Chapter 29: Race Against Time
( 3rd POV )
On a chilly night in a sea near the coast of two different islands, Swallow Island and Minion Island, colossal naval warships floated in the sea. Within one of these warships, the majority of marines were women, attentively following the orders of an elderly woman clad in a white coat with the word "justice" emblazoned on her back.
"Don't let your guards down; our enemy is Doflamingo!" she instructed the crew.
"Yes, ma'am."
The elderly woman, a high-ranking officer, seemed to be inspecting her crew and reminding them to remain vigilant at this moment, until a female crew member approached, delivering news.
"Sigh, Sengoku, that fool. I don't know where he got intel about Doflamingo and deployed us at this time," she commented on their current situation.
"Report, Tsuru Vice Admiral, we got a call from the lookout ship stationed at Minion Islands," the female crew member said, bringing important news from one of the islands.
The female crew handed the Den Den Mushi to Tsuru, who began listening to the news from the other side.
"Barrel's hideout is on fire?" she questioned the situation with the person on the call.
"Yes, some of us are heading there to see what is going on," the man's voice came from the Den Den Mushi, informing Tsuru.
"Idiot, once they find you guys, the deal will be off. Check the coastal area now and tell me if you find someone suspicious," she replied, instructing them to follow a new order.
"Yes, ma'am," the man answered and started implementing her order.
Meanwhile,
In Snow Island, in a certain area that looks like a base, a giant fire is raging and burning the buildings around them. The scene looks very chaotic; people there start to panic, shouting to put the fire down and asking for water.
Suddenly, a man with brown hair and an X scar on his chin jumped out from the windows of the house on fire. He started running away from the scene, breathing heavily. He seemed to be running away from something.
"Huft... Huft... Damn bastard," he murmured while still continuing his run despite his body condition betraying him.
.....
On the other side of Snow Island, a kid wearing a cloak and a peculiar hat gazed toward a few navy soldiers passing by. He seemed nervous while holding a tiny black object in his hand.
"Come on, move... I need to move, damn it. Cora-san is depending on me," he said, murmuring, trying to encourage himself.
When he finally saw a lone navy soldier about to pass, he gathered his courage and walked out from behind the wall toward the navy. "Hey, take this!"
The navy saw the boy handing him a small black object containing a letter inside. "Oh, it must be a letter. Thank you for sending it to me; I'll keep it safe. By the way, you sound so weak, boy," he said.
"Can I trust you?" The boy asked him a sudden question.
"Yeah, like I said, I will take responsibility for the letter. So, you do—"
Before the navy could finish his words to the boy, the boy urgently interrupted him. "I need you to help someone. H-He got shot, and he is dying!" he said with a desperate tone.
"Please, save him! I don't want him to die at any cost! He got shot... because of me!" The boy looked up at the navy, who was apparently wearing black sunglasses, while crying.
The navy finally decided to help the boy and carried him on his back, heading toward the direction the boy had been pointing. In the island full of snow, the fates of various people are about to be decided; whether they will survive or not is still unknown.
.....
( Vanze POV )
Up high in the clouds on a certain sea, there is a giant goldish-black ship floating, heading toward the direction that the black compass on the white-haired man's hands always points to.
There is a commotion on the deck, where we can see a little girl running around with a white hair lady trying to chase a little white bear. It is a weird scene indeed, but what makes it even more weird is that the bear is running with his two little feet while standing.
Yes, there's a little human-like bear with white fur all over his body on our ship right now. The little guy seems like he is still a child from his size alone.
"Nooo, stop chasing me... I'm not emergency food! Help!" The little bear shouts, asking for help, and surprisingly, he can talk with a human language.
"Hahaha, chase him, Uta-chan!" The white-haired lady said to the young girl called Uta.
"Yes, Yamato nee-chan, don't run around, Bepo! We will catch you, haha." Uta said while running and laughing at Yamato's jokes.
Poor Bepo...
"They are so lively..." Reiju comments while watching their antics. The others who are not far away from our spot also nod with understanding on their faces.
"Fufufu, both of them are always like this, but now adding little Bepo just makes it more fun for them," Robin said, explaining their usual action to our new member.
Yes, the little white bear's name is Bepo; he is a future nakama for Law and a member of the Hearts Pirates. He is also a mink who can transform into a Sulong form in the future, and how did I know? Of course, it is from the spoiler on the internet back then.
It must be confusing right? Why suddenly little Bepo got on our ship. For that, I need to recall a scene from four days ago. After we departed from the last island, we encountered a storm on the sea at night time.
While Azel and I were trying to navigate the ship out from the storm, we spotted the wreckage of a small ship not far from us. We heard a voice asking for help from there, so Azel decided to check it.
While he flew to the location, he saw a little white creature holding on to the last pile of woods to help him float in the sea.
So, he decided to help the poor little thing before he got drowned in the sea storm and bring him back to the ship. The little guy is still shook and scared after experiencing that, so we guided him to the empty bedroom and let him rest for the night.
The next morning, we informed the crew what happened at night and introduced Bepo to them. Bepo also started sharing his story on how he almost got drowned. He said he is from a race called mink and lives on the back of a giant elephant; his hometown is called Zou.
While thinking about his brother who went to the sea years ago, he decided to also leave his hometown to search for his brother. But, it seems fate is not kind enough to help him. He got drowned by a storm the first time he set sail and got rescued by a merchant ship that was heading toward the North Blue.
