As he stood in a secret room inside the Thriller Bark mansion, holding a scrapbook and looking around, Laffite had a strange expression.
No matter how one looked at it, this room looked like a shrine, the pictures of a beautiful blonde woman with a dazzling smile adorning the walls and leaving no unclaimed space.
'And the girl is even dead, it seems.' Laffite's expression scrunched up in confusion as he looked at an article with the same girl's picture, stating the date and manner of death.
He shook his head, letting go of the subject as he turned to a fancy-looking chest tucked in one corner of the room and smiled along with several other containers and barrels.
He had already scouted the entirety of the mansion, and this room looked like the only logical place to store treasure. However, considering how long Moria had been stalking the Florian Triangle, Laffite didn't think a mere one chest like that could hold all the warlord's treasure, fancy as it was.
In fact, it looked like a trap more than anything else, but the navigator was already here. He might as well take a look at what's inside the chest before moving on to the mainmast.
He walked towards the fancy chest and stopped in front of it, reaching for the lid and taking a step back.
Suddenly, an oversized jack-in-the-box with hideous features and stitches all over its body emerged from inside the fancy chest.
"Too bad! We don't store the treasure here, ehehe!" the zombified creature exclaimed, hauntingly raising two hands in the air with a wicked laugh that would send shivers down most people's spines.
However, Laffite felt nothing but bemusement and annoyance while looking at the creature. The Jack-in-the-box continued to laugh, unaware of its own blight, dimwitted as the thing was.
However, even dimwittedness had its limits, and as it took a closer look at Laffite, it finally realized the navigator wasn't reacting as expected.
Its laughs suddenly felt hollow, with no joy or wickedness behind them, slowly dying out as sweat trickled down the creature's face under Laffite's bemused gaze.
"I just remembered I left the stove on..." the jack-in-the-box nervously remarked as it slowly retreated into the chest, holding the lid and trying to close it, but it couldn't.
The creature turned to look up and began sweating even more profusely as it noticed Laffite's foot on the lid, his hands holding a black cloud buzzing in blue lighting as he stared down.
...
Somewhere on the shores of Thriller Bark, a pink-haired girl suddenly awoke, holding her head as she heard a pained shriek reverberate all over the island.
She turned to the center of the island, flashing a sympathetic glance, as a feeling of comraderies washed over he heart, having already experienced two traumatizing events within the short span of only one day.
She sighed, dusting herself and heading back towards the center of Thriller Bark island.
...
As law opened the door in front of him, walking through, he froze upon hearing a high-pitched scream from the very room.
He surveyed the room and quickly spotted Laffite, standing over the charred, disintegrating remains of a zombie inside a wooden chest.
Their eyes met, and there was a pause of awkward silence as the two stared at each other. The awkward silence was luckily broken by Doc and Bepo walking into the room and Stronger's loud neigh.
"Oh? You're here, Laffite. You sure work fast," Doc said, smiling and nodding at the navigator.
"I had to work quickly before the captain went on a rampage. It would be even harder to find Moria's treasure if the captain destroyed the place," Laffite replied with a light chuckle, waving a hand to the side.
"Well, he did seem a bit too eager to fight that Moria guy..." Doc remarked with a laugh of his own, shaking his head. "Anyway, we're looking for Hogback's lab. Can you help?" he asked after he stopped laughing.
"Oh, if it's the lab you're looking for, then it's on the other side of the mansion's secret area," Laffite said while pointing in its rough direction.
"Thanks, then we'll leave you to it," Doc said as he left the room, followed by a still confused Law and an oblivious Bepo.
"Now then... of to the mainmast tower, I guess,"
...
Byron's eyebrows scrunched in a frown, his ears twitching at the sounds of metallic clanging as cane sword and katana constantly hit each other, their wielders moving quickly, light as feathers as they danced around each other. A deadly but beautiful performance.
"Moria's shadow fruit sure is something. They're using the same techniques. The same movements, but..." Byron remarked as he watched the zombified Ryma and Brook simultaneously and identically thrust their weapons, but the former's blade was faster.
"The zombie is physically superior. And it's holding back, still," Kozue added, frowning as Ruma's katana hit Brook's ribcage, sending his hurtling backward with a grunt of pain.
"Hm? holding back, you say?" Byron asked, raising an eyebrow as he received a nod of affirmation from Kozue.
"It's beyond doubt. That is the corpse of my ancestor, Shimotsuki Ryuma, and it's welding Wano's national treasure, the great sword, Shusui," Kozue solemnly muttered in a cold tone, eyeing the moving corpse.
"As rotted and decayed as it may be right now, Brook doesn't stand a chance against it," she concluded, shaking her head and resting a hand on the hilt of her sheathed katana.
"That's a weird flex, but ok," Byron said, holding back a sigh. "Are you alright? You're taking this much better than I thought you would," he added, sending a side glance to the former assassin.
"On the contrary, I'm seething right now. But there's no use throwing a tantrum right now," Kozue replied, turning to Byron and giving a slight smile that almost made Byron choke in surprise at how cold it was.
"The skeleton won't last much longer, and I'll have my chance to vent on whatever is possessing my ancestor's body..." she added, clutching the hilt of her sword.
"As for the man responsible for defiling his corpse... he'll have to the deal with the captain," she concluded, relaxing her expression much to Bryon's relief.
"Indeed, I even feel pity for the poor bastard. The captain has been in a bad mood since that Alabasta incident, even though he doesn't really show it," Byron replied, sighing and scratching his head.
"And you know how scary he can be, sometimes," he added, bitterly chuckling as flashes of when Johnny was training him passed through his mind.
"It looks it'll be your turn soon. Brook looks close to his limit already," Byron concluded, earning a nod from Kozue as he turned to look at the fight between the two undead creatures.
"I see you've gotten stronger. But I wasn't idle during the past three years..." Ryuma remarked, swinging at Brook's head. The skeleton dodged by bending backward. However, a tuft of his afro fell to the ground as the zombie's sword passed through it.
"You and I think the same way, after all, so I've trained myself as well," Ryuma exclaimed, thrusting his sword towards Brook's as the latter hurried to catch his top hat that slipped off his head when he dodged.
The strike hit, and the skeleton fell on his rear, clutching a fractured rib bone as he glared at Ryuma.
...
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