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It had already been a few hours since leaving Little Garden, and Nami was already starting to run a fever from the bug bite. Luffy had ordered her to stay in the cabin and rest, giving Vivi the temporary role of Navigator until they get Nami treatment. She was now holding the Eternal Pose for Drum Island, the closest island to their current position with a harbor. Meanwhile, Zoro, Lithos, Ferros, Haruo, and Hunter were leading the rest of the crew in heavy training to make up for not being able to while on Little Garden.
"COME ON! I'VE SEEN BETTER WORKOUTS FROM SICK MEN!" Hunter barked like a drill sergeant.
"This is torture...!" Eddy groaned out.
"Holy crap, these guys are monsters. No wonder they beat us." Mikita said as she watched the training.
Sanji was rushing back and forth helping Nami keep her strength up with large helpings of food and clean water.
"Our crew is really missing a doctor. Hopefully, we can find one to join us at Drum Island." Merone noted.
Nami, meanwhile, was still trying to fulfill her duties, trying to get up or downplay her illness.
"Don't make us strap you down, little missy!" Ariala snapped. "Ash would only make things worse for you and you're getting enough water as is. Just rest up until we reach the island."
Luckily despite her illness, Nami was still able to innately predict the weather, helping the crew avoid a sea cyclone on the way to Drum Island. As snow started to settle in, Usopp noticed something odd.
"Hey, Ferros?"
"Yeah?" The Metalbender asked as he joined Usopp in the crow's nest.
"Are there people on the Grand Line who can stand on water?"
"Not to my knowledge."
"Something like that sounds weird even for this place," Kuishi agreed.
"Well, that's exactly what I'm seeing right now!"
Sure enough, there was a man dressed in a green jester jumpsuit and fur coat and armed with a bow and arrow, seemingly standing on the open ocean.
"Well, there's something you don't see every day!" Eddy said.
Romaz nodded. "Even out here."
"Hi there. Chilly today, isn't it?" The man said.
"How are you standing on the ocean?" Luffy asked.
"I'm not. I'm standing on my crew's ship."
The Straw Hats got confused until something started to surface under the man. It turned out to be a large round ship, with the man standing on the mast.
"Hey, watch it! We've got a sick crew member on board!" Luffy barked.
Metal plates on the ship lowered and a large hippo figurehead with a crown was raised. A Jolly Roger with the skull wearing a crown was revealed.
"It's a pirate ship!" Johnny realized.
"Just what we need right now..." Yosaku muttered.
"Holy crap...I think that's the Bliking Pirates." Marianne said.
A large man with a metal jaw laughed as he came onto the deck of the ship, carrying a large meat haunch on a sword.
"Sorry if my ship, the Bliking, startled you."
The Straw Hats suddenly found themselves surrounded by pirates with guns.
"WE ARE BEING BOARDED!" Ed exclaimed as he held his hands in the air.
Luffy, however, was nonchalant. "You guys have five minutes to clear off my ship before we kick you off."
"You seem pretty strange for a group of pirates." The metal-jawed man regarded the crew as he finished eating his meat, while also chomping down on the sword with it. "You must be new here."
"I'm guessing you have a Devil Fruit. Otherwise, you wouldn't be eating a sword like it was a candy cane." Bella said.
"And to think I thought I've seen it all at this point..." Double-D sighed.
"Yes, as a matter of fact. My name is Wapol, and the Devil Fruit I ate is called the Munch-Munch Fruit, which lets me eat anything." The man said. "Regardless, we're on our way to Drum Kingdom. Do you happen to have an Eternal Pose or Log Pose? If not, I'll simply take your treasure and this ship."
"You'll take nothing and return to your ship immediately," Lithos warned. "Trust me, none of your men or even you are a match for us. And right now we're in a hurry, so we don't have time to play nice. "
"And right now, you've still got TWO minutes to haul your big butt off our ship!" Bella snapped. "Don't make us go medieval on you!"
Wapol laughed. "Trust me, I'm not the sort of person you want to say 'no' to. Men, start cleaning them out!"
