One Piece: New Life by AncientFunOp (One Piece fanfic)

Latest Update: February 18, 2023

Summary: Luffy dies at the age of 15 before he even starts his journey but due to an astronomical chance, a higher dimensional being and another dead person from another universe, he gets a new life equipped with the memories of a very different version of himself from our universe. Follow a self-aware Luffy as he goes through his life and journey in his dark fucked up world with knowledge about his own future as he drives everyone crazy with his endless talks of random stories and references no one has ever heard of and seemingly clairvoyant abilities.

Link: https://forums.sufficientvelocity.com/threads/one-piece-new-life-one-piece-fanfic.112616/#post-26510483

Word count:160k

Chapters:7

Chapter 1 - Soul Plane​

Luffy was lying on his back with a blank look on his face, staring up into the dark beautiful evening sky littered with numerous stars as he contemplated on how to get out of his current predicament. He had sea stone cuffs on his wrists which apparently sapped his rubber powers, had numerous cuts, burns and bruises all over his body, had been starved for weeks and most importantly he was feeling the effects of the lethal poison he was fed a couple days prior.

He had no idea what to do as he laid there barely able to move his body. If it was an enemy, he could just punch them and if that didn't work, just keep punching them until he won. No matter how badly he got injured, he would just keep fighting until the other person went down. But for poison, he had no idea what he could do. He was already in a weakened state due to cumulative effects of sea stone cuffs, wounds and starvation, but now with the addition of a lethal poison, he didn't see any way out. He was dying and he had no idea how to survive.

Luffy tried to move his head, but barely managed to move it a few centimeters with great effort and he darted his eyes looking around himself to see if he could find anything or anyone that could help him. He was lying on a grassy plain but it wasn't green. Instead, it was dyed red with the blood of all the other dying people lying there just like him. They were all battered, burned, cut, starved, bruised and would soon lose their life, just like him. Most of the others around him were already dead and some of the few that were still alive or relatively uninjured were just staring at nothing and had an empty hollow look in their eyes. Luffy recognized that look. He had seen it on some people in Gray Terminal over the years. The look of someone who had given up on life and were just waiting for death. He didn't like it one bit. He was a firm believer of 'You don't give up on living and fight until the very end'. But he understood why they had that look though. The things he had seen the last few months were unlike anything he had ever seen and realized just how messed up the world truly was. He had thought that the Gray Terminal Fire was bad, but what he had gone through and seen over the last few months was a thousand times worse.

Luffy lifted his gaze back up to the sky after seeing that there was no one around that could help him and saw the top of a magnificent castle to his right. He could also make out sounds of a party going on. Party. Meat. There would be lots of meat there. If only he could somehow move his damn unresponsive body and make his way there! He had been trying for a long time but his body just wouldn't move. Earlier when he was trapped in a solitary cell, he was forcing his body to move even with all the near lethal cuts and slashes, but once that poison was forced down his throat, his body had just locked up. He had been dragged from the cell he was in and thrown onto a wagon with tons of other dead/almost dead people, taken on a little ride to the grassy plain and thrown out into the open where he was currently lying. It was the first he had seen the wide open sky in a few months and thought he could finally make his escape, but he then realized that his body wouldn't move no matter how hard he tried. Over the past two days, he had managed to move only his hand extremely slowly and grab his prized Strawhat which was thrown next to him, and doing just that had taken him a tremendous amount of patience and will.

As he lay there waiting for the last remnants of his life to die out, his mind wandered to the events that had led him here. It had all started a few months after Ace had left on his journey. Makino had shown up at the bandit hideout in the morning one day with that day's newspaper wanting to show a specific article and bounty of a certain fire user.

Ace had finally gotten his first bounty and it was also mentioned that he was the captain of the Spade Pirates. Luffy was of course ecstatic and had immediately called for a celebration. Thus, he, Makino, Dadan and the others all decided to throw a huge party at the hideout and for the party, Luffy felt like eating a huge fish instead of the forest beasts like always, so he had gone out to fish on a boat he borrowed from the one of the village fishermen to hopefully catch a huge fish or a Sea King to satiate his enormous appetite. He had just said 'I'll be back!' to Makino and Dadan before leaving to fish, and that was the last time he had seen either of them.

The small fishing trip was where things had started to go wrong. While fishing, he had dozed off on his boat and by the time he woke up, his boat had drifted somewhere far off as he couldn't see Dawn island anywhere. He had just started rowing in a random direction trusting that he will eventually find his island or come across someone who could help him but unfortunately, he had kept rowing for two days without finding any other person or island. He hadn't packed any food, so he made do with fishing and eating raw fish. He had just kept on rowing with no particular direction in mind and finally on the third day since he left the island, he spotted a ship. It had no Jolly Roger, so they weren't pirates but looked to be a merchant ship or a cruise ship. He didn't care either way as he was more concerned on getting water and food, so had just immediately rocketed himself on to the ship ecstatic at finally having found someone.

He had startled the people on the ship at first as they saw him just suddenly drop out of nowhere onto their ship and seeing his stretchy limbs had just shocked them. But after a short explanation about his devil fruit and how he had gotten lost, they welcomed him on the ship and gave him some food and water. Luffy didn't like them for some reason - the way they looked at him irked him off, but he was way too hungry to care about such stuff. But he changed his opinion that they were nice people when they gave him food and also told him that they would take him home.

What Luffy didn't know, at the time at least, was that the ship he had landed on dealt in slave trading and seeing a devil fruit user literally fall from the sky on to their ship, they were very happy. Plus, he was a rubber human and they were sure that some rich asshole would find that very amusing, so they could sell him and make a huge profit. Seeing the very trusting nature and the hungry Luffy, they just decided to trick him and put some sleeping pills in the food they had given him. As soon as Luffy had fallen asleep, they put sea stone cuffs on him and kept him sedated until they could make the sell.

When Luffy groggily opened his eyes the next time, he found himself in a dark unfamiliar place with cuffs on his hands. The last thing he remembered was finally finding a ship, eating the food they gave him and falling asleep, so he couldn't understand where he was and how he had gotten there, but more importantly his body felt extremely weak. He felt like how he would feel if he fell in to the sea. A few seconds of looking around and he finally realized he was in a mystery cage in a dark room. It was a 'mystery' cage because when he touched the bars, his body felt even more weak and just went limp. He couldn't understand at the time what exactly was happening but he later learned that the cuffs he was wearing and the cage were made with something called Sea stone which would apparently weaken devil fruit users the same way seawater did. He was shocked to find that there was even such a thing in the world.

Luffy had called out for someone but no one came in for a long time. He was in a dark cage all alone, weak, hungry and freezing. He had dozed off again when someone finally did come in and woke him up. It was a man he couldn't see properly and when he had asked what was happening and where he was, all he got in response was mocking laughter. The man then tried to explain that he was apparently a slave now and would spend the rest of his as a plaything for someone but Luffy didn't understand. He was going to be the Pirate King and the Pirate King is the freest man on the seas. So, of course he wasn't going to be someone's slave! The slaver just laughed in his face when he voiced that out.

The rest of the days in enslavement were honestly a blur for Luffy. The sea stone made him sluggish and they gave him very small amounts of food so he was always starving and couldn't understand much of what was going on. A few guys had come in, tried to order him to do a few things which he adamantly refused to do, so they started beating him up, but still Luffy stubbornly refused to do anything they ordered him to do saying that no one can make him do things he didn't want to. A bunch of different people had come in trying to break him, but of course no one succeeded.

The slavers were actually trying to break him and make him lose all hope, so that he would become an obedient slave and then present him to the Celestial Dragons or any of the Royals at that year's Reverie, but the resolute defiance in Luffy's eyes just didn't die no matter what they did. After the first few days, he had just defaulted to a blank look and glared at anyone that got close to him as if challenging them. They thought that if they presented a slave with such a defiant look, it would be their heads which would be rolling, so tried everything they could to make him obey them. Many tried but they all ultimately failed. No one had seen someone like Luffy who just refused to bow down to anyone while also challenging them. They had seen many unresponsive slaves sure, but they would usually be ones who had blank hollow eyes, had given up on life and didn't care what happened to them… but Luffy was different. He didn't lose the fire in his eyes but also didn't obey a single order. They tortured, starved and straight up mauled him almost to death, but he never once did anything they ordered him to do. It was simple at first but when he didn't obey anyone for a week, a couple of slavers took it as a challenge upon themselves to break him and pretty soon, it became a game of sorts among all of them to see who could break him first. So, they made sure to keep him barely alive and made it their mission to break him.

Luffy didn't know anything though. All he knew was some assholes were trying to order him around and hell if he was going to listen to them. He would rather die than obey them and when they did things like press a gun to his forehead threatening to shoot if he didn't do something, he pressed his forehead closer to the gun, looked into their eyes and dared them to shoot. That pissed them off the most though, and would beat him almost to death, but then would treat him just enough to keep him alive. The only times he almost broke was when they offered him food if he did something they ordered, but he had managed to stay strong. Few strong people with strange torture methods had all come in and tried to break him, but he didn't bow down to anyone. He didn't understand why they just didn't kill him and be done with but what he didn't know was that it had become a challenging game for all the slavers.

