"You must be deranged to even suggest such a thing!" Luffy exclaimed, looking at the people around him. His amazing plan had been sabotaged and now he had to suffer through another round of being stuck with these people!

How much must his luck hate him?

His only consolation was that quite the famous example of a pirate was dominating this island and the raven head decided to take this very opportunity to show these idiots how it was done. It was time to take it upon himself to educate the fools, since he doubted any other chances of escaping were going to spring up. Nami had made it quite clear that she wouldn't let it and Luffy made up his mind that if she didn't repent when this was all over, only the plank awaited her. Preferably in a zone with man eating fish, too.

"So me, Chopper and Brook are going to protect the ship." Nami declared brightly.

Luffy stifled a snort. It was clear she was extremely happy to be left out of learning time. Well, no matter. He'll make some other idiot teach her.

"Usopp, Robin, Law and Caesar will be on the search team." The orange head continued, oblivious to her captain's glare fixed on her face. "And Zoro, Sanji-kun, Franky and Luffy are the team going into the city."

Luffy scrunched up his nose at the people he was stuck with, but supposed it could have been worse. Now he had a real chance at escaping. It was obvious that Nami was an idiot for assigning him on that team since chances of finding an escape increased with the decrease in IQ.

"What do you mean 'search'?" Law scowled, the most rational thing to do in such illogical situations, in Luffy's opinion. "We have to keep to the schedule! Doflamingo has to go down." The man was growling now and the black haired teen applauded his fierceness of protecting his dreams. Every one of them could learn something from him.

Such an exemplary pirate.

Nami glared right back at Law, her temple slightly pulsing, though Luffy considered that if he could see that fine muscle movement from this far away, the Navigator had an undeniable problem.

"We have to find the guy who screwed Luffy up and have him return our captain to normal." She spoke slowly, accentuating each syllable.

Reflexively ignoring her words, the pirate captain was becoming even more concerned about her wellbeing, however curious such thing was.

"We will also be looking for that man while we wait inside the city." Robin's reassuring tone allowed the Strawhats to sigh in relief.

Now that every pirate was accounted for and happy with their plans, the large group split, some returning aboard while the others descended through the large rocks on the shore, making a beeline for the city center and the far north, towards Green Bit.

Luffy grumbled all the way through the lively town, his eyes holding a bored light as they took in the friendly atmosphere. It was quite obvious what was happening in that country and it took no longer than a few minutes' walk through the bustling city to realize that. However strange the New World was, toys didn't just up and walked around like people. And surely no one would deem it even remotely normal. As it was, the citizens of Dressrosa were either complete loons or uninformed and stupid. Maybe all three and it will somehow fall to Luffy and his – temporary – incompetent bunch to solve the problem and save the day. The teen wouldn't put it past his supreme luck.

Sighing in discontent, the straw hat wearer glanced around wearily, trying to figure out if an escape route was available yet when the distinct waft of delicious dishes entered his nasal range. Everything around him magically vanished without a trace as Luffy started towards the source of the pleasant smell, not even stopping to tell anyone where he'd disappear. Those idiots didn't have to know anyway.

Thankfully for the Strawhats, Zoro had been paying enough attention to spot their captain slouching away from the group on a back alley. He hit the love cook on the shoulder to make sure he was following, nodded to Franky, and the quartet, Kin'emon included, stealthily started after Luffy.

They found him ingurgitating enough food to feed a small village, though with one hundred percent more manners and tact than his usual self would, and being surrounded by so many plates full of exquisite foods, the teen was barely visible. It seemed that even with the turn of personality, Luffy was still a gluttonous guy.

The black haired captain glared at them when the three took their seats around the table and started helping themselves to his food that he had ordered and surely he'd have to pay for in the end. Even though he didn't have any money.

To his immense chagrin and irritation, the bastards even had the nerve to glance over at him through the rest of the meal, not even bothering to hide their stares. After a couple of hours of such thing happening – which were no more than a few minutes in actuality – Luffy slammed his fist on the table, fixing well deserved glares on their shocked faces and opened his mouth to speak when loud laughter interrupted him. The bastards turned around to stare over his shoulder at the source again and Luffy followed their example this time, cursing the blasted idiots who dared interrupt him when he was administering justice.

A couple of shady men were gathered around a seemingly oblivious old man, who kept betting his ass off and not winning anything. The straw hat wearer snorted at the pure display of idiocy and stood up, intent on kicking those loudmouths' asses to next week, thus ensuring his sanctuary of peace.

The group of fools gave him disdainful looks as he approached, but remained silent overall until he was a few steps shy from the old man's form. His glare made a few of them blink and smirk, clearly too slow-witted to realize they were signing their own death warrants.

"You have quite the dreadful aura around you, boy." The black haired old man spoke quietly, as if afraid to disrupt the atmosphere. At second glance, Luffy concluded the guy was blind.

Great, now I can kill them and demand a large sum of money by inventing an absurd story about the dangerous situation he had been in.

If things went as good as he'd expected them to, Luffy will have his sanctuary of peace and a few golden coins from saving the man, thus getting money to pay for all the food he had ordered.

