Chapter 15: The Weight of Trust
Unfortunately, my spar with Zoro had to be postponed. We still needed to tie up the defeated pirates and dump them back onto their ship so they wouldn’t cause any more trouble.
Once that was done, we ransacked their vessel for any valuables before setting it adrift to sail aimlessly into the sea. Not all of them were sent away, though. I planned to turn Kuro, Jango, and the Nyaban Brothers over to the Marines for their bounties.
Together, their combined rewards totaled thirty-two million Berry, more than enough to cover the rest of what Nami needed to raise one hundred million.
Our new three prisoners had their weapons confiscated and were securely bound, left unconscious in a pile on the side of the battlefield.
That was when we received visitors, Usopp’s young friends and Kaya herself, who was nervously gripping a flintlock pistol.
They stopped at the top of the cliff, eyes wide at the scene below. After we confirmed that Klahadore was indeed the infamous Captain Kuro and reassured them that the threat had been dealt with, they finally relaxed.
An injured Merry had informed Kaya about Kuro’s true identity and she had come here in a foolish attempt to confront Kuro herself.
Kaya apologized profusely, especially to Usopp, for not believing his warning. He waved it off with a bashful grin while his little friends praised him for his bravery.
With everything under control, Kaya invited us back to her mansion for a meal, which we happily accepted. Zoro volunteered to stay behind and watch the prisoners, so I promised to bring him back some food and booze later.
All in all, the battle had been surprisingly anticlimactic, lasting barely half an hour.
=====
A While Later
Relaxing in the shade of a large tree near the mansion, with Zoro napping not far away after breakfast, I finally turned my attention to the notifications I had received at the end of the battle.
[Feat Achieved! Defeated the Black Cat Pirates] +1 Gold Random Ticket
[Feat Achieved! Met All Relevant Characters in the Gecko Islands] +1 Silver Random Ticket
I raised an eyebrow at the relatively low number of tickets. As if reading my thoughts, another notification appeared.
[Announcement: Tutorial Phase Complete. Ticket acquisition will become significantly more difficult going forward.]
‘So that was the tutorial…’ I thought, shrugging it off. ‘Makes sense.’
‘Anyway, time to roll.’
[Rolling…]
[Photosynthesis]
|Rare Trait|
Who cares about food or breathing? Natural sunlight is all you need in this life. You regenerate energy faster under sunlight and when under the sun you also feel satiated and don't need to breathe as your body can function off sunlight alone. Water is still needed though.
[Sunlight Spear]
|Rare Ability|
Allows the user to conjure a spear of lightning imbued with the power of the sun that they can throw as a projectile. This spear possesses penetrative power and deals increased damage against draconic entities and unholy beings.
‘This gacha really is leaning hard into the sun theme, huh?’ I thought with a small smile before another notification popped up.
[Ability Slots Increased to 2.]
‘Nice. I forgot that was my fifth ability.’ My smile widened at the pleasant surprise.
Looking at Photosynthesis, I realized I no longer had to worry about food if I didn’t want to. That wasn’t something I was willing to give up though, as I had been really looking forward to testing food again in the near future.
At the least, this would help massively with my energy reserves and meant I no longer had the weakness of needing huge amounts of food when using my Gears. That was honestly a godsend, since it was one of the original Luffy’s biggest weaknesses.
All of his Gears used massive amounts of energy, requiring him to eat enormous quantities of food just to recover.
While I was distracted by my thoughts, I suddenly heard Zoro stir beside me. I looked over as he slowly sat up and let out a huge yawn.
“That was a nice nap,” Zoro muttered, rubbing his eyes before glancing at me calmly. “Now that everything is over, how much longer are we staying here? With our current prisoners, we can’t linger too long before the villagers start to panic about having dangerous criminals on the island if someone notices.”
“As soon as our ship is ready,” I said after thinking about it. “Based on what Merry told us yesterday, he just needs to remove some personal items and do a few finishing touches, so I doubt it will take long.”
Zoro nodded in understanding before a challenging grin grew on his face.
“That means there’s nothing stopping us from having our spar now, huh?” he asked, his battle lust spiking with excitement.
Sharing the same grin, I nodded as adrenaline started pumping through my body.
“That’s right,” I said, getting to my feet. “Why don’t we do it while Tiche, Nami, and Usopp aren’t here? I don’t want the others to interfere.”
“Hahaha, you read my mind,” Zoro said with a happy laugh as his hand settled on the white handle of Wado Ichimonji.
