Chapter 1: It's Dawned On Me
If Luffy had to describe time travel with one word, it would be trippy. If he had to describe it in two words, they would excruciating pain. It was like being pulled by the pinky toes through the eye of a needle while being choked, burned, stabbed, eaten, lightly salted, and blown up all at the same time. All in all, it was a pretty fun experience.
"Ugh, my head~" Much like any fun experience, it left Luffy with a terrible hangover, his head pounding from the inside. How did Zoro deal with this? Oh yeah, by drinking more. Sadly, it didn't seem Luffy's new surroundings had any alcohol readily available. Most children's treehouses were rather lacking in that department.
"Huh? Am I….whoa~" Luffy couldn't believe his eyes as he looked around the interior of the treehouse he, Ace, and Sabo had built back on Mt. Corvo. If he was in it, then that meant he was back at Mt. Corvo, and if he was back at Mt. Corvo, then he had actually time traveled. That weird transforming guy had actually sent him back in time.
"Aw cool! It's just like that book Robin told me about!" Luffy hopped up and stuck his head out the door, breathing in the fresh jungle air. The sun poked over the trees of the mountain, making the mist in the air shine. The familiar cries of the birds, tigers, monkeys, and other beasts filled the air. It was just like he remembered it. "Wow. I kinda missed this place. Oi, wait, if I'm back on Mt. Corvo, then…..DAAAAAADAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANNNNNNN!"
Leaping from the treehouse, Luffy raced through the jungle towards the bandit house. It took him much longer than he expected, going much slower than usual in his younger, weaker body. He'd have to fix that later, but for now, he had an old grumpy bandit to see.
Breaking through the underbrush, Luffy stopped and stared at the bandit encampment. Memories of his days here with Ace and Sabo flowed through his mind. 'This time...we'll all come back and see it.'
He took deep breath and screamed, "DAAAAAAAAADAAAAAAN!" The reaction mere seconds as the door to the house flew open. Dadan stormed out, cigarette hanging on her lip as she grimaced at Luffy.
"Shut up, you brat! Don't go around yelling people's names so early in the morning!" Luffy laughed, walking up to the doorway.
Dadan blinked at him confusedly before he wrapped her in a tight hug, coiling his arms around her multiple times. "Hey! What the hell are you doing? Stop hugging me, you brat!"
He responded by hugging her even tighter, smiling from ear to ear as he did. He had missed Dadan. She wasn't the nicest person to be raised by, always pretending that she didn't care about him or Ace, but Luffy knew that she was just a big softie inside. That was why she only complained about the hug and did nothing to actually stop it.
"Eh, what's goin' on here? What's Luffy yellin' about?" Dogra grumbled as he walked into the scene, rubbing the sleep from his eyes, He stopped when he saw Luffy hugging Dadan. "...What the hell?"
"Dogra!" Like some sort of cuddly octopus, Luffy grabbed Dogra and pulled him into the hug as well. The tiny man struggled to no avail and soon submitted to the hug. This cycle of capture and cuddling continued as the Dadan Family slowly awoke. Within thirty minutes, all the members had been assimilated into Luffy's hug. "I missed you guys so much even if you are mountain bandits!"
Dadan smacked Luffy upside the head, screaming, "Luffy, let us go right now!"
The hit didn't really do anything to Luffy, but he let all of the bandits go, most of them walking away with a strange glow around them similar to that of a parent who is greeted with hugs from their adorable child. Dadan felt the glow too, but she had a persona to maintain, choosing to grumble out on the deck while Magra and Dogra talked to Luffy.
"Now, now, Luffy, what do you mean 'you missed us?' Did you go somewhere last night?" Magra asked.
Dogra added in, "Yeah, what's with all this huggin' and yellin' and stuff. Did somethin' happen to ya or somethin'?"
"Hmmm…" Now that Luffy thought about it-he had been trying to do that more often since they entered the New World-he probably shouldn't tell people he's from the future. It didn't really matter if they knew, but then they'd ask about future stuff and Luffy didn't want to tell them what happened to Ace. 'Nothing's gonna happen this time.'
"Nothing happened. I didn't say that I missed you," Luffy lied. Magra and Dogra obviously-to most people-didn't believe him, but they didn't say anything. When it came to Luffy being weird, there was no point in asking questions. It was either something stupid or dangerous.
Satisfied that his lie had completely tricked the two, Luffy hopped off the front deck and ran back to the jungle, "See you later!" He waved them goodbye and disappeared into the brush. He was hungry and needed to think.
Finding a nice seat on a cliff over the sea, Luffy munched on some raw tiger he had caught and started thinking about what he should do. Despite what most people thought, Luffy was capable of thinking and planning ahead. He simply chose not to. It ruined the fun randomness of adventure, but for an adventure like this, he needed to plan a little bit.
