The First Journey Part 8 // Calm Seas and Ascend

-{Scene Break}-{Time Lapse: Through the Calm Belt and New World}-

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The Calm Belt was surprisingly calm. It sounded like a bad joke but the word calm was the best way to describe it.

But nonetheless Green did not expect it to be this level of calm.

The water in a bathtub was more in movement than this sea. Because the water was not moving at all you could actually see through it very well. So on their right side you could look down the Red Line until it disappeared into the darkness of the ocean and on the left side you were able to look deep into the ocean.

Green noted that unlike in the West Blue they had stationed multiple watchers which had the exciting job of watching water their entire shift. Their boredom was interrupted at least once an hour when one of them spotted a Sea King. As soon as it was spotted Tsuru and Gion instantly showed up.

During their 5 day journey through the Belt they were only attacked 2 times, which both times were dealt with by Tsuru with a one-hit-kill. Green had to console an angry Artoria, who could not watch the take down as at that time she was taking a shower after finishing her training.

The move which Tsuru used was also nothing that special for One Piece circumstances. Green saw her jump off the ship and then immediately accelerate with what he reasoned with being a combination of her Devil Fruit and Sky Walk. Followed was that by a sonic boom and the next thing Green was able to observe was a hole between the Sea King's eyes right through with Tsuru standing in the air before it.

He theorised that Tsuru used her Wash-Wash Fruit to reduce her air friction after using Sky Walk to speed up to an insane velocity and them maybe combined that with some sort of overpowered Finger Gun, or maybe she can use that technique with her entire arm, with the help of her Fruit, and punched right through the Sea King. The sonic boom was also probably from the attack itself, instead of Tsuru then her Devil Fruit would remove that.

Nonetheless Green was happy to see that happening twice. Artoira was more than happy, ecstatic would be better to describe her afterward. Green had to listen to her for multiple nights about how awesome Tsuru was. He was convinced that Artoria had a small crush on Tsuru after seeing that.

He also continued his routine of playing chess against Tsuru. They would talk about pretty much everything, other than actual World Government politics as Green avoided that thema like a plaique.

Another person to join their seasons was Gion. During their inatied journey to the West Seat, Green had only minimal contact with her, so he was interested in learning more about her.

She had a sort of tragic backstory if Green had to rate it. Her childhood was destroyed at 10 when the nation she lived in was attacked by a rivalling nation. Her entire family died and she ended up on the battlefield at the age of 11 as a child soldier until shortly afterwards the marines came in and ended the war. Tsuru found her on the battlefield as the only member of her battalion left. That led to her joining Tsuru's ship as a cabin girl and then on the recommendation of Tsuru joining the Marine Officer Academy afterwards, which she just graduated from right before this journey.

Despite that heavy backstory she was pretty open about it, not mincing her words. When Gion and Green were alone playing, she would also add that she was immensely happy and grateful that Tsuru took her away from her nation, because she did not think she would be able to settle there ever again. The memories of her dead family were too prevalent there.

The five day's ended quickly. They crossed the threshold between Calm Belt and New world at around noon so it was visible when it happened. Green asked Tsuru the day before so he could observe the transition.

It was not a hard cut. If he had to guess based on the relative speed of the ship, which was 5 Kilometres per hour, that the transition between the two seas was around twice that long. And by that he means the change from complete calm to the average sea. It started with small ripples on the ocean surface, followed up by the smallest of breeze that Green was able to feel on his skin. That turned into normal waves and wind which you would expect on a sunny day.

They still kept the Red Line in viewing distance, not moving far away from it. Green expected to see the rapid weather changes which were infamously notorious for the Grand Line but after a quick question to Tsuru he now knows that the weather around the Red Line is always stable. It still meant that it could change but it would follow a circle closer to the ones you would see in the Blues.

The journey from Calm Belt end till the point they would cross the Red Line was completely uninteresting. It took nearly two weeks of sailing on the ocean with nothing other than the Red Line passing.

