Chapter 32: Shells Town
"Grandpa, you can never lift it up. Hehehehe..." Luffy was laughing and for the first time in his life was having a sense of accomplishment. Enma in his hand turned himself back to the monkey.
"What is this?" Garp looked at Ken because he had only seen Ken using it. even in Dadan's home sometimes he would see the hammer in the hands of Ken but he never cared. Until today.
"It's useless Grandpa. But don't worry I will take away the hammer when I am very far after that you can go on your way and we go our own way. I know you don't want us to be pirates but we both know that once Luffy had decided there was nothing that could change his mind." Ken said.
Garp didn't know what to say. After the incident with Shanks, Luffy changed a lot and even before meeting Shanks, he was already clamouring to be a pirate. Shanks just added more fuel.
"What about you? Why don't you join the marines? I thought you wanted to lead a good life." Garp asked, almost giving up lifting the hammer. He tried with his hand but he still couldn't lift it up.
"I don't want my hands dyed red with the blood of the innocents." Ken said with a very serious expression and in a whispering sound. Garp was confused by this.
"What are you talking about? Marines protect the innocents. It has always protected the normal people in the seas."
"Grandpa, we both know that isn't true." Ken said as he started walking off. He didn't want to argue more with Garp about ideologies and the past. It was meaningless.
Luffy too didn't bother anymore with Garp and started walking off. Garp could only move his head and eyes and see his two grandsons go away in the sea. For some reason he didn't feel resentment. Luffy had some weird moves while Ken even knew Haki. They were already very powerful and could easily play in the first half of Grand Line.
Until then there was still a lot of time.
The locals who had been hiding cheered as they came out. This small fight had destroyed a lot of things so Ken gave away 10 million bellies to the village chief.
"You don't have to do this. We are self sufficient. You have even killed the sea kings nearby, so we are happy." the village chief said as he held his cane. But Ken insisted. The sea kings were their food anyways so it didn't matter.
Makino too came forward and provided some barrels of ale as she knew that Ken loved wine and ale. Ken was more than happy to see this. After getting on the deck of the ship both Ken and Luffy bid their goodbyes.
"Everyone.. Goodbye.. Grandpa, I will lift the hammer when I go far. Don't come after us." Ken shouted. Luffy had a wide smile as he too said their byes and set sail.
"Oi kid come back .. Take away the hammer. If you go away, who will lift it up? Oi marines come here." Garp was furious that Ken didn't pull away the hammer and just left shamelessly. He didn't know what Ken meant by the thing that he would lift the hammer later. Some marines came who had gained consciousness and tried lifting the hammer.
But none of them could. No matter what!!
The more Garp saw this the more he became angry.
"How dare this kid leave me here. I will beat him once I reach the Grand line."
Ken and Luffy sailed away slowly with the help of knowledge Ken learnt in the past few months. He marked the Shell's Town and all other places where Luffy was destined to pick up his comrades. So after marking it the ship turned in that direction.
"Luffy, we will need a crew. Who will you go for first?"
"We need a navigator, a chef... umm.. Oh yes, a musician..." Ken could understand the dream of Luffy of going after a musician. He himself wanted to listen to the songs of his previous life but he couldn't. Now the sailing had started and they would pass most of the time on the sea.
It would be boring. And music might just help elevate that mood.
But sadly the musician is very far away..
"There is a person in Shells Town named Roronoa Zoro. It is said that he is a very powerful bounty hunter and is the most powerful in the East Blue. Do you want to go for him?" Ken suggested. Ken was banking on the fact that the lives of these people were still on the original trajectory and thus they would be able to 'catch' them as they were supposed to.
"Bounty hunter? Won't he hunt for us?" Luffy was puzzled.
"I heard this Zoro guy wants to be the greatest swordsman in the world so it doesn't matter if he is a bounty hunter or a pirate. As long as we can take in our group and set sail it will be fine." Ken said.
"Yosh!! Then we will go for this Zoro guy." Luffy decided as he went to the fridge to consume some meat. Enma too was accompanying them and he didn't go back. He wanted to see the sea too. Rarely he gets to see a new world. But soon he got bored after seeing the same ocean so he decided to go away.
Luffy didn't care as he was busy eating meat.
"I wonder if we will meet with Alvida and Koby." Ken thought as they encountered a whirlpool. Seeing the whirlpool, Ken's face twitched. Luffy was thrown to the whirlpool and had to hide in a barrel which was later recovered by Koby.
Now it seemed like fate still played that trick and pushed them to the whirlpool. Both Luffy and Ken had to run and make adjustments to the mast and steer away from the huge whirlpool. They just got the ship. In no way, it would be destroyed by this shit.
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Hello all, I would really like if you can provide some power stones to the story for a little more respectable ranking. Thank you