what she got. She started to draw on some loose paper she placed on top of the cloth.
No longer able to keep her curiosity in check, Sandersonia probed.
"What are you doing Onee-San?"
"What do you think, imouto-chan?" Hancock mumbled absently minded focused on her task.
"Drawing?" Sandersonia wondered out loud.
"Drawing!" Hancock playfully quaked
"That's what you think I'm doing. I expected more of my imouto-chan." She continued to tease after her little outburst. "For you to recognize the importance of what I'm doing. After all, I'm about to correct an oversight that prevented us from being recognized as REAL pirates." Hancock all but declared.
Not that her words would have helped her little sister in figuring out what was going on. Her interest, on the other hand, was roused further.
Sandersonia came closer and moved behind Hancock to see what she was working on.
"Ohh!" was what she exclaimed. "Please, Onee-sama let me help you," she begged.
Wordless Hancock made some space for her sister and gave her access to her tools. Within moments, they were solely focused on what they were doing, dead to their surroundings, their hunger forgotten.
They also managed to ignore the various scents the air coming from downstairs carried with it, each one being more enticing than the last. My mouth watered at the prospect to get the first decent meal in years, because what Rayleigh called food hardly qualified as such.
Sure it sated one but so did eating paper, and there wasn't much difference between those two. He might have been a Legendary Pirate and is undoubtedly still one of the strongest men this world had to offer a cook, on the other hand, he was not.
I would have liked to boast of my ability to make better meals than he was capable of. As a consequence of my mother's death, I cooked for myself, and doing so should have taught me a thing or two about cooking. Alone out of necessity, you can only survive on frozen food for so long, until you can't stomach looking at, let alone eat it.
The problem was all my knowledge and the dozen or so dishes I was confident in preparing required ingredients the Island we were on just didn't have. The few experiments in which I tried to substitute things the Island lacked with something found on the Island turned out to be even more inedible than what Rayleigh did manage to produce, which was the reason I gave it up. Wasting the few hours of downtime I was allowed each day on this doomed to fail project.
Therefore I hardly could fault my body reacting this way, in joyful anticipation to have once more a use for my sense of taste.
I didn't have to endure the torture of only smelling the food for long. Marigold emerged a few minutes after the first attack on my senses took place with four large steaming soup bowls and a loaf of freshly baked bread carefully balanced on top of a tray.
She stopped on the last step of the stairs incredulous looking at her sisters. Both not even budging from their position on the floor.
"You could have told me that you stuffed yourself with air and no longer require food. So I wouldn't have bothered to prepare four bowls. This way and could have spared me from having to wash the two dishes not needed."
"Mari, don't you see we are occ..."
Hancock came that far with her reprimand until her brain started to process what her senses were registering.
"Food!" Hancock exclaimed and jumped on her feet. In the blink of an eye, she had raced towards her sister, nearly barreling Sandersonia and her cargo over, coming to a stop at the last possible moment. She unceremoniously reached for a Bowl and some bread. With both in hand, she returned to her place as fast as the stew in her bowl permitted.
"I'm starving!" Hancock shouted before she lifted a steaming spoon filled with the stew in the air.
I was about to open my mouth to warn her, but she gave me no time to do so and had the spoon stuffed it in her mouth before a sound could leave my lips. I could watch how her eyes started to water, and her tongue was occupied, moving the hot contents of her mouth from left to right.
I bent down and took one of the flasks standing at my feet and threw it to Hancock. Despite having trouble to keep her mouth from ending up a blistering mess, she had enough presence of mind to catch it. With some impressive swiftness, she removed the cap and took a huge gulp.
"That hit the spot!" Hancock said only to look sheepish my way. "Thank you Onee-sama."
"You really should be more careful. We don't have a doctor that could stitch you back together in case you hurt yourself," I said. "That applies to all of you."
"Hehehe, sorry I didn't think it would be that hot - no matter; Mari you did good that stew is incredible." Hancock praised while blowing air at her next overfilled spoon, not wasting a second to eat.
Sandersonia showed some wisdom by not repeating her big-sisters mistake and exercised the necessary caution by probing the heat of her food by flicking her tongue like a snake right before she put it in her mouth.
Marigold walked up to me and handed me my own plate and a few slices of bread.
"Thank you," I said. "That looks and smells really great."
I sat down cross-legged under the watchful gaze of Marigold and took my first bite of her stew after taking my time blowing at the steaming hot spoon, and I had to agree with the verdict of Hancock it really was great.
To Marigold, who was still watching me like a hawk, waiting for my assessment, I said after swallowed the contents in my mouth.
"Your sister is right, this is great. If I wouldn't have been sure before of you being the right girl for the position of our crews cook; A small taste of this and you would have convinced me of it."
She avoided my eyes and looked down at the ground while nervously shuffling with her right foot.
"T... Thank you." was her whispered response.
Oh, did she have trouble accepting praise? Or was it praise from somebody she admired?
I waited for her to sit down and for her to eat herself. But she remained standing and shuffling around. The unpleasant silence was only interrupted by the occasional eating sound of her sisters and threatened to drag on a long time. I decided to show her some mercy. She didn't deserve to be teased by her sisters for this, certainly not after conjuring up this meal.
I leaned a little her way to reduce the chance to be overheard by her sisters and whispered
"Marigold, your meal is getting cold."
She made a faint peep sound by being ripped out of her state of contemplation. She was flustered, with a pink tinge to her cheeks. Avoiding looking at me, she sat down and, with her eyes trained on her food, she started eating.
I couldn't help but inwardly smile at that situation.
For the rest of the meal, we ate in silence, all of us too occupied enjoying the sensory impressions to talk.
The portions Marigold prepared for us were big enough to fill all our bellies, even those of the children after the heavy workout I had them do. Well, the remains in the half-full pot are going to end up as our supper.
"While we are busy with digesting, let's talk about our schedule from today on."
"Schedule, Onee-sama?" Hancock wondered.
"Yes, we need a plan in place on how to split waking hours between us," I said. "We are now on the sea with Pirates roaming them, so we have to take precautions not to be raided while we are all asleep. We have to be vigilant, and at least one of us has to be awake at all times to be in a position to warn the rest of us."
They nodded their heads in understanding.
"Do you want to split us up into four shifts, each eight hours in length? Sandersonia asked.
"It would be a reasonable assumption for you to think that, if you would all be adults but since you are not. This is how we are gonna do it," I said. "You three together will be responsible for the ships twelve hours a day from six in the morning to six in the afternoon, and I will be taking care of the twelve hours at night."
"But then we won't see each other Onee-sama, you will be sleeping when we are awake and we will sleep when you are awake," Marigold stated.
"Who is gonna train and teach us?" Hancock asked.
"I am," I said.
"How?" Sandersonia inquired.
"Well, if you would allow me to finish, I was about to tell you exactly that," I said.
"Sorry, Onee-sama." Sandersonia and Hancock sheepish admitted.
"As I said before, I was so rudely interrupted," I voiced in the best impression of my mother's stern and lecturing manner I could manage "I will take the night shift; guarding you during the night and will wake you come morning. You then will proceed to train your body like we just did. You best take turns with one of you having an eye on the course and the horizon. The same applies when you bathe, cook, etc. One of you needs to be vigilant at all times. I trust our Vice-captain can handle that?"
"Of course, Onee-sama leave it to me. You won't be disappointed," Hancock declared.
"I know I won't, but that is neither an excuse for you to slack off. After all, only those that take their training seriously will get anywhere nor for you, Hancock, to think you have to handle all by yourself. If anything is happening out of the ordinary, be it a ship on the horizon, raining toads, whatever. I want you to wake me. Is that understood?"
"Yes, Onee-sama!" She promised.
I allowed my eyes to roam, and when they fell on Sandersonia and Marigold, it elicited a fervor nod from them.
"Good, that means in case nothing happened during the mornings, you will then wake me up around noon." This would allow me around six hours of sleep; Being roughly the amount I was used to. I could go without sleep, by splitting myself into two iterations.
I could then have the smaller one stay awake while the other larger part slept. By remerging, after the larger part got her good nights rest I could circumvent my need for sleep. The problem with this, I would find myself in a constant state of light sleepiness, similar to not getting a good night's rest, something that would present me with nothing more than some inconvenience and discomfort.
Still, it was not a state I would like to find myself in for a prolonged amount of time, if not absolutely necessary.
Doing it this way also had some advantages. It would distance the security blanket I was, in their eyes from them. Of course, it wouldn't be gone entirely. Nonetheless, the kids would have to make their own decisions, think things through, learn to take responsibility, which might be exactly what was needed for them to build up some trust in their own capabilities or, in Hancock's case, regain it.
Furthermore, this would allow me to train away from their prying eyes. After all, I had to get used to wielding the new sword in my possession.
"After we take our meals together, I'm gonna take over your training for the rest of the day," I continued to say.
"What will you teach us?" Sandersonia asked.
"That depends mostly on what I think you need to improve on. For a start, we will focus on the development of your Haki and see how that goes. That reminds me, we lack certain tools to do that." I said.
"In the storage room fastened on the right side, you will find a bowl about knee height with a diameter of more than a meter. Could two of you bring it up here? And could you also fetch the fine-weave fishnet lying on the desk in my cabin?" Another late night project of mine.
Sandersonia and Marigold stood up and went downstairs. I stood up and took the helm in my hands and adjusted our course to intercept the other `tool´ required for their training I sensed from miles away.
Without turning my head, I addressed the still behind me sitting Hancock.
"Care to tell me, what you and Sandersonia were doing commanding such an attention, that you even forgot your own hunger?"
"We were designing a Jolly Roger for our Pirate Crew," she proudly declared.
"A Jolly Roger," I repeated. I didn't know much about the topic. Before I found myself in this world, I never would have thought of such knowledge to worthwhile. What little I did know was, that the use here and back home greatly differed. On Bet, the Pirates only announced themselves as Pirates by raising their Pirate Flag when their intended victim was within range.
They used it as a declaration of intent, allowing the other ship the opportunity to decide on what to do, surrender, or fight. In this world, according to Rayleigh, the Jolly Roger was a matter of Pride for the Pirates, and they wouldn't even consider sailing under a false flag, not their own.
It was a stupid sentiment, why paint a target for the marines on your back if you can avoid it. I couldn't be the first one to contemplate this, which gave credence to there being a hidden meaning of some kind.
My best guess, it was about reputation and I knew exactly, since my time with the Undersiders, how important reputation could be if one happened to be on the wrong side of the law.
It was a currency more valuable than gold, and it said a lot about you.
If you can fly a Pirate Flag constantly, it carried with it certain implications for one; the most important being about your crew's strength.
"Did you settle on a design?" I wondered.
"No, I was mostly practicing. I... I have trouble coming up with a unique motive. Something that really fits, you know," she confided.
"I see," I said. I really didn't want to damp her enthusiasm. It was obvious to see how into creating an identifier for our crew she was. However much I disliked doing it, I had to.
"Hancock, I won't forbid you to pursue creating a Jolly Roger for us, our crew, but you should know it might take quite some time before we can sail under it," I said.
"Why? Aren't you a Pirate? Aren't we Pirates? A jolly roger is important without it... we are no real Pirates." Hancock attempted to make her case.
I sighed, how to best explain it to her.
"I'm aware," I said. "Tell me what would be the effects of us flying a Jolly Roger."
"We would fulfill another requirement to be real Pirates," Hancock answered.
"Go on," I prompted her. "What else?"
"We would show to the World, that this is a Pirate ship," she said.
"Exactly," I confirmed "and why might drawing attention to us be a problem?"
I didn't need to look at her to know, that her face was strained in concentration. Eyebrows narrowed, contemplating my question.
"The Marines might attack us," she offered as an explanation, unsure of her words.
"Yes, that is one of the reasons why I'm reluctant to do this," I conceded. "Another one is; that as Pirates, we might not be allowed access to every Island we come across. Both of those things will hinder our progress and inconvenience us one way or the other, but that isn't the main reason why I'm against it. Do you have an idea as to what that might be?"
After a minute in which she was unable to come up with an answer to my question, I saved her by explaining.
"When we are eventually attacked, be it from the Marines or another Pirate crew trying to establish their superiority over us, we will have to fight against them. I'm strong, I can hold my own in a fight, but can you or your sisters do the same as you are now?" I asked her.
Her response to this question was silence.
"I can take on the average Pirate crew on my own, and in the first half of the Grand-line, anything better is quite a rarity," I said. "Nonetheless, just because something doesn't occur normally doesn't mean it never will," I paused to allow that to sink in.
"Remember those two guys with the devil-fruits back on Sabaody, neither one of them, given their strength, should have been found this side of the Grand-line. Despite that, they were on this side, and against guys like them even I might find myself hard-pressed fighting them and protecting you and your sisters at the same time." I tried to caution her from the notion to think infallible.
"Do you think you and your sister could stand up to someone like that in a fight? Or that you could outrun them?" I asked her.
"No, I don't think you could," I answered the rhetoric question myself.
"So tell me," I asked. "Should I risk your and your sister's well-being by just assuming we won't run into such dangerous guys again?" I needed to drive the point home that the danger to her and her sisters was far from over.
"No." was her curt response, and she ended up pouting.
"Don't worry, if you keep training, it won't be long until I give you permission to paint our sails with the motive for our Pirate flag you came up with."
Saying those words was the first step in reconciling with her, and it also served to alleviate her souring mood.
We ended our discussion when Marigold and Sandersonia emerged from the stairs carrying the bowl in between them.
Their timing was impeccable.
"Thank you. Place it on the ground over there, next to the railing." I said.
They did as bid and put it down.
"Hancock, would you be so kind, to take over the helm? You two should take a step back if you don't want to take another, involuntary bath." I said as I moved to the bowl and relinquished control over the ship to Hancock.
I bent down and removed the spider-silk net the two had put inside from within the bowl, then proceeded to unfold it and threw it over the railing. The net was dragged alongside the ship for a few seconds until I was sure enough fish had been caught in it.
In a swift motion, I hauled it back on deck right into the bowl, thanks to my speed and the semi permeability of the net, not only the fish but a huge chunk of seawater landed in the bowl.
Sandersonia and Marigold for their own good followed my advice and escaped being splashed.
"So far so good, now please sit down," I bid them.
I had the three girls arranged around the bowl filled with those tiny fish, no bigger than a segment of a finger.
"As a first step in your Kenbunshoku Haki training, I want you to catch those fish. To do so, you sit down in front of the bowl, and with one swift motion, you try to grab one. In case you managed to catch one, you put it back in and try again. You graduate from this exercise if you can catch ten fish in succession." I explained.
"That's easy. We won't even need Haki for this," Sandersonia said.
I raised my eyebrow at that comment.
"Someone seems to be sure of herself. Why don't you go ahead demonstrate for your sisters exactly how easy this is."
"Sure, piece of cake," Sandersonia said and sat herself down cross-legged in front of the bowl. She pulled up her sleeves and then started to intently study the movement of the fish, trying to discern some pattern in their erratic changes of directions. Suddenly her flat hand shoot out, dipped into the water, closed itself before it was retracted equally fast. She proceeded to open her hand only to find it empty.
"Huh, where is the fish?" She wondered, "I was sure I had him."
Hancock and Marigold had trouble keeping their giggling contained at seeing her sister fail at, as she put it, a seemingly easy task.
Meanwhile, I asked her,
"Am I right in the assumption you struck the exact spot you saw the fish being present?"
"Of course, where else should I have attacked," she answered put off why I would even ask that.
I threw a coin into the bowel and watched it sink to the ground.
"Reach for the coin," I ordered.
She put her hand in the water and moved her fingertips at the exact spot she saw the coin lying on the ground only to find her fingers touching nothing but the bowl.
"Keep touching the ground and move your hand in a straight line closer to yourself," I directed her movement.
"I have it." she proclaimed and removed her hand from the bowl, this time with the coin in it.
"What just happened Onee-sama," Sandersonia asked curiously.
"You just witnessed an optical illusion or, more precisely, the refraction of light passing from one medium to another."
They all looked at me with mouths open as if my head was sprouting leaves, not comprehending what I just told them.
"For us in order to see something with our eyes, the object or person we are looking at has to reflect the light making contact with the surface of it and from there needs to be redirected to our eyes. This is one of the reasons why we can't see when it is dark; no light means no reflection and therefore nothing to register for our eyes."
"I see. But what has that to do with the coin not being at the spot where I saw it." Sandersonia asked impatiently.
"I was coming to that," I said. "You see, light moves slower in certain materials than it does in air, for example, water. This means when light passes from air to water and vice versa, it gets refracted. Letting it look like as if the thing you are looking at is somewhere else."
"Is there a way to prevent this from happening?" Sandersonia inquired.
"There are ways to diminish or eliminate this effect entirely. For example, if you look straight down from above the water surface to an object the refraction is non-existent. Allowing you to see the object position even though it submerged in water and while you are not."
