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Glory to my chief Proofreader: Solare. For he is the one who points out mistakes and acts as my favourite wall to bounce ideas off of.
Sorry for the delay, turns out uni plus starting a new fic is quite time consuming, who'd have thunk?
Anyways, go check out my Elden Ring fic if you're interested and enjoy.
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Some Time Later…
"Hmm… Now that I'm here, I should consider all the things I need to cover before I leave for the next island." Adam muttered as he leaned back in a Silver throne gilded with Gold engravings, the entire throne room before him was lit up with torches that seemed to burn with unnatural power.
"I should first look for any information that's available on any neighbouring islands, then information on existing Pirate groups and the World Government's forces... Oh, I should probably get some funds for the journey in case I need it. I won't be paying for much, but some back up money couldn't hurt…"
Adam shifted in his seat, raising one of his legs and resting it upon the other which put more pressure on his 'Leg Rest'. He then looked down at his 'Leg Rest', which happened to be the back of King Balthus who he had made sit on his hands and knees before him so he could rest his legs on top of his back.
"Say, Mongrel. Does your castle have a Royal Treasury of some kind? Some place where you keep your valuable treasures and what not?" He asked the quivering mess of a King, looking back up towards the rest of the throne room which had a couple dozen servants working on restoring it.
He looked with a slight hint of amusement at a trio of servants that were trying their hardest to pull out the greatsword nailing Elemer's head into the wall, with very terrible results. Others were collecting and removing all of the thorny vines implanted into the marble floor of the throne room, which shockingly didn't dissipate with Elemer's death.
"Y-Yes, w-we do! I uhh.. W-Why do you a-ask, S-Sir Valentine?" Balthus stammered, his arms straining to maintain their strength and stay upright. He nearly crumpled over himself a moment later when Adam's foot pushed downwards on him again slightly, a sign of his displeasure.
"Because I'm looking to take whatever I find useful, obviously. I'm a Pirate aren't I? As they say, 'When in Rome, do as the Romans do'. Perhaps you should think before you ask any stupid questions, Mongrel 'King'." Adam answered mockingly as he rested his head on one of his hands.
"I-I see! F-Forgive me!" The king blurted out in panic, upsetting the Pirate that held his life in the palm of his hands was the opposite of what he wanted to happen at the moment.
'Thankfully, the servants of this castle played along quite well. Didn't take them very long to get with the program after telling them exactly what would happen if I saw any Marines busting into the castle while I'm around.' The Lunarian thought impassively, going back to considering what he wished to get before leaving the island.
He looked around the room, spotting one of the servants standing to the side as if awaiting orders. Adam raised his other hand, snapping his fingers to get the black haired servant's attention before beckoning him to come closer with one finger.
A small smile covered Adam's face as he watched the black haired servant hurriedly walk over to him, 'Well, I must say – Monkeys they may be, at the very least they are well trained Monkeys.'
The servant stopped just before him and bowed, he looked down at the prostrating king with a mixture of nervousness and amusement before meeting Adam's crimson eyes with his own. He seemed unsure for a moment as he appraised what he should say before he spoke tentatively.
"Y-Yes, S-Sir? Eh, Lord? I'm sorry, w-what should I call you? Y-You weren't very clear on that..?" He asked nervously, drawing a hum from Adam as he tilted his head slightly in thought.
"Hm.. Well, I don't plan on staying here for long and it's beneath me to rule over an island of Monkeys, so don't call me your 'King'. Just Sir or Sire is fine." Adam replied while waving him off dismissively, swapping his legs' positions on each other atop Balthus's back.
"W-Well then, Sir. My n-name is Tobias, what can I help you with?" The servant introduced himself with a low bow, wanting to be sure to stay on the Pirate's good side.
"First of all; I didn't ask, Mongrel." Adam stated coldly, drawing a tense flinch from the black haired man as he leaned forward, placing his hands on his knee and continuing. "Secondly, do you know the location of the castle's treasury? I assume it has a Library or a Study too, yes?"
