Chapter 249

—

Things weren't favourable for Raki.

She had lost not only her devil fruits… but even her twin blades.

She's been using them for a while now since Shiki's death, but they had merely melted like butter in front of the beam of superheated plasma.

Now she was at her weakest with only her body at her side… and even then, there was something strange and different about her body.

It's been two days since Skypiea was utterly destroyed, and Amon was too busy maintaining his territory with Robin to give Raki the attention she needed right now.

The best option would be to go and meet him by herself, but she was… anxious to approach him. 

Very anxious.

What price did he pay to bring her back from the dead?

Did he sacrifice his life force? His soul, maybe?

She didn't want to face him with those questions. Her brother has done so much for her, and he did that once again.

She would feel guilty to just meet him in this state.

However, even with all that thought in her mind, the uncomfortable feeling of weakness in her stomach was getting too much for her to handle anymore. So she had finally decided to meet Amon head-on.

The guard in front of Amon's door almost stopped her before they recognised her and dipped their head in the air.

Ignoring them, Raki knocked on the door twice as it sprung open by itself.

Raki slowly walked in and closed the door behind her. Then her eyes met Amon who was sitting on the table with dozens of paper sheets in front of him.

"Oh, hi, Raki, what's up?" Amon said as he signed some papers, not even looking at her. "I was wondering when you'll finally come to see me, I was missing you."

That caused Raki to sigh in relief as her stiff shoulders loosened a bit.

She scratched the back of her head and looked outside the window to not meet his gaze.

"Um, Bro… are you okay?"

Amon stopped scribbling his paper and raised his face at her. She didn't want to, but she still met his gaze.

"I should be the one asking you that question." He said. "I am fine, entirely. Hundred percent healed in both body and mind, but what about you? You lost your swords and fruits… You are at your weakest."

Raki's lips tightened as she bit it.

"I… don't feel so good." She said as she scratched her right arm quite uncomfortably. "It feels like I lost my limbs… I am useless now."

Amon chuckled softly at her words and leaned back against his chair.

"Nah, you are emotional support. Isn't that enough use?"

She clenched her fist hard.

"...That's not enough for me." She said, meeting his gaze. "I have no power, and I even lost my swords. I am a fangless tiger who has now become a cat." She continued. "...How will I serve you in this weak state? You know better than anyone that I won't be fine with just being mere emotional support."

"Brother…"

She clenched her jaws but at his gaze, her eyes softened and a desperate sigh left her lips. 

"I don't want you to be protecting me, my dream since I can remember was to protect you. I wielded my first sword with that thought in my mind."

Amon parted his lips to say something… but only a sigh left him. He shook his head.

"I am really sorry… but," He opened his drawer, taking out a… blue guava devil fruit, as he threw it towards Raki. "I couldn't find the Quetzalcoatl fruit anywhere."

Raki caught the fruit mid-air as her heart bumped aloud.

She looked at Amon with wide eyes as the situation sunk in her. She suppressed a smile.

"Um, thank you."

Amon cracked up at this. "Don't say thank you, it sounds weird coming from you. Anyway, the fruit that the Quetzalcoatl-DF uses as a 'vessel' used to grow in a tree that has gone extinct. Remember, Seraph kept that fruit to her for 800 years."

Raki nodded at his words.

"I will have to search the nearby islands with weird geography such as Little Garden, to see if I can find the reincarnated fruit or not. Unfortunately, the trees I had in Shandora were destroyed in the attack, and my clones have already checked Little Garden, it's not there as well."

Raki's delightful face darkened a little but she nodded nonetheless.

"I understand… Though I won't lie, I would have loved that fruit more than this." She said, looking at the world's strongest Paramecia in her hand. "I am more familiar with it, even with the Tremor Devil Fruit Mastery I got from Whitebeard's corpse. More so…" her face reddened. "Without that fruit, my body is as weak as... the other girls you slept with. I won't be able to take you on at your best without that."

Amon stared at her with an agape mouth for a while before breaking out in laughter.

Then, he walked beside her as a sword teleported in his hand. Raki recognised that it wasn't Kiyu. It was just a normal sword.

"Well, you are quite wrong this time..."

His hand whipped as the sword suddenly landed on Raki's neck.

Raki's eyes trembled but she didn't protest his attack at all and even closed her eyes to accept her death.

But… upon coming into contact with her skin, the sword simply shattered into pieces.

At the sound, Raki slowly opened her eyes as she found Amon's face in front of her, smiling teasingly. 

"I didn't think you'd accept death so easily."

Her face flustered but she didn't protest. She would have not done so if it was someone else.

