บท 35: Chapter thirty five- Mira, challenge accepted

Gabriel didn't know how long he had been out for, he still had a blinding headache even after he woke up and really wanted to smack himself, 'when will I learn, not to upgrade so much at once, or If I'm going to do so do it where no one might come across me' he berated himself as he stood up and rolled his shoulders to get the cramp out of his neck.

Looking up to the sky he couldn't tell if he'd been sleeping for an entire day or just an hour or so. Shaking his head, he closed his eyes and reached out with his devil fruit powers as he felt the vibrations all around him stretching out in all directions with him at the centre.

It only took him a few seconds before he found the others, they were all currently dealing with Mr three and miss Golden week, he shook his head, from what he could feel he had waited until the giants were fighting again and sprung his trap, using his wax he tripped them both up before encasing their hands and feet with a bar across the middle of their bodies to keep them from getting up. He had apparently been in the process of covering their mouths and noses with wax to suffocate them both when Luffy and the others came to help.

From what he could feel they were only a few minutes away from beating the pair.

'Time to go recruiting then' Gabriel thought to himself before disappearing with a burst of Soru to head to where the battle was taking place.

He turned up just in time to see Luffy sending Mr threes giant wax mech suit flying with a gum-gum bazooka. He didn't pay attention to the others and instead reached out with his devil fruit to find where his target was, 'ah ha, found you' he thought before turning to the forest and walking into it again and away from the fight.

He found his target twenty meters into the forest sitting on a bolder eating come cookies, she noticed him as soon as he appeared and gripped her paint brush as if she were ready to fight.

Gabriel saw that and raised his hands up, "take it easy little lady, I don't have any intentions of fighting you, I don't want to hit a kid" he told her.

She seemed to frown at that but didn't let go of her paint brush, "what do you want?"

Gabriel nodded, "I wanted to make you an offer," he explained, "your partner is about to be thrashed back there, and you know as well as I do that you don't have a hope of completing your mission without him, not that you two had a chance with me around before but that's beside the point"

"arrogant much," Miss golden week countered in a dead pan tone.

"When it's warranted," Gabriel retorted with a smirk, "now my offer is this…"

"Yes," Miss golden week said cutting him off.

Gabriel blinked, "but I haven't even had a chance to make my offer yet," he complained.

"You were going to ask me to join your crew like the others, my answer is yes," she said as she put her paintbrush down and held out a cookie for him.

Gabriel blinked again but stepped forward and took the cookie, "Okay," he said finding it rather strange that she just accepted his offer, "may I ask why?"

She shrugged, "you're strong, stronger than that bozo from before, what other reason do I have not to accept, if I didn't I couldn't return to the boss after failing, and you already know who I am, though you have said you don't hurt kids, you said nothing about letting others do so"

Gabriel frowned at that, "I wouldn't for your information, I have never in my life raised my hand to a woman or a child" and he meant that for both his lives, he had avoided the women bounty hunters back in whiskey peak and he didn't count as beating Mikita as hitting her, he simply let her pass through him, not the same thing as hitting her himself, "I wouldn't expose who you were, nor let the others in my crew or the straw hats hurt you, not that they would"

She nodded, "then it is the obvious choice to make, if you are good to your word, and wouldn't let others hurt me then why shouldn't I join you?" she asked tilting her head to the side as she looked at him.

Gabriel stood with his mouth open for a minute as he held the cookie in his hand thinking for a few seconds before he just shrugged, "Good point," he said before taking a bite of his cookie, "So what should I call you, since you don't like your name"

"Mira," She replied as she took a bite of her own cookie.

Gabriel nodded as he went over to sit down next to her, "well welcome to the crew Mira," he said as he held out his cookie and she tapped hers against his as if toasting to something before they continued to eat them in mutual silence.

It was about twenty minutes later before Gabriel and Mira re-joined the others after Mr three's defeat. Vivi had been shocked to see Mira knowing who she was, but Gabriel explained that she had defected like the others and after he had explained what Baroque works real goal was she was just as disgusted as them as they all were.

So with that everyone decided to celebrate their win with a jungle barbeque picnic cooking the various dinosaur meats that were supplies by the local wild life. It wasn't long before Zoro and Sanji caught up with them all and the food really got flowing with their kills and Sanji behind the cooking.