He made ready to chomp down on the Merry, only for his teeth to find solid steel instead, courtesy of Ferros.
"We weren't asking ya, bub!" He sneered. "We're TELLING ya!"
Delphia thrust her arm out as it extended into several wooden branches that wrapped around the pirates before pulling with great strength her petite frame would suggest otherwise as she threw them into the sea.
"GREAT BRAMBLE SWING!"
Some of the pirates opened fire but Bella formed a large square shield of mana to protect her allies, absorbing the bullets as she then pushed the mana barrier forward, knocking away the pirates.
Several more pirates tried to attack from the Bliking, only for the rest of the Straw Hats to completely decimate them. Usopp shot their guns right out of the hands, Zoro slashed them multiple times, and several had bruises from Sanji's kicks.
Haruo turned into his Hybrid Form and smacked several pirates overboard with his tail while Hunter fired non-lethal rounds from his HMG. Katsu, in her own Hybrid Form, flapped her wings to send out shimmering gold dust that blinded the pirates, leaving them open for Eddy to take away their guns and combine them into a giant cannon he used to shoot Ed out at them.
"SHINING DUST SHROUD!"
Wapol stared in shock as some of his men were rendered unconscious by Double-D injecting them with a powerful sleeper agent, while some had their weapons completely destroyed by Kuishi's jaws. Johnny and Yosaku proved to be a whirling typhoon as they easily sent the pirates flying off the ship with their sword skills. Many wound up washed overboard by Merone's powers, or stunned into submission with Grahambel vibrating sound waves through their eardrums, followed by being blown off by Ariala's wind.
"What kind of ship did I wind up on...?"
"It's time for you to get off my ship!" Luffy declared as he got in front of Wapol. "GUM-GUM BAZOOKA!"
He stretched his arms back and let them snap forward to send Wapol flying, much to the shock of his crew, who quickly chased after him on the Bliking.
"Well, that was nuts," Mikita said as she, Gem, and Marianne witnessed the action.
"If that Wapol guy is lucky he'll land on something solid. Otherwise, he's dead once he hits the water." Gem noted.
Vivi thought for a moment. "Have I seen that man somewhere before?"
Carue just shrugged. "Not that I remember. But he seemed like kind of a moron, so let's not worry about it."
Meanwhile, Smoker and Tashigi had been reassigned to the Grand Line after Marine HQ intercepted a Transponder Snail signal.
"Sergeant Major, you've been out of it for some time. You okay?" Smoker asked.
Tashigi has recently been informed that the man she had met at the sword shop was actually Roronoa Zoro. Which needless to say was causing her to have a crisis, since he had given her that excellent life advice. She was slightly mollified by finding a Ryo-Wazamono sword named Kashu.
Smoker sighed. "Just get over here. Our Black Transponder Snail just picked up a transmission between two men."
The message was the same one between Mr. 3 and Crocodile from Little Garden.
"We got just enough to determine they have designs on Alabasta. But most of it was indecipherable." An officer noted.
"Judging from what we could get, it seems this was from Baroque Works." Smoker noted.
He looked over to a man in a top hat they had captured who answered to the name Mr. 11. They had managed to confirm he was part of Baroque Works, but couldn't get him to talk about anything else.
"It seems like the Straw Hats are currently at war with Baroque Works. The recent TB was broadcast from Little Garden and had them fighting a man named Mister 3 and a young woman named Miss Goldenweek." Tashigi noted.
"And it sounds like this group has its sights set on Alabasta. The Straw Hats are currently escorting Princess Vivi there, likely to stop the civil war currently raging." Smoker said. "Judging from the impression I got from their Captain, Quartermaster, and First, Second, and Third Mates, they're not the sort to take hostages or demand ransoms."
"I take it we're going to Alabasta as well?" Tashigi asked.
"Of course. Contact HQ and request an Eternal Pose for Alabasta at once." Smoker ordered. "It's high time something was done about Baroque Works."
