God's Shrine

As the group of four moved quickly through the jungle of enormous trees, Cherry passed the time by examining the flora and fauna in more detail with her Life Sense.

Her Life Sense stretched over the jungle, easily encompassing the entire island due to the particular thick and vibrant plant life.

Most everything was pretty standard fare, aside from the enormous size of it, but there was one trees species that caught Cherry's eye.

"We're making a detour." Cherry told the others as she changed directions.

It didn't take too long to arrive at the destination she had honed in on.

See the trees she had targeted, Cherry was practically shaking with excitement.

'These are Soul Snaring Trees!' The thought made her mind tremble.

Soul Snaring Trees were an exceptionally rare resource even in the myriad worlds of her last life. Though, in fairness, their rarity was largely due to the fact that cultivators would harvest them on sight.

"What about these trees has you so excited?" Robin asked.

Cherry carefully considered about how much to say about them. She was itching to go on a rant, but she wasn't sure how much Robin would believe. She didn't want Robin to think she was a quack, like somebody who sells common stones to gullible people as 'alternative healing' methods.

"This is no ordinary tree. It is very rare and extremely useful as a medical reagent." Cherry summarized, feeling dissatisfied.

"Oh? Tell me more." Robin motioned for her to continue.

Cherry opened her mouth to say more, but stopped. She looked at Robin suspiciously. "Are you just doing this so I have to listen to you ramble about your archaeology stuff later?"

Robin said nothing, but gave her a sly smile.

"Fine then. It's not like I'm not at all interested in history or anything." Cherry acquiesced.

"These are called Soul Snaring Trees, on account of the fact that they ensnare the souls of the recently deceased to feed off of the excess spiritual energy the souls release before leaving the world." Cherry explained.

When Robin gave her a funny look, Cherry said. "Don't look at me like that, there are devil fruit that deal with souls like Big Mom's Soul Soul Fruit or the Revive Revive fruit. The existence of souls is not in question, it is an empirical fact."

"In any case, the spiritual energy that a Soul Snaring Tree accumulates is stored within its taproot. I just need a little bit of time to collect them." Cherry said.

"Isn't that going to take a long time-" Serene's words were cut short when Cherry cleaved a tree down at the base and swiftly pulled the taproot out within 10 seconds. Serene touched the scar on her face and shivered, remembering how close she'd been to ending up the same way as that tree.

Cherry collected a few dozen taproots and stored them on Cabernet in her ship form, then they moved on towards the giant beanstalk.

"Somebody up that beanstalk is able to detect us at the base of it at the very minimum distance, likely this is God Gan Fall's doing. So be prepared for combat. If anyone attacks us on the beanstalk, Robin should try to make them fall. Anyone who comes for us won't be too weak and should survive the fall when they land on the island cloud below." Cherry explained.

Robin and Cabernet nodded, while Serene was feeling quite useless without her devil fruit and wondering why she is even being brought along. She had some confidence in her martial art, but next to these monsters she just couldn't compare.

They reached the mass of island clouds beneath the beanstalk and started hiking up. Then they ran over to the beanstalk and started to climb its giant vines.

Sure enough, they soon noticed people flying out from God Gan Fall's Shrine above them, skating along small streams of clouds created from dials.

Robin fulfilled her role excellently and caused them to drop out of the air like flies, plummeting down into the soft island clouds below.

They either decided to wait for them to reach the Shrine or did not have any more soldiers to spare, because no more pursuers came after them while they climbed up.

After about half an hour of climbing they reached the island cloud God Gan Fall's Shrine was nestled upon.

"Alright, Robin, you and Cabernet go try to find our clues while I distract Gan Fall. You can handle any of his men, I trust." Cherry said. Then they burst through into the Shrine.

...

Enel sensed Cherry and her group enter God's Shrine and that Gan Fall started to move personally with his Mantra.

"It's time. Let's go." He ordered. He and his men moved quickly into Upper Yard.

...

A group of well armed Shandians were racing along the white white sea towards Upper Yard, led by a man named Wyper.

"It won't be long now, prepare for battle!" Wyper commanded.

"Are we sure now is the best time to attack?" One of his men questioned.

"There will never be a 'best' time to attack! If we wait, then we will be waiting forever! Now is the time to take back our homeland from that mad man!" He insisted.

...

A group of pirates just arrived at the white white sea, having been carried up a sea cloud waterfall by a giant shrimp.

"That entrance toll was really ridiculous, what even is an 'Extol'?" Nami complained.

"Why are you complaining, we didn't even pay the toll and still went up just fine." Spoke Usopp.

"Look it's a sky island! An island in the sky! Shishishishi!" Luffy laughed.

The laid anchor on the beach of the cloud island, ready to enjoy themselves at the wonders this land had to offer.

"Heso." A woman greeted them and introduced herself as Conis.

"You're the second strangers I've met today. I'm glad that you made it here safe and sound it seems. The women I met earlier were not so lucky. Their ship was destroyed by the ocean current that brought them here." She told them.

Nami and Usopp paled, thinking about what could have happened to themselves if they hadn't been 'lucky'.

Then a thought occurred to Usopp.

"Among the women you met, was there a tall, dark beauty, an evil looking woman with red eyes, and a blonde with a scar on her face?" He asked, and the others realized what he was asking.

"That's right. Do you know them?" Conis tilted her head.

Chopper started to cry in hysterics. "Their ship was destroyed?! Then Cabernet is dead?!"

The other Straw Hats were also shocked.

"Cabernet was fine when I saw her earlier though?" Conis said.

""""""Eh?"""""" The Straw Hats said in simultaneous confusion.

"Hm?" Conis didn't know why they though Cabernet had died, she didn't think she said so.

"But you said their ship was destroyed?" Nami asked.

"Yes? That's what they told me." Conis couldn't wrap her head around this conversation.

Nami let out a sigh of relief. "So they lied, huh?"

"Eh? Lied?" Conis didn't know what to think anymore.

...

In God's Shrine, Cherry and company faced a large number of guards, undoubtedly experiences warriors in their own right.

Behind them stood an old man with a long white beard and mustache. The crazed, shifty eyes gave him away as Gan Fall immediately.

"What have you come here for, hm? Are you here under Enel's orders to assassinate me?" He spoke frantically and did not seem to expect any answers, as in the next moment he ordered his men to attack.

Cherry charged into the ranks of the soldiers and let loose with a cackling laugh. Every time she swung a fist or kicked with her legs, a man would fall and not get back up. Many of them were clutching their family jewels with tears streaming down their faces.

Gan Fall couldn't take his eyes off of Cherry as she was the primary threat to himself. Robin, Cabernet, and Serene took the chance to sneak away and try to find the dream journal, the cloud iron box, or anything else of relevance to Gan Fall's madness.