Éclair was walking around in her home city. It was about 20 minutes away from the Hotel Gourmet itself. She spoke to one of her fellow employee, "Komatsu, you should have been there. It was so amazing, capturing the Rainbow Fruit." She sighed, "One day you should go out and see these things for yourself, you'd be surprised by what you'd find. I must admit though, it was all pretty scary. I could have died at any moment, but that Bishokuya Toriko knows his stuff." The smaller chef looked up at his friend, "Wow, sounds amazing, but I don't think I could do that. Putting my life in danger, it just sounds too scary." The blond shrugged, "I guess it's just one of those things where you had to be there. It was just seeing the Pincer Fish that day, something about the image of it jumping out of the water can't leave my mind. There have been more amazing things, but that moment to me is something that I'll remember forever." Her eyes pointed to the ground, "Have you talked to Ootake?" Komatsu stopped and looked at her, "Not since you have." "You, me, Ootake, and Ume should get together sometime again. We should all have lunch." Her phone began to ring, and she looked at it, "It's Toriko, interesting." She picked up the phone, "Hello? ~Nope I'm not doing anything. ~Wow, really! ~Alright, I'm on my way!" She hung up the phone and smiled. Komatsu looked at her confusingly, "What happened?" "It's about the Puffer Whale. It'll be the first time in 10 years it's making its debut. Toriko just invited me to get some with him." Komatsu's eyes glistened, "What are you standing here for? Go get it! If you can, bring some back for me." She nodded, "I'll do what I can. Hold down the kitchen for me while I'm gone. See you later Komatsu!"
The bullet train sped through a grassland area. The scenery was breathtaking to those who weren't used to it. Inside one of the cars sat Toriko and Éclair. The blond girl looked out the window with her hands planted on the glass. "This is so cool. I've never been out here before." She turned around and sat back in her seat. She picked up a glass of red wine and sipped just a bit. "I know it's a celebratory thing, the Puffer Whale's appearance. But did you really have to buy all the booze on the train?" He picked up a bottle of hard whiskey and downed it easily. "I don't know. I just like to drink, you know, I'm excited." She smiled, "I guess, though that made almost no sense. Hey, I forgot to ask, who is this person we're meeting up with?" "He's one of the 10 people in the world that can perfectly extract the poison sack from a Puffer Whale. Well, 1/10 times." Éclair raised her eyebrows, "Impressive, that's better than what I can do. Then again, I've never tried. Oh I can't wait to taste it. I can only imagine!" Toriko snapped his fingers, "That reminds me. I made something for you." "A gift?" He took out five cone shaped firecrackers, "I call them Toriko Crackers. Use it whenever you're in a tight spot, but don't forget to use earplugs okay?" She grabbed them and her arms instantly dropped, "Thanks. Hopefully I can fit this thing into my satchel and still function." She was getting ready to take another sip before a loud obnoxious voice caught her off guard.
"Hey, word on the train is that you two bought out all the booze. You two better hand over the hooch if you know what's good for you." His two buddies were snickering off to the side. One with a bald head spoke, "You'll regret messing with Zongeh!" The other one nodded in agreement. The large caveman-like man chuckled, "I've got one of the fiercest Full Course Menu's around, take a look." As he pulled out a paper, Éclair tuned him out. "Yawn, I'm totally not impressed." She swirled around the alcohol in her glass, "You want some booze? How bout you pry it from my cold, dead hands." An evil glint appeared in her eye as she looked at him. The bigger man pounded his hands on the table, "What was that!" Toriko grabbed the blond girls head and gave her a soft noogie, "Ignore this little firecracker here." As he stood at his full height, intimidation struck the trio. They shook a bit as Toriko spoke, "Go ahead Zombie, take a bottle. Any one you want, I don't care." The black haired cave looking man took two bottles, "T-thanks, and it's Zongeh." Toriko smiled, "No problem." Éclair sucked her teeth, "If it were me, I would have made him beg for it." He nudged the girl, "Hey, be nice. We need allies on our side. You never know who's going to help you out. The more people on your side, the better." The blond shrugged, "I guess I understand." She drank the last bit of her wine, and when she set down the glass, another face appeared before her. It was an old shaky old man. With all of the top Gourmet Hunters surrounding them, it was apparent that he was definitely on the wrong train. He smiled a cheeky, snaggle toothed smile. "Can you spare some booze for an old Gourmet Hunter?" Without listening to a story, Éclair scooted a bottle of Tequila toward the man, "Take it, we don't need this much anyway." His red face brightened even more "Hic~ thank you darling ~hic." Toriko shrugged, "Take it all, we're getting off at the next stop anyway." The shaky old man grinned, "I'll pay you back someday." Éclair nodded, "You got it old timer. Take it easy." Toriko poked at the girl, "Such a softy you are." She looked away and folded her arms, "You just had to one up me didn't you?"
