Rolling My Way to Pirate King (One Piece Chaos Gacha) (Patreon)

Chapter 32: Reverse Mountain

“Am I seeing things or is that stream going up the mountain!?” Sanji’s yell could just be heard over the rain and thunder around us as we steadily sailed closer to Reverse Mountain.

“Hah!? Are you drunk, Ero-Cook? Everyone knows streams don’t… go… up. What the hell?” Zoro’s mocking voice faded as he too witnessed the strange phenomenon in front of us with a surprised face.

“It’s a mystery stream!” I yelled to the heavens before dissolving into chuckles at the private joke.

“Is this really the time to be laughing, Luffy!” Usopp screamed hysterically while holding onto the main mast. “We should turn the ship around while we still have the chance!”

“What are you talking about, Usopp? Didn’t we just make that declaration and everything? That’s clearly the path to the Grand Line. Right, Nami?” I said with a shake of my head, completely unconcerned even as the ship started gaining speed due to the current.

“As unbelievable as it sounds, Luffy is right. That’s the only path forward.” Nami declared loudly as she looked down at the map we had retrieved from Buggy a while back.

While she said that though, her form was a bit pale and she was clearly a bit nervous as she looked up at everyone with a serious expression. “It looks like, as Luffy said before, we shouldn’t use logic to make sense of anything on the Grand Line and be on the lookout for the unexpected.”

“Shishishi, isn’t that awesome?” I laughed happily as I held my hat so it wouldn’t be blown over by the wind.

“We’re still not out of danger, dumbass!” Nami threw me a small glare but didn’t hit me as she would have before as she got everyone’s attention again and signaled forward toward Reverse Mountain and the stream leading up the Red Line.

“That’s our path, but we only have one shot at making it! At this speed and with the current, if we don’t make it we’ll end up crashing into the Red Line and drowning.”

“T-That’s scary!” Usopp yelled, still from his position on the main mast.

“Leave that to me.” I grinned confidently and playfully grabbed my bicep.

At that moment, as if planned, Tiche chimed in from inside, who was currently in charge of steering the ship. “Luffy-sama, the ship has become impossible to move! The current is too strong!”

“You heard the lady, let’s move, people!” I yelled with a raised hand.

“Aye!”

We immediately got to work, raising the sails and steadily steering the ship so we wouldn’t crash into the Red Line.

Our hard work eventually paid out as we finally reached Reverse Mountain and watched with relieved smiles as we avoided crashing into the mountain and quickly gained speed as we sailed up it.

“Woo hoo! Here we come!” I yelled with a hand on my hat as I held onto Merry’s figurehead as we passed by a bunch of huge gates.

“We’re actually going up the mountain!” Sanji yelled with an excited grin as he held onto the ship.

“I-It almost feels like we’re flying!” Usopp yelled, fear momentarily forgotten as he grinned just as happily as everyone else.

“Heh, on the other side of this mountain lie my dreams.” Zoro declared with a challenging grin.

“We’re really doing this.” Nami muttered from beside me as she held onto my chest for support despite the jealous glare thrown my way by Sanji.

“Of course we are, and this is just the beginning.” I declared next to her ear as I grinned down at her, getting a happy smile in return.

“Yeah.” Nami got a bit closer, using the excuse that it was getting colder the higher we climbed up to snuggle up to me.

“I see the top! Hang on, everyone!” I yelled, wrapping my hand firmly around Nami as everyone quickly did as instructed.

Moments later, we seemed to sail over the Red Line, causing Usopp and Sanji to panic for a moment before we descended back down onto the ground and started gaining even more speed now that we were going down.

‘Shishishi, I can’t wait to prank them once we reach Sky Island in that huge drop. That was genuinely hilarious.’ I thought to myself in amusement, remembering the funny faces Sanji and Usopp made as they thought they had sailed off Skypiea.

I idly noticed I had received a notification from the Gacha before a terribly loud sound was heard by all of us, causing our attention to focus on the distance.

‘That’s right, I almost forgot about Laboon.’ I thought in realization before letting out a small wince again as Laboon cried out again, hurting my sensitive ears.

“What’s that sound!? It’s so loud!” Nami asked loudly while separating herself from my embrace, her and the others thankfully not having been affected much at this distance.

“It’s coming from below!” Usopp yelled and pointed forward.

“Nami-san! There’s a mountain up ahead!” Sanji suddenly yelled in slight panic.

