Kuragaina

(AN: Some people are not going to like how a certain event around 3/4ths of the way plays out. I advise you to KEEP reading because it will be explained.)

(Four Days Later)

"So, this is the last stop before Momoiro, huh?" Tiger asks, looking at the navigational charts.

"Indeed, it seems we will soon have to part ways my friend. Are you sure I can't steal Hatchan off your ship? I'll make sure to treat him well." Rex says half-seriously.

Another top chef was always good with both Kid and Bonney on his ship. Besides, he could always use Hatchan to cash in on that favor with Raileigh to learn Haki. Still, Rex wasn't too insistent on the matter.

"I will miss you… bro." Tiger says reluctantly. He had started to get close to Rex in their daily shared meals. The two pirate groups' experience on Reaper Island had given them a deep bond.

"Me too, bro." Rex says, giving Tiger a fist bump as he left.

Now, Rex turned to the next matter at hand.

"Porche, can you call Rose, Sugar and Thatch to my office please?" Rex calls out, wanting to deal with his Kuragaina island affairs.

Soon, the two officers make it to their captain's quarter.

"I'm choosing you three to be with me on the primary expedition team onto Kuragaina. Killer, Bonney and Hawkins will form the secondary team."

"That is… intriguing." Rose said, knowing Rex didn't usually divide his crew into 'expedition teams'.

Meanwhile, Thatch was excited. Ever since he had gotten on the ship, Thatch had been eager to get some real exploring in.

Unfortunately, Kid hadn't let him participate in any of the battles before the race. It was Kid's opinion that Thatch's 'godlike hands' should only ever be used in the kitchen, and he would never forgive himself if they were injured in combat.

Still, Rex felt it was time for Thatch to join a mission.

"Well, what is it we're looking for?" Thatch asked eagerly. "Buried treasure, an ancient civilization, a legendary sword!?"

Rex smiled, remembering when Kid was so eager for such things. Before he realized the true power of Rex's methodical planning methods.

"We are looking for a tribe of primates, human-drills." Rex said, packing up some supplies.

Rex can see Thatch notably deflate at this, before a confused expression arises on his face.

"Wait, if we're only looking for monkeys, why do you need me to come with you?" Thatch asks.

"I need you to prepare food to help tame them. They're going to be joining our crew, not unlike the Blugori have." Rex explained, wanting the human-drills for a very particular purpose.

Rex had a dream of possessing a massive army, to dominate land, sea and air.

With Bonney, Rex could basically instant breed animals. The Blugori, which Rex had stocked up on when he visited the North Blue, would make an excellent sea force. The human-drills would be his land force, while the Goayu birds would be an aerial assault force.

Of course, Rex was planning much more. If he could get his hands on Shirahoshi, he would be able to expand his sea army to sea kings as well. Not to mention dragons if he could get his hands on them and countless more land forces. Still, the human drills would be a good start since they could learn swordsmanship and martial arts.

The moment Rex settled any island in the Grand Line, he would have a massive army courtesy of Bonney.

Soon, the ship has docked at the forested portion of Kuragaina Island. Dubbed the 'eye of the storm' Kuragaina Island was a rather safe Island.

While there was extensive military and defense presence on the island to maintain this safety, Rex had no intention of bothering the locals on this mission. Instead, he wanted to go to the forest.

Killer, Bonney and Hawkins would make contact with the locals and get the temperature of the island. If it was safe, Rex was more than willing to engage in trade with Kuragaina. After all, he now had buckets full of resources from Kid's looting during the Dead-End Race.

Disembarking, Thatch takes in a long exhale as he sets foot on Kuragaina.

"Yeah I smell it!" Thatch cries out.

"Smell what, Mr. Grape Chef?" Sugar asks curiously, smelling almost nothing in the air.

"Well, there's pine, dirt, grass, fresh manure, a sprig of some mint a dozen meters over there and some oregano in the underbrush over there but I'm talking about the scent of adventure!" Thatch cries out.

"Che-e-esy!" Sugar scoffs, hopping onto Thatch's shoulders for a piggyback ride. "Now march Grape chef!"

Thatch has a sheepish expression on his face as he ferries around the ecstatic Sugar, meanwhile, Rose had an odd expression on her face. Walking in the directions Thatch indicated, she did find what he stated.

"How did you smell them so easily?" Rose asked curiously, finding that Thatch's nose seemed to be comparable to Rouge's.

"Natural talent." Thatch says with a grin, only to wince when Sugar pulls his hair angry that he stopped. "A chef's gotta have a good sense of smell. It helps you know when the time is perfectly right to put in the next ingredient."

"Like chemistry."

"Sure, like chemistry." Thatch said, imagining a mad scientist pouring liquids into each other and blowing stuff up.

"Intriguing…" Rose said. "In a traditional patrilineal society, the woman is meant to be the chef, no? Did you come from a matrilineal island?"

