Swordsman's adventure 25

One of the things Tanya absolutely did not enjoy learning was how to strut. By that, of course, she meant how to walk in ways that maximize appeal, rather than for other kinds of utility. But Grandmother, as in Mai, not Shakuyaku, had put quite a bit of effort into the education, and it was a good opportunity to chat with the albatross around the world’s neck, pun intended. 

Of course, one of the unexpected benefits of this training was becoming better at doing the opposite, walking in such a way as to de-emphasize her hips, increasing the difficulty of spotting her as a girl at first glance. 

Larry, on the other hand, was definitely her better in that department, somehow managing one of the dantiest strides Tanya had ever seen despite his hairy, muscular legs. The high heels helped, of course, the whole reason they became fashionable for women in the first place was because they made strutting feel more like a natural gait. Tanya learned that too, naturally. She possessed far too many pairs of high heels back at the castle, although she only had the pair she was gifted to attend that wedding currently. 

Even then, Tanya’s Observation clocked Larry as one of the strongest fighters among this group of revolutionaries. Was this the grace and power of an Okama Kenpo master? 

After they boarded the ship, Kuina went below decks towards the weight room, as she usually did after something disturbed her worldview. Okamas did tend to do that. 

They, on the other hand, went into Tanya’s cabin. Tanya secured the chests, as they had drifted a bit while they were drinking, and opened up the drawer of her drafting table. It was supposed to be used for maps, but she used it as more of a general drawing table. “This is what I’m currently working on.” Tanya said, unrolling the large poster.

It was a picture of Roger, deliberately aged to the point where she was fairly certain he’d be if he was alive again. His hair was gray, his moustache was even more magnificent, and his wrinkles had multiplied, especially the laugh lines around his eyes. She used her previous drawings of Grandpa and Scopper as references to how people like them aged, along with the best pictures that could be found of the former Pirate King and his mates. 

Roger was seated in the picture, holding a sake cup. He was wearing a coat somewhat similar to Father’s, with flared sleeves to make it look less put-together. No shirt underneath, of course. The casual design was capped off with shorts that went down to a little bit above his knees and sandals on his otherwise bare feet. 

It was all in pencil still, of course: she hadn’t inked it yet. Furthermore, while the sketch was done, it was only a small part of the drawing: Roger took up only a third of the paper. 

“Oh wow, how vivid!” Larry complimented. “It’s like he’s still alive…” That’s what hours upon hours of practice got you: she wasn’t exactly the best artist in the world, but she was proud of her hard-won skills. 

“Tanya.” Lucy said, suddenly dead serious. She gripped Tanya’s shoulders so she could make intense eye contact. “Tanya, you’d tell me if Roger was still alive, wouldn’t you?” Tanya was speechless. What? “Tanya. You’re not saying anything and I’m scared. Please tell me that Gold Roger is dead.” She repeated, desperation creeping into her voice. 

Tanya burst out laughing. “Roger’s dead, Lucy.” She assured her friend. “This is a speculative drawing. I don’t have many live models nowadays, so I have to make due with references.” She took out the wanted poster, mug shot, and newspaper clipping she used as her references. Yes, even Gold Roger got a trial, in a courtroom, in front of a judge. It wasn’t a fair trial, mind you, but the man was guilty as sin of enough of the crimes he was accused of that the result would have been the same even if it was fair. “Also, his family name was Gol, not Gold. It annoyed him immensely that the World Government made the mistake.” Of course, it was no accident. Same reason her own no-bounty poster doesn’t include her middle initial. 

Larry tittered. “Well, those Ds are always popping up when they’re unwanted.” 

“D. Was his middle initial.” Tanya clarified. “His full name was Gol D. Roger.”

“The mysterious D…” Lucy murmured. “What does it mean?”

“Anyway,” Tanya said, changing the subject. “-the rest of the picture would be him having a drink with his Left and Right Hands, together again.” She gestured to the white expanses at either side of the Roger sketch. “I was thinking of making the background imply that Roger’s welcoming his friends to the afterlife,” Mostly for political considerations, it didn’t actually make much sense if she was drawing him aged, “-but I haven’t finalized that yet.” She was planning on giving the finished product, in full color, to Grandpa for his 75th birthday, but then Tanya thought Ace might want to see it too, so she decided to get started on it early. 

