"I don't acknowledge him as my father. My father is Whitebeard. He is the only one." Ace declared as he felt irritated. He never wanted that label but somehow it stuck with him. Of course, nobody hated him for this. They were pirates to begin with and the father of Ace had conquered everything. Everyone had starry eyes when they looked at Ace. Especially Usopp and Chopper. They wanted to be pirates from the start and now Ace was the son of the great Pirate King.

This was a privilege in the eyes of the two.

"This crew has too many high profile people." Robin murmured.

"Yeah. A bunch of monsters." Vivi said and for the first time they were in agreement with each other.

"What about the bloodline of Sanji? I still didn't understand." Usopp was still curious about Sanji as there seemed to be a secret. Sanji hung his head in shame. He felt like everyone was judging him with his eyes as he felt guilty. Luffy could see it and said.

"It doesn't matter where Sanji comes from and what he did in the past. I don't care."

Sanji shuddered at those words. He looked at Luffy and almost had tears in his eyes. He couldn't believe what Luffy said. His Captain didn't even care about his past and just accepted him.

"What are you brooding about? I accepted you after knowing and even your mentor Zeff knew about it. He still accepted you. Stop living in the past and accept what you were born with."

"What? Owner Zeff knew?"

"He had a vague idea about it and he still didn't care. Same goes for us. Everyone here has past. So it doesn't matter. But Sanji, if you really want to achieve great heights don't reject yourself."

Sanji just nodded his head but Ken knew that Sanji wasn't ready. Nobody asked Sanji anything more about his past since Luffy declared that he didn't care and they respected the Captain. Even Ken, who was the master of spilling secrets, shut his mouth.

There were some things that only Luffy had powers over and everyone was fine with it.

The ship continued sailing but there was a subtle change among the crew members. Luffy and Zoro were both discussing the Haki with Ace while Sanji just buried himself in cooking. He was a little depressed and so he wanted to get rid of it with his work.

Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

Nami and Usopp got serious about completing their characters. Especially Nami who was very close to completion. She had already started practicing more vigorously as she tried remembering all the spells and knowledge she knew.

She was already using magic to draw the charts of the ocean and thus she didn't spend much time on drawing and was rather practicing magic when she could. After a sail for 2 days, they had finally reached the shores of Eramalu. A small town built just near the divide of Alabasta.

The ship anchored at a place near the abandoned harbor. But as Zoro lowered the anchor his eyes met with a unique sea creature that came in a group.

The Kungfu Dugongs.

"What are these?"

"The Kung Fu Dugongs. They are the local sea turtles who reside in this part of the sea. They are known for strong body and they go around challenging everyone."

"How are these called Dugongs when they are not even Dugongs. At best they should be called Kungfu Turtles, not Kungfu Dugongs."

"Hahhaha.. Ken-san I don't know about that." Vivi seemed a little embarrassed. It was true, these sea creatures didn't look like Dugongs at all. Of course, when Ken was talking with Vivi, someone went forward and challenged the Dugongs and that idiot would be Luffy.

He won with no cap.

And then, these small sea animals were ready to follow Luffy.

"Luffy, we are not going to take them." Nami shouted.

But then the Dugongs showed the iconic 'Puss in the boots' cat's eyes to Nami and Vivi. This made the two women guilty and they didn't know how to reject. Chopper was the one who came forward and solved the problem after offering them food. It was good that everyone in the crew, the magical bag or else Luffy would have been subjected to an earful.

Ace joined them because he wanted to know the location of Blackbeard and Ken didn't bother to tell him his location. They were going to meet Blackbeard anyway in that awful town so they were going to meet Teach long before Ace would. Ken already had a plan in his mind to deal with that scum.

The group moved swiftly through the abandoned town and they saw the horrors that this place had gone through. There was no vegetation and they even came across a dried up skeleton. The more they saw, the more the crew got incensed. Vivi was shaking as tears rolled through her eyes.

Luffy and others too got angry as they vowed to take very 'good care' of Crocodile. Ken just looked at their reactions and thought.

'This is nothing. What Crocodile did is nothing as compared to the atrocities done by the World Nobles, Kaido, Doflamingo. Crocodile at least had a goal in mind and ethics. He even saved Ace once in the war. The others don't even have a conscience.'

Of course, Ken wasn't stupid enough to spill everything. The crew needed to learn it by themselves. The group soon was in an open desert and it became extremely hot. But there was relief in all of this. Banchi had come to help.

Banchi was a creature that could move fast in the desert too. So Robin with the help of Nami attached a carriage behind Banchi. And thus instead of treading on hot and scorching sun, everyone was inside a luxurious carriage.

"Nami, you are so awesome." Chopper appreciated this the most as he was a winter animal and hot weather wasn't for him. Nami looked proud as she had made the carriage out of magic and even installed a fan inside to help with the heat outside.