Green could not decide if he was disappointed that nothing happened despite being in the New World or that he should be happy that nothing happened. Nonetheless the next point in their journey was coming up.

It was the ground station from which they would get lifted over the Red Line.

Sometimes Green would forget that he now lives in a fictional world but something like this always pulled him down and reminded that he was not in a "normal" world.

By "lifted over the Red Line", people would assume that you would board an elevator and it would bring you and your cargo up and over.

Here it meant that the entire fucking warship would be lifted up and over. That conversation with Tsuru had been shocking, as Green was once again questioning why the world living standard was only slightly over the dark ages.

In his old world, lifting an aircraft carrier over the mount Everest would be absolutely nonsensical, but here it was nothing special. Tsuru said the technology with which they do it only works around this area of the world, which Green instantly translated to Sabaody Archipelago bubble trees. With the station coming closer he could confirm that, as he saw some bubbles rising from it.

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-{Scene Break}-{Now}-

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They stayed on the base station for the night and then in the morning their ascent started. Green once again tried to wake up early enough to see them "launching" off. With the help of his System he woke up and also dragged a not so motivated Artoira out of bed into the Mess. Tsuru was already sitting on her usual table. They joined her a minute later after they also took their breakfast.

"How long is the ascent going to take?," Green asked.

"Over 30 hours and before you ask, the descent on the other side is just half an hour longer," Tsuru replied. She seemed for a moment to want to say something else but then didn't. After she took a deep breath she looked a bit more intense at both of them.

"What I am going to say now will not leave this table, do you understand?," the Vice-Admiral was easily identified through her voice. Artoria and Green shared a look with each other, afterwards they both nodded and as soon they did that a weird feeling went over them, which made all their hair on their bodies stand up.

Seeing Green and Artorias uneasiness she explained, "I just put up a barrier around us with my Devil Fruit, which will "wash out" all the sound around us, do you understand what this means?" The surprised faces of them did not conficed Tsuru and she explained further, "The World Government wants to portria themself always in a certain manner, so even for members of high noble families, that includes royals and such, that they are the perfect entity."

"Is she going to give us the fucking slave talk?," the reincarnated boy thought. Tsuru takes another sip from her coffee.

"I am going to give you a warning now. When we are up there, there's a chance that we could run into a Celestial Dragon," she took a pause which she used to study their faces. Green was keeping calm while Artoria seemed to be surprised. "Incase we are meeting one, I am sure you both know what to do with your lineage."

"I am ordering both of you to stay in their cabins as soon as we arrive at the top," she said with her captain's voice.

"Why do we have to stay inside? My father was up there and he even received a small tour through the city." It was Artoria who asked, as Green knew why. Tsuru looked like she did not want to answer that question. So Green decided to do for the first time in his new life something risky. "Because they are monsters?" he half questions and answers for Tsuru and Artoria.

Tsuru looked more shocked than Artoria.

"How do you know that?" Tsuru demands.

"I once overheard my father and his advisors talk about what a couple of "World Nobles" did while they were on a tour through the West Blue. I thought half the stuff they talked about were made up but with you warning us about them, I'm sure that it was not made up," he explained while mixing trues with lies. There was indeed a tour that a bunch of "World Nobles" did a year ago through the West Blue, but that is the only true thing. He never heard his father talk about them, he was just sure they did some fucked up shit on their journey.

"I was not informed about your family's business?," Tsuru asked a sort of half question, half statement. "She probably wanted to probe for more information before deciding what to do," he reasoned to himself.

"Traditional trading company, his company won a contract to supply them," Green made up on the spot.

"I understand, but I hope you never talk about that with anybody else. If a World Government agent would overhear you, you could get put on an "unsavoury" list."

"Can somebody explain what is going on here?!," Artoria butted in.

Tsuru and Green looked at each other and after communicating silently on which would have the honour to educate her on the danger of Celestial Dragons, the Vice-Admiral decided to do it.

