Jonny and Yosaku's fight; Jonny's POV;

“I'll attack its joints, try to test its armour,” I called out while sprinting low at the Kuma guy. This guy wasn't Kuma, Jo sounded sure enough. Still, this not Kuma was large and looked quite powerful.

It was fast as well. The moment I got close enough to swing my sword I already had to evade the incoming fist. A quick roll to the side brought me out of its reach and the fist impacted with the ground. Cratering it and throwing rock and dirt up and away.

I stood at its side and had my sword ready to pierce forward. Feeling this thing with my Observation was tricky. It had no emotions, I could only anticipate its moves. That's why it was hard for me to evade the kick that was thrown right at the side of my head.

I nonetheless managed to duck under the massive foot and then bring my blade forward. The black tip of my Kuronazo pierced into the chest of the not Kuma. A metallic sound rang through the air and I felt heavy resistance. That definitely was not made out of flesh.

Its fist came down again, but Yosaku has reached us by now and blocked the attack with the broad side of his sword. He then used the momentum to make a turn and hack into the shoulder of the not Kuma.

There was the sound of metal hitting metal again and Yosaku's sword got stuck after cutting into the thing. He only managed to cut a few centimetres into it.

I jumped back and watched how Yosaku ripped his blade out of the things shoulder. The wound got slightly bigger, but not remarkably. “That thing is hard. Josef said that they are made out of the same thing that is Fiara's arms, but getting told and seeing are two different things,” I said to Yosaku.

He nodded and gripped his sword with both hands. A quick glance told me that it wasn't as heavy as it could be. Slightly less than half a ton. He said he could go up to 3 ton, but that becomes annoying outside of fights.

“I either need more weight or activate Haki to do any damage. Any luck with hitting his joints?” Asked Yosaku, both of us were not taking our eyes off of the not Kuma. So far it has done nothing.

“Didn't get close enough. That thing is fast,” I replied.

Suddenly the not Kuma opened its mouth and a yellow light shone out of it. “That looks eerily similar to what Fiara can use,” observed Yosaku with a forced smile.

Not a second later the thing shot its laser attack and I had to jump out of its firing line. Yosaku was not as quick and had to place his sword in between himself and the attack. The laser hit his sword and got deflected into the air, where it vanished into the sky.

Hopefully, he has to recharge those things like Fiara has to. If he's able to fire then none stop I call bullshit.

Both of us attacked again while the thing wasn't moving. It swung its arm at me, slightly slower than before. It was enough for me to evade with more room and then place a good cut on the inner side of its elbow.

I cut easily through its jacket and even into its joint. It then, however, closed its arm and trapped my sword. I'll have to either let go of my sword or get trapped with it.

Thankfully, Yosaku came to the rescue. He had coated his arms and sword with Armament and cut into the right shoulder. It was the one that was holding my arm. The blade run right through the shoulder and the thing lost its whole arm.

My blade was now free again, but I had another problem. Namely the glowing yellow light that was shining into my face. While I was being trapped it had moved its free arm up and pointed its palm at my face, particle laser charging up for a blast.

The beam fired and I used my hard earned skills in Kami-e. My upper body moved backwards and bent almost 90°. The laser shot over my body, I felt the heat coming off of it.

Then, as fast as I could, I pushed the tip of my sword forward, right into the ruby-like dot in the middle of the things palm. It cracked under my attack and my blade pierced through its hand. The hand began to spark violently, while the arm started to vibrate strongly.

Before it could explode, and take me with it, I ripped the blade out and jumped backwards. The arm sparked one last time, before stop moving altogether. “Puh, thought that thing will explode with you standing close,” said Yosaku relieved.

I nodded, before engaging the robot again. Now without its right arm and the left one immobile, it should become easy to take it down. It still prepared one of its mouth attacks, nonplussed that it had neither arms to defend against attacks.

A Soru brought me in close and an upwards pierce at its throat ended the fight in our favour. The throat was soft and got cut into easily. I cared little about why that was the case, more happy to have killed this thing.

I jumped back to get some distance. The arm exploded after taking out the ruby thing in its palm. Maybe the head will do so too.

Yosaku and I were watching closely how the flying sparks were increasing in numbers, until with a loud beeping noise the whole body exploded into a thousand pieces. The explosion was big enough to take out a large house, it was good that I took some distance.

I gave Yosaku a high five and turned to see how the fights of the others were going. Nojiko and Fiara had already finished with theirs. Nojiko has watched us and was grinning winningly at me and Yosaku. She'll boast about being faster than us for sure.

On the other side of the clearing, I could see how Noa and Josef were having some trouble with their not Kuma. The thing was moving fast enough to keep Noa on his toes and away from doing any damage, while Josef simply lacked the means of doing damage.

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Josef was not trained to fight literal tanks. He is a speed fighter like me and prefers to target weak points and generally more blood filled enemies. I only managed thanks to the sharpness of my sword.

It came as it must have and Noa made a mistake. The elbow of the not Kuma impacted with his chest and he got flung away. This will leave a heavy bruise. Josef tried to distract the not Kuma from advancing on Noa by shooting dozens of finger bone bullets. They sadly weren't doing anything to the hard metal armour.

The palm of the not Kuma began to glow and I was already mid-sprint to get Noa out of its firing line. The blast fired the moment I reached Noa. There would not be enough time to get both of us out, so I readied my sword and placed it in between the blast and myself.

If I get this right I might be able to cut through the attack.

I quickly gathered myself, added what little Armament I know about, and cut down into the attack. The attack split and flew past me on both sides. It missed Noa and me completely and destroyed a nearby tree.

And with missed completely I meant just that. It had not even reached my sword. I blinked to get used to the light. In front of me stood Lara, her palm outstretched. The particle cannon was hitting her directly and moving alongside her palm, making a curve around her body and then continuing on, with none of us three in its line.