The train stopped and Toriko propped up excitedly, "Looks like this is our stop." They made their way off the train and looked around at the baron city. Éclair scratched her head, "This place is a ghost town. I would have thought a fortune telling city such as this would be booming." The bluenette shook his head, "Not at this time." "And what time would that be, monster o'clock?" She snickered to herself as she mocked the town." "Precisely, that's why people are barricaded in their homes." Her laugh stopped into a fearful look, "Toriko, that's not funny." He shook his head, "I'm not trying to be. The fortune teller in this town, the man we're meeting up with predicted it." She shook in her boots a little bit, "Uh we aren't gonna see any of these monsters are we?" "He is the same man that predicted the appearance of the Puffer Whale, so stay close, okay?" They walked down a short set of steps before they heard the sound of loud feet pounding on the ground. Her heart sank as this really was a time meant to be indoors. She grabbed tightly on the back of Toriko's shirt, "Don't tell me.." A large capture level 10 monster came out from one of the corners. As it walked out, a man was walking from the opposite direction of Toriko and Éclair. He had no sense of fear as he walked past the monster. Éclair looked fearfully at the man, "Get inside! Don't you know its monster o'clock!" Toriko put a hand over her mouth, "Shhhh." She watched fearfully at the man as she pried the hand from her mouth. "Get off me! We have to help him!" Toriko held onto the girl not letting her go, "Éclair, be quiet. We don't want to draw attention to ourselves. Just watch." She stopped wrestling and watched the man continue to walk without a fearful bone in his body. The Kuendon knelt down and prepared itself to release a massive roar. By the time the two crossed paths, something came over the monster. It stood upright and walked in the direction opposite the man. Éclair looked surprised, "What the? How did it not attack him?" The unharmed man walked up to the two, "Hey Toriko. My prediction told me I'd be meeting you." Toriko laughed, "It's good to see the Gentleman of the Heavenly Kings again." Éclair gasped, "Wow, you didn't tell me we'd be meeting one of the Heavenly Kings Toriko!" Her screams carried throughout the town. A crowd of women flooded the streets. "Is the beast gone?" "Is that Coco-Sama?" "Coco-Sama read my fortune!" The black haired man was snatched into the sea of ladies. Coco cringed, "Please, don't touch me. Let go of me!" Toriko pouted as he walked to the crowd, "Hey you girl's go somewhere else. You can crowd Coco later, but for now, Shoo." Éclair smirked, "Looks like someone learned a little sass from the master." The girl's walked off in anger, "What a pig." "I know what a complete jerk he is!" "Hmph!"
As the three walked up the hills and throughout the boondocks, a conversation sparked. Toriko began, "So Coco, who were those women?" "Customers." Éclair's face turned pale, "Um, what do you mean by customers?" Coco's face went blank, no, he was not an escort. "Fortunetelling is my main job as of right now." She sighed in relief, "Oh, how cool." Toriko cut off the girl's thought, "So Coco, how's Zebra?" "He's serving his time in Gourmet Prison." Toriko laughed from a fond memory, "A problem child that Zebra was. I can just remember our youthful days in the garden, fighting to the death. Those were the days." Coco nodded, "Yes, an old memory." He pointed in the distance, "There, my house is on that rock." Éclair folded her arms, "So what exactly are we supposed to do huh? Climb down this rock, walk through the jungle and then climb up to your house. My legs are completely wrecked from walking here. I'm not sure if I will make it." Coco laughed, "Don't worry about it, there's an easier way." She saw the shadow of large wings circling on the ground. Her blue eyes looked up and she saw the top bird that was the Emperor Crow. It landed next to Coco and the man pet it, "This is my partner, Kiss." He looked at the large bird, "You think you can carry us all, Kiss?" The bird crowed and the three boarded.
