Hello everyone, how you all have been doing? I Hope doing good.
Sorry for the long wait, is ironic how I that in the past always grumped on how long some of my favorite authors would take to update, now I'm here doing the same to you all my dear readers.
As the phrase I put in the summary says, 'Life sure can be surprising' right?
Anyway, at the beginning of this year, some very annoying visitors had come and stayed in my house for around two months, and like a dementor from HP the two sucked all I (and after some time my family) energy I had inside.
Things obviously got better after they left to never come back again, but even so, I still didn't felt like writing anything. It was only a few days ago that I began to type a few lines every day of what now is this chapter.
Well, here he is, but first some guest reviews.
Guest (Ch. 7 Jan2): First thanks for liking the fic.
The reason One Piece most of the time shows the marine in a bad light is, one, the main characters, Luffy and his crew, are pirates, as such is kinda a no brainer why most of the time they are shown as villains. Two, a part of the marine, especially a few in high ranks, are not really good people.
I'm willing to believe most marines are not like that, the same way most pirates aren't like Luffy and his bunch and instead are like most people expect pirates to be, but since some high ranks are and they are generally what we see, this is how the Marine will appear to some.
I'm not saying they are all good people, Akainubitch and his like-minded sure don't are, but overall I'm willing to believe that is not that bad to be a marine in this world.
Guest (Ch.15 Jan 5): Very probably that he will (when? I don't know!)
Lucas is trailing the marine way on his own accord and he is enjoying it too, basically doing all that Garp wanted to see from his children. The seasoned marine would never let the chance of using his older grandson to try convince the young one to go down the marine path.
He will certainly fail but will try nonetheless.
Guest (Ch.3 Feb 28): First, thank you very much for liking the fic and for the words of encouragement.
Now, about my grammar? this a difficult topic. You see, not only English is not my first language, is Portuguese, but also I actually never really did any in-depth class to learn English!
Here in Brasil, all the formal classes I had about English had been two a week when I was in school, and basically, all of them had been basic ones all the way through. I would be doing my teachers a disservice if I said I didn't learn anything in those classes, but overall all that I learned there amount just to the basics.
That's to say the English I have today it's almost 85% self-taught.
On my day-to-day, it worked really well, I can read or watch/hear basically anything in English without any difficulty, is writing that causes me more trouble.
I don't write in English nearly as often as I do the other things, as such when I write my English comes out not very good. I know this is no excuse to write a bunch of gibberish, but I hope you and the others could understand my side.
Like I said in the first chapters, this is also English training for me, and I believe I had gotten better since I started writing this. Grammatical errors will still appear, but I hope you all will not get too upset with them.
DISCLAIMER: I don't know if I should do this or not but whatever, I don't own anything here apart from my OC's.
May have grammar errors
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Marine Base Dormitory, Mel Island
It was dawn, the rising sun could be already seen on the horizon, and with him came his comfy warmth washing the coldness of the night away from the island.
In a certain room in one of the dormitories for the low-rank marines, a person completely covered by the blanket could be seen soundless sleeping on the bed.
"Uufh"
The sunlight entering the small room through the window fell on the bed making the person sleeping on it, stir around underneath the blanket. Then the person stretched an arm from under the blanket towards a small cabinet on the right side of the bead, after a couple of clumsy missed attempts the slender hand finally found its target, red-framed glasses.
Putting the glasses on the person finally rose from the bed..
"It's already morning?..." with a yawn she turned and looked at the sunlight coming through the window "I need to get ready then"
With short blue hair, the person was obviously Tashigi
Still feeling a little groggy Tashigi rose from her bed and walked to the mirror at the side of the room, there the reflection of a beautiful young woman with her hair and clothes disheveled looked back at her'Jeez… how you ended up like this after just one night of sleep?...'
With those thoughts in her mind, the blunette picked a towel and some other things headed out.
…
After a time Tashigi, now fully awaken thanks to a warm shower she took in the women's bathroom, returned to her room.
Changing to her uniform she turned to the mirror, the sight of her now groomed self in the mirror made her nod in satisfaction.
