And another one!

Yeah, not gonna lie, surprised by how quickly this one came out, we started this morning and finished just a half hour or so ago.

Though that's probably because we had a pretty good idea for this one for the most part.

Anyway, hope you enjoy part two of the Dead End Adventure!

Consciousness slowly returned to him, shifting around as he heard voices, slowly finding them to be sounding clearer and clearer until he could properly make out Chopper's voice "Give him some space everyone."

Slowly, he opened his eyes, seeing his Zoan crewmate standing over him as he lay on his back on a small cot placed in the kitchen "What…?"

"Easy Lumen, don't move too suddenly." Chopper told him "You were out for an hour before finally waking up."

"That long?" Lumen repeated in confusion, blinking his eyes and shaking his head a bit while Chopper shifted to his full human form and held up his hand.

"How many fingers am I holding up?" he asked, clearly wanting to make sure he wasn't disoriented.

"Three." Lumen said, slowly sitting himself up, placing a hand to his forehead "What… happened exactly?"

Chopper stopped at that "You… don't remember?"

"No… should I?" Lumen asked in confusion.

Chopper looked aside nervously at that, before turning back to Luffy, whom was sitting down and watching them seriously "Luffy…"

The rubber man frowned a bit, before looking at Lumen "You passed out after seeing a weird girl when we met this Gasparde guy earlier. She called you Darling and you just fainted in fear."

Lumen twitched at that, his body giving a full shudder as he started breathing rapidly "Oh no… no no no no no no…" he trailed off, repeating the word in fear.

"He's relapsing. Sanji!" Chopper said urgently.

"It's ready." Sanji said as he poured some warm water into a cup and brought it to Lumen "Drink. Now."

Lumen's hands thankfully snapped around it and he drank down whatever was in the cup, and they could see him finally calm down when he brought the cup away from his lips "What? Why do I…?"

"It's an herbal remedy made to help patients calm down when they start to have panic attacks like you were." Chopper informed him.

"Lumen." he heard Nami's voice, turning to look at her and the rest of the crew giving him looks of concern "What happened?'

Lumen paused, as if not sure what to say, before taking a deep breath. "She's someone I WISH I didn't know," he said after a moment. "She's someone I knew from my hometown and not in a good way. You heard how she called me 'Darling', right? Well let me say it straight. I wouldn't want anything to do with her even if she was the last woman on the planet," he said.

"That… she's someone you REALLY don't like then?" Usopp asked.

"'Don't like' is putting it lightly," Lumen grumbled. "Her name is Blair Violet. She's my crazy stalker, and someone I thought I was rid of. She's been the bane of my existence for 5 years. Ever since I first met her. All I did was be polite, and somehow that twisted head of hers thinks every little thing I did is proof of my 'undying love' for her," he said, and at this point it felt like a dam broke as he just couldn't stop talking anymore. "If it was just that, I could have lived with that. But then one day I find the window to my room broken and a whole bunch of junk that may as well have been her saying she wanted to move in or something. Then when we boarded up the window, she went and broke into the house and repainted half my room before we called the cops on her. Then even after that she broke the lock in my room and started leaving ideas for 'baby names'," Lumen was shuddering violently at that point. "We had to relocate my room to the basement with enough locks and security to make our fridge look like an open invitation!"

Everyone winced at that, seeing as the fridge on the Going Merry had several locks on it to keep Luffy out and that was already what most would call overkill, but Lumen wasn't done yet.

"And when she still tried breaking in, we started keeping guns around the house, and you know what happened when I had a shotgun aimed right at her face?! She was acting like I was giving her a marriage proposal or something! And when we tried to report her to the authorities, the local judge was a fucking sociopath or something because they dismissed my claims despite the mountain sized pile of evidence against her and how many arrests she had. I had to climb higher and higher through the courts until I got someone that FINALLY did something. Not only did they make sure the other judge was sacked, but they gave me a restraining order that makes it so she can't get within 50 feet of me or else I'm legally entitled to putting a bullet between her eyes. She's even HURT other people, friends of mine, because she viewed them as being in the way! The last time I heard anything about her, she was put under total house arrest because they found out she was planning to kill my little sister!" Lumen was almost frothing at the mouth at that last one, showing just how much he LOATHED that woman.

