"So you have both of these types of haki?" asked Larry, spinning his revolver in one hand.
"Yes, I do, though I myself am pretty new to haki, I only awakened it pretty recently, not even a year ago", Ryu showed them as his fingers blackened with armament haki, "I can cover about my fists worth of surface area at once. There are some people out there that can cover their entire body and even their weapons. Some -the truly strong- can even peer into the future using observation haki"
"See into the future? Haki sounds amazing could you… teach me? Observation haki of course, I have no great use for armament haki, if I can't coat my bullets with it right now", Larry looked at his revolver, "maybe one day though… one day I'll be the world's best sniper"
"A goal worthy of my crew! Of course, I can teach you, here take this blindfold…"
They spent the next six months training observation haki and hunting down pirate crews to grow their infamy. Nami also joined in on their training. Nami progressed slower than Larry but by the time that the six months was over, they both had the most basic grasp of observation haki, having a range of 1 meter around them and Ryu's own range of sensing had increased to twenty meters. Then, they went off to find logue town, the domain of Smoker… but he wasn't nearly as defenseless as Luffy would be against a Logia type user, he had haki, so there would be no problem in defeating him if it came to that, though he wouldn't seek out trouble unless it was necessary.
Later, they arrived at logue town, not flying their jolly roger, they looked just like a normal traveler's ship, "Okay, let us regroup here in three hours, I give each of you a million berry to shop for personal likings, Larry, you get another million berry for our food supply"
Each of them ran off in different directions. Ryu went to a sword shop and rang the bell as he entered, "ah, a customer", the shop owner, an elderly woman said, "welcome to my humble shop, what can I interest you in?"
"Do you have any graded blades, the type of grade is unimportant, though higher graded swords would be preferable", Ryu asked, his eyes wandering across the shop, there were many blades in here, though only a few seemed to be of good quality.
"Of course, I have three in stock right now", she pulled a katana from the wall, "this is Mizugakure, a grade sword", then she pulled a saber, "Narichigakure, a grade sword too" and finally, she pulled a rapier from the wall, "and Raikirimaru a skillful grade sword"
"how much for Raikirimaru?"
"3 million berry"
"Sold", he took the blade in his hands and channeled some of his lightning through it. There were no sparks or anything of the like but the blade hummed with power, "this will work nicely"
Later, they regrouped at the ship. Nami was carrying bags of clothes and Larry was silently loading food into the ship.
"Got everything you need, captain?"
"Yes I do, look at this beauty", he presented them with the rapier, "and I also bought a log pose", he held out a log pose.
"What is that?" Nami asked, eyeing the contraption.
"These are the only way to reliably sail across the grand line. In the grand line, each island has its own magnetic pull, making regular compasses useless. These devices lock onto the magnetic charge of the next island you want to visit, there are several paths across the grand line and for each, there are log poses, I bought one which points to whisky peak, a trap for pirates. They pretend to be an island full of pirate friends, get you drunk and then take you in to collect the bounty on your head"
"And why did you get a log pose to that island?", Nami asked, clearly ticked off
"Because it is the perfect way to help you train, fighting a few bounty hunters is just the right thing to temper you in the flames of battle", Ryu explained, laughing at the look on their faces, "Rararara!"
"So are we heading to reverse mountain then?" asked Larry.
"What is reverse mountain?" Nami looked puzzled.
"It is the entrance to the grandline, a current that runs up a mountain, one entrance on each of the blues and converging on the entrance to the grand line", Larry explained, pulling a map out of his pocket and showing her reverse mountain.
"Normally, that is the only way to get to the grand line, the calm belt cuts of access to it on each of the sides and there is no current or wind in the calm belts but-! but but but! I have spent a damn near extortion level amount of money to have the ship coated with seastone, they are already here with me, about to do the job. With this, we will be able to sail through the calm belt without attracting any seakings and I can provide us the wind for it, this way, we can enter and exit the grand line as we please" The coating had cost him nearly 50 million berry but it was worth it, the ability of entering and exiting the grand line was worth far more than the 50 million he paid for it.
A few days later, they were done coating it and they were ready to leave. Smoker hadn't recognized them, thankfully, so they could just leave the island and -once sufficiently far away, hoist their jolly roger again. Over this time, he had started getting familiar with his new sword. In his previous life, he had trained in using a rapier, as a hobby. As he trained, muscle memory was kicking in. They sailed south until the wind stopped carrying their sails, they were in the calm belt. Ryu waited a few minutes but no seaking attacked them, seems the coater's were telling the truth… He raised his arms and wind filled the sails once more, propelling them further and further south. It took a day of sailing at high speeds before they entered the grand line. From there, Nami navigated them to whisky peak, which took another day or two.
