Chương 361: Scavenger Hunt
Cherry was surprised that Smoothie didn't immediately begin retracing her steps from their little game of tag through the city. Instead she was making a bee-line somewhere with purpose, and that purpose became clear soon after.
They were now in the vicinity where the chase had begun, making it clear that Smoothie intended to start from the beginning rather than the end.
"Fruit seller." Smoothie barked out, causing the man to flinch at her voice and tone.
"Y-yes? Was there something more you needed, general?" the fruit seller asked tentatively.
Smoothie held out her hand towards him. "Give me the coin and I will forget that you lied to me earlier."
"Hehehehe~" Cherry began to giggle. "I have to hand it to you! You're smarter than I gave you credit for~!"
The fruit seller quickly dug into his pocket and produced a shiny gold coin bearing Cherry's likeness on the face of it. A bribe to keep his mouth shut, so he had been told by Cherry when she bought a pineapple from him before Smoothie's arrival. Now it had come back to bite him in the ass and he was filled with terror and regret.
Smoothie snatched the coin away from the pathetic little man and considered killing him on the spot since her guess had been correct. However, Cherry chimed in to interrupt her thoughts, "Now now, don't harm the game pieces or I may call the whole thing off. Besides, every second wasted here may very well lead to the other coins getting harder to find."
Smoothie couldn't argue with that logic. Nothing said that no one would find the coins before she did and wander off with them.
As it turned out, Smoothie was a decent detective. Cherry hadn't hidden the coins at random, she had always left some tie to the interactions that she'd had with the woman or other people along the way.
A little girl who had dropped her doll down a well had had that doll given back to her, with a coin taking the doll's place in the well.
Cherry had 'accidentally' tripped over a loose cobblestone and had 'nearly' been caught as a result. Smoothie found a coin beneath the cobblestone.
At one location, Smoothie had managed to kick Cherry, but upon searching the surroundings she found no signs of the coin. In a moment of what Smoothie was sure was foolishness, she lifted her foot and found a coin fused to the bottom of her boot. She glared at the laughing Cherry for that one.
Eventually, Smoothie found seven of the eight coins, but the last was proving to be the most difficult.
"There is no eighth coin, is there?" Smoothie said with a frown.
"Giving up? That's a real shame because you've come quite close to the last coin," Cherry answered cryptically.
"So you insist that there is another coin, but I have searched everywhere it could be! Even searching inside the homes nearby!" Smoothie was becoming irate.
"Hm, would you like a hint? If you agree to let me go see Sanji, then I'm fine with giving you one," Cherry tempted her.
Smoothie's knee-jerk reaction would be to refuse outright. It stung her pride to admit failure and ask for help, especially if she had to make a compromise to get it. However, there was something more important than her pride on the line here.
"Tell me." Smoothie spat out.
"The hint is that I've already given you a hint that you didn't realize was a hint~" Cherry smirked infuriatingly.
Smoothie set aside her growing irritation and wracked her brain for every word that Cherry had spoken towards her. Two instances popped into mind one after another.
The first was Cherry saying "I have to hand it to you" and the second came to her right after, when she had picked Cherry up she had asked to go see Sanji.
Smoothie growled in annoyance as she dropped Cherry and looked at the palm of the hand she had been holding her with, and found a gold coin with Cherry's obnoxious smirk on its face resting there.
*Gacha*
The snap of a camera den den mushi taking a photograph that Cherry got from who knows where.
"Look at your face! It's amazing!" Cherry was in tears from how hard she was laughing at her.
Smoothie was struck with an unusual cocktail of emotions then. The strongest two feelings that stood out were the urge to grab Cherry and wring the life out of her on the spot, whilst the other was the urge to laugh alongside her. She did neither.
"Very well. Let us go see your former crewmate." Smoothie spoke almost mechanically to hide both her anger, and what may be a growing fondness for the shorter woman. "Then we're going to talk with Mama about our deal. Understood?"
"Yeah yeah, whatever." Cherry said, already skipping ahead.
…
The Germa Kingdom was a mobile fortress made up of a large fleet of high tech ships linked together. Cherry could hear the hum of many engines before she could even see the monstrosity of a castle atop of it with its odd leaning towers with curved, pointy roofs.
There seemed to be a commotion occurring on the deck, which was more of a town, and it quickly drew the attention of Cherry and Smoothie.
What Cherry found with her Life Sense was far more interesting, however. She hadn't caught it before she was scrutinizing them now, but many of the vital energy signatures were nearly identical to many others aboard the floating kingdom. When she got close enough to see the people, she understood that they were alike in more than just that, but appearances as well.
A number of guards noticed Smoothie approaching and lowered a gang plank for the two of them to board.
"May I inquire as to the reason for your visit?" one of the guards asked.
"One of the wedding guests is here to see the groom. Bring us to him." Smoothie commanded.
"Allow me to contact his majesty for permission-" the guard spoke, but Smoothie grabbed him.
Before Cherry even understood what she was doing, she sensed her devil fruit activate and the guard was wrung dry of all liquid in seconds. She dropped the desiccated husk to the deck and glared at the others. "I do not need your permission to go anywhere, and certainly not anywhere in Tottoland."
The other guards didn't even flinch at their comrade's death. Cherry didn't think they were just suppressing a reaction either, it was more like they didn't care enough to do so.
"Go on inside, General Smoothie. We shall see to it that your presence is properly announced," another guard rephrased diplomatically.
Smoothie gave a curt nod and marched inside. She didn't notice the disgusted look that Cherry gave her as she followed along behind her. Cherry said nothing to the woman though, keeping her thoughts and opinions to herself.
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