Chapter 3

Shortly after the sun rose into the sky, the repairs and modifications to Merry had been completed. The hull had been reinforced with iron plates while wings and a tail had been added to the frame. The last big modification was to the figurehead. The sheep head figure had been turned into a chicken head. It was stupid... and cute as hell. Markus couldn't help smiling as he ran his hand over the hull, "You look great Merry. Soon you will get to do something very few ships ever have the chance to do, fly!"

As the whole group climbed aboard, Cricket shouted, "Saruyama alliance! Don't go slipping up now y'hear! No matter what put every last ounce of energy you have to get them up in the sky!" He turned to Luffy and smiled, "Kid, this is goodbye for now! There's one more thing I know for certain at least. Whether it's the city of gold or Sky Island, there's never been a person who's proven they don't exist! Sure, people might call it an absurd fantasy, but so what?! ISN'T THAT FANTASY PRECISELY WHAT MAKES IT SO ROMANTIC?!"

Luffy grinned widely, "Romantic, huh?"

Cricket laughed, "That's right! ... Thanks for protecting me and those two idiots. Now, Don't you go falling out of the sky!"

Everyone was shouting their goodbyes as the three ships pulled out into the ocean. The two monkey-looking men's ships were towing the Merry toward their destination. As they sailed, Usopp and Luffy played with the Southbird, turning its head in different directions and laughing when it looked directly south once again. While the silly members of the crew played and the members of the Saruyama alliance looked for the location where the knock up stream would appear, Markus looked around the Merry.

He was looking for a comfortable place to enjoy the coming hellish ride up the Skypeia. Markus decided to relax while sitting on the deck with his back against the wall leading into the cabin. A perfect spot to be whether the ship was horizontal or vertical. He closed his eyes and went into his Image Training since it would be a couple of hours until they found what they were looking for. He would use that time to enhance his Haki skills. They were the only thing that could help him if he was forced to face Enel before Luffy could defeat him.

When it came to defending against physical attacks he didn't have much to fear. Between Physical Resistance, Tekkai, and his Armament Haki he could pretty-much nullify physical damage dealt by stacking them all together. For non-physical attacks... He only had his Armament Haki. While it could prevent more than half of the damage dealt, he was certain Enel's attacks would be on a whole different level. He also highly doubted that his Conqueror's Haki would have much effect. Even weak people had been able to resist Luffy's.

He summoned hundreds of minion level people and used his Conqueror's Haki to knock them all out to grind its level. He summoned the strongest people he could, who couldn't one-shot him, like Mihawk, and beat the hell out of them with his Armament Haki and bare fists. He summoned mid-level opponents and just stood there while they wailed on him to raise his Physical Resistance and Tekkai. He summoned Smoker, who could chase him in the air, and used his Geppo to run away. He summoned Bellamy and used him as a racing partner to practice his footwork. Like that, he practiced as many of his skills as he possibly could.

During his training, he chugged his Health and Willpower potions like they were candy. He also made sure to keep his crafting queue filled and continue to level it. He had no idea what level it needed to be to work with Seastone but he might get lucky. He wasn't going to count on it though. If he couldn't, maybe he could get his Haki strong enough to cover bullets with. That would take that dick Enel by surprise!

He trained for a solid two hours. When he opened his eyes the entire crew was staring at him in shock. Markus tilted his head to the side, "What?"

The whole crew shouted, "YOU'RE COVERED IN BLOOD!"

Markus blinked and looked down at himself. His eyes widened a bit. He might have gotten a bit carried away with letting the NPCs in his Image Training beat him up. He was sitting in a pool of his own blood and his clothing was soaked in it. Chopper was panicking, "You've lost too much blood!"

Chopper immediately began to examine Markus but there were no wounds on his body. Thanks to the passive skill 'Life is but a Game' his body didn't keep wounds for more than a few seconds. Even if someone tried to decapitate him, his head would remain on his shoulders and he would just lose some of his HP. Markus waved Chopper off, "I'm fine, I'm fine. It's just a bit of blood."

"A BIT?!"

Markus laughed, "I might have gotten too carried away in my Image Training. I'll be fine! So, are we there yet?"

That earned him something rare. Nami slammed her fist into his head, "Don't worry us like that, you idiot!"

Nami's blow was hard enough to slam his face into the deck of the ship. Even more shocking was that her blow hurt like hell and even caused a bump to form on his head. That should have been impossible! Markus rubbed his head and looked at Nami with a soft smile, "Sorry for worrying you." He looked at the others, "Sorry for worrying you all."

Soon, his little mistake was forgotten, especially after Chopper gave the all-clear. Just under an hour later, a dark shadow could be seen. They quickly made their way toward it, the knock up stream was coming early! The three ships made their way toward the darkness in the direction indicated by the divers from Shoujou's ship. They could discover the spot the stream would come from thanks to his sonar ability.