Luffy saw a lot of strange people during his days in that lonely dark cage. Some rich noble type people, who reminded him a lot of the assholes in Goa, had come in to take a look at him like he was an animal at a zoo, and even some strange people in actual bubble helmets. His hellish daily routine of being tortured broke one day when he had seen and laughed at a woman wearing a bubble helmet saying how funny she looked. That had somehow pissed her off and his life became more hellish from then onward.

The bubble helmet wearing woman had glared at Luffy when he laughed at her and then said some things to the slavers, who bowed down and nodded like a dog to everything she said. And soon, Luffy was finally taken out of the cage and brought to the outside where he finally saw where he was. It was a large underground chamber with multiple cages lined up in multiple rows with all sorts of people inside the cages. As he was dragged along the corridor, he observed all the others in the cages. There were lots of humans but also, for the first time in his life, he saw Fishmen, Animal-like people, people with long legs and long arms, and even one mermaid. And they all had one thing in common. They had a defeated and hollow look in their eyes as if they had given up on life.

He wanted to talk and ask for information from them but he was being dragged by two people with lots of others guarding him, so couldn't do much. He was soon brought into a fancy looking room where the woman in the bubble helmet was sitting with a few other women, also in bubble helmets while soldier like stoic men were standing behind them.

Luffy spent less than a week with the weird bubble helmet wearing woman and her apparent equally weird bubble helmet wearing friends… And the things they did to him during those days were the worst things anyone had done to him since he was caught. They treated him like a rag doll while laughing and giggling the whole time and did unspeakable horrors upon his body and mind. From burning, stabbing, taunting him by throwing food to the ground and telling him lick it off the ground, humiliating him by throwing rotten food on him, making him watch as they ate and wasted food, stepping on him with sharp heels, making him fight other slaves, making him a steed, whipping him and so on….What baffled Luffy the most was when a little girl, barely 10 years old, in a similar bubble helmet and clothes had come in and started stabbing and burning him while taunting him just like the other women, all the while laughing and giggling as if she was playing with toys. He was further baffled when three more children came in and treated him in a similar fashion. Luffy had looked into the eyes of the soldiers holding him down while the women and children did things to him and they all had blank steely looks in their eyes. That was enough for him to understand this was a regular and normal thing for them.

But even with the bubble people, Luffy still didn't obey any order they gave. No matter how much they tortured and taunted him, he took it all without muttering a single word and didn't obey a single thing they ordered him to do. He didn't crawl a single step when they treated him as a steed, he didn't move a single muscle when they asked him to fight other slaves and just let himself get beaten up, he didn't break when delicious looking food was thrown on him and he could smell the delicious food just millimeters away from his mouth. He just felt like he would lose something important if he gave in here, so just wiped the food off, shrugged away the torture and stared defiantly at the bubble people.

And they did not like it one bit. The torment lasted for almost the entire week by the end of which the bubble people were pissed off at him. They called in the slavers and ordered a few things which Luffy could barely hear as his ears were bleeding because of the multiple needles stuck inside them.

The next thing he knew, he was being treated by a few doctors and the slavers actually looked at his body with pity. A couple days later he was told that the bubble women had bought him and he was going to be their property from then on. Luffy didn't know who the bubble people were, but understood that if he was sold to them, the rest of his life was going to be hell. He understood that the only reason he was being treated and kept alive was because the bubble people wanted to break him.

Unfortunately, during that time when he was being treated was also the time that the slavers got a hold of his weakness. One of the doctors who was treating Luffy ended up talking to him like he was a person and Luffy being Luffy, had quickly befriended her. Her name was Kell and she was the first person in months that had talked to him like he was a human being and Luffy, who had been starved for such contact, had happily started talking to her. It was just two days but the doctor was laughing with him as he joked around even in such a messed up situation. When one the slavers saw the scene of Luffy cracking a joke and the doctor laughing at his joke, that doctor's fate was sealed.

A day later when his injuries were not even healed properly, he was brought in a room with a furnace. The bubble woman and her supposed daughter were there along with a few slavers, a couple of whom were standing near the furnace with heated iron rods. Luffy instantly realized he was going to be branded and much to his horror, he wasn't the only one. Kell, the one person who had showed him kindness, was also in the room, on her knees and severely beaten up. Luffy raged as he saw that someone who had just kindly talked to him was now in chains because of him and the slavers finally saw him break.

He struggled against all the men holding him as he screamed in anger when he saw that the slavers were torturing Kell and heard her gut wrenching screams. He was being held down by multiple people so he couldn't do much.

He and Kell were made to kneel side by side while Luffy continued to struggle with all he had to break free, as two guys with heated brands came closer to them while laughing. The brand was a circular symbol with some triangles sticking out at the sides and judging by what the slavers had told him, it was the mark of the bubble people.

Luffy kept struggling as the two guys brought a heated brand close to him and Kell. He saw the bubble woman standing a bit to the side laughing at him and Kell, then looked behind him to see the red hot iron rod, looked at the malicious grin of the guy holding it, heard all the laughing and taunting from the other slavers, then saw the pitiful state of Kell- the one person who had treated him like a human who was now sobbing in agony, and his mind raged in frustration, defiance, powerlessness, fury and finally, he just snapped.

He felt something, a power he had never felt before, burst from within him and get unleashed on his surroundings. He didn't really understand what it was but he instinctively knew it was something powerful, so he just dug deeper and unleashed more of whatever it was that was being released. It was a mysterious force that he felt coursing through his body-no, not his body, but his spirit almost. He didn't understand what was happening but a couple seconds later, the room he was in erupted in chaos. He looked around in confusion and saw people foaming at the mouth and keeling over for no apparent reason. Before he could make sense of why people were falling unconscious, he felt the searing pain of hot iron being dragged across his back. He looked back and found the guy who was about to brand him had also fainted, but while fainting, he had ended up dragging the brand across his back, instead of just pressing it. He looked to his side and saw that Kell had also fainted but luckily the guy who was going to brand her was far enough that it didn't reach her.

He didn't have time to think as the bubble woman and child screamed falling over too, and the soldiers behind them caught the two before they could hit the ground. Luffy looked around the room and found that more than half of the people had fainted for some reason. He didn't understand what was happening but he saw his chance to escape. He grabbed Kell and dashed to the door in all the chaos as the ones who were still conscious were trying to look around for the enemy that had seemingly made half the people in the room collapse.

Luffy burst out of the room while carrying Kell and started running in a random direction as he had no idea how the place was structured. He tried to wake Kell up, but she had fallen unconscious too. Whatever power had affected the slavers in the room had also affected her apparently. Seeing no help from the doctor, he went to the first cage he saw and banged on it trying to get the person's attention, but he was unresponsive. He went around to the other cages too, but no one gave him a response other than a simple uninterested glance. He yelled at them in frustration but no one responded. The other slavers were quickly alerted and thus began the chase. Luffy ran around causing chaos in the underground space with slavers chasing after him. He looked for a kitchen or any place where he could find food to fill his stomach first and get his energy back, but couldn't find any place where they kept food. He kept asking the people in the cages for help but not one person did anything more than spare him a glance.

Luffy had been starved for months with only morsels of food thrown at him now and then, so he had no energy to fight an entire slave base. He was already in a very weakened state because of sea stone, torture and starvation, so couldn't keep running for long. And with the burden of carrying another person, he couldn't put up much of a fight and was soon caught. A bunch of nets made of sea stone were thrown on him, and his first escape attempt failed.

For some reason though, the slavers had been trying to capture him and made damn sure not to kill him, which confused Luffy. He and Kell were brought to a room where all the slavers had also gathered and Luffy thought they were going to continue the branding but he could see that the slavers themselves were insanely terrified for some reason Luffy didn't understand. They were apparently waiting for the bubble woman to regain consciousness in another room.

A few hours later where the slavers had looked like they were waiting for a death verdict, one of the soldiers guarding the bubble woman walked in the room and told them that their master- the bubble woman, had lost interest in doing business with the slavers and as a result, lost interest in buying Luffy too. He then proceeded to kill a few of the slavers, who Luffy later learned were the leaders of the slaver group, while the rest stayed still not doing anything, which baffled Luffy. The soldier killed pretty much all the slavers who were in the room during the branding and a few more, and then just left. Luffy later learned that the leaders were all killed because they had let the bubble woman get hurt while in their facility.

Kell hadn't woken up even after the bubble woman and their soldiers went away and she was separated from him and taken somewhere. Luffy, on the other hand, was enslaved again and put in a solitary cage and the slavers that were still left alive were extremely pissed off at him for causing their leaders to be killed. They didn't really know who had caused the people in the room to faint but since it had happened during his branding, they all blamed Luffy.

