The deity met another member of his supposed family and gains a headache. Ace finally appears.

Do leave some reviews for me, Thank you! Hope you love it so far. I have some questions but I'll leave it at the end.

Chapter 3 ~ First Crack

Months passed by, and the day finally came. That morning Rouge's water broke, signifying the end of her pregnancy. Luffy, having read a few pregnancy books, had quickly prepared her for birth. Albeit uncertain, the deity was resolved to be the one to deliver her baby.

Surprisingly, they had a visitor, a strong one. Luffy was aware the instant a strong presence neared the island, But he ignored it because Rouge was starting to sweat and groan in pain, she had begun having contractions a while ago and was currently having painful ones.

Unfortunately, the strong presence steadily kept getting closer until he was in the hut's range. Luffy would've groaned if it wasn't for his inability to express himself. He glanced at Rouge which was groaning on the bed, then towards the main door. Deciding he should probably take care of the problem.

"I will be back, Rouge," Luffy said, untangling his almost crushed fingers from her strong pain induced grip.

"CaLL mE MO-aahhhhM!" She yelled, in between painful groans as another wave of contraction hit her.

The woman had started asking Luffy to address her as his mother since the incident, insisting that he was her child. Not always, but whenever Luffy called her mother, she would be visibly happier. Saying that she could at least be a mother once in her life, reminding the deity of her limited time and filling him with an unfamiliar feeling of sadness.

Luffy ignored her in favour of looking out the window. The first thing that caught his eyes was the blaring white uniform and cape the old man was wearing, eliciting a faint frown from the teen. He placed his hands in front of him as if he was holding something in his hand.

Just then, water droplets seem to gather quickly from the surrounding water vapour, growing in size, and compressed into a long scythe. It had a long handle with a huge crescent blade that would barely fit through the door, on one end. On the other there were two symmetrical, shorter, and smaller blades, creating a T shape. The weapon was taller than Luffy, who was 174 centimetres tall, with 235 centimetres in length.

The handle was a simple staff with ridges on its surface that formed a scale like pattern, also providing the user better grip. It looked like glass or ice that contained the roaring waves itself. At each end where the staff meets the curved blades, there were blue sea serpents coiling intricately, as if holding them together.

The crescent blade was huge, curving, almost reaching the middle of the handle. It was smooth and pure white with sharp edges that glinted blue under light. The other two blades were similar, only smaller and less curved, more for stabbing than slicing.

People would say it was a beautiful, pure weapon. But it was the white that allowed blood to look so red on it, blood to flow into its handles. It may look clean and bright, but Luffy remembered what it was like when it was soaked dark red in blood. Once, he was mistaken as a grim reaper after a great war, covered in a blood soaked cloak while holding a blood red scythe, creating quite a terrifying silhouette.

Twirling the weapon carefully in the small space, it had been a long time since he held his favourite weapon. Though, the appearance of his weapon never meant a good thing, it meant the reaper would visit, and it would not be for him. However, he felt like it would be required if he wanted to finish a fight with the old marine quickly.

Before the door was knocked, Luffy opened the door and at the same time, manoeuvred his huge weapon with practised ease out the door, towards the man's neck. The old man's eyes visibly widened as the cold weapon drew a drop of blood, but it was more in interest than fear. His hands which were posed for a punch were frozen mid-air.

"Garp-san!" Two people in pure white gowns shouted in worry, jerking in surprise.

"Bwahahaha, don't worry! I'm fine!" He said, dismissing their concerns with a wave of a hand, "and who are you? I sensed someone in there with Rouge but I didn't expect it to be a brat," he said with a huge grin, not worried.

Luffy didn't give out any sort of reaction beside the slight narrowing of his eyes at Rouge's name. But not sensing any bad intention from the man, he decided to reply (scythe still pointed of course, he's careful), "My name's Luffy."

The man's eyes widened comically at that and gaped, turning into stone at the same time. "B-but, Luffy's dea…" he trailed off and just stared. Finally noticing the similarities Luffy had to the deceased child in the picture his son sent him, but Luffy shouldn't be this old yet. His blue eyes were also a light ocean blue rather than the dark navy blue his daughter-in-law had.