Sandersonia was about to stand up when I placed my hand on her shoulder and stopped her.
"This exercise is not about how to circumvent the refraction and get reliable information with your sense of sight. It is about teaching you that your senses, no matter which one, can be tricked, and for you to not get overreliant on just one of them. You have to use them in concert, and this exercise is designed in such a way that you have to disregard sight. Humans most trusted sense, in order to first notice the discrepancy to what your other senses tell you and to rely on your Haki, even though your eyes tell you different." I explained.
"So with that said, I hope it became clear to you that you need to stay at the edge of the bowl no leaning over it or changing your point of view while you try to catch some fish, understood?"
"Yes, Onee-sama." All three of them said in chorus.
"Good, then see to it."
Authors Note: I'm aware, that a Cobra doesn't possess the most deadly venom of all the snakes in existence and that this title is either held by the Inland Taipan or some sea-snake. But the Boa sisters don't know/care about that.
"Again," I ordered.
"Onee-sama," Hancock moaned. "Why do I have to participate in the drills, too? I'm the Vice-captain shouldn't I oversee them instead."
"You have to take part because you are the Vice-Captain. Everyone in a Leadership position should know exactly what it is you demand from your subordinates, and what better way is there than to experience it yourself," I lectured. "Besides, as small as our crew is, every one of us has to know exactly how to sail the ship."
"I see," Hancock said and went back to help her sisters unfold the sails of our ship. An activity I had them do the whole morning, so far I was impressed with what I was seeing, their dedication and teamwork was something many could learn from. They managed to reduce the time it took them to get it done by half in a single morning of concentrated effort.
While I had them running around on deck, I had some spiders I separated from my body weaving silk in my cabin to get them something to wear that did more than just cover their bodies but also protected them.
I didn't want to make the same mistake that nearly cost me, my whole team, twice. I learned this lection from not providing the Undersiders with Spider-silk costumes at the earliest opportunity the hard way. Furthermore, they were in dire need of clothes. Since they only had the rags they wore at the moment, onboard this ship.
I waited for them to set the sails and decided, to stop this here for the moment. With the wind starting to intensify, ending the calm, I tried to make use of by doing some drills with them.
After all, if we did this the whole day, we would never arrive anywhere. All the sailing we did yesterday, despite done under favorable conditions only brought us so far.
"Good job," I praised. "We will continue this another time. Now let's start your training."
"Training Onee-sama? But didn't we do that just now?" Hancock wondered.
"No, those were drills." I clarified. "For you to internalize every single movement required to be able to sail the ship. So that you don't have to think about what you are doing because eventually, we will get in a situation where we won't have the luxury to think; A situation in which our lives might depend on for you to be able to do all that blindfolded."
"Then what else do you want us to train," Sandersonia asked.
"To Fight obviously," I said, "didn't you all want to become strong Pirates?"
"We are going to be strong Pirates, Onee-Sama," Marigold informed us with unwavering conviction of her statement to become a reality.
"Strength is something you have to work for in order to achieve it, not something you are entitled to." I said, "which is why we are gonna train."
"Are we gonna get as strong as you Onee-Sama?" Hancock asked hopeful.
"Eventually you might," I conceded. "It depends on how far you are willing to go."
"What do we have to do?" Hancock eagerly wanted to know.
"Let's start with some push-ups," I said.
At least for now, I was holding back from telling them, what I ultimately planned to teach them. Given their readiness to do everything I asked of them, without a single complaint. To please me, their Onee-Sama, suited me just fine. And I had every intention to take full advantage of it while it lasted.
The minds of children are fickle. I fully expected them, at one point, to start to question the purpose of this training, my methods and showing off the Rokushiki techniques might be the one thing to keep them interested in it. Given my lack of prior experience with girls their age, their attention span, and how long their devotion to reach a goal would last, I thought proceeding this way to be a good idea.
After all, it wouldn't do me any good to shoot off all my ammunition at the very beginning, and seeing a demonstration of the Rokushiki when their motivation is about to hit a low point might be enough to turn it around. I just hoped the six incentives the Rokushiki was able to provide would be enough in that regard.
"How ... many ... do ... you ... want ... us ... to ... do?" Hancock inquired in between doing her push-ups.
"Keep it up until your arms feel like jelly, and you are no longer able to lift yourself from the ground," I said. "Then I want you to do knee bends until your thighs feel the same, following that sit-ups, running... and when you are done, with those exercises; you are to repeat them over and over again. Until there is not a single muscle in your body left not aching."
"Did ... you ... do ... all ... that ... to get ... so ... strong ... Onee-sama?" Sandersonia asked one word at a time whenever she reached the peak of a push-up.
"Yes" I confirmed, and I happened to eat a devil fruit, that allowed me to cheat, which probably saved me years it would have otherwise taken to get anywhere near my current strength. But that is something you didn't need to know about. At least not until you could use Geppou. I really wouldn't want to risk them to crave for a Devil Fruit, while they were unable to keep themselves from falling into the sea.
I was still on the fence on telling them about the four devil Fruits hidden under the planks, in the hidden compartment of my cabin. Let alone letting them eat any, despite there clearly being a connection between three of those fruits and the girls doing their exercises right in front of me.
Did I really trust this newly gained ability to bet the lives of those kids on it? A devil fruit wasn't something that could just be taken back. It was a life-altering event to eat one of those, and I had no idea what abilities those fruits might grant them. What if it turned out to be a useless or unwanted ability? Would they hold it against me having traded their ability to swim for what they might end up with?
A question that didn't need answering today. Even with Soru and Geppou considered as the two easier to learn techniques out of the six, it would take them weeks to get anywhere with them. Though I had to admit I was impressed with them. Their bodies were in excellent condition, stronger by quite an enormous margin compared to mine, when I first had arrived here.
Considering the headstart they had in regards to Haki. They undoubtedly would be a force to be reckoned with within a few years. I wondered how strong those Kuja Pirates were when all the children living on Amazon Lily received the same training.
If Rayleigh was to be believed, and I had no reason to doubt anything he had said, Haki users in the First Half of the grand-line were nearly unheard of. But right in front of me were three kids, being living proof that there are exceptions to every rule.
I had my fun watching them exhaust themselves and calling them out when they started to slack off or got slower. For now, it was enough to remind the girls of their goals. Telling them, `If they stop now, they will never become a strong Pirate´ was more than enough to keep them going.
I watched and spurred them on for quite some time, the wind blowing in my hair on this sunny day, the sisterly japing from my cute little fosterlings, and I started to really enjoy, to feel at home. My thoughts drifted to Lisa... I stopped them from going any further; the memory that crept its way into my thoughts immediately souring my mood.
I wasn't sure if I gave something away. Either through my face or my Aura since I was lax in reigning it in, controlling what feelings it displayed since we left Sabaody behind. For a reason unknown, Sandersonia stopped in the middle of a set of push-ups at exactly that moment my thoughts drifted and flipped herself on her back.
She gave me the strangest of looks with her cheeks reddened her breathing heavily, all the while sweating profusely. Her clothes were clinging to her skin as if she just arose from the water she took a swim in.
While she was still trying to regain her breath in order to have enough air to voice whatever it was, she wanted to share with us. Her stomach started to growl, and by this, I meant roar. It drowned out the wind and the heavy breathing of her and her sister effortlessly.
Hancock and Sandersonia, unable to suppress their laughter at their sister's plight, could no longer sustain the body tension necessary for their push-ups and joined their sister on the ground.
Marigold looked bewildered at them for a moment only to join in with them, and I couldn't hide the smirk that sneaked on my lips.
"Let's stop here for today," I said. "Why don't you all go and wash yourselves, and after you are done. Sandersonia can show us her skills as a cook and prepare a delicious meal for us? We wouldn't want any of you to go hungry, now would we?"
I threw to each of them a water flask yet again. Since I stressed how important drinking during strenuous physical activity was. They didn't hesitate, and each took a huge gulp from the flasks to quench their thirst...
"I have prepared you a bath in the cargo hold," I said.
Their joy at the end of the torturous training session only lasted till they tried to move under deck.
"I can't feel my feet," complained Sandersonia.
"Au, au, au" were the sounds Hancock made with every step she took.
The only one making their way down in silence was Marigold, but she couldn't hide the grimace her face turned into with every other step.
They took their sweet time to get themselves cleaned up, soaking in the three-barrel of seawater I had prepared in advance. The empty cargo hold was ideal for that, the only room not allocated a purpose and spacious enough to hold the barrels. Since the rest of the ship with the three rather small cabins was rather spartan in regards to free space or fulfilled another purpose like the kitchen or the toilet it was also the only room that could reasonably be used for that.
And the three cabins split made a certain sense, allowing for the day and night shift crews to have their own cabins. It would help to reduce the chance of disturbing the others during their sleep. The designers of the ship even went so far as to have them on the opposing sides of the ship. One cabin was located backboard and the other starboard only separated by the hallway the staircases lead down to.
The last cabin was being placed aft, giving its size with only one large hammock in it, clearly the one intended for the captain. The first time noticing the lack of a cot or bed I was surprised, thinking about it, it made a lot of sense given what type of ship the Sakura was. She was built to lean into the wind, which meant the ship wouldn't be horizontal most of the time. On the contrary, tilted will be her default state during travels, and no one wants to fall out of a bed mid-sleep, something a cot couldn't prevent from happening a hammock, however, could, by leaning the same way the ship did at any time.
I took advantage of their lack of vigilance and replaced their discarded clothes with the first set of spider-silk ones I finished. Weaving them kept me awake the previous night, and only during their training was I able to finish them. I had my spiders steal the rags they wore. They wouldn't be needed any longer.
It was quite funny to listen in to their chatter when they finally decided after their skin had turned pruney to emerge only to find their clothes they had strewn about the room in a straight line to the barrels missing.
"Onee-san someone stole my clothes," Marigold exclaimed surprised.
"Mine are missing, too," Hancock said.
"Who could have done this, aren't we the only ones on board?" Sandersonia wondered.
"Of course we are," Hancock reassured them "Onee-sama would know otherwise and would have taken care of any stowaway and I didn't sense anybody else onboard either."
On the one hand, the trust they obviously had in me was adorable. On the other hand, somewhat disturbing. If they kept this up, I might think of myself as a sect leader.
"What is that?" Sandersonia asked and pointed to the three bundles of clothes marked with their names lying on a small bench next to some towels.
They all approached the Bench dripping wet, leaving puddles in their wake. Sandersonia was the first to reach for a bundle of clothes with her name attached.
"Clothes" she confirmed and held them up "the fabric is so soft" she mused while caressing it with her fingers and even went as far as to bury her face in it. This served as the go-ahead for her sisters to overcome their initial reluctance and moved to touch their own bundles.
"So soft and tender" acknowledged Marigold while rubbing her cheek against the clothes in her hand.
Hancock tried her hardest to keep her dignity intact as the older sister and refused to give in to her desire to do the same. My bugs could see her eyes twitch, occasionally when she looked at her sisters snuggling with their clothes.
Hancock was more reserved in how she made her observations, acting the big sister. Nonetheless, she clearly was impressed, if her diligence and caution with which she traced the clothes were anything to go by.
"I'm never going to wear anything else in my life If I can help it." She suddenly declared only to receive passionate nods from her sisters. They took the towels and dried themselves in record time and nearly fell over themselves more than once in an attempt to put on their clothes.
I had their outfits designed with their previous ones in mind. No easy task, with all those missing pieces in those torn shreds, that at one point might have qualified for clothing. I did the only thing, they could still be used for and had my spiders throw them overboard.
I had to rely on guesswork and no small amount of imagination to reach the conclusion, that the rags I found them in, might have been qipao dresses or some variation thereof.
Of course, I made some adjustments. My first priority was the continued physical integrity of the girls, which is why I regretted not having any hard bug-shells at hand to reinforce the clothes around the vital parts of the wearer. It was something I planned to rectify at the earliest convenience. That meant, for now, the multilayer spider-silk-weave their clothes were made of had to suffice in safeguarding them.
I fashioned them after piqao dresses and made them high-collared to protect their throats and body-hugging, contrary to how they are usually designed. I made them longsleeved down to their wrists. Combined with the gloves I prepared, it would allow them to enclose the entirety of their arms in slash and piercing resistant fiber.
For completion's sake, I added pants more resembling stockings. Since they also extended over their vulnerable feet. With the difference of the fiber being a thick multi-weave more resembling to what one would use for pants. The soles were further reinforced to last a long time, even if worn without footwear.
The dresses themselves were slit up, up to their thighs in order to not impede the movement of their legs. I took great care in ensuring the hem of the dress wasn't long enough for them to accidentally step on it in a stressful situation and lose their balance or worse, trip over it.
That left only their heads unprotected; the reason for this once more was the lack of suitable materials to make anything that wouldn't just end looking like fancy headwear without any real protective-properties. Like so many other lessons, I had to learn the hard way how important a wholly enclosed helmet is. Because of this, I had every intention to have some made for all of them as soon as possible.
I already had started with another set of clothes but was determined to wait a few more days to make any more. The reason for this was two-fold. First, I wanted to observe if the clothes didn't impede them in any way to adjust the following designs to accommodate their preferences. Furthermore, I had to make sure the measurements I took of them while they slept were accurate, as it turned out it was no easy task to do so with bugs.
They thrashed around and turned constantly. In addition, I had to dodge their attempts to swat away my little crawlies while they slept. It nearly became an exercise in futility.
But since I didn't want to wake them from their more than deserved rest. Also, because I couldn't be sure of how they would have reacted to be swarmed by spiders for measurements. I thought it prudent to proceed without their knowledge, and to a lesser degree, I wanted them kept in the dark about my devil-fruit powers to avoid them becoming an issue.
For the most part, I intended to prevent them from seeking one of their own, just to be more like me. My mind wasn't made up in this regard, nor did I want to lie to them.
When they finished putting on their new attire, the girls converged. Each one of the three making up the apex of an equilateral triangle. Grim-faced, looking at each other until they all started to smirk and began chanting.
"Deadly like Cobra-Venom,
fast like a black mambas strike,
strong and unrelenting like a constrictor,
sharp like a snake Fang"
During all this, they performed a silly dance mimicking certain aspects of the behavior of snakes.
I felt a knot in my chest at seeing this, remembering a young Emma and I doing something similar, a dance we made up once upon a time to cement our friendship. I pushed those memories down before the two years of abuse I suffered at her hand had time to resurface, too. I didn't want to give them the opportunity to taint their display of genuine affection and sisterhood.
The determination to preserve not only their lives but their childlike innocence, their naivety strengthened as I watched them. Even though I knew how futile such an endeavor would be. There was just no way to succeed; this world and my old had far too much in common, and my path would undoubtedly lead me right into the heart of the darkness of this world.
When they were done with their dance Hancock asked.
"Who is gonna become a super-strong Pirate?"
"We are!"
They all yelled, which was followed up by giggling, that soon was accompanied by stomach grumbling from all of them. Awkwardly rubbing their bellies.
"We better start cooking," Hancock noted, which her sister agreed with, given their nods and made their way towards the kitchen.
Aspiring to follow in their role models footsteps was commendable. But I was sure they romanticized the life as a Pirate even more so than I had done with the life of a Hero, something I couldn't fault them for doing. After all, they were a few years younger than I had been when I first set out and should have known better.
Which, to be honest, had me in a bind. Do I correct their worldview and prepare them for the reality that awaits them, or would it be better if they experience what it was really like for themselves?
How would I have reacted, if Lisa wouldn't have soft sold me what it was like with her whole cops and robbers spiel, to diminish that being a cape was a life and death struggle most of the time.
Knowing myself, not well in the slightest, I more than likely would have gone my own separate way, without a team at my back and people who knew what they were doing. Given what I know now and what events ultimately transpired in Brockton Bay. It was not unreasonable to think I wouldn't have made it, someone or something would have gotten me sooner or later, and the list of possible culprits was a long one.
Despite my faults and the destination, my journey was gonna take me. I had to admit to myself that they would be safer and more prepared for what was to come if they stayed close to me instead of allowing them to follow their own path.
In the kitchen, Marigold took out pots and put them over the small fireplace.
"Nee-San can you light the fire?" she asked Sandersonia, who proceeded to place some logs under the pots and lighted them.
Meanwhile, Marigold started to slice vegetables and meat into small pieces, which was understood by her sister as an invitation to attempt stealing food from her in order to take the edge of their hunger. At least this was how I interpreted their hands slowly sneaking closer and closer to the food, carefully trying to avoid detection.
"Au, don't be mean." Hancock cried out when her sister stopped her attempt to spirit some food away by slapping her hand.
Perhaps hide and seek should be added to their routine, for them to get a feel for covert stuff, because this was just pathetic. They wouldn't even manage to steal a soother from a baby.
"Then don't go stealing food until it is properly cooked." Marigold chided.
"But that is gonna take forever, I'm hungry," Hancock whined. Apparently, no longer caring about her older sister role when it came to still her hunger.
