Nice to be back, so I guess this will be my last chapter this year but hopefully you get alerted next year, in someway. In the meantime, here's another good chapter for you all. I admit that I think that this chapter is kind of weird but you'll see why I did it.
"…The Labyrinth groans for the prey,
Sends forth horror without delay,
The walls thicken with greed and despise,
Harder they must search to uncover their prize…"
Last time:
"Then it's settled, we go explore and hopefully get out of this darn maze" Nami decided. Everyone agreed with the decision and headed off into the dark corridors of the maze, not knowing what they will find, just as long as Sanji is able to turn it into a meal…
Chapter 3: Decoy and separation
Chopper trudged along the snowy path, kicking the snow around. There was something different about the snow here, it was as if this snow was artificial yet Chopper knew that it was indeed real snow. It was just the presence of it that worried him. He felt unsafe with this mysterious ice caging him in but didn't want the others to worry about him. In fact, he was beginning to worry about his friend's health. Zoro hasn't been eating much since the day that they annihilated the walrus thugs.
It had already been a day since they were first in this icy labyrinth, so far they had found nothing, only walls endlessly leading to another cross-section. Nobody really spoke but they knew what each other were thinking about.
"Darn it" Luffy punched the ground with his fist, "another cross-section".
"Which way?" Sanji asked the group, nobody really had enough energy to answer, they were all conserving their energy for a critical moment.
"I guess we should go East" Luffy started walking, no one objected. They continued walking until Usopp started twitching his nose.
"Whats this?" Usopp stopped and continued sniffing, "It's food!".
"Are you sure, you could be smelling Chopper" Sanji grinned, "tempting isn't he" Sanji joked, he would never eat his friends but it was fun scaring him.
"Where's the food?" Luffy panted like a hound,
"It should be…" Usopp sniffed again, leaving the pirates staring at him in disbelief.
"It's just behind this wall" Usopp followed the scent with his eyes closed until he crashed into a wall.
"Gum Gum blast!" Luffy punched the wall as hard as he could but the wall didn't budge at all.
"We've already tried Luffy, these walls are just too durable" Zoro sighed, "But I guess at this stage, we need to try everything". He grabbed his katanas and sliced the walls rapidly but no marks were left and the walls still stood there as if it was new. Usopp sighed and leaned on the wall,
"This sucks, we'll never be able to live, just kill me so I don't need to suffer!" The walls suddenly exploded and left Usopp falling straight through the walls.
"It must have been my great words of honour!" Usopp smiled,
"Congratulations, the first thing that thought your words were honourable was a wall" Nami said.
"Never mind that!" Luffy smiled, "Food!". Everyone realised why Luffy was smiling, they saw a beautiful wooden table with food covered all over it.
"Oh my gosh!" Nami exclaimed, "They have everything". Luffy picked up a turkey and ate it in two bites,
"Lets eat!" Zoro instantly dug in, acting like Luffy.
"Everyone is so happy to eat again" Nami shed a tear, "I sure hope we make it out of this icy hell".
"Yikes!" Chopper suddenly flinched without warning.
"What is it furball?" Sanji asked.
"There's squid…" Chopper retreated.
"Its fine Chopper, it's not like the food is going to jump at you" Usopp smiled as he took a bite out of a turkey. A bright flash skimmed past Usopp's eyes and into the squid which caused it to pounce at Usopp.
"Usopp you said-" Chopper started,
"Never mind!" Usopp snapped and madly tried to hit the squid with his Usopp hammer. The squid retreated and sat on Nami's head. However she was oblivious to this and continued eating her salad.
Usopp's quick reactions caused him to target the squid not noticing that it was on Nami's head. The squid jumped away and Usopp ended up htting Nami.
"Usopp!" Nami roared.
"But, there was a squid-" Ussop stumbled.
"I'll squid you!" Nami hissed and striked Usopp's head with great momentum.
"Zoron!" Chopper cried and pointed at the squid which disappeared as soon as everyone caught a glimpse of it.
"Whose the zoron!" Zoro hissed at Chopper with an assassination stance.
"I'm being serious, theres a zoron here!" Chopper mimed in frustration.
"A zoron?" Sanji snickered. The room fell into silence as everyone braced themselves for an ambush. Usopp stepped out of nowhere and punched Zoro in the face.
"What was that for!" Zoro roared but became confused when he realised that there were now two Usopp's standing next to each other.
"One was enough but now there are two" Sanji commented.
"Hey Luffy, it's me Usopp!" An Usopp said but the other one wacked him in the face.
"I'm the real captain Usopp!" the other Usopp said.
"Aha!" Luffy smiled,
"What Luffy?" Nami asked,
"One of the Usopp's can be the marksman and the other can be the musician!" Luffy clapped.
"This was your big idea?" Nami growled in disappointment.
"Musician what! I can hardly play the triangle" the Usopp's complained in unison.
"Hey stop copying me!" One Usopp said to the other Usopp.
"You're the one whose copying me" the other replied.
"Well I know that you are copying me" the first Usopp said,
"I know that you know that I know that they'll know that I know that you're the fake" Usopp replied.
"What?" Luffy frowned, "I didn't catch that".
"I meant that I know that you know that I know that you know that I know that he's the fake".
"Aww, cut the crap" Zoro burst out, "I reckon we should just stab them and see who bleeds, it's more convenient and It'll be fun for me"
'"But you'll hurt our new musician!" Luffy said,
"Shut up!" the Usopp's yelled.
