章 135: Return to Baltigo
Sabaody Archipelago.
Serene and Going Merry had been left alone with the Thousand Sunny. Rayleigh had come to explain to them that all the others were sent flying in different directions by Bartholomew Kuma to distant corners of the world.
This news had been pretty devastating for Merry as she was filled with worry for her beloved crew.
Serene also felt somewhat depressed over these events as she had actually started to like them a little bit. Okay, maybe more than a little bit… maybe a whole lot.
Frankly she was pretty sure that Cherry would have let her go after her powers had been returned, but her status as "Cherry's prisoner" allowed her to stay with them freely without needing to set her pride aside.
But now all that was out the window. If she was still here when they got back, then they'd know she had chosen to stay with them. Otherwise she would have taken the chance to escape.
Then the Rosy Life Riders showed up and said that they'd help to protect the Thousand Sunny until the crew came back. That gave her the ingenious idea to use some perceived debt to them as an excuse, it was perfect!
With Serene's devil fruit and the assistance of the Rosy Life Riders, cleaning up the trash who came for the ship was not even the slightest bit difficult.
Merry had taken to fighting the thieves in hopes of getting stronger herself, as she did not want to simply stand on the sidelines whilst her beloved crew fought hard battles.
So Merry would fight until she could no longer do so, then Serene swoops in and makes them hallucinate for the Rosy Life Riders to clean them up.
After a bit more than a week of fighting off hoodlums, the war against Whitebeard was aired live over den den mushi broadcast.
Imagine her surprise to see Luffy and Cherry in the mix. Moreover they were both quite eye-catching in their own ways. Luffy being very strong for a rookie pirate, especially for his age, and Cherry being an absolute nightmare that struck fear into the audience.
Serene was just glad she was on that monster's side now.
A few days later, Bartholomew Kuma showed up. This was terrifying for the Rosy Life Riders, but surprisingly they held strong.
Fortunately for those fools, Kuma seemed out of sorts and wasn't hostile to them. Instead he actually started to help protect the Thousand Sunny from the bounty hunters and pirates.
This did make Merry's training a bit complicated, but they soon discovered they could simply intercept the thieves before coming within a certain range of Kuma. Kuma would only attack if they entered that range for some reason.
One day, a woman who called Shakky came to check up on them, apparently acquainted with Rayleigh in some way.
"I just came to see how you were holding up. Can't have been easy for you to be separated from your friends like that." Shakky sympathized with them.
"Baaaaah…" Merry let out a mournful bleat.
"Hmph! I'm just paying my debt to them, then I'm a free woman!" Serene spoke without a hint of sincerity.
"Right. Well since you're here, would you like me to teach you some things? I used to be quite the fighter back in the day, you know." Shakky offered.
Serene sized her up and was impressed with what she saw. Shakky might look relaxed to the untrained eye, but a martial artist can tell that she has no openings to exploit.
"I-I suppose it would help me repay my debt if I was stronger… if you'll have me?" Serene spoke hopefully, almost expecting Shakky to rescind her offer.
"Alright, I'll come by to spar with you and give you some pointers from time to time. I've got a bar to tend to, so I can't be here everyday I'm afraid." Shakky said.
Serene was a bit disappointed at that, but eagerly accepted the offer. She only really knew her massage arts, taught to her by her mother. She knew those wouldn't be enough if she wanted to face stronger opponents.
Life continued in that fashion for both Serene and Merry as they steadily grew stronger from the many battles they fought.
…
Black Drum Kingdom (until quite recently)
Cherry and company stuck around for a few days to keep the populace from getting any funny ideas about escalating their little rebellion towards the World Government with some well placed gossip.
After that was settled, it was time to return to Baltigo.
The return trip was uneventful and they reached the outpost from which they would receive the means to return to Baltigo.
Cherry did their little knocking routine that granted her entry into the fortress and they reported back to Dragon directly.
"Hm, you did better than I expected you would." Dragon commented.
"What, did you think I'd just walk up to the castle and drag him out kicking and screaming?" Cherry asked incredulously.
"Yes." Dragon said without hesitation. "But I am glad to be wrong, naturally."
After a moment of silent glaring at one another, they started to chuckle.
"In all seriousness, I am quite impressed that you could so easily inspire the people to rise up, as well as manipulating the political situation beforehand to minimize the consequences of said rebellion." Dragon praised.
"You're creepy spy dude should arrive sometime soon with Wapol, Musshur, and Kinderella." Cherry said." What did you want that dweeb for anyways?"
"After his invention of 'wapometal', we realized the potential in Wapol's devil fruit. The man himself is too foolish to use it properly, but we will make excellent use of it." Dragon explained.
"By the way, it isn't very nice to call Giles 'creepy'. The look is intentional, but it still hurts his feelings." Dragon admonished.
"I'll keep that in mind. Now let's get to training already! I've gotten antsy without my daily routine of haki training!" Cherry insisted, practically dragging a helpless Dragon out the room.
Sure enough after a couple more weeks Giles and his crew arrived at Baltigo with their prisoners. Musshuru was gagged and squirming inside his bindings, and Wapol was still depressed. Kinderella was clearly annoyed that she'd been tricked and thus captured without a chance to run away, but otherwise cooperative.
She also wasn't very happy that she was the one who had to force feed Wapol on account of him not eating or drinking of his own volition.
Cherry decided to come meet them herself to see how the three prisoners were fairing after the journey. Hopefully they were pleasantly infuriated and she could get some amusement out of poking fun at their expense.
"Well hello again, my queen! I hope you enjoyed the trip to your new home?" Cherry exclaimed.
Kinderella recognised Cherry, but didn't remember ever having met her herself.
"I understand the confusion, I was in disguise at the time I brought you out of the castle after all." Cherry enlightened her.
"What?! How dare you trick me?!" Kinderela was about to go on a tirade cursing her, but swiftly remembered what a terror this woman had been during the war at Marineford and shut her mouth.
"It's good that you have more sense than your husband and brother-in-law. Perhaps your stay will be a little more comfortable as a result." Cherry said.
Kinderella straightened her posture and immediately wore a pleasant smile on her face. If she could increase her quality of life, she was going to snatch up the opportunity by any means necessary.
"I will be on my best behavior, Miss Harpin. Perhaps I can be of service in some way to you?" Kinderella offered.
"How about a foot massage?" Cherry asked. She did so miss Serene's foot massages ever since she stopped forcing her to do so.
"Y-yes, Miss Harpin! Whatever you like, I will do it for you." Kinderella managed to say, masking her dissatisfaction quite well.
"Excellent. Come along then, you won't be staying in some dingy prison cell if you serve me well." Cherry said, her words being a great source of relief from the anxiety of the trip. Kinderella almost forgot that Cherry was the one who put her in this mess to begin with.
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