Wealth, Fame, Power…

Chapter 38: Checkpoint

Nami sighed to herself as she leaned on the railing at the front of the ship. She could now clearly see land off in the horizon. And at this point, she was just waiting for Luffy to spot it so he could freak out and get all excited. He'd been pestering her for days on when they'd arrive, so she was gonna wait for him to find out on his own. But it was seriously crazy how annoying he could be sometimes, even after the whole bounty incident the other day, he just wouldn't shut up.

She sighed again as a small smile crept onto her lips, she supposed she was getting used to his shenanigans though, and it was getting easier to control him now that she could hurt him for some strange reason.

But while she was on the topic, it really was eye opening how fast Luffy got his first bounty. And not just to her either, the whole crew ended up being shocked. Sanji and Usopp swallowed it the fastest, quickly moving on to bicker about Usopp's convenient photo bomb in the background. Zoro just gave a big grin and a nod of respect, something she had never really seen from the swordsman, he must have been quite impressed.

Now was she impressed? Well, the short answer would be, yes. But a better descriptor for reaction after all the screaming settled down was… Speechless. She'd been around pirates her whole life, conning them, stealing from them, manipulating them. But she had never really seen such a huge bounty before. Well, at least not one that could compare to Arlong's. So yes, she was very impressed, but it wasn't like she would tell anyone that. One of Luffy's best traits in her eyes was his humility, and she wasn't about to even risk giving him a big head with any compliments.

But that didn't stop the boy from having his own little celebration and acting like a little kid on Christmas. He was jumping around all over the place like a lunatic. And no matter how much the navigator insisted that infamy was a very bad thing, Luffy only seemed to get more excited.

Nami was soon pulled out of her thoughts when the person on her mind jumped for joy out of nowhere.

"Woohoo! Land ho everyone! Why didn't you say anything Nami!?"

Yep, there it was, she called it.

The navigator rolled her eyes, noticing that everyone else had followed Luffy out of the kitchen after hearing him yell. "I wanted some more peace and quiet before you got all loud again."

"Oh my sweet Nami, you're so beautiful when you're annoyed!" Sanji swooned. "Would you like me to shut this dumbass up for you?"

"No thanks Sanji," she replied sweetly. "I can handle him just fine if he keeps it up."

Luffy completely ignored the sadistic tone in the girls voice and continued on with his enthusiasm. "So what was this place called again Nami? Loguetown?"

"Wow, you actually remembered something I said for once," she joked. "But yes, that's Loguetown. They call it the town of the beginning and the end since it's the last stop in the East Blue before you get to the Grand Line. It also happens to be where Gold Roger got executed at the start of the pirate era."

"Oooooh," Luffy and Usopp sparked in awe.

Zoro just scoffed at the meaningless detail. "Yeah that's great and all but they better have a blacksmith or some kind of sword shop. I don't ever wanna have to rely on this crappy cook to win a battle ever again."

Sanji shook out of his loving gaze and quickly turned to retort back at the swordsman. "Go to hell mosshead! It's not my fault you refuse to learn to fight like a normal person with only one sword!"

"Yeah!? Right back at ya eyebrows! I'll learn some one sword style the day you learn to fight with your hands!"

Nami once again rolled her eyes and sighed at the antics of her crewmates. Luffy and Usopp had their arms linked running in circles out of joy for arriving, and Zoro and Sanji were butting heads like children over their little dispute.

So why in the world did she decide to come back again?

"Adventure! Adventure! Adventure!" Luffy and Usopp chanted together.

"Screw you blondie!"

"You first shithead!"

Oh yeah, all these morons needed a babysitter…

When the pirates eventually made it to shore and docked, everyone was eager to dismount and stretch their legs for a bit. But none were as ready as Luffy was. "Alright! Time to go see where the last Pirate King died!"

The boy's declaration immediately triggered a thought in the navigator's mind, reminding her that she had been waiting for the perfect opportunity to get the rubber man alone and really question him about all of her curiosities.

"Hey Luffy, wait up! Maybe I could go with y-"

But before she could even finish her sentence, the straw hat teen had already leapt off the Merry, taking off in a mad dash towards the center of town.

"Aww man," Nami muttered to herself. Annoyed at how hasty the boy could be sometimes.

Never one to miss a detail that caught his eye, Zoro furrowed his brows at the girl's behavior. What was that about? He was sure he would have thought more about it if he didn't already have a pressing matter to attend to with her. One that he was sure he was gonna regret. "Hey, Nami, I need some cash. I was serious before about buying some new swords and I'm flatout broke right now."

Nami sighed and turned to the green haired swordsman, pushing her stupid captain out of her mind for now. There would be opportunities later on to get to know him better. "Alright, how much do you want?"

