277. No Longer A Pirate

After the match, everyone is curious about Luffy's reason to ask for an arm-wrestling match because it's quite out of his character.

"I just want Jon's last battle as a pirate is against me. But we can't have a real battle because when Jon & Zoro fought, I could see a lot of times they were hesitating in their attacks. It's just impossible to truly go all out in a fight between friends because we won't try to kill each other. That's why I asked for an arm-wrestling match that tested our strength instead."

What Luffy says really makes sense for them. Besides, if Jon & Luffy fight seriously, then it will destroy an island, so they should avoid that. Just an arm-wrestling match has already caused such destruction, so no one wants to see the result of their serious battle.

"Are you sure you guys don't want to meet Vivi?"

"It's fine. We will see you and her again at your wedding anyway. Besides, it will be hard to part ways if we keep delaying it."

"Alright, if that's what you want."

"Then, it's time to go. Let's meet again from time to time. You have teleportation, so there's no reason to not visit us."

"I know, I'll meet you when I have free time. Take care of yourselves and I leave Jane to your care. She is still too weak."

"Don't worry. You know we always protect each other."

"Yeah. You guys too. Call me anytime you need my help or if you just miss me."

Jon smiles and they talk for a while before the Straw Hat Pirates leave. They wave at each other with big smiles on their faces. But once they can't see each other, those smiles disappear and a lot of tears flow out of their eyes.

They have been together as a crew for almost 12 years. This is not the end of their relationship and they still can meet each other. But even if it's not forever, this is still a separation and an end of their lives together as a crew. Now Jon will walk a different path from them.

'Do you regret it, kid?'

"No, it's a sad choice, but I'll never regret it. This is my choice, this is my path, and this is what I want to do. Also, it's hard to accomplish my dream if I keep being a member of a pirate crew."

Jon's dream is to know everything in the world or simply to say, gathering all information. To do that, he needs to build an intelligence organization. He has built a hidden village and trained ninjas to gather information for him in Alabasta.

However, he couldn't fully control it to develop the hidden village and ninjas because he was a member of a Pirate crew. He needed to follow wherever the crew went, so he couldn't manage the hidden village and his ninjas well.

That's why he needs to leave the crew to fully grow his hidden village. But he also loves his pirate crew, so he stayed with them for a long time before deciding to leave. Now he can focus on developing his hidden village to chase his dream.

"My hidden village will be the best intelligence organization. Not even the World Government's Cipher Pol will be a match for it."

'Sometimes you need to make sacrifices to achieve your goal. But remember that your goal is not an easy thing to achieve. Heck! I would even say that it's straight impossible to know everything in the world. You are not a God.'

"But isn't that why this dream is worth chasing, Kurama? Trying to achieve the impossible, that's what will make this 2nd life much more interesting."

'I think I heard humans say to dream as high as possible. But you simply dream for the impossible. And I like it.'

"I may never achieve my dream in my whole life, but that means I'll never lose my dream and won't need a new dream because I reach my dream."

Jon and Kurama have a talk about life and dream as they walk to Alubarna. By walk, it means that Kurama is walking with Jon on his back after Jon summoned him. Kurama wants to go out and Jon doesn't want to walk that long of a distance from the coast to Alubarna.

By the way, Jon doesn't tell Vivi that he is coming to Alabasta today. Obviously he doesn't tell her that he quits from the crew. So she will be very surprised and he needs to be ready to answer a lot of her questions.

Then as he thought, Vivi is very shocked and asks a lot of questions about why he made that decision. So he tells her all his reasons from marrying her to developing the hidden village. He needs to quit being a pirate to get all of those things.

"But don't worry, Vivi. I will still take you to sail the sea and explore the world because I know you also want to have a great adventure. But we can't do that while I'm still a pirate. It will be safer for you and Alabasta if we do that after I become a member of the Alabasta Kingdom and marry you. I will still have my bounty, but I will be a royalty and not a pirate anymore. So the World Government won't be able to do anything about us when we explore the world."

"Will that really be the case?"

"Well, hopefully. If that doesn't work, then I will just take over a Kingdom and be a King before marrying you."

"Please don't do that, that's scary."

"Hahaha, well, it's just a plan B. I'm sure the World Government and Marines are smart enough to not mess with a Great Kingdom and someone they themselves acknowledged as the strongest."

"How can you be so sure they won't just declare a war with us? They have put you as one of the most dangerous people in the world."

"Alabasta is one of the few Kingdoms that have participated in creating the new World Government. And whether they admit it or not, I had a big role in that too along with Straw Hat Pirates. They won't record it in official documents, but that's the fact. That's why I'm sure they will ignore this matter once we ask them."

"Makes sense. You also have connections with them, so it should be possible. Then our marriage shouldn't be a problem. We just need to give you a noble rank and introduce you to the citizens to make everything go smoothly and stay on the procedures."

Jon & Vivi then start talking about their marriage with the Royal Family. They even talk about making Jon the next King of Alabasta, but he refuses because it's too much work. Besides, they have Vivi's half-little brother now that can be the King.

"I just need the hidden village to have a certain level of freedom while still being a part of the Kingdom. We need to do a lot of operations and we can't keep asking the Kingdoms for permission, after all."

"No problem. You were the one that built that place and you should be its leader. The leader of a specialized intelligence unit should have the same rank as an Army General, and it should be high enough to allow you to marry the princess without anyone protesting against it. Though I doubt anyone will be against you marrying Vivi anyway, but it's the most appropriate procedure."

"I will leave this difficult official stuff to you old men."

"Sigh, that's not how you talk to this father-in-law of yours, you know. But well, it really is mine & Igaram's job. Now, let's talk about the wedding."