To those who want Hao/Zeke in this story, I'm afraid he won't be appearing in this story. I don't have any plans for him. This doesn't mean the story won't be exciting; I have a lot in store for you all!

Chapter 6: The Empty Village

It's been a week since the shaman gang joined the Straw Hats.

Luffy lays his head on the side of the ship. "Oh… Why are there no islands…? Are we going towards the right direction?"

"Food supply is running low," says Sanji. "We only have about 2 days portion left."

"Man, why do the food supplies go down so fast? As the captain of the ship, I say that we should conserve our food supply more!"

"You're the one behind the decreasing of food supply! Tell that to yourself!"

Yoh is trying to lift up the weight that Zoro uses often. For the past 30 minutes, he wasn't even successful in lifting it into the air even a millimeter. "Ow… This weight is too heavy! How can anyone possibly lift this up?"

Zoro approaches him and asks, "Too heavy, eh?"

"Yeah, it's too much for me… I don't think Anna can lift it up herself."

"Use these dumbbells instead; they're lighter." Zoro hands him a pair of smaller weights.

"Thanks, these are much lighter than this monster here."

Zoro grabs the heavy weight by the tip and lifts it up using only one hand! He places it on his shoulder and left, as if the weight only weighs as much as a feather! Yoh looks at him with an awestruck face. "That strength… is inhuman…!"

-

Ren and his sister Jun are sitting in the cabin. "Sister, I don't really think we should be staying here any longer," Ren says to Jun.

"Why?"

"We are not from this world, so we must try to return to our own world. If we only stay on this pirate ship, what do we gain?"

"You have a point there. I really miss the modern day equipments back home."

"But how do we return?" asks Pai-Long.

"We ended here after our yacht got sucked into a whirlpool. So I was thinking, if we get ourselves sucked into another whirlpool, we'll probably end up in our own world again," answers Ren.

"But it can be risky! What if that didn't happen and we lost our lives?"

"It is better to try than to sit here and do nothing."

"And do you think the captain of this ship will let us go that easily?" asks Jun.

"He'll have to. I don't want them to take the entire ship to the whirlpool just to help us. I've decided to…"

"Everyone, I see an island!" shouts the voice of Usopp, interrupting Ren.

-

Luffy hops onto the front of the Going Merry. "Yahoo! An island at last! I can't wait to buy even more meat!"

They got to the shore of the island and dock the ship somewhere away from civilization, in fear that someone will see them and scream pirates.

"Okay! I'm gonna go explore this place! Somebody should guard the ship!" says Luffy.

"I will be glad to stay behind and guard the ship," volunteers Pai-Long.

"Good! Zoro can finally to a break and go out there for some exercise!"

Nami comes down from the ship, carrying several equipments and writing utensils in her hand. "I want to make a map of this island."

"Okay! Let's go explore this island! You all can go wherever you want! If anyone sees meat, call me!"

With this, everyone went in separate directions. The Straw Hats went their own way and the shamans went another way.

When the shamans are by themselves, Ren spoke to the group about his plan on returning to their own world. "So I've decided that we should get our own ship and sail off on our own."

"What? And to sail around aimlessly on the sea and eventually starve to death? Why should we!" complains Horohoro.

Ren gives him a glare. "Don't you miss your own home?"

Everyone thought for a while. They figured out how much they really miss their home back in the modern day. "I want to listen to my MP3 again," says Yoh.

"I miss the TV," says Anna.

"And I really want to ride my motorcycle again. Sniff…" says Ryu, who has tears in the corner.

"See? You all miss home. If we continue staying with them, then we'll never get anywhere!"

"Okay, Mr. Smart-Guy. Where do we get our OWN ship?" Horo asks him.

Ren thought for a while. "Um… We buy one?"

"A ship must cost a lot! And furthermore, where do we buy one?"

Amidamaru flies down next to Yoh and tells him, "Master Yoh, I found a village in the direction ahead! It's only a few minutes walk to get there."

"Great! Let's go there!" says Yoh.

-

Nami is standing on top of a tall rock, with Sanji accompanying her. "Okay… So the highest elevation of this island is 900 meters," she says to herself while writing down notes. "Now to check the lowest point…" She looks into the telescope and sees Sanji's face.

"Why not calculate my love towards you?" says the cook.

"Get lost!" Nami kicks him away and views into the telescope again. "Hey, I think I see a camp there."

-

"This is the village I saw," points out Amidamaru. The shamans are standing in front of the entrance to a village that resembles the olden days of Europe.

"Looks like a quiet village," says Yoh, stepping into the entrance. "We should be able to get a peaceful rest here."

"And I can't wait to try out the foods!" says Horo excitedly. They all enter the village and went separate ways. They wandered through the village aimlessly, looking for other people, but strangely enough, there's not a single villager here.

"That's strange…" says Pirika. "Why is there no one in this town?"

"And the restaurants empty!" says Horo. "I wonder if they have food inside though." He goes into the empty restaurant, walks into the kitchen, opens the refrigerator, and screams, "IT'S EMPTY!"

-

Ryu was depressed, because there's not a single lovely woman in this village. "What kind of a village doesn't have a single woman…?"