"Oh my god!" Vivi gasped in horror at just how… INSANE that girl was.

"And here I thought I'd met crazy people before." Zoro said with a frown.

"I thought I'd seen bad stalker cases before, but this is LITERALLY the worst one ever." Akira added, shaking his head.

Robin didn't say anything, though she did frown, her eyes gaining a dark glint to them, especially when he mentioned his troubles with trying to get her off his back.

"Is your sister alright at least?" Nami asked with a frown.

"She was fine before I left. And with me gone from the island I assumed she'd just focus on trying to find me and fail at it. Sadly, that was hoping for too much clearly." he answered in a mix of anger and frustration.

"And she somehow found her way here. I don't even know what to call that," Sanji frowned.

"I call it a sick joke if you ask me," Lumen grumbled. "I seriously thought I was rid of her, heck, I hoped that when we entered the Grand Line, if she actually was following me, she'd go sink somewhere," he snarled. "How the heck she managed to make it this far...I have no idea…"

Luffy frowned, before standing up "If she gets close to the ship… we kick her ass and send her flying." he said seriously "She's not gonna do anything to Lumen anymore."

"I'll fire her out of a cannon if we have to," Usopp said.

"I know how to make some really strong sedatives too," Chopper added.

"She'll be getting a lightning bolt to the face if she tries getting on Merry," Nami added.

"Carue, you have full permission to kick her with everything you have," Vivi said, Carue saluting without hesitation.

"Let's see how she likes being a training dummy if she tries anything," Zoro smirked a bit.

"It's against my policy to hit a lady, but I have no intention of defending this one whatsoever," Sanji said.

"Well, would you prefer just throwing her overboard, or would you prefer something important broken?" Robin offered.

"Someone like her DEFINITELY needs to be locked up with the key thrown away," Akira nodded.

Lumen looked stunned at the others, before he smiled at them, tears at his eyes before he wiped them away "Thanks everyone… I'm really glad to be part of this crew."

"Hey, what are friends for?" Nami said with a smile.

"So uh...not to ruin the mood a bit, but what happened while I was out?" Lumen asked after a moment.

"Well to begin with you gave us quite a scare when Luffy came well...flying back...with you unconscious for some reason," Vivi said.

"We got back to the ship immediately after that, and you've been here ever since. Though we did start on prep while you were out," Sanji said, looking over to a few bags of flour at the side of the room... which made sense since they were in the kitchen and Chopper didn't really have a clinic in the Merry, so this was probably the most stable place that would always have someone in the room in case anything happened.

"Though...now that we got the full story, didn't we hear someone shouting something that sounded like 'Darling' while we were running?" Usopp gulped.

"...we're taking turns keeping watch after this," Nami said flatly, everyone nodding in agreement at that. However, when she noticed Lumen was among the ones nodding, she pointed at him. "EXCEPT you," she said. "You've had to deal with her enough."

"Right...thanks…" Lumen sighed a bit.

"If you want, we could try some therapy to help you handle yourself better the next time we run into her?" Chopper suggested.

Lumen grimaced "Good call… now that I'm a pirate the law isn't on my side with that restraining order."

"Well… technically, you would still have it on your side." Akira said "Your bounty is set to OOO, not to you, so if you could get a copy of the restraining order…" he trailed off.

Lumen shook his head "Too difficult. It's all the way back home, and I don't know if we can even get there." he said before sighing "I'm gonna have to face her eventually… though it won't be this week I can tell you that much." he added before shaking his head "Anyway… what's our game plan, if any?"

"Not much. Right now our only plan is to rest up, wake up early to get ready for the race, and in the meantime we keep an eye out for that nut job and anyone else who might be looking to sink us before the race starts," Zoro shrugged.

"While the race IS anything goes once it starts, that hasn't stopped some from trying to sabotage the competition ahead of time," Robin added.

"About as good a plan as any I guess," Lumen sighed.

"Then let's head to bed for now." Vivi said, everyone getting up, with Chopper helping Lumen to his feet.

Stepping out of the cabin, he glanced around at the city nervously, heading for the hold where he slept with all the other guys "So… which one of you has the first watch?" he asked curiously.