Thatch shook his head. "No, my home had the same traditions. My dad was actually pretty ticked off when I told him I wanted to be a chef. He said that was 'wife' stuff and that I needed a 'real' job."

"Unfortunate." Rose agreed, sympathizing with Thatch. "I know how it's like to have a father who is… opposed to your interests." She said, not knowing how to explain that her father was a psychopath who wanted to turn her and her brothers in psychopaths.

Rex then freezes in place, raising his hand to stop the trio behind him. Then, in the distance, a large pack of 30 human-drills, ranging in size from small cubs the size of a kindergartener to massive hulking apes the size of a giant.

Truth be told, if this was after the human-drills learned to fight, Rex would be terrified. After all, a giant human-drill was capable of equaling post-time skip Zoro. That was a level far above the current Rex.

However, currently, the human-drills were a peaceful people.

"Thatch, do you have the offering?" Rex asks, being careful to speak softly such as to not to make himself appear threatening to the human-drills.

Thatch nods, staring in awe at the massive human-drill. A 'species of primate'? That was an understatement.

"Slowly, take it out, and present it to the largest human-drill." Rex says softly, walking forwards slowly with Thatch.

Then, Thatch presents the largest human drill with a massive chalice in which is a banana smoothie.

Sugar reaches out towards the smoothie, wanting to drink it but Rex shoots her down with a glare. In any other situation, he would indulge her for her age and cuteness, but this was a delicate friendship.

The human-drill reaches out for the chalice, taking it in its massive hands and drinking it like it was a shot glass. The monkey then hoots and beats its chest in joy, stomping on the ground causing mini trembles to run through the earth.

Rex shakes his head. Some things were just way too massive in the One Piece world.

After the offering, Thatch cooks some food using local ingredients while Rose deals with the health needs of some of the human-drills. Even Sugar contributes by playing with some of the human-drill cubs by running around at massive speeds.

Meanwhile, Rex tries to communicate with the human-drill.

"You." Rex points to the human-drill. "Come." Rex does a walking signal with his fingers. "With me." Rex points to himself.

The human-drill frowns having understood the gist of Rex's communication. Still, it had lived on this island for the majority of its life. It was unsure if it should…

BOOM!

A massive explosion echoes from the civilization in the distance causing the human-drill tribe to go crazy. They start freaking out immediately, smashing things and running around in circle.

"Calm down!" Rex shouts out, trying to reassure the human-drills. "I'm sure the explosion was just some mining or demoli-"

BOOM!

Rex curses the explosions, seeing the situation starting to gradually fall out of his control. Not wanting to have to resort to this Rex sighs.

Whoosh!

A weak wave of Conqueror's Haki radiates out from Rex causing the human-drills to face him with awe. All the panic had stopped as they look at him with respect.

"You!" Rex points to the human-drills. "Follow!" Rex makes hand signs of two people walking one behind the other. "Sugar!" Rex points towards the green-haired girl.

The large human-drill nods, but Rex can see the fear in the massive ape's eyes. Rex sighs, directing Sugar to bring them to the shore before turning to the city with a scathing glare. Who had messed with his operation?

Meanwhile, at Kuragaina city, numerous fires were spreading as artillery rained down from above. The attackers, two immense pirate ships on the shore of the island.

Moments later, the King Gucci sails into the port seeing the massacre of Kuragaina. Kid frowns, while he liked destruction and all, it seemed unfair to attack a town that could barely defend itself.

While Kuragaina was equipped to deal with land-based attackers, they were sorely unequipped to fight in naval war. A few super Foxy cannon shots had sunk their entire navy leaving them completely defensive.

What's more, Kid could see massive plume of smoke covering the city as there is an immense monster destroying Kuragaina.

"Fire on the two ships!" Kid says, not recognizing either ship due to their foreign Jolly Roger. Still, Kid had an odd feeling of Déjà vu at this whole encounter.

"Eustass-a Kid!" A familiar voice calls out. It was Foxy.

Kid widens his eyes, hatred flashes in his gaze. "Destroy them!"

Several minutes later, Rex finally appears, seeing the maw of destruction invoked by the massive nine-tailed fox.

"Thatch, Rose, go help the civilians, evacuate the city!" Rex barks, enraged by Devon's complete disregard for human life.

"What are you going to do captain?" Thatch asked curiously, wondering how any man could stand up against a beast that large.

"I am going to do my job." Rex says, leaping into the fray.

While Rex understood a few civilians caught in the crossfire, this was just too much. It seemed like Devon was going out of her way to reap innocent lives.

"Kurama!" Rex shouted out. "Your reign of terror is over. No longer will you assault the citizens of Kuragainagakure! Your opponent is me Vesta Rex, the fourth Jacketkage of the King Village!"

Devon's brain just collapses for a moment as she struggles to make heads or tails of anything that Rex said but she just shrugs it off.