"Way better, there's just one thing missing… " Walking to her bed she picked her trusted partner, the katana Shigure, that was resting at the bedside. Strapping the sword on her hip Tashigi returned to the mirror "Now it's perfect"
Smiling happily at the valiant-looking woman looking back at her from the mirror Tashigi opened the door and then walked out of her room.
This dormitory that she and the others that came from Marineford are is somehow big, with around five stories high the blue building housed many of the low ranking marines on the island. Both men and women lived in the building, which makes it, in a way, a mixed dormitory; with the east side, where Tashigi is now, belonging to the female marines, whiles the west side to their male counterparts
After leaving her room Tashigi walked five meters down the corridor to a set of stairs, descending the steps she left the fourth floor, where her room is, all the way to the second floor.
"Good morning"
Greeting some of her fellow marines she passed by along the way, Tashigi walked down a hallway towards a set of stairs that would lead to the last floor of the men's side. The reason was very obvious, she was planning to go call her two friends for them to go together eat breakfast and then go to their posts.
'A lot happened yesterday, a pirate crew caught us by surprise and attacked our ship. Then with Lucas spearheading a charge we cut through the pirates attacking the cargo, Lucas clashed against their second-in-command and defeated him using his devil fruit powers' recalling the display of her friend's devil fruit powers she sighed 'To think all this happened just yesterday…'
During this first week of hers acting as marine Tashigi practically spent all her active time in the dock fourteen working with the coming and going of many loads of equipment and others, from in and out of Marineford.
The unexpected course of events that happened yesterday really caught her by surprise, and even now she still feels like what happened was somehow a little surreal.
'But…' bringing her hand to the side she tightly gripped at her trusted sword's handle; Excitement rushing through her as the scenes of them fighting the pirates flashed in her mind 'Everything was actually very fun… '
The corners of her mouth slightly curved up in a reminiscing smile, her attention to the real world lowering as she began to get lost in the memories of that event, along with the strange but novel feeling they brought up again.
"Yo Tashigi!"
"?!"
Walking absent-minded Tashigi got caught by surprise when someone called her name. She tripped a little but was quickly able to recover her balance.
Looking ahead she saw her blonde friend, Torlo, walking out of the stairs towards her.
"Oh it's you Torlo" she smiles seeing that it was her friend "Good Morning"
"Good morning to you too" he threw her a concerned look "I saw you walking absent-minded there, you almost tripped and everything. What happened?" Torlo then made a mock look of surprise "Could be that our dear meito master had seen my handsome face coming towards her and became struck but what she saw? But that couldn't be, she already saw me plenty before-"
"Shut up Torlo"
Giggling she gave him a mock knock in the head, in return Torlo began to giggle along with her.
"What's on your mind then?"
"Nothing really serious, just thinking about what happened yesterday"
"Oh, That?" Torlo adopted a reminiscing look just like that previously on Tashigi's face "Yeah, yesterday was really something. It's no surprise you had that look then, I was also with my head in the clouds earlier thinking about that"
Tashigi nodded in understanding "Sigh Who could have thought our first day here on the South Blue would be like this?"
"You could say that again? I have been a marine for about half-year longer than you guys, during my time I had gone out in some missions nearby Marineford, and in none of them, something unexpected like that happened. But on the very first time we go out together, a pirate attack happens" his expression turned into a mix of helplessness with an excited smirk "One thing is sure, my time with you and Lucas is sure to be filled with surprises"
Tashigi chuckled a little seeing her friend's expression, but stopped when she heard Lucas name as she seemed to recall something "Oh right! Where's Lucas? I was actually going to call you two"
"Him? Probably had gone down to eat or something"
"Probably?"
"Well… I'm not really sure" scratching his head Torlo gave her a confused look "His room is in the same corridor as mine you know? So when I woke up I walked to his, but when I arrived there I didn't find him"
She looked surprised after hearing that "Really?"
"Yeah"
"Hmm, I wonder where he is"
"Maybe it's like I said, he probably had gone eat ahead or somethin-""What you guys are gossiping there?"