As they got closer they could see an enormous whirlpool had formed in the ocean. As they approached, Masira called out, "I'll take you to the whirlpool!"

Nami, looking scared as any same person would, called back, "Then what?!"

Masira laughed, "Then just follow the current all the way to the center!"

As their ship moved into the current of the whirlpool Nami and Usopp panicked. Chopper looked enchanted. Sanji was saying stupid flirty things. Robin was just fascinated by the size of the whirlpool. Zoro was resigned. Markus was just smiling lightly and staying put. Luffy was on Merry's head screaming, "LET'S GOOOOOOOOOOOO!!"

As the ship moved deeper into the whirlpool they saw a giant yellow sea king being helplessly pulled into it. Nami and Usopp tried, one last time, to convince Luffy to not go. He was far too excited. There was nothing in the world that could convince him not to go. Markus doubted that he could even be convinced not to go even if they spotted Laugh Tale right then and there.

Markus didn't bother with anything. This had been his goal since the moment he saw Avlida when she was still a fat hag. He was smiling just as widely as Luffy was! At that moment, the ship passed the edge of the whirlpool and began falling into it. Markus gripped the ship tightly and waited. Logically, he knew they would succeed. Logically, he knew that even if something happened and they failed, he could survive using Geppo. Logically, he should have had no reason at all to be scared. Logic did not stop his heart from hammering in his chest like mad or stop him feeling his stomach rising into his throat as the feeling of gravity vanished.

However, just a moment later the ship stopped falling and the top of the ocean became calm. Markus tilted his head to the side. Something was missing... He tilted his head further to the side as he tried to think about it. There was something else that was supposed to happen right about now but he couldn't remember what. It didn't seem important so he let it go. At that moment, Nami looked down at the deck of the ship, "It's starting!!"

The ship began to rock violently as the water started to rise right beneath them. The water was being pushed up in a dome shape but that didn't last long. With a deafening roar, the ocean exploded and blasted a massive pillar of water into the air. The Going Merry was pushed along for the ride! There were screams of fear from several of the crew members. Markus sat in the same position he was before. The wall provided an excellent perch for his back! Zoro had a similar idea, but he was standing on the wall. The others were just hanging on wherever they could.

As they climbed higher pieces of another ship began falling from the sky and were followed by the sea king they saw previously. Markus listened as the rest of the crew discussed what to do about the ship slowly coming away from the pillar of water. Nami was thinking rapidly and came up with a solution, "Everyone! Raise the sails! This is still the ocean, it's not some separate stream of water! What we're doing now is sailing an ocean current! The heat from the blast has created a skyward wind! As long as we're dealing with seas and winds I can navigate through them! Did you forget who the navigator of the ship is?!"

Markus joined the others in getting the sails set. Once set, the sails billowed as they caught the rising wind. The Going Merry was pulled completely off of the water of the knock up stream and literally flew through the air. Markus placed his hand on Merry and grinned, "Look at you go. I told you that you'd get to fly. Now, take us to Sky Island!"

As if listening to what Markus said, the ship accelerated faster and faster, pushing them up into the sky. As they rose higher and higher, Markus started finding it harder to breathe. Up so high in the sky the air got thinner. A few moments later the ship blew through the clouds and landed roughly on 'water'. Everyone was soaked from traveling through the bottom of the sea they'd just landed in. Markus stayed where he was and breathed slowly. He needed to adapt to the thinner air before he did anything stressful.

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New Quest!

Crushing 'God'

The true Gods do not appreciate Enel thinking he's one of them. His every breath infuriates them. Destroy Enel, his Priests, and his army.

Objective 1: Defeat members of Enel's Divine Soldiers

Objective 2: Defeat any of the four priests of Enel

Objective 3: Defeat Enel

Failure Conditions: Death, Death of a crewmember

Rewards:

Objective 1: Dials will become available in the System Shop

Objective 2: Ancient and Extinct Dials become available in the System Shop

Objective 3: Rewards TBD

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Markus looked over the quest while excited conversation broke out as everyone looked over the pure white cloud sea they were currently floating on top of. As everyone was looking around, Usopp jumped onto the edge of the ship and stripped off his boots. For some reason, god knows what, he also lowered the suspenders on his overalls, "For my first course! Captain Usopp will swim!"

Markus hopped to his feet and dashed over to grab Usopp by his nose while Luffy and Chopper were cheering him on, "Idiot! We're in a whole new sea, thousands of feet up in the air. Do you want to swing completely through the clouds and fall back to the ground?! Are the clouds even thick enough to swim in?! What might live in those clouds that will find you to be a tasty snack?!"

Usopp's whole body began to shudder in fear, his shudders becoming worse with each possible horrible death Markus mentioned. Markus let go of his nose, "If you're still okay with it then go ahead and jump in."

Usopp hopped off of the railing and started putting his clothing back on, "Come to think of it my 'I can't swim in clouds' disease is kicking in!"

