In the middle of nowhere (III)

He had done many things in his ten years of life.

From bathing in the blood of his enemies to burn to the ground an entire section of Coatl and be one of the reasons that his civilization had been unified.

The feats that he had done were something worthy to be told through generations to come, as either a savage demon or a great warrior sent by the heavens.

He had never felt in place while living on that island.

No matter how hard he tried, no matter how much love his mother and uncle showered in, he still felt out of place and unsatisfied living in Coatl, tolerate the stares that the rest of the people would give him.

He still felt out of place here, but he felt more at place here than in Coatl.

He didn't feel the constant stares around him and the feelings of displeasure from his mere presence. The only bothersome thing was getting Chip to eat her vegetables and make Bonney work for the food that she wanted to eat; it was understandable in Chip's case as he also didn't like the flavor of vegetables and preferred things like meat and the like as he would usually get sick from eating vegetables, but having been instilled into valuing the importance of consuming such things as it was something that helped with the healthy growth of a person (Despite him never feeling healthy while eating those things) made him want to give her as many nutrients as she could have.

As it was one of the main teachings that had been given to the younger generations by the older ones, he had been instilled in such traditions since very young despite his obvious dislike and incapability to consume them, and he could see from where these teaching had come from, as it was to be expected of such fate when their natural environment was filled by dangerous beasts, from which the average specimen from the weakest species could take down five of their hunters from a group of fifty hunters.

The people of Coatl had been forced to eat the fishes found in the waters infested with the titanic beasts that the elders had referred to as Sea Kings, but they mostly depended on the vegetables and fruits.

It was only until he had joined the forces of the hunters that they had managed to go towards greater challenges.

Another thing that had been carved into his mind was the value of the next generations, putting great care into the protection and their nutrition, and that was a lot of work considering that the average amount of children that a normal family had reached to twenty-five. His uncle was weird in the eyes of the village as he only had a single child with his woman and decided to not have another woman as he had promised to her that he would give everything to take care of their child when she had died.

Thus... what the whale was doing was unacceptable!

"Leviatan! Get Chip down in this instant!"

"Relax, she is having fun~"

WHILE BEING THROWN TO THE AIR LIKE A DOLL?!

High enough in the air to probably see above the tallest tree of this island they were in. He was constantly repositioning himself in the area around the whale girl, his eyes never leaving the small shape of Chip that went up and down constantly while giggling.

He circled Leviatan, one would think of him as a predator trying to find a weak point in a prey hard to crack with the gaze that he had on her.

"Atl~" The calm voice of the giant tried to call his attention while putting the bowl he had made from wood away from the black hole known as Bonney. "Come eat, I doubt that Levia would do any harm to Chip when she spoils her so much."

The whale girl spluttered out protests, her cheeks red but never denying that she did spoil the little pale child a lot.

Still looking at them while consuming his food, he took notice that it no longer tasted like charred meat. It amazed him how good she had gotten at cooking just by looking at this decently cooked meat compared to the atrocities that she had done before.

A whole week of trying and trying... and being a victim to those atrocities, and being forced by Hreinn to smile and his stomach suffered while his body tried to reject the abomination inside his system.

Looking at her from the corner of his eyes, he could see how smug and proud she looked.

One couldn't help but let out their laughter.

"Come on, pretty boy." The whale girl had to add her two cents with that obnoxious smile of hers. "You can't just giggle like that." Her smile just grew larger as his patience grew thinner. "Makes me want to see under that skirt of yours to check if you truly are a male."

The bowl of wood was destroyed while his eye twitched.

With his melting hand on blue flames, he tried to calm himself down.

Then the little child landed on his face and make him fall to the sand.

The coarse, rough, and irritating sand. The very same sand that got everywhere in his body.

"Nnnn... Leviatan ("Ou?")... naaaaa... you have ten seconds to get into safe waters before I decided to punch you to the other side of the island. One-"

And run she did, fast enough for the normal eye to be considered a blur, she ran away not out of fear for him, but out of fear for the giant gentle girl, they were going to blow off steam in the other side of the beach where she wouldn't see them.

"You two are going to fight again."

The large girl complained with a pout and narrowed eyes landing on him.

"Yes." He didn't deny, for what use would there be to deny it?

And so Hreinn stood up, Chip in hand, and went into the direction that Leviatan had gone to, the distant scream that followed pleased him.

Their relationship... he felt oddly comfortable with everyone, even the annoying whale, she felt like an annoying little sister.

It was the day after the last full moon he had seen the day before his whole island had been destroyed by the bubblehead and the other guy in a white coat.

Celestial dragons... marines...

One Piece.

It took him some time, but he was finally able to put the memories together and manage to remember as much as he could in this time with these girls and Berry, along with reading a few of the half-torn records found in the wreckage of the ship.

It was one of the many things he had used as entertainment that he had used to read/watch in the life before this one.

He could put the whole picture thanks to the records they had found that had triggered quite a few memories as he continued reading the remains of the information found on them... and he had been wrong, those memories would help him, no matter how blurry and distant most seemed.

