[Chapter Size: 2626 Words]
Monkey D. Luffy POV
Onboard a stolen Marine ship in the vast expanse of the East Blue.
…
…
The following day, Luffy woke up peacefully and decided to attend to some unfinished business while still in bed. There was one thing he hadn’t explored the previous day, something he hadn’t found a moment for amidst all the excitement of recruiting his first crew member. This was the crew system, an option that had become available after acquiring his first nakama.
Opening the system, he navigated to the crew option, and a screen appeared:
——-Crew——-
[Monkey D. Luffy] – (Captain)
Devil Fruits: Moa Moa no Mi – D / Eikon Eikon no Mi, Model: Chaos Ifrit – D
Vitality – S
Strength – B
Defense – A
Speed – C
Spirit – B
Haoshoku Haki – [Locked]
Voice of All Things – [Locked]
(– As a member of your crew, all your talents are increased by 100%)
———————-
[Yamato] – (Vice Captain)
Devil Fruits: Inu Inu no Mi, Model: Okuchi no Makami – B
Vitality – S
Strength – A
Defense – S
Speed – B
Spirit – A
Swordsmanship – B
Kenbunshoku Haki – D
Busoshoku Haki – C
Haoshoku Haki – D
(– As a member of your crew, all your talents are increased by 100%)
————–
[Shirahoshi] (No specific role)
Devil Fruits: None
Vitality – S
Strength – E
Defense – D
Speed – E
Spirit – S
Poseidon – [Locked]
Haoshoku Haki – [Locked]
(– As a member of your crew, all your talents are increased by 100%)
————–
[Megalo] (Mascot)
Devil Fruits: None
Vitality – C
Strength – C
Defense – D
Speed – D
Spirit – D
(– As a member of your crew, all your talents are increased by 100%)
————–
[Zoro] (Swordsman)
Devil Fruits: None
Vitality – D
Strength – C
Defense – D
Speed – C
Spirit – C
Swordsmanship (Santoryu) – C
Haoshoku Haki – [Locked]
(– As a member of your crew, all your talents are increased by 100%)
————–
[Trafalgar D. Lami] (Doctor)
Devil Fruits: Ope Ope no Mi – C
Vitality – C
Strength – C
Defense – C
Speed – B
Spirit – C
Swordsmanship – D
Haoshoku Haki – [Locked]
(– As a member of your crew, all your talents are increased by 100%)
————–
[Bepo] (Assistant)
Devil Fruits: None
Vitality – D
Strength – E
Defense – E
Speed – E
Spirit – C
(– As a member of your crew, all your talents are increased by 100%)
—————————–
System Rules – The classification level of the system works from E to EX, where EX represents the ultimate limit, with the progression from lowest to highest.
{ E -> D -> C -> B -> A -> S -> SS -> SSS -> EX }
—————————–
“What!?” Luffy exclaimed in surprise at the incredible bonuses each crew member received from the system. It was a significant advantage that made his crew much more powerful.
“Hahahahaha. I mean, it might be overpowered, but it’s great because my crew can be even more powerful than I planned. Even though I can’t directly control their development, I can still monitor all of them!” Luffy mused with great satisfaction.
Furthermore, he could now see hidden abilities within each of his crew members. Four of them had the Haoshoku Haki, although most of them couldn’t access it yet. Five crew members possessed the power of the Conqueror’s Haki, including Luffy. It was an extraordinary start for their journey.
“Did you know that Roger had three people with this Haki?” Luffy thought to himself. “And as for Rocks, they had five, from what I know – Xerec, Newgate, Shiki, Kaido, and Bigmon. But look at my crew – we have five members with Haoshoku Haki and an ancient weapon at the beginning of our journey!” Luffy couldn’t help but laugh internally at the immense potential.
Shaking off his thoughts, Luffy rose from his bed and made his way to the ship’s kitchen, where his comrades were enjoying their first meals of the day.
“Good morning!” Luffy greeted them, and he received greetings in return.
“Alright, Megalo, can you get back to pulling the ship today? We’re nearing Orange Town,” Luffy asked the shark, who responded enthusiastically with “Sharky Sharky Sharky!”
After they finished eating, Luffy went outside with Megalo and returned him to his full-sized form. The shark dove into the water and began pulling the anchor once again.
Although Luffy could use his Devil Fruit powers to multiply the ship’s speed, he decided to focus on other matters for now.
“Now, we have some time before we reach the next island, so I’m going to start training you all here.”
“Training? How can you do that?” Zoro inquired, curious about Luffy’s plan.
“It’s simple. I’ll use my Devil Fruit powers to enhance your abilities,” Luffy replied, a confident grin on his face.
“What kind of powers are those, Luffy-sama?” Shirahoshi asked hesitantly.