"I'll handle it." Akira said "I don't want to just be a freeloader to you all while you're putting up with me after all."

"Alright, night then." Sanji said, putting out his cigarette before they all headed inside to sleep, Akira placing himself so he had all the doors of the Merry in his sight, and he made sure to set up a few Gorilla Candroids around the ship as extra sentries to give him an early alert.

It was going to be a long night.

The following morning…

Lumen yawned as he woke up, glad that it seemed he been able to fall asleep. It was a testament to how much he trusted his friends that he was able to fall asleep so easily. Although, once he DID wake up, he realised that… "Really you two?" he said in deadpan, because Chopper was leaning on him on one side, while Carue was just unconscious across Lumen's legs.

He heard a laugh come from overhead, looking up to see Usopp chuckling down at him "Yeah we kinda woke up to that, and it was too funny to NOT enjoy it a bit." he said, laughing more before he was suddenly brained with Lumen's pillow and fell out of his hammock. "What was that for?" Usopp groaned.

"Comedy toll. My entertainment doesn't come cheap," Lumen smirked a bit.

"...eh, worth it," Usopp snorted.

At that point, an arm sprouted just on the wall above Lumen and knocked on it, before disappearing "Guess it's time to get up then. Come on you two." he said, shaking the two that had decided to use him as a pillow at some point in the night.

A short while later saw everyone above deck and they immediately got to work after a quick breakfast Sanji had already prepared. Everyone made sure the ship was in good condition, unfurled the sails, raised the anchor, made sure the cannons were ready, etc etc.

"You know, not that I'm complaining, but I'm kinda surprised Blair didn't come looking for the ship," Lumen said as he was busy helping with the anchor.

"Who says she didn't. There's gotta be lots of ships hidden on this island. If she's as crazy as you said she is, she might have spent the whole night looking through every one of them," Zoro grunted.

"Thanks for the nightmare fuel, moss-for-brains," Lumen deadpanned.

"Anytime," Zoro smirked a bit...right before the loud laughter that had started up right after Lumen called him 'moss-for-brains' became rather annoying. "Shut it Dartboard Brow!"

"Let's just get the stuff ready so we can start the dang race," Lumen sighed. Before long everything on the ship was prepared, while Nami double checked the Eternal Pose.

"Hm...its still pointing over the mountain," she frowned.

"It is?" Luffy blinked. "Do we have to climb a mountain again then?"

"Speaking of which, where is everyone else? That Bookmaker said that this Island is supposed to be the starting point, but why are we the only ones here?" Vivi frowned.

"The entire island is the starting point, yes," Robin nodded. "As for what Mr. Captain said, this island has an upward stream just like Reverse Mountain, namely every river on the island flows towards the mountain. In short, it doesn't matter where you start, on this level, you'll be taken to the true starting line."

"So we literally are going up the mountain, huh? Great…" Lumen sighed. The last one was crazy enough as is.

"If that's the case everyone into position! We're going to ride up the mountain!" Nami ordered, everyone quickly getting into position and bracing for what was soon to come. Reverse Mountain was one heck of an experience, and they had a feeling this was going to be one too...one way or another.

Tensely, they all watched towards the open ocean, waiting silently, before Nami snapped up straight "It's here!" she said, and suddenly a strong wind caught onto the sail while the current headed towards the island itself.

"Oh boy, here we go!" Lumen grunted as the ship actually tipped forwards from how strong the wind was.

"Hang on tight!" Usopp shouted as he held the mast tightly.

"We're heading for a cave!" Chopper said, before they entered the dark tunnel.

"Quaack!" Carue let out loudly while pointing ahead, causing Vivi's eyes to narrow a bit before they widened.

"There's light at the end of the tunnel!" she told the others, causing them to look closely as they gradually approached while Merry finally righted itself a bit.

"Light at the end of a dark tunnel huh?" Zoro said with a smirk.

"There's a joke there that I REALLY don't feel like diving into." Akira said with a sigh.

The group soon reached the end of the tunnel and soon revealed...that they were on a canal and that all the paths upward ran through canals spanning the entire town. "Wow, talk about a water town," Lumen whistled as all around them they heard cheering from the various residents and pirates who were spectators for the race.