“That’s some dangerous art…” Larry said, “I like it.”

“As for my finished works,” Tanya said, rolling her latest work back up and putting them away. “I’ve drawn some good portraits of my crew, in my opinion at least.”

While she did have portraits of the humandrills, they hated standing still, so it was a little difficult to get good references. Furthermore, all the fur tended to obscure the anatomical details to the point where she had given up on making realistic drawings of most of their bodies. So her work with those tended to be more… stylized. 

“Cute!” Lucy and Larry said at the picture of the humandrills monkeying around. Somehow, they sounded exactly the same. 

“Next, I have these portraits of Kuina.” Tanya said, showing off the next set side by side. The first was a recreation of when Tanya met the blacksmith once more, with her wearing her apron without a shirt holding a sword she was polishing. The next was an action pose, Kuina balanced on her foot as she thrust Chigiri Kakudo forward towards the viewer, her expression determined. 

“Fearsome!” Larry said, 

“Badass!” Lucy said a half-step behind him. 

“Then Ace…” Tanya said. She only had one made of him, just in a casual pose watching something to the side. 

“Hubba hubba!” Larry exclaimed, rubbing his thighs together like an excited schoolgirl, “You sure spent a lot of time tracing each and every muscle there…” They added, elbowing Tanya in the side. She flushed at the implication. It wasn’t her fault that all of her usual models were incredibly muscular! It gave her a lot of practice, and it was just a habit at this point…

“Is he single?” Lucy asked, interested. “He looks hot!” Tanya jolted and double-checked the picture. Did she add any flames and forget about it? No, just a coincidence, not a pun. 

“I do not appreciate your insinuations.” Tanya said heatedly to Larry, who tittered at the aggression, clearly amused. “The boy is even more allergic to shirts than my father.” In the colder, wetter climate of Gloom Island, he actually wore shirts quite often. He was just quick to ditch them if they got dirty. “Anyway, lastly we have Deuce.” She drew a picture of him furiously studying one of Crocus’ books, the old man glowering menacingly in the background. He had his mask on, of course. 

“He’s fine too, I guess.” Both of them said simultaneously, doing a poor job of hiding how performative it was. 

That was cold… Yeah, Deuce’s portrait wasn’t the most flattering but… Ouch. She was almost tempted to draw him equally shirtless… almost. 

“This next set is of the current Seven Warlords.” Tanya said, coughing. Father in an action pose, Jinbei seated with a sake cup larger than his webbed hand, Hanafuda twirling his kusarigama, Crocodile lighting a cigar, Moira half-sunk into his shadow making a spooky pose, Doflamingo showing off his rickets (not really, he just walked very strangely), and Hancock laying dramatically over a chaise lounge. “I couldn’t get Hancock as a live model, unfortunately, but I managed to get a few photos.” Grandma got them from her contacts on Amazon Lily. The eldest Boa sister’s beauty was not exaggerated; seeing just the picture for the first time nearly turned her to stone! Fortunately, Grandma knocked some sense into her. By now, after careful study as she drew from the reference, she was reasonably confident she wouldn’t make a fool of herself if she ever ran across the Empress. 

Tanya brought out a few more pictures, each time getting some appreciative comments from her audience. She even showed them some more of Grandpa’s crew without them even realizing; beyond the top three officers, the rest of the crew wasn’t really known to the public at large. 

Once the Revolutionary Army members took their leave, Tanya took a moment to appreciate the ones she didn’t dare show to anyone not already in the know. 

A picture of Scopper Gaban with his family, laughing as he sat cross-legged in his girlfriend's left hand, held in front of her stomach. Their son Colon, who looked seven despite being fifteen, just a year and a half older than her, was being held on his mother’s hip on her right side, her stance slanted to even out the weight. Giants took a little more than twice as much time to mature as humans, and even then tended to keep growing all throughout their lives, if not nearly as fast as when they were maturing. 