“I have the Moa Moa no Mi, and I can multiply many things with it,” Luffy explained, earning surprised looks from his crew members. However, before anyone could ask more questions, he continued.
“For instance
, Lami, I noticed that your recovery magically increased from yesterday to today. Did you do something?” he asked, looking at the doctor, who had fully recovered overnight and was back to 100%, much to his confusion.
“Yes, did you do something?” Lami inquired, equally surprised.
“I did. I increased your recovery rate by 30 times. That’s my limit for now, but it’s quite overpowered. Hahaha,” Luffy chuckled.
“That’s unbelievably incredible, you know?!” Kuina exclaimed, astonished.
“I know, but even though it’s overpowered, there are still some limits. I can’t increase a person’s size by 30 times, only up to 10%. The same applies to enhancing your learning abilities; I can boost your training speed by a maximum of three times. But that’s what I want, and it will help a lot when I apply it to you,” Luffy explained.
“EHHHHHHHHHH?! Hold on! Are you saying you can increase our learning by three times? So, a day of training with you is equivalent to three days!?” Yamato asked in disbelief.
“That’s correct,” Luffy confirmed, but he knew the actual number was closer to six days, as the system provided a full bonus to their talents. However, he chose to withhold this information for now, not quite sure how to explain it to them.
“It’s truly amazing. But if the world finds out…” Lami murmured.
“I know, Lami, but I trust you all. That’s why I’m sharing this with you. As I said, I’m going to make all of you even stronger. Didn’t I promise that yesterday when we officially formed this pirate crew?” Luffy said confidently.
“Yes, thank you, Luffy-Sama!” Shirahoshi quickly jumped happily onto the captain to hug him, and Luffy was quick to catch the princess so she wouldn’t fall to the ground.
“Incredible…” I heard Bepo muttering beside.
“Anyway, I’m going to train you physically. Come with me to a more open space.” Luffy led them to the middle of the deck. It was an open part of the ship with plenty of space for everyone.
“I’ll start. Shirahoshi, step back a bit. I’ll begin with them first to test their levels,” I said, and the princess swam in the air with her bubble of air to distance herself from them.
[Moa Moa no Mi: Gravity, apply 5 times!]
Pressure surged in the middle of the group, causing everyone to fall to the ground, except Yamato, who barely felt the pressure and looked at everyone with amusement.
“What is this?!” Zoro asked alarmed, pinned to the ground, but gradually trying to push against the pressure with his face against the ship’s wood.
“I’m applying five times the gravity; it’s only five times your weight. Some of you are barely suffering, while others can’t even resist,” Luffy explained. Bepo and Kuina, with her weak body, couldn’t even move their mouths to complain.
Seeing that Zoro, Lami, Kuina, and Bepo couldn’t handle just five times their weight, Luffy opened a store and bought some weights, spending some berries.
“Take these.” He tossed four sets to attach to their arms, legs, and a weighted shirt that he bought from the store.
“I’ve added 100 kilograms to each with my multiplication. You’ll follow a training regimen that I’ll provide with physical exercises. As you get accustomed to the weights, I’ll double them using the power of my Devil Fruit. You’ll also be under the influence of three times the learning speed I’ve already applied to you, so make the most of it,” I said and looked at Shirahoshi.
“Take these weights, Shirahoshi. You’ll start with 20 kilograms, and later, I’ll increase them, understood?” I told her.
“Yes, Luffy-Sama!”
Now, he turned to Yamato.
“Yamato, you’ll train with me under the pressure of gravity and weights,” he said to her.
“Yes, you can count on me!” She replied with a confident smile.
“Yamato and I have the most powerful bodies here due to our lineage, so I’ll train with her under the highest pressure I can withstand,” Luffy quickly reasoned.
They quickly began their set and exercise routine. Luffy couldn’t help but notice the beautiful daughter of Kaido in front of him as they trained.
“She’s stronger than I am, so I’ve strengthened her with some multiplied weights while I do my push-ups in ten times gravity, which is my current limit,” Luffy thought as he continued the exercises.
After a whole morning of training, they finally had a break to rest, and Luffy gave Megalo a break to join them for lunch.
Everyone was quite tired.
“Wow, that was worse than any training I’ve ever had, but I’m satisfied. I can already feel some results!” Zoro, who was eating while lying down due to the paralysis from training, commented with a slight smile.
“It’s really invigorating!” Yamato said, as she had been training with both the added pressure and the weights Luffy gave her, feeling better than any other training she had experienced in Wano.
“I’m so tired!” Shirahoshi didn’t stop complaining, along with a broken Bepo beside her.
Lami and Kuina remained silent, but they were equally tired.
Despite everyone being satisfied with the results they could already feel after just a few hours of training, Luffy let them rest because, as their first training, it’s good to let their bodies start getting used to it. They still had plenty of time to train before entering the Grand Line.