"Y-Yes, Sir. I do know the location of the treasury, a-although I believe the key is in the King's possession. As for a Library or a Study, we have an Archive room, i-if that counts? I haven't been there myself, but I believe most of the Kingdom's important records and sources of information are stored there."
As Tobias finished speaking, he noticed Adam's eyes slowly drop down from him to the prostrating king. "Well, Mongrel? Do I have to beat the key out of you?"
"I-It's in the throne! There's a secret compartment, you have to push a button near the back of it!" Balthus babbled nervously, preferring losing his worldly possessions over losing his own life.
"For your sake, it better be there." Adam muttered as moved his legs off of the king's back, allowing him to finally rest his body. He stood up from the throne, with a single step he made his way to the silver throne's side.
There he found a small indent, he pressed it which caused another compartment to open on the seat. Within the compartment was a large Golden key which he grabbed and placed in his pocket with a small hum of satisfaction.
"Good then, let's go to the Archive Room first. After that, the Treasury." Adam ordered as he turned to Tobias, prompting the servant to nod before turning to the still sitting Balthus.
"Um.. What should I do with King-" Tobias began speaking, wanting to ask what he wanted to do with Balthus but was cut off by Adam.
"Don't you Dare call that thing a 'King' in my presence!" Adam ordered, instantly causing everyone within the room to stop in their place as he placed a hand on his chest. "I am the only one that is worthy of being called a 'King' in this World – All others are Mongrels, pretenders to the name."
He took a step forwards towards the servant, staring him down with an intensity that made him quiver with terror. "Understood?"
"Y-Yes, Sir! Understood!"
Adam grunted, walking past Balthus and Tobias while crossing his arms. "Humph.. Well, as long as you know. Now then, take me to the Archives. Let's get this over with so I can get to the next island."
"O-Of course, Sir." Tobias muttered with a bow as he began leading him towards the Archives, Adam followed him until the double doors of the Throne Room where he turned to face another one of the servants that stood closeby.
"You. Go take the old fool to his family, I'll call for him later on." He ordered, to which the servant simply bowed and moved to fulfil his orders.
After that, he was led to the Archives, a spacious room with several bookcases around, which thankfully looked to be labeled and marked well. There was a large desk in the corner of the room, it had an oil lantern on it which could be used for long studies in the dark room.
"Hm.. Alright, this'll do. I'll have a look at what you've got recorded here and then call you when I want to visit the treasury. In the meantime, send someone with a barrel of water here."
Adam waved the servant off as he walked into the Archives, his eyes scanned the room for a moment before they found several lanterns around. With a snap of his fingers, they all instantly burned alight and lit up the room softly.
…
30 Minutes Later…
Adam sighed tiredly as he leaned back in his chair, before him was a few dozen reports on Pirate activity in the New World as well as several high profile Bounties. Of them all, 4 in particular caught his attention.
'Dreadlord' Wang Zhi - Bounty of 2.2 Billion Berries.
'King of the Beasts' Kaido - Bounty of 2.8 Billion Berries.
'Big Mom' Charlotte Linlin - Bounty of 3.2 Billion Berries.
'Whitebeard' Edward Newgate - Bounty of 4.1 Billion Berries.
These 4 were considered the Pirates with the highest Bounties and danger levels in the World currently, the '4 Pirate Emperors' or the Yonko. Although Ochoko was considered a level below the rest of the quartet as he only rose to power thanks to another pirate emperor 'Golden Lion' Shiki getting captured.
It also seemed like his information on Charlotte Linlin was outdated, her Epithet had actually changed since last he read about her. Along with that, all of their Bounties had raised significantly if his memory was to be believed.
"Out of them all, this last one is the most interesting however… 'The Strongest Man Alive', huh? Wonder how strong he could possibly be to be openly crowned such?" Adam muttered under his breath as he leaned back even further in his chair, stretching his back and causing it to crack satisfyingly.
