Conomi Islands, the place where Nami was from was a small archipelago. It was a chain of island that contained if the map Kaden was following was anything go by, around twenty if not more communities.

'Even if each of these communities only had ten adults, with Arlong charging them a hundred thousand beri a month to live….' Kaden's thoughts trailed off as he flew towards his destination on his ever comfortable bright orange flame cloud.

That would be twenty million beri a month he made from just those poor people. But he knew for a fact they were bigger than that, and if he took Nami's village Cocoyasi Village as an average, which he knew should have at least thirty adults if not more…

The number would look closer to sixty million beri on average a month Arlong made, if not more. And he'd been there for what, even years at this point?

He'd have made literally over five billion beri.

That was utterly absurd.

Though he needed to take into account that Arlong had may have destroyed a few of the villages after throwing a tantrum like he had when Nami returned in canon, and then there was the money that he had to have spent to build Arlong Park and pay off the local marine branch.

Being generous and even striking his profit to even a fifth of what it should have been, he'd still have over a billion beri.

God, how did one accumulate so much wealth, talk so much big shit, but just bum around in the weakest sea like he was?

Arlong truly was a pathetic little loser.

Clearly his sister inherited all the worth in his bloodline.

Honestly, thinking about Arlong was pissing him off. The guy was just everything wrong with the world. He was like a caricature of character defects in the shape of a stupid looking blue skinned retard.

…He had the serious urge to rip that stupid ass nose of his clean off his face and stab him in the throat with it.

That sounded cathartic.

Or maybe he could pin him down after ripping his nose off and let Nami do it? Letting the little girl he'd enslaved stab him in the throat with that nose of his he was so proud of, sounded the biggest insult of all he could give that fish freak.

'I should keep the karate one alive for a little bit at least and force him to show me how to use Fishman Karate.' Kaden mused, putting the murder of Arlong out of mind for the moment.

Honestly, he couldn't remember much about the guy aside from the fact he was a cunt and fought Sanji. Oh, and he remembered him beating the shit out of Genzo, the guy Nami and Nojiko saw as a father figure and then carving him up with a sword.

Actually, you know what? Maybe he could just learn Fishman Karate at Fishman Island or something instead.

It took just over two hours before Kaden arrived at his destination.

Kind of.

….It took him two hours to reach the archipelago of islands and then another half an hour to figure what one had Cocyasi Village.

Which actually just amounted to him flying around atop his glittering orange flame cloud until he found Arlong park.

And as much as it galled Kaden to admit it, it was a pretty snazzy looking place. It looked like a seriously nice vacation spot for some of the rich and famous.

A huge towering mansion-like base. The surrounding area looking like it was build with glittering white marble. High privacy giving walls, and out the front of it, a waterway that looked like multiple large glistening pools, with a marble walkway down the middle of them leading to a gate that led to the ocean.

There was even multiple little wall-less beach hut-like buildings, Kaden wasn't sure what they were called, but they looked really nice.

And the place was surrounded by tons of greenery on the outside lots of small marshes with glistening clear water.

Spoiler

The place was really nice.

And totally undeserved.

"….I'm taking this place." Kaden decided right then and there as he circled above the place on his flame cloud. Luffy had destroyed it, but the place was worth a serious shit ton of money for sure.

Hmm?

As he circled, he noted he could see quite a few figures down below within the confines of Arlong Park. Fishmen of varying sizes, shapes and skin or was that gill(?) colours.

Spreading out his awareness with observation haki, Kaden got a feel for him. He ignored their general emotions, more interested in their strength and numbers.

…And he was left honestly disappointed.

He counted just over fifty of them in total. But, as a whole? They felt disappointingly weak. As in, the vast, vast majority of them wouldn't have stood out from the mook pirates he'd taken ownership over at Clock Tower Island.

And the rest? The stand out ones? One felt around Bear King's level, two a decent bit below Bear King, and one decently above him, but not by a large noticeable amount.

Absolutely pitiful.

….Hmmm!?

Just as he was about to direct his flame cloud away for the moment to take scope of the village, something stood out to him.