Markus smirked and walked back to his spot to relax... well a foot away from his old spot. He needed to clean the blood off the deck and wall still. Though, passing through the ocean had cleaned the majority of it off. As he relaxed a large purple snake-like creature burst out of the water and came toward the ship. It was quickly taken care of. When he saw it, Usopp wiped imaginary sweat off his brow, "Safe!"

While the others chatted, Markus pulled out his revolvers and checked that they were both fully loaded. He always kept them loaded but it was a good idea to make sure. His Armament Haki was still growing, he planned to focus on it for a while, at least until he could coat his bullets with it. He also wanted to level up Rankyaku more, he wanted to not only increase the width of the attack but try to infuse his Armament Haki into it as well. It would be extremely deadly if he could.

As he was making plans, Chopper called out, "A ship! I see a ship! And... a person?" As he continued to look he exclaimed in surprise, "Eh...? What?! EH?!"

Markus looked over and then looked away. He'd leave dealing with Wyper and Gan Fall to the others. He focused on his memories. He'd reviewed the Skypiea arc multiple times but he went over it again. He had to be careful with his steps here. If he made one wrong move he could lose the fruit for good. He hadn't thought about it before, but he'd already changed things a lot. For starters, the 'Mantra' used by Enel and his priests would no longer be a surprise or unknown. The entire crew would recognize it as Observation Haki. Luffy had even developed a few moves to deal with it, like his Shotgun.

Markus had taken the time to teach everyone about Observation Haki and how it worked. If they could do anything about it... that was up to them. He also planned to abstain from many of the fights that were about to happen. Especially Zoro's fights. They would help him learn how to perform flying slash attacks. While he made his plans, Wyper attacked and was repelled by Luffy and the arrival of Gan Fall. When he saw Gan Fall's bird, Pierre, turn into a horse for the first time, he groaned internally.

Feeding the Pierre the Uma Uma no Mi was such a waste. If he had a second extraction serum he'd totally steal the Uma Uma no Mi from Pierre then find a beautiful large bird and feed it the fruit for a beautiful pegasus. He wouldn't need a flying mount but he could gift it to Nami. He smiled at that thought. She would probably love having one. Sadly, the only other option would be to kill Pierre and hope one of the fruits he had stored in his inventory matched it. He couldn't bring himself to do that though.

As the others tried to figure out how to get higher up, Markus closed his eyes and focused on using his Seimei Kikan. He wanted to see if he could find a way to reduce his presence and make himself nearly invisible to Enel and the priests. The events that happened in Skypiea had a lot of consequences due to how things happened and what went down. If things didn't happen properly, the Birkans and Skypians could end up continuing their war. It shouldn't matter much to him since he would leave the place but... he didn't like the idea of innocent people getting hurt. Being around Luffy and the others had given him a sense of justice.

After a while, they finally found Heaven's Gate, the entrance to Skypiea. As they pulled up to the gate, a door opened and a tiny old woman with small wings on her back walked out. She held up a device that looked just like a camera, just made of wood and shells. She started snapping photos of the crew as she asked in a withered old voice, "Are you here for sightseeing or... for fighting?" Before the crew could answer she continued at her own pace, "Actually, it doesn't matter why you're here. If you want to go up, each person must pay a one billion Extol entrance fee. That's the law."

Luffy was shocked, "An angel! So that's how Angels look! She looked like a pickled plum..."

Usopp was shocked by the sheer number unaware that one Belly was equal to 10,000 Extol making the entrance fee just 100,000 Belly a person or 700,000 total. Unfortunately, the ship only had about 50,000 Belly at the moment. Minus what Markus had hidden inside of his inventory right now. Luffy pretty much ate all of their money. Nami was the one to ask, "If... we... um don't have any money..."

The old lady answered, "You can still go up. Also, if you don't want to go up... it's okay too. I'm not a guard nor am I a soldier. I just want to know your... intentions."

Luffy immediately shouted, "Then we're going! We want to go to Sky Island! Even though we don't have any money, we're going granny!!"

"Really? Eight people right?"

Luffy looked a bit confused but answered, "Right! But how do we get up?"

As if to answer Luffy for her, two giant red claws appeared out of the white cloud-like sea and grabbed onto the broken sections of the ship where the wings used to be. Everyone looked confused and asked what was going on as the old lady explained, "That's white sea's special 'Speedy Shrimp'..."

The shrimp was gigantic and didn't fit its name at all. With a firm grip on the ship, it took off and propelled them along a road made of clouds and suspended in the air. Everyone was shocked as they started climbing the waterfall. As the ship moved rapidly up the waterfall roadway they spotted a sign. Nami read the sign out loud, "Godland... Skypiea?!"

The shrimp propelled the ship through a short tunnel before launching it into the air. Everyone watched with wide eyes as the Sky Island came into sight. They had finally arrived and could see signs of civilization. Luffy shouted, "There's and Island! It's Sky Island!!"