Seeing this, Luffy grabbed a beach chair from the sailors and lay down to rest. His body was equally tired, and he ended up taking a nap at that moment. He woke up when someone shouted his name in distress.
“LUFFY-SAMA!!!” Shirahoshi cried out to him.
Luffy opened his eyes and saw the mermaid who was asking for help.
On her end, there were two men holding swords and threatening her on the ship.
“Hehehe. I never thought I’d see a mermaid here in the East Blue!”
“I didn’t even know they existed; I thought it was a legend from the Grand Line!”
“Captain Buggy will surely compensate us for this!”
Seeing this, Luffy became furious and quickly used his increased speed, punching the men with an amethyst flame without giving them time to react. The two men, who didn’t even see Luffy approaching like a flash, were hit and covered the area where they were with their flames. They didn’t even have time to react or see what had hit them; they simply disintegrated instantly with the scorching and dangerous heat of that mysterious fire.
*BOOM*
The explosion of flames was so loud that it made the ship shake a bit.
“What is this?!” Zoro jumped off the mast quickly; he was sleeping but woke up due to Shirahoshi’s crying, though he reacted much more slowly than Luffy.
I ignored Zoro and the other crew members on their way and saw Shirahoshi on the deck with a scared and crying face. Luffy sighed as he walked over to her.
“Hey, are you okay?” He asked as he knelt beside her, gently touching her head.
“I-I-I don’t know. They-they said they were going to sell me! Waaa….” She began to cry and jumped on Luffy to hug and cry on him.
At this point, everyone on the ship had gathered around due to the commotion.
“I know, but don’t worry, they won’t harm you anymore. I promised you that you’d be safe with me, understood?” Luffy tried to calm the young mermaid.
“Yes, thank you, Luffy-Sama. I was so scared…” She murmured, still crying.
“Anyway, where did these guys come from?” Lami asked loudly as she saw the area I had struck, destroyed, while noticing only some scraps of their clothes that hadn’t disintegrated with the captain’s punch. This made her think about the fate of their future enemies and caused her to break into a sweat, imagining that he wouldn’t show mercy if someone hurt his crew.
“Doesn’t matter who they are or if they’ve seen a mermaid. They have no idea even on a ship with a Marine flag?” Kuina complained.
“What?!” He shouted, and Luffy ignored him to look at the girl with a fish tail and pink hair clinging to him like a panda to a tree.
“Shirahoshi, how did these men get in here?” He finally asked the mermaid seriously, who was clinging to his neck and crying.
“I-I was looking at the view to admire the sun and the horizon, then I saw a boat next to the ship asking for help. I wanted to help those humans, and when they got on our ship, they threatened me
with their swords, so I screamed for Luffy-Sama, who helped me right away.” She sobbed all of this.
*Sigh*
After sighing, Luffy turned to the group that was observing them.
“Yamato, I know you have Observation Haki. You should have known about them before anyone else. I don’t want to see any intruders entering this ship so easily, understand?” I said seriously to Yamato.
“Observation Haki?” Kuina asked curiously, but Luffy ignored her and focused on Yamato’s response.
“Yes, you’re right. It won’t happen again,” she said seriously.
Yamato had indeed sensed their presence when Shirahoshi helped them onto the ship. However, since she saw that the mermaid was helping them, she didn’t think it would be a problem. She took that into account only because she couldn’t sense the emotions of others with her current level of Haki.
“Great, please, I’m counting on you and Megalo.” I told the shark, which was still hugging Shirahoshi.
“You will always stay with Shirahoshi; don’t lose sight of her again, understand?” I spoke to the shark.
“Sharky Sharky Sharky!” It said, determined and a bit remorseful for not being with its friend right now, as it was sleeping.
“Shirahoshi, I know you have a good heart, and I admire that in you. But you shouldn’t trust just anyone; you know how cruel everyone can be, even humans and fish-men, right?” He said seriously to her.
“Yes, Luffy-Sama! I’m sorry; I’ll call you or someone else the next time I see something unusual,” she said, still crying.
“Now, get your things ready. We’re very close to Orange Town now, and it won’t be a peaceful visit. We’ll face our first enemy pirate crew as the Straw Hat crew!” He said determined.
“Yes, Luffy-Sama!” Shirahoshi replied, feeling a bit better.
“Sharky!” Megalo said.
“Yes, Captain!” Zoro responded.
“Yes, My Luffy!” Yamato quickly put her club on her shoulder.
“Yes,” Lami said, holding her sword.
“YES! I’m sorry,” Bepo entered a depressed state.
Kuina didn’t say anything because she wasn’t an official member of the group. She really wanted to be part of this, but she still had to think about it before talking to her father.
Luffy looked at everyone, satisfied, as he pushed Shirahoshi away from him to look at the small shadow of the island on the horizon, growing larger as they approached.
—————————————————————————————