Amon ignored the subject and instead pinched her cheeks. At his pinch... Raki felt something different again.

Something was truly wrong with her body.

Amon spoke, "I am sure you noticed something different in the past two days but have dismissed it with the possibility of your zoan-less body. Let's just say you are wrong." He said and slapped her cheeks softly. "Cheers and celebration for you, as you now have Germa's Ultra Enhanced body."

The words sunk in Raki's mind as her eyes widened just a little.

Amon continued. "Super Strength, Super Speed, Exoskeleton, and some minor other boosts. You see, applying such genetic boosts is not possible to a grown-up's body, and is only possible to add them in the body's embryonic state. Luckily, when creating a clone, the body needs to go through the embryonic state too. Your current body is a clone, as you know, and when it was created I had asked the Germa to add the best possible things in you. In a sense, your body's many times stronger than before. You just don't realise it."

Raki's eyes sparkled all of a sudden.

"Even in this non-zoan state, your strength, defence, and stamina can match your previous Hybrid form. Now, if I can somehow find your Zoan fruit again, you'd be at least a few times stronger than before in your humanoid forms. Don't forget you can even train your body further, as your body's potential and limit has been increased greatly too."

Raki nodded to Amon eagerly. "...And?"

"You also have a Raid Suit. "

"Whoa. W-what else?"

Amon smiled at her. "A special superpower. Light Manipulation."

"..."

"Cool right?"

Raki immediately hugged him tightly. "I love you soooo much."

With a small laugh, Amon patted her back.

"I love you too. But the bad news is, I think I would need to find you another Zoan instead of looking for your old one. That one is pretty much impossible to find on a planet of this size, even with my new senses. Sorry."

Raki made an agreeing sound and hugged him tightly.  It's certainly a pity to lose her cool dragon zoan, but if she knew her brother right, the new one wouldn't just be some random one, either.

Then his voice took a... cold turn all of a sudden.

"So, let us go and hunt a big fish."

—★—

Luffy sat on the bed beside the window as his eyes looked at the sky far beyond.

Ace had died.

Murdered.

Luffy had a lot of feelings inside him, grief, hate, rage, regret, and many more. But the desire for vengeance was topping everything else.

He had no personal grudge against Amon, and nor did Amon have one against him. The Emperor in fact was kind enough to let him and his crew go mostly unharmed even after Luffy infiltrated his base.

Yet Luffy couldn't stop the raging flame inside his chest from burning his heart.

Amon had betrayed Ace, it was clear from the live streaming that he got to see in the HQ of the Revolutionary Army.

His brother was betrayed, and in such a case, he must take revenge in his name.

Moreover, Sabo also agreed with him.

Luffy's mind didn't break this time because he wasn't there in person when Ace died, and nor did Ace sacrifice his life for Luffy's. Along with that, with Sabo's sudden memory recovery, he was in a much calmer state than in canon. 

This time he did not need Jinbei's emotional support. Today, he just wanted revenge.

As Luffy's eyes followed a bird flying far in the sky, the door of his room suddenly parted out. 

"Oi, Luffy."

Sabo peeked from the other side, his face forming a small smile.

"Someone… special is here."

Luffy stared at his other brother's face for a while and then nodded before following him towards Monkey D. Dragon's office.

He had met his father a few days ago when Betty brought him to the HQ. There was of course no lovely family reunion as Luffy didn't even know the man properly. But it was certainly not a bad feeling meeting a blood relative.

But... as he entered the office of his father, his legs came to a halt as he saw the sight in front of him. 

It was not his father whose appearance shocked him, but it was the appearance of the man sitting opposite to him.

Monkey D. Dragon was sitting in his chair while someone else… a certain red-haired pirate was sitting opposite him.

Hearing the footsteps, Red-Haired Shanks turned his head at him and smiled softly as he stood up from his seat.

"Luffy, it's been a long time, huh." Shanks walked forward and ruffled his hair. "You are almost as tall as me now. Would you look at that?"

He laughed softly while Luffy's eyes trembled as old memories surfaced in his mind.

"Shanks…"

Shanks' smile widened as he continued.

"I heard about your desire to seek vengeance… Gotta say I am not a fan of that, but I do agree Amon needs to be eliminated. Luckily for us, he is at his weakest with his base now destroyed and all his territories in a disarray." Shanks looked deep into Luffy's eyes with his smile unmoving. "Now, if you don't mind, I would like to train you in both your Haki and that magnificent devil fruit of yours."

**

**

**

Author's Note: The Main characters of the Novel and the Main characters of the world itself — both are getting power-ups. What is the antagonist doing right now? Does he even care about these two?