"Fine fine, you can use the triangles then" Luffy said,
"That's not the point" the Usopp's gave in.
"I know, I'll ask them a question and the first one to rely is Usopp!" Luffy smiled,
"What is your name?" Luffy questioned both of them.
"Usopp!" the Usopp's both replied.
"What kind of question was that?" Sanji sighed,
"We should split the Usopp's up and ask them questions" Nami advised, "Sanji, Chopper and I will work with that Usopp and Luffy, Zoro.
Usopp was tied up and Luffy leant over him,
"Are you really Usopp?" Luffy asked,
"Hell yes!" Usopp replied,
"Just ask a question that only the crew knows of" Zoro said.
"okay, heres the question, are you fake?" Luffy asked.
"Not that kind of question" Zoro sighed, "Let me take over, what was your old pirate crew called?"
"The veggie pirates!" Usopp replied.
"That's right" Zoro stood up, "You try Luffy"
"What did the veggie pirates taste like?" Luffy asked,
"They're human" Usopp sighed, "how would I know what human tastes like?".
"Zoro, he can't answer, he must be the fake Usopp" Luffy grinned,
"He couldn't answer because you're bloody question was bloody rigged!" Zoro exclaimed, "Lets just hope the others have the fake Usopp so we know that this Usopp is real".
The other Usopp was also tied up to a pillar and Chopper was examining him.
"So, what enemy did we fight on Drum island?" Chopper asked,
"No! No more musician talk!" Usopp recoiled.
"No, the Drum island where it is very cold, kinda like the North Pole" Sanji explained,
"What pole?" Usopp asked,
"Yes, it was Wapol" Chopper said, "he got it right Nami".
"Yes but I still don't trust him" Nami said,
"What is the name of our ship?" Sanji asked,
"Just let me go" Usopp struggled to escape.
"Correct, it's the Merry Go" Sanji smiled,
"What?" Usopp was confused now.
"One more question, Who gave us the ship?" Nami asked. Usopp had no idea of the answer to this question but he had to make up something.
"I built the ship" Usopp replied and waited to see if he was correct.
Nami wacked the fake Usopp hard with her staff, Sanji saw his cue and began kicking the zoron madly.
The maze started to rumble as it started to rearrange again. The walls of the room were closing in and it crushed the table that was once full of food.
"This was a trap" Zoro admitted as he joined the group again with Luffy and the real Usopp who was quickly untied, "the zoron's purpose was to stall time". The exit was sealed off by a wall and now the walls were closing in faster.
"We have to get out now!" Nami yelled. We should escape from above" Usopp pointed at the top of the walls.
"Gum Gum rocket!" Luffy had already reached the top and pulled Nami up.
"The wall is closing in too fast, we won't all make it!" Zoro said as Sanji leapt up and was caught by Luffy.
"Not if I can help it, rumbl ball!" Chopper pulled out a rumble ball from his pocket and ate it.
"Jump boost!" Chopper transformed into his jump boost form and held Zoro as he easily leapt over the walls. They heard a smash as the walls collided with each other.
"That was close" Luffy commented,
"…and it's going to be even closer" a voice rang out. An army of skeleton warriors emerged from the icy walls.
"They must be the left overs of people who died here" Nami said, "We'll put them to rest the painful way ".
"Oni giri!" Zoro performed his famous sword attack and began slashing away at the axe wielding skeletons. The labyrinth continued to rumble as Sanji rushed in to help Zoro, a wall protruded from another wall and blocked off Zoro and Sanji.
"We lost two fighters" Usopp said,
"Don't worry, you won't miss out the fun" the same voice laughed and undead warriors started to emerge from their side as well.
"Gum Gum double barrel!" Luffy shot his stretchy arms and smashed at a few skeletons but a few ice spikes shot up from the ground and trapped his arms.
"Arm boost!" Chopper growled and he transformed into his arm boost form, he charged at the undeads, smashing them along the way until he came to the spikes. He smashed them with one arm and Luffy was free again but the ice spikes wrapped around Chopper's leg instead.
"Freezing squid of doom!" Chopper cried as he reverted back to his brain boost mode.
"For heavens sake! There's no such thing as the freezing squid of doom!" Nami yelled but Chopper was pulled down into the snow before he heard Nami's words.
"Chopp-" Usopp started but was also pulled down by a pair of icy spikes.
"Oh no, we're all separated" Nami said and defended herself against the skeletons.
"We have to get out of here, these skeletons are endless" Luffy grit his teeth".
"Gum Gum rocket!" Luffy grabbed Nami and they catapulted themselves past the enemy and began running on the ground again. The skeletons didn't follow and simply disintegrated. Nami and Luffy slowed down to catch their breath,
"Where to now?" Luffy asked. Nami shook her head,
"I think we should continue east because the others know that we had agreed to travel east".
"I sure hope we meet up with Sanji again, I'm hungry" Luffy moaned,
"After all that food?" Nami asked,
"Yeah but I only ate nine whole turkeys and five legs of ham" Luffy explained,
"That's what an elephant would eat!" Nami seemed astounded.
"But elephants eat leaves" Luffy said and scratched his head.
"Never mind, we have to hurry before the labyrinth changes again and blocks our path. The two pirates rushed through the maze towards the east where they would meet expect to meet up their friends.
End of chapter 3
That was Chapter 3, just a bit of bluff and stuff in preparation for the main plot. I reminder that I will be in Malaysia for a month or so (see the end of chapter 2), please still check out my story when I come back and thanks for your great reviews!