Then she slowly raised her other hand and moved as if she was grabbing the not Kuma in her hand. She squeezed her hand shut and the beam stopped instantly. The light dimmed down enough for me to see that the not Kuma was shaking violently. Its body began to creak and groan and then suddenly it broke apart.

Its body parts were laying in a pile, not a sign of damage.

“Thanks, Lara, that guy played exactly into our weaknesses.” Thanked Josef. It brought me out of my stupor and I noticed that the fighting was over. I helped Noa up and sheathed my blade. Noa nodded and walked up to Lara, I followed. The pile wasn't just a pile of metal. There were cables and plates sure, but we could also see why Josef sounded so disgusted when he spoke about these robots.

In between the cables was a liquid that strongly resembled blood. Arms and legs without skin and a brain.

“Thank you, Lara, what did you do?” thanked Noa, before he inspected the pile that was once the not Kuma. The rest of the crew came over as well, our newest member stood slightly at the side. She looked a little unsure at us and her body signs were guarded. Hopefully, she will open up to us.

“Fiara is superheating metal and then firing it off through something that is closely resembling a rail gun. I thought that the Pacifista are still running on the same principle and created some magnetic waves that forced the beam around my palm and body. I trained that with Fiara a few times.” Explained Lara while rubbing her palm. It was slightly red, seems as if the heat does not get blocked.

“And the thing after that? Why did he fall apart?” Asked Nojiko.

“These things are not alive, this gives them the bonus of being impossible to sense with Observation. But living things all have a natural defence against Devil Fruit powers. They resist any attempt of influence, the Pacifista do not. They do have a slight presence, a remnant of their once living body, but that is not enough.

It is rather easy to target them with my power and a machine that is such fine tuned and effective as this one needs to have fine and small parts. Parts that can easily be dislodged or break if under rapid and strong strain. Such like vibrations. It's an attack I have invented against ships, but works on them as well.” She further explained.

Fiara was picking clean pieces of it up and looking at them closely, before throwing one of the larger pieces over at Noa. “Noa, could you please put those together? Its parts are still undamaged and I want to see if I can find its power source or if there are any differences between their metal and that of my arms,” she requested. Noa wordlessly followed her command and pulled a rope out to bind the pieces she threw at him together. From the distance, we could hear the fights of the other crews. Sometimes there were explosions visible, other times we heard shouting and screaming.

The whole archipelago was in uproar and chaos.

They were five minutes into their work when we heard a loud roar of an animal. It sounded pain filled and crazed with furious anger. But then, it suddenly stopped mid-roar and everything got silent. It must have been some Zoan user that got taken out.

“You think the Admiral is already on the island?” Asked Yosaku me. It was the first thing he said since the end of our fight. The air was too filled with tension for him or me to banter like we usually do. This is more like a war zone.

“The HQ is close enough, I just hope we don't have to fight him. These three were enough for me,” I replied with a shudder. Those inhuman machines are horrible and there were parts of humans inside. The simple thought let me shudder.

“We're all finished, ready to go,” announced Fiara. She and Noa had sorted all the organic and metal parts. Lara had cleaned the metal with her vibrations and they pulled the 'clean' pieces together with a rope.

“Let's go back to the Marine base on grove 60th. I still must visit the Marine HQ and you all have something to do as well,” ordered Lara. We began to move again, jumping from grove to grove. Signs of heavy fighting were visible all around.

The Marines must have cleaned house. Every grove in between 1 and 30 was in some form damaged or showed heavy signs of fighting. Most battles were already over, sometimes we could see groups of pirates hiding in half-destroyed buildings.

People were looking out of their houses, hiding away from all the fighting. Marines were marching through the streets and storming houses to look for criminals. Which there were a lot. Whenever we saw them we evaded most with Soru. There's no need to leave a bloody trail on our way back to their base.

Fiara was really confused why we were now back to be friendly with the Marines, but accepted that things could be strange like that and agreed to only burn them when Lia says it is okay. I feel like crying when I see what Lia had done to the friendly and innocent Tontatta.

There was significantly less fighting from grove 30 and onwards. As if we stepped out of a war and into an amusement park. There were no people on grove 30 till 35. But after that, you would not believe it if someone tells you that there was a small war going on only a few kilometres away.

The few patrolling Marines did not even attack us. They were staring at us and whispering with each other, but none tried to arrest us.

That's how we reached the Marine base without any more fights. The base was in full activity. Pirates were processed left and right. Rows and rows of gallows were being built to execute all the caught pirates.

I really wanted to smash this place, but there were more important things than pirates we know nothing about. For all we know they might have earned their end.

Soon enough we were confronted by a Marine Lieutenant. A young woman with two pistols as her chosen weapons. She didn't look very strong, fast or dangerous. She didn't feel as if she was as well.

She did a quick salute before addressing us. “Miss Slicer, we have gotten word about your new importance just recently. I apologise if some of our not informed soldiers attacked you. I'm still ordered to thank you for not killing everyone of them in sight. Please follow me to your escort ship, your crew may leave on their own and pick you up here after your work as a Warlord is done.” She then made a sharp turn and walked off, expecting Lara to follow her without pause.

Lara turned to Lia and gave her a long deep kiss, before waving at us. “Well, see you in a few days then. You know what to do. And Lia, tell them about the new fruits we have. Inari, sorry that I'm not able to show you around, but the others will be friendly. Try to befriend them, that goes for the others as well. I don't want to come back and learn that Inari feels left out.” She then jogged after the already distant Marine Lieutenant and caught up to her.

We watched how Lia starred after Lara, a troubled and worried expression on her face. She only turned to us when Lara was no longer in sight.“Let's go back to the ship, we have a timeline to keep,” ordered Lia.