As the Merry continued to sail toward Drum Island, the climate started to turn colder and colder. Kuishi and Romaz started staying close to the heater to keep warm.
"Looks like we're almost there, everyone!" Ariala said.
"The Grand Line has four types of islands. Summer, spring, autumn, and winter. Drum Island is a winter island, so this level of snow and cold means we're close to it." Lithos noted.
"Man, the Grand Line has a lot of mysteries to it," Eddy said.
"But if the islands have such drastic climates on them it's no wonder the seas between them have such unstable weather," Double-D added.
Usopp looked out. "So if the weather is starting to stabilize, then that means that... Ah-ha! Land ho!"
The island ahead looked like it was made of ice and snow, large mountains of white jutting up from the ocean.
"Drum Island dead ahead!" Bella declared.
"Wow, there's so much snow! I've never even seen snow before!" Luffy said excitedly.
"I hope the river doesn't freeze before we reach a town," Delphia said.
Suddenly, several people appeared with guns pointing at the crew.
"Stop right there, pirates! Leave this island at once!"
"We're not in a position to leave!" Luffy replied. "Our Navigator is sick and we came here to find a doctor!"
"We won't fall for that trick, you filthy pirates!"
Ariala sighed, then dragged the man who said that over with her wind powers, bringing him in to see Nami. The man came out looking rather sheepish.
"They're not trying to trick us..."
The first man, known as Dalton, came aboard to see for himself.
"Apologies, we thought you were raiders trying to attack our village."
"It's not a good idea to jump to conclusions like that. You're not going to make friends that way." Luffy said.
"And friends should always be there to help you!" Ed chimed in while wagging his finger.
Dalton nodded. "I suppose you're right. Follow me to the village."
The heavy winter weather meant most of the crew had to bundle up. This was especially the case for Merone, Romaz, Kuishi, and Grahambel. Luffy didn't need winter clothes because he could just accelerate his rubber heart to heat up his blood and stay warm, while Lithos was naturally immune due to producing magma rock heat and Haruo was just naturally covered by his hoodie. The others were all bundled normally, with Nami carefully being carried to the village.
"Don't you think you're overdoing it?" Usopp asked Double-D, who was wearing an extremely thick orange puffer jacket, burnt yellow scarf, mittens with a white stripe, grey earmuffs, and purple snow pants with a white stripe on both sides.
"One can never be too prepared."
"Just to let you know, the only doctor in our village is a witch." Dalton warned.
"This isn't one of those things you read about where people who display unique gifts are accused of witchcraft, right?" Ferros asked.
"No, she's just a pain to deal with, and tends to overcharge for her services." Dalton clarified.
"So she's a metaphorical witch, gotcha." Sanji surmised.
"I knew there was a country here on the island. What do you call it?" Romaz asked.
"It doesn't have a name."
The group passed by a large bear Dalton called a hiking bear, and he instructed them to bow to it to show good manners. Eventually, they reached the village of Big Horn, a thriving settlement. Most of the villagers that were with them headed off, surprising Vivi.
"I thought they were this land's security force."
"They're just ordinary citizens, more an emergency militia than anything else." Dalton clarified. "For now let's get out the cold. My home is this way."
A huge woman about the size of the Hiking Bear arrived.
"Hey there, Dalton! I heard there were pirates showing up. Are you okay?"
"Everything's fine, Maria. Turns out the pirates aren't malicious raiders."
The Straw Hats noted that everyone seemed to respect Dalton and even see him as a leader, though he was dismissive of this, claiming to be a sinful man.
"I can sense a deep wound in his heart..." Romaz hummed. "I should know, I too have felt sinful for my actions as a member of the Arlong Pirates."
Eddy winced. "Geez, way to bring down the mood."
Inside Dalton's home, Nami was carefully laid in the bed and bundled up.
"Forgive the heavy-handed introduction," Dalton apologized. "So what happened with your navigator?"
"She seems to have contracted an illness from the last island we visited. Her fever's gone up for three days in a row. It's at 42 degrees Celsius right now." Vivi explained.
