12 Setting Sail
Grandma Angela finally relented after Cherry convinced her she was amply prepared to venture out into the cruel, cruel world.
It was a tearful farewell for the both of them, as well as old man Martin and Borke. Slenk wasn't there as he was still 'recuperating', the big baby.
Cherry had a custom ship commissioned with her savings working in Martin's smithy. It was small enough to sail by herself and was quite fast. She didn't want to spend more time on the open ocean longer than necessary.
Unmooring her ship, she set sail out into the enormous West Blue!
Navigation was an easy enough skill to learn for her. She looked at her map and decided where to go.
Cherry's plan was to scour the ocean's uninhabited islands for devil fruit.
How would she do this? With a nifty skill called 'Life Sense', a kind of supernatural sense utilizing vital energy. The range of Life Sense was dependent on her own cultivation and the abundance of living things in the vicinity.
If her thoughts were correct, this meant she could just take a leisurely stroll around an island with dense rain forest or some such and know for certain if a devil fruit existed there. This was on the basis that devil fruit would be very unique in their vital energy signature as well as the density of energy.
Life Sense would also be useful on the ocean, full of little critters and plankton as it is. It would help locate fish or detect sea kings.
Several weeks pass and Cherry arrives at a large island with a dense tropical rainforest, often avoided due to its abundance of large and ferocious animals.
She hadn't had any luck with the last couple dozen islands, but that was to be expected as devil fruit were renowned for being ridiculously rare.
She had, however, picked up a number of interesting plants and hunted animals with unique body parts. She lamented that she didn't learn more than the basics about pill refining in her last life. Nothing that she could make with her shallow skills would be sufficient for her cultivation method.
'Well, let's get to it. It's getting dark, but that won't be a problem for me.' She thought as she anchored her ship in the shallow water.
...
Captain 'Land Lubber' Lorston is a notorious pirate in the West Blue, whose bounty is a whopping 11,000,000 Beri! He and his crew, he surmised, were feared by all in this quarter of the world and he reckoned his arrival in the Grand Line was hotly anticipated to come very soon.
His unusual moniker was on account of his seeming inability to gain his sea legs and stand properly on a ship at sea. This was a rather clever ruse on his part, as in actually he could move around just fine at sea. This 'weakness' of his would draw his opponents into a false sense of superiority and then he would strike!
Truly Lorston was the most deviously cunning pirate to have ever lived.
He and his crew, the Manly Chin pirates, stopped on a large tropical island to resupply their fresh water and perhaps hunt some game.
Naturally Lorston could not be outdone by his own men, so he trekked further than the rest to seek his prey.
Near the center of the island he caught sight of an enormous boar. This would perhaps be a tough hunt for him, but he was no coward. So he quickly thought of a clever plan to deal with this great beast.
'Aha! I shall stand before that large stone and goad it into charging me, then dodge out of the way. It will crash into the stone and become dazed long enough for me to dispatch it. Sometimes my most powerful intellect even surprises me!' He thought to himself.
Lorston carried out his plan and the boar being quite stupid crashed into the stone as anticipated.
"HaHA! Take that, you stupid pig! You shall be my dinner soon!" Lorston shouted, jabbing his spear into the boar's throat.
He had somewhat miscalculated the boar's resilience, however, as it turned to charge him once more.
Lorston barely managed to dodge out the way and ended up dancing around the ferocious beast until it bled out.
"Phew, a-all part of the plan, haha." Lorston huffed, wiping the sweat from his brow.
At that time, something fell from one of the trees the boar had rammed and hit him on the head, knocking him out cold.
When he awoke hours later, he looked around to find what hit him. It most closely resembled a coconut, however it was shaped like some sort of pot and was dark grey in color with yellow and orange swirling patterns like flames.
His confusion lasted for more than a few moments when a thought sprang to mind.
"Is this a legendary devil fruit?!" He screamed, then looked around to see if he was heard, but finding no one.
He quickly snatched it up and stuffed it into his coat. After standing up he sent a glance at the boar, which was covered in seagulls eagerly tearing away at it with their beaks.
He sighed "Let's hope the boys got dinner sorted.", but he couldn't help but smile.
He wasn't sure whether to eat the devil fruit or try to sell it, but he was sure either way that his future was very bright.
He was very wrong.
...
Cherry walked through the trees, sending her Life Sense surging outwards. She found a number of large animals that would serve well as her meal, but business came first.
That's when the unexpected occurred. She got a hit! She had found a devil fruit on the opposite side of the island from where her ship was anchored!
She focuses her Life Sense on the area and found something else as well.
'People. This might complicate things.' She thought. 'If they're pirates there's no issue with killing them, but it's hard to judge strength from vital energy alone in this world. If they're not pirates, should I steal the fruit? No point thinking about, I need to hurry before someone eats it!'
With that, Cherry rushed through the dense foliage using her Traceless Steps.
She found a vantage point she could observe the group from, while still being able to act quickly enough to intervene if necessary.
"Gentlemen, I have returned from my hunt! As you can see, I bring no meat with me, but I assure you that I have obtained a prize far greater!" An buffoon with nearly rotten teeth said while standing on a barrel.
"Wha' could be betta thun meat, Cap'n?" A 10 foot tall freak spoke.
'What the hell, why's that guy so big? Is he even human?' Cherry pondered, as the 'Cap'n' continued his obviously impromptu speech.
"Good question, Archibald! What I have brought to show you is widely thought to be a myth!" The buffoon pulled out the devil fruit from his coat.
"Ech, gross, froot!" The freak Archibald said while feigning to gag.
"Not juts any fruit, men! A Devil Fruit! Those who eat it gain a strange power that no other in the world possesses! With this fruit, conquering the Grand Line will be smooth sailing for us! I'll be king of the pirates and you'll be the kings crew!" After saying this the crew cheered.
'He's a pirate after all huh? Why don't I remember him? I'm sure I memorized all the pirates in West Blue with bounties over 20,000,000 Beri.' Cherry wondered.
"Soon enough my already impressive bounty of 11,000,000 Beri will grow to great heights, hahaHA!" Shouted the buffoon.
'Ah, so he's stupid AND weak.' Cherry realized, pulling out her pistol.
Under the chants of "EAT EAT EAT" from his crew, Lorston gazed longingly at the devil fruit in his hand, at his glorious future. As he went to bite it...
*BANG*
He toppled backward off of his 'stage', dead before he hit the ground.