""?!""
Talking between themselves the two friends lowered their attention towards their surroundings, which lead to something similar to what happened with Tashigi earlier.
Someone had walked behind them without them knowing, speaking very close to their ears this person was able to catch them off-guard, spooking the two to a point of jumping.
Turning around in a hurry Tashigi saw who it was "Oh, it's you Alvara!"
The person that walked behind them was Alvara, the blond ponytail marine that had come from Marineford alongside them.
"The reaction of you two was hilarious" said Alvara while giggling, an amused expression in full bloom on her face as she looked at her two fellow young marines "I really scared you two hein?"
"Haha very funny…" Torlo murmured as adjusted his red bandana" Also, who are you saying got scared?"
"The guy that just jumped thrice his height"
"That? I did just to go along your little play"
"Whatever you say" finishing joking with Torlo she turned to Tashigi "So, what were you talking about?"
"Oh, we just had been talking about Lucas. Torlo said that he was not in his room when he had gone call him, so we had been wondering where he could have gone"
"Our white-haired sparky hero?" said Alvara receiving two nods back "Well, I may have the answer for that question"
At the side Torlo's eyes widened in surprise, an expression mirrored by Tashigi "Really?"
Alvara nodded "Earlier when I was going to the canteen, I saw our white-haired hero appear running. When I asked what he was doing Lucas said he was doing his morning training, after we talked a little he sprinted towards the training area behind the dorm"
"Training area?" asked Torlo.
"Yeah, there's a small field behind our dorm that many here used to do some training. It's obviously not like the facilities on the base used for proper training but is enough for anyone looking to stretch up a little"
The information came as surprise to both of them, since they hadn't explored the base much they didn't know about these details.
Having absorbed the new info Tashigi asked.
"Can you take us there?"
"Of course, like I said it's just behind the dorm. You just need to go down this away…"
…
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Behind the dormitory of the low-ranking marines was a small field surrounded by some trees slowly being bathed by the sunlight.
The sun that already rose from the horizon had washed away most of that earlier cold mist of the morning, the rays of sunlight could now freely fall on the small field, be from the between the green leaves on the trees or by going through the clouds in the sky, and bath the space used for training with the warmth of the sun, a gift from the celestial body that watches over the world from far away in the distance.
Shoosh!
At that moment on the small field behind the dorm, a white-haired figure could be seen training some punches. So strong his moves that a light gust of wind would follow each of his moves.
Shoosh!
The white-haired figure was, obviously, Monkey D. Lucas.
Yesterday after he returned to his room from his night stroll Lucas had gone sleep right away, waking up with the sun Lucas got himself ready for the day. When he walked out and saw that would take some time for the others to wake up, he decided to use this gap of time to warm himself up with some morning training.
He had first run around the base before coming to this small training area, previously when he had flown back to the base he had seen this field behind the dorm. It looked quite inviting with the trees around, so he came here to follow his morning training.
"..."
In his fighting stance with a calm and focused expression, Lucas threw a punch forward with his right, kinda like a jab. Being a move he had done countless times the punch was throw in almost perfection, a small gust of wind surged around him as a result of his punch.
Shoosh!
Before the gust could dissipate Lucas threw another punch with his left and like before following the punch came the wind
Shoosh!.
Then moving again Lucas did an upper-slashing kick with his right leg, his body momentarily leaving the ground as result. In the air using the momentum of the kick Lucas titled his body back and did a backward flip, then using his left leg as support he touched the ground again, and as he did that he briefly bent his knee.
"Hphm!"
Putting strength on his left leg he pushed himself upward, by doing this he put even more power in the build-up momentum he was already carrying. Clenching his right fist he used all that build-up momentum to throw an uppercut punch.
Shoosh!
The power of this punch was bigger than the previous ones, a much stronger gust of wind was created as result, going around him even before the previous gust could have properly dissipated.
The strength he put on his leg ended up lifting him some seven meters in the air, adjusting his body as he fell back to the ground Lucas lifted his left fist back. As his two feet touched the ground brought his left down in a downward punch, one that like before created a gust of wind that swept the area around him.