A family picture of her own family back when both of her Grandparents visited Gloom Island, one of her few self-portraits. Father was having Grandma cut and style his hair, while Tanya (age 13) pretended to be taught how to play dice by Grandpa, curiously turned away from the perspective to allow it to be displayed, in the background. This was not an easy pose to make a self-portrait of. She was wearing her kuja dress, because Tanya has a hard time saying no to her grandmother when there isn’t at least a day of sailing between them. The main reason Tanya didn’t show this to Lucy was that she knew the girl well enough that she would absolutely insist that Tanya remove her bindings to prove that she wasn’t exaggerating her own proportions. Well, maybe she had changed; she knew about Tanya’s complaints on the subject; Tanya half-expected Lucy to bring them up on her own initiative, but she didn’t. Small mercy. 

Most of the Roger pirates were too paranoid for their bounties to show up again to want to be drawn, but she did have two more: First, there was Sunbell and his daughter, an oarfish mermaid by the name of Moonflower. The picture was of them mid-training session, Sunbell easily controlling the clash between their tridents despite Tanya knowing for a fact that that clash was immediately preceded by Moonie charging so fast she created a sonic boom underwater. That was not easy, even for a mermaid. She hoped she had properly conveyed the force of the blow with her drawing of the water ripples… Alas, she couldn’t really show it to anyone. 

Finally, although this one was not up to her current standards of quality, one of the massive Nozdon and his much smaller wife from the White Sea, plus their wingless daughter, who was… nineteen now? Somehow, the girl managed to inherit her father’s immense strength and packed it in her mother’s tiny frame. She never did learn where they lived, having only met them once six years ago with a few snail calls since. She had probably grown quite a bit since then… Ace would probably love to meet her. Maybe she became a pirate already? 

She’ll write to Grandpa, get their home island from him. Everyone’s location, actually, she was reasonably certain she remembered most of them… although she may have to spoil the surprise if she tries that. Hopefully it’s not too close to Reverse Mountain, or she’ll need to turn around by the time she gets the reply. 

Anyway, she better leave the cove before someone who cares spots her associating with Revolutionaries. This whole civil war is a heaping pile of none of her business, now that she’s made money. 

-------------------------

[Portgas D. Ace]

“So that’s the situation, Deuce.” Ace said seriously. “We’ve gotta help Ten out!”

“Are we really going to abandon the Captain on the first island?” Deuce asked. It was a reasonable question. “She never struck me as the ‘hero’ type.” He turned to Ten. “Hey, does your family have any money? It’s pretty much the only thing she cares about.”

.

Ten growled. “No… Dad spent all of the treasure he got from his days as a pirate. He’s a lumberjack now.” Ah, yeah. Woodcutting’s a pretty easy source of cash, when he was saving up for his pirate journey he got a fair amount of it that way. It was good training too. “All our money goes into his stupid airboat project.”

“Airboat?” Ace asked. That sounded cool… 

“Oh, it’s just a boat with a giant balloon.” Ten said dismissively. “Uses flame and breath dials to fly, yadda yadda, go to a Sky Island when-” Ten sarcastically used air quotes while rolling her eyes. “-the time comes.” 

Deuce and Ace looked at each other. “The time comes for… what?” Deuce asked. 

“I don’t know!” Ten groused, “He never said, just smiled and laughed when I asked. Told me not to worry, because he had a plan.”

Ace remembered Old Man Crocus’ story about Shandora, the golden city in the sky. “I’d like to go there one day.” He said, “You know where the sky islands are?”

Ten shrugged, “You have to watch for a special kind of cloud, and there’s a few natural super-geysers that’ll get you up even without an airboat, but that’s hard to time, supposedly.” Yeah, that matched up with Old Man Crocus’ story. Damn, he was hoping there was an easier way. 

“We’ve drifted off topic.” Deuce pointed out, “How, exactly, are we supposed to accomplish this before the Captain drags us off to the next island?”