Zoro shook his head as he watched Luffy beat those obvious thieves half to death. The swordsman might have been impressed by the ruthless nature their captain could have harbored, had he been born with such a tyrannical personality. As it was, he could only watch in disbelief as those people stumbled away in their haste to exit the restaurant, not daring to glance back at the devil that had wiped their asses on the floor. At that moment, the seemingly harmless old man took out his sword and made a huge hole in the freaking floor which successfully stopped their strategic retreat. Besides the unnerving closeness of the abyss, Zoro was more concerned by Luffy's suddenly friendly behavior to the guy. He was obviously trying to get the man to join his crew, if the swordsman's trained Luffy-hearing was anything to go by.

"That was savage, old man! You seriously got to join my crew." Luffy couldn't mask his tone of utter delight any longer. Those guys were surely paste on the ground below in that hole. How an old man like this harbored such an awesome power, the teen left it to destiny, but that didn't mean he couldn't convince the guy to join his crew. With his addition, Luffy had three worthy pirates, four if the green oaf was included, though his derisive laziness was starting to grate on his already overstressed nerves.

The man had the audacity to laugh!

"I thank you for the offer, young man, but I am saddened to refuse. We have different paths paved out ahead of us."

His ominous words did nothing to derail Luffy.

"C'mon old man!" The teen was close to whining. "I just saved you from a bunch of thugs! You gotta repay me somehow."

The guy nodded and started to walk away from him. Without any other word!

Gritting his teeth, the black haired pirate released another question. "Who're you anyway?" At least he might be able to hunt him down.

The blind man laughed... again.

Grrr.

"It's better for both our sakes if you don't know." He said before exiting the restaurant.

Luffy twitched. How dare he?

"For both your sakes?" Sanji exhaled, looking after the guy with clear suspicion.

The captain rolled his eyes. "Thanks for repeating that horrible statement." He sniffed in indignation. "Get a move on. Oh, and don't forget to pay."

Zoro and Franky looked at each other, silently balancing their options before both darted to the exit, Kin'emon hot on their heels. Realizing what those insufferable barbarians had done, Sanji swore as loud as he could, keeping in mind that there might be ladies around him.

"What the hell, where's my sword?!" Zoro's almighty roar shook off a couple of tiles from their respective roofs.

Kin'emon watched him with pity, a hand protectively placed on his own katana.

Sanji's eyes rolled, but he deemed it important enough that the bastard won't lose his way on this big island, so he followed after his crewmate along with the Samurai.

Luffy made to step away from them as inconspicuously as he could muster, praying to all gods that they wouldn't notice his absence that fast. Unfortunately for him, Franky had other ideas.

"Luffy wait up! I've got an idea." The robot looked pretty serious so the teen decided it best to be honest.

"Let me go, I'm going!" His scowl simply bounced off the shield of pure obliviousness.

"Don't worry, I know what needs to be done. Leave everything to your bro!" Franky's sunglasses glinted dangerously in the sunlight.

Luffy rolled his eyes. "What the fuck are you on now?"

"Not gonna lie to you, this was probably one of my best ideas."

And this was saying something.

Fortunately, they still had limbs and neuron synapses, though Luffy had an inkling feeling he'd better be holding onto his for dear life.

Unfortunately, the bleeding guy in front of them was not so lucky. Luffy would have wanted to make sure he finished the old man's job in killing the guy, but the towering shipwright behind him insisted that he had a plan that could possibly help them. The captain doubted it very much, but at least he'd play along and maybe, he'll find something interesting enough to do around here.

"Just as I thought... you're obviously Doflamingo's man!" Franky exclaimed dramatically. "Tell us everything you know about the SMILE!"

Luffy crouched down with a heavy sigh. He had the inkling feeling it was going to be a long time until they'd move.

"I-I... I've got no i-idea about this MSILE thing." The sputtering guy managed between coughing blood. He looked to be having some kind of seizure if his foaming mouth was anything to go by.

"What the hell is MSILE? You have some kind of weapon, old man?" The teen grinned maliciously as he bent forward, his fake beard touching the guy's nose and his black sunglasses reflecting the terrified face of his victim.

"It's SMILE, not MSILE. Clearly this guy doesn't know anything." The cyborg muttered, crossing his huge arms over his chest.

"Yeah, he's definitely useless. Let's go already." The straw hat wearer huffed, preparing to stand up. "Finish him, Franky."

The sudden yelp and scramble behind made Luffy raise an eyebrow. He turned back to see the guy weeping, snot all over his face, and underneath the repugnant sight, a horrified expression.

"W-W-Wait, everyone's so busy at the Colosseum you won't find anyone who'd know!"

"Oh?" Now that was interesting. "And why is everyone goin' there?"

Heartened by the display of interest, the guy carried on. "It's a big event there today! Everyone is going to watch it. The young master has prepared an amazing prize!"

Franky threw him a doubtful look, but unseen to the two men, Luffy's eyes sparkled at the notion.

"Could it mean that weapon of mass-destruction that Mingo was talking about?!" The teen exclaimed, referring to his earlier conversation with the man.

"He only said that it'd be something you'd want..." Franky grumbled, lost and concerned.

Cheers suddenly erupted all around them from the direction the teen pinpointed the Colosseum to be in and Luffy couldn't contain his glee anymore.

"Tell me what it is!"

A/N: Hi :D

Quick update before I go back to procrastinating and writing anything else but the end to this story (why must brain always do this?) xD

Anyway, just a random note on Luffy's unchanged appetite in case you were wondering: in my opinion, it's ingrained in his brain/being not just his personality so it remains a constant o3o

Reviews and Feedback are loved! ^^