"This many people gathering to watch, all these crews in one place. I know more than a few marines who'd have this as their...murder dreams…" Akira couldn't help but say.

"Yeah...let's not think about that," Nami sweat dropped at hearing that one.

"Look how much these guys love us though!" Usopp said with a grin "A lot more people bet on us than we expected!" he said, posing along with Luffy as the two laughed… until…

"Hey, you idiots better tap out of the race early, I bet you'd sink in 10 minutes!"

Their faces fell at that "Jerks…" Luffy muttered.

"It's to be expected. From what I can tell, our new Bounties still haven't reached them yet." Nami said "They don't know how much you're worth now, or that Zoro and Lumen have bounties on them too. Same goes for them not knowing about us having Vivi aboard."

"And myself as well." Robin added.

"I can see the other contestants in the other canals." Sanji noted as he hanged off the rigging, looking around the town, before he noted something "Hmm… those are… Marine sails, but the logo is crossed out."

"Gasparde." Akira growled, gripping his Birth Buster as a precaution.

"Is he… using a steam ship?" Lumen wondered "This is honestly the first like it I've seen." he admitted.

"That's his yeah. Apparently it's called the Salamander." Nami said, going up to him "Blair is probably on it."

Lumen's fist tightened at that "Let's sink it if we can then."

"Will do." she told him, patting his shoulder.

Everyone stayed the course, especially as the canals were soon converging together. As they did, several other ships soon joined the path they were on, and in typical fashion, there was a whole bunch of smack talk coming from all sorts of crews, several of them with some very weird ships, though the oddest had to be the ship with the honest to god drill mounted on it and the 'ship' used by the two giants which looked less like a ship and more like someone crossed a sailboat with a jet ski. Other than that, the ships gathering were all unique...but not quite as eccentric.

Of course they couldn't 'appreciate' the eccentricities of the various crews seeing as they were going further up the mountain and it was soon becoming a straight incline, forcing everyone to grab hold of something. "This feels like it's gonna be another roller coaster!" Lumen shouted.

"Oh crap, I hate those!" Akira shouted.

"How do you get into the Grandline then?!" Usopp couldn't help but ask.

"We use paddle systems and a seastone coating under our ships so we can actually sail right through the Calm Belt without alerting Sea Kings!" Akira shot back.

"Huh, maybe we should get one of those for our ship," Zoro mused.

Any further conversation was put on halt as they were soon leveling out, allowing them to see the sunrise, which would have been a beautiful sight...if not for the fact that they were at the top of a gigantic waterfall…which they just went over the edge and were about to go STRAIGHT down towards another river leading off the island.

Everyone was pretty much speechless, their jaws hanging (except for Robin)... even Merry looked surprised, before Luffy broke the silence with a shout of excitement as they started falling.

"Sweet baby sea kings this is stupidly crazy!" Lumen shouted as he hanged onto the railing, grabbing Usopp by the nose when the sniper started floating up into the air.

"Why the nose, man?!"

"Blame your parents and their genes for giving it to you!" Lumen shot back at him.

Vivi winced as she looked over the side of the ship right as they hit the water and started going down "One of the others just landed right outside the river itself… their ship is in ruins."

Carue shivered a bit, before he said something, which made Chopper nod with a nervous swallow "Yeah… a LOT of luck indeed."

Meanwhile Nami was clinging to the mast, her face blue "That… was the Grand Fall…?" she muttered with a death grip on the mast.

"This isn't the time to be overwhelmed Miss Navigator!" Robin said seriously, snapping Nami out of it.

True enough, all around them chaos was erupting. The various crews who landed on the river they were on wasting no time in trying to take out the competition…some even to the point of mutual destruction.

"This is crazy! We've barely started and they're ALREADY going at each other's throats?!" Akira gasped.

"That's just how much many of these people want to win," Robin said, right as they noticed a ship being literally drilled apart by Willy's ship, debris flying everywhere...and among them something that flew right towards them...and brained Luffy on the head.

"Ow ow ow!" Luffy shouted as the object hit the ground, though Luffy himself didn't look remotely as bad as someone normal would have been. "What hit me?!"