"The more you interfere with my cooking, the longer it is gonna take." Marigold deadpanned.
"Moah, Mari don't be that way. Give me just a little something to last." Hancock begged.
"No, as this crews cook, food dispensation is under my purview. And you get your share when I'm done not before." Marigold had barely closed her mouth saying that. When Sandersonia coming from the other side, took advantage of the distraction Hancock provided her with and successfully stole some food and stuffed her mouth with it.
Marigold narrowed her eyes and grabbed Sandersonia and Hancock by their earlobes, and dragged them out of the kitchen. She was ignoring the protest and pleading of Hancock the whole way, whereas Sandersonia was occupied chewing the contents in her mouth, that had her look like some greedy hamster with her stuffed cheeks. Marigold closed the door behind them and returned to her task.
"That is an unfair treatment. As Vice-Captain I order you to let us back in." Hancock pleaded in front of the closed-door, hammering against it.
"Why are you so cruel to your sisters, withholding food. Don't you love us? ... Mari?" her pleading became more desperate but had no effect whatsoever. Marigold on the other side of the door ignored her completely.
A fact Hancock seemed to recognize too, her focus shifted to the sister who was banished together with her. Her eyes narrowed at the still chewing Sandersonia.
"This is all your fault, couldn't you have worked in concert with me distracting her alternating so both of us could claim some spoils?" She said angered while continuously poking the chest of her sister, who seemed to ignore her sister's rant, still occupied with chewing.
Hancock evidently became aware of the futility of what she was doing and literally tried to tear her hair out to relieve her frustration but gave it up before it could come to that and instead just stomped away frustrated.
If this was their usual behavior, then I was in for a fun ride.
Hancock marched into one of the storage rooms and started rummaging through the crates she found there. It was obvious, that she didn't do this just to still her curiosity. On the contrary, she was out on a mission and was searching for something specific.
It took her a few minutes in which the pile of items she gathered rose in height until she finally seemed to be satisfied when she found a stack of books deep down in a crate. She skimmed through it and a content grin formed on her lips.
She climbed down from shelve and refastened all the crates she opened and then took her spoils and made her way past Sandersonia, who watched this proceeding with great interest and started to follow her big sister.
They both came up on deck shortly after. Hancock placed the items on the ground near the entrance minus the book she found and approached me at the helm holding it close to her chest.
She moved to my side and presented me with the book at the end of her outstretched arms, grinning she said.
"Here Onee-Sama, for you."
With raised eyebrows, not knowing what to expect, I accepted it from her. I skimmed through it, fully suspecting the book to contain a printed story of some kind. Even a handwritten journal wouldn't have surprised me given the general technological level of this world. But seeing a completely empty book with only white, untouched, sheets of paper in it certainly was a surprise.
I closed the book and looked at her.
"It is empty," I stated.
"Of course it is," she said smirking. "Our journey has only just begun." Understanding dawned on me when she continued to explain. "It is logbook, for the captain to record all the adventures the crew is experiencing."
I didn't actually share her enthusiasm. I was never a fan of paperwork of any kind; working two years for the government just reinforced that notion.
It was probably something she thought Pirates or, to be more precise, the captain, had to do.
"I see," I remarked emotionless. Immediately, Hancock picked up on my apathy, and her smile faltered, which compelled me to add. "I will treasure it, and I will be sure to write down everything that happened to us on our journey. Thank you."
Which, as it turned out, was the right thing to say. Given by her reaction jumping up and down like a little energizer bunny.
I looked down on the book I held in my hands and sighed. Well, keeping a logbook shouldn't be so bad, and if it kept her happy, why not. Inwardly I hoped the entries would turn out to be more positive, than those my last diary was filled with.
When I looked up, Hancock had returned to her pile and with Sandersonia started to spread the items out. This was the first time I laid my own eyes on them.
She placed the color cartridges aside and flattened the cloth piece she used as an improvised pouch to carry all the items up here. She then inspected all the writing utensils she brought with her brushes and the like. When she was satisfied with what she got. She started to draw on some loose paper she placed on top of the cloth.
No longer able to keep her curiosity in check, Sandersonia probed.
"What are you doing Onee-San?"
"What do you think, imouto-chan?" Hancock mumbled absently minded focused on her task.
"Drawing?" Sandersonia wondered out loud.
"Drawing!" Hancock playfully quaked
"That's what you think I'm doing. I expected more of my imouto-chan." She continued to tease after her little outburst. "For you to recognize the importance of what I'm doing. After all, I'm about to correct an oversight that prevented us from being recognized as REAL pirates." Hancock all but declared.
Not that her words would have helped her little sister in figuring out what was going on. Her interest, on the other hand, was roused further.
Sandersonia came closer and moved behind Hancock to see what she was working on.
"Ohh!" was what she exclaimed. "Please, Onee-sama let me help you," she begged.
Wordless Hancock made some space for her sister and gave her access to her tools. Within moments, they were solely focused on what they were doing, dead to their surroundings, their hunger forgotten.
They also managed to ignore the various scents the air coming from downstairs carried with it, each one being more enticing than the last. My mouth watered at the prospect to get the first decent meal in years, because what Rayleigh called food hardly qualified as such.
Sure it sated one but so did eating paper, and there wasn't much difference between those two. He might have been a Legendary Pirate and is undoubtedly still one of the strongest men this world had to offer a cook, on the other hand, he was not.
I would have liked to boast of my ability to make better meals than he was capable of. As a consequence of my mother's death, I cooked for myself, and doing so should have taught me a thing or two about cooking. Alone out of necessity, you can only survive on frozen food for so long, until you can't stomach looking at, let alone eat it.
The problem was all my knowledge and the dozen or so dishes I was confident in preparing required ingredients the Island we were on just didn't have. The few experiments in which I tried to substitute things the Island lacked with something found on the Island turned out to be even more inedible than what Rayleigh did manage to produce, which was the reason I gave it up. Wasting the few hours of downtime I was allowed each day on this doomed to fail project.
Therefore I hardly could fault my body reacting this way, in joyful anticipation to have once more a use for my sense of taste.
I didn't have to endure the torture of only smelling the food for long. Marigold emerged a few minutes after the first attack on my senses took place with four large steaming soup bowls and a loaf of freshly baked bread carefully balanced on top of a tray.
She stopped on the last step of the stairs incredulous looking at her sisters. Both not even budging from their position on the floor.
"You could have told me that you stuffed yourself with air and no longer require food. So I wouldn't have bothered to prepare four bowls. This way and could have spared me from having to wash the two dishes not needed."
"Mari, don't you see we are occ..."
Hancock came that far with her reprimand until her brain started to process what her senses were registering.
"Food!" Hancock exclaimed and jumped on her feet. In the blink of an eye, she had raced towards her sister, nearly barreling Sandersonia and her cargo over, coming to a stop at the last possible moment. She unceremoniously reached for a Bowl and some bread. With both in hand, she returned to her place as fast as the stew in her bowl permitted.
"I'm starving!" Hancock shouted before she lifted a steaming spoon filled with the stew in the air.
I was about to open my mouth to warn her, but she gave me no time to do so and had the spoon stuffed it in her mouth before a sound could leave my lips. I could watch how her eyes started to water, and her tongue was occupied, moving the hot contents of her mouth from left to right.
I bent down and took one of the flasks standing at my feet and threw it to Hancock. Despite having trouble to keep her mouth from ending up a blistering mess, she had enough presence of mind to catch it. With some impressive swiftness, she removed the cap and took a huge gulp.
"That hit the spot!" Hancock said only to look sheepish my way. "Thank you Onee-sama."
"You really should be more careful. We don't have a doctor that could stitch you back together in case you hurt yourself," I said. "That applies to all of you."
"Hehehe, sorry I didn't think it would be that hot - no matter; Mari you did good that stew is incredible." Hancock praised while blowing air at her next overfilled spoon, not wasting a second to eat.
Sandersonia showed some wisdom by not repeating her big-sisters mistake and exercised the necessary caution by probing the heat of her food by flicking her tongue like a snake right before she put it in her mouth.
Marigold walked up to me and handed me my own plate and a few slices of bread.
"Thank you," I said. "That looks and smells really great."
I sat down cross-legged under the watchful gaze of Marigold and took my first bite of her stew after taking my time blowing at the steaming hot spoon, and I had to agree with the verdict of Hancock it really was great.
To Marigold, who was still watching me like a hawk, waiting for my assessment, I said after swallowed the contents in my mouth.
"Your sister is right, this is great. If I wouldn't have been sure before of you being the right girl for the position of our crews cook; A small taste of this and you would have convinced me of it."
She avoided my eyes and looked down at the ground while nervously shuffling with her right foot.
"T... Thank you." was her whispered response.
Oh, did she have trouble accepting praise? Or was it praise from somebody she admired?
I waited for her to sit down and for her to eat herself. But she remained standing and shuffling around. The unpleasant silence was only interrupted by the occasional eating sound of her sisters and threatened to drag on a long time. I decided to show her some mercy. She didn't deserve to be teased by her sisters for this, certainly not after conjuring up this meal.
I leaned a little her way to reduce the chance to be overheard by her sisters and whispered
"Marigold, your meal is getting cold."
She made a faint peep sound by being ripped out of her state of contemplation. She was flustered, with a pink tinge to her cheeks. Avoiding looking at me, she sat down and, with her eyes trained on her food, she started eating.
I couldn't help but inwardly smile at that situation.
For the rest of the meal, we ate in silence, all of us too occupied enjoying the sensory impressions to talk.
The portions Marigold prepared for us were big enough to fill all our bellies, even those of the children after the heavy workout I had them do. Well, the remains in the half-full pot are going to end up as our supper.
"While we are busy with digesting, let's talk about our schedule from today on."
"Schedule, Onee-sama?" Hancock wondered.
"Yes, we need a plan in place on how to split waking hours between us," I said. "We are now on the sea with Pirates roaming them, so we have to take precautions not to be raided while we are all asleep. We have to be vigilant, and at least one of us has to be awake at all times to be in a position to warn the rest of us."
They nodded their heads in understanding.
"Do you want to split us up into four shifts, each eight hours in length? Sandersonia asked.
"It would be a reasonable assumption for you to think that, if you would all be adults but since you are not. This is how we are gonna do it," I said. "You three together will be responsible for the ships twelve hours a day from six in the morning to six in the afternoon, and I will be taking care of the twelve hours at night."
"But then we won't see each other Onee-sama, you will be sleeping when we are awake and we will sleep when you are awake," Marigold stated.
"Who is gonna train and teach us?" Hancock asked.
"I am," I said.
"How?" Sandersonia inquired.
"Well, if you would allow me to finish, I was about to tell you exactly that," I said.
"Sorry, Onee-sama." Sandersonia and Hancock sheepish admitted.
"As I said before, I was so rudely interrupted," I voiced in the best impression of my mother's stern and lecturing manner I could manage "I will take the night shift; guarding you during the night and will wake you come morning. You then will proceed to train your body like we just did. You best take turns with one of you having an eye on the course and the horizon. The same applies when you bathe, cook, etc. One of you needs to be vigilant at all times. I trust our Vice-captain can handle that?"
"Of course, Onee-sama leave it to me. You won't be disappointed," Hancock declared.
"I know I won't, but that is neither an excuse for you to slack off. After all, only those that take their training seriously will get anywhere nor for you, Hancock, to think you have to handle all by yourself. If anything is happening out of the ordinary, be it a ship on the horizon, raining toads, whatever. I want you to wake me. Is that understood?"
"Yes, Onee-sama!" She promised.
I allowed my eyes to roam, and when they fell on Sandersonia and Marigold, it elicited a fervor nod from them.
"Good, that means in case nothing happened during the mornings, you will then wake me up around noon." This would allow me around six hours of sleep; Being roughly the amount I was used to. I could go without sleep, by splitting myself into two iterations.
I could then have the smaller one stay awake while the other larger part slept. By remerging, after the larger part got her good nights rest I could circumvent my need for sleep. The problem with this, I would find myself in a constant state of light sleepiness, similar to not getting a good night's rest, something that would present me with nothing more than some inconvenience and discomfort.
Still, it was not a state I would like to find myself in for a prolonged amount of time, if not absolutely necessary.
Doing it this way also had some advantages. It would distance the security blanket I was, in their eyes from them. Of course, it wouldn't be gone entirely. Nonetheless, the kids would have to make their own decisions, think things through, learn to take responsibility, which might be exactly what was needed for them to build up some trust in their own capabilities or, in Hancock's case, regain it.
Furthermore, this would allow me to train away from their prying eyes. After all, I had to get used to wielding the new sword in my possession.
"After we take our meals together, I'm gonna take over your training for the rest of the day," I continued to say.
"What will you teach us?" Sandersonia asked.
"That depends mostly on what I think you need to improve on. For a start, we will focus on the development of your Haki and see how that goes. That reminds me, we lack certain tools to do that." I said.
"In the storage room fastened on the right side, you will find a bowl about knee height with a diameter of more than a meter. Could two of you bring it up here? And could you also fetch the fine-weave fishnet lying on the desk in my cabin?" Another late night project of mine.
Sandersonia and Marigold stood up and went downstairs. I stood up and took the helm in my hands and adjusted our course to intercept the other `tool´ required for their training I sensed from miles away.
Without turning my head, I addressed the still behind me sitting Hancock.
"Care to tell me, what you and Sandersonia were doing commanding such an attention, that you even forgot your own hunger?"
"We were designing a Jolly Roger for our Pirate Crew," she proudly declared.
"A Jolly Roger," I repeated. I didn't know much about the topic. Before I found myself in this world, I never would have thought of such knowledge to worthwhile. What little I did know was, that the use here and back home greatly differed. On Bet, the Pirates only announced themselves as Pirates by raising their Pirate Flag when their intended victim was within range.
They used it as a declaration of intent, allowing the other ship the opportunity to decide on what to do, surrender, or fight. In this world, according to Rayleigh, the Jolly Roger was a matter of Pride for the Pirates, and they wouldn't even consider sailing under a false flag, not their own.
It was a stupid sentiment, why paint a target for the marines on your back if you can avoid it. I couldn't be the first one to contemplate this, which gave credence to there being a hidden meaning of some kind.
My best guess, it was about reputation and I knew exactly, since my time with the Undersiders, how important reputation could be if one happened to be on the wrong side of the law.
It was a currency more valuable than gold, and it said a lot about you.
If you can fly a Pirate Flag constantly, it carried with it certain implications for one; the most important being about your crew's strength.
"Did you settle on a design?" I wondered.
"No, I was mostly practicing. I... I have trouble coming up with a unique motive. Something that really fits, you know," she confided.
"I see," I said. I really didn't want to damp her enthusiasm. It was obvious to see how into creating an identifier for our crew she was. However much I disliked doing it, I had to.
"Hancock, I won't forbid you to pursue creating a Jolly Roger for us, our crew, but you should know it might take quite some time before we can sail under it," I said.
"Why? Aren't you a Pirate? Aren't we Pirates? A jolly roger is important without it... we are no real Pirates." Hancock attempted to make her case.
I sighed, how to best explain it to her.
"I'm aware," I said. "Tell me what would be the effects of us flying a Jolly Roger."
"We would fulfill another requirement to be real Pirates," Hancock answered.
"Go on," I prompted her. "What else?"
"We would show to the World, that this is a Pirate ship," she said.
"Exactly," I confirmed "and why might drawing attention to us be a problem?"
I didn't need to look at her to know, that her face was strained in concentration. Eyebrows narrowed, contemplating my question.
"The Marines might attack us," she offered as an explanation, unsure of her words.
"Yes, that is one of the reasons why I'm reluctant to do this," I conceded. "Another one is; that as Pirates, we might not be allowed access to every Island we come across. Both of those things will hinder our progress and inconvenience us one way or the other, but that isn't the main reason why I'm against it. Do you have an idea as to what that might be?"
After a minute in which she was unable to come up with an answer to my question, I saved her by explaining.
"When we are eventually attacked, be it from the Marines or another Pirate crew trying to establish their superiority over us, we will have to fight against them. I'm strong, I can hold my own in a fight, but can you or your sisters do the same as you are now?" I asked her.
Her response to this question was silence.
"I can take on the average Pirate crew on my own, and in the first half of the Grand-line, anything better is quite a rarity," I said. "Nonetheless, just because something doesn't occur normally doesn't mean it never will," I paused to allow that to sink in.
"Remember those two guys with the devil-fruits back on Sabaody, neither one of them, given their strength, should have been found this side of the Grand-line. Despite that, they were on this side, and against guys like them even I might find myself hard-pressed fighting them and protecting you and your sisters at the same time." I tried to caution her from the notion to think infallible.
"Do you think you and your sister could stand up to someone like that in a fight? Or that you could outrun them?" I asked her.
"No, I don't think you could," I answered the rhetoric question myself.