"Sigh"
Straightening himself up Lucas closed and opened both his hands in succession while giving them a nod "Eh, nothing wrong here. I think this is enough of warming up"
Intending in leaving Lucas turned around, and as he did by accident his eyes fell on a human-sized wooden training target on a corner of the field. A certain memory flashed in his mind, his eye glinting as an idea came to him "Well, maybe I can test this one last thing…"
Walking towards the training target Lucas put his left hand on his right shoulder, pressing it down a little while the same twirling his shoulder.
When he was around more or so fifteen meters from the target he stopped, assuming his stance Lucas brought his arm back, fist aligned with his head.
"Hmnn…"
Closing his eyes he then delved into the memory that had just flashed in his mind.
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…
Around three months into his training…
In a rocky area beside a cliff on some part of that unknown island on the Grand Line a scene that would be considered strange in other places, but had long become common there was taking place.
"BWAHAHAHA!"
Boom!
Boom!
This scene was that of a tall and muscular old man wearing a tropical shirt and light shorts, laughing as he threw rocks at a very astounding speed at a bare-chested white-haired young man in the distance.
These two are Lucas and his grandpa Garp, and what was happening there was nothing more than just one of the training the two do together.
"Nice done Lucas!"
Praised Garp while his trademark wide smile adorned his face before throwing another rock. Not far behind to his right the tiger Khan laid lazily on the ground while watching the Monkey D. duo training.
On the opposite side Lucas was moving around trying to dodge the rocks that had the size of a cannonball, and after being thrown by his grandpa also the speed of one. At the same time, he used his lightning when he can to blast the rocks before they could reach him.
Zap!
Throwing a lightning Lucas was able to successfully blast into thousand pieces an incoming rock cannonball, just for another one even faster to appear on the shadow of the previous one.
"Hmph!"
Calling out his dragon tail using partial transformation he used the strength of his tail as a form of boost to throw himself to the side in a sideway jump with a spin, like that avoiding the incoming rock cannonball, albeit barely.
However, Lucas just adjusted his body when he saw two more rocks practically already on top of him.
Acting quickly Lucas moved in high speed, looking like as if vanishing he appeared a moment later around ten meters ahead from where he was.
"Bwahaha that was good! Now, how you handle this one?"
Turning to the side Lucas saw his grandpa effortlessly lifting a rock probably the size of a small house that was on the side, then laughing boisterously like he always did his grandpa proceeded to throw the giant rock at him.
"?!"
Lucas eyes widened seeing that, in mere seconds the rock was already high in the air doing a parabola, which the end target being him. The place where he stood was already cast under the shadow of the giant object looming closer and closer.
Not wasting a second more Lucas began to call out his lightning power in full force!
ZAP!
Looking like a raging beast, blue lightning surged around him with great intensity, which then following his will began to gather in the form of a spinning sphere on his right hand.
Moving his arm Lucas then threw the spinning sphere at the incoming giant rock, midway the sphere turned into a spinning drill.
When the lightning attack touched the rock it easily drilled itself inside it, reaching the core part of the rock the drill released all its energy, like that destroying the rock from inside out.
On the rock's surface, spider cracks began to appear one after the other at a very fast-paced speed, blue light followed by lightning sparks soon surged from within the cracks.
BOOM!
A just a few moments later the giant rock then couldn't withstand and then exploded sending pieces of rock and lightning all over the place.
…
From where he was Garp saw perfectly how his grandson successfully destroyed the rock, nodding in satisfaction Garp yelled to him "That's enough Lucas!"
"Ufa!"
Hearing the signal Lucas finally relaxed, huffing he retracted his dragon tail and wiped away the sweat from his forehead 'That last part was unexpected' he thought as he reviewed what has just happened.
This is not the first time he and his grandpa Garp had done this training where his grandpa would throw rocks at him, this is something his grandpa had come up with the intention of training his dodging abilities, alongside his aim and some control of his lightning.