Gabriel even went to get Gem and Mikita to join the fun and when he came back he finally got to meet Brogy the blue ogre, and grinned inside his head, he finally had both of them so he could fight them in his mind palace.

Though as soon as he thought that thought crossed his mind, he heard the familiar bell chime in his ear and a new quest screen came up in front of him.

Quest: warrior of legend

Goals:

Defeat both Dorry and Brogy in 2 on 1 combat in your mind palace

Reward: 500AP, 3TP, Skill book

That brought Gabriel up short as he looked at the quest goals. Sure, he had been planning to fight with both the giants, but not both at the same time, they were giants after all, and he didn't know if he could handle fighting both of them at once. But that was before he had the major skill increase from the raffles. So, it might be possible for him now, hmmmm.

He accepted the quest, there was no timer on it after all he could wait to take it on, the juicy rewards of a mysterious skill book for taking on both of them was a tempting offer.

Putting it to the back of his mind for the moment Gabriel just decided to enjoy the party, he knew everything was going exactly as he wanted so far, his crew was coming along nicely, they'd reach drum island on schedule with no problems, and what's more with no Gem and Mikita helping Mr three out this time there was no way for him to catch Zoro, Nami and Vivi in his wax statue maker, and as a result Nami didn't get her shirt burned off and so there should be absolutely no way that she would have gotten bitten and subsequently infected.

…. Crap, without Nami being infected that meant that the straw hats would have no reason to go to drum island and that meant no reason to meet and recruit Chopper.

Gabriel sat down and started to think, how he could direct the straw hats towards Drum kingdom. What were his options, he could make himself sick or try to… that was stupid…. he could claim to have business there…. that might work. Okay then plan B…

Gabriel kept scheming while everyone else partied long into the night, eventually falling asleep with everyone else and as morning came, they all got ready to leave.

Sanji had come across mr threes little house as he knew he would, and after tricking crocodile had retrieved an eternal pose for Alabasta kingdom from the unluckies.

While the rest of the crew were busy restocking things, Gabriel made his way below deck. He now had a solid plan in mind for how to get the straw hats to go to Drum kingdom and left the rest to fate that they could happen across chopper when they were there.

But right at that moment the only thing Gabriel cared about was preparation. He had decided to take on the quest to beat both Dorry and Brogy at the same time in his mind palace. He was confident that with his skills he would be able to handle them both. But he wanted to have a tiny bit more security, so he was going to see about buying a second sword

It didn't take him long to find a mate for his current sword in the system store, he knew he wanted to keep the swords style the same so looked for that, and found a similar graded sword, only instead of it being all black, it was all white, named Kamisori meaning cloud razor.

The price tag on it was a heavy one of three million, but in the end, he decided to go for it, with two blades he'd be twice as lethal as he already was.

Taking the sword out of his inventory he looked it over and nodded seeing that it was the same length as Kurobuchi, before he slotted both into his waist band.

Feeling the ship jerk beneath him he knew they were setting off and he started back up the stairs to the main deck to see the going Merry heading towards the mouth of the river out to sea.

"No matter what happens, keep going forward!" Dorry called to them as he stood on one side of the river.

"There is another reason why so few very rarely leave this island, let us clear your path!" Brogy declared from the other.

That seemed to get everyone's attention as the Merry sailed passed the two Giants and out into the ocean. Even though Gabriel knew what was coming, the sight and sheer size of the island eater still shook him.

It was colossal, he didn't know how anything could grow to be that size and yet he also knew that there were even bigger creatures than this out there.

As the island eater opened its maw Nami started screaming orders to turn but Usopp refused trusting the giants words as he kept the Merry going straight.

Gabriel swallowed hard and closed his eyes, there was no turning back now, as they sailed into its maw and were swallowed hole. Only to be launched out through the top of the island eater's skull a few seconds later by a razor-sharp blast of air pressure.

Gabriel took in a breath and exhaled softly, that had been an experience he did not wish to repeat though he knew that they would be fine each time, thanks to the giants' attack.

The Merry landed with a crash only to be lifted and sped forward by the wave formed by the collapsing body of the island eater. They had to wait a few moments before everyone could move without falling over.

Looking around Gabriel nodded satisfied everything was in hand now and decided to head down below deck, it was time for him to tackle some giants.