"So tell me," I asked. "Should I risk your and your sister's well-being by just assuming we won't run into such dangerous guys again?" I needed to drive the point home that the danger to her and her sisters was far from over.
"No." was her curt response, and she ended up pouting.
"Don't worry, if you keep training, it won't be long until I give you permission to paint our sails with the motive for our Pirate flag you came up with."
Saying those words was the first step in reconciling with her, and it also served to alleviate her souring mood.
We ended our discussion when Marigold and Sandersonia emerged from the stairs carrying the bowl in between them.
Their timing was impeccable.
"Thank you. Place it on the ground over there, next to the railing." I said.
They did as bid and put it down.
"Hancock, would you be so kind, to take over the helm? You two should take a step back if you don't want to take another, involuntary bath." I said as I moved to the bowl and relinquished control over the ship to Hancock.
I bent down and removed the spider-silk net the two had put inside from within the bowl, then proceeded to unfold it and threw it over the railing. The net was dragged alongside the ship for a few seconds until I was sure enough fish had been caught in it.
In a swift motion, I hauled it back on deck right into the bowl, thanks to my speed and the semi permeability of the net, not only the fish but a huge chunk of seawater landed in the bowl.
Sandersonia and Marigold for their own good followed my advice and escaped being splashed.
"So far so good, now please sit down," I bid them.
I had the three girls arranged around the bowl filled with those tiny fish, no bigger than a segment of a finger.
"As a first step in your Kenbunshoku Haki training, I want you to catch those fish. To do so, you sit down in front of the bowl, and with one swift motion, you try to grab one. In case you managed to catch one, you put it back in and try again. You graduate from this exercise if you can catch ten fish in succession." I explained.
"That's easy. We won't even need Haki for this," Sandersonia said.
I raised my eyebrow at that comment.
"Someone seems to be sure of herself. Why don't you go ahead demonstrate for your sisters exactly how easy this is."
"Sure, piece of cake," Sandersonia said and sat herself down cross-legged in front of the bowl. She pulled up her sleeves and then started to intently study the movement of the fish, trying to discern some pattern in their erratic changes of directions. Suddenly her flat hand shoot out, dipped into the water, closed itself before it was retracted equally fast. She proceeded to open her hand only to find it empty.
"Huh, where is the fish?" She wondered, "I was sure I had him."
Hancock and Marigold had trouble keeping their giggling contained at seeing her sister fail at, as she put it, a seemingly easy task.
Meanwhile, I asked her,
"Am I right in the assumption you struck the exact spot you saw the fish being present?"
"Of course, where else should I have attacked," she answered put off why I would even ask that.
I threw a coin into the bowel and watched it sink to the ground.
"Reach for the coin," I ordered.
She put her hand in the water and moved her fingertips at the exact spot she saw the coin lying on the ground only to find her fingers touching nothing but the bowl.
"Keep touching the ground and move your hand in a straight line closer to yourself," I directed her movement.
"I have it." she proclaimed and removed her hand from the bowl, this time with the coin in it.
"What just happened Onee-sama," Sandersonia asked curiously.
"You just witnessed an optical illusion or, more precisely, the refraction of light passing from one medium to another."
They all looked at me with mouths open as if my head was sprouting leaves, not comprehending what I just told them.
"For us in order to see something with our eyes, the object or person we are looking at has to reflect the light making contact with the surface of it and from there needs to be redirected to our eyes. This is one of the reasons why we can't see when it is dark; no light means no reflection and therefore nothing to register for our eyes."
"I see. But what has that to do with the coin not being at the spot where I saw it." Sandersonia asked impatiently.
"I was coming to that," I said. "You see, light moves slower in certain materials than it does in air, for example, water. This means when light passes from air to water and vice versa, it gets refracted. Letting it look like as if the thing you are looking at is somewhere else."
"Is there a way to prevent this from happening?" Sandersonia inquired.
"There are ways to diminish or eliminate this effect entirely. For example, if you look straight down from above the water surface to an object the refraction is non-existent. Allowing you to see the object position even though it submerged in water and while you are not."
Sandersonia was about to stand up when I placed my hand on her shoulder and stopped her.
"This exercise is not about how to circumvent the refraction and get reliable information with your sense of sight. It is about teaching you that your senses, no matter which one, can be tricked, and for you to not get overreliant on just one of them. You have to use them in concert, and this exercise is designed in such a way that you have to disregard sight. Humans most trusted sense, in order to first notice the discrepancy to what your other senses tell you and to rely on your Haki, even though your eyes tell you different." I explained.
"So with that said, I hope it became clear to you that you need to stay at the edge of the bowl no leaning over it or changing your point of view while you try to catch some fish, understood?"
"Yes, Onee-sama." All three of them said in chorus.
"Good, then see to it."
Authors Note: I'm aware, that a Cobra doesn't possess the most deadly venom of all the snakes in existence and that this title is either held by the Inland Taipan or some sea-snake. But the Boa sisters don't know/care about that.
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Chapter 09 - The Florian Triangle
Chapter 09: The Florian Triangle (Late Winter 1505)
Captains Log: 15.12.1505
It has been three weeks since we left Sabaody. The daily schedule I established, beyond some little hiccups in the early days of its implementation, worked without a hitch.
The three girls are coming along nicely. Their training is already showing remarkable progress, in a few days time, they will possess the necessary leg strength to start them on Soru. From there, it won't take them long to get Geppou down, which brings me back to my initial conundrum - Do I offer them the devil-fruits?
With every passing day, they get closer to the requirement I set for allowing them to eat a devil fruit, but my mind is still in flux. I'm hoping the coming days would help me to come to a decision.
The morale of the crew is good, even though at some days I feel like a kindergarten teacher, having to break up fights between the girls over the most simple things. Fortunately, none of their fights lasts long, and after they are separated and had time to calm down, they usually make up within minutes.
Strangely enough, those quarrels only started last week, and it took me a while to connect the dots of why? It was the small things that gave me the final clue.
At first, they were on their best behavior, always taking great care of everything to clean up, to do their chores the moment they arose, which then slowly started to degrade.
To the point, I was agitating about what to do, should their behavior towards each other worsen below a certain threshold, and get untenable in the process.
When I happened to come upon a discarded piece of clothing lying in the hallway. At that moment, it all began to make sense. They finally started to feel at ease. Their prior behavior was what you would expect from a guest, always tense careful not to anger their host, not one you would expect from someone calling the ship their home.
Needless to say, the loss of pressure to fulfill some self-imposed code of conduct would also result in removing inhibitors regarding expected and proper dealings with their sisters.
On the one hand, this was great, and I'm really glad for them, for them returning to their true (unmasked) selves. On the other hand, I'm being exposed to girl-drama. I shudder at the thought. I was more than happy when I graduated from all of that. Especially the teenage-drama with all the bullying. I had high hopes to never coming across such things only to end up, right in the middle of it.
The worst part of this all, I can't even run away; living on a ship made that rather difficult.
Of course, I'm exaggerating. They aren't that bad. On the contrary, they grow on you - eventually. More than once, I caught myself wondering is this what having a little sister is like?
Would I have come to think the same, if Mom and Dad would have had another child, or would it have turned out into sibling rivalry kind of thing?
Having those girls around me is definitely different than taking care of all the orphans, back in Brockton Bay was - I never really got close to any of them. I was their part-time caretaker, their protector at best, with Charlotte and Sierra filling the roles of mothers and sisters for them.
I really regret not having gotten the chance to find out what it would be like to have a sibling. Strangely enough, I never talked to my parents about it - never found out the reason I'm an only child.
Therefore being here, with them turns out to be more than just a second chance at a life, a chance to make new experiences. Well, at least as long as my stay here would last.
"Onee-sama, Onee-sama did you see how I pierced the fish right through his head?" Hancock excitedly wanted to know.
"Yeah, I saw," I said.
"But you weren't even looking..." she accused me.
I closed the log-book and looked up at her reeling in her harpoon via the rope it was connected to. This, throwing spears at fish, was the next exercise I had them do after they graduated from catching fish in the bowl.
It didn't only train to sense the exact position of their target but also required them to predict where they would be in the time it took the harpoon or any projectile weapon they may decide to wield to reach the position of it.
It was not future sight, which was also a possibility if you got far enough in Kenbunshoku Haki training, something they wouldn't manage for quite some time. It was only reading the intent of the fish, where they want to move with the information they gleaned about their current position. It was just combining it into one coherent picture.
"Onee-sama, what is the next task?" Sandersonia wondered. "I already managed to catch thrice the number of fish you said was needed to clear this exercise."
A look at their respective piles confirmed what she said. Sandersonia was clearly in the lead and had no trouble to get any number of consecutive hits on even the fastest and most erratic fish. On the other hand, both her sisters were struggling with this, Hancock doing better than Marigold, which was no surprise since she had a few years more training in this, but she was still behind her other younger sister.
It was clear to me that Sandersonia must be naturally inclined to Kenbunshoku Haki, whereas her sisters were not. Marigold clearly was a Busoshoku type and, I was tending to say the same about Hancock if not for her having showcased far more endurance and therefore Haki at her disposal than both her sisters combined, being able to go strong long after her sister had already flagged some time ago, a disparity that couldn't be explained solely by her being a few years older.
A theory that was supported by the fact, that the discrepancy in Haki endurance between Sandersonia and Marigold was far smaller.
Nevertheless, despite my suspicion, I refrained from addressing it at this point. For one, I wouldn't want to get her hopes up and end up wasting her time to bring something forth that she might not even have. Furthermore, I was not sure I would even be a help to her in developing this ability. Since my Haoshoki Haki and the way Rayleigh described his and how it was used varied greatly.
I never found out if I was just special with a unique version of it or if I just experienced using it differently. Owed to the fact, that I once possessed a similar ability.
I decided to delay crossing that particular bridge until she showed some actual signs of awakening it.
Talk about luck to have two blessed with the disposition of a conqueror within the small group of people I interacted with after coming here - one to teach me and one to be taught by me.
"Continue, for now, perhaps your sisters might get inspired by your prowess to do better, and tomorrow you will get to do a more advanced exercise. Wouldn't want for your sister to hold you back now, would we?" I said.
Hancock glared at me, while Marigold saw fit to say
"That was mean Onee-sama"
"Why?" I asked, "I just stated a fact, everyone with some eyes would be able to confirm just looking at the fish at your feet."
It was clear neither Marigold nor Hancock were satisfied with just that.
"Listen, so what if Sandersonia is better at piercing some fish with a spear than you Marigold, or has some more talent as a navigator. You are better at cooking and probably a dozen other things than her, and the same is true for Hancock. You aren't the same, you are different, unique in your own ways with your own strengths and weaknesses. There is absolutely nothing wrong with one of you being better at something, that is just how it is." I lectured them, and I could see understanding in their eyes.
"We train in order to find our strengths, develop them and to conceal our weaknesses, knowing what you are good at is just an integral part of this, and who knows, when we come to train your Busoshoku Haki it will be your turn to be better than your sisters." I teased.
"Doubt it," murmured Sandersonia under her breath.
Marigold's response was sticking out her tongue, which was mirrored by Sandersonia, the recipient.
Hancock stepped in between them, and without warning, caught both their tongues with her fingers.
"If you have time to be silly, you clearly aren't training hard enough. Back to work, you two!" Hancock chided her sisters, stifling the nascent argument in its tracks.
I gave her a small smile. She was really growing into her role as a vice-captain and took my suggestions what that included to heart. Being the arbitrator between the crew and the captain, enforcing discipline and taking care of the crew.
Which, in this case, meant keeping her sisters in check.
"Mgkay" Marigold and Sandersonia both managed to voice without being able to make use of their tongues.
Hancock gave both of them a stern look before she released them from her hold.
"That hurt Nee-San." the second oldest complained.
"Bully" were their simultaneous whispered responses.
Hancock's eyes narrowed "Did you say something?" she inquired in a saccharine tone, which left no doubt in what consequences objections would encompass.
"No Onee-san." her younger sisters said cowed at the same time.
"That must have been the wind." Sandersonia tried to offer as an excuse.
"The wind, really?" The black-haired girl wondered skeptically.
"Of course, Onee-san what else could it have been?" Marigold backed her sister's flimsy excuse.
"I see," Hancock let the issue slide but couldn't help to give them both a stern look before she said, "let's catch some more fish."
Their bickering was worse than Regent and Aisha's had been at their worst.
I felt a sudden drop in temperature, a short glance towards Sandersonia made it clear I wasn't the only one who noticed it. We both looked ahead and saw a screen of fog forming directly in our path stretching along the horizon.
A look at the Eternal Pose for Water 7 attached to a small pedestal, right next to the helm showed the needle pointing right at the fog.
Sandersonia noticed the same and was staring at me, awaiting orders.
Well, it seemed like it couldn't be helped we have to go through it since it didn't look like the fog would dissolve anytime soon.
"Reef the sails," I ordered.
We had to reduce our speed to increase the time at our disposal to evade, should something appear right in front of the ship we might crash into.
While Haki allowed us to sense the presence of Lifeforms feeling inanimate objects, that weren't interacted with on a regular basis by living things was next to impossible.
I could still make some guesses in order to locate the placement of rocks through the movement pattern of the fish in their proximity.
Unfortunately, it was not a hundred percent accurate method, for it required fish to be present and only worked under the assumption the Rock wasn't hollow or possessed holes that allowed fish to traverse through them, throwing off this form of detection.
The girls went to work and rolled up the canvas of the mainsail, through the next to the mast fixed pivotable contraption (boom) stretching alongside its length up to top. Being separated at the Gaff like the two sails connected to it. By rotating the small capstans at the bottom of the contraption connected to the gaff sail it started rotating, and the canvas was rolled around it, reducing the length of the sail and therefore the area the wind could hit to propel our ship.
Sandersonia lectured me, the first time this came up at great lengths about the correct term for this being roller furling. By now, she seemed to have accepted the fact, since she refrained from correcting me, that I couldn't care less as long as they knew what they were meant to do when the order was given.
We steadily began to lose speed. I had the girls reduce the gaff sail to less than one-quarter of its original size, which given that the height stayed roughly the same, reduced the area of the canvas by around 80%, and our speed dropped by a similar amount.
Our ship slowly got closer to the wall of fog, which turned out to be thicker than I originally assumed it to be. I considered reducing our speed further down to crawl when the fog started to change color going from milky white to a multi-colored kaleidoscope.
"So pretty," Hancock mumbled.
I ignored the accurate observation from Hancock. I was far more concerned about this phenomenon and what it might mean for our crew. Rayleigh warned me about strange, dangerous, and random effects the grand-line even Paradise has to offer those that travel on it.
No matter the nature of what we were witnessing, it didn't look to be dangerous, which in most cases meant it was. Nature had a way to lull the intended victims of a trap into a false sense of security, and I had no plan to fall for it.
"Shake out the sails, we are going around it," I ordered.
"Huh, why? it's only fog" Hancock asked surprised.
"pretty fog," Marigold added.
"I have a bad feeling about it," I told her. Well, that wasn't the whole truth I felt an urge to steer the ship right into it. I never felt something like this, but the resemblance to how others described being subtle mastered felt like couldn't be denied. In addition, there was a transparent line, a spider thread intangible extending from my chest and disappearing into the fog - calling for me to follow it.
To say I was reluctant to blindly trust another power trying to influence my actions was without a doubt an understatement, especially since I had no idea how this one operated. The vague description I got of `being able to change fate´ was as indeterminate as it can get. Dinah's prediction, she had me follow, in contrast, were crystal clear.
I turned our ship around, with the wind blowing in the direction of the fog, we couldn't just sail away from it in a straight line and had to close haul the ship.
Which, of course, reduced our speed tremendously compared to what it could be sailing the other way. The strange thing, despite the wind blowing with quite some force, the fog wasn't blown away from us. Instead, it moved against the wind's direction, as if it was pursuing us.
Looking back, it was easy to see that it was gaining on us, the distance separating us constantly shrinking.
I went through my options, which, to be honest, weren't many and not very promising. The best would be to grab the kids and Geppou the hell away from here, but with their added weight, while not much, having to carry it for days would undoubtedly take its toll on me. I estimated I could keep us in the air a few days, with spider silk kiting perhaps a week - at most. But would that be enough to find an Island, a ship on this vast sea anything? Before the strength would leave me, and we would slowly drown.
It would come down to luck, something I wouldn't risk our lives for. Especially if there were other options still open to me, and despite my reservations regarding the fog. It probably wouldn't kill us outright, meaning our chances going in it were better than abandoning the ship on the open sea.
There wasn't much else I could do, short of abandoning the girls – in case this fog was only after me. Something I couldn't be sure of. It was just an inkling, which also told me that leaving the girls alone as we entered that fog would be a monumentally bad idea.
So I stayed put – hoping that I wasn't about to make a huge mistake -
The rainbow fog made contact with the outer edges of the boat. Some of the tension left my body when it didn't start dissolving our ship. I made a few steps in the direction towards the slowly on the ship encroaching fog and put my hand in it. To my great relief, nothing seemed to happen.