"I have no idea what the hell you're talking about. All I know is it'll feel really good to eat you!" Devon shouts out.

Rex grins, Devon surely had gotten cocky, and a tad cannibalistic. While Rex was sure she had grown in the past few months, Rex wasn't just sitting around trying on jackets. At least, not all of the time.

'Assault Jacket!' Rex shouts out in his mind rushing at Devon. As he runs, his torso and head seem to shrink slightly while his arms and legs bulked

Assault Jacket was one of Rex's newest and most powerful moves. There were many different styles of jackets that had varying amounts of material. For example, a hoodie was much lighter and airy than a parka was. Assault jacket minimized all the defensive 'material' focusing purely on offense and speed.

In terms of gamer lingo, it essentially made Rex into one, fast, glass cannon.

"Flame Claw Massacre!" Rex shouts out, dashing across Devon's massive body. While Devon was indeed large, there was a sizable disadvantage to her fruit, were she would lose mobility.

After all, Kuragaina wasn't the barren wasteland it would be when Mihawk inhabited it. There were dozens of buildings all across the area. Whenever Devon tried to move out of the way of one of Rex's attacks, she would just slam into one of the buildings. Eventually, Devon's massive body is covered with numerous wounds.

"ENOUGH!" Devon roars, condensing down to her hybrid mode. While she was still much larger than usual in this form, she was at least maneuverable enough to dodge. "Let's face each other, mythic Zoan to mythic Zoan!"

"Sure!" Rex says with a grin.

While Rex had kept his cool through this whole fight, Devon was sixth on the list of people he blamed for Gem's death, being only behind Doflamingo and his four officers. As such, Rex definitely wanted her dead.

Devon and Rex rush towards each other at their top speeds, lashing out their claws at each other. While Devon didn't know if she could beat Rex in terms of speed, she knew she would win in a head on collision.

Rex sees a thin, transparent film start to form on Devon's claws. Rex raises his eyebrows in surprise. 'So, that's why she was so confident.'

Rex still isn't the slightest bit worried. After all, he had no intention to play this fairly.

Res releases his standard flammable coat to his tiger jacket, only this time, the flammable coat was made of alcohol instead of oil. As for why it was made of alcohol…

"Toxic Flame Tiger Print!" Rex roars out, igniting his jacket to emit a bright blue flame, Rex's mouth and nose then seal off entirely with Rex supplying his lungs oxygen through a supply kept in his pockets. While this fire wasn't true blue fire in terms of heat, it had a better advantage.

As the toxic fumes emitted off of Rex's body reach Devon, she immediately gets woozy. After all, Rex had diffused a vast array of poisonous gasses into this alcohol, all of which were being directed straight at Devon.

While Devon's Zoan constitution helped her, she was still floored on the ground coughing vigorously. With the dying breaths of her Den Den Mushi, Devon makes a call.

"F-foxy. Send a cannonball at the evacuation site." Devon then rushes off with a ragged stride, relishing in the conflicted expression on Rex's face.

Rex grits his teeth but shakes his head. After all, it was no simple thing to kill Devon, even while she was poisoned. Going after her would seal the fate of the evacuating civilians. Vengeance was not worth hundreds or thousands of lives. It just wasn't worth it.

Rex then rushes off towards the evacuation center a couple hundred meters away. Kicking away the cannonball before rushing towards the shore. At the shore, Rex meets up with Thatch, Sugar and the human-drills who seem to be growing increasingly violent.

Rex looks towards the distant ships clashing and frowns. It seemed that Foxy and Devon were fleeing with Foxy using his Noro Noro no Mi to slow down the King Gucci.

Rex sighs. It seems he would gain, nor lose anything in this encounter with them. Or would he?

Rex grins widely, the trap had now been set.

"Why are you so happy captain?" Kid asked curiously. "They both got away without any damage to their ships or crews. They won."

"I'm disappointed in you Kid. Do you really think I would have actually let them get away for no reason?" Rex says with an ever widening grin.

"What are you planning?" Rose asked, finding that even with her intelligence the Captain's plans were an enigma.

"The greatest casualty in defeat is confidence. Foxy and Devon are not the ones I seek. But I feel that they will make a most excellent bait to capture the one I truly seek." Rex says mysteriously.

Of course, Rex had his reasons for Devon to stay alive. She would make for good bait once his plan was finished.

Truth be told, even if he had won, Rex was just planning to beat Devon up a bit, vent out some anger and then cut her loose. After all, she was one of the few people Rex knew could contact his real enemy, and once his plan was fully cooked, he would need that ability.

This was a plan Rex had been cooking up for months and soon, all the pieces will have been fitted together perfectly. Then, and only then, could Rex truly get his revenge.

"Let's go." Rex says, making it onto his ship. He had made a promise to get Tiger to Momoiro island.