Zoro froze and looked at the girl incredulously, not trusting that she was being genuine. This has to be a joke right? She would never give in that easily!

Nami gritted her teeth as her patience ran thin. She was already annoyed at how fast Luffy ran away, and she wasn't about to deal with any more idiots right now. "Ugh, do you want any money or not!?"

The swordsman immediately shook out of his stupor and responded hesitantly. "Uh, yeah, how does two hundred thousand sound?"

Nami grumbled to herself as she pulled the money out of her pocket, happy that it wasn't enough to make her go below deck to her stash. This was chump change after all. "Here, now I'm going shopping," she turned towards the other two boys on the ship. "And since your Captain has absolutely no manners in waiting for a lady, someone else has to go with me."

It was at this point that Sanji threw himself in front of Usopp, waving his arms around dramatically in hopes of catching the girl's eye.

Meanwhile, Zoro was looking down at the bills of cash in his hand wondering what the hell was going on? Did she really just give him money outright without any sort of drawback? What was the catch? "Hey, witch, what the hell is this!? Aren't you gonna try to screw me over with some crappy excuse? Or give me some ridiculous interest or something?"

Nami rolled her eyes at the man yet again, what a dumbass. Here she was cutting him some slack and the first thing he does is bring it back up. "You're so stupid Zoro, I should give you five hundred percent interest every time you breath for calling me a witch. But lucky for you, I'm in a forgiving mood today. So watch your mouth."

And just like that, Nami turned back to the two other boys of the crew. Not hesitating to reach out and grab Usopp by the nose and dragging him off the ship to go shopping.

And unfortunately for the long nosed teen, this meant carrying more bags then shopping.

"Oh that's fine my lovely angel! I have my own things to do anyway!" Sanji swooned, leaping off of the boat himself. And walking in a different direction. Oddly enough, he didn't appear to be too broken up about the navigator's choice of company, he really did have business to attend to, after all. "I better hurry and pick up some fresh food for my beautiful swan. As a man, It would be shameful to feed a lady the same scraps that I feed those other idiots."

With that, the only crewmember left aboard the Merry was none other than the pirate hunter himself, and boy was he speechless. Forgiving mood? That was her in a forgiving mood!? Gah, whatever, I've got some decent enough cash to replace my swords and I won't owe a cent over two hundred thousand beris. The swordsman thought as he smiled devilishly in excitement. Who knew, maybe he would actually thank the navigator later for her mercy. Though for some reason he couldn't shake the feeling that he should really be thanking his captain for what just occurred…

Walking down the quiet streets of the now peaceful Loguetown was a large, bulky man. He wore a large white coat with a patch on it that clearly showed his affiliation with the world government. Hell, the only reason this town had gone from a pirate's paradise to a ghost town was all because of him. And as the large man scratched his solid white hair, he took another puff of the two cigars hanging out of his mouth, it sure was boring around here lately.

But then again, boring wasn't the worst thing in the world, he'd rather all of the civilians be safe then have a bunch of chaos just for entertainment.

Because no one got hurt on his watch…

"Oof!" A muffled voice bellowed as they hit the ground hard, bouncing right off of the large marines chest.

"Watch where you're going kid," He said grumpily, narrowing his eyes at the odd looking teen.

Luffy picked himself up off the floor and adjusted his hat back onto his head, a big goofy smile on his face the entire time. "Gee, sorry mister, I guess I wasn't looking where I was going. See, I'm trying to find the place where the Pirate King was executed."

Still holding his narrow eyed stare, the large marine lifted his arm and pointed behind himself. "The plaza's straight that way, you can't miss it."

"Wow!" Luffy exclaimed graciously. "Thanks a lot!"

With that, the boy took off again, bobbing and weaving through the crowd of passersby with every step he took.

Not being able to hold it back, the large man let out a chuckle at the boy's enthusiasm, finally laughing when he saw him speed up and run into someone else. Stupid kid.

"Captain Smoker! You have to see this!" Another marine yelled as he ran up to his superior. "We just received this bounty from HQ , they think it's possible that he's already here!"

Sanji walked around town with hearts in his eyes for who knows how long, his gaze meeting a brand new girl every couple of seconds. All that combined with the thoughts of pleasing a certain orange haired navigator had him feeling nothing short of amazing right now.

The boy promptly sobered up out of his loving state however, when he came across something that caught his eye, or to be more precise, someone. "You've gotta be shitting me! It's him!"

Here we are guys, another chapter. A bit on the short side, I know. But this whole Loguetown Arc is only gonna be two more chapters after this so it's all good. I decided since a good amount of it is filler that I would be doing a fair share of cutting stuff out. See ya next time :)