Which struck me as odd – if there was no effect why did my power want me to go inside – or was I missing something?
I chose not to stress over it. Simply because there wasn't much I could do until I got an idea of what was special about this fog.
I turned around, and the fog passed over me, and the rest of the ship – including the girls. Aside from the sight restrictions accompanied by such an event, everything being overcast by a milky hue everything was normal. Despite that, I didn't lower my guard.
"Reef the sails" I ordered. With the visibility so low – around a dozen feet, which barely allowed us to make out both ends of the ship while standing in the middle of it – Speed became the greatest threat to us.
"Sandersonia get up within the crow-nest. The very instant you see something you let us know." She saluted and climbed up the mast. I didn't expect for her to see much not through this fog, which uncharacteristically reached far above the sea level instead of clinging to it.
To be fair, Rayleigh did warn me to expect coming across strange weather phenomenons going against common sense. This just seemed to be the first instance of it happening to us.
"Marigold, I want you to get the furthest you safely can towards the bow of the ship with your eyes straight ahead – looking out for anything that might be a threat to the ship..."
"and inform you the moment I see something." she interrupted "got it."
"Hancock, I want you to stay on the helm. Be ready to follow your sister's directions. In case they see something, you won't have much time to react." She grimly nodded and put her hands on the helm.
We cruised through the fog for quite some time. The eerie feeling was compounded by a lack of sunlight, sight, and sound. The only occasional noise that broke the silence aside from our breathing were the droplets of water that built up on surfaces of the ship falling down.
Suddenly out of nowhere, I sensed several people right in front of us hidden by the fog closing in fast. Faster than only our speed should have allowed for. Sandersonia disturbed aura was a clear indication, that she sensed it too. Being taken by surprise unsure of what she sensed, she reacted just a tad bit slower than myself.
I immediately ordered "hard starboard". The glimpse I got of the future showed me, that the crew from the ship on a direct collision course with us would react the same way when they would finally notice us.
As predicted, not a second later the fog revealed a huge shadow more than 30 feet in height and twice the size of Sakura. A panicked voice out of their Crowsnest screamed "EVADE!" which got their helmsman, without waiting a second, to turned the rudder, and their ship swerved starboard.
Risky doing such a thing, quite a lot, in fact, changing the course of a ship without first checking which direction was safe - without access to Haki, I could have just as easily ordered us to avoid them by steering backboard, and then our ships would have crashed into each other.
My musings were interrupted when I noticed two silhouettes on the bow of the other ship. The sudden shift of their ship had them lose their balance.
As a consequence, the smaller of the two lost hold on the two objects in order to steady itself on the railing. I only got a short glimpse at the objects sailing through the air – that high up, and with all the fog; it was impossible to identify what they were.
The bigger silhouette lost no time, and in going after one of the objects shoved the smaller silhouette out of the way. Already unsteady on its feet the forceful push, was all that was needed, for the silhouette to fall over the railing - just as our ships passed each other.
The object forgotten, I jumped into the air and grabbed the small silhouette, which turned out to be a girl, at the gruff of her neck just in time to prevent her plummeting into the ocean.
I registered hearing a splash as I geppoued again and brought us both back onto the deck of the Sakura. I lowered the girl back down. Her feet barely made contact with the ground when I saw another glimpse of her reaching out with the palm of her hand towards me. Under normal circumstances, nothing that I or anybody else should have had to fear. But what I could sense from her hand was an ominous feeling paired with the ill intent - behind her attack because it was one - had me act on the side of caution.
I swatted her hand that went for my midsection away while making a half-turn. I raised my knee at the same time to give her a light tap to her ribs to open up some distance between us.
I wasn't sure what the reason was - Did I misjudge my own strength? Her weight perhaps? either way, my hit barreled her over the deck. She only came to a stop when she crashed against the railing.
Hancock, who stood close enough to observe what happened, gasped. She was about to run over to the girl, when I moved my still sheathed Nodachi in her way, blocking her from advancing toward our new passenger.
A shake of my head made it clear to her that she had to keep her distance.
I turned towards Hancock at the helm and said, "turn the ship around, we've got something to give back, and we wouldn't want to lose them in this fog."
"Aye, Aye" was her curt response as she steered our ship into a wide turn and started to pursue the other ship.
I tracked them through the fog through their auras. Just as I was considering shaking out our sails to catch up to them, they took in their sails and brought their ship to a stop. About time – going under full sails in this fog was reckless, and I wondered if they had a reason to.
I double-checked our surroundings and came up empty – curious.
As we neared the other vessel towering over the sea. We were able to see its shadowy outlines cast by the light from their lit torches on deck.
I ordered Hancock "Bring us alongside the other ship. Marigold, Sandersonia get over here."
I turned to our new passenger. She was close enough leaning against the starboard railing that I had an unobstructed view of her. The girl was small, perhaps eight years old, with pink hip-length hair. She wore a green hat, orange, and black striped knee-length loosely fitting pants, - were those suspenders? - and something that seemed like a mix between a sleeveless t-shirt and a tank top.
The girl was wide awake and staring at me. Unbothered nor dazed by my hit, which could only mean she somehow rolled with it. No easy feat, not against me even though I held back considerably. This in itself spoke volumes of her. The dexterity and flexibility necessary to do this were not easy to come by, and the instinct and experience to do so even less.
At a closer look, the visible signs of abuse on her body were hard not to see, bruises in various stages of healing strewn on her limbs. I had no time to regret my choice in handling here when I sensed on an elevated position on the mast right next to me an aura appearing out of nowhere. It was weak, barely noticeable, belonging to something around marble big. The curious thing was it had the exact same signature as one of the people I sensed on the other ship.
I was about to turn my head to look at what it was that appeared on my ship when suddenly from the railing above the girl sprang forth two muscled arms clearly belonging to a man and moved to strangle her.
When the arms were crossed and about to close around her throat, I moved. With a flicker of my wrist spider-silk wound around her ankle, a slight pull, and prior sitting girl landed on her back. Her head out of the way of my sword pierced right through the palms of those arms.
Looking straight up, to the space which a second ago was occupied by her head. The girl's eyes widened unnaturally at seeing what was nailed above her against the railing. Before she could make any headway scrambling away from the railing towards myself and the Boa sisters. They, at that point, all converged around me.
Along with them, I witnessed the arms simply disappearing, dissolving into flower petals, and at the same time, a scream originating from the deck of the other ship reached us.
With my head turned towards the mast, I found myself stared at by an eye-ball which also disappeared in the same fashion a second later.
Interesting – This Devil-Fruit apparently allowed for the user to manifest body parts on any surface. A versatile power, no doubt, perfectly suited for espionage and assassination even in the hands of a person with no fantasy – Handling the downside, on the other hand, would require some intelligence.
I split myself in two – one iteration was stepping out of the other. The girl fear-stricken crawling towards us, her head turned looking over her shoulder was trained at what was behind her, didn't even notice. I grabbed her, and before she could realize what was happening, I already put her down on the deck of the other ship.
All around us were heavily-armed sailors running around - Not unlike what I imagined headless chickens would act like. A few gathered on the bow of the shit forming a circular cluster. They were surrounding a man sitting on the floor, cradling his arms close to his body.
"Dammit," he cursed "get away from me you incompetent idiots. Stop the ship and find me that damn fruit!"
"Where?" the girl at my legs asked. Our presence went unnoticed. Nobody was paying attention to us appearing out of nowhere on their ship. Most were looking over the railing down below to the sea, searching for something. Ignoring us - that wouldn't do.
I put my mask over my face and said, "I think you might have lost something." My voice easily cut through their chitter.
Some of them jumped at hearing an unknown voice behind their backs, others didn't. What they all had in common - Without exception, all eyes, of everybody on deck, were suddenly trained on us.
There was surprise clearly displayed on most of their faces, with the sole exception being the face of the guy sitting on the ground.
He painstakingly stood up with the help of the men around him, taking great care not to use his hands. When he stepped out of the cluster his face showed nothing but anger. Addressing the girl at my feet he shouted.
"You damn brat – Do you even know how much money you just cost me. It wasn't enough that you somehow hid on this ship and made trouble. No, you had to steal two Devil-fruits... and then you idiot dared to take them hostage, and now look what you have done. One went overboard and the other I took a bite off by mistake."
True to his words there was a strangely formed fruit rolling around on deck missing a chunk behind his feet.
"I should have killed you the moment my eyes fell on you, instead of trying to sell you as a slave." He lamented "It would have been a fast clean death. But now... now you damn little hellspawn I'm gonna make you suffer. And somehow, someway I'm gonna use you until I get every single berry out of you, you fucking owe me!"
The girl just shrugged while scratching her ear. Nonchalantly she said.
"What did you expect would happen if you don't feed the best thief this world has ever seen – duh huh – idiot."
The men nearly had a heart attack at her dismissal of the devil-fruit. Her reaction was a stark contrast to her behavior just a few moments ago, as she tried to crab-crawl away from those sailors frantically looking around for a way out. My eyes fell on her hand now back at her side, trembling like a leaf.
That was all I needed to know. I grinned under my mask – She had some spunk. I loosened three strings of spider-silk rope and threw them behind me down the side of the ship. Their sticky ends clinging to the ship.
Back on the Sakura, my other iteration ignored the starstruck girls demanding an answer of what I just did and brought us alongside the ship.
"I'm gonna answer all your questions later – for now you are needed up there," I said and pointed up the deck of the other ship. "So, up you go."
The glare Hancock sent me promised a continuation of this discussion, without further protest, she and her sisters jumped over the railing the short distance separating our ships and used the ropes dangling from above and climbed them.
Meanwhile, this iteration moved to fully take in the reefed sails to bring the Sakura to a stop.
Hancock was the first to make it on deck, followed by Marigold and Sandersonia. Standing behind me, they took in their surroundings.
"Where the hell did you come from?" The injured guy demanded to know.
"These bitches are multiplying captain." Someone to his right said as he reached for the cutlass at his side. "Permission to take them down," he requested grinning, displaying his rotten teeth to us.
"Permission granted" the now as captain identified man said. "But take them alive, all of them. We have got some losses to make up for and you all know, damaged merchandise fetches a lower price."
His words diminished the earlier enthusiasm until he added. "but just this once I'll make an exception."
"That means Captain" someone inquired.
"No lasting damage," was his heavy with meaning answer. Smirking he added, "now get them."
Well, any reservations I might have had in not killing them disappeared after witnessing this particular display. Granted, it would have been criminally easy to do so, given how weak they were.
Instead, I said, "Girls take them down." I needn't to turn my head to know they were pleased by this turn of events. Being given a chance to take down slavers, to redeem themselves in their eyes ... perhaps it might even be enough to help them shake off the occasional nightmare they suffered. Who knows – but what I was sure of was, that it would be a great workout for them.
Because none of them was able to get down a single Rokushiki technique so far - even though they were close - allowing them to experience first hand, despite that, they actually made progress would do them some good. Furthermore, allowing them to fight here, with me ready to intervene made this situation as safe as it could possibly be short of a spar.
Getting a look at how they chose to fight might give me some insights into how to help them to develop their innate abilities even better.
For a moment, some doubts about the Rightness of my actions crept up. Stating they were kids, they should be playing, not fighting for their lives, least of all at my behest.
I squashed it – In this world, even in my old one. The luxury of being allowed to grow up away from the ugly side of life was not something many had the privilege to enjoy. Those girls lost their innocence the day they were captured by slavers. And no matter how much I wished for it, it was outright impossible to restore it. They were now irrevocably part of this world, and the only thing I could do for them was to make sure they would survive having to live in it.
The girls lost no time and stepped around myself and our blind passenger. The smiles on their opponents grew, assuming their victory to be a sure thing, most likely thinking of only myself as a moderate threat. Since I had a sword on my back and my appearance clad in an elaborate armored spider silk costume under my hooded ankle-length coat made it clear I meant business. My bug-themed mask just served to emphasize this.
But because I wasn't brandishing my weapon – it was just about teaching a few little girls a lesson.
A muscular bald man was the first to make a move trying to grab the three heads smaller Sandersonia from outside her line of sight. She slipped below his outstretched hands and found herself behind him with one precise kick against his right knee, which carried all his weight at that exact moment and broke.
With a deafening scream, his leg gave out. He fell down and curled into himself another perfectly aimed stamp, and she crushed his windpipe against the floor.
The earlier smiles they wore on their faces froze and were replaced by a serious grimace – Sanderonia display rattled them but not enough to abandon the fight. They drew their weapons, mostly consisting of swords and daggers. With the girls now registering as credible threats in their minds, they closed their ranks around the girls.
The first one to get near Marigold didn't fare any better. Marigold, instead of displaying a knack for where and when to strike with surgical precision, used what little basic she possessed of Busoshoku Haki and somehow got a thin unstable layer to form around her fist.
It wouldn't stand up to scrutiny or last for any length of time without needing to be reapplied, shaky as her skill with it turned out to be. But as it turned out, it was more than enough, to punch right through the sword her opponent brought in front of him to defend himself. The sword splintered into a thousand pieces, whereas Marigold's fist went on unobstructed to cave in his chest. The remainder of his body was sent flying, right through the railing into the sea.
Hancock downed her first opponent by letting him take a downward swing at her with his sword. She took a step back to get a hairbreadth out of the sword's reach and, in one fluid motion, made a backflip from a standing position. This allowed for her leg to connect cleanly with the chin of her attacker, who fancied himself outside of her reach. His under and upper jaw crashed into each other at high speeds. What little of rotten teeth remained in his mouth were pulverized.
His body was flung backward and crashed into two of his comrades standing right behind him. Taken by surprise, the unconscious body coming their way dragged them down to the ground in a tangled mess of limbs and opened up their lines even further.
I wasn't the only one to notice that at this point, with their encirclement broken, the crew of this ship essentially lost. They were just too stubborn or stupid to realize it. Their only chance to win would have been a concentrated effort of attacking the girls all at the same time. Creating a situation where evading everything got impossible and to make something stick, which at this point was a pipe dream.
The first successes of my girls had their spirits broken and cast them into disarray, uncoordinated attacks from opponents, who would like to do nothing more than to turn around and flee, just wouldn't be enough.
This was precisely why their captain had no other choice but to intervene. It was a now or never situation. He couldn't lose more of his men, since any further losses meant his people wouldn't be able to turn this around. Therefore, despite his injuries, he materialized an arm on the deck right behind Hancock. His intent was clear, an attempt to trip or, in case that should fail, unbalance her.
Which, if successful would have been fatal. Hancock clearly used a mobile, leg-favored combat style making great use of centripetal movements to gather the necessary force to deliver devastating attacks.
Some things she did kept reminding me more of what an Olympic gymnast would do than somebody in a fight, but it also meant she was susceptible to unintended or forced shifts in balance more so than her sisters.
I took a step forward and stamped down on the appendage reaching for Hancock's ankle and squashed it under my heel with little difficulty. If it would have been a real limb, mush consisting of blood and bone-splinters would have been found under and around my foot, instead of some flower petals.
Despite that, the damage I inflicted was still transferred back to the source and had him scream out as his already injured hand turned into a mangled mess.
A small dash of Soru and I came to a stop at the stern of the ship – a good 30 feet from my previous position behind the enemy captain. In a casual motion, I grabbed his jerkin and threw him overboard. A loud splash later and his screams of pains were silenced, for good.
I shifted my attention back to the fight, which was nearing its end. It looked like my initial assessment was right. Sandersonia preferred an evasion based style centered around fast and surgical precise counters strikes against weak points she could reach, like limbs and soft tissue.
Resembling a snake dancing around her prey and striking when least expected designed to inflict the most damage with the least expenditure of strength, which given her knack for Kenbunshoku Haki and her observation skills were the perfect match for her to maximize her effectiveness. No doubt she would profit the most from Kami-E and perhaps Shigan of the three of them.
Marigold on the other preferred a style centered on her hands. Her feet barely left the ground throughout the whole fight and only were repositioned to allow for a better transfer of power into her fists. You might have gotten the impression that she was rooted to the ground like a thousand-year-old tree, and every one of her punches she unleashed on her opponents generated the power of said tree collapsing around them.
Although she clearly lacked the flexibility, speed, and foresight of her sisters, she made up that deficit in the strength, endurance, and sturdiness department many times over. With her clear disposition towards Busoshoku Haki and her immobile and steadfast combat style, hardening her body with the use of Tekkai would easily increase her resilience and offensive power manifold even before Haki came into play. This would allow her to weather her opponent's attack and waste them with her own juggernaut attacks.
In Hancock's case, it was a similar clear cut case – Rankyaku was probably gonna end up being the Rokushiki technique she would gonna get out the most of.
It was apparent the kids had prior training – someone must have coached and even helped them develop their fighting styles because they perfectly catered to their respective strengths.