"Hello pirates! We welcome you to whisky peak, you must be weary from your travels, rest, drink, eat, you deserve it, you are heroes!" the mayor of whisky peak greeted them. It wasn't Mr. 8 but a different mayor. They indulged in food and drink, though they purposefully kept it light on the drinks, knowing that a fight was bound to happen. Once night rolled around, the baroque works agents attacked. Nami and Larry were battling the agents, dodging thanks to their observation haki, whilst Ryu was flying in the air, observing, stepping in whenever they were in serious trouble, which was often. They could only sense short range attacks, so he had to take out all the gun users but eventually, they stood victorious, panting over the unconscious bodies of close to a hundred baroque works agents.
"You did well", Ryu carried the two exhausted crew members onto the boat and set sail, using his limited navigation knowledge to follow the log pose. The next island was little garden. He had made sure to have enough rations to last them the year that it took for the log pose to re-calibrate. On their way there, he continued getting familiar with Raikirimaru, sending slashes of lightning through the empty seas.
When they arrived at little garden, Brogy and Dorry were in the middle of a clash, their massive clashes sending shockwaves through the island. Each strike as powerful as a vulcano's eruption. When they were done, Brogy turned around and saw the crew, "Hello little ones, we didn't hurt you in our duel, did we?"
"No, you are good, why are you fighting?" asked Nami.
"99 years ago, we had a disagreement and there is only one way for us giant warriors of elbaf to conclude such a disagreement, through a duel, the winner will be the one in the right… to be honest, I don't quite remember what we were arguing about, we have forgotten that many moons ago but our honor dictates we finish this duel", Brogy laughed, "each of the volcano's eruptions signals the beginning of another clash"
"Say, do you know how long it takes for a log pose to recalibrate here?" asked Larry, hoping with all his heart that it wouldn't be long, he was wary of these giants. To his misfortune, Brogy said, "a year, give or take a week"
"A whole year? You knew about this captain, didn't you? It was why you insisted on packing so many rations…", Larry stared at him with disbelief.
"I might have had a hunch", Ryu shrugged, "see it this way, we have a whole year to train and become stronger. I can teach you more about observation haki, maybe even teach you armament haki and possible, just maybe, I can awaken my conqueror's haki"
"What is conqueror's haki?" Asked Nami, "you just told us about armament and observation haki"
"Well, conqueror's haki is the third type of haki, unlike the other two, which all can learn, you have to be born with kingly qualities in order for you to awaken conqueror's haki, it is a one in a million chance. I don't know for sure whether I have it or not but if I do, I want to train it, so this one year on this island will be a great opportunity to hone our skills"
One year later:
Ryu was steadying his blade, taking a practiced swing at the tree in front of him. The tree split in half after just one slash. The blade of his rapier was coated in black armament haki, as was the entirety of his body. Satisfied with his swordsmanship, he used Shave to move to a different place. Over this year, he had replicated shave of the six marine styles, making him able to move at incredible speeds. Once he was further into the island, he let his conqueror's haki run wild, making the animals on the island faint. He gathered a few of the unconscious animals, killed them and carried them to the ship, where Larry was waiting for their meat to cook with. What surprised him was that there was not just the one ship he was expecting but also a second one, the Going Merry, "seems like canon has finally caught up to us"
He searched the island with his observation haki and noticed a few presences, Mr 3 and miss Goldenweek in a house out of wax, Luffy, Zoro and Sanji out exploring the island and Usopp staying behind on the ship. No new navigator eh? Seems like Usopp has taken over that role in this type of the straw hat group. It had been a few weeks ago that the newspaper had delivered Luffy's first bounty, only 15 million berry, much less than in canon, thanks to no Arlong but they still defeated Buggy, who was tenacious enough to try and re-capture the town. Ryu had a wicked grin on his face as he approached the Going Merry, "Hello there, good to see some new faces around here, are you the straw hat pirates? Led by Monkey D. Luffy?"
"Y- yes we are a- and- we have a thousand men on this ship so don't you dare a- attack us!", Usopp lied through his teeth, shivering.
"If a thousand men can fit on that ship, I'll eat my own bo-staff" Nami snickered from their ship.
"I- it is true! A thousand well armed men, b- blood thirsty and powerful", he didn't back down, even after being called out. The nerve on that guy…
"We mean you no harm", Ryu raised his hands into the air in a gesture of defeat.