Temporary mates

"Are you being serious?"

"Is it really?"

Mashira and Shoujo were very gullible and immediately got excited hearing the words of Ken, but Cricket was the smarty pants here and started thinking of the implications of the words of Ken. The Log Pose of Nami had already established that there was something up there. And he had seen Knock Up Stream multiple times from far away, and it was massive.

There was really a high chance that what Ken just spoke of was the actual truth. He had been searching for the lost kingdom for such a long time and still couldn't find anything except for a few gold items, which halfheartedly proved that there might have been a kingdom here, but all of this wasn't enough.

He needed to see the real kingdom.

"Are you sure about that?" Cricket asked.

"Why don't you, Mashira and Shoujo, come with us to Skypea to see it with your own eyes?" There might be more surprises waiting for you."

Luffy and others didn't expect that Ken would even offer them a ride to Sky Island. Though Luffy was the captain here, Ken could definitely allow a temporary ride for someone.

"Ken, are you so sure that the lost kingdom is up there? Nami asked.

"Not exactly, but I have a feeling of that." Ken said. Nami's eyes instantly lit up like a thousand-watt headlight. It was so bright that everyone had to put their hands up to stop her shining eyes from blinding everyone.

She had already heard of the gold, and now she couldn't stop herself from getting there and taking the gold.

"We can't go up with you. I can't put my friends lives in danger just because I want to prove something from the past." Cricket said. According to him, there was only one way to go up, and that was the knock-up stream, which had an almost 100% death rate.

"No, we will go."

"How can you say that? We want to prove that Mont Blanc Norland was right." Mashira and Shoujo immediately protested against Cricket's words.

"Who said we will go to Skype using the knock-up stream? That will be stupid if we do that. I don't want Merry to suffer. It had suffered enough." Ken said.

"Then how will you go up?" Cricket asked. Knocking upstream was the only way that they could get up. There was no other known option.

"We will take care of that, and I can guarantee you that going up will be a very safe journey. The only thing I can't guarantee is about the island up there." Ken said. Even though he did invite them on the journey on a whim, he did remember the main problem that was up there.

Enel and his goons.

Enel was probably one of those cases where so much potential was wasted due to a lack of knowledge. He didn't know the presence of Armament Haki, or else it would have been much tougher for him to get defeated by Luffy.

Plus, Luffy was his natural enemy. Cricket was in deep contemplation about this. He was very tempted about visiting with them, and Mashira and Shoujo were actively persuading Cricket.

"I want some time for this." Cricket said. Ken just shrugged his shoulders.

"Ken, how will we go up?" Vivi couldn't help but ask. Caroo could fly a long distance, but she felt like going up high in the air might not be his forte.

"I will use my Stormbreaker," Ken said.

"Are you crazy? It will break the ship instantly." Ussop shouted out loud. Everyone else had the same thought.

"Relax. The bifrost has other ways to be used too. All you need to do is add wheels on the underside, and Caroo can do the rest." Ken said.

"We will trust you on this." Sanji said. With those words, everything was settled, and they got to work. Nami and Ussop were actively retrofitting the ship. They punched some holes in the underside of the ship and attached huge wheels on them, which also had rubber on them, so that the journey was a smooth one.

This new version of Merry took time, while Ken and others just helped them when they could. Cricket was confused by this but didn't ask, as he wanted to see how these people would go up.

Ken had a little sadness in his face. This was probably the last arc for this ship. After this, their ship would change. Ken wanted to preserve this ship as much as possible because he wanted their new ship to have Merry as its backbone.

After a few hours, everything was ready.

"Yosh! Of we go to the Sky Island." Luffy got up and was all hyped. Everyone too was ready for their new exciting journey. Ken took out his Stormbreaker, got up over the head of the Merry, and placed the weapon on top of it.

Stormbreaker immediately opened up the Bifrost, only this time it didn't suck him away but placed a colorful road ahead of them. Everyone had shining eyes looking at it. Some of them had experienced the Bifrost's violent pulling but never this 'good side' of it.

Cricket and others had never seen anything like this before, and they were in awe. Caroo came forward and was tied to the ship so that it could pull it while it changed to therian form. In fact, Chopper wanted to turn itself into an elephant and pull, but was stopped by Ken.

If Chopper pulled Merry, it would take ages to reach the top. With Caroo, it would take less time.

"We want to go with you." Cricket pulled up her courage and asked. Seeing everything around, he was too tempted right now. Ken then looked at Luffy, who nodded his head while chewing on a huge piece of meat.

"Hop in. I am sorry that your crew can't come." Ken said. Mashira and Shoujo had huge crews, but Ken couldn't bring them. There would be a massacre up there, and these unnamed people would just die.

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