"Alright, this should be more than enough information. I don't care to search up more." He commented, grabbing his satchel and retrieving his Log Pose from within it. His eyes slightly widened as he did, spotting that it had actually locked onto a new signature.
"Huh… I guess getting on another island finally had gotten it to lock on to this island's signature and then fully reset, lucky. Now I won't have to get a new one."
Adam reached for his partial map of Paradise, unfurling and using it as a reference along with his Log Pose to find out which island it locked onto. After a few seconds of searching, he had found it.
"'Alabasta', huh? Same as my Eternal Pose…" He muttered as he eyed up the map, he turned to the side a moment later and reached for a book that kept a record of the Geography of prominent islands. His hands quickly swiped through the pages of the book quickly, glossing over a page about 'Dressrosa'.
"Well, since I'm already here, I might as well check it's contents. Just in case it's a.. Desert… Island…" His words trailed off in the middle of his sentence as soon as he reached the page that held information of Alabasta.
The first sentence of the record read as such:
"The Kingdom of Alabasta, which is located on Sandy Island, is ruled by the Nefertari Family, who, unlike the other families of the First Twenty, did not leave their home country to live in Mary Geoise…"
His eyes glazed over the rest of the text and latched onto a description elsewhere on the page.
"The Largest Known Desert Island on the Grandline, and possibly the World..."
"Yeah, no. Fuck that. I am not going to another damn Desert, what's another closeby island?" Adam muttered, utterly rejecting the very idea of going to Alabasta. "Hm.. So my options are either... 'Lulusia' or 'Foolshout'?"
Adam hummed slightly as he tilted his head in thought, eventually he nodded and stood up while beginning to gather his things. "Alright, I think I've learned everything there is to learn here. Anything that I care about at any rate…"
He connected his satchel onto his person once again and walked out of the room, as soon as he did he spotted Tobias standing right beside it at attention. When he closed the door, the torches in the room seemed to spontaneously burn up brightly, their flames slowly spreading to burn the entire room away.
The black haired man flinched slightly at his presence before coughing into his hand and speaking up tentatively. "U-Um.. Sir? A-Are you done with the Archives?"
Adam crossed his arms and nodded, "Yes, I am. Take me to the Treasury. And on a side note, would you happen to know where the Eternal Poses for neighbouring islands would be?"
"I believe those are stored within the treasury itself because of how valuable they are?" Tobias offered, it was obvious in his tone that he wasn't very sure about his answer.
"Humph.. Good enough." Adam replied, prompting Tobias to sigh and begin walking. Within a few minutes, they had arrived at a large vault in the heart of the Castle. Adam eyed it up and down before turning to the servant at his side.
"I'll go in there and see whatever seems worth it to grab, you go tell the king he can have his worthless kingdom back now. You can call the Marines too or whatever, I won't be here for long."
Adam didn't wait to see if the servant had heard his words, simply walking forward and inserting the Vault's key into its hole. A mechanism with the Vault door clicked dully a moment later before it began unfurling and locking.
A few seconds later, the latch on the vault door was completely undone, allowing Adam to reach forwards and pull it open. As soon as he opened it, he was hit face first with a rush of Golden light. Within the treasury were hundreds of bars of Gold as well as countless precious jewellery.
In the corner of the room he spotted several of what looked to be priceless jewellery; Diamonds, Ruby, Emeralds and the like. Adam shrugged, they were lightweight and bound to cost a fortune and a half if sold, so he walked ahead and pocketed them into his storage in case he needed them later on.
He then took a look around the room in order to find anything worth taking as well, he saw a couple of what he assumed to be famed blades scattered among a sea of golden coins. Then, a large black leather trench coat met with his eyes, it also had a pure white furry interior. Beside it were clothes that nearly perfectly matched it, with a black shirt and pants.
"Hm.. That looks good actually…" Adam reached forwards and grabbed the coat, shockingly it seemed to fit his enormous size. He used a knife that was placed nearby to cut 2 holes in the coat, ones large enough to let his wings go through them and move freely.