"...our luck is crazy sometimes," Lumen blinked as a chest had hit Luffy, to which he didn't hesitate to open it, revealing a small pile of gold and jewels...and something round and blue peeking out of the gold. "No way…" he gasped, before finding it was a Tako Medal.

"Guess you really are a Coin Magnet," Zoro laughed.

"They're Medals, but I think you might be onto something…" Lumen sweat dropped.

And then he felt something grab onto him, looking down to see Nami clinging to him… and her eyes had turned to Berri signs "Not that I'm complaining, but…?"

"You're our lucky charm at making money!" she said gleefully.

Lumen sweat dropped at that "Right…" he sighed, before looking at Usopp "Hey, Usopp, go guard the rear yeah?"

"Why me?!" Usopp demanded in fear.

"You're good with a cannon, duh." Luffy said, understanding easily why Lumen had said that, making Usopp groan as he marched to the back of the ship… and saw another ship coming up behind them, their captain on the prow and laughing like a maniac as he gloated.

"One's on us already dammit…" Usopp groaned even as he took out a white bandana, tying it around his head and putting his goggles on finally, sliding them down over his eyes as he angled the cannon correctly and lit the fuse… and the cannonball went straight through the ship tailing them, blowing it up easily.

Usopp stared for a moment, blinking "Sometimes I scare myself… but damn if that wasn't awesome." he finished with a grin.

Up ahead the race was already extremely hectic as ships rammed into each other, crews boarding enemy ships and starting all out fights, something Luffy saw and just laughed. "They sure are going at it!" he grinned.

"Well they're idiots for getting too excited so early on," Akira frowned.

"What makes you say that?" Luffy asked.

"Because the river is starting to twist and turn!" Akira shouted.

Gasping, Nami grabbed a telescope and saw the turns that were fast approaching. "Everyone, get ready for a sharp turn starboard!" she ordered, everyone quickly starting to shift Merry towards the right, something that they did with increased urgency when a ship literally did crash from failing to turn in time, crushing several houses in the process when it fell to the side.

Of course, some were more foolhardy, like the giants who actually increased speed, and aimed to use the remains of the ship as a ramp, sending them flying into the air...to which they crashed into a part of the town, having completely failed to clear the full stretch.

"That's one epic fail we do NOT want to join in on!" Lumen gasped.

"Chopper, cut the helm!" Nami ordered.

"I'm trying, but we're not turning!" Chopper shouted, and he even had Carue and Akira helping him too.

"We're going to crash at this rate!" Vivi shouted.

"Think if I kick the ship from underneath it'd cushion us?" Zoro mused...in a tone that said he was seriously considering it.

"Don't even try!" everyone nearby (save Luffy) roared. However, at that moment that gave Nami an idea.

"Wait...cushion? That's it!" she said. "Luffy, you're up!"

"Huh?" Luffy blinked, before his eyes lit up "Oh! I think I get it!" he said before he ran up to the front and jumped off Merry right before they hit the wrecked ship "Gum Gum Balloon!" he inflated his body as much as he could, and his breath was nearly knocked out of him when Merry rammed into him, his body being used as a cushion, before he rolled upwards, sending Merry up as well… and soon flying into the air, Luffy trailing behind before he shot his arm arm out and Lumen grabbed him, pulling him back onto the ship "Thanks!"

"No problem Captain." Lumen grinned.

"Wait, what do we do now though?!" Chopper asked in worry, as while they were flying through the air, they were above the town, and were NOT going to make it to the open ocean.

"We need to get back to the water!" Vivi said hastily.

"I've got an idea!" Lumen said as he ran for the port side of the boat, bringing Luffy with him while he took out his Driver and quickly slotted in all three blue medals "Hopefully this works!" he said, tilting the driver and scanning the medals "Henshin!"

"SHACHI! UNAGI! TAKO! SHA-SHA-SHAUTA, SHA-SHA-SHAUTA!"

Quickly, Lumen was donned in the armor of OOO, the legs now a light blue in color and sporting what looked like octopus suckers on them. Quickly, he grabbed the Voltarm Whips off of his arms, before looking at his Captain "Ready Luffy?"

"Let's do it!" Luffy grinned, before tossing his arms out with Lumen's whips, both the whips AND the arms grabbing onto the roof of one of the buildings "Gum Gum…"

"Voltaic…"

"Grapple!" the two finished together as they pulled HARD, sending the Merry flying back towards the river, and just BARELY managing to land back into the water.