Another presence. Pitifully weak, barely standing out strength wise from the mook fish men, but their emotions, their will.

They blazed almost like a sun in comparison to the flickering candles and smouldering camp fires of the rest.

Kaden stared directly down at where he felt the presence, and his jaw dropped and eyes widened as he saw an orange haired figure stepping out of Arlong Park's gates and walking along the long winding path leading from it to Cocoyasi Village.

It was a girl, or rather a woman. And what a woman she was. Even from as high up as he was, Kaden could make out her beauty. Short burning bright orange hair, deep brown eyes. Slender and average of height, yet with full hips, long toned legs and a voluptuous chest that stretched out the white shirt she was wearing tantalizingly.

Spoiler

It was Nami!

For a moment, Kaden just stared at her as she power walked away from Arlong Park, a stormy expression on her face.

After him coming to his senses over thinking about her, after deciding saving those people outweighed any personal desires of his own, after even deciding to make a plan to use Arlong and his cronies to make up for not getting to see her-

He came at one of the rare few times she was on the island after bringing back her stolen loot?

Was this karma? Was this the world itself telling him that following the path of the D. was better than the path of the Celestial Dipshits?

Or maybe it was just coincidence. Either way, he wasn't about to miss the chance to meet her.

With a thought, he directed his flame cloud down towards her, the glittering orange cloud zipping down through the air and carrying him down right in front of her.

Nami stopped in her tracks, eyes widening in shock at his sudden and abrupt appearance, "W-what the!?" she sputtered.

"Sup?" Kaden lifted a hand and greeted her with a grin, "I'm Kaden, and I'm looking for some information about things going on around here and since you just came from Arlong Park, I figured you'd be in the know."

It was only a little white lie. Actually, not even really a lie because everything he said was the truth, so it was more just an omission of all the facts.

Nami goggled at him for a few good seconds, but points to her, she quickly smothered her emotions and gave him a wary look, "…Kaden, right," she repeated his name, "Why are you here? And what's with this freaky cloud you're sitting on?" she asked, eyes moving from his face to gave the flame cloud a quizzical look, and something else.

He didn't even need to use observation haki to feel the greed coming from her. He could almost predict and hear her thoughts, 'What a freaky cloud. It flies, how? Wait…if I could get my hands on….it!'

It was almost telling really how her face shifted from wary to a bright inviting smile.

She had no idea who the hell this kid was. He just appeared out of nowhere, sitting cross legged as he pleased on a glowing orange cloud of all things.

What the absolute hell?

She forced a bright pretty smile on to her face even as her mind ran a mile a minute as she took stock of him. He was a teenager, broadly built, bright blonde hair, shining blue eyes, sunny smile. Younger than her, maybe around fifteen years old, sixteen maybe?

The boots and pants he was wearing looked like the types marines tended to wear, but that long red coat with the gold pauldrons? It screamed either privateer or pirate. But, there was no way a kid like this was an actual pirate, right?

Her eyes flickered to his shoulders where the hilts of two blades stuck out noticeably over them and a massive sack sat behind him on the large cloud. Gosh, where did he get that thing? She'd never seen anything like it. And with how fast she'd noticed it zip down to get in front of her…

Well, she could already feel plans beginning to form in her mind. If she could get her hands on it and fly around she could seriously speed up her travel time and have way easier escapes from tough situations when she went back out on her journey to steal more cash.

She had already stolen just shy of eighty million beri, just twenty more to go! And then she could kiss Arlong and his filthy crew behind.

"This? It's just a flame cloud," the kid, Kaden shrugged pointing at the cloud, and the way he casually said it, sounded like it wasn't anything special at all, most likely meaning he could get his hands on another one or maybe even more and- "It's just one of the abilities given to me by my Devil Fruit."

Nami's plans for getting her hands on the cloud ground to a halt, "Devil Fruit?" she gaped at him, was he serious? "They're real?" she goggled at the boy.

She'd heard the stories, but even being part of Arlong's crew for the past eight years now and having been travelling all over the East Blue to gather up the funds to buy back her village, she'd never saw one in person and thought it was just a myth.

