40 Chapter 4

They pulled the ship up to the shore where Luffy and Usopp were the first off the ship, but Markus wasn't far behind them. The moment his feet hit the 'ground' he felt his feet sink into the soft plush cloud. It was a crazy feeling. He walked around a bit before immediately returning to the ship. As he climbed aboard, he saw Nami running out of the cabin with a very angry looking Southbird pecking at her while she apologized.

Markus looked over Nami's outfit as the Southbird flew away while making complaining noises. Nami was wearing capri pants and a blue-camo bikini top. When she spotted Markus and the thumbs-up he was giving her, she blushed and rushed off to talk to Robin. Markus went into the cabin and changed his outfit. When he left the cabin he was wearing dark blue shorts, sandals, and a white tank top. The only thing he kept was his usual black hoodie with an orange interior and skull surrounded by lightning bolts on the back.

Markus hopped off the ship once more and felt more comfortable in his new outfit. He looked around at the crew all finding different ways to relax and enjoy themselves. Markus walked over to a gazebo and joined Chopper and Nami in relaxing on the chairs made out of clouds. It was unbelievably comfortable and relaxing. He'd never experienced anything like it before and wouldn't be able to describe it as anything but 'soft yet firm.'

As he relaxed he heard the delicate sound of a harp being played from nearby. He looked in the direction the sound came from as Sanji pointed, "Hey! There's someone over there!"

Nami leaped from her seat, "Is it another guerilla?!"

Chopper panicked, "Whistle!! Where's the whistle?!"

Sanji gasped, "It's... AN ANGEL!"

The 'angel' was a young woman standing on an outcropping of cloud playing her harp. She was a pretty girl with long blonde hair in a strange hairstyle. Though most of it was done up in a pretty standard pair of braids, the ends of those braids ended in thin sections topped with balls. Even odder, on the top of her head, she had two outcroppings of hair with thin stems topped with balls. They almost looked like alien antennae. As she looked at everyone she smiled brightly and said, "Heso!"

She walked down from the cloud and moved toward the group, "Are you guys from the blue sea?" She looked at a little creature standing near Zoro and called out, "Suu, come here."

Suu, the creature, looked mostly like a fox, though its mouth was long and thin similar to an Ant Eater. The little creature scampered over to the young woman. Luffy was the one to answer the woman, "We flew up here from the bottom. Do you live here?"

She nodded and came to a stop not too far from Luffy, "Yes, I live here. This is Skypiea's Angel Beach." She looked at the large melon-looking fruits that Luffy had tucked under his arms, "That's Konasshu. Do you want to drink it?" She accepted one of the fruits from Luffy and flipped it over. She used her small folding knife to cut a hole in the bottom while everyone watched, "The top is like steel so biting won't do anything. You have to go from the bottom."

She cut a complete circle in the bottom of the fruit and popped it out before inserting a straw, "Alright, enjoy!"

As Luffy took a sip of the drink and had a very big reaction, the young woman introduced herself, "I'm Conis. If you have any problems, please let me help you."

Sanji immediately started to flirt but all that earned him was a hard tug on his ear from an annoyed Nami. Markus joined Nami next to Conis as Nami spoke, "There are so many things we want to know. Everything here is so strange to us."

Conis smiled brightly, "Yes, please ask me anything!"

Before either of them could ask Conis anything, Zoro directed everyone's attention to the White Sea, "Hey, there's something coming from the sea."

Luffy said something stupid before Conis said, "Ah, it's my dad."

Everyone got excited when they saw the vehicle that Conis's father was riding on. It was their first time seeing a waver. Even Markus found it interesting as it reminded him of a Jet Ski from his previous world. He couldn't remember if he'd ever driven one but he'd seen them plenty of times in various media.

Hearing questions about the vehicle, Conis explained, "It's called a Waver."

Conis's father called out loudly, "I'm Sorry. I'm going to stop now."

His version of stopping the Waver involved riding it up onto the beach and crashing it into a tree. A move that would make Luffy proud. The man crawled out of the crash site and asked, "Is anybody hurt?"

Zoro couldn't resist shouting, "Ask yourself that first!!"

Nami recalled seeing something similar to the waver Conis's father was riding in the pile of junk Luffy and the others had recovered from the ship that fell out of the sky before they arrived in Jaya. Conis's father introduced himself as Pagaya and it soon became clear he had a bad habit of constantly saying 'I'm Sorry' every time he spoke. He invited everyone to his home for dinner exciting both Luffy and Sanji. Luffy because... well... food and Sanji because of his desire to learn more about Skypiean cuisine.

While they were talking, Markus followed Nami over to the waver to take a look at it with her. He might have seen them on the show but he was seeing one in person now and it was rather interesting. As they looked it over together, Nami looked over at Pagaya, "Before we go, may I ask a question first? How does this work? There's no sails or paddles. How come it can sail on the sea?"