So, instead of killing him like the bubble woman had apparently ordered, they hid him deciding to make him an example and prolong his torture for as long as possible before killing him. From then on, his torture was tripled and was also done in front of an audience. He would be dragged in the middle of the other cages and tortured in front of the other slaves to serve as an example to what happens to disobedient slaves. This was a boon to Luffy though as he wasn't in solitary confinement anymore and could see more people, no matter how uncooperative they were.

Luffy also saw that Kell was now in a cage too, battered and bruised with a hollow look in her eyes. He had caught her eyes a few times but she always averted her gaze, seemingly not wanting to acknowledge him. He realized she was probably mad at him as he was the reason she was made a slave in the first place, and felt extremely guilty.

Two weeks later, Luffy led his second escape attempt, this time more successful than the last time, but this too had ultimately failed. He had freed a lot of slaves including Kell and it was a glorious escape attempt in which a lot of slavers had lost their lives. Luffy had managed to help Kell and a few others escape but unfortunately, he himself wasn't able to escape successfully.

And that seemed to be the last straw as the remaining slavers who were still alive gave up on breaking Luffy. Even with the increased torture, not once had he obeyed them, so they didn't think he was ever going to break, so decided it was time to kill him. They also didn't want to see him do something like what he did during the second escape attempt again. So, they lethally poisoned him, and threw him into a death pit with other slaves. He was told that he wouldn't be able to move his body because of the poison and it would slowly kill him over several days. They wanted him to die a slow agonizing death for all the trouble he had caused them and they made sure to let Luffy know that.

And so, that's how Luffy had ended up in the impromptu graveyard of slaves. He didn't see Kell nor the other slaves he had broken out during his second escape attempt again, but he was sure they had escaped, so hoped they were safe somewhere.

Luffy stared at the sky full of stars reminiscing the past few months and it was finally settling in that no one could help him anymore and he would die here. He couldn't believe that he would die before even starting his journey… before he even had a chance to chase his dream.

"Let's live without regrets"

He apologized to Ace because he had broken that promise as he regretted his current situation.

"I'll gather an amazing crew better than yours…"

He darted his eyes to his side where his greatest treasure, his Strawhat was sitting right next to him covered in smears of blood. When Luffy had woken up the first time in a cage, he only had his clothes and his hat on him. In a moment of clarity, he had realized that he couldn't let the slavers know that he had anything precious on him. The only reason he could oppose them as much as he did was because he had nothing to lose except his life. If he let it slip that his hat was his greatest treasure and was precious to him, they would obviously use it against him. So, he had never once said anything about his hat and acted casual about it. And looked like they just threw his hat away with him too.

"….and I'll become the Pirate King!"

He stared at the hat and apologized to Shanks that he couldn't keep his promise of returning his hat to him after becoming a great pirate.

"It's my treasure tab. I'll pay my tab with all the treasure I get when I become the Pirate King"

"I'll never do the chores. The Pirate King doesn't do chores!"

He remembered all the others who mattered to him- Makino, Dadan, Dogra, Mogra and the other bandits, Gramps, Sabo… He apologized to each one of them for unfulfilled promises.

Luffy kept staring at the star studded sky as he felt his life slipping away. His eyes slowly closed as his time ran out and the man who would have become the Pirate King, the man who would have become the freest man ever, the man who would have flipped the world upside down, the man who would have become the most influential figure in history, the man who would have saved many lives and inspired generations of dreamers, the man who would have brought hope into the lives of millions, the man who would have been the ray of sunshine in this dark fucked up world…died.

———

Luffy slowly opened his eyes and laid his eyes on what looked like faint purplish clouds. He sat up looking around in confusion and found that he was in…a void of blackness with purple streams of clouds all around the vast void in a chaotic manner. He also found that he was also sitting on mass of purple cloud and when he touched it, it almost evaporated in his hands. It took a moment for him to realize that he had just been lying in an impromptu graveyard of dead people where he was also dying but suddenly he somehow found himself in this space. He looked down at himself and saw he was dressed in his signature red vest and blue jeans with his hat also on his head. His clothes that had torn off long ago were now somehow perfectly fine. So, he was dressed in his favorite clothes in a seemingly purplish black void with no memory of ever getting there.

"Hello?!" he yelled hoping to catch anyone's attention. And thankfully, he got a response.

"Ugh, where the hell am I?" he heard someone groaning from behind him.

Luffy quickly turned around and saw the back of another person. It was a man wearing a red hoodie and was sitting down with his back to him. He saw the man looking around in confusion too and so called out again "Hey"

The man turned around and Luffy studied him with interest. He had black curly hair, dark round eyes, slightly angular face with a small scar running down his chin. He was wearing a red hoodie with the word 'Freedom' emblazoned across it and black jeans. The man also studied him carefully as Luffy studied him and he too wore a confused look on his face.

"Umm…Hi? Where am I?" the man muttered after a couple of seconds.

"No idea. Just woke up here"

"Me too. Can't see anyone else other than the 2 of us here…" he trailed off staring at Luffy intensely.

Luffy tilted his head in confusion at his stare "What's wrong?"

Still staring at him intensely, his lips curled up into a smile as he smirked and said "Heh. You look a lot like Luffy"

"Oh? You know me?"

"….what?" the man blinked in bewilderment.

Luffy again tilted his head in confusion. The man apparently knew him somehow but he had never seen him in his life.

"You just said my name. I am Luffy. How do you know me?"

The man just stared at him not saying anything as if he had been given some life altering news, which only further confused Luffy.

"Who are you?" Luffy asked after a few seconds of getting no response from the stranger.

On reflex, the man said "Oh. I'm Leo…wait, that's not important! You said you're Luffy and you look like him too. Hmm… I'm not dreaming, I already pinched myself…hmmmm" he said the last part to himself with a contemplative look on his face.

Luffy frowned, not understanding this man called Leo and decided to change the topic. "So, any idea where we are?"

"Hmm… No idea. Last thing I remember is being in a motorcycle accident and slowly bleeding to death with my limbs cut off…" he trailed off but then shrugged, "So random guess? I'm in a vegetative state and my mind is making this up"

"Ooh I was dying too. And what's vegetable state?…and what do you mean by your mind making this up?…Ah! Is this like Uta's power?!"

"Wow. Great going, my mind" Leo chuckled, "You are so Luffy-like…And what do you mean by Uta's power? What's her power?"

Luffy decided to ignore his beginning rambling and answered his question "Uta said that her mind can make up worlds when she sings"

"Make up worlds? The hell does that mean?"

"No idea. But I've been in her world before. She could fly and make amazing tasty food!"

"Huh…the movie isn't released yet, so I don't know her powers. So, my mind is making up random stuff?" Leo questioned with a pondering look.

Luffy frowned not understanding what he was rambling about, "You're confusing…"

"Hey, I'm just as surprised as you by all this!"

"Well, how do you know me?"

"Why wouldn't I know you? I've been watching you for over a decade now. I fucking love One Piece and love you as a character… We're kinda similar you know, so I guess I just click a lot with you. If I lived in a world such as yours, I'm pretty sure I would set out to be a Pirate King too" Leo said happily.

Luffy didn't understand most of his words but he concentrated on the 'I love One Piece' part.

"Wait…you love the One Piece? That means you found it already?! Doesn't that mean you're already the Pirate King?!"

"…umm no no wait wait. I don't know what the One Piece is exactly. Although there are lots of theories…" Leo trailed off contemplatively with a hand on his chin.

Luffy was even more confused now. Leo was making no sense. His face scrunched up as he crossed his arms and attempted to process what Leo was saying. 'He loves the One Piece. But doesn't know what it is. We're similar? He wants to be Pirate King too. Damn, another rival! But, he knows me from somewhere. He's been watching me over for a decade? How? How does he know me? Did I meet him somewhere?…' Thankfully, before steam could start rising out of his head from thinking too much, another voice popped up.

"Oh! What's this? What's this?" came a very excited voice from seemingly nowhere. Leo and Luffy started looking around to see where the voice was coming from but couldn't find anyone.

Suddenly, streams of white light came out of seemingly nothing and coalesced into a white humanoid body. The new 'person', if it could even be called that, had no physical or facial features except for a thin line where his mouth was supposed to be.

"Whoa, a ghost!" Luffy exclaimed with excitement.

"Ooh, Truth from Full metal Alchemist" Leo grinned wide, "Wow, my mind sure is a great place… But why Truth though? I want Winry or Edward to show up"

Luffy went silent not knowing what the heck Leo was talking about but since he seemed to recognize the figure, he waited to see what the ghost was going to say. Meanwhile, the white figure just studied Leo and Luffy for a few moments before gasping, "Ooh I know what's happening! It's the Same Soul Resonance effect"

"The what?" Luffy and Leo asked.