They all sat around the table in Coco's house. He poured tea for the two and brought it to the table. "Thank you Mr. Coco, Fortuneteller ~lady killer." He chuckled at her compliment, "No, no. Far from it." She looked at him with her hands placed under her chin, "So, the glutton here tells me you are able to perfectly remove the poison sack from a puffer whale." He sipped a bit of tea from his cup, "My odds of extracting it perfectly is one 1 of 10. You see how delicate this is now don't you?" Her eyes were paralyzed by the sight of his face, the whole left half of his face turned purple. A sweat broke from the side of her face, but she'd dare not ask what that was about. He put down his cup and fixed his wraps, "Excuse me. I apologize for that." His eyes never left her face all the while. He could sense her fear in him; after all, he didn't explain the bazaar occurrence that took place. "So, you're a chef I hear." Éclair looked at Toriko with pretentious rosy cheeks, "Aww, did Toriko tell you that. Good to know he talks about me." She nodded as her demeanor resumed its seriousness, "Yes, I am a chef." "Can you handle the Puffer Whale?" She raised her hands, "I can handle Blow Fish. Listen Coco, I may be able to cook many ingredients, but I've never touched a Puffer Whale, so I really wouldn't know." He nodded, "That's not the biggest problem I'm afraid. Making it into the deep cave in and out will be a journey against odds. There is a 0.1% of us making it in and out. That means 1 out of every 1000 Bishokuya. Not to mention the Devil Python's that inhabit the cave. We don't even know what other monster's we'll encounter." The blond girl smiled promisingly, "Those are terrible odds, that's been made apparent. But I already have a will made, so if I die, I'm covered. Besides, I've stared death in the face more times than the average person in the past few of days. I'm not turning tail now." She gave Toriko a quick high five. The bluentte looked to the other Heavenly King, "Why so apprehensive Coco? You don't see the Shadow of Death, do you? Is it on me or Éclair?" He looked down and back up with a faux smile, "Okay then, let's go." Coco was in his own thoughts as Éclair and Toriko spoke. The girl jumped out of her seat and danced around, "Woo, we're gonna eat some Puffer Whale, we're gonna eat some Puffer Whale!" The two laughed, and the blond girl's smile was nothing to take for granted. Little did she know, she was in a world of danger.
The three stood outside of the deadly cave. There were thieves and other Gourmet hunters sitting outside, looking both defeated and devious. Éclair raised her eyebrows, "Looks like someone's journey was cut short." Coco shook his head, "Not exactly, they're waiting for other Gourmet Hunters to come out so they can steal their catch." The blond girl walked in between the two large men and grabbed her machete, "Nothing is going to happen to US, right?" Toriko sighed as he lit a cigar, "You're still carrying that thing around? I told you, it'll only slow you down." She pouted, "Hey, don't talk about this thing. It's sacred to me." Before they could enter the dark cave, they saw Zongeh and is crew running out of the cave at full speed. Toriko exhaled the acidic smoke, "Hey, it's Sangeria, did you find the beach?" The gruesome man frowned, "It's Zongeh! And yeah, I saw the beach, it was right there in my eye line, the glistening water." He wasn't able to get in another word as Éclair put a hand in his face, "Lies! You probably just stopped at the entrance." She walked past the man and he shook his fist at her, "You don't know what you're talking about!" He spit on the ground, "What a bunch of amateurs. We'll see how good they do when their weakest link is the only one with a weapon."
The bluenette looked back at the girl, "Hey Éclair, you might want to stay close to us. It's dark in here, so use your light, okay?" She ignored his warning completely and gasped in excitement. "Ooh, Snap Mushrooms! How cool, I haven't seen him in a cave like this!" Toriko ran over "Seriously, I want some!" The two filled their mouths with the mushrooms. Éclair giggled, "I love the snapping sound it makes when you bite it." They walked up a bit further and there was a fork in the road. The blond sighed, "If we get this wrong, that's gonna suck." Toriko sniffed the surrounding air, "To the left. I smell a hint of the beach scent that way. To the right is probably a nest of millipedes, I can smell one." Éclair nodded in awe, "That nose hasn't been a failure so far. I trust it." They decided to go to the left, as it was the wisest decision. They found themselves climbing uphill at this point. Coco looked back, "Be careful Éclair, It's pretty slippery." She nodded, "Thanks Coco." She tried to climb without grabbing onto any loose rocks. "How the hell can he see in all this darkness?" Her shoulder flashlight didn't shine nearly as far ahead as Coco could see. Toriko replied, "Coco's eyes are some of the best in the world. He can see ultraviolet, infrared, and electromagnetic waves. His eyes in this darkness are about as clear to him as yours would be outside." "Wow, that's really something." Coco stopped walking and Toriko raised his eyebrows, "What's wrong? Why'd we stop?" They heard the sound of hundreds of legs crawling around. Éclair ran up behind the two, "Okay, I can't see a thing." She shined her light at the ground and there were Scorpion Cockroaches everywhere. Éclair jumped up on the Bishokuya Toriko's back. "We're not going in there are we? Tell me we aren't gonna do it!" As she looked in, a Bishokuya fell into the nest. Éclair bit her bottom lip, "Get out of there! Hey!" He hid her face in Toriko's shoulder as she couldn't bear to watch a man get eaten alive. One thing's for sure, his screams were something she'd not forget. Toriko rubbed the back of the girls head, "It's okay Éclair, it's over." She shook her head, "I just wish that we could have saved him, but I know there's no way we could." Coco looked at the two, "Unfortunately there's no way around this. We'll have to go through. I'll go first." He took the wraps from his neck and head and jumped down the trench. Éclair frowned, "Are you crazy, you'll be killed!"