Then again, this world could be different, what law was there to say that this was the same place from those blurry memories? His mere existence had changed everything... or maybe it hadn't as he was just a single grain of sand in a vast desert, basically piling a weight so low to the world that he wasn't even considered.

Whatever the state of the world was...

"I would have liked to eat Enel's fruit."

He muttered with a dissatisfied expression as he tried to clean off the sand from the meat.

Or maybe go to find the devil fruit related to gold or maybe even the fruit of darkness he remembered to be a strong one, it would be a good thing.

It was obvious what Devil Fruit he had consumed... and until he didn't manage to unlock Armament Haki, it would always feel like a waste considering that there was a powerful fruit in the sky waiting to be eaten by an idiot with a god complex that would be defeated by a child of rubber, a nice child of rubber and an idiot with the power to destroy an island... but it still felt like he had lost an opportunity even if he didn't know where it was located that fruit.

"What good use can I put to chocolate?"

"To be consumed?"

The familiar voice of Bonney helpfully added as she munched in the large piece of meat she had cooked to be edible for normal people, she had also begun to get bolder and try her hand on the seasoning of the meat, and so far, it tasted great. He could consume it raw and don't get sick, but he was used to eating cooked food like the rest.

"In battle."

"Oh... to be eaten."

Bonney once again added while looking at him as if he was an idiot, while he looked at her in the same way. Memories about her... she holds grudges and was hot-headed, it seemed like she hadn't changed over the years since she was also hot-headed as a child.

It was weird, he had never spoken much back in Coatl, being completely direct to his family members, the hunters or the fishers. While here... he continuously talked, they asked many things and didn't like the idea of silence, he felt like he should have been annoyed, but he quickly found the time with them as enjoyable as their presence was... even with how annoying a certain whale was.

Clapping his hands, melting it, then spreading it.

There, in between his palms, a thick brownish substance slowly tried to fall to the ground.

He could make chocolate really sticky, hot liquid, or hard depending on what he wanted.

... No Devil Fruit was weak, actually, there were some Devil Fruits that seemed weak at first, like the Gomu Gomu no mi or the Bara Bara no mi, in the right (Or wrong, depending on which side one was in) hands these two, and many more fruits like those, could wreak so much havoc that their users would be recognized as monsters.

How to make himself stronger with a fruit that had turned him into a man whose body was made of chocolate?

... Heh, he still had the same mentality he had on the island, to become stronger so that he would survive the next day. Not that there was anything wrong with it, for the world only tolerated those with power, and those who had none were simply swept by the strong or had to live under their shadow, and he had enough of living in the shadow of beasts.

For now, becoming strong should be one of the things that he should focus on since the idea of the many beings that went beyond the mere concept of monsters breathing in the same air as he made him uncomfortable considering that he had no way to defend himself against them in his current level... and a way to become stronger was to have a mastery over his Mantra... over Haki.

The two colors that he needed to learn to use... the question would be how to awaken Armament Haki and get better in the use of his Observation, he needed to get skilled enough to be able to use it in such a way that he would be untouchable.

He needed to try harder to remember who was the person he was thinking about, but there was a person that could even see the future with the ability he had been born with.

If one were to ask him how he felt about this knowledge, the knowledge that the ocean held monsters that would make the average predator in his island seem like a pet, he would say that it was satisfying finally understanding why he could *hear* and *feel* the *voices* of the people, their auras. It was also nice to know that he wasn't the only one hearing these things.

While he was busy with his inner thoughts, the small pink-haired girl, frustrated for having being ignored in such a way, decided to call his attention... and what better way to do it than with a slap...

It hurt for her, it had been like hitting a boulder or something hard like that rather than having hit flesh.

Still, it succeeded in one of its intentions, calling the attention of the boy.

"Nnh?" He made a sound to call her attention, seeing her dancing around like a headless cockatrice. "What?"

Still clutching her hand, she looked as furiously as her full mouth could afford to the cause of her current pain. "What?" She repeated incredulously with a twitch of her right eye. "What the hell are you made of? I had broken a barrel with my bare hands in the past, but hitting you still hurt."

He looked at her, she looked at him... and all he did was shrug, for neither he knew why he was like this.

"My skin has always been hard, the stones brought from the volcano would break after coming into contact with my skin and the teeth of large beasts would have a hard time piercing mine."

Had he ever been truly harmed in the past? Or was it just an illusion of his mind, remembering a time where his skin was as soft as the average person?

"Tch." She turned around while clutching her hand.

He wondered when had he went towards her to grab her hand and cover it in the blue fire he was so used to see. She tried to pull her hand away in fear, he didn't even notice for his focus was found on easing the pain of her hand.

1... 2... 3

Ta-da~

And so, silence returned, she stared at her palm with eyes as wide as the coconuts found in the pile of food she was planning to eat while he started taking the sand off his body.

"The fuck was that?" She stared at him with a look that demanded an answer, upon not hearing an answer from the boy, gritting her teeth, she repeated once again. "What was that?"