"Same soul resonance. Very rare but it happens once in a billion years or so…" Still seeing the blank look on Leo and Luffy's faces, the white figure continued, "It happens when the same soul dies in two different universes at around the same meridian at the same point in time while on the same axis"

There was a brief silence as the two didn't understand anything the white figure said.

"…So what you're saying is…we're not in my mind?" Leo finally asked breaking the silence.

"No, we're not"

"Huh…who are you then? You look like Truth"

"Don't know what you mean by truth, but I'm just a being living in a higher dimension compared to yours. Just call me White. I was just passing by when I felt a strange vibration from this direction so decided to check it out. And I found you two trapped here"

"I don't get anything" Luffy whined completely lost on what the ghost was saying and gave up on figuring out what was happening. He just waited to see if Leo or White would explain it in simpler terms.

Leo, on the other hand, seemed to understand at least a bit of what White had said as he looked like he was thinking and after a while, finally said "Okay, a few questions. First, you're a being from a higher dimension? How does that wo-….you know what, I'm sure whatever you say will go right over my head"

"Smart" White said giving a thumbs up.

Leo then pointed at himself and Luffy "Okay so you're telling me that we're both souls from different universes who are dead?"

"Almost dead. You're just outside the Soul Plane. Soul Plane is where souls from every universe go after they die. Both of your souls were ascending to the Soul Plane at the same time and axis, so your souls resonated with one another and kinda trapped you in this buffer space just outside the Soul Plane. It's just a temporary phenomenon, so no need to worry. The resonance effect will pass in a few hours and you'll ascend to the Soul Plane completely and truly die"

"I see" Leo nodded his head sagely. "So we are in fact dead… and also we're both also from different universes huh?"

"Yep"

"So this is like the afterlife?" Luffy asked.

"Pretty much yeah"

"And we're from different universes?" Luffy asked confused.

"Different world? Different reality?" Leo offered hoping he could understand that.

"So…Like an alert real tea?"

"…Alternate reality yes" Leo said sweat dropping.

"Wow! That's so cool! Sabo told me about such a story once!" Luffy exclaimed with shining eyes.

Leo looked at Luffy with amusement before pointing at him and turning to White, "So why is Luffy here?"

"He's dead too obviously" White stated simply.

"No no I mean, why is Luffy, the fictional character here?"

"Hey! I'm not fictional!" Luffy protested.

"Fictional?" White looked confused before he went up to Leo and touched his forehead. He gave a yelp of surprise, then immediately went to Luffy and touched his forehead too before he started laughing maniacally. "PFFTTT… OH BOY! THIS IS AMAZING! HAHAHAHAHAHA!"

Leo and Luffy just sat there staring at the cackling humanoid madman, then looked at each other, shrugged conveying that they had no idea why he was laughing and then focused their gazes back on White. After a full minute, White finally composed himself.

"Explain. Now." Leo demanded

"Okay okay Pfft.., Now that I got that out of my system, let me explain. You guys are both from vastly different worlds with different world histories, physical rules, and much more. As a small and simple example, in your world-", White pointed to Leo, "The landmass split into 7 and formed the 7 continents you know of", then pointing at Luffy he continued, "While in your world, the land mass just formed a sort of ring around the world and formed the Red Line," he then pointed to both of them, "But you're both essentially the same souls."

"How can we both be the same?" Luffy asked. He barely understood any of his words, so concentrated on things he could understand.

"Every soul has to be born in every iteration of the universe. Yours just happened to be born in a world where the Red Line, Grand line and Devil fruits exist, and Leo just happened to be born in a world with 7 continents, the technology is mass produced and the world is connected… But essentially, you are the same soul. Just born in different worlds… If that's still too hard to understand, just imagine two worlds - One in which you love meat and the other in which you love tangerines but everything else is the same. Both versions of you die and come here and the only difference in your lives would be your favorite food. That's easier to imagine as you guys being the same soul right? Now imagine the same thing but with instead of just a single difference in your lives, your whole lives are different with the land masses, world history, ancestry, parents and a lot of others things being so different to the point where you're even named differently. But you're still the same soul"

"I see. So multiverse theory is real huh? And also every piece of fiction ever written is real somewhere out there huh" Leo breathed in awe and a bit of horror thinking about some of the messed up stuff he had read.

"Not every piece of fiction. I saw some stories in your world from your memories that are pretty out there which make no sense. Like for example, there are some characters in some comics which are the personifications of Death, Time, Universe. That's just inaccurate in any sense of reality. Plus entropy also plays a role. In Leo's world, devil fruits just aren't possible because the world is stabler and physics isn't that malleable. But in Luffy's world, physics is relatively more loose, thus making stuff like Devil fruits and Haki possible"

Leo nodded sagely at that. Some stories introduced God too so such stories couldn't possibly exist.

"So, I'm Luffy in another universe huh" Leo trailed off staring at Luffy in awe. "And this guy is the Luffy…Wow…"

Luffy of course still didn't understand. "I still don't get it. If I understood correctly, you're saying we're both from different worlds right? But then, why do you know me? If we're in different worlds, you shouldn't know me. And why do you keep calling me fictional?" he asked with a puzzled look on his face. He clearly hadn't understood a majority of the things that were said, and had just latched onto simple concepts like they were from different worlds.

Leo chuckled at that. "Because in my world, there's a comic book called One Piece where the main protagonist- Monkey D. Luffy sets out to sea to achieve his dream of becoming the Pirate King!" Leo declared reverentially. "I was an avid fan and watched your journey up till Wano!"

Luffy's eyes widened with shock as he gaped at Leo with disbelief.

White hastily added, "And that's the funny part here! This same soul resonance has happened before for others, but they were in fairly similar worlds or some in widely different worlds too. But, I have never seen or even heard of a situation where one person's world is a fictional story in the other! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAH"

"I'm a comic book character?… Wow! SO COOL!" Luffy exclaimed excitedly with shining eyes but did a complete 180 a second later as his face scrunched up in confusion, "But wait… I didn't even set out yet. So, how come you saw my journey? I died before I reached 17"

"WHAT!?" Leo yelled shocked, "How old are you right now?! How did you die?!"

"I'm 15. Some mean guys kidnapped me and kept me locked up for a long time. They beat me up everyday and tried to make me a slave. I obviously didn't listen to a single thing they said, and a couple days ago, they just fed me some poison and threw me out in a pit… where I died"

"There are multiple iterations of your world" White explained, "Multiverse theory, remember. In some other world, that world's Luffy already set out and had all the adventures that is described in the comic book from Leo's world. In your specific world, you died before you even started your journey"

"No fair!" Luffy whined with a pout.

Leo, on the other hand, was having a mental breakdown "…Oh no… Your world is doomed. So many people die because you're not there…" He teared up thinking about all the people Luffy helps throughout his journey and buried his face in his hands. "Oh god, what will happen to Nami? Robin? Brook? All the countries you save? Oh god…Oh no…"

Seeing Leo tearing up, Luffy got alarmed and also curious about his supposed journey, "What happens?"

Leo, with tears running down his face, began "You affect and save sooo many lives, you know. First off, all your crew mates. They didn't have such good lives before you dropped in. You save them one by one, bringing hope in to their lives…", Leo started remembering most of the crew's backstories and felt even more sad. After taking a moment to calm himself, he continued, "…And that's just your crew. You go on to save so many countries and the people you befriended along the way. And oh god, Ace and Sabo! They both would be devastated!"

Luffy was feeling extremely bad now. He apparently would have ended up making a lot of friends and they are in trouble judging by what Leo said. He felt guilt rising up in his chest as he had let them all down. Ace and Sabo would be sad too… And Sabo?… Wait Sabo?

"Wait, Sabo? He's already dead. Why would he be devastated?"

"Ah no no, Sabo's still alive. You'll find out- would have found out- in the future. He has lost his memories so that's why he hadn't contacted you guys yet. He would have come to meet you after he gets his memories back because of Ace's de-…." Leo stopped himself before he went further realizing what he was about to say. 'He doesn't know his crew and the future yet, so it shouldn't affect him that much, but he knows Ace. If he realized Ace dies, then he would lose it. Let's not burden him with such knowledge just before he dies.'

Thankfully Luffy was still caught on the fact that Sabo was alive to realize Leo's slip up. "That's great! Now, Ace won't be all alone! He still has Sabo!"

'Still thinking about others uncaring of his own death.' Leo thought with a small smile.

"Tell me more!" Luffy excitedly perked up after sometime. "I'm not gonna live it, but I still want to know my adventure!"

White clapped his hands getting both their attention. "If you want to, you can just share your memories. Just touch each other's forehead and the memories will flow to the other person."

Luffy was curious about this other world and the supposed comic book about his own life story, so he was up for it and nodded instantly looking excitedly at Leo, but Leo was a bit hesitant. He didn't want to burden Luffy with knowing about all the lives depending on him in his last moments as he would obviously feel extremely guilty for letting them all down and Ace's death was also a factor. Seeing his hesitant look, White spoke up "It's his life. He has the right to know"

"But…"

"If you're thinking that I would feel guilty because I let down all my crew and all the people I save, then you're right. But I don't care. It's my responsibility, and I did let them down. At least let me know who they are"

Leo looked stunned at Luffy before his lips curled up into a smile. 'Damn idiot is so perceptive when it comes to people.'