"Oh yeah sure, they're pretty common on the Grand Line," the kid casually dropped a massive bomb, "And I've only been here in the East Blue a few days to be honest, but I know there's quite a few people in this sea with them. Like I ran into a pirate group I hunted down with two of them the other day, a paramecia and even a logia. Honestly, gotta say it's crazy a logia was just bumming around East Blue, but then she was pretty damn weak, it was honestly kind of sad."

Paramecia? Logia? She had no idea what he was talking about? Different classifications she assumed, and Logia if the way he talked were pretty…strong devil fruits?

And on top of that, he just casually revealed he came from the Grand Line. Even the few times she overheard Arlong and the others speak about the place, she knew it was filled with utter monsters.

What the hell was a kid this young doing in the Grand Line? And what was he doing in East Blue now?

'He said he just hunted down a pirate group,' she thought, ones with devil fruits at that. If there were pirate groups with devil fruit users, then they were probably some of the highest bounties of East Blue.

…If he was here hanging around not far from Arlong Park, after admitted to hunting another pirate group.

Then there was only one conclusion to make.

"You came to take Arlong's head?" she blurted out, and despite herself she felt her hands clench into fists. She had to make this kid leave. Devil Fruit or not, he was just some dumb kid, Arlong was a fishman, and had a whole crew of them. He was just going to die, and she'd vowed before, to make sure she didn't have to watch people die by his hands ever again if she could do something about it.

"Pretty much," Kaden shrugged in confirmation, "I heard him and his cronies had more or less enslaved the people around here and were paying off the useless marines in the area to look the other way from him. I didn't like the sound of that, so I decided to come shove my foot up ass and take his head."

He was confident, Nami would give him that. And going by what he said about fighting devil fruit users before and pirate ones at that and implying he killed them, he was no doubt strong.

For a human.

"You should leave kid," Nami told him, her bright smile evaporating and being replaced by a serious frown, any thought of getting her hands on his possessions fleeing her mind, "I get you think you're strong, and you probably are. And it's nice of you to want to help the people here…but pick another target, you're just going to die if you try and take on Arlong."

The kid, Kaden blinked and stared at her for a moment.

Before erupting into laughter, "Chadadadadadadadadadadadadadadadadadadadadadadadadadadada!"

Nami sat there for a moment as the blonde red clad teenager floating on a glowing orange cloud gave a long laugh of full on hilarity at the warning she gave him.

…His laughter was kind of annoying.

"What's so funny?" she growled in annoyance.

His laughter began to fade, but even still, by time he stopped a few moments later, he was literally wiping tears of mirth from his eyes. He genuinely did find her warning him that Arlong would kill him, absolutely hilarious.

"The fact you think a weakling like Arlong, a Grand Line drop out, could beat me," Kaden snorted, giving her an almost pitying look, "Like, do you even know who Arlong is?"

The question was almost insulting, "Of course I know who he is," she growled, "I've dealt with the bastard for eight entire years."

"Do you really though?" Kaden raised an eyebrow at her, lazily leaning forward and perching his chin atop his fist and staring her in the eye, "Because if you did know who Arlong is, you'd know he's just a little guppy that ran away from the Grand Line like a little bitch after getting kicked out of the Sun Pirates."

The sun pirates. Nami grimaced, she'd heard vague talk about them and their leader, Jinbei one of the seven warlords of the sea and there was talk she'd overheard here and there about how he'd unleashed Arlong on the East Blue in return for becoming a Warlord because he was too hard to control.

And she'd overheard Arlong himself boast about such a thing before she was sure.

That didn't really make much sense to her, but she didn't know much about the Warlord's in general, only that they were absurdly powerful and influential pirates. If one of them couldn't even control Arlong, it showed just how strong he was.
Wait.

"Kicked out?" Nami blinked, "No that isn't right, he got let loose because the Sun Pirates leader couldn't control him, right?"

Kaden outright goggled at her, "…What?" his jaw dropped and he just stared at her for a moment.

Like she was an idiot.

She didn't like that.