The more I got to know about them, the more it became clear that those Amazons must be a force to be reckoned with if their children receive this kind of training. And those were just the individual strengths they showcased, their teamwork was immaculate. They had a perfect understanding of each other, they not only knew the current position of each other, they knew where the others would move and what they would do without even looking. - It wasn't a Haki thing the only one perhaps far enough in her training to manage that was Sandersonia - To get to this level of teamwork, that they worked in tandem like a well-oiled machine, required hundreds of hours of concentrated teamwork drills. The Undersiders at the peak of our ability were nowhere near that good when it came to teamwork – we came not even close.
One such display of teamwork in that short fight stood out - when Sandersonia's opponent prevented her from closing the distance by wildly swinging around his sword. Without prompting Marigold gave Hancock a leg up and catapulted her over the head of Sanderonia and with a perfect somersault that devolved into a guillotine dropkick. The head of their enemy went through the planks – not that he noticed – he was out the second Hancock foot connected with the top of his head.
The fight wound down when a roundhouse kick from Hancock downed the last of them. The girls were all breathing hard but came out of it otherwise unhurt.
Some of them were still breathing, and under different circumstances, I could have afforded to let them live. On the ocean with a crew of three girls and what I assumed they had in their cargo hold made that into a non-viable option. They had to go – the faster, the fewer problems they would generate in the long run.
"Strip them of their valuables and then throw them overboard," I said to the girls and then made my way down the stairs into the belly of the ship. "I'm gonna take a look around – shouldn't take long."
My younger self would probably berate me for having three young girls first kill some people and then make them do the work of a mortician and heave the bodies into their wet graves. What she, on the other hand, would agree with was that I couldn't allow for any of the girls to set a foot down here and even she might concede the point the best way to do that would be giving them something to do.
It was bad enough that some of them might be aware of what they would find here – Sandersonia definitely was.
When I reached the base of the stairs. I ignored the cots, and the supplies stacked right and left and moved to the aft of the ship. I came to a stop when a heavy metal door blocked my path. Trying to open it the conventional way made it clear that someone must have locked it after the pink-haired girl somehow escaped.
I didn't have the time nor the inclination to look for the key. Which I suspected by now had reached the ground of the ocean hanging around the neck of their captain.
The padlock succumbed to a hard yank from my hand. I opened the door and stepped through into a barely lit room. The only light illuminating the room came from a lamp behind me. I didn't need to wait for my eyes to adjust to knowing what I would come to see but did so anyway.
The room was two stories high, the whole star and backboard side were lined with cubical metal cages. In every single one of them was a person, held like animals.
Their skin in various shades of pale white – an indicator that they didn't see the sun for extended periods of time. If they wore anything, it was for the most part just rags, and clothes, in general, were far more sparsely found on the women than on the men.
I balled my hand into a fist. Suddenly I regretted not having paid their captain the attention he was due.
It took a single step inside for me to be hit, with the stench of human feces, sweat, and blood... I'd rather avoid thinking too hard on what else might be mixed in with that. With a hand in front of my mask which had nearly no effect to suppress the smell.
"The crew of this ship is no more – I'm now gonna release all of you. But before I do that is anybody in here who knows how to operate a ship of this size?" I asked.
The first reaction I garnered was unintelligibly grunting then disbelief and then the murmuring started.
I had no time for this – I needed to be done here and gone before the girls were finished with their task. They definitely didn't need a reminder of what happened to them. I materialized Kain and Lilith on my shoulder blades, and they sprung into action opening those cells – an easy feat with their sharp claws and a little bit of Haki.
A small burst of Haoshoki Haki directed their way – nowhere near enough to make a human subservient – was all it took to get them to shut up.
"I asked you a question and, I want it answered, or I'm gonna leave you in your cages – Is that understood?" I stressed with a dangerously low tone.
"Yes, here ..." someone said, interrupted by a cough. "I served as the first mate on a trading ship." From there, the dam broke, and around a dozen more people followed, all stating various degrees of experience with sailing. That was good enough for me.
Sure they were all in bad shape – but that was nothing, a few good meals and some sunlight couldn't fix with time, and as it so happened, this ship was stocked with food.
Therefore I had no problems leaving them to their selves.
"Good – This ship has everything you need to reach a harbor. I advise you to do just that."
With that out of the way, I turned around and left. The last padlock fell away from a cage a moment later, and its inmate stumbled into his newly won freedom. Kain and Lilith caught up to me as I reached the stairs.
The first thing I saw when I emerged from below deck was the pink-haired girl kneeling above one of the still-living slavers. Her hand was touching his cheek, and I could see how he aged in fast motion, from a thirty-something-year-old to somebody I would have pegged a hundred or more years in age.
Satisfied by the result, she removed her hand. Hancock and Sandersonia then took a step forward and picked the skin and bones he was atrophied into up and, in a concentrated effort, threw him over the railing.
"Thanks, Bonney-chan – doing your thing makes it easier to get rid of them," Hancock said.
So that must have been what she tried to do to me back on the Sakura. Either some kind of draining ability or a time manipulating striker power – Could be dangerous when she actually manages to get close enough to use it.
"Let's go," I said to my crew without looking at them. I made three steps when I noticed that nobody was following me. I stopped in my tracks. I needn't turn around to know that Hancock was fidgeting as were the other two. They shared a glance, and then Hancock began to speak.
"Onee-sama, we were wondering if Bonney-chan can join our crew – you know she wants to be a thief, and we thought ... that ..." was as far as she came when she lost confidence.
"she would make a good addition to our crew. Every Pirate crew needs a thief." Sandersonia took up the slack.
"It is known," Marigold added.
When did they have the time to befriend Bonney - was it - let alone come up with the idea to recruit her and prepare a request to that effect. I was only gone for a few minutes.
I sighed, I really should have known when I saw an aura similar to the Boa sisters around Bonney that I wouldn't get rid of her that easy. Seems there really was something to this fate-spider thing, after all. Or was there? They were three girls away from home. It was clear that they wouldn't want to let go of the first acquaintance their own age they met after weeks on the sea with only interaction being with each other and myself.
Admittedly she had a useful Devil-fruit – one that could be dangerous in the wrong hands – Then again, a girl more or less shouldn't make a great difference. It would certainly be safer for her to come with us than allow her to stay with ...
My mind came to a screeching halt – I searched my memories, and no. I wasn't wrong. There wasn't a single child in any of those cages - only adults. Given the numbers of prisoners and the fact that children are usually easier to catch, not to speak easier to indoctrinate... there should be more children present if those slavers went after what they could get.
But just one – something wasn't right.
I turned around and crossed my arms in front of my chest "Sure, I'll allow it – After I'm told what you can really do. The full scope – no holding back" I said in a stern voice.
"What gave it away?" Bonney asked.
"You are the only child on this whole vessel," I answered.
"I see – then it can't be helped I guess." She shrugged with her shoulders, "as you might have already guessed. I can steal store and transfer life forces – this comes with the side effect that I can use this life force for myself," she said and to demonstrate she became younger and younger until she reached what I would think was the age of a two-year-old. She was near to drowning in her own clothes "I can also do the reverse steal my own life force and add it to my reservoir." This time she became older much older – she passed twenty, thirty and stopped as she reached her sixties, with her pink hair partially turned grey.
It was now obvious why she wore those suspenders. It was the only way her loose-fitting clothes wouldn't get lost when she drastically changed her age. With her demonstration done she returned to her eight-year-old self.
"How old are you really," I asked.
"I'm not sure – where I'm from we didn't exactly celebrated our birthdays. This," she pointed at her current self, "is what I looked like when I ate some strange fruit."
I couldn't be entirely sure she wasn't lying to me – Her aura was steady and didn't imply otherwise, but I couldn't rule out that she was just a notorious liar. Then again, the maturity over what I suspected was her years, could be explained by a harsh upbringing and malnutrition. She was just skin and bone... that the effects of the latter weren't more pronounced could be another side effect of her power. Substituting nutrition with life-force.
"She can come with us," I said. For now, I was appeased -
I jumped down on the deck of the Sakura and the girls followed sliding down the rope. My other iteration set the sails and we remerged as I moved to the helm.
"Onee-sama are you now going to tell us how there can be two of you," Sandersonia asked, obviously still remembering me using my Devil Fruit.
"It is magic, it has to be," Marigold stated.
"So Bonney can use magic too," Hancock interjected starstruck. "You have to tell us all about that. My sister and I really want to know how to do magic."
"Only if we don't have to use blood to do it," Marigold said as she moved closer to Bonney "I don't like needles."
"What are you talking about?" Sandersonia wondered walking over to them. "Bonney didn't use any needles or blood, or did you see her use any? So it must work different a chant perhaps... wholly consisting of unpronounceable words."
Bonney seemed to get increasingly uncomfortable with the Boa sister standing around her and pestering her about "magic".
"Stupid – If they are unpro ... unpronninciable – or whatever" Hancock frustrated gave up to get it right "how could she say them in the first place. No, there has to be another explanation... Bonney has to be a witch."
"A witch, what is that," Sandersonia asked.
"I know – it's somebody like Yosei-Onee-sama," Marigold said.
"Can't be – witches are strong." Sandersonia said eying the overwhelmed Bonney "she isn't."
"She must be. She has a witch's power." Hancock mysteriously said "You'd better not doubt a witch. It could anger her to use her witch powers on you."
Oh boy -
I could see the shudder running through Sandersonia's body even from where I was standing, and I knew I had to stop Hancock now from filling her sister's head with her made-up stories lest I would end with girls unable to sleep at night.
"Girls, stop that. I'll explain..."
Authors Note: If it wasn't clear. That one "slaver" ate the Hana Hana no Mi Robin´s canon Devil-fruit. Some might wonder, how he was able to grow limbs on board the Sakura since Robin fruit seemed to be sight dependant. Well, I don't think it to be sight dependant there are a few panels that indicate otherwise. I think she sort of has a range (measured in Hanas according to Oda) and in that she can identify surfaces that can be used to "grow" a limb. With them being on the open ocean the Sakura was the only other location where this was possible. And indeed the "slaver" got a really fast handle on how to use the very basic of this power.
In regards to Bonney – I fear that including her in the crew will come to haunt me. One of the great many problems writing a fanfic to an uncompleted original work is that some things aren't known by the time the fic is written ... and I have a feeling that Bonney might come to play a major part in the future One Piece canon (the hints are there – ) and that her past will be fully disclosed ...which given some theories can range from her being a Charlotte (resemblance to Big Mom, similarities in their devil fruit powers ...) to being hundreds of years old.
So everything I come up with when it comes to her, most certainly at one point will turn out to be wrong. Which more than likely won't be changed/retconnced by me later – so just bear with me in that regard -
Her Devil-fruit power: I will go with the interpretation that she can steal the life-force of living creatures (including herself) and store it to be used later on. Either to make herself or others younger by transferring that lifeforce – those effects are permanent and her power requires a touch, no extra conditions necessary- A Worm typical striker power. The speed of how fast she can do that is dependant on her training ... so at the beginning, it will take some time ...
Captains Log: 15.12.1505
It has been three weeks since we left Sabaody. The daily schedule I established, beyond some little hiccups in the early days of its implementation, worked without a hitch.
The three girls are coming along nicely. Their training is already showing remarkable progress, in a few days time, they will possess the necessary leg strength to start them on Soru. From there, it won't take them long to get Geppou down, which brings me back to my initial conundrum - Do I offer them the devil-fruits?
With every passing day, they get closer to the requirement I set for allowing them to eat a devil fruit, but my mind is still in flux. I'm hoping the coming days would help me to come to a decision.
The morale of the crew is good, even though at some days I feel like a kindergarten teacher, having to break up fights between the girls over the most simple things. Fortunately, none of their fights lasts long, and after they are separated and had time to calm down, they usually make up within minutes.
Strangely enough, those quarrels only started last week, and it took me a while to connect the dots of why? It was the small things that gave me the final clue.
At first, they were on their best behavior, always taking great care of everything to clean up, to do their chores the moment they arose, which then slowly started to degrade.
To the point, I was agitating about what to do, should their behavior towards each other worsen below a certain threshold, and get untenable in the process.
When I happened to come upon a discarded piece of clothing lying in the hallway. At that moment, it all began to make sense. They finally started to feel at ease. Their prior behavior was what you would expect from a guest, always tense careful not to anger their host, not one you would expect from someone calling the ship their home.
Needless to say, the loss of pressure to fulfill some self-imposed code of conduct would also result in removing inhibitors regarding expected and proper dealings with their sisters.
On the one hand, this was great, and I'm really glad for them, for them returning to their true (unmasked) selves. On the other hand, I'm being exposed to girl-drama. I shudder at the thought. I was more than happy when I graduated from all of that. Especially the teenage-drama with all the bullying. I had high hopes to never coming across such things only to end up, right in the middle of it.
The worst part of this all, I can't even run away; living on a ship made that rather difficult.
Of course, I'm exaggerating. They aren't that bad. On the contrary, they grow on you - eventually. More than once, I caught myself wondering is this what having a little sister is like?
Would I have come to think the same, if Mom and Dad would have had another child, or would it have turned out into sibling rivalry kind of thing?
Having those girls around me is definitely different than taking care of all the orphans, back in Brockton Bay was - I never really got close to any of them. I was their part-time caretaker, their protector at best, with Charlotte and Sierra filling the roles of mothers and sisters for them.
I really regret not having gotten the chance to find out what it would be like to have a sibling. Strangely enough, I never talked to my parents about it - never found out the reason I'm an only child.
Therefore being here, with them turns out to be more than just a second chance at a life, a chance to make new experiences. Well, at least as long as my stay here would last.
"Onee-sama, Onee-sama did you see how I pierced the fish right through his head?" Hancock excitedly wanted to know.
"Yeah, I saw," I said.
"But you weren't even looking..." she accused me.
I closed the log-book and looked up at her reeling in her harpoon via the rope it was connected to. This, throwing spears at fish, was the next exercise I had them do after they graduated from catching fish in the bowl.
It didn't only train to sense the exact position of their target but also required them to predict where they would be in the time it took the harpoon or any projectile weapon they may decide to wield to reach the position of it.
It was not future sight, which was also a possibility if you got far enough in Kenbunshoku Haki training, something they wouldn't manage for quite some time. It was only reading the intent of the fish, where they want to move with the information they gleaned about their current position. It was just combining it into one coherent picture.
"Onee-sama, what is the next task?" Sandersonia wondered. "I already managed to catch thrice the number of fish you said was needed to clear this exercise."
A look at their respective piles confirmed what she said. Sandersonia was clearly in the lead and had no trouble to get any number of consecutive hits on even the fastest and most erratic fish. On the other hand, both her sisters were struggling with this, Hancock doing better than Marigold, which was no surprise since she had a few years more training in this, but she was still behind her other younger sister.
It was clear to me that Sandersonia must be naturally inclined to Kenbunshoku Haki, whereas her sisters were not. Marigold clearly was a Busoshoku type and, I was tending to say the same about Hancock if not for her having showcased far more endurance and therefore Haki at her disposal than both her sisters combined, being able to go strong long after her sister had already flagged some time ago, a disparity that couldn't be explained solely by her being a few years older.
A theory that was supported by the fact, that the discrepancy in Haki endurance between Sandersonia and Marigold was far smaller.
Nevertheless, despite my suspicion, I refrained from addressing it at this point. For one, I wouldn't want to get her hopes up and end up wasting her time to bring something forth that she might not even have. Furthermore, I was not sure I would even be a help to her in developing this ability. Since my Haoshoki Haki and the way Rayleigh described his and how it was used varied greatly.
I never found out if I was just special with a unique version of it or if I just experienced using it differently. Owed to the fact, that I once possessed a similar ability.
I decided to delay crossing that particular bridge until she showed some actual signs of awakening it.
Talk about luck to have two blessed with the disposition of a conqueror within the small group of people I interacted with after coming here - one to teach me and one to be taught by me.
"Continue, for now, perhaps your sisters might get inspired by your prowess to do better, and tomorrow you will get to do a more advanced exercise. Wouldn't want for your sister to hold you back now, would we?" I said.
Hancock glared at me, while Marigold saw fit to say
"That was mean Onee-sama"
"Why?" I asked, "I just stated a fact, everyone with some eyes would be able to confirm just looking at the fish at your feet."
It was clear neither Marigold nor Hancock were satisfied with just that.
"Listen, so what if Sandersonia is better at piercing some fish with a spear than you Marigold, or has some more talent as a navigator. You are better at cooking and probably a dozen other things than her, and the same is true for Hancock. You aren't the same, you are different, unique in your own ways with your own strengths and weaknesses. There is absolutely nothing wrong with one of you being better at something, that is just how it is." I lectured them, and I could see understanding in their eyes.
"We train in order to find our strengths, develop them and to conceal our weaknesses, knowing what you are good at is just an integral part of this, and who knows, when we come to train your Busoshoku Haki it will be your turn to be better than your sisters." I teased.
"Doubt it," murmured Sandersonia under her breath.
