Chapter 190

"The city of gold didn't sink into the ocean. It flew into the sky," I repeated, still pointing upwards with my index finger as I smiled.

"Don't give me that look. It will make sense if you think about it..." I remarked as I noticed the strange way Cricket looked at me like I was mentally challenged. "Well, as much sense as the grand line bullshit can make, anyway," I added with a shrug, scratching my head.

"The city of gold was in the middle of this island, and the central chunk of the Jaya's landmass disappeared along with it..." I explained while pointing at Jaya's map on Cricket's house wall.

"It makes little sense for the center of the island to sink while the rest of Jaya remained intact," I concluded, shaking my head.

"Even if that's the case, it doesn't mean the city of gold flew into the sky," Cricket flatly replied, waving his hand to the side. "If nothing else, then it means the city of gold never existed," he concluded with a sigh.

"But it does," I remarked with a smile. "Have you heard of sky islands...?" I asked as I took out a breath dial and threw it to Noland, who caught it and gave me a sideways glance.

"We got this from a sky island we visited in North Blue before coming into the grand line..." I explained as I took out another breath dial, activating it in Lago's face, making it call in alarm as a breeze of air ruffled his feathers.

"There should be something about the sky islands in Noland's logbook too. You have it, don't you?" I asked, and Cricket nodded with a sigh after giving me a confused look.

"You also know about the knock-up streams around Jaya, log poses pointing into the sky, and the rest should be self-explanatory..." I concluded with a dismissive shrug as I took a sip from the drink in front of me.

"So you think a knock-up stream sent the city of gold flying into a sky island above Jaya...?" Cricket asked as he rubbed his chin with a thoughtful expression, making me nod.

"There are too many ifs in this scenario..." Cricket said while shaking his head. "But... that's the only explanation assuming Noland was indeed telling the truth..." he added with another heavy sigh.

"Either way, you can go and see for yourself, or you can wait for us to come back for the sky island," I said with a smile as I stood up, stretching my limbs. "I'll ring that famous golden bell for you when we find it up there..." I added as I began walking towards the door.

"But I've had a stressful day so far, and I need some rest," I remarked as I reached for the door and opened it. "You guys take your time here. I'll see you back at the hotel," I concluded as I exited Cricket's house, heading back for the Tropical Hotel.

...

I smiled as I watched the miniature, blue, transparent dragon emerge from the water and begin circling around me as I stood on the water in the middle of the sea a distance away from Jaya.

It has been a month since we met Cricket in his house, and we were still in Jaya. After all that stress and bullshitery in Alabasta I felt I needed a break from it all, and the crew seemed to feel the same.

I spent the first week doing nothing but relaxing, lazing around, and exploring the island, but that quickly got boring, so I started working on my devil fruit ability for the next three weeks.

The little dragon dancing around me was the result of said three weeks. It's an application of density control where I increase the density of liquid, gas, plasma, and any other non-solid matter, giving it shape and solidity.

I had already worked something similar with my flaming impact fist, where I would shape the flame into a closed fist and send it flying, but that technique merely compressed the fires and gave them shape.

However, now I can create constructs and control them to a degree in a specified length with solidification via density increase, and I just needed to work on the scale and range of the technique to perfect it now.

Still, even when I perfect solidification, I'll still have much to work on mastering the devil fruit. The possibilities were almost endless with density control, and the more I had time to think about it, the more I was pleased with its uses.

I also had no idea what would come out of awakening the devil fruit, but thinking about it is of no use right now. I'll master it one day in the future, even if it was the far one instead of the near. I had nothing but time.

That said, my crewmates weren't idling about either. Wilson was working on his brute strength as usual, and we've had more than one chance to spar against each other like we used to, something we haven't done in quite a while.

Wilson's original gorilla form has been steadily increasing in size as he grew powerful, and it's nearing the height of Elbaf giants already. However, I doubt any regular giant would stand a chance against Wilson.

Laffite and Byron were also working on their devil fruits and slowly gaining more and more mastery over them, with Laffite already learning every move Lokni used against me and then some.

Byron wasn't doing any worst either. He was slowly but surely getting the hang of the Eight-Span-Crow's abilities as he began mastering new techniques from the three of his forms.

Bob was still being the lazy bastard I knew since he joined the crew, but Elly did both her share of training and his as she constantly nagged Wilson Laffite and me to teach her armament Haki, which we did, of course, and she was slowly but surely getting there.

Doc was finally fully healed as well, and that's not all. The sickly doctor even managed to cure Stronger, his horse, and the recovering horse was already looking better and stronger (cause his name is Stronger, get it?) than ever.

I even made the mistake of asking Doc what was with his horse and how he cured him, and he proceeded to talk my ears off with medical Jargon that I didn't want nor need to know, not to mention I understood none of it.

But I did figure out Doc wasn't called, well, Doc for no reason as he turned out to be just as eager and deliberate about medicine as he was about that fate nonsense he and Laffite keep talking about every day.

Law and Bepo, of course, didn't lag behind in the effort department, the former working tirelessly on his devil fruit abilities, trying to come up with new techniques and mastering old ones.

Bepo, on the other hand, was stuck to Bob and Laffite like their shadow, trying to learn martial arts from the former and navigation for the latter, and they obliged whenever they had the time.

Domino and Kozue became the fastest of friends, and they almost did everything together from hanging out to training, and they sparred against each other on a daily basis, improving both of their strengths.

All in all, our time on Jaya island has been both pleasant and productive, but the grand line awaits for no one, and it was finally time to leave.