“What!? There shouldn’t be a mountain at all. There should be straight ocean up ahead!” Nami screamed back in confusion.

From this distance we finally saw that a huge shape could indeed be seen down below that, due to the sheer size, looked like a mountain.

“That’s not a mountain! That’s a whale!” I yelled, already moving into action as I jumped to the front of the ship and used Geppo to push myself against the bow.

“What!? A whale!?”

“Brace yourselves! I’m going to try to slow us down!” I yelled as loud as I could and waited a few seconds before using Geppo again as hard as I could.

With my back against the Merry, I used the kinetic force I was producing due to my kicks to try and slow us down. The problem was though that with us moving so fast, it was taking time to do anything as everyone on the ship panicked.

Luckily Tiche quickly caught onto my plan and joined me moments later and started working hard to slow the ship as well.

“Thanks, Tiche!” I grunted as I didn’t let up and continued kicking against the air as hard as I could.

“I-It is my duty, Master!” Tiche responded back humbly, even resorting to calling me Master again.

“Waaah! We’re not going to make it!” Usopp’s yells could be heard from somewhere in the ship, sounding clearly panicked.

Contrary to his words though, moments later the ship finally started slowing down before coming to a complete stop some distance from crashing into Laboon.

At that moment, Tiche’s body seemed to give out and I reacted quickly, extending my hand and bringing her into my arms before making my way to the deck again with only some sweat on my face to show the effort that had caused.

It seemed the combination of Peak Specimen, Daily Grind, Photosynthesis, and my own monstrous strength and stamina were finally showing their results, since I wasn’t tired at all compared to Tiche, who was barely hanging onto consciousness in my arms.

“We did it.” I gave everyone a smile as I saw them all slumped onto the deck with clear relief in their faces before looking down at Tiche again and smiling softer at her.

“You did great, Tiche. Rest up.” I murmured, getting a tired smile in response as I walked her into her and Nami’s quarters. Well, Jewel’s too now that I thought of it, since the goose had a bed too that Nami had specifically bought for her.

Jewel actually had a better bed than us guys, since we were all sleeping on hammocks which, while comfortable, didn’t beat a bed’s softness.

When I came back out onto the deck moments later, I saw that Sanji and Zoro were using the oars to move us away from Laboon’s position quicker before I was forced into the ground when Laboon cried out again.

Due to my enhanced senses, it was pure agony, and I felt as if someone was repeatedly stabbing knives into my skull to the point that I wanted to throw up since it was throwing my balance out of whack.

I didn’t even notice when someone cradled my head or wiped my nose with something due to how disoriented I got, with everything being blurry.

It took me a few moments to realize that Nami was cradling me against her chest with a really worried look on her face and seemed to be talking to me.

“...ffy.”

“…uffy.”

“Luffy!”

“N-Nami.” I muttered, still in pain, and remembering I had a healing ability I quickly slotted it and brought my hand to my head, letting out a small sigh of relief when I felt it immediately working.

“What happened!? You collapsed all of a sudden and then started bleeding from your ears and nose!?” Nami asked me with slightly wet eyes as she brought a rag against my face and wiped it for a moment, with the rag coming out a little bloody.

“The noise. It ruptured my eardrums.” I muttered with a groan as I sat up properly and shook my head as I quickly recovered due to my vitality, Healing Light, and natural regeneration.

Noticing something on my finger, I looked down briefly and spotted my Ring of the Sun Princess that I had lent to Nami now back on my hand, meaning she had probably put it on me with her worry. Sending her a questioning look, she caught my gaze and responded.

“I was worried, okay? You were really out of it and weren’t responding to me, so I panicked and put the ring back on.” Nami pouted with a bit of a sniffle as she quickly wiped her face and looked away.

“Thanks, Nami. I’m alright now.” Smiling at her, I patted her head, causing her to pout harder.

“How were you so affected in the first place? I have seen you do some pretty crazy things, so to see you taken down by a whale’s cry was strange. For a second, we even thought it was something else.” Nami asked curiously as she helped me get back to my feet again.

“You know how I have enhanced senses, right?” I asked, and seeing her nod I continued as I idly shook my head to get rid of the last of the dizziness. “Seems they were more enhanced than I first thought and were enough to affect me physically.” I said with a bit of a grimace.

‘Great, now I have to watch out for another weakness other than water unless I get an ability that cancels it out in the future.’ I thought with some annoyance as I started looking around us, noticing that we were no longer on the deck and I was actually in the girls’ room.