The deity quickly recalled the old man from his memories and realised who he was. Monkey D. Garp, his supposed grandpa. "I'm not your grandchild, but I was adopted by your son," Luffy informed, drawing the old man from his swirling thoughts. He withdrew his weapon a little, and added, "-sort of."

"Bwahahahaha, that means you ARE my grandson!" He exclaimed happily, advancing in a hugging motion. Luffy could feel a headache coming already just from his short interaction with the man.

He pushed his weapon back anyway, threateningly. "That still doesn't explain why you're here," the raven said calmly.

Garp took a deep breath, expression straightening into a serious one, "Roger asked me for a final favour, to protect his son," he sighs, the old man seemed sad, regretful and burdened all at once (not that Luffy noticed), "what about you? Why are you here?"

The teen stared longer to ascertain his claim, the old man held his gaze steadily. He didn't sense any lie in his eyes and aura, finally retrieving his weapon to his side. "An old favour, to protect his wife," he admitted, not bothering to hide his intentions.

Garp looked at him oddly, he had sensed that Luffy was different somehow but he couldn't pinpoint it. But they were soon distracted by Rouge's screams of pain. Garp explained and quickly ordered his two trusted doctors to do their jobs while Luffy stood beside his 'mom', giving her comfort as much as possible.

After an agonisingly painful hour of screaming, a baby was born, wailing aloud. The baby was declared perfectly healthy and passed to Rouge, who looked extremely weak at this point, but happy nonetheless. Luffy knew she didn't have long, her life force fading rapidly like water leaking through a broken vase.

"Ace if it's a boy, Ann if it's a girl," she whispered weakly, passing the baby to Luffy.

Luffy, kneeling beside her, stiffened at the contact, zoning out into a daze. In his arms was a fragile, pure, little life, Rouge's treasure. And for the first time in hundreds of years, he was so scared. How could someone so empty and heartless raise a baby? How would he provide it with love? What if he broke his mom's treasure.

Rouge gently cupped his face, snapping the raven out of his thought, and she could see the barely visible fear in those ocean eyes. She leaned closer to the kneeling raven to bring her head closer to both his son's.

"You'll be a fine brother, Luffy," she said, before leaning down to kiss the baby's head, "I'm sorry that I can't be there for you, but I'll always be watching over the both of you. I love you, my baby."

"I promise you mom, I'll take care of the baby," Luffy said, eliciting a final smile from Rouge as she passed into eternal sleep. Just like that, Luffy lost another mother, another tear flowing down his face which he wiped before it could bloom into flowers. Not in front of the marine.

Luffy looked down to meet the baby's ashen eyes, as it gurgled and gave him a gummy smile. The baby had raven hair, not unlike his, and few tiny freckles that splattered his cheeks, just like his mom's. Just like Merose's son, Ace's inheritance seemed skewed towards the father's side.

For the first time while looking at the baby smiling and giggling at him, kindness bloomed in the deity's heart, he swore again to himself that he would raise Ace with care no matter what, even if he was heartless to everyone else.

Unbeknownst to him, that small kindness blooming in him would be enough to give love to little Ace and many others. Through kindness, he would be able to feel again, feel love, sympathy, anger, and sadness again. But for now, all his love would be directed to the little baby who made it bloom in him.

Ahhh~ Another chapter for ya'll.

I don't think babies are ever born with freckles hahaha, they're technically caused by the sun. But this is fictional anyway :P

Here's the big question, so I haven't written very far ahead, and I have two directions to go but can't really decide... So,br /

a. one is where they leave to be pirates at 17 and Luffy goes along undercover (maybe as a little kid)br /

b. or focusing on Ace's adventure where Luffy appear occasionally and would reveal himself when the problem comes (like an OP reveal, I love those XD)br /

c. or they leave early still kids due to some problems, and will prolly interact with Whitebeards (they're fun to write)

Well that's what I thought of so far. Help hahahabr /

HollowSea signing out ~

(1497 words)