Moments later, we stood facing each other on an open clearing, hands resting on our swords.
“Remember not to hold back. I want to see the difference between us and how much I still have to catch up,” Zoro declared seriously as he tied his bandana around his head and unsheathed all three of his katanas.
I slotted in Impulse, boosting my reflexes and speed by a good amount, then let out a small breath as I activated Total Concentration Breathing. A serious look crossed my face.
“Very well. Just be aware that if I go all out, I might damage that sword of yours you care so much about,” I said calmly while channeling a small amount of Armament Haki into Muramasa — not enough to turn it black.
“Let me worry about that,” Zoro mumbled through Wado, though I did see a small flicker of worry cross his face.
“Then here I come, Zoro!”
No sooner had I said that than my body was instantly in motion. Using Soru, I appeared right in front of a slightly surprised Zoro, who hadn’t expected me to move this fast.
To his credit, he still managed to block my downward slash with all three of his katanas, but he grunted as the force of the blow caused his feet to dig into the ground.
“This is just the beginning! Don’t go getting surprised now!” I exclaimed, disappearing from my spot again as I began bombarding the green-haired teen with blows from all sides. He barely managed to block them.
=====
Zoro’s POV
His Captain was a monster.
That was the only thought that kept repeating in Zoro’s mind as he did his best to merely block the avalanche of attacks coming his way from all directions.
He had seen him using Soru before, but he had clearly been holding back since the speed he was currently moving at was absurd. It was taking all his focus just to not get cut.
If that wasn’t enough, his attacks were extremely heavy and strong, to the point that he slowly felt his hands becoming numb after every blow.
What kind of physical training must he have subjected himself to get this ridiculously strong?
The only positive about this so far that Zoro could say was that his Observation was getting a lot of training and it was the only reason he hadn’t been cut yet as it enabled him to just barely block Luffy’s attacks.
“I see you’re getting the hang of Observation.” Luffy said suddenly with a serious look. “Don’t rely on it too much though, it has two major weaknesses. Let me show you!”
Luffy suddenly sped up even more, by several times at that which was ridiculous, causing his eyes to widen as he panicked a bit and his Observation failed to activate before he felt a cut to his side making him grunt in pain.
This happened several more times, with each one his Observation failing to activate and receiving a cut for it that while not life threatening was slowing his movements by a bit.
Zoro grunted as Luffy used his superior strength to keep all his katana’s pinned under his blow.
“Did you figure it out?” Luffy asked calmly the serious expression never leaving his face before his form blurred again and he heard his voice come from all sides as he concentrated trying his best to find him.
“It’s your concentration. Observation requires a lot of focus and if you lose that, you become an open target. Now for the other one.”
Breathing heavily feeling his lungs protest from the strain of Total Concentration Breathing, Zoro blinked as Luffy suddenly slowed down and he focused as he saw through his Observation where Luffy’s next attack would come from.
That’s when he suddenly sped up again and he felt a cut on the location he knew was coming but was too slow to react to and Zoro silently realized what Luffy meant.
“Seems you caught on. What purpose does it serve seeing an attack coming if your body is too slow to react to it.” Luffy said appearing in front of him with his katana at the ready and slightly leaking his blood.
And was it just Zoro, or was Luffy’s body now steaming slightly and appeared pinkish or was it just his imagination?
“Now ready yourself, I’m coming at you seriously this time.” Luffy declared as his sword suddenly started emitting sparks of lightning.
“Bring it!” Zoro declared fearlessly while breathing a bit harshly, since this was exactly what he wanted.
Concentrating, Zoro took a deep breath pushing his body to the limit with Total Concentration Breathing as he got into a stance.
In his focus, Zoro didn’t notice how Wado acquired a slight black sheen nor the quirk of the lips from his Captain.
“Thunder Breathing: Fourth Form…”
“Santoryu Ogi:”
Zoro felt his mind empty of all thought as he focused in one thing and one thing only.
Cutting his Captain.
“Distant Thunder!”
“Sanzen Sekai!”
Seeing a literal bolt of lightning heading towards him, Zoro swung all three of his swords before a second later losing consciousness.
=====
Back to Luffy
Wiping the tiny cut from my cheek, I turned around with a proud look at Zoro’s unconscious and bloody form.
“Shishishi, Rayleigh is proven right once again. Haki truly blooms in battle and now with your Armament unlocked, you will get much stronger from now on.” I commented happily at his downed figure despite knowing he was unconscious.