He then put on the trenchcoat, feeling his wings pass through the holes perfectly. Adam gave them a few experimental movements before nodding with satisfaction and turning away, a few seconds later his eyes met with a table which held multiple Eternal Poses.
As Adam got close to them, he saw that there were shockingly 4 Eternal Poses stored in a glass container. When he got closer to the glass display case, he saw that one pointed to Drum Island itself and the others Eternal Pose pointed to 'Kyuka', 'Kuraigana' and 'Foolshout'.
"Hm.. Don't recognise the other two, I'll just go with Foolshout. It's the closest island out of the 3 possible ones anyways…" He muttered as he reached forwards, placing a finger on the glass cabinet as a low chant escaped his mouth.
"Cleave."
The glass was instantly overtaken by a perfect square flaming indented outline in the middle of the glass pane. A second later, that cut out glass square disintegrated into nothing and left an open path for Adam's hand to pass through and grab the Eternal Pose.
A second later, he had the Eternal Pose in his hand, it pointed to the South East of where he currently stood at about a 123 degree angle. He looked at it for a moment before looking back at the other 3 Eternal Poses, a small spiteful smirk covering his face.
He raised a hand to the glass cabinet, seeing his own smug face in its reflection for a moment before it was obliterated by flames. After that Adam walked through the treasury in the direct path of the Eternal Pose until he reached a wall, to which he simply raised hand to it.
Flames sparked at his fingertips as they generated and formed around it for a moment before gathering together and erupting into a pillar of fire. It shot directly at the wall and seemed to struggle against the multilayered stone structure, then mere moments later it burst through in a brilliant inferno that painted the bluish night skies a crimson red.
And then without any ceremony or care, Adam flew off into the distance with a combination of multiple 'Sky Bursts' and 'Speed Mode', pushing him through the harsh seas of the Grandline at a record's pace. This time he made sure to take breaks when possible to avoid the last mistake being repeated once again.
After nearly a 14 hour flight, with some breaks in between, he finally spotted an island that matched his Eternal Pose at the end of the horizon. As he got closer, he got a good look at its coast. It looked to have an arid, yet grassy plane as far as the eye could see with countless cacti dotted around it.
Adam huffed in annoyance but simply sped up anyways, within a few seconds he had finally reached the island's shore. He stretched his wings harshly, feeling the muscles in his legs and wings burn from the exertion. It was a satisfying burn as he knew that with each time he felt it, he would get even stronger than before.
He took a look around the island, feeling a light cool breeze flow past his hair. In the distance, he could spot several animals that belonged in a Savanna dotted around, although they were oddly enough eating the huge cacti around.
Adam reached to satchel, pocketing the Eternal Pose in case he needed it eventually and then retrieving his mother's Log Pose. He nodded when he saw that it had begun recording the signal of the island, despite it not being the one it had originally locked onto.
The Lunarian returned the Log Pose to its place and began walking in land, his right hand reached upwards absentmindedly and ran through his hair as he walked, "I guess I'll look for something to eat, any one of these animals around should be good enough. Any island will do for me, as long as it is not a Desert."
…
Meanwhile, in Alubarna…
"Man, I fucking hate Deserts!" Guernika slumped down at the table of the coffee shop he sat in, it was located in the middle of the hot and dry Alabasta desert. Wind blew over his table, getting sand stuck on his clothes and in his coffee.
"Ugghhh.. How long is this stupid mission gonna take?!" He muttered tiredly, resting his head on the glass table while pouring away his now sandy coffee. Despite being a member of Cipher Pol 0, he was wearing traditional Alabastan attire in an effort to blend in with the average civilian.
"Why is it that every time we meet, you must show this side of you, Guernika? I know that Miss Caramel recommended you personally for this role, but don't you think you could do better?" Gismonda asked as he appeared behind his junior suddenly, said junior had known he was there as he had picked him up using his Observation Haki.
