"Bitch stay in your lane, shh don't say my name,

I'll set you to flames, no we are not the same.

Set fire to rain, this the house of pain,

There ain't no running away, when the sickness hits your brain"

Sickick, Bermuda

She leapt and rolled out of Hector's arms, just as Coby kicked out and took him down. She screeched back that there was more than one and Coby and Helmeppo pulled out their respective weapons, being a frying pan and a large sword by the name of Goenem. Goenem was just a cheap Nodachi purchased an island over, sturdy enough to handle weak people like this but nowhere enough for somebody who knew how to use swords properly. Helmeppo himself was only just fully memorising Kata and was a monster with the weapon in his hand. (The frying pan was just on hand. There's a story behind it but it's a bit traumatising right now. Somewhat of a noodle incident. Maybe we'll tell you in the future.)

The boys both swung at the same time, taking hordes of people down at a time. It was a fun work out, tough yes, but nothing on Garp's daily routine (He snailed them (God I feel insane saying that) daily and smiled gleefully to the sounds of them becoming slightly less hopeless every day. He was proud of those squirts and could only imagine how powerful his grandkiddies could have been had they picked this route. But alas, kiddos are kiddos and his were just particularly stubborn. He'd get them one day.) which now hardly took anything out of them anymore compared to when they started. Garp had advanced them higher and higher and soon enough they'd be working on the same morning routine he would as a warm up and then they'd be sparring at his level also. They were nowhere near as close to catching up though.

'Maria', however, stood back and crossed her arms, watching the boys like hawks and shouting out if anyone was sneaking up on them. She couldn't be asked for this one, honestly.

What? She hadn't expected the Barmaid to give her such a nice dress, it would be a shame to ruin it now- oh look, the barmaid was one of the few who weren't actually a slave trader, interesting. One would assume that she would have been, as least with the dress she gave her. Oh well. Not anything to look into, really.

Someone was sent flying her way. She rolled her eyes and sent the guy a glare, booting him in the nuts with her bare feet and stealing his boots. Sturdy, partially worn in, steel capped- she'd have fun with this one. He'd been about her height, around 5"7, just slightly shorted, so the boots fit perfect, if only a tiny bit large. Oh god, she was gonna have fun with these.

She stomped on him again with his own boots and smirked at the quiet oomph it garnered. She stayed to the side the rest of the fight, booting and stragglers back into the middle. She wasn't particularly bothered by this, but towards the end of the fight there was an obvious lull as Coby and Helmeppo because tired enough that they were on the same level as the Slave Traders and had to resort to their Devil Fruits that they were keeping as discrete as possible.

(Helmeppo's new visor was just a thin layer of his nylon, coloured black. He kept plates of nylon under his clothes and they helped greatly.)

(Coby was refining his wood by making Helmeppo bokkens and the three were developing teamwork by working to weave between each other and launch off their attacks. He like rekindling dying trees and any that they cut down, he regrew)

(Coby and Helmeppo were better at it than their resident Zoan)

Coby ensnared them in a solid beech that was his hand, so if they twitched he squeezed, and Helmeppo incapacitated them with stretchy, rubbery nylon. 'Maria' actually felt rather left out- they were a rather good team without her. she'd have to improve by miles to feel competent next to two canon characters who were impressive in their own rite.

In lieu of them, Rika was practically nothing. Their Paramecia and Logia were both insanely useful, (Also, did you know that nylon wasn't called that? It was called False-Glass. He called himself a False Glass-Glass man. The substances' names were pathetic in this world. She'd have to fix it) and a Zoan to that was practically child's play. She'd been falling behind lately and was actually even struggling with Garp's. Unlike, she suspected, the people from this world, her body hadn't been trained over generations to endure, and she'd noticed a few severe differences. First off, Height: No problem if you're a marine; highest recorded in a Marine was well over thirteen foot. Weight: yet again, not problem. Waist size ten, who's that? I'm a zero! Face: Literally everybody had the face of either a cherub of a handsome devil. Why did this happen to her? Clothes: fashionable as shit. Doskoi Panda? No thanks, I'll take Jasse's spare sewing scraps and tie them into a shirt because not only are they pretty but hot damn, clothes were little more than strips on some females. Anyways, not the point. She was different and that reflected.

So she invested in something that would give her a either a kickstart or fail miserably. A kilo was easy enough to carry, so she started herself off with a kilo weight on each limb, all never leaving. A t first it left a subtle ache that coated her skin, bt after a week had passed and so had the ache she bumped it up three kilos to make four. Her ankles became hard to lift and don't even get her started on stairs.

Soon after though, she tripled it and moved herself up to 12 kilos per limb. It became hard to walk and it took her 2 weeks to adjust this time. Soon enough hough, she was adjusting with no more burden than the first set of weights and she reluctantly tripled to 36 kilos. Her arms were pulled forward and down in an awkward manner and she found that doing much more than breathing was hard. She continued with 36 kilos for about two more weeks, getting right back into Garp's routine. It was a little harder than usual but still quite easy, but sparring was a different story. 36 kilos, apparently, hurt to get hit in the face with. Coby learnt this the hard way, poor guy.

When training became child's play, she tripled yet again into 108 kilos. For the first day, she was plastered to the deck. Three weeks on though, her sparring was up to par and yet again becoming easy. She tripled yet again and moved to 324 kilos. Rinse, repeat being plastered to the deck. She kept her weights as this though and only tripled it on land because even though she could take more, the poor boat rocked when she took steps. 714.29 was a lot of weight to carry, especially considering her scant 65 bumped her up well above the average weight of a man from this world, which was just under 200. In fact, when Garp had tried to pick her up to throw her into Coby, he'd had a fun time trying to get a good grip to hoist her with. Her muscles were startling when they developed and she was awfully proud. They were still considerably small, but they were good enough for her. Her naturally larger cat-leg muscles had been... fun to say in the least to try and carry the weights with. The half cat form was easier, the cat form was harder and the human middlest. She tripled it once more to 972. It was so much easier to bear after a long time and she found herself feeling easier and easier to sleep. Before her bed broke from the weight of well over a ton crushing it.

Honestly not surprising, the first time she took the weights off, she'd jumped and accidentally launched herself halfway up into the stratosphere. She could run, it seemed, faster than the eye could follow, and she love, love, loved it. Helmeppo and Coby were still slightly above her in combat, lower in speed (With weight and most definitely without) and lowest in tolerance and stamina, they, however, were best at weaponry and combat-Devil-Fruitery. Being able to heft a ton and a half was impressive as it stood, but not exactly beneficial. She took to finding a weapon, and decided that she really liked Naginata. Uncommon, yes. Useful?

Hell yeah.