But from all the times they have done this training, this was the first time his grandpa Garp threw a giant rock at him like that, normally he would throw a bunch of rocks at the same time, like if he was a human Gatling-Gun. The sudden change had gotten him by surprise 'If that was grandpa's intention, it worked'
"You did well on that last move Lucas!"
"Thanks grandpa"
Garp having arrived there beside his grandson looked at him with a pleased expression "So, how you feeling?"
"Good, I feel like I gained a lot with this training. That last move for instance gave some ideas" twirling his shoulder earning some crack sounds he looked at his grandpa "So what now?"
"Oho? Not feeling tired?" asked a grinning Garp.
"You know me grandpa"
"That's just what I like to hear!"
Mentioning for Lucas to follow him Garp walked some meters forward until they arrived in the center part of that rocky area. Stopping he turned to his grandson and seized him a little again before saying "Show me some of your strong punches"
Lucas raised an eyebrow at that, but then he just shrugged and followed what his grandpa said.
Swoosh!
Turning to the said Lucas launched a strong punch in the air with his right, and a testament to its strength was the gust of wind that was created as a result of the punch. If this was when he just started his training, Lucas would have stopped a moment to marvel at what one's physical strength was capable of in this world.
Swoosh!
Following it Lucas threw a few more strong punches that also cause some wind to surge around him. He threw around a dozen punches like those before Garp said for him to stop.
Garp pointed to the side and said "You see that rock over there?"
Turning to the side Lucas saw the rock his grandpa pointed, it was around fifteen meters away from them and had about the size of a normal person "That one?"
Garp nodded "Now, from where you are standing, try to destroy that rock with a punch"
Lucas was taken aback by that, turning to his grandpa he asked in a confused tone "From here?"
"You heard right" answered Garp while smiling.
"Ok"
In his place a certain rubber head kid would have followed with more questions (and complains) after hearing that answer, Lucas on the other hand just shrugged, cracked his fists a little before turning to do what his grandpa told.
"Another thing!" turning his head to the side Lucas saw his grandpa looking at him with a grin while cracking both his knuckles "You better not use your devil fruit power for this, otherwise... Bwahaha"
Very used to this Lucas just smiled and turned back to look at the rock.
After clenching his right fist tightly and flexing the muscles of his arm he moved.
Swoosh!
Extending his arm forward he threw a hard punch towards the rock, this time instead of a light gust, a true burst of wind was created by his punch.
"…"
But just like what happened before, after the burst of wind surged around him and swept some dust and small rocks nothing more happened.
That rock fifteen meters away? Not slightly affected.
"Hmn?"
The result of his move made Lucas frown, deciding to try again he threw another punch with his left.
Swoosh!
Swoosh!
Swoosh!
…
Lucas then spent ten minutes punching insensately, the strength behind his punches was obvious and Lucas form of punching was well trained, but even so, nothing really changed from the result he got on the first punch.
"You can stop now"
Stopping Lucas gave his fists a look, then turning to his grandpa that had been looking at him all this time with a wide smile on his face he asked "What's the trick?"
"Bwahahaha So you figured out?" turning to the side he pointed at the rock "You see, all those punches you threw had the correct amount of strength, but they lacked the correct technique"
That got Lucas "What technique?"
"Just like with your lightning that needs a more precise control besides just power to use certain moves, physical strength is not only about pure brute force, but also the way you put all that strength to use. See, you are very similar to me, we both have a tremendous amount of strength" he scratched his beard a little "Well, yours still developing but anyway. When we use our strength with the right technique, we are able to do things like this!"
Before Lucas could even begin to wonder what his grandpa meant with 'this' he saw the man in question turn around, clench his right fist, and then throw out a punch.
Swoosh!
The strength of Garp was unquestionable, so was not a surprise that he could create a burst of wind with a punch. But different from Lucas, the burst of wind that actually looked like a whirlwind that came from Garp's punch didn't surged all over around him, instead, the wind came out in a straight line following his fist.
The wind flew high and hit the wall of the cliff, where it landed the stone sunk in the form of a very familiar giant fist. From that fist imprint, giant spider cracks started to appear on the cliff. Moments later that section of the cliff exploded!
