Luffy sat at the barstool, watching Makino clean the bar as he thought about his new friends.

He had been asked by Shanks to give Uta a tour of the village, which almost ended up with both of them getting eaten by a sea-king. But with the view he showed her of the village at sunset, he felt like he accomplished his job.

After Uta declared her desire to start a 'New Genesis' while he reaffirmed his dream to become the Pirate King. He also decided he's going to start a new age of freedom. Gold Roger started the great age of piracy, he wants to end it and start a new age of freedom and joy.

He could proudly say that Uta was his friend, if she wasn't already one of Shanks' crewmembers, he'd ask her to join his crew.

As of now, Shanks and his crew on off on their latest voyage, once again refusing to take him on his journey, leaving Luffy bored with nothing to do.

"I'm bored!" Luffy shouted with a groan as he slammed his face on the bar.

"You can go outside, Luffy. Just make sure you're back for lunch!" Makino smiled at Luffy and said as she watched him jump up with a smile.

"Okay! I'll be back!" Luffy shouted as he ran outside. He ran over to the port to make sure Shanks is not back yet, and when he saw he wasn't, he ran into the forest.

He kept running until he found an old campfire that looked like it was used a long time ago.

"OIII! Let's train! I know you guys are there!" Luffy shouted at seemingly nothing, but once he did, 4 heads poked out of the bushes behind him. Luffy turned around and smiled.

"Hi, guys! Sorry, I haven't come by recently! There's this super cool pirate that came to the island and I've been listening to his cool stories!" Luffy said to the heads with a smile. The four heads poking out come out of the bush, which are the 4 monkeys he fought with back on that random island.

"But, I gotta get stronger or else Shanks will keep making fun of me! And don't even get me started on Grandpa if he found out I was slacking." Luffy shivers as he thinks about his grandpa's punches.

Now that he thinks about it, how did they even get over here? He smacks both sides of his face twice.

"Anyways! Let's fight! I gotta get used to my rubber body and the best way is fighting!" Luffy yelled with a smile.

4 hours later*

Luffy can be seen trying to catch his breath lying in the middle of an open part of the forest, behind him, 4 monkeys piled up with massive bumps on their heads.

"MEAAAATTTTT" Luffy screamed as he tried to get up but his body wasn't listening to him.

Snoreee*

Luffy decided to rest to gain energy for hunting.

2 hours later*

Sniff* *Sniff*

Luffy snapped his eyes open with the smell of meat invading his nose. He was about to jump up when he felt two hands on his shoulders. He looked up and saw Makino looking at him with worry.

"Luffy, what are you doing out here? You missed lunch and were about to miss dinner if I didn't bring it out here. What's going on?" Makino asked with a concerned expression. She knew Luffy trained for his dream, but he's been doing it much more frequently and much harsher than normal. Luffy smiled at her.

"Shanks told me I need to be stronger than anyone to make sure I can protect my friends! He also told me that the only way I'll be able to get stronger after I set out to sea will be to fight strong people! So I wanna get super strong before I leave so I can fight those strong guys and get super crazy strong!" Luffy explained the reason for his efforts. Makino showed an understanding look.

"I think I understand, Luffy. But, why do you sound like you want to fight those 'strong guys'? Wouldn't it be better to try and stay away from them to keep your friends safe?" Makino asked as she was worried he wanted to go pick a fight with every strong person out there. Luffy looked at her like she was an idiot. He stuck his pinkie finger up his nose.

"Why would I do that? I'm not a coward and fighting is fun, so why would I avoid fighting strong people?" Luffy asked, genuinely confused about why anyone would try to avoid one of the best parts of adventures.

Makino laughed, shook her head, and said "Well don't stay out here for too long, remember that Shanks should be getting back soon. I'm going back to the bar"

"Okay! See you later, Makino!" Luffy said with a smile as he turned back to the forest, noticing that his monkey friends had disappeared, he decided to try out a couple of ideas he had with his new rubbery body.

He looked at the tin cans he had set up the other day and forgot about because of meat. He looked at his fists, and back at the tin cans. He thought of when he told Shanks his punches were like pistols.

"Gotta load it in the right place…" He mumbled as he threw his arm straight back and he felt it extend as far as it could. He kept his eye on the tin can and when he felt ready, he shot the pistol.

"Haaa!"

TING*

He felt and heard his hand hit metal and watched as the tin can was destroyed by his fist and said fist kept going into the tree behind it, knocking it down.

"Holy crap…" Luffy looked at the tree and then his fist in awe.

"It's like when Grandpa taught me how to punch, but better!" Luffy said with a smile. His smile got wider as he started thinking of new things he could do.

"Shishishishi! Shanks said it's a curse, but I don't care! This is awesome!" He shouted. His determination to become stronger was higher than ever.

Yo! 4th chapter done! Sorry if you read the chapter before I edited it, I thought I set the auto-publish to 6:45 PM, not 6:45 AM or whenever the hell it ended up getting posted. Anyway, I'm finished with the 'Romance Dawn' saga as of writing this and I just need to go through and edit them. I'll probably post them on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday with the last chapter of the saga being posted on Friday. This should give me the time I need to write out most, if not all of the 'East Blue' while also giving me time to see if people have any suggestions. Thanks for reading and see you Monday!