"Well, I'm sorry, okay?! Deserts just suck! Tell me one good thing about them!" The junior Cipher Pol agent asked, drawing silence from his senior as he simply sat in front of him in similar clothing.
Gismonda turned to the side, looking the cafe owner in the eyes before motioning him to bring two coffees. "That doesn't matter, you have a job, Guernika. You must keep to your duty, your comfort and even your life are of no consequence."
Despite the harsh words, his fellow CP 0 agent didn't seem affected in the slightest, showing that he had long since come to terms with that. "Well obviously I know that! That doesn't mean I can't complain about it! Let me cope!"
"On another note, why the hell is there even a Cafe all the way out here in the middle of the damn desert?! We're a couple kilometres outside Alubarna, anyone leaving the capital just keeps going – Anyone coming in just eats inside!" Guernika exclaimed heatedly, seeming almost personally insulted at his situation.
"Who the hell even comes here to eat at this cafe?!" He asked incredulously.
"..." All he received was a judging silence from Gismonda, the extremely tall man ignored him for a moment as the cafe owner came to the two of them and gave them two cups of fresh coffee.
Gismonda grabbed the cup with a practised hold, bringing it up to his lip and taking a sip of the bitter drink. "In any case… I heard that we are about to receive another emergency update on our case, hopefully we found a lead."
"Oh really?" Guernika asked, grabbing the scalding hot cup of coffee and greedily downing it all in a single motion despite its extreme heat. "How come I didn't hear about it?"
To that, Gismonda just looked him up and down before raising an eyebrow.
Guernika just grumbled in annoyance as his Senior's Den Den Mushi erupted a moment later.
"Perurururururu~! Perururu-KACHA!"
"This is subject 'L' containment team Alpha, we're all ears." Gismond spoke with a steely tone, even his usually unserious teammate had instantly lost all semblance of weakness.
"This is Saint Figarland, the Marines have reported a sighting of that damn Lunarian." Garling's voice spoke from the Den Den Mushi, demanding complete obedience and attention.
"He has appeared on Drum Island, according to eye witness reports he spent some time in one of the Village's Town Hall's before proceeding to fly up to the Royal Castle. In there he killed some worthless Bounty Hunter before taking the King hostage."
Garling took a small break to allow the two of them to absorb the information, a second later he continued speaking.
"After doing so, the only thing he did was apparently study up on some of the things in their Royal Archives before setting them on fire. After that, he went to the treasury and stole some gems along with a coat and perhaps some Eternal Poses."
This time, Gismonda spoke up. "Forgive me for interrupting, Saint Figarland-Sama, but do we know which one he stole?"
An annoyed look covered the Den Den Mushi's face, "That's the thing, damn Slave is getting too smart for his own good. He destroyed all the Poses, meaning he could have used any one of them, covering his tracks perfectly. And to make matters worse, that worthless maggot of a king doesn't know what Poses they were."
"What of the other of the king's servants, Sire, perhaps they know?" Asked Guernika respectfully.
"The Marines asked about that, but it seems like anyone who would know was killed by the filthy Lunarian Slave." Garling spat out, his rage was palpable, he had never spoken of anyone with this sort of mirth before, not even Rocks D. Xebec many years prior.
"I-I see.. What do we do now then, Saint Figarland-sama?"
"You will stay in Alubarna for the meantime, keep patrolling. That damn Slave is going to show up at some point, I just know it. By the end of this, I am going to have someone's head tied to the bumper of my ship! And you are either going to find him, or find out how painful it is to have your head ripped off by a Chimpanzee!"
With those scalding words, the Den Den Mushi clinked once again, leaving the two Cipher Pol 0 Agents in complete silence.
"...Maaaan~! …That means we gotta stay in this bastard Desert even longer!"
"That's what you are worried about?"
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Author's Note:
Big action starts in next chapter, I promise.
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Next Chapter Title: An Island of Fools.
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