Once his feet touched the ground, he took the wrap from his wrists. The Scorpion Cockroaches ran at the man, but stopped short of an attack. Éclair squinted her eyes, "I don't get it." Toriko smirked, "As poisonous as they are, they can sense the more lethal poison in Coco's body. It's the same reason that Kuendon didn't attack him when we first met up. In order to capture poisonous creatures, many Gourmet Hunters inject themselves with different anti-bodies. I'm personally protected from around 70, but Coco's protected by over 7 times that amount." Eclair rubbed her chin, "Is that why his face inexplicably changed colors when we were at his house? He had a little accident?" The man nodded, "Yeah, that was his poison." She shook her head, "Not gonna lie, that's pretty scary. But I don't know what's more weird, the fact that it happened or the fact that he never addressed it." He waved the girl along, "Come on now, let's not get left behind." He jumped in with the girl on his back. She looked in fright at the green insects that inhabited the cave. She held tightly around his neck until they reached a safe place. She dropped off the man's back and sighed, "That was nerve wracking." Coco dressed himself back up as he retracted his poison, "We better keep moving, there's a lot more ahead of us." They continued walking up down and all around the cave. It was tiring, and Éclair was getting awfully fatigued.
She panted as they reached another stop on their way. It was a deep hole. Coco looked down, "Looks like our destination is 100 meters deep into this hole." Éclair smiled, "You mean the beach?" He shook his head, "Not quite, but we're getting close." Toriko looked at the girl, "You should hold on to one of us as we descend." She exhaled loudly, "You don't think I can handle myself or something?" She poked Coco with her finger, "If I go with you, you aren't going to leak on me are you?" He shrugged, "It's probably not a good idea to go down with me." Toriko laughed, "Hahaha, you're fear of Coco is for good reason. You might die on the way down if you go with him." The girl folded her arms, "I am so not scared of Coco! Plus, I already wrote my will, I told you this. Since you think it's so funny, I'll let you bring a nice bouquet to my funeral. Let's go lady killer." She jumped on his back and held on with all her strength, "Please, don't kill me, I'm just trying to prove a point." As they descended, small fireflies lit up the dark room. She smiled, "They're so amazing. They all look so beautiful." The moment was quickly ruined as the scream of someone echoed through the vertical cave. They lowered themselves more quickly until the hit the cave floor. Éclair dropped from the man's back, "Thanks for that, gentle ride Coco." She turned her flashlight back on, and there was a swarm of bats flying at the three. Toriko put his hands together, "I give thanks for this meal. Itadakimasu!" He dove at the bats with a wide mouth and ate them whole. Éclair shook her head, "You certainly live up to the name Glutton." He wasn't eating them nearly fast enough, and Coco removed a wrap from his wrist. "Poison Dressing!" Before she could see the impact of the poison, she felt a hand cover her mouth and an arm hold her in place. She was being kidnapped.
The man holding onto her snickered, "Those kings should have their hands full for a while, and you my prize.." He laughed louder, "You will be my ticket to the beach. With you as a little snack, you should make a good enough diversion for me to slip past the Devil Python." Her eyes were at full alert, she was going to die. There was no way she would be able to kill an entire Devil Serpent on her own. Fear stuck her heart like a bolt of lightning. She breathed heavily as her torturous fate was somewhere ahead of her. She squirmed around until she freed her mouth from his hand, "Let me go you bastard!" He laughed once more, "Not until I get my prize." He ran but a few steps further, and heard the sound of the enormous Devil Python. It was a scream that sounded like something from another dimension. She moved her hand to her thigh holster and removed her machete. She swung it at the man's arm, gazing off a bit of the man's skin. He let her go and pushed her into the trench ahead of them. Éclair screamed, "You idiot!" She panicked as a pack of vicious monsters surrounded her. She took off her satchel and took out a heavy firecracker. She held it up, "So heavy! Geez Toriko, did you have to make this so big?" She pulled on the handle but it wouldn't budge, "Come on, come on!" She pulled harder and released the energy. A flash of white was all she could see. Her line of vision looked like a painting getting erased before her eyes. Her eye lids slowly shut as her limp body fell onto the hard, cold rock. Her heart rate flat lined, and Éclair Reinbou was dead.