Marigold's response was sticking out her tongue, which was mirrored by Sandersonia, the recipient.
Hancock stepped in between them, and without warning, caught both their tongues with her fingers.
"If you have time to be silly, you clearly aren't training hard enough. Back to work, you two!" Hancock chided her sisters, stifling the nascent argument in its tracks.
I gave her a small smile. She was really growing into her role as a vice-captain and took my suggestions what that included to heart. Being the arbitrator between the crew and the captain, enforcing discipline and taking care of the crew.
Which, in this case, meant keeping her sisters in check.
"Mgkay" Marigold and Sandersonia both managed to voice without being able to make use of their tongues.
Hancock gave both of them a stern look before she released them from her hold.
"That hurt Nee-San." the second oldest complained.
"Bully" were their simultaneous whispered responses.
Hancock's eyes narrowed "Did you say something?" she inquired in a saccharine tone, which left no doubt in what consequences objections would encompass.
"No Onee-san." her younger sisters said cowed at the same time.
"That must have been the wind." Sandersonia tried to offer as an excuse.
"The wind, really?" The black-haired girl wondered skeptically.
"Of course, Onee-san what else could it have been?" Marigold backed her sister's flimsy excuse.
"I see," Hancock let the issue slide but couldn't help to give them both a stern look before she said, "let's catch some more fish."
Their bickering was worse than Regent and Aisha's had been at their worst.
I felt a sudden drop in temperature, a short glance towards Sandersonia made it clear I wasn't the only one who noticed it. We both looked ahead and saw a screen of fog forming directly in our path stretching along the horizon.
A look at the Eternal Pose for Water 7 attached to a small pedestal, right next to the helm showed the needle pointing right at the fog.
Sandersonia noticed the same and was staring at me, awaiting orders.
Well, it seemed like it couldn't be helped we have to go through it since it didn't look like the fog would dissolve anytime soon.
"Reef the sails," I ordered.
We had to reduce our speed to increase the time at our disposal to evade, should something appear right in front of the ship we might crash into.
While Haki allowed us to sense the presence of Lifeforms feeling inanimate objects, that weren't interacted with on a regular basis by living things was next to impossible.
I could still make some guesses in order to locate the placement of rocks through the movement pattern of the fish in their proximity.
Unfortunately, it was not a hundred percent accurate method, for it required fish to be present and only worked under the assumption the Rock wasn't hollow or possessed holes that allowed fish to traverse through them, throwing off this form of detection.
The girls went to work and rolled up the canvas of the mainsail, through the next to the mast fixed pivotable contraption (boom) stretching alongside its length up to top. Being separated at the Gaff like the two sails connected to it. By rotating the small capstans at the bottom of the contraption connected to the gaff sail it started rotating, and the canvas was rolled around it, reducing the length of the sail and therefore the area the wind could hit to propel our ship.
Sandersonia lectured me, the first time this came up at great lengths about the correct term for this being roller furling. By now, she seemed to have accepted the fact, since she refrained from correcting me, that I couldn't care less as long as they knew what they were meant to do when the order was given.
We steadily began to lose speed. I had the girls reduce the gaff sail to less than one-quarter of its original size, which given that the height stayed roughly the same, reduced the area of the canvas by around 80%, and our speed dropped by a similar amount.
Our ship slowly got closer to the wall of fog, which turned out to be thicker than I originally assumed it to be. I considered reducing our speed further down to crawl when the fog started to change color going from milky white to a multi-colored kaleidoscope.
"So pretty," Hancock mumbled.
I ignored the accurate observation from Hancock. I was far more concerned about this phenomenon and what it might mean for our crew. Rayleigh warned me about strange, dangerous, and random effects the grand-line even Paradise has to offer those that travel on it.
No matter the nature of what we were witnessing, it didn't look to be dangerous, which in most cases meant it was. Nature had a way to lull the intended victims of a trap into a false sense of security, and I had no plan to fall for it.
"Shake out the sails, we are going around it," I ordered.
"Huh, why? it's only fog" Hancock asked surprised.
"pretty fog," Marigold added.
"I have a bad feeling about it," I told her. Well, that wasn't the whole truth I felt an urge to steer the ship right into it. I never felt something like this, but the resemblance to how others described being subtle mastered felt like couldn't be denied. In addition, there was a transparent line, a spider thread intangible extending from my chest and disappearing into the fog - calling for me to follow it.
To say I was reluctant to blindly trust another power trying to influence my actions was without a doubt an understatement, especially since I had no idea how this one operated. The vague description I got of `being able to change fate´ was as indeterminate as it can get. Dinah's prediction, she had me follow, in contrast, were crystal clear.
I turned our ship around, with the wind blowing in the direction of the fog, we couldn't just sail away from it in a straight line and had to close haul the ship.
Which, of course, reduced our speed tremendously compared to what it could be sailing the other way. The strange thing, despite the wind blowing with quite some force, the fog wasn't blown away from us. Instead, it moved against the wind's direction, as if it was pursuing us.
Looking back, it was easy to see that it was gaining on us, the distance separating us constantly shrinking.
I went through my options, which, to be honest, weren't many and not very promising. The best would be to grab the kids and Geppou the hell away from here, but with their added weight, while not much, having to carry it for days would undoubtedly take its toll on me. I estimated I could keep us in the air a few days, with spider silk kiting perhaps a week - at most. But would that be enough to find an Island, a ship on this vast sea anything? Before the strength would leave me, and we would slowly drown.
It would come down to luck, something I wouldn't risk our lives for. Especially if there were other options still open to me, and despite my reservations regarding the fog. It probably wouldn't kill us outright, meaning our chances going in it were better than abandoning the ship on the open sea.
There wasn't much else I could do, short of abandoning the girls – in case this fog was only after me. Something I couldn't be sure of. It was just an inkling, which also told me that leaving the girls alone as we entered that fog would be a monumentally bad idea.
So I stayed put – hoping that I wasn't about to make a huge mistake -
The rainbow fog made contact with the outer edges of the boat. Some of the tension left my body when it didn't start dissolving our ship. I made a few steps in the direction towards the slowly on the ship encroaching fog and put my hand in it. To my great relief, nothing seemed to happen.
Which struck me as odd – if there was no effect why did my power want me to go inside – or was I missing something?
I chose not to stress over it. Simply because there wasn't much I could do until I got an idea of what was special about this fog.
I turned around, and the fog passed over me, and the rest of the ship – including the girls. Aside from the sight restrictions accompanied by such an event, everything being overcast by a milky hue everything was normal. Despite that, I didn't lower my guard.
"Reef the sails" I ordered. With the visibility so low – around a dozen feet, which barely allowed us to make out both ends of the ship while standing in the middle of it – Speed became the greatest threat to us.
"Sandersonia get up within the crow-nest. The very instant you see something you let us know." She saluted and climbed up the mast. I didn't expect for her to see much not through this fog, which uncharacteristically reached far above the sea level instead of clinging to it.
To be fair, Rayleigh did warn me to expect coming across strange weather phenomenons going against common sense. This just seemed to be the first instance of it happening to us.
"Marigold, I want you to get the furthest you safely can towards the bow of the ship with your eyes straight ahead – looking out for anything that might be a threat to the ship..."
"and inform you the moment I see something." she interrupted "got it."
"Hancock, I want you to stay on the helm. Be ready to follow your sister's directions. In case they see something, you won't have much time to react." She grimly nodded and put her hands on the helm.
We cruised through the fog for quite some time. The eerie feeling was compounded by a lack of sunlight, sight, and sound. The only occasional noise that broke the silence aside from our breathing were the droplets of water that built up on surfaces of the ship falling down.
Suddenly out of nowhere, I sensed several people right in front of us hidden by the fog closing in fast. Faster than only our speed should have allowed for. Sandersonia disturbed aura was a clear indication, that she sensed it too. Being taken by surprise unsure of what she sensed, she reacted just a tad bit slower than myself.
I immediately ordered "hard starboard". The glimpse I got of the future showed me, that the crew from the ship on a direct collision course with us would react the same way when they would finally notice us.
As predicted, not a second later the fog revealed a huge shadow more than 30 feet in height and twice the size of Sakura. A panicked voice out of their Crowsnest screamed "EVADE!" which got their helmsman, without waiting a second, to turned the rudder, and their ship swerved starboard.
Risky doing such a thing, quite a lot, in fact, changing the course of a ship without first checking which direction was safe - without access to Haki, I could have just as easily ordered us to avoid them by steering backboard, and then our ships would have crashed into each other.
My musings were interrupted when I noticed two silhouettes on the bow of the other ship. The sudden shift of their ship had them lose their balance.
As a consequence, the smaller of the two lost hold on the two objects in order to steady itself on the railing. I only got a short glimpse at the objects sailing through the air – that high up, and with all the fog; it was impossible to identify what they were.
The bigger silhouette lost no time, and in going after one of the objects shoved the smaller silhouette out of the way. Already unsteady on its feet the forceful push, was all that was needed, for the silhouette to fall over the railing - just as our ships passed each other.
The object forgotten, I jumped into the air and grabbed the small silhouette, which turned out to be a girl, at the gruff of her neck just in time to prevent her plummeting into the ocean.
I registered hearing a splash as I geppoued again and brought us both back onto the deck of the Sakura. I lowered the girl back down. Her feet barely made contact with the ground when I saw another glimpse of her reaching out with the palm of her hand towards me. Under normal circumstances, nothing that I or anybody else should have had to fear. But what I could sense from her hand was an ominous feeling paired with the ill intent - behind her attack because it was one - had me act on the side of caution.
I swatted her hand that went for my midsection away while making a half-turn. I raised my knee at the same time to give her a light tap to her ribs to open up some distance between us.
I wasn't sure what the reason was - Did I misjudge my own strength? Her weight perhaps? either way, my hit barreled her over the deck. She only came to a stop when she crashed against the railing.
Hancock, who stood close enough to observe what happened, gasped. She was about to run over to the girl, when I moved my still sheathed Nodachi in her way, blocking her from advancing toward our new passenger.
A shake of my head made it clear to her that she had to keep her distance.
I turned towards Hancock at the helm and said, "turn the ship around, we've got something to give back, and we wouldn't want to lose them in this fog."
"Aye, Aye" was her curt response as she steered our ship into a wide turn and started to pursue the other ship.
I tracked them through the fog through their auras. Just as I was considering shaking out our sails to catch up to them, they took in their sails and brought their ship to a stop. About time – going under full sails in this fog was reckless, and I wondered if they had a reason to.
I double-checked our surroundings and came up empty – curious.
As we neared the other vessel towering over the sea. We were able to see its shadowy outlines cast by the light from their lit torches on deck.
I ordered Hancock "Bring us alongside the other ship. Marigold, Sandersonia get over here."
I turned to our new passenger. She was close enough leaning against the starboard railing that I had an unobstructed view of her. The girl was small, perhaps eight years old, with pink hip-length hair. She wore a green hat, orange, and black striped knee-length loosely fitting pants, - were those suspenders? - and something that seemed like a mix between a sleeveless t-shirt and a tank top.
The girl was wide awake and staring at me. Unbothered nor dazed by my hit, which could only mean she somehow rolled with it. No easy feat, not against me even though I held back considerably. This in itself spoke volumes of her. The dexterity and flexibility necessary to do this were not easy to come by, and the instinct and experience to do so even less.
At a closer look, the visible signs of abuse on her body were hard not to see, bruises in various stages of healing strewn on her limbs. I had no time to regret my choice in handling here when I sensed on an elevated position on the mast right next to me an aura appearing out of nowhere. It was weak, barely noticeable, belonging to something around marble big. The curious thing was it had the exact same signature as one of the people I sensed on the other ship.
I was about to turn my head to look at what it was that appeared on my ship when suddenly from the railing above the girl sprang forth two muscled arms clearly belonging to a man and moved to strangle her.
When the arms were crossed and about to close around her throat, I moved. With a flicker of my wrist spider-silk wound around her ankle, a slight pull, and prior sitting girl landed on her back. Her head out of the way of my sword pierced right through the palms of those arms.
Looking straight up, to the space which a second ago was occupied by her head. The girl's eyes widened unnaturally at seeing what was nailed above her against the railing. Before she could make any headway scrambling away from the railing towards myself and the Boa sisters. They, at that point, all converged around me.
Along with them, I witnessed the arms simply disappearing, dissolving into flower petals, and at the same time, a scream originating from the deck of the other ship reached us.
With my head turned towards the mast, I found myself stared at by an eye-ball which also disappeared in the same fashion a second later.
Interesting – This Devil-Fruit apparently allowed for the user to manifest body parts on any surface. A versatile power, no doubt, perfectly suited for espionage and assassination even in the hands of a person with no fantasy – Handling the downside, on the other hand, would require some intelligence.
I split myself in two – one iteration was stepping out of the other. The girl fear-stricken crawling towards us, her head turned looking over her shoulder was trained at what was behind her, didn't even notice. I grabbed her, and before she could realize what was happening, I already put her down on the deck of the other ship.
All around us were heavily-armed sailors running around - Not unlike what I imagined headless chickens would act like. A few gathered on the bow of the shit forming a circular cluster. They were surrounding a man sitting on the floor, cradling his arms close to his body.
"Dammit," he cursed "get away from me you incompetent idiots. Stop the ship and find me that damn fruit!"
"Where?" the girl at my legs asked. Our presence went unnoticed. Nobody was paying attention to us appearing out of nowhere on their ship. Most were looking over the railing down below to the sea, searching for something. Ignoring us - that wouldn't do.
I put my mask over my face and said, "I think you might have lost something." My voice easily cut through their chitter.
Some of them jumped at hearing an unknown voice behind their backs, others didn't. What they all had in common - Without exception, all eyes, of everybody on deck, were suddenly trained on us.
There was surprise clearly displayed on most of their faces, with the sole exception being the face of the guy sitting on the ground.
He painstakingly stood up with the help of the men around him, taking great care not to use his hands. When he stepped out of the cluster his face showed nothing but anger. Addressing the girl at my feet he shouted.
"You damn brat – Do you even know how much money you just cost me. It wasn't enough that you somehow hid on this ship and made trouble. No, you had to steal two Devil-fruits... and then you idiot dared to take them hostage, and now look what you have done. One went overboard and the other I took a bite off by mistake."
True to his words there was a strangely formed fruit rolling around on deck missing a chunk behind his feet.
"I should have killed you the moment my eyes fell on you, instead of trying to sell you as a slave." He lamented "It would have been a fast clean death. But now... now you damn little hellspawn I'm gonna make you suffer. And somehow, someway I'm gonna use you until I get every single berry out of you, you fucking owe me!"
The girl just shrugged while scratching her ear. Nonchalantly she said.
"What did you expect would happen if you don't feed the best thief this world has ever seen – duh huh – idiot."
The men nearly had a heart attack at her dismissal of the devil-fruit. Her reaction was a stark contrast to her behavior just a few moments ago, as she tried to crab-crawl away from those sailors frantically looking around for a way out. My eyes fell on her hand now back at her side, trembling like a leaf.
That was all I needed to know. I grinned under my mask – She had some spunk. I loosened three strings of spider-silk rope and threw them behind me down the side of the ship. Their sticky ends clinging to the ship.
Back on the Sakura, my other iteration ignored the starstruck girls demanding an answer of what I just did and brought us alongside the ship.
"I'm gonna answer all your questions later – for now you are needed up there," I said and pointed up the deck of the other ship. "So, up you go."
The glare Hancock sent me promised a continuation of this discussion, without further protest, she and her sisters jumped over the railing the short distance separating our ships and used the ropes dangling from above and climbed them.
Meanwhile, this iteration moved to fully take in the reefed sails to bring the Sakura to a stop.
Hancock was the first to make it on deck, followed by Marigold and Sandersonia. Standing behind me, they took in their surroundings.
"Where the hell did you come from?" The injured guy demanded to know.
"These bitches are multiplying captain." Someone to his right said as he reached for the cutlass at his side. "Permission to take them down," he requested grinning, displaying his rotten teeth to us.
"Permission granted" the now as captain identified man said. "But take them alive, all of them. We have got some losses to make up for and you all know, damaged merchandise fetches a lower price."
His words diminished the earlier enthusiasm until he added. "but just this once I'll make an exception."
"That means Captain" someone inquired.
"No lasting damage," was his heavy with meaning answer. Smirking he added, "now get them."
Well, any reservations I might have had in not killing them disappeared after witnessing this particular display. Granted, it would have been criminally easy to do so, given how weak they were.
Instead, I said, "Girls take them down." I needn't to turn my head to know they were pleased by this turn of events. Being given a chance to take down slavers, to redeem themselves in their eyes ... perhaps it might even be enough to help them shake off the occasional nightmare they suffered. Who knows – but what I was sure of was, that it would be a great workout for them.
