Another Path

The marines were left laying on the street whilst confused townsfolk looked upon them, unsure if they should be frightened, outraged, or amused. In the end they decided to just go about their days' business and pretend they hadn't seen anything at all.

Mean old man Martin dragged his rodent-like apprentice back into his shop. Later the poor boy would receive a lengthy verbal lashing followed by months worth of tedious busy work as punishment for being such a tattletale.

As Cabernet launched into the air with the other three on board, Cherry wondered if she should go looking for her grandmother.

'No, that would be too troublesome.' Cherry concluded. 'Grandma Angela is a capable and intelligent woman. I'm sure that she will work out that I'll eventually wind up on Sabaody Archipelago and probably wait for me there. I'll just see her at that time.'

Back at Baltigo, the four of them resumed their training.

Dragon decided that Cherry's performance during the rescue operation of Betty was more than enough to cover the rest of her lessons with him, so she wouldn't have to do any more missions for the revolution as payment.

After all, Sengoku's appearance there was beyond their expectations. Dragon had been plagued by guilt when Betty reported to him that Cherry had nearly died fighting him. What neither of them knew was that the majority of the damage she had taken was self inflicted by fusing her sword, Sakura Tengoku, into her body, but they didn't need to know that, did they?

That said, Dragon admitted that they were swiftly reaching a point in which he could no longer teach her. Haki was primarily influenced by one's willpower and it must be honed in battle to become more powerful, not by practicing in sparring matches.

"There's something I should tell you about for future reference as well. I wasn't going to tell you about it before, but this will make us even for rescuing Betty. When you attain an extreme mastery over your Armament Haki, it will become possible to infuse your Conqueror's Haki into your attacks. Some would say it's too early to tell you right now, but I trust that you will know when you're ready and not waste your effort before the time comes." Dragon explained.

"Seriously? Just how much stronger is that than Armament Haki?" Cherry asked, annoyed with how often the bar gets raised for the strength of this world's powerhouses.

"Well, Gol D. Roger didn't have a devil fruit and still became the king of the pirates if that says anything about it. Kaido's infamous nearly impenetrable defense is also the result of that and his mythical zoan devil fruit, he hasn't even awakened it to my knowledge. You should have experienced it yourself when you faced Sengoku, too." Dragon answered.

"Hm, Sengoku WAS hitting me a lot harder than I'm used to. I assume your father can use it too if he's known as the strongest marine. He's such a softy, he definitely didn't use it even once against me." Cherry mused.

Dragon smiled at that. As much as he butted heads with Garp, he could never deny that he was a good man who just wanted to do what was right. That's why Garp never accepted a promotion to admiral, he didn't want to be directly beholden to the celestial dragons.

"Speaking of, just how tough is your body? If I didn't know any better, I'd swear that you have a zoan type devil fruit ability." Dragon commented.

Naturally, the reason was Cherry's cultivation, which when combined with Armament Haki created a superb defense. She wasn't going to tell that to Dragon, though, so she simply smiled at him and walked away without answering his question.

She would have normally responded by asking why he was so interested in a lady's body, but Dragon had apparently grown quite a thick skin through years of similar interactions with Ivankov. Cherry had to admit that she couldn't compete with the okama queen in that regard.

…

Time passed until it had been a year since Bartholomew Kuma separated the Straw Hat crew.

As Dragon had said, Cherry no longer had anything left to learn from him. At least not until she has put what she trained to the test in real combat.

"Are you sure you don't want to just stick around until it's time for you to meet up with your crew?" Koala asked, looking sad to part ways.

"I've spent far too much time sitting around in one place in my life. I need to stretch my legs!" Cherry said.

"We'll see you later some time, Koala. We'll BOTH miss you." Robin said, giving her a hug.

After several goodbyes with various revolutionaries they had come to become friends with, they set off on their journey.

Where were they going?

Well, since the New World was off limits for now, they decided to travel down the other paths on the Paradise half of the Grand Line.

Arriving at the Red Line at the beginning of the first half of the Grand Line, Cherry decided to stop by the lighthouse on the Twin Capes that she had been told about by the others.

An old man sat sunbathing on a lawn chair whilst reading a newspaper without paying any attention to them. However, after being stared at in silence by four beautiful women, the old man started to blush.

"Excuse me?" Cherry said.

"Hm?" The old man grunted in question.

"Are you Crocus, the lighthouse keeper here?" Cherry asked.

"Depends." He answered.

"We're not debt collectors or assassins." Cherry said.

"In that case, yes I am." Crocus confirmed.

"That's great, though I have to admit that I lied. We're debt collectors AND assassins." Cherry spoke with a wicked smile.

"Well, shoot. I knew I shouldn't have taken such good care of my organs." Crocus said, returning his gaze back to the newspaper.

"I like you old man." Cherry said, enjoying his antics. "If you keep up with the news often, though, I suspect you already know who I am."

"That I do. So what brings you all the way back here, then?" Crocus asked.

"We were just passing by to take another path for fun. I figured we could let you know that we found a survivor from the Rumbar Pirates in the Florian Triangle." Cherry said.

Crocus was shocked by that revelation. He didn't want to believe that those friendly pirates had abandoned Laboon, so he had been certain they were all dead. Especially now after over fifty years.

"Who was it?" Crocus asked.

"Brook, the musician. He ate the Revive Revive Fruit so he came back to life after they got annihilated by another pirate crew. Funny thing is that he got lost in the Florian Triangle trying to find his body and when he did, it was already a skeleton! Poor guy spent half a century going mad on a ghost ship with a broken rudder, all alone." Cherry explained.

Crocus didn't want to imagine what kind of hell Brook went through on that ship.

"Apparently it was a promise he made to that whale, Laboon, that let him hold on to the last vestiges of his sanity. What a guy, huh?" Cherry nodded her head, appreciating Crocus' talent as a good listener.

"Certainly I couldn't have done it. I can't even say I wouldn't have just thrown myself into the ocean and been done with it." Crocus said.

Crocus pondered whether or not he should tell Laboon about this. He knew that he should, but he didn't know if he wanted to see Laboon to grieve again if Brook failed to return a second time.

"Anywho, we ought to get going. Places to be, you know how it is." Cherry waved goodbye and left the old man to his thoughts.