The first thing he needed to do was get his body back to how it was and even better. Now that he had a second chance to save Ace, he needed to be sure that he would be strong enough to save him.
But even if he got as stronger than he was before he time traveled, would he even be able to save Ace. All the Marines at Marineford were super strong and there were thousands of them. Even Whitebeard hadn't been able to beat all of them by himself.
Maybe he could stop Ace from getting captured? No, he didn't know when or where Blackbeard caught him. Maybe he could just beat Blackbeard on Jaya before he caught Ace? No, Ace would never forgive him for that, Blackbeard was his fight to deal with. He could just break into Impel Down again, but then he'd have to go to Hancock's island again and get separated from his crew by Kuma again.
Speaking of his crew, Luffy wondered if they were doing the same thing as him right now. Hopefully, they knew they had to wait. If they changed too much stuff, Luffy wouldn't be able to find them again and that'd suck. Luffy couldn't leave early either. He made a promise.
Trusting his friends to do the right thing, Luffy turned back to the original problem. Really, getting Ace back wasn't the only problem. Even if he saved Ace at Marineford, his crew would still be destroyed at Wano by the Marines and Kaido. They weren't strong enough to hold off thousands of Marines and hundreds of pirates and samurai at the same time. The only reason they lived long enough to get to the cave was because of the Minks, Traffy, and those from the Grand Fleet that showed up.
Even back on Whole cake Island, he hadn't been able to beat big Mom's Army of Rage even with Nami by his side. Sure, he'd been tired from fighting Cracker and Sanji, but he still wasn't sure if he could've beaten all of them at full strength with just the two of them. And that was only a little bit of Big Mom's forces.
'Fight fire with fire.' That was something Nami had said once that Luffy didn't really get until now. If the thousands of Marines were the fire then to fight them, he was going to need an even bigger fire than that.
"I need a bigger crew." Something similar to the Grand Fleet but not just a bunch of crews under him. He wanted them to join his crew. They could still call themselves whatever they wanted, but they would be Straw hat Pirates at the end of the ay. "It'll be like usual except with more people. And more people means more friends and fun and adventures."
Now that he was really thinking about it, Luffy was getting kinda pumped. Already, he could think of a bunch of people he could ask to join his crew. He didn't want his adventures to be the same as last time and bringing more people would definitely change things up.
"Shishishishi! I can't wait!" He cheered to the ocean. "This time, I will become the King of the Pirates!"
For the next year, Luffy spent his days training non-stop. Dawn Island wasn't nearly as rough as Rusukaina, so he had to train twenty times as hard to make progress back to where he had been and beyond. He worked until he dropped and continued even while he slept. He ate so many of the animals in Mt. Corvo, he had to start going into the Goa Kingdom for food. Thus began to The Legend Of The Gluttonous Demon That Came From The Mountain.
Every few days, a man covered in bruises and blood wandered into the city carrying boulders on his back. He would enter restaurants and order mountains of food, and when the joyful servers asked for food, he would run. Soon, restaurants started getting wise to his game and refused to serve him. It never worked. When they denied him food, he would look at them with a piercing gaze and the servers wills crumbled, doing as the man commanded without argument.
The restaurant owners tried everything to stop him. Policemen were dealt with easily, left bloody and foaming at the mouth. Poison only slowed him down for a while until it stopped working entirely. Assassins found their bullets bouncing off him and their blades shattering against blackened skin. Bounty hunters and thugs ended up scared of him, many of them having ended up in the hospital trying to stop him. More than a few restaurants had to shut down for good.
All the attacks on him were good training for Luffy. His Observation Haki got a workout tracking all the police and assassins and thugs that came after him. After a while, he got a sense for reading people's thoughts and emotions but wasn't close to the level of someone like Katakuri He practiced different levels of Conqueror's Haki on people, using it to command them, intimidate them, or straight up beat them. He even learned how to focus it on select people. He only used Armament Haki on occasion.
By the end of the year, Luffy was in top shape. He remastered Gears 2nd and 3rd and had gotten better with Gear 4th, he came up with a few cool new techniques he had thought up, his Haki was better than ever, and his body was stronger at base level than before. It had been backbreaking work, but he did it. Now he had to go even farther. He was going to be the King of the Pirates. He couldn't settle for good enough. He had to be the very very strongest he could!
One Year Later
"Well, he finally left, Chief," Makino said as she waved goodbye to the dinghy in the distance. All around her, the townsfolk of Foosha Village yelled their goodbyes. "We're gonna miss him."
Woop Slap, mayor of Foosha village, remained the only one unenthused about the departure, scoffing. "That boy's going to ruin the good reputation of this town with his 'pirate shenanigans.'" Makino only chuckled at the old man's grumpiness, seeing the glint of worry in his eyes.