Thankfully, they are good people and agreed to lend him a small boat. Bepo got another boat to sail and started his journey once again, but storm after storm always followed him, and it damaged his little boat again.
Eventually, he ended up on in this sea with his damaged boat, but the boat can't hold on for too long, so it got destroyed, and luckily for him, we heard his voice back then.
The others listening to his story seem touched by how a little guy can endure all of the hardships until now. Even Uta came to give him a hug; it looks cute because both of them are the same height.
We offered him our help and let him stay with us while searching for his brother. Bepo, who doesn't have much choice, immediately agrees to our proposal.
After a few days being together, now Bepo is already making friends with all of us, especially with Uta and Yamato. That's why they are now playing and running around on the deck.
'Sigh, do we still have enough time before that event happens?' I ignored their action for now and thinking about the next plan instead while holding Jack's compass in my palm.
[ Let's just hope that you make it in time; you even decided the ship to fly to make it go faster. ]
'Yes, I hope we still can make it.' I know that the person who I'm looking for will be fine, but it is better to meet him at that island.
'Oh right, show me the last quest and the reward from the last time I beat Judge, Seele.' I almost forgot that time the system issued a mission for me.
[ You still remember it, brother? I thought you forgot. ]
'In case you forgot, back then I happened to be busy with things, so yeah, please show me now.' I just rolled my eyes at her comment.
[ Alright then. ]
[ Ding!
Quest: Rip... And Tear!!!
You are now in the presence of the mighty and genius king from the kingdom of science. He dared to rip off peoples from their freedom, including her daughter! Teach him a lesson by destroying his kingdom and save the princess in distress!
Rewards:
¢ 30,000 coins
Blue summoning crystal 2×
Status: Completed ]
'That was a quest with a big payload after the last time when I raided Onigashima. So how many coins and the gacha ticket do I have now, Seele?'
For years, there are not many missions with a lot of rewards. It is either for training or when we defeat other pirates; it is so easy and boring that time. Thankfully, I managed to save up for a long time during our training time on that island in the Calm Belt.
[ You still have ¢ 3,960,000 coins left, 14 white tickets, and 2 blue tickets left for now. You used a lot of the ticket to pull a gacha from all those years, brother. ]
'I know, thankfully I can sell most of the garbage and accumulated a lot of coins from it.' Thanks for my saving that I've got many coins until now.
I also got something that valuable for us from the blue gacha pulls such as two pellets from Wuxia world that can cure any disease in the world, an advanced camera and drone which can be invisible to the eyes that can record anything and live broadcast everything to this world, and etc.
If I count all the things I got from there, it will almost reach 1 million coins at least. But all of them are useful to me so I won't sell them.
'By the way, how many coins if I sold all of the technology including the clones from Germa, Seele?'
[ Well, at least you can get two million coins from it. The lineage factor and cloning technology are rare in any other worlds after all, but I suggest you just sold the clones that being unused for now. Don't sell the core tech and wait first if you can get the perfect version from Vegapunk. ]
'You are right Seele; let's wait first. Anyway, we have a lot of coins for now.' I remember the Pacifist and the Seraphim project, but I don't know if Vegapunk already started it now.
Anyway, let's focus on our objective this time, the Minion island. We've been sailing toward that island nonstop until now; we should be close.
I glance at my trusty compass that has been pointing toward the north and walked to the head of the ship before looking down while activating both my KG and Kenbushoku Haki.
While I focus my attention scanning the area below on the sea, my crew is waiting on the deck while talking to each other despite the chilly and snowy weather today.
"Hmm, it's been almost a week we've been searching for that island now. Are you sure you are not being defrauded, Robin?" Hancock questions the intelligence that Robin got back then from the underworld.
Robin hears her complaint just rolls her eyes and responds back to her. "You can never truly trust the information from that place, but we also don't have a choice. Either it is a hit or it is a miss; let's just see."
"Vanze-san seems surveying the area now." Azel said while noticing my action from his spot.
"Even if we make it in time, didn't the navy already surround that island? We just gonna go straight into the trap like Doflamingo then," Hancock said, and she is not wrong by saying that.
"That's why our ship is flying now, to avoid being detected by the Navy. Vanze still hasn't given us the next plan, so we just need to wait," Robin said to Hancock, reassuring her.
Not far from them, Bepo finally being saved by Reiju from the two girls who have been chasing after him. Reiju feels pity watching her fellow new member decide to help him and told both of the girls to stop because she senses that we are already near our destination.
Finally, after done surveying the area, I noticed two islands not far from us, and there are a few warships stationed on the coast of each island.
"Hehe, I found you." I said while smirking, realizing that our destination is just up ahead.
I walked towards the others and asked them to gather around while letting the ship fly toward the snowy island.
"Alright, guys, I just found the island, and there are indeed navy warships there. I can even see fire in those ruins on the island, so the situation there seems to be chaotic." I explain what I have just seen to them.
"So, what are we going to do then?" Robin asks me.
The others also start staring at me, anticipating my answer. I stay silent for a while, contemplating our next moves. After a while, I still haven't decided what to do, so I just tell them that Azel and I will go down and check the area first.
"Sigh, first, Azel and I will go down first while all of you stay on the ship, and then..."
.....
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