‘Seems I was out of it longer than I thought if Tiche is no longer here resting.’ I idly thought curiously.

“Thankfully it appears that it takes only extreme sounds like the one we just heard, and I can always heal myself up in the future if it happens again. I was just unprepared this time since this is the first time I’ve experienced this. Now let’s go tell the others I’m alright.” I continued, already walking toward the door.

“Umm, hehe, about that.” Nami suddenly laughed nervously, causing me to turn to her with a raised eyebrow to see her looking off to the side sheepishly.

“What is it?” I asked curiously.

“Well, when you passed out we panicked, attracting the attention of the whale, and then… …it swallowed us.” She finished while scratching the back of her head.

I could only deadpan at her and let out a sigh. ‘So that still happened, huh? Oh well, at least this way we can meet Flower Pops or Crocus faster.’

“…That’s a new one. Anyway, let’s go out and see what’s going on. I feel a presence just outside and another two getting closer to us.” I said with an unconcerned shrug as I opened the door and stepped outside.

“Act more concerned, damn it!” Nami suddenly yelled behind me as she quickly caught up to me and started glaring up at me with a pout and her hands on her hips.

My attention though, as well as the others from the crew, was on the figure of an old man sitting on a small island with an ornament on his head that looked like flower petals.

I stood back and watched in amusement as Crocus ran his small gag with the crew before finally stepping in when Sanji and Zoro got annoyed and looked ready to beat him up.

“Shishishi, hey flower guy! Nice to meet you, I’m Monkey D. Luffy.” I called out as I stepped up to the railing and gave the old man a small wave in greeting, receiving a silent raised eyebrow in return, though he did seem to pause at my D. name but quickly hid it.

“You wouldn’t happen to know how to get out of this whale, do you? Seeing as you’re living inside it and all.” I asked with crossed arms and a grin as the others gaped at me.

“We’re really still inside the whale!? So we’re not in heaven!?” Usopp exclaimed in panic as he and the others quickly started looking around at our surroundings as what appeared to be the outside was in reality the stomach of a huge island whale, since the clouds or birds in the sky didn’t move.

“This is all painted!?” Nami asked in surprise, completely forgetting about her worry and argument with me from earlier as she looked around in shock and panic. “Wait! That means we’re going to get digested!”

“Call it an artist’s hobby. And the exit is over there.” Crocus tried to do his gag on me as well but then calmly pointed to the exit when he saw that his little stare-down gag wasn’t going to work on me.

“It was there all along!?” Sanji shouted in shock at not having noticed it at all.

“Why didn’t you tell us sooner!?” Zoro yelled back at the old man in annoyance.

“It gets lonely in here, so how else was I supposed to amuse myself than scaring a bunch of pirates that intruded into my one-man resort.” Crocus said with a small shrug, getting angry tick marks from everyone around me.

“Shishishi, you’re funny, Crocus. I like you!” I laughed in a hearty manner as I saw the annoyed faces of my crew and gave the man a nod of respect.

“Heh, glad I amused you.” Crocus smirked in return.

We were forced to stop for a moment as the inside of Laboon started shaking suddenly, with Crocus quickly moving into action and sedating Laboon, causing the shaking to stop.

Crocus then spent the next few minutes explaining the reason Laboon had all those scars on his body and his tale of wanting to see his friends again and his belief that the Red Line was standing in the way of that.

‘You will reunite with Brook soon, Laboon. Just wait a bit longer.’ I thought silently, thinking of the lonely skeleton and the only person from Laboon’s friends that had survived so far fondly, still clinging onto life with the hope of one day seeing Laboon again someday.

I was pulled from my thoughts as I sensed the two presences quickly approaching and looked up, where moments later shouts were heard before a hatch was suddenly opened and the figures of a man and a woman fell through.

“Seems we have guests.” I muttered with a grin, and a second later I was already in the air with Geppo and gently caught the curvy and womanly figure of a beautiful light blue-haired girl with her hair pulled into a ponytail.

I looked down with a smile as Nefertari D. Vivi grunted a bit when she landed in my arms before slowly opening her doe-brown eyes when she noticed she wasn’t falling anymore and immediately focusing on my face with a surprised look.

“Hey there~ My name is Monkey D. Luffy. What’s yours?” I asked with a genuine happy expression on my face as I looked at the princess of the Arabasta Kingdom and a precious future nakama.