He thought about it for a second more and looking at Luffy who gave him a serious reassuring smile, he sighed and agreed to it albeit a bit reluctantly.

They both moved forwards and brought their foreheads together. A yellow spark of electricity passed at the point of contact as all memories of each person flowed into the other and they slumped down the next second. Each of them experienced the other's complete life in that single instant.

—

Even though Leo already knew of Luffy's childhood from the story, it was an entirely different experience of feeling and living it. He felt the fear when Garp threw him in a tiger's den or tied him up to weather balloons or threw him in ravines… He felt the loneliness of his life before Shanks, the joy of being around Shanks and Uta, the pain when Uta didn't show up and he thought she died, the hopelessness he felt when Shanks lost his arm because of him, his resolve of being the greatest pirate, the loneliness after Shanks left, joy of meeting Ace and Sabo…

Leo felt every punch Porchemy gave Luffy with the spiked gloves and experienced the thoughts that went through his mind where he kept thinking that Ace and Sabo would never become his friends if he spoke. He felt the joy when the two finally accepted him, all the sparring and playing around, declaring their dreams on top of the cliff, becoming brothers by exchanging sake cups…

He felt the burning heat from the Gray Terminal Fire and the despair of knowing Ace was lost somewhere in there… He felt the pain of losing Sabo…

He lived and experienced the rest of his life, conversations that were never shown, stories that were never told, experiences that were never mentioned… So many things had happened in Luffy's life on Dawn that was never shown and Leo got an entirely new understanding of Luffy. He saw his growth from being a crybaby to his current self and was awed by it. Luffy was a very unique individual whose thought processes was very different from what Leo himself knew and experiencing all of Luffy's thoughts and views on many matters gave him a deeper understanding of how Luffy worked.

Leo also experienced all the training Luffy put himself through and Leo could also now do everything Luffy could do. His physical strength wouldn't change obviously, but techniques, battle tactics and mental discipline was all now integrated into Leo, and he truly realized that Luffy was a genius in battle.

And when he experienced what Luffy experienced when the slavers had caught him and tortured him endlessly for months, he lost it and started screaming and tearing up in pain, rage and sadness.

—

Luffy was awed by Leo's life. His world was very different and seeing Leo's perspective and growth as he went through his life was a fantastic experience for Luffy. Leo was an orphan who grew up in an orphanage until he was 18 when he finally got his own job and a place to live in. Leo had to grow up very quick as he had no one to depend on for monetary matters nor take care of him. Luffy had never really thought much of money as he just stole it, but in Leo's life, it was everything.

His world also had compulsory education, so Luffy also experienced school life and learned all the things he had never gotten a chance to learn in his own life. Math and Science which Luffy never understood other than the basic elementary stuff, he could now understand because Leo understood it. He learned the history and geography of their world, marveled by how they already had a world map using satellites and were even mapping the universe! The everyday technology which connected a majority of the world fascinated Luffy.

The internet and smartphones were mind boggling inventions that gobsmacked Luffy. All those functions in that tiny device with all the information in the world, access to tons of content from news to entertainment, movies, shows, video calling, social media apps, forums, chat rooms, music videos, comedy skits, science experiments, cat videos…too many things across various topics to experience and pretty much anyone in Leo's world could access all that. And all the internet and meme culture was amazing to Luffy.

In Leo's personal life, he was a born leader. Even when he was as young as 9 years old, he would take charge to take care of the younger kids in his orphanage. He was active in school activities, taking charge in organizing events and also a people person. He made lots and lots of friends, helping them out any chance he got. He also read a lot. Be it fiction, non-fiction, fantasy, politics, science or philosophy - Leo dabbled in a wide variety of genres. Luffy never had any interest in reading because it seemed boring, but experiencing reading through Leo's memories gave Luffy an entirely new perspective.

And then there were the tons of TV shows and movies Leo watched. The amount of entertainment in his world was baffling as nothing like that was ever present in Luffy's world, at least not on Dawn Island. And Leo loved watching all sorts of shows, movies and anime. All the different lore and concepts of different fictional worlds amazed Luffy. It was like going on an adventure in different worlds which he absolutely loved.

One of the other things that Luffy absolutely loved about Leo's life was that he was a musician! Leo could play the piano and guitar very well and was very interested in music. He participated in school and local musical competitions and even won a few times. He went on to do Masters in Music in college too. He minored in human psychology as he was interested in that too but he had mainly wanted to make a career in music. He had planned to join a Music firm to make soundtracks for different movies/shows and eventually become a Music Coordinator but unfortunately had died before he could do anything serious.

Then came Leo's dating life. Luffy never really paid any romantic attention to girls and didn't even really understand what sex was, but going through Leo's dating life was an…interesting experience to say the least. Leo dated a few girls before finding the love of his life - Serena. She was a classmate at school and they had started off as friends which had soon evolved into something more. And Luffy experienced falling in love through Leo's memories, which was extremely weird. They dated for three years from when Leo was 17 to 20 and the two had a fantastic relationship. But then tragedy struck as Serena died…and that started Leo's destructive years, which Luffy absolutely hated to experience.

Leo was lost and depressed after she died and he had spiraled into drugs, alcohol, sex, and just didn't care much about life anymore. Experiencing all those dark feelings and moments during this part of Leo's life made Luffy uncomfortable, angry, sad, sympathetic and he experienced loneliness again. He lost most of his friends and it was a horrible time in his life… and Luffy experienced everything as if it was his own life.

Thankfully, Leo was able to come out of his destructive spiral after 18 months and chose to be better. He reformed himself, got clean, started paying more attention to his education and career, and was doing a very good job. Sadly, a year after he changed his life for the better, at age 22, he died in a motorcycle accident.

And the main thing that had initiated this whole thing- the comic book and anime about his own life. Seeing himself in a comic book was surreal to say the least. Seeing himself animated on TV was even more surreal. One Piece was Leo's favorite so he read the manga, watched the anime, laughed his ass off at the funny bits, bawled his eyes out at the sad bits, got angry at specific characters (for good justifiable reasons. Fuck you, Spandam!), went on forums to discuss the story, theorized what happens next, argued with people who just didn't get the story, bought merch… Leo was obsessed with One Piece and he loved Luffy. And loving himself as if he was a different person was the strangest experience ever.

Luffy saw his own would-have-been adventure in the form of a comic book and an anime with awe, reacting to it like it was just a fictional story. It wasn't finished yet as when Leo died, the manga was still ongoing. The latest chapter showed Luffy facing off against Kaido in Wano and he had unlocked Gear 5.

As he went through his own adventure from Alvida's ship to Wano, Luffy felt extreme levels of guilt building up in his chest. He now understood what Leo meant by him affecting and saving so many lives, and he cursed himself for letting them all down. His world was fucked up to say the least and he now understood so many things and knew of so many secrets of the world. And so many mysteries too! He thought he understood that the world was much more crueler when he was being tortured, but seeing all the things that happened in the story gave him a much better understanding of his own world.

—

Living an entire person's life in an instant had left Luffy staring off into space in a daze as he processed all the memories, while it had left Leo also in a similar daze before the memories of the enslavement got processed and he got reduced to a writhing and angry mess.

"…Haaah…haaah…those fucking…Celestial Dragons! I want to fucking eviscerate them!" Leo roared panting hard bringing Luffy back to his senses and finally see Leo trembling and suffering in pain.

"Are you okay?" Luffy worriedly asked making him sit up and trying to calm him down.

"Yeah yeah…Just…not much of a fighter in my world you know. So all that horrible training you put yourself through, your grandpa put you through and then the enslavement…the memories of pain erupted all at once all over my body… It just made me lose my mind a bit, that's all"

"Shishishishi yeah, all you did was watch and read stuff. The most you did was walk in terms of physical activities"

"Hey! My world didn't require me to be strong. I could get by on my brain alone!"

"You didn't even travel anywhere. All you did was stay in a couple of cities" Luffy whined. "I wanted to see Europe and Japan and all those amazing places you saw on videos…But you never traveled anywhere"

"Hey! I couldn't afford to go on adventures as I wished! People need money where I'm from! Not like I can steal from the Gray Terminal, or raid other evil pirates for money or just find a city of gold!"

"Shishishi! Yeah, your world sucks in that!"

Leo just shrugged agreeing with that statement but then suddenly realizing something, looked at Luffy with a horrified expression "P-Please tell me you didn't get the memories of my entire life…."

"Yep. Experienced everything"

"Oh no" Leo breathed in horror burying his head in his arms.

"Shishi it's okay, it's okay. You watched porn, so what?"

"Oh god no!"