Her teeth grit together and a vein pulsed on her forehead. He obviously wasn't trying to, she knew that, but at the same time, it felt like he was completely invalidating everything she and everyone who suffered under Arlong's rule, as if Arlong was truly nothing.

"Arlong wasn't let loose by Jinbei because he was too hard to control, Arlong was literally kicked out of the Sun Pirates because of how violent he was towards humans, he'd literally be locked up right now still in Impel Down if Jinbei didn't use his position as a Warlord to get him out," Kaden spoke before she could blow her top, "But he didn't let him off lightly. Jinbei beat the crap out of Arlong and kicked him out of the Sun Pirates and after that he ran here because he was too scared and weak to hack it in the Grand Line without Jinbei's protection. In fact, he's so low tier as a pirate, Jinbei doesn't even know where he is. Granted, that's because of the corrupt marines he's paying off."

No.

She tried to deny his words. This kid, popping out literally just out of nowhere and talking nonsense like this? She wouldn't allow herself to believe it.

Couldn't.

If she did. Then…what was she doing all this time? It would have meant she could have just went and seduced the first decently strong Grand Line pirate she came across and had him defeat Arlong and his crew for her with ease.

"Honestly, even this Arlong Park is just a copy of Sabaody Park where rich and powerful humans enslaved a lot of different people and races, and were big on getting fishmen slaves," the kid continued on, casting a glance at Arlong Park, "I gotta say, even his aura is pathetically weak from what I can feel from here. I honestly expected it to be stronger but, he feels like fodder. Physically he's nothing to write home about and from what I can feel mentally, you're vastly stronger when it comes to willpower."

What….just what?

Nami was having a hard time processing this, "What do you mean aura? How strong he feels?" she asked, "Is that a power you have from a devil fruit?"

Kaden turned back to her with a grin, "Nah, my devil fruit is a zoan and stupid powerful, but what I'm using to scope Arlong out is a pretty common power in the later half of the Grand Line," he replied, "It's called Haki, specifically I'm using Observation Haki that among other things let's me sense how strong people are, feel their emotions, sense people over a distance, that kind of thing. Honestly, I might actually be able to take Arlong out from here without doing a thing, that's how pathetic he is."

He was bragging, the kid was literally bragging about what he could do and how weak he thought Arlong was in comparison to him.

Nami wasn't sure how to feel here right now. It was so convincing, but at the same time, she wasn't sure how to feel about how it invalidated all of her struggles in a way.

…That explained why he just popped down on his dumb cloud in front of her after seeing her leave Arlong Park. He could literally feel how much she hated Arlong.

And it seemed the Grand Line was even scarier than she thought if that kind of power was common.

"I could literally give you one of the Devil Fruits I have right now and within a few days you'd be capable of beating his ass yourself," the boy laughed, "That would be hilarious actually."

…What?

"You have more Devil Fruit?" she blinked, "And you'd….just give me one?" Nami asked, thoughts stuttering to a halt. Weren't they supposed to be incredibly rare?

"Hilarious as it would be, no," Kaden snorted, "You kidding? The fruit I have that would let you beat Arlong and his entire crew within just a few days is a high tier logia devil fruit. If I wanted to sell it, I could get a billion beri or more pretty easily for it and probably just as much for the other one I have as well, even the weakest devil fruits go for a hundred million as a starting price."

'A billion beri!?' Nami internally sputtered, eyes going wide. Devil fruits could go for that much? And he had two by his estimates that could go for that much? Her eyes flickered to the massive sack sitting on the cloud behind him.

It was huge.

And probably where those devil fruits lay.

Absurd, utterly absurd. And he was just moving around with that kind of loot as casual as could be?

And what else was he carrying in that sack? She couldn't help but wonder. This kid was absolutely loaded for sure.

…But if he was telling the truth, then there was no way in hell she could get any of it off of him. He could literally sense her intentions.

Could she seduce him? He was younger than her, and she hadn't missed the way his eyes lingered on her chest and legs every now and then.

But no, if his strength was as real as he casually stated, so strong he thought Arlong whom she could never beat in a million years was trash, then she'd never escape the kid, at least until he got bored of her in some way.