"It's crazy the kinds of things we get up to…" Usopp wheezed.

"With that kind of crazy things we get into, it's almost a miracle we haven't sank to the bottom of the ocean by now," Sanji mused.

"If this is normal for you lot, I worry for the sanity of anyone trying to catch you," Akira said, looking a little green from what just happened. He might have been a Marine, but this was WAY beyond an exciting day at the job. It was more to the level of 'Code Red! We're all gonna die!'

"At any rate we're well on the way. As long as we can avoid the other crews and whatever the seas throw at us, we can enjoy the ride till the end," Robin smiled.

"If this was one of the Blues maybe…" Vivi sweat dropped at that one.

"Who cares, I'm really pumped up! Let's win this race!" Luffy cheered.

"Heh, well you heard our captain," Zoro smirked a little. "Let's win this."

"Yeah!" everyone cheered.

"Not to be a wet blanket, but where is everyone? I know we weren't exactly pole position, but shouldn't we be seeing someone else around now?" Lumen asked, a good hour after they'd stopped being able to see the island.

"They probably all decided to try and find their own paths. The Eternal Pose might point us straight to our destination, but that doesn't mean we have to follow it to the letter...as paradoxical as that sounds…" Nami said.

"I guess that makes sense. I mean, if everyone took the same path, we'd probably tear eachother apart before we're even half way there," Lumen nodded.

"At least the seas are calm for a change," Vivi said as everyone was on the deck, more or less enjoying the weather, Carue had even fallen asleep, his head in her lap. "Still, we should probably make some preparations whenever we can. Could someone check for any damage? We DID go through a bumpy ride on the way down," she mused.

"Right, since things are calm, who's turn is it for that?" Usopp asked, to which Chopper quickly went inside the kitchen area and came out with a time table.

"Zoro's turn!" Chopper reported.

"You're up, Moss Head," Sanji snorted.

"Right right," Zoro waved it off, grumbling a little about what they needed a chore time table for anyway, but went below deck to check anyway. "Doesn't look like there are any leaks," he said, walking around. He didn't see anything nor did he hear any splashes that would come from puddles formed by leaks. However, before he was finished, he sensed something and soon opened the way into the bathroom, a hand on one of his katanas. "If you're looking to stowaway, you picked the wrong ship. This is a pirate ship after all," he said.

He received silence in return, but only kept up his glare as he clicked Wado out of its sheath.

Suddenly a voice shouted as a figure rose up from their hiding spot in the bathtub, firing a gun with a roar, but Zoro moved faster and grabbed the figure, slamming them into a wall, revealing…

"A kid?!" he said with a grimace as the child fell unconscious, and he could see that the kid was dressed in dirty clothes like you'd see in a workshop of some kind, including a too big hat on their head.

Still, there was now a question on Zoro's mind.

"What fresh hell have we waltzed into now?" he said with a sigh as he looked at the unconscious kid.

And there's the chapter!

So, yeah, Blair Violet... yeah she's fucking crazy.

Every main character in One Piece has their own personal demons to face... so for Lumen, we figured the best thing was someone from his home that scared him when he was jut a vanilla human.

Realistically, I know SOME of you guys reading this might say you would have happily accepted her advances... but if you apply logic, you realise that a Yandere Stalker is NOT a good thing, she WILL kill your friends if her twisted little mind in any way thinks they'll get in the way, she'll even kill your mother if she thinks she needs to.

She'll also kill YOU if it comes down to it.

To a regular nerd like Lumen before he ended up in the Blues and took a level in badass, this is TERRIFYING.

And now suddenly she's followed him across dimensions to continue tormenting him.

You can see why he had a panic attack when he did.

There's still a bit MORE in store for her though, something that'll certainly shock you all.

Look forward to that, but for now...

Count the Medals:

Red: Taka, Condor

Green: Kuwagata, Kamakiri, Batta

Yellow: Lion, Tora, Cheetah

Grey: Sai, Gorilla, Zou

Blue: Shachi, Unagi, Tako

Orange: Cobra, Kame, Wani

Black: Kani

Purple: Tyranno