"And had a lot of sex with a lot of girls. So much drugs too"

"Ohh gods nooo…" Leo grumbled with a blushing red face having all his embarrassing moments laid bare in front of Luffy. Luffy was like a hero to him and showing him all his embarrassing, weak and dark moments was definitely mortifying as hell.

"Man, so much se-"

"Ugh please stop talking" Leo shut Luffy up by covering his mouth. He then angrily turned on White, "You asshole! Why the hell didn't you tell me all my memories would get transferred?! I only wanted to show him stuff about the story!"

"Ehh you never asked…" White whistled innocently.

"Shishishishi"

"You bastard! Don't laugh! I got your memories too you know! I know all your embarrassing moments too! Like how you asked Dadan why your dick got hard in the mornings!"

Luffy gasped turning a bit red as he now understood just how embarrassing a situation that actually was.

"And let's not forget 'the Talk' Ace gave you! HAHAHA! Man, Ace sure was blushing and struggling to give you the birds and the bees. He was being so awkward and you were so stupid that you didn't even understand anything and kept asking stupid questions making him more flustered! Man, poor Ace!"

Luffy went even more red and before he could rebuke, Leo continued, "And then the next day, you started staring at the those girls in Goa!"

Luffy finally lost it and began defending himself, "I just stared unconsciously because I was curious about what Ace had talked about! That's all!"

"But you did stare!"

"Grr…what about you huh?! You and Serena did so much freaky stuff with each other! And after she was gone? You spiraled into even more with so many other girls!"

"Hey! Don't bring up a man's destructive years! I agree I went off the rails then!"

"Ah yeah…Sorry. You're right, I won't bring up those 18 months of your destructive spiral" Luffy said with pity before he started arguing again, "But what about before huh?! You and Serena had a sinful amount of sex!"

"Well, at least I did have sex, you virgin idiot!"

"I'm just 15! Even you lost your virginity at 16!"

"Well not like you were gonna lose it any time soon either!"

"Grr… I had a damn good reason!"

"Yeah," Leo suddenly calmed down and looked contemplatively at Luffy, "Well, going by your past, you choose not to romantically think of girls huh? Judging by how you didn't even bat an eye at Hancock, the logical conclusion was that you were asexual but you had a very valid and complex reason as to why you never bothered with romance or girls huh?"

Luffy also calmed down, "Yeah. Wonder why Oda never included that tidbit from my childhood in the story"

"He did say he won't show any romance in the story…But who cares? Now that you understand how sex really works, would you have broken the promise you made to yourself to never think of girls romantically?"

"What do you think?"

"Of course not"

"Yeah. Now that I know about Rouge too, there is no way I'm ever breaking that promise I made to myself"

"Yeah makes sense and choosing not to think of girls romantically is as easy as pie for you…which is also unique…" Leo trailed off staring at Luffy, "You are way more complex than you let on, you know. Sure, you don't understand complex things like science and stuff but that's just knowledge. Wisdom wise, you're really smart. And you experience self-doubt and fear just like any other person, but just never let it show…The manga didn't really delve into inner monologues, so you always seemed like this fearless infallible captain who can do anything…but you're just like everyone else. A very special and unique way of thinking with a lot of optimism sure, but…you're still human"

Luffy rubbed his head sheepishly, "Yeah well, if the story me was anything like me, he couldn't allow himself to show weakness. I'm the captain, so it's my job to reassure my crew and be a rock they can lean on. If I showed fear and doubt, I can never be a captain…I have to constantly keep the crew happy too"

Leo smiled nodding and agreeing with him. "As I said, you're stupid in knowledge sure but you are a people person"

"Yeah… and the fight with Usopp was something I had never imagined happening with one of my crewmates…" Luffy said with sadness laced in his voice, "I always thought the crew I made would never fight among themselves seriously…Guess I broke and matured a bit then huh?"

"Yeah… that was heart breaking to watch… I can't even imagine your emotions during that time…"

"Yeah well, now I'll never know…" Luffy trailed off sadly.

Deciding that moping like this wasn't going to do anything, Leo quickly changed the topic. "It was surreal to actually live your life you know" Leo began, "Gramps sure didn't hold back while training you and the 'Fist of Love' actually hurts a lot!"

"Oh yeah it hurts so much" Luffy whined rubbing his head unconsciously. He also thought that crying about the current situation wasn't going to help anyone, so just decided to chat more.

"And your dream?!" Leo exclaimed with a broad excited smile, "It's amazing!"

"Why was that even a secret in the first place?"

"Thematically, it makes for an amazing reveal! I can only imagine the panel Oda would've written your dream with. I'm sure it would have been glorious!"

"Shishishishi yeah!"

"Also, Uta? She's the one who kinda inspired you to even think about a dream huh?"

"Yeah… I got the idea of creating a New Genesis from her. I wanted to do something like that too and I came up with that dream… Roger also had the same dream huh? That's surreal"

"Yep…And her power? She can sing and pull your soul into her world while your real body is asleep huh? That's one insane power"

"Yeah but why is she just a movie character? She's very important to my childhood and she isn't even canon?" Luffy asked with a frown.

"I think Oda mentioned that she is canon and the events that happened in your childhood is canon, but the movie itself would be non-canon"

"So she wouldn't have ever shown up in front of me in the future?"

"Naguri is real," White suddenly popped up in between them startling both as they had forgotten he was even here.

"Wow White…Sorry, I had forgotten you were here" Leo apologized sheepishly.

"Yeah sorry White. We were just too lost in each other's memories"

"It's fine it's fine" White waved it off dismissively.

"So what do you mean Naguri is real?" Leo asked.

"Naguri was a filler anime character right?"

"Oh yeah!" both exclaimed in unison. Naguri was the old man the ASL brothers had met in Gray's Terminal who had trained them for a while. But he was an anime only character so basically filler. But in Luffy's reality, he had actually met Naguri, so that might mean the other fillers could have been real too.

"So fillers are real too? Like Apis and the Dragon? Rainbow Mist? They don't make sense in the context of the world though. Dragons in East Blue? And a space-time loop? They just don't make sense"

"Yeah don't know about Dragons in East Blue but Rainbow Mist is probably not real" White replied with a hand on his chin.

"What? You don't know? Shouldn't you be an omnipotent being?" Luffy asked.

"I'm a higher dimensional being. I'm not a God…There are trillions of universes out there, so of course I'm not gonna bother learning about all of them. Do you learn everything about every single cell in your body? No, right? It's the same for me. The only things I know about your world is what I saw from both your memories just now"

"Ah I see, makes sense" Leo and Luffy both nodded sagely.

"So what does fillers have to do with Uta showing up or not?" Luffy asked getting back to the main topic.

"Just saying that the manga doesn't represent your world. Fillers don't have any effect on the manga story but if the fillers are real, then they will definitely have an effect on the rest of the story. So, manga isn't canon in your reality."

"Ahh I see" Luffy nodded sagely, "So movies and fillers would have all happened too in one way or another and what happens in the manga wouldn't necessarily have happened the way they did either"

"Yep!"

"Damn, Luffy now understands things huh? Just a few minutes ago, you were calling alternate reality as 'alter real tea' PFFHAHA!"

"Jerk!" Luffy yelled dope-slapping him.

Leo kept up his mischievous grin and continued, "You know, the more time I get to go through your memories, the more they're feeling like my memories"

Luffy nodded agreeing with him, "Yeah, me too. It's feeling more and more like my memories now"

"Exactly. So~" Leo drawled mischievously, "If you think about it…You just lost your virginity!"

Luffy went beet red and lunged at Leo intent of beating him up. Already expecting it, Leo jumped out of the way and started running around trying to escape his punches. Luffy in turn chased him, all the while Leo cackled with laughter and Luffy used a few choice words from Leo's world. This went on for a few minutes until White cleared his throat and only then did Leo and Luffy stop. They had again forgotten about White, lost in their own world. They both apologized sheepishly and sat down again.

"So…how you holding up?" Leo asked cautiously. He nor Luffy wanted to talk about this, but they just couldn't not acknowledge it. "All the missed adventures and friends… and…and Ace"

"…It's a lot to take in" Luffy let out a deep heavy sigh, "What's going happen to all of them now? They'll all either die or face a fate worse than death… And Ace… I don't know… if I wasn't dead or hadn't gotten all your memories too, I think I would have gone catatonic like I did in the story"

Trying to lighten the mood, Leo smirked remarking "Wow, you used the word 'catatonic'. Using big words now huh? Guess losing your virginity in someone else's memories makes you a man now huh"

Luffy just dope-slapped him again.

"Memories are what makes a person's personality" White said sagely, "Since you basically lived another life, your personality would have undergone a change too."

Luffy and Leo nodded at that completely agreeing with him.

"Yeah, I definitely feel like I would take more risks if I went back to my world and not worry so much about things I can't control. And definitely travel more even without money and see where I end up. Also join a fight club or something" Leo said with a smile.