Conis looked at them, "Ah, you don't know what a 'Dial' is?"

Conis didn't get a chance to explain. Luffy instantly latched onto the Waver and got permission to take it out into the sea and give it a try. Considering the kind of coordination he usually had... it didn't go well. He ended up getting thrown off and into the sea. The moment he hit the water he started sinking and drowning in it. Markus hopped into the air and started running through it. When he got near Luffy he dropped into the water and swam down until he could grab his hand. Once he had a good grip, he swam to the surface and started running through the air again to get back to the shore.

When he landed and threw Luffy to the ground, the rest of the crew was staring at him with slack jaws. Chopper was the first to recover from his shock and checked on Luffy. Nami was the next to recover and asked the big question, "H-how did you do that?"

Markus lifted his leg and wiggled his toes in his sandals, "Strong legs."

Nami facepalmed while the others started shouting at him. He just smiled and enjoyed the moment. They'd see plenty of people capable of the same thing soon enough. His actions didn't retain their attention for long before Nami decided to try her hand at riding the waver. Within seconds, she was riding it like she'd been riding one for her entire life. Her proficiency shocked Pagaya and Conis who thought it would take ten years to learn how to ride one.

Markus ignored the group chatter while he watched Nami enjoying herself. He wanted to give it a try himself but two things stopped him. Nami needed to use the Waver to get over to the Upper Yard and trigger an event. Though his main reason was that she looked like she was having a lot of fun. Only after the rest of the group had walked up a set of stairs leading toward Pagaya's house and through the town did Markus begin to follow behind them.

He took notice of which house belonged to Pagaya and kept walking. Before things got ugly and the group became criminals, he wanted to get his hands on a few things. It wasn't hard to find his way to the shopping district of Angel Beach. The place was crazy. There were buildings all over the place, in places that buildings shouldn't normally be. Even a few that appeared to just be sitting on clouds floating above nothing. It was disconcerting but he got over it quickly.

He checked with a couple of friendly locals and found his way to a dial shop. It was one of the buildings sitting up in the air. The only way to get up to it was by grabbing onto a rope hanging down from a hole in its floor and letting it pull him up into the shop. He couldn't help thinking how dangerous it was to just have holes in the floor. Then again, if you landed on anything but a building you'd be perfectly fine.

He grabbed the rope hanging from the shop and gave it a tug. It immediately retracted and pulled him up into a room filled to the brim with different shells. Markus looked around with a wide grin at the variety of Dials available in the shop. He walked over to the counter and was greeted by a middle-aged man working behind it, "Welcome, if there's anything I can help you with, please let me know."

Markus smiled politely, "Thank you. I just arrived from the blue sea and was looking to purchase some of the amazing Dials I've been hearing about."

The man smiled broadly, "You've come to the right place, my friend. We have many different kinds of Dials for sale to help with almost anything."

Markus looked around and didn't dispute what the man said, "I can see that. The thing is, I don't have any Extol or many Berry's, but I do have something else I think has some value."

The man frowned a little, "I'm sorry sir but we don't barter here."

Markus opened his inventory and retrieved one of the crates he'd filled with soil back on Jaya. Each of the five crates he filled was 2x2x2 feet, or eight cubic feet. The man's eyes widened when the crate appeared out of nowhere, "How did you do that?!"

Markus just smiled, "I have a Devil Fruit that lets me store things." He popped open the lid of the crate and showed the man the dirt inside or as the man shouted, "Vearth!"

Markus grinned, "I noticed a distinct lack of it around here. Still not interested in trading?"

The man rushed around from the counter and touched the 'Vearth' with shaking hands. He ran his fingers through it while smiling widely, "Sir, you can have every Dial I have!"

Markus didn't have to pretend to be surprised, "Seriously?"

He knew that the dirt would be valuable but not that valuable! Markus double-checked, "Are you sure?"

The man turned to look at Markus and started to sweat and shake, "No, no, you're right." He climbed to his feet and looked more certain, "You can also have all the Dials I have stored away too!"

That... was not what Markus had been expecting. He wasn't about to argue though. He smiled, "The Vearth is yours."

The man looked extremely excited and started to practically caress the dirt. Markus walked around the store and placed every single Dial inside of his inventory. Markus didn't feel like he was ripping the man off either. Almost all of the Dials were likely to be destroyed when Enel destroyed Angel Beach tomorrow anyway. At least this way the man would have something smaller and easier to take with him when he fled in fear.

Once Markus had every Dial in the shop stored away, the man gestured to the ropes that lead to the ground, "Follow me, the rest of the dials are stored at my home. Ah. If it wouldn't be too much trouble, could you bring the crate of Vearth using your ability? It's too heavy for me."

