The progression in the last few years hasn't been great for Ken. He had only been able to complete 50% of the Thor character and as he reached 50% he could feel that he had greater control over thunder than he had before but the progression was still very slow.
Ken had a theory that only fights and working on the behaviour of Thor could make his character progress fast but here in this island there was almost nobody with whom he could fight against. All would just die with one shot of him. Even the tiger almost died when he swung his hammer at him. At that moment he had forgotten how the hammer treated others who weren't worthy.
As all these thoughts were revolving around his head, there was a totally different scenario for Luffy. He was battling for his life every single day running after Ace. One time he almost died and Ken even thought of helping him at that point but Luffy's sheer will kept him alive.
"This guy is truly troublesome!!!"
Like this way a week had passed and finally Luffy was able to find the secret hideout where Ace and Sabo used to stack up money. And thus in this way the first interaction happened. The famous trio finally met each other for the first time and Ken as usual was hiding in one of the branches high up in these huge trees.
"The trees here are really big. Makes my hiding easy. This idiot Thor never learnt how to do stealth operations. It is fortunate that Thor during his training at least noticed Loki or else I would fail terribly in stealth missions." Ken got goosebumps thinking of the thousands of years he had passed inside the system. He got terribly bored and was almost crying. It was no wonder Thor and Loki played the game of cat and mouse with each other.
Living for such a long time would definitely lead to evil thoughts and prejudices.
As expected Luffy was caught by Ace and Sabo and since he saw the secret treasure place of Ace and Sabo, they both decided to do one thing.
"Let's kill him."
"Yes, we will have to do it."
But both didn't realize how stupid Luffy was. The moment he realized that he might be killed, he started crying loudly. The cry was so loud that even Ken, who was far from the trio could hear the screams and almost had to close his ears. And those cries of Luffy finally attracted Prchemy, one of the members of the infamous Bluejam Pirates.
This Pirate group was an authentic one and they didn't have any bottom line. They would plunder, loot and kill anything that came in their paths. And they have been particularly annoyed recently because of the frequent raids of Ace and Sabo on their 'wallets'.
And as the story should have progressed Porchemy hearing the cries of Luffy came straight from Gray Terminal to find Ace and Sabo. Ken was looking at the whole drama from high above and couldn't help but twitch his face a bit.
"Luffy's cries even attracted people from Gray Terminal. His cries are really legendary." Ken thought as he remembered how Luffy cried after the death of Ace. And as idiocy goes, Luffy was caught by Porchemy at the end and taken away.
Ken who was looking at all this now had his hand on his forehead. He could clearly see that the trio was hiding from Porchemy but then Luffy went and got caught. Almost deliberately!!
"It's as if Luffy wanted to prove his loyalty to Ace and Sabo by not giving up the secrets!!"
Ken didn't stop Porchemy as his plans were in motion and he just needed to wait for a bit more. Thus Luffy was kidnapped and taken away in front of the eyes of Ace and Sabo. Seeing Luffy was taken away the first thing Ace and Sabo did was move the treasures to a new place and hide them while Ken just followed Porchemy from behind.
He needed to make sure that Luffy was alive until Ace and Sabo came to free him.
"Sorry Luffy, for my own selfish reasons, you will have to suffer for a bit. I promise that I will make it up to you." Ken prayed silently in his heart as he saw Luffy was being tied in ropes around his waist and abdomen and hanged.
And thus the cruel assault of Luffy began. But the more Ken saw all of this from far the more he tightened his grip on his umbrella. The skies above Gray Terminal and half of the Goa Kingdom was slowly being filled with black clouds and thundering sounds.
The skies looked like there would be doom approaching soon but none of this mattered to Ken as he saw Porchemy beating the hell out of Luffy with his special gloves. Honestly, if Luffy's body wasn't made of rubber, he would have died long ago by the constant punches of Porchemy.
"Why don't you tell me where the money is hidden?"
"I won't tell!"
"I won't..."
"I won't.."
His indomitable will, his devil fruit and him being accustomed to pain and suffering allowed Luffy to survive until the sun was going down far in the sea. The sky was gloomy all over but it was clear on the far side.
There was a strange orange hue over the Gray Terminal. And finally Porchemy got tired of punching Luffy and picked up his huge dadao shaped sword and dragged it by the ground. He got fed up and was suffering from fear of Bluejam at this point. He knew that if he couldn't bring the answers to Bluejam then he would die so it was better that this kid died and he could at least buy some time to find Ace and Sabo.
As he dragged the sword, Ace and Sabo had already started running from the forest towards the hideout of Porchemy and his pirate group. Ken smiled looking at this as it was finally time to come out from hiding and take the first step on the Pirate World.