Sheathing Muramasa, I made my way to Zoro before kneeling down and letting Healing Light do its work as it slowly healed him of all the injuries I had caused him, leaving not even a scar behind.
“Be proud Zoro, you are strong.” I whispered before standing up and turning toward the direction of the village. I saw the surprised and wide-eyed looks of Nami and Usopp who had arrived in the middle of our spar unbeknownst to Zoro.
Tiche was also with them but with her already knowing my current strength, she didn’t seem surprised at all and just nodded to me respectfully, already expecting such an outcome.
“It’s alright now guys, we are finished with our spar.” I said with a wide smile as I waved them over.
I silently noticed the looks Nami was giving me in particular. Her wide eyes had turned hopeful for a moment before she snapped out of it when she noticed my attention on them.
As they got closer though after getting over their surprise, Nami’s look toward me turned thoughtful and it didn’t take a genius to guess that she had something on her mind.
“That was crazy! Why were you guys fighting to the death!?” Usopp yelled as soon as he got within a certain distance while looking at the various cuts on Zoro’s clothing and the still fresh blood on his clothes.
“We weren’t fighting to the death Usopp.” I denied with an amused smile and a shake of my head as I got up and took Zoro, supporting him by the shoulders.
“We were just sparring, nothing serious.” I said waving his concerns away with my free hand as I headed to a tree to let Zoro rest against it.
“You call that a spar!?” Usopp yelled in greater shock as he followed us.
“Yep.” I said simply.
Just as Usopp was about to say something else, Nami spoke up in our defense.
“It’s true.” Nami said making Usopp turn to her with wide eyes. “These two idiots train like this all the time and even agreed to this before we arrived.”
“T-That doesn’t make it any better!”
Shaking my head at Usopp’s antics I set Zoro down before turning to Tiche who noticing my gaze immediately straightened her back.
“Tiche, would you mind watching over those three idiots for a few hours? I want to take a nap.” I asked with a smile.
“Of course. Leave it to me, Luffy-sama.” Tiche said with a nod before she disappeared with Soru and appeared next to the bound pirates.
“Oh, good news Luffy~” Nami suddenly exclaimed with a happy smile as I turned to her. “Kaya said that our ship should be ready by tomorrow morning. And get this, she’s even willing to give it to us for free!” Nami said sounding extra happy at the last part.
“Yeah, Kaya wants to thank us for what we did today.” Usopp said suddenly sounding all brave with his hands on his hips.
“That’s great. Though I don’t know how I feel about getting a free ship. How about we just ask her to fill it up with supplies instead?” I suggested instead since I wanted everyone to know that the ship officially belonged to me to solve a few issues later down the line.
“Huh!? Are you serious right now!?” Nami suddenly got a terrifying aura and grabbed my cardigan with a strong grip as she looked at me with narrowed eyes.
“That’s millions of Berry we’ll be saving you know!?” she demanded as she started shaking me back and forth comically.
“Sorry Nami, but this is something I will not negotiate on.” I said calmly with a shake of my head causing her to freeze and seeing my serious expression, she slumped a moment later.
“Aargh! Fine!” Nami grumbled cutely as she huffed letting go of me and turning her back to me giving me the silent treatment.
“We already had an agreement Nami. I really don’t like breaking my word.” I said more gently this time as I patted her shoulder while Usopp just watched us silently not knowing what to say.
“Tsk, what kind of pirate are you?” Nami muttered under her breath with no heat in her voice before she let out a sigh and turned to me as her expression suddenly got a bit nervous causing me to raise an eyebrow.
“B-By the way, there’s something I want to talk to you about. Mind if we speak in private?” Nami asked me nervously with her eyes not meeting my own and a slightly vulnerable look appearing on her face as she fidgeted nervously in place while one hand gripped her left shoulder quite tightly.
“Of course, Nami. Lead the way.” I said with a smile as I gave her shoulder another reassuring squeeze.
At my words, Nami slumped a bit in relief before nodding jerkily and walking ahead. “Follow me then.”
Turning to the curious Usopp I signaled to the unconscious Zoro. “Hey Usopp. Mind looking after Zoro while he wakes up?”
“Huh? Oh! Yeah, sure.” Usopp said with a nod and a shrug as he sat down and started fiddling with his pouch.
Giving him a nod in thanks I walked up to catch up to Nami who I noticed was going back to our boat for our discussion.
As I walked behind her noticing her tense shoulders and posture, I wondered if this was going where I think it was.
‘Is she finally going to come clean about Arlong and ask for help?’ I thought hopefully.