Tokageroh appears besides him. "To be precise, there's not a single soul in this village either! Can it be a ghost town?"

-

Manta is all by himself. "Strange… There's nobody in this village besides us. Where can they go?" He then caught notice of two people standing not far from him. "Oh! Somebody at last!"

The two people notices Manta and they run towards him. When they got near, Manta found out they are pirates by looking at the way they're dressed. "Hey kid! You're new here?" one of the pirates asks him.

"Um… Yeah…"

"This village is off limits to outsiders! If you really want to enter, then you must pay us gold!"

"Gold…?"

"Yes, gold. Our captain loves nothing but gold. He demands all those who wants to enter to pay him a large amount of gold."

"But… I don't have any gold with me…"

"What? Say that again!"

Manta begins to tremble in fear. "I… don't have gold…"

"Then what are you doing here! We should take you to the captain!" The pirates grab Manta and drag him away.

"Help!"

-

Luffy is rolling around on the grassy field, enjoying his time. Suddenly, a monkey appears and takes his straw hat away, and then climbs up a tree. Luffy runs up to the tree and shouts, "Monkey! Give back my hat!"

The monkey just makes a face and shakes his butt at him.

"I said give it back!"

The monkey throws a fruit at him.

"That's it!" Luffy kicks the tree, breaking it in two. The monkey falls down and bangs onto the ground, passing out. Luffy takes the straw hat back and happily runs off. "I got my hat! I got my hat!"

-

Nami walks to the camp that she saw earlier, with Sanji closely behind her. She got to the camp and sees the people there quite depressed. A guy walks up to her and asks, "Are you new to this island, lady?"

"Yeah, we just landed here."

"Well, if you are, then I don't really recommend you to stay on this island."

"Why?"

"Because our village, which is on the other side of the island, is taken over by pirates, so we have no choice but camp out here."

-

The two pirates take Manta to the largest building of the village. They go inside and throw Manta onto the floor. He looks up and sees a large terrifying man with long, red, spiky hair, sharp golden nails, and he wears an armor of pure gold.

"Captain! This little kid is found wandering around the village and he doesn't have any gold with him!" the pirates report to him.

"What! No gold! RAAAARGH!" roars the captain angrily. "How dare you come into my territory without bringing a single gold! I, the great El Drago, demands gold from whoever comes in here!"

Manta trembles in fear even more.

"A kid like you ought to be punished! Get'em, my boys!"

Manta screams in fear when the pirates approach him, cracking their fists and showing a wicked smile.

-

Yoh suddenly felt a something running through his body. Anna felt the same thing too. "You felt that, didn't you?" she asks Yoh.

"Yeah, I did."

"Our friend is in trouble."

The other shamans show up and reunite again, for they also felt the same thing. "Manta didn't return, so that means he's in trouble," says Anna.

"What trouble can he get into?" asks Ryu. "There's no one in this village that may attack him."

"There is!" says a voice from behind. They turn around and see a middle-aged man standing there.

"Who are you, sir?" asks Yoh.

"I'm the mayor of this town, Doodad."

"Doodad? What a funny name! Hehe!" says Pirika quietly to herself.

"You kids are new around here, right?"

"Yeah, we are. We just arrived," answers Yoh.

"Why is this village so empty?" Horo asks the mayor.

"Because the pirate El Drago has taken over the village. He forces the people here to pay him gold in order to access the village. We don't have much gold, so we escaped to the other side of the island and camped there. It's been like this for a month already."

"Then what are you doing here?" Horo asks him again.

"I'm the mayor of this village, so I must stand up for my people and fight off those pirates!"

"Don't push yourself to much, old man," Ryu tells him. "You don't look like the fighting type."

"I'm not old yet! I can still fight!"

"Well, whatever…"

"You said one of your friends is missing, right? He must've been captured by El Drago and his men."

"And do you know where they are right now?" Yoh asks him. "I must rescue my best friend!"

"The pirates have made themselves home in my house. It's that tall building over there."

They turn around and see a building towering from behind the roofs. "Okay, let's go," says Yoh.

"Wait kid!" Doodad calls out to him. "Are you serious about rescuing your friend?"

"Of course we are," replies Yoh. "How can we leave him there and not rescue him?"

"Are you sure you can defeat El Drago?"

"Don't underestimate us," Ren tells him. "We are not any ordinary kids."

"Right! Every opponent we've fought bowed down before us because we're too good!" says Ryu with pride.

Doodad thought to himself, "These children are brave! If someone as young as them can do it, then I can surely do it also!" He steps ahead of them and says, "Fine, I'll take you to the pirates' hang."

"Okay! Let's go!" says Yoh, and the shamans follow Mayor Doodad to the building.

TO BE CONTINUED…

Doodad is just my OC. El Drago, on the other hand, is not. He is the main villain of the first One Piece movie: Adventure in Gold Island. I originally planned for Buggy, but it would be too sudden for him to take over a village in a short while. I thought about Bellamy, but then he's already dead. Soon, I remembered the movies, and thought that El Drago will be a good one that won't be too tough for the shamans to fight, but not too easy either.

One last thing: Please at least give a decent review that's more than one sentence. All I see are short and simple phrases.