"I just got crammed with so much knowledge about math, science, psychology, and thankfully music. I think I can now play the instruments you could… And so much movie, shows and anime knowledge including my world's knowledge. And let's not forget the internet culture. I'm itching to make an obscure reference or a meme joke" Luffy said chuckling. "But I also feel I've matured a lot since you were mature for your age. I wouldn't do some of the stupid stuff I did in the story."

"Like punch a gigantic whale in the eye?" White suggested with a chuckle.

"Or do that stupid Pinwheel attack and get stuck in concrete!" Leo added with a mischievous grin.

"Not realizing who Sogeking was"

"Or ask Chiffon if she's Bege"

"And then ask her fucking baby if he's Bege!" White and Leo started cackling.

Luffy blushed in embarrassment and cursed them. "Jerks!"

"Sorry sorry… but you punching the whale actually led you to meet Crocus, got the log pose without which you would have died, and also met Vivi…So it wasn't a bad thing." Leo placated seeing a pouting Luffy, but then added, "Buut the other things, Yep. Completely moronic."

"Ding-a-ling stupid"

"Rubber-brained idiot"

"Rubber bone-head"

Luffy blushed in even more embarrassment and snapped "There's no way I wouldn't have recognized who Sogeking was or think that Fake Sanji and Zoro on Sabaody were real! Oda just wrote me as more stupid than I am!"

Leo actually thought about it and nodded slowly, "Well…I can't actually deny that. You had Observation at that point too, so there's no way you would have made that mistake. And you're waaaay more perceptive than you let on. You understand things about people with very minute clues and make accurate conclusions…You just don't voice them out a lot huh?"

"Yeah, even I was surprised by that" White added, "Oda definitely made you more stupid for comedic purposes cause not recognizing Sogeking, fake Sanji and Zoro, or Ceaser just doesn't make sense. You're stupid in understanding stuff sure, but reading people? You do that amazingly well"

"Yeah well, I don't bother doing it a lot though as it's kinda boring and also intrusive" Luffy said sheepishly rubbing his head, "But now that I know the story, I guess I have context now too, so I would understand even more things if I faced such situations"

"Yeah…you also have my memories of learning human psychology now, so you would be a bigger perceptive monster" Leo added with a smirk.

Leo and White teased Luffy a bit more about some of the stupid stuff he does in the story and after another laughing fit at a pouting and embarrassed Luffy, and a couple of bumps on Leo and White's head courtesy of Luffy's fists, conversations stopped and silence descended. Luffy and Leo were extremely worried about what would happen to Luffy's world, so they tried to joke around…but it was eating away at them that they couldn't do anything. They couldn't keep their minds off of the depressing and literal existential crisis they were facing.

"So how long till we die die" Luffy asked breaking the silence.

"Around 3 more hours, I guess" White answered while scratching his chin.

"Anything we can do to hopefully live?" Leo asked expectantly. "Luffy at least should survive. It was just a story but experiencing Luffy's life made it sooo much more real. I-I can't imagine the horrors his crew and friends would face without him around"

White thought for a moment before answering "Trust me, I really want to help but I don't think I can do anything here. I can't interfere in the mortal world in any way that would help you in your current predicament. It would be like if you tried to help 2 microbes. You would just end up killing them as they're so small compared to you. Same thing with me and you as I'm on a much higher plane. Anything I try to do will just destroy your solar system. The only reason I'm even able to talk to you like this is because both of you are dying and are outside your universes near the Soul plane. Your souls resonated with each other sending out a strong signal of sorts and thus I was able to find you and talk to you guys… I could help and interfere in your universe with tools but it will take at least a month to set up. Like think of helping microbes using micron microscopes and lasers but it takes time to gather those materials right? Same with me. I don't have the right tools to interfere in your universe on such short notice… And once you completely ascend to the Soul plane, even if I pull you out, you won't be able to go back to your universe as souls who have integrated into the Soul Plane even once aren't allowed to go back to any universe"

Luffy and Leo didn't understand much of what he said, but basically inferred that he couldn't interfere.

"Best I can do is push you back into your universes but you're both dying, so you'll soon just come back here again. You need help from someone in your world to treat you and only then can you survive. I can also transfer one of yours time to the other. Basically giving more time to one of you by sacrificing the other. But Luffy's poisoned and Leo's bleeding out with cut limbs on a lonely road. Even with extra time, I don't think either of you can survive."

Leo and Luffy nodded at that and there was another long stretch of silence as they thought of anything that could help them.

Suddenly Leo perked up as he had thought of an idea. "Exactly how much time will Luffy get if you give my time to him?"

"Around 7-8 hours"

Luffy frowned and was about to ask Leo what he was thinking but Leo cut him off excitedly.

"You know where you are right? With the story's knowledge now, you should be able to figure it out."

"Yeah I already made the connection. I'm in Mariejois. Right outside the Pangaea castle in a death pit to be exact while the Reverie is ongoing. And the bubble people were Celestial Dragons and the slavers were killed because I used Conqueror's and made the bubble woman faint."

"Guess they didn't realize it was you who used Conqueror's huh" Leo guessed.

"Yeah but why wasn't I killed by that Celestial Dragon woman herself? And even before that, why did the slavers keep me alive for so long? Did they just want me to suffer that much? What did I even do to them?"

"Well you were too out of it because of sea stone and starvation and couldn't process what you were seeing but I can see your subconscious memories too" White explained, "The first two slavers you pissed off by not obeying them took it personally. They kept trying to break you and after a couple of weeks, it just became a sort of game for them to see who can break you first and pretty soon, more people joined in on the game"

"Ah I see"

"Yeah and when the Celestial Dragon woman saw you laughing at her, she got offended and ordered the slavers to bring you to her. When you still didn't break after that week of torture, she definitely wanted you so that she can personally break you. But after the first escape attempt where you used Conqueror's and made her faint, she wanted that slaver group to be punished and even forgot about you as you were their product. Thus, all the leaders of the slavers were killed and the remaining slavers didn't know what exactly had happened, so they blamed you and prolonged your torture until your second escape attempt after which, the still surviving slavers gave up"

"So that's what happened" Luffy nodded in understanding.

"That resolve is amazing Luffy" Leo chimed in with awe, "And your second escape attempt? That was Amazing with a capital A!"

"Yeah yeah" Luffy smiled at the praise, "Hope Kell and the others are safe"

"Yeah hopefully… anyway, let's get back to the topic. You also realized that the Reverie is still ongoing right? This death pit was never shown in the story but they are probably going to burn or bury everyone in the pit at the end"

"Yeah probably. What are you getting at?"

"It's been 3 days since you were thrown here and do you remember what happened during the night for the past 3 days?"

Luffy thought for a bit and with confusion said "Nothing much. They were having parties in the castle. I remember some people who were looking at us, some even walking among us and some on us. There were some kids who were playing around too using the slaves as toys…"

"Yes, but I also saw some of them taking away anyone they wanted from the pit"

"Hmmm yeah I do remember some people just taking any slave they want…But if you're thinking that someone will take a soon to be dead lethally poisoned slave, I'm pretty sure it won't happen."

"If you know the right people to look for, then yes they might."

Luffy frowned not understanding where Leo was going with this. "Who?"

"There were some nobles you recognize now right? If I saw your memories correctly, I'm pretty sure I saw Vivi on the first day. I think she was shedding tears while looking at the pit"

"…Oh yeah! That was Vivi! She looked so young!"

"And she's not the only one. I saw the Germa too" Leo added excitedly.

Finally realizing what Leo was trying to say, Luffy gasped "You mean get the attention of Reiju! She can heal me with her poison powers!"

"YESS! She and her brothers have come every night, so they should be here tonight too!"

"That's actually a really good plan" White agreed. "Getting her attention should be easy as she can probably sense if someone is staring at her but what then? How will you convince her to save you? Not like she'll take pity and save a random slave"

Leo and Luffy thought for a bit.

"You just have to mention Sanji" Leo finally said. Luffy had also come to the same conclusion. That's the only way he could survive here.

"Why not ask help from Vivi?" White suggested, "She's 14 now, so Crocodile has already started his plan to take over Alabasta. And she'll be going undercover very soon. If you reveal that Mr.0 is Crocodile, she will help you in return."

"…No, I don't think that'll work" Leo theorized, "Luffy's just a random slave she found. Even if he somehow convinces her that it's Crocodile that is ruining her country, without proof, they would get nowhere so she'll probably still go undercover. Besides, Crocodile isn't stupid. If he realized that Vivi and the royal family somehow knows his secret, he might prepone his takeover or do something worse… And the Strawhats won't be there to stop him. Also, if he prepones his takeover, and kidnaps the King and goes to the Poneglyph with Robin, Robin will obviously tell him nothing about Pluton, resulting in him killing her. Even if he doesn't, Robin will give up on life…"

After a few moments, Luffy also agreed adding "Right, if we're not there to stop him, no one will come to stop him. Even if I somehow convince the King that he's the one behind it all and the King asks for help from the World Government, they might take this chance to strike a deal with Croc to wipe out Alabasta because of their stupid grudge against the Nefertari's. And we might lose Robin. Too many variables"

Seeing Luffy analyzing a situation brought a smile to Leo's face. His personality had definitely rubbed off on him as Luffy was just like him when he theorized on forums about any future events whenever a new chapter came out. He smiled thinking that at least some of him will live on in Luffy after he's gone.