"I've done all I could to keep her steady, but my medical knowledge is...limited," Double-D added. "All we know is that she seems to have caught it from a bug bite, but we don't know how to treat it."
"That's bad, if she's not treated soon, she'll die. Our village doctor is up in the Drum Rockies, the large mountains you can see out the window there. She resides in the castle you can just make out on the tallest one in the middle." Dalton said.
"She lives in a castle?" Usopp asked.
"Wow, was she the royal doctor or something?" Bella asked.
"That castle no longer has its king, instead it's the home of Doctor Kureha. People call her a witch, mostly because she's a hardass." Dalton explained.
"We can't go all the way up there!" Sanji exclaimed. "Can't you call her down here?!"
"Unfortunately we have no means of contacting her, but I assure you, her skills as a doctor are peerless. She's nearly 140 years old, likely due to her talents as a doctor coupled with a healthy lifestyle." Dalton said.
"So what do you do when someone in the village gets sick or injured?" Zoro asked.
"She comes down whenever something like that happens. Somehow she can sense it. Or maybe she's just watching the village for fun. Who really knows?" Dalton shrugged. "But she comes down, treats the patient, then takes whatever she wants from their house before leaving."
"Wow, no wonder you call her a witch," Delphia said.
"How does she go up and down the mountain?" Merone asked. "It looks like a sheer vertical cliff face."
"I'm not sure, but some people have claimed to see her riding a sleigh through the sky on moonlit nights. Others have seen her with a strange creature they've never seen before." Dalton said.
"Well, we can't afford to wait for her to come to us. Not only does Nami's life depend on it, but there's somewhere we need to get to quickly." Luffy said before turning to Merone, who nodded.
"WATER CONTAINER!"
Dalton looked shocked as Merone used her water body to draw Nami in.
"I should be able to climb the mountain even with a person contained in my water body. Luckily, I can manipulate it so that she can breathe inside."
"Be careful, don't go jostling her too much," Sanji warned.
"Trust me, I am quite careful." Merone assured. "I was able to hold Uncle Vista when he was sick and needed to be carried across the land we visited."
"If you really need to climb the mountain, I'd recommend going up the other side. This side of the mountain has Lapins." Dalton warned.
"The heck's a Lapin?" Eddy asked.
"A carnivorous rabbit, dangerous pack hunters, and a big problem for winter islands like this," Ferros explained.
"Looks like Merone's gonna need backup then. I'm going to." Luffy declared.
Lithos, Ed, Sonson, Choi, Hsiao, Hunter, Zoro, and Sanji nodded and agreed to come along.
"Will they be alright?" Dalton asked.
"I'm not worried about them," Eddy said. "Big Ed is a tough guy."
"Those Lapins are as good as rabbit stew once Zoro-Aniki gets his swords near them," Yosaku noted.
Dalton nodded. "You know, this town used to have a lot more doctors. This region was even known as an advanced medical nation. But then a few months ago, the country was destroyed. All at the hands of pirates."
"The whole country?!" Bella said in shock.
"Yes. As such the word 'pirate' is still too much for everyone to handle." Dalton said. "There were only five people in that group of pirates. The Captain called himself 'Blackbeard'."
"Teach?" Ariala asked. "Why would Teach attack an entire country with only five people?"
"You know him?" Dalton asked.
"He's a member of our old man's fleet, but Dad would never order the attack of an entire country. The name of Whitebeard would be sullied forever." Ferros said.
"Blackbeard claimed no connection to anyone named Whitebeard, saying he was independent. But regardless, he and his fellow pirates completely destroyed the country." Dalton said. "Though some say it was actually a good thing. The monarchy that existed back then was appalling in the people's eyes. This country was once known as the Drum Kingdom. And its king's name was Wapol. He was the worst king possible!"
"I can believe it. We fought him some distance from here. Sent him flying into the ocean." Luffy said. "The guy seemed full of himself, demanding things and not thinking about others."