Boom!
Giant pieces of rock that once composed a part of the cliff under the always present power of gravity begin to fall down one after the other. The booming sound caused by their fall rumbled across this section of the island.
After all that ended a smiling Garp turned to his grandson "Try again. This time try to focus on your strength, your energy, and the way you unleash it in a punch"
"Right"
Nodding in understanding Lucas turned to look at that rock and prepared to do it again.
Closing his eyes he began to concentrate.
'Focus… Focus… '
…
…
…
…
'Focus… Focus… '
Opening his eyes Lucas moved.
Swoosh!
This time after he punched the gust of wind that before would have surged around him came out from his fist and flew ahead towards that human-size training target.
Crack!
It soon arrived at the wooden target, and where it landed a 'fist imprint' was sunk in the wood. Spider cracks begin to appear one after the other and just a few moments later the target exploded sending some splinters flying around.
"Hmnn…" Lucas looked at his right fist and frowned 'It's still lacking…'
...
"Wow"
"That's was good punch!"
As he pondered about what he could do to make this fist technique work a couple of voices came from behind him, turning around he saw three very familiar figures walking towards him from the side pathway.
Happy to see his friends Lucas smiled "Good morning everyone!"
"We have been looking for you" Torlo walked to his side and put his arm over his shoulder "I had gone to your room, but you were not there. I knew you could awake earlier, but man you got me by surprise today"
Lucas looked at his friend with a smile "What can I say?" He lifted his hand and made some sparks appear on it "I have a lot of energy"
"Oh?" Alvara that was by the side crossed her arms and said with a smirk "so you know how to joke too huh?"
"Hahaha" chuckling he turned to her "Well, would you believe if I say I'm actually quite the heavy sleeper?"
"Really?"
"Yeah, waking myself up when I want is easy. Others waking me up? Very hard!"
"Well, from the time we have spent together, that doesn't seem likely"
"You can test out later"
At that Torlo perked up"Oh? Don't mind if we do then!"
"Anyway" Tashigi looked at the sun for a moment before saying "I think is better we move if we still want to eat something before the time runs out"
The other three nodded, with Alvara leading the way the group of young marines began to walk towards the canteen.
….
As they walked Tashigi that was at Lucas's right turned to her friends and said "I have been thinking all morning about what yesterday"
"Well that is normal" said Alvara that was walking just in front "What happened the previous morning is probably in the heads of everyone the came from Marineford with us"
Torlo nodded "Yeah, I wonder what today have in store for us"
After recalling all that happened yesterday, both during the day and the night, Lucas's eyes also began to glow like those of his friends "I too wonder that"
Alvara then turned to them "Hey, earlier I heard something interesting from some marines that have been working at night"
"What is it?" Asked a curious Tashigi.
"They said a metal plate with something written on it had fallen from the sky in the post on the East River Park"
Torlo raised an eyebrow after hearing that "You serious?"
"Yes" she nodded "They didn't look to be laying when they said that"
"I wonder what happened" Tashigi adjusted her glasses with a finger then turned to the tall young man beside her "What you think Lucas"
"Who knows?"
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So, that the chapter.
This chapter apart from some more interaction between the characters, the chapter heavily focused on the flashback of Lucas's training on that unknown island with his grandpa.
Back then I need the training part because I wanted to put our white-haired protagonist out in the world soon. The training was then kinda left aside, but like shown in this chapter, bits of that period can appear from time to time in the future.
We never saw Garp fighting, so what he can or can't do is really a mystery. So I made use of that old creative liberty to give him the fist technique shown in this chapter, some that I came up with by using two things as a reference.
One was those wind blade moves swordmen generally use here and in other works, the other reference... well, I believe most already know what is the other thing I used as base :)
What Will happen next? I don't know! Only when the next chapter gets written will we discover.
Like always thanks guys for reading, we arrived at the insane number of 479/631 favorites and follows! To know so many are willing to read this journey I'm writing always feels surreal to me.
Again, thank you all!
Constructive critics are always welcomed.
Fiquem Bem!