"I see. Makes sense." White agreed after processing what they said.

"So, mention Sanji in front of Reiju and hope she helps." Leo concluded and looked at Luffy, who had a deep frown on his face. Knowing Luffy, he was probably thinking that this was kind of deceiving her and didn't like it.

"Look Luffy, I know you'll have to trick her a bit as telling her all this multiverse and comic book stuff is out of the question as it will make you look crazy, and this might seem like you're deceiving her but we've got no choice here. You have to- nay, need to survive! It's not out of malice. It won't hurt her in any way. In fact, she'll be happy to know that her brother is doing well and is happy" Leo explained trying to convince Luffy.

But Leo was taken aback when Luffy looked at him as if he was stupid "I understand that already, idiot. There are way too many lives riding on this and I don't mind telling a white lie. That's not why I was frowning"

"…Then why?"

Luffy gave him a small sad smile "You're the same as me. Thinking about others even at the cost of your own life"

"Wha…?" Leo was taken aback.

"If my time and life are given to you, you'll surely be able to survive until morning and the street where you had your accident will become relatively busier. If you have even 6 hours more, you'll be found by someone, taken to a hospital and can probably survive… you also have important people in your life who will grieve for you if you're gone"

Leo averted his gaze awkwardly massaging the back of his head. He took a few moments to think and looked back into Luffy's eyes "Well if you have my memories, you should know that I never really fit in. Sure, I had music as a passion and would have loved to produce music for a living. I had friends who I could call on to hang out or have fun. But, even then, it felt kind of empty. And after Serena was gone, that feeling only got amplified. I wasn't satisfied with such a simple life… Like I wanted to do more… not shackled by physical and monetary constraints, go on adventures, not bound by stupid rules, make friends with truly amazing people, punch the living daylights out of tyrannical rulers and throw a huge victory party afterwards with everyone you saved… You are a hero to your friends, Luffy. I know your stupid stance on being a hero but you have to admit that throwing a victory party after overthrowing a tyrannical ruler feels really really good. And that's pretty much my dream."

Luffy agreed to that. He could imagine why he went around saving countries even though he didn't want to be a hero.

Leo sighed continuing, "And if I took your life and went back to my world knowing full well that I denied you the chance to live our dream, it'll eat me up inside and I guarantee that I'll end myself eventually. You have my memories, so you know I'm being absolutely truthful here. I want to do all the things I just mentioned, but my world just won't allow that… Basically, I want nothing more in my life…than...to be You", he added the last part softly as he was blushing profusely after saying something so cheesy. 'Why the fuck does this sound like a damn confession?' Leo screamed internally.

"Why the fuck does this sound like a damn confession, you fucking asshole?!" Luffy yelled in mock anger and smacked him on the head.

Both Luffy and Leo stared amusedly at each other for a second before they burst out laughing while White was mimicking what Leo had said and was laughing his ass off too.

After they calmed down, Leo held his hand out to Luffy asking for a handshake but Luffy just ignored his hand and gave him a bone crushing hug by wrapping his limbs around him, and he just laughed and returned the hug.

"Brothers?" Luffy asked and that crashed Leo's brain.

Leo stared at Luffy dumbfounded. "I…..your…br-brot…" he couldn't even get the words out and started gaping like a fish. 'Holy hell! Luffy just asked me to become his brother! Th-This is the greatest thing that has happened to me in my life! Ahh, but I'm already dead! Haha, Dead joke!… Sorry Brook for stealing your shtick.' Somewhere in the Florian triangle aboard a ghost ship, a certain skeleton suddenly felt irritated for some reason.

"C'mon, we literally know everything about each other. Let's become brothers!" Luffy pressed on.

"Y-Yes!" Leo finally stuttered nodding his head vigorously.

They wanted sake cups but seeing where they were, they just pretended like they were holding sake cups and clinked their cups together and drank it sealing their bond as brothers.

Knowing that they didn't have much time and that every second was important so that Luffy could survive, Leo decided that it was time to say goodbye.

"Okay, no time to waste. Let's do this" Leo said clapping his hands and looked at White.

"Give me your hands" White told them both and they obliged.

White just stood there holding their hands and after a few seconds he let go nodding with a huge smile "Done! Leo, you'll start disappearing in a couple minutes and Luffy, you'll wake up in your world soon after. You'll have more strength as you're getting new life energy. Don't waste it. Make every second count. And a few words of advice, the comic is a representation of your world but with Oda inputting his own ideas and events. Stuff won't happen exactly like what he wrote. Reality is more complex… Also, don't assume you know people because the story describes them. People change. Like Reiju for example. The story shows her feelings at Whole Cake when you were 19. You are currently 15 so you don't know how she was at this point."

"Yes, I understand" Luffy nodded gratefully looking at White.

"Also," Leo added, "As we discussed earlier, Uta is real and so is Naguri. So let's assume all the movies and fillers are real too…and if those are real, then they must have an effect on the rest of the world unlike in the manga. So things will be different"

"Yeah and I hope I can meet Uta sometime down the line. It's nice to know she's still alive at least. With the way Shanks was when he came back without her, I was pretty sure she had died…"

"Yeah…damn I was so hyped for the movie Red. And now I find out that Uta was in fact real. I wonder what happened to her… From the trailers, it seemed she did become a diva? But also looked like she might be the villain?"

When Leo died, the movie wasn't released yet, but the trailers and her songs were out and Leo absolutely loved the songs! He also looked forward to the movie as it looked like it would go into Shanks' history too. But alas, he died before he could watch the movie, and thus, had no idea what her story was apart from what he had seen of her in Luffy's childhood memories.

"Yeah…I hope she's okay"

"She was your first crush, Lu" Leo said with a small smile. "You were just 7, but still, she was your first real friend and you really had a crush on her"

Luffy also smiled nodding his head "Yeah, I see that now. I wanted to get strong to impress her when she came back, so I trained hard. She was the first friend my age who didn't ostracize me and could also keep up with my monstrous strength. So, of course, I wanted her to acknowledge me and looked forward to seeing her every time…Sigh…when she didn't come back, I was so heart broken huh? I also said some bad things to Shanks when he didn't tell me what happened to her…"

"Yeah, you even cried while being carried on Benn's back saying you wanted to get stronger…Maaan, there was so much stuff that happened with Shanks when you were younger that wasn't shown in the anime…And your life with Ace and Sabo too. Garp too! So much stuff happened!"

"Shishishishi yeah…not like Oda can draw each and every moment of my life huh"

"Yeah…anyway, this just cements the fact that the stuff that happened in the story might not necessarily play out the same way in your reality"

"Yeah," White added, "The movies look solo and don't make sense in the timeline of the anime, so if they are real, then they will play out differently"

Luffy understood and nodded resolutely at that. "Thanks, Leo. Thanks, White. I'm truly grateful"

Leo also nodded gratefully at White, "Yeah, thank you"

"It's nothing. You guys showed me something that's never happened before. That's more than enough payment for this small favor." White said with a smile.

Not letting go of one last chance at teasing Luffy, Leo joked "You know how to thank someone properly now? Wow."

"Asshole!" Luffy fumed with a huffing pout, "Teasing me until the end…"

Leo chuckled seeing his very cute pout but then suddenly turned serious after a moment, "Luffy…"

Sensing the serious gaze, Luffy perked up listening to him intently.

"You have my memories now too. So answer me this…" Leo said very seriously.

Luffy gulped. "What?"

Leo held Luffy's gaze for a couple more tense seconds and just as he felt himself disappearing, he asked in a serious deadpan voice "Meat or Sex. Which is better?"

Luffy just stared at him for a moment before his anger burst "STUPID JERK! I THOUGHT YOU WERE GONNA TELL ME SOMETHING IMPORTANT!"

Leo started to laugh his ass off, cackling like a madman before he started disappearing. Just before he fully disappeared, Leo calmed down, looked at Luffy and gave him a small smile.

'Live our dream!' went unsaid but still understood by Luffy.

Luffy returned a small smile of his own.

'I will!' went unsaid but understood by Leo.

As soon as Leo disappeared, Luffy could feel his own consciousness slipping… and the man who could become the Pirate King, the man who could become the freest man ever, the man who could flip the world upside down, the man who could become the most influential figure in history, the man who could save many lives and inspire generations of dreamers, the man who could bring hope into the lives of millions, the man who could become the ray of sunshine in this dark fucked up world…returned to the land of the living.

Link: https://forums.sufficientvelocity.com/threads/one-piece-new-life-one-piece-fanfic.112616/#post-26510483