Out on the tiny little sloop, Luffy stood on the prowl, looking over the calm seas of the East blue. Nothing like the Grand Line or the New World at all.
For this new adventure, Luffy had taken up a brand new attire. Still sporting a straw hat, sandals, and shorts, Luffy changed it up to include a red sash around his waist and an open, light red captain's coat with silver trim. He was going to be in charge of a massive fleet, so he wanted to look like a super cool admiral. He'd still be called Captain though. Being called Admiral would've made his skin crawl.
Beneath him, the calm waters of the sea began to rumble and from them came forth the Lord of the Coast, a serpent-like Sea King that had eaten Shanks' arm ten years ago. He roared at Luffy, remembering him from the day of his greatest shame. He would not be cowed by some human again! He was a Sea King damn it! So what if he was smaller and weaker than all the others? He was gonna eat this human and then he was gonna go show those uppity big Sea Kings what he was made of...or maybe not.
Luffy smiled at the Lord of the coast, tipping up his hat. "Shishi, I've been waiting to see you again. It's been ten years since that day...you saved me from that bandit but you ate Shanks' arm. So….Gomu-Gomu no Pistol!" Luffy's arm stretched in a flash and smashed into the Lord's cheek, knocking him back into the water with more than a few broken teeth. After a few seconds, it rose back up with a defeated look and a few broken teeth. "Alright, now that I hit you, I want you to join my crew."
'He wants me to what? Join his crew? Does he know who I am? I'm not some lowly human looking for companionship, I am the Lord of the Coast! The most powerful Sea King….near here.' His head drooped, 'Who am I kidding? I'm nothing but a weakling preying on creatures weaker than me to inflate my own fragile ego, unwilling to confront my own inner doubts for fear that my father was right and I am a massive disappointment.'
"Wow, that sounds like it sucks. Sorry about your dad."
'Don't be. He didn't have any room to talk anyway. He always talked big, but he was just a coward. He had the strength to fight but chose to hide and stay out of trouble. I have drive, damn it! I want to become the strongest Sea King in the world! I want my name to be known from the deepest depths of the sea to the highest cloud in the sky! Mein, the Lord of the Coast and Terror of the Seas!'
Luffy chuckled, "That sounds super cool. If you wanna do all that, then why don't you join my crew? If you come with me, you can have tons of fights and grow stronger and more well known!"
'Would...would you really do that?' The Lord asked hesitantly. He had almost eaten the boy twice now. He hadn't expected him to be so kind.
"Sure! I wanna be King of the Pirates so I need a cool pet like that. Can't settle for anything less! Besides, I like helping my friends achieve their dreams. That's what being a pirate is all about after all. Having a dream and going after it no matter what anyone else says!"
Mein sniffed, wiping his tears with his tail. No one had ever believed talked to him in such a way. All the other Sea Kings made fun of him for his size and his parents abandoned him long ago. He'd never had a friend in the world, and now this human he had tried to eat twice was asking him to come with him and achieve his dream. Was this what friendship was like?
Lowering his head to touch Luffy with his snout, Mein spoke, 'Alright! I'll come with you, straw hat boy. I'll join your crew and become the greatest Sea King in the world...and help you become this King of the Pirates.'
Luffy patted the Sea King on his snout. He'd always wanted a sea monster as a pet. Nami said he wasn't allowed to keep Surume or Mohmoo, but now Nami wasn't here to stop him. Picking up a rope, Luffy held it up to Mein. "Now, first act as the first member of the Straw Hat Armada, pull the dinghy until you find a cruise ship or an ugly ship covered in pink hearts..please."
'Aye sir!' Mein took to the task with gusto, taking the rope, which had been tied to the ship, in his mouth and racing off towards the horizon at max speed. Luffy had to hold onto the sides and his hat as they blazed across the seas. A smile split his face from ear to ear. Things were already off to a super start!
"YAHOOOOOOOOOOO!"
Fy3Flyt3: And that is the second Chapter of Press Start to Continue. took a few redos to get it how I wanted it and I'm still not fully satisfied, but I never am with my writing. Now that we're past the intro, things should go faster and have a little less exposition. I know this story has similarities to New Game Plus so far, but trust me, they'll be few and far between going forward. How do you guys like the first member of the Straw Hat Armada? Going in the same theme as Surume (his name means dried squid, a food in Japan), the Lord of the Coast is named after fried noodles, Chow Mein. And yes, I know chow mein is Chinese.
Anywho, I hope you enjoyed the chapter. Next time we'll be seeing a few familiar faces and familiar places and start setting sail on a whole new adventure. if you have any comments or critques, be sure to leave a review. Until Next Time, Bye!