"As a former princess you know that over 200 years ago the Reverie came to the agreement to ban slavery. The World Government acknowledged that and banned it in all their influence. The Celestial Dragons do not fall under the World Government, they are if you want to be above the law."

It took a second for Artoria to understand what Tsuru meant here, but then her face turned into absolute horror. "D-d-d-do you want to say that they still have slaves?," she screamed out while also jumping out of her chair.

"Yes," Tsuru answered coldly.

Artoria stared at her then changed her target to Green and he just nodded, while motioning her to sit back down.

"Why? They are super insane rich; they receive the heavenly tribute each year; they own so many companies across the globe; they are partly owing the FUCKING World Government and Marines; WHY?!" Artoria's question sounded more like a plea.

"Like your friend said, they are monsters," Tsuru answered. "If you only ever heard about them from the story and history books then you think that they are near Gods, but in all honesty they are greedy, ugly, unethical monsters."

This time Green was also stunned. He could not believe that Tsuru would speak so freely about that subject. "She is the same generation as Garp so she probably has seen some fucked up shit." Green was not sure what reasons Tsuru had but from the way she was clutching her coffee mug it was nothing nice.

"So I order you both to stay inside in your cabins while we are on top of the Red Line and while we are passing Mary Geoise, can I trust you doing that?" She asked once again.

Green nodded, while Artoria seemed to think she wanted to say more.

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-{Scene Break}-{After Breakfast on the Deck}-

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"Did you really know about it?" Artoria asked Green.

They both were watching the marines put the ship in a sort of harnish. On the front and back of the ship was what looked like an airship but with a huge bubble dopple the size of the ship. Each ship had multiple guiding cables which probably extended all the way up the Red Line. There were multiple propellers on them to further increase their lift.

"Yes,... sort of, I heard about it during a meeting between my father and the board, they talked about how much the nobles wanted for the little they paid. Afterwards I read the reports about them, and my father let me read every report about basically everything to prepare me to take over later on. Some of the stuff that was written in them I thought were just so over the top that I thought they were bullshitting us because they made mistakes in that branch to cover up," Green explained his bullshit story.

"What did the Cele-," Artoria was about to say.

"Do not say the name, you heard Tsuru just now." Green whispered with pressure in his voice. "And to answer your question. They behaved like animals. If they want anything they get it. And I mean EVERYTHING. They consumed around 250.000.000 Berries in products from us and did not ever pay a third of it. They said it was our tribute. Then the straight up crimes they committed. If you give me a Law book it would be easier to point out the once they did not break….

Artoria if we are up there we there," he points with his pointy-finger upwards, "we will sit in our cabins and do not do anything that could bring any attention to us. And I mean that we should not even look through the fucking window by that."

Green whispered the entire thing basically to Artoria, but still tried to convey the urgency. "I know it goes against a lot of things you have been taught but they are not reasonable and I am going to be 100% honest with you, that in case one of them sees you, especially male, that you could end up as some concubine or worse."

He did not even think that was over the top, Green can honestly see one of these inbred idiots taking a liking to Artoria's looks and before you've even realised what happened she has a slave collar around her neck.

Artoria was completely stiff after listening to Green. She seemed to be deep in thought and her face went through all forms of horror and disgust. They stayed silent for a good while.

Meanwhile the marines seemed to have finished the docking and only a small crew was going around doing checks. Half an hour later the sun was just above the horizon at that time, the ariships started spinning up their propellers.

Multiple ropes were loosened and the warship started to float upwards. Green was able to hear the wood conduct, as it was under a different load then normal. The uperward jolt was felt for a moment but then the airships reached their maximum speed and everything was smooth afterwards.

Green was having the time of his life, marvelling at the engineering and set accomplishment, while Artoria realised a girly "kyaa~" at the abnormal movement which had Green full belly laughing and Artoria beet red.