Markus nodded and stored the crate away. The man was clearly very trusting. Then again, Markus had zero intention of ripping him off. The crate of dirt was worthless anywhere but here. Once they dropped to the ground, they made their way to the man's house. Once inside of the nicely decorated home, the man gestured to the middle of his living room, "Please place the crate there."

Markus complied and set the crate back out. Once he saw the crate in his home, the man was all smiles. He led Markus into a room at the back of his house that was filled to the brim with Dials of all shapes and sizes nicely organized. Sitting in the middle of the room was the biggest Dial that Markus had seen so far. It towered above him and looked to be at least twenty feet tall. The man walked up to it and stroked it, "This is my pride and joy. The largest Breath Dial ever found near Angel Beach."

Markus looked at the huge Dial with a broad smile. He already had plans in mind for it. It would be one of the propelling forces of his own ship. Something that could be used when he didn't feel like powering it with his own lightning. He planned to be able to cross through the Calm Belt at will. Markus went through the room and stored every other Dial away, leaving the massive Breath Dial for last. He let the man say goodbye to it before he put it in his inventory, "Thank you for everything."

The man smiled brightly, "No no, thank you! If I had any more Dials I'd give them to you."

"Is there anyone else around here that sells Dials?"

The man shook his head, "I'm afraid not."

Markus shrugged. He hadn't really expected there to be but it was worth asking. After saying goodbye, he moved back through the town while examining his gains. He'd managed to get his hands on most of the dials he'd heard of including Breath, Flame, Flash, Flavor, Heat, Lamp, Milky, Tone, Vision, and Water. The more combat-oriented ones, such as the Impact and Axe Dials, were clearly not available in a regular store. That didn't bother him though. He'd get plenty of those during the fighting that was going to happen tomorrow. All Enel's enforcers would have either Axe or Impact dials, he would just take the dials from them after they were defeated.

As far as the rarer and more powerful Reject and Jet dials... Well, he only knew the location of a single Reject dial. The one Wyper had. Getting it would be difficult. As far as Jet Dials, the Arc Maxim had two hundred of them for him to choose from. He wouldn't have much use for the Dials as combat tools but they made excellent convenience tools. Breath and Jet dials could propel the ship he wanted to have in the future. Heat and Flame dials could be used for cooking. He also hoped that he could combine Flame and Breath dials to create intense flames for metalworking, if necessary. There were plenty of things he could think of for using the Dials.

When he finally made his way back to Pagaya and Conis's home, he heard Sanji yelling, "What if something happens to Nami while you're wasting time here?! Put it down we'll be back soon enough!"

As he opened the door Conis said, "Actually, we don't know for sure if she really went there, so please don't act recklessly. If we anger God Enel, this will become very problematic."

Markus drew some attention but no one said anything to him or asked where he was. Pagaya seemed to be trying to distract Luffy from going to Upper Yard by offering to fix the waver they'd found. Markus grabbed a bit of food that managed to survive Luffy before following the group down to the beach.

They fetched their waver from the ship. Luffy delivered it to Pagaya while the rest stayed on the ship. Pagaya immediately began to examine it with interest, "This is really old! I'm sorry."

Luffy asked, "Can you fix it?"

Pagaya continued to examine it closely, "I don't know. I cannot give an answer until I open it up... I'm sorry."

As Pagaya examined the waver, Luffy spotted a group of strange men. As they got closer the man in the lead shouted out, "That suspicious-looking ship! Stop right there!"

Men wearing blue pants with white cloud patterns, purple shirts, and white berets, were shimmying along the ground toward Luffy and Pagaya. They looked... rediculous. When they got close to Luffy, the man in the lead called out, "Squad halt!"

All the meant hopped to their feet and gave an odd salute that resembled the antennae-like hair that all the Skypieans had. The squad leader practically shouted, "Heso!"

Conis replied with a casual, "Heso!"

While Pagaya replied, "Hello, Heso!"

Markus smiled to himself and leaned on the railing while he watched what was going on. The leader of the squad, better known as the White Berets, of all things, revealed that the eight members of the crew were criminals due to their illegal entry into Skypiea. Markus didn't care to hear any of what was about to happen. It was all stupid and he could spend his time better. He knew the crew would end up splitting up soon, he planned to stay on the Merry when that happened. While there was a commotion going on outside, Markus stepped into the ship's cabin, got comfortable, and waited.

He didn't have to wait long. There was a lot of commotion going on at the beach before it got quiet. As he relaxed and organized the Dials he had in his inventory, he heard Nami, Robin, Zoro, and Chopper climb about and begin preparing the ship to set sail. While waiting for Luffy and the other two, the ship suddenly began shaking violently as it was grabbed by a giant shrimp. As the others were shocked, the shrimp took off with the ship held firmly on its back. Markus chuckled to himself, they were heading to Upper Yard. Things were about to get interesting!