…What was this guys game, really? There was definitely something more going on here that he wasn't saying.

"Who are you really?" Nami narrowed her eyes at the boy, "You're obviously not coming here just out of the goodness of your heart. You want something out of this for sure. No way you just turned out up here as a coincidence."

The boy blinked at her, before shrugging, "I mean, I kinda did?" he replied, "I mean it wasn't a coincidence, beyond meeting you here I guess. I was actually heading somewhere to train and get stronger when I remembered what Arlong was doing here. It even kind of messes up my goals a bit coming for Arlong right now because I wanted to get stronger first before going after my goals."

"Your…goals?" Nami repeated, fishing for more. Bit by bit, things were becoming clearer, the picture being filled in dot by dot but she needed more information here.

"I suppose I should introduce myself in full then," Kaden shrugged, "Like I said before, I'm Kaden D. Freeman, former marine commander stationed in the Grand Line, now technically a pirate I guess after I went rogue for slaughtering a marine vice admiral and his entire platoon because they were corrupt and abusing their power over the civilians they were trying to protect. I'm planning on becoming a Warlord and to do so, I'm going to be taking the heads of a ton of pirates with bounties to show off my strength."

He grinned at her as her eyes widened once more, "Arlong doing the shit he's doing right now, got to me though on my way to where I want to train and so I ended up coming to take his head," the teen added, "Then I saw you when I was scoping out the island, could feel your literal hate for him and his fishy crew and came down to scope you out because you're gorgeous. If I kill Arlong for you, how about a date?"

Nami was stunned silent at his words.

There was a massive amount to unpack there from being a marine commander with how young he was, to going rogue and killing other marines for being corrupt, to him now being a pirate, which she'd usually hate him for, because she hated pirates…but the reason he became one wasn't one that she could hate.

Then there was the rest of what he said to her.

But beyond that-

This kid….

He was definitely, for sure, an idiot.

Her head was absolutely spinning with everything he'd dropped on her. And despite herself, despite how she'd mustered her resolve for years, despite all the effort she put in to raise the money to buy the freedom of her village from Arlong.

She wanted to believe this kid.

He was just too dumb to be lying to her with what he was saying.

Because if he was telling the truth. Then, the people at her village didn't need to wait any longer. The people across the archipelago of islands that she couldn't do anything about, would be free as well.

And Arlong would be truly punished instead of just getting a pay day of a hundred million beri.

"If you're telling the truth kid, then sure, I'll go on a date with you," Nami plastered a smirk on her face, crossing her arms under her chest and pushing her voluptuous chest up, "But unless you that devil fruit of yours is something truly special, I don't see how you can beat Arlong. Fishmen are ten times stronger than humans, and Arlong is way stronger than most fishmen."

"…I'll hold you to that," the kid grinned, before nodding, "And as far as how strong Arlong is. Believe it or not if you want, but I'm far stronger physically than Arlong. I'm stronger than most fishmen actually, the only one I know who is stronger than my when it comes to pure strength, is Jinbei, and maybe their king, and I'm fine to prove it if you want."

"…Is that a power of your devil fruit, then?" Nami had to ask, because a human being physically stronger than the vast majority of fishmen, just didn't make sense at all.

He'd have to be an utter monster to be able to do that.

"Nah," Kaden chuckled, shaking his head, "My devil fruit power lets me turn into a giant dragon, control a bunch of elements like fire, wind and ice and even lets me fire blasts from my mouth so powerful I can destroy entire mountains." He helpfully informed.

…Eh?

Alright, back with chapter ten of this.

What can I say? This dice favoured Kaden meeting Nami. And, can't say much more at the moment cuz I'm kind of in a hurry and busy right now beyond that we're still quite a few chapters ahead on the Pa-atreon if any of you wanna read ahead.

Anyway, again, shameless Pa-atreon plug. I've got one, go by the same username on there, easy to find and all that jazz. Support me if you want, it'd be swell, but don't feel pressured lads and ladies, I'll be uploading my stuff outside it regardless and not keeping it all behind a paywall or anything like that.