Vivi was shocked. "I knew he looked familiar! I met Wapol once at a monarch meeting my father took me to. But when we met him yesterday he called himself a pirate."
"He must have trying to camouflage himself. He's probably been wandering the sea trying to return here." Dalton suggested.
"I'm not surprised he was kicked out. Marshall D. Teach was one of the strongest members of Father's fleet back when I was a kid. And he likely hasn't slowed down with age." Merone said.
"Yeah, that guy was ruthless in a fight." Ferros added.
"He always shared his favorite cherry pies with me..." Ariala said sadly.
Lithos muttered. "Why would he go rogue? And why would he attack a country?"
"It's not even that, Wapol's army didn't even try to fight! The second he learned how strong the pirates were, he just up and abandoned the country and fled to the sea! The entire nation was thrown into despair." Dalton said.
That got Vivi angered beyond belief.
"Is that what the king of an entire country does?! That's sickening, boring, and maddening!"
"Well, at least it's all over now. Those of us remaining in this now-nameless country have come together in order to rebuild. But many still live in fear of Wapol's return." Dalton said.
"We should get going now, before Nami starts to get worse." Zoro said.
"Don't worry, Nami! We'll get you fixed up soon!" Sonson said. "Also, Merone, if it gets too much to carry her, I can call in my Somersault Cloud!"
Merone nodded. "Thank you, Sonson."
With no more time to spare Luffy, Lithos, Merone, Ed, Sonson, Choi, Hunter, Zoro, and Sanji raced up the mountain at high speed. Several Lapins tried to attack during this time but were quickly dealt with. Merone stayed in the back as the others thrashed the giant rabbits.
Down below, Maria walked over to Dalton's house.
"Hey there, Dalton. I heard you were looking for Doctor Kureha. It turns out she's in the neighboring town of Cocoa Weed."
There was a few seconds of silence.
"WHAT?!" The remaining Straw Hats plus Dalton all called out.
Sure enough, Kureha had just entered a restaurant where a child was crying. With her was a large reindeer wearing a hat, vest, and pants. She listened as the boy's father kept berating him for not stopping.
"Such a mean father. A child that's crying is obviously trying to signal that something's wrong with his body." Kureha admonished before turning to the reindeer. "Stay out here, Chopper."
She walked over to the door and punched it down. Naturally, the adults in the restaurant were freaked out at her sudden arrival. The father quickly went to shield his child.
"What are you doing here? My son's not sick or anything!"
"Why don't you let the actual doctor be the judge of that?" Kureha pointed out as she started to examine the kid and noted that he complained about his hands hurting and that his legs also apparently hurt when lightly pressed.
"Hmm, he doesn't seem to have a fever... But there's a distinct swelling in his leg from purulent inflammation. Definitely a bone infection. Chopper, get me the antibiotics."
The reindeer nodded and went to do as asked while Kureha got out a syringe. One quick anesthetic later, and Kureha was now ready with a scalpel. Within minutes the boy was successfully treated.
"Make sure he gets plenty of rest and keep his legs bandaged tight, then keep them cooled." Kureha ordered. "As for my fee, I'll just take whatever paper bags and toilet paper you can spare. Oh, and fifty percent of the restaurant's assets."
"THAT'S A RIP-OFF!" The villagers all called out.
Kureha sighed as the villagers hurled the usual insults, like the boy's illness wasn't as bad as it seemed, or that she was taking advantage of someone else's weakness.
"You kids keep on blabbering like you know better. Ha! I wonder if you'd say the same if there were more doctors on this island. Not to mention you have no idea how expensive medical equipment is."
The boy then sat up and smiled.
"Thank you, Doctor. I feel a lot better now."
Kureha smiled. "Well now, that's a good tip I just got. We'll make it forty-nine percent instead. Just make sure to remember the happiness you feel right now. Come on, Chopper."
She and Chopper walked out of the restaurant.
The Straw Hats have arrived at Drum Island in search of a Doctor for Nami and have come across the nefarious king, Wapol! Will they be able to save Nami in time? Find out in the next all-exciting chapter!