"The people from where I came from." He started, seeing that she was not going to just leave this topic alone. "Had found many ways of surviving, amongst them, supernatural techniques." A clap of his hands, focusing all his energy into igniting a flame from the warmth of his body and thus a flame of blue color was born. "From controlling their muscles to become as hard as boulders, releasing bursts of lightning, launching cuts without blades, launching powerful waves of air capable of leaving a mark in the ground just with their fists or summoning a mystic fire at will." Waves of memories of many battles passed through his eyes before returning to the present. "For them to live on that island, the people had to adapt, become stronger, so they would be able to distribute the food for the strongest to survive."

From the many numbers of children that each family would have, if a parent was lucky, they would see five of their children having children of their own but on average it was expected that only a single child would be alive by the time they were adults in the eyes of the elders.

"Sounds... familiar."

"Your island had food problems, right?"

She huffed in what seemed to be amusement, the storm in her aura told a different story, a violent story.

"We had problems with everything." Swallowing a tangerine whole after peeling it, munching it for a short time before swallowing before she continued, feelings of impotence, rage, and longing were the most notorious things he could feel. "The island I come from was named Taur, it was a barren land that could not pay the government for their protection thus we were abandoned and became the punching bag of the seas, it was normal for us to see slaver ships or pirates every day." Ripping violently a watermelon in two with ease, dirtying the both of them, her rage started to swallow whatever other emotion he could feel from her. "The news of the outside world was brought by the same people that abused us, and one day a man came, capable of creating lives where there wasn't... all seemed good." She munched the food in anger, for a moment he believed that she had bit her tongue as well due to the blood that splat on the ground. "Then... a trash bubblehead decided that the appearance of our island was ugly and ordered his ships to destroy every bit of what little civilization was still there... the survivors like me were taken by him as his slaves or were killed off." Her lips quivered and sadness was mixed with her anger. "My father wanted to keep me and my sister safe tried to fight off that trash's dogs but was instantly killed... he didn't mark me in the time in that ship, but he did mark my sister and did whatever he wanted with her."

And from biting off her lip, blood started to fall as his mind became numb to the image, those words making him re-play the memories of what he had faced in the last day of his civilization, making his eyes gain a vicious light of murder.

And all he that left his lips was an emotionless 'I see'.

"So what now?"

The words suddenly left his mouth, his words were aimed at no one in particular, practically he was saying that to himself. Bonney answered his question a few moments later after she had calmed herself down.

"What do you mean by 'what now'?"

"Think about it." He pointed at the place where he, Berry, and Leviatan had left all the bodies, even now Berry was putting the last pieces of dirt to bury them so they wouldn't cause them troubles like making them catch some illness, but mostly to make sure that the disgusting smell of their corpses was not something they smelled in their daily basis. "There were important people there, won't there be a rescue mission? And when they find out that they are not alive, what will happen to us?"

Her facial expression fell and he could feel how her heart dropped to the ground, every sort of warm feeling was suddenly buried under the cold despair of the terrifying memories of what had happened in that ship.

"No." She breathed out as he grinds his teeth to the image of his mind. The last thing was a sudden thought, he had not been thinking about it at all the time he was on this unknown island, but it came out of nothing, a comet of information that made him sweat cold at the mental image of a man that could freeze the entire island on a whim if he so desired and of a man who could make hell come to earth.

The mental image of those two beings was not the one of a monster, it was something else.

"We need to find a way to get out of this island... or at the very least get away from this zone to make them less suspicious of us."

"We are the only ones here idiot!"

She punched his face, the only one feeling pain was her but she ignored it completely.

"What do you suggest then?"

"... You have been playing with those books, right?" A nod with a strange twist to his face, not finding out the- It struck him and he ran off to find the object he was trying to find.

"I think there was one that looked like the blueprints of a ship, but I cannot read it." It was a fortune that he had left it in a place easy so close to this place. "Not to mention that there are many parts that are torn or unreadable due to it having fallen to the water." It was large, possibly double the size of his chest.

The state of the object was pitiful, the pages were barely hanging and some seemed to have been put hastily between random pages after being separated from the record.

"Why didn't you told us?"

Bonney growled in anger while looking straight into the eyes of the horned boy.

"I told Berry, he took a look at the record and-"

"We don't have the materials to make a ship like the ones on the blueprints." Berry barged in with an apprehensive expression while carefully getting behind Atl, a distance away from Bonney but at the same time getting close to trying to take a look at the book in the trembling hand of the girl that was about to explode. "Not to mention that with you eating so much food, we do not have reserves to make safely sail to wherever we manage to go with the erratic weather that surrounds this island... I thought I told you that, Atl."

"... You said that." He answered with fake innocence hiding his embarrassment for having ignored him when he had said so many important things.

"Pay more attention to me, Atl!" It didn't work! His tactic of trying to look as innocent as a fanged bunny ready to pounce at it's victims didn't work!

It wasn't that he had ignored the guy with ill-will, it was just... his attention span was fucked in anywhere that was not a hunt or a battle!

But they would never know and for that he had to remain vigilant to every word that left their mouths-

"Oi, Atl, did you just ignore me once again?"

Dammit!

And so he withstood the scolding from the teenager... or rather ignored most of it and had to listen to it many times.