Because none of them was able to get down a single Rokushiki technique so far - even though they were close - allowing them to experience first hand, despite that, they actually made progress would do them some good. Furthermore, allowing them to fight here, with me ready to intervene made this situation as safe as it could possibly be short of a spar.
Getting a look at how they chose to fight might give me some insights into how to help them to develop their innate abilities even better.
For a moment, some doubts about the Rightness of my actions crept up. Stating they were kids, they should be playing, not fighting for their lives, least of all at my behest.
I squashed it – In this world, even in my old one. The luxury of being allowed to grow up away from the ugly side of life was not something many had the privilege to enjoy. Those girls lost their innocence the day they were captured by slavers. And no matter how much I wished for it, it was outright impossible to restore it. They were now irrevocably part of this world, and the only thing I could do for them was to make sure they would survive having to live in it.
The girls lost no time and stepped around myself and our blind passenger. The smiles on their opponents grew, assuming their victory to be a sure thing, most likely thinking of only myself as a moderate threat. Since I had a sword on my back and my appearance clad in an elaborate armored spider silk costume under my hooded ankle-length coat made it clear I meant business. My bug-themed mask just served to emphasize this.
But because I wasn't brandishing my weapon – it was just about teaching a few little girls a lesson.
A muscular bald man was the first to make a move trying to grab the three heads smaller Sandersonia from outside her line of sight. She slipped below his outstretched hands and found herself behind him with one precise kick against his right knee, which carried all his weight at that exact moment and broke.
With a deafening scream, his leg gave out. He fell down and curled into himself another perfectly aimed stamp, and she crushed his windpipe against the floor.
The earlier smiles they wore on their faces froze and were replaced by a serious grimace – Sanderonia display rattled them but not enough to abandon the fight. They drew their weapons, mostly consisting of swords and daggers. With the girls now registering as credible threats in their minds, they closed their ranks around the girls.
The first one to get near Marigold didn't fare any better. Marigold, instead of displaying a knack for where and when to strike with surgical precision, used what little basic she possessed of Busoshoku Haki and somehow got a thin unstable layer to form around her fist.
It wouldn't stand up to scrutiny or last for any length of time without needing to be reapplied, shaky as her skill with it turned out to be. But as it turned out, it was more than enough, to punch right through the sword her opponent brought in front of him to defend himself. The sword splintered into a thousand pieces, whereas Marigold's fist went on unobstructed to cave in his chest. The remainder of his body was sent flying, right through the railing into the sea.
Hancock downed her first opponent by letting him take a downward swing at her with his sword. She took a step back to get a hairbreadth out of the sword's reach and, in one fluid motion, made a backflip from a standing position. This allowed for her leg to connect cleanly with the chin of her attacker, who fancied himself outside of her reach. His under and upper jaw crashed into each other at high speeds. What little of rotten teeth remained in his mouth were pulverized.
His body was flung backward and crashed into two of his comrades standing right behind him. Taken by surprise, the unconscious body coming their way dragged them down to the ground in a tangled mess of limbs and opened up their lines even further.
I wasn't the only one to notice that at this point, with their encirclement broken, the crew of this ship essentially lost. They were just too stubborn or stupid to realize it. Their only chance to win would have been a concentrated effort of attacking the girls all at the same time. Creating a situation where evading everything got impossible and to make something stick, which at this point was a pipe dream.
The first successes of my girls had their spirits broken and cast them into disarray, uncoordinated attacks from opponents, who would like to do nothing more than to turn around and flee, just wouldn't be enough.
This was precisely why their captain had no other choice but to intervene. It was a now or never situation. He couldn't lose more of his men, since any further losses meant his people wouldn't be able to turn this around. Therefore, despite his injuries, he materialized an arm on the deck right behind Hancock. His intent was clear, an attempt to trip or, in case that should fail, unbalance her.
Which, if successful would have been fatal. Hancock clearly used a mobile, leg-favored combat style making great use of centripetal movements to gather the necessary force to deliver devastating attacks.
Some things she did kept reminding me more of what an Olympic gymnast would do than somebody in a fight, but it also meant she was susceptible to unintended or forced shifts in balance more so than her sisters.
I took a step forward and stamped down on the appendage reaching for Hancock's ankle and squashed it under my heel with little difficulty. If it would have been a real limb, mush consisting of blood and bone-splinters would have been found under and around my foot, instead of some flower petals.
Despite that, the damage I inflicted was still transferred back to the source and had him scream out as his already injured hand turned into a mangled mess.
A small dash of Soru and I came to a stop at the stern of the ship – a good 30 feet from my previous position behind the enemy captain. In a casual motion, I grabbed his jerkin and threw him overboard. A loud splash later and his screams of pains were silenced, for good.
I shifted my attention back to the fight, which was nearing its end. It looked like my initial assessment was right. Sandersonia preferred an evasion based style centered around fast and surgical precise counters strikes against weak points she could reach, like limbs and soft tissue.
Resembling a snake dancing around her prey and striking when least expected designed to inflict the most damage with the least expenditure of strength, which given her knack for Kenbunshoku Haki and her observation skills were the perfect match for her to maximize her effectiveness. No doubt she would profit the most from Kami-E and perhaps Shigan of the three of them.
Marigold on the other preferred a style centered on her hands. Her feet barely left the ground throughout the whole fight and only were repositioned to allow for a better transfer of power into her fists. You might have gotten the impression that she was rooted to the ground like a thousand-year-old tree, and every one of her punches she unleashed on her opponents generated the power of said tree collapsing around them.
Although she clearly lacked the flexibility, speed, and foresight of her sisters, she made up that deficit in the strength, endurance, and sturdiness department many times over. With her clear disposition towards Busoshoku Haki and her immobile and steadfast combat style, hardening her body with the use of Tekkai would easily increase her resilience and offensive power manifold even before Haki came into play. This would allow her to weather her opponent's attack and waste them with her own juggernaut attacks.
In Hancock's case, it was a similar clear cut case – Rankyaku was probably gonna end up being the Rokushiki technique she would gonna get out the most of.
It was apparent the kids had prior training – someone must have coached and even helped them develop their fighting styles because they perfectly catered to their respective strengths.
The more I got to know about them, the more it became clear that those Amazons must be a force to be reckoned with if their children receive this kind of training. And those were just the individual strengths they showcased, their teamwork was immaculate. They had a perfect understanding of each other, they not only knew the current position of each other, they knew where the others would move and what they would do without even looking. - It wasn't a Haki thing the only one perhaps far enough in her training to manage that was Sandersonia - To get to this level of teamwork, that they worked in tandem like a well-oiled machine, required hundreds of hours of concentrated teamwork drills. The Undersiders at the peak of our ability were nowhere near that good when it came to teamwork – we came not even close.
One such display of teamwork in that short fight stood out - when Sandersonia's opponent prevented her from closing the distance by wildly swinging around his sword. Without prompting Marigold gave Hancock a leg up and catapulted her over the head of Sanderonia and with a perfect somersault that devolved into a guillotine dropkick. The head of their enemy went through the planks – not that he noticed – he was out the second Hancock foot connected with the top of his head.
The fight wound down when a roundhouse kick from Hancock downed the last of them. The girls were all breathing hard but came out of it otherwise unhurt.
Some of them were still breathing, and under different circumstances, I could have afforded to let them live. On the ocean with a crew of three girls and what I assumed they had in their cargo hold made that into a non-viable option. They had to go – the faster, the fewer problems they would generate in the long run.
"Strip them of their valuables and then throw them overboard," I said to the girls and then made my way down the stairs into the belly of the ship. "I'm gonna take a look around – shouldn't take long."
My younger self would probably berate me for having three young girls first kill some people and then make them do the work of a mortician and heave the bodies into their wet graves. What she, on the other hand, would agree with was that I couldn't allow for any of the girls to set a foot down here and even she might concede the point the best way to do that would be giving them something to do.
It was bad enough that some of them might be aware of what they would find here – Sandersonia definitely was.
When I reached the base of the stairs. I ignored the cots, and the supplies stacked right and left and moved to the aft of the ship. I came to a stop when a heavy metal door blocked my path. Trying to open it the conventional way made it clear that someone must have locked it after the pink-haired girl somehow escaped.
I didn't have the time nor the inclination to look for the key. Which I suspected by now had reached the ground of the ocean hanging around the neck of their captain.
The padlock succumbed to a hard yank from my hand. I opened the door and stepped through into a barely lit room. The only light illuminating the room came from a lamp behind me. I didn't need to wait for my eyes to adjust to knowing what I would come to see but did so anyway.
The room was two stories high, the whole star and backboard side were lined with cubical metal cages. In every single one of them was a person, held like animals.
Their skin in various shades of pale white – an indicator that they didn't see the sun for extended periods of time. If they wore anything, it was for the most part just rags, and clothes, in general, were far more sparsely found on the women than on the men.
I balled my hand into a fist. Suddenly I regretted not having paid their captain the attention he was due.
It took a single step inside for me to be hit, with the stench of human feces, sweat, and blood... I'd rather avoid thinking too hard on what else might be mixed in with that. With a hand in front of my mask which had nearly no effect to suppress the smell.
"The crew of this ship is no more – I'm now gonna release all of you. But before I do that is anybody in here who knows how to operate a ship of this size?" I asked.
The first reaction I garnered was unintelligibly grunting then disbelief and then the murmuring started.
I had no time for this – I needed to be done here and gone before the girls were finished with their task. They definitely didn't need a reminder of what happened to them. I materialized Kain and Lilith on my shoulder blades, and they sprung into action opening those cells – an easy feat with their sharp claws and a little bit of Haki.
A small burst of Haoshoki Haki directed their way – nowhere near enough to make a human subservient – was all it took to get them to shut up.
"I asked you a question and, I want it answered, or I'm gonna leave you in your cages – Is that understood?" I stressed with a dangerously low tone.
"Yes, here ..." someone said, interrupted by a cough. "I served as the first mate on a trading ship." From there, the dam broke, and around a dozen more people followed, all stating various degrees of experience with sailing. That was good enough for me.
Sure they were all in bad shape – but that was nothing, a few good meals and some sunlight couldn't fix with time, and as it so happened, this ship was stocked with food.
Therefore I had no problems leaving them to their selves.
"Good – This ship has everything you need to reach a harbor. I advise you to do just that."
With that out of the way, I turned around and left. The last padlock fell away from a cage a moment later, and its inmate stumbled into his newly won freedom. Kain and Lilith caught up to me as I reached the stairs.
The first thing I saw when I emerged from below deck was the pink-haired girl kneeling above one of the still-living slavers. Her hand was touching his cheek, and I could see how he aged in fast motion, from a thirty-something-year-old to somebody I would have pegged a hundred or more years in age.
Satisfied by the result, she removed her hand. Hancock and Sandersonia then took a step forward and picked the skin and bones he was atrophied into up and, in a concentrated effort, threw him over the railing.
"Thanks, Bonney-chan – doing your thing makes it easier to get rid of them," Hancock said.
So that must have been what she tried to do to me back on the Sakura. Either some kind of draining ability or a time manipulating striker power – Could be dangerous when she actually manages to get close enough to use it.
"Let's go," I said to my crew without looking at them. I made three steps when I noticed that nobody was following me. I stopped in my tracks. I needn't turn around to know that Hancock was fidgeting as were the other two. They shared a glance, and then Hancock began to speak.
"Onee-sama, we were wondering if Bonney-chan can join our crew – you know she wants to be a thief, and we thought ... that ..." was as far as she came when she lost confidence.
"she would make a good addition to our crew. Every Pirate crew needs a thief." Sandersonia took up the slack.
"It is known," Marigold added.
When did they have the time to befriend Bonney - was it - let alone come up with the idea to recruit her and prepare a request to that effect. I was only gone for a few minutes.
I sighed, I really should have known when I saw an aura similar to the Boa sisters around Bonney that I wouldn't get rid of her that easy. Seems there really was something to this fate-spider thing, after all. Or was there? They were three girls away from home. It was clear that they wouldn't want to let go of the first acquaintance their own age they met after weeks on the sea with only interaction being with each other and myself.
Admittedly she had a useful Devil-fruit – one that could be dangerous in the wrong hands – Then again, a girl more or less shouldn't make a great difference. It would certainly be safer for her to come with us than allow her to stay with ...
My mind came to a screeching halt – I searched my memories, and no. I wasn't wrong. There wasn't a single child in any of those cages - only adults. Given the numbers of prisoners and the fact that children are usually easier to catch, not to speak easier to indoctrinate... there should be more children present if those slavers went after what they could get.
But just one – something wasn't right.
I turned around and crossed my arms in front of my chest "Sure, I'll allow it – After I'm told what you can really do. The full scope – no holding back" I said in a stern voice.
"What gave it away?" Bonney asked.
"You are the only child on this whole vessel," I answered.
"I see – then it can't be helped I guess." She shrugged with her shoulders, "as you might have already guessed. I can steal store and transfer life forces – this comes with the side effect that I can use this life force for myself," she said and to demonstrate she became younger and younger until she reached what I would think was the age of a two-year-old. She was near to drowning in her own clothes "I can also do the reverse steal my own life force and add it to my reservoir." This time she became older much older – she passed twenty, thirty and stopped as she reached her sixties, with her pink hair partially turned grey.
It was now obvious why she wore those suspenders. It was the only way her loose-fitting clothes wouldn't get lost when she drastically changed her age. With her demonstration done she returned to her eight-year-old self.
"How old are you really," I asked.
"I'm not sure – where I'm from we didn't exactly celebrated our birthdays. This," she pointed at her current self, "is what I looked like when I ate some strange fruit."
I couldn't be entirely sure she wasn't lying to me – Her aura was steady and didn't imply otherwise, but I couldn't rule out that she was just a notorious liar. Then again, the maturity over what I suspected was her years, could be explained by a harsh upbringing and malnutrition. She was just skin and bone... that the effects of the latter weren't more pronounced could be another side effect of her power. Substituting nutrition with life-force.
"She can come with us," I said. For now, I was appeased -
I jumped down on the deck of the Sakura and the girls followed sliding down the rope. My other iteration set the sails and we remerged as I moved to the helm.
"Onee-sama are you now going to tell us how there can be two of you," Sandersonia asked, obviously still remembering me using my Devil Fruit.
"It is magic, it has to be," Marigold stated.
"So Bonney can use magic too," Hancock interjected starstruck. "You have to tell us all about that. My sister and I really want to know how to do magic."
"Only if we don't have to use blood to do it," Marigold said as she moved closer to Bonney "I don't like needles."
"What are you talking about?" Sandersonia wondered walking over to them. "Bonney didn't use any needles or blood, or did you see her use any? So it must work different a chant perhaps... wholly consisting of unpronounceable words."
Bonney seemed to get increasingly uncomfortable with the Boa sister standing around her and pestering her about "magic".
"Stupid – If they are unpro ... unpronninciable – or whatever" Hancock frustrated gave up to get it right "how could she say them in the first place. No, there has to be another explanation... Bonney has to be a witch."
"A witch, what is that," Sandersonia asked.
"I know – it's somebody like Yosei-Onee-sama," Marigold said.
"Can't be – witches are strong." Sandersonia said eying the overwhelmed Bonney "she isn't."
"She must be. She has a witch's power." Hancock mysteriously said "You'd better not doubt a witch. It could anger her to use her witch powers on you."
Oh boy -
I could see the shudder running through Sandersonia's body even from where I was standing, and I knew I had to stop Hancock now from filling her sister's head with her made-up stories lest I would end with girls unable to sleep at night.
"Girls, stop that. I'll explain..."
Authors Note: If it wasn't clear. That one "slaver" ate the Hana Hana no Mi Robin´s canon Devil-fruit. Some might wonder, how he was able to grow limbs on board the Sakura since Robin fruit seemed to be sight dependant. Well, I don't think it to be sight dependant there are a few panels that indicate otherwise. I think she sort of has a range (measured in Hanas according to Oda) and in that she can identify surfaces that can be used to "grow" a limb. With them being on the open ocean the Sakura was the only other location where this was possible. And indeed the "slaver" got a really fast handle on how to use the very basic of this power.
In regards to Bonney – I fear that including her in the crew will come to haunt me. One of the great many problems writing a fanfic to an uncompleted original work is that some things aren't known by the time the fic is written ... and I have a feeling that Bonney might come to play a major part in the future One Piece canon (the hints are there – ) and that her past will be fully disclosed ...which given some theories can range from her being a Charlotte (resemblance to Big Mom, similarities in their devil fruit powers ...) to being hundreds of years old.
So everything I come up with when it comes to her, most certainly at one point will turn out to be wrong. Which more than likely won't be changed/retconnced by me later – so just bear with me in that regard -
Her Devil-fruit power: I will go with the interpretation that she can steal the life-force of living creatures (including herself) and store it to be used later on. Either to make herself or others younger by transferring that lifeforce – those effects are permanent and her power requires a touch, no extra conditions necessary- A Worm typical striker power. The speed of how fast she can do that is dependant on her training ... so at the beginning, it will take some time ...
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