“The log pose takes a whole week to reset here.” Ten pointed out, “So you’ll have at least that much time. The rebellion’s not going to last that long if we don’t do anything.”

Ace scoffed. “Eh, I bet I could take him.”

Ten laughed. “Dad’s the strongest guy on the whole archipelago. The only reason Zeref didn’t kick it sooner is that he left us alone.” She stopped laughing, a little sad. “Dad always said that Zeref was here first, and that he wanted to give me the chance to choose my path in life, instead of it being chosen for me.” She sighed, “He’s a really good dad…” Ace scowled, his chest aching at the emotion in that little-but-not-really girl’s voice. Firming up, she continued: “Which is why we’re going to save him!”

“By saving your mother.” Ace finished, clenching his fist and half-rising out of his seat. 

“Right!” Ten said, wiping away the small tears that had formed. “They won’t be so quick to kill Mom if some unrelated pirate breaks into their fancy citadel, so what we need to do is make sure they think you’re going after something completely different!”

He liked this plan. Time to join a war! 

-------------------------

[Dracule D. Tanya]

Now, she had a few days to waste not joining the local war while the log pose reset, so what to do… 

Well, she wouldn’t be a very good merchant if she did all of her work in a single port, there were plenty of other ports where she can get good prices on the products of local industries, so that’s a good way to spend time. 

The seat of government was on New Alvarez, although the island used to have another name of course. It was a citadel island, a military bastion that maintained a large enough Navy that it was able to exert military pressure on every single other island on the Archipelago. As she understood things, the main reason the civil war wasn’t over had more to do with some influential military leaders taking “neutral” stances, making sure to protect the seat of power while doing very little to stop the rebels. 

Only a fool would dare attack such a place without an overwhelming strength advantage. She might be able to break it if she were so inclined, but kingdoms like this tended to have at least one or two people that were powerful for this part of the ocean, and while she was one of those people, there was a very real chance that whatever final defender they had on hand could match her. Furthermore, her Observation was capable of giving her an idea of how durable inanimate objects were if she focused, and those stone walls were… cuttable, but they’re sturdy. All in all, she’d give herself a 60% chance of being able to conquer the kingdom right here and now. Her Observation couldn’t pick up anyone particularly powerful right now, but that didn’t mean as much as she’d like. 

Oh, one of the patrol boats is hailing her. She supposed that sailing what was no doubt an unfamiliar ship to them within twenty miles of their fortress, even if it was just on the way to her actual destination, was sufficiently concerning to send some poor bastard to flush out if they’re pirates. 

Tanya wasn’t flying her jolly roger right now, of course. She was just standing on her ship’s frontal chase turret, one of her favorite places to command the rest of the ship from. Good view, and she could launch flying slashes at any incoming obstacles. She could also aim and fire the cannons from up here, theoretically, but it was much easier to do that from the rear of the turret, where the actual controls were. 

She instructed the humandrills to slow the ship down, and allowed the patrol boat to come up alongside. It was substantially smaller than The Argent, and Tanya hopped over to the side turret, grabbing a sail and swinging underneath it so she could do so without using a movement technique. She walked down the middle cannon, and once she got to the end she kicked it just so and it went all the way down, poking out flush with the deck like the old stories of ‘walking the plank’. It was now pointed straight at the patrol boat’s main mast. It wasn’t loaded, though. Kayaku, thoughtfully, had a single artillery shell in his hands as he approached the turret and offered it helpfully. She silently gestured for him to be ready to load it in case she wanted to make a statement. 

“What do we have here?” Tanya began before they could start issuing demands. “Are you customers, perhaps? I’m afraid I’ve already unloaded most of my goods, so unless you’re interested in purchasing your own country’s goods, my catalogue is rather barren right now.” She whispered to Saifu and retrieved her inventory ledger, snapping it open to the page detailing the inventory she finished about two hours ago. “But not empty, if you were interested in making some small purchases. I still have a few fine blades remaining, created with the techniques passed down from the samurai clans of Wano!” She sold the Revolutionaries enough to fit in the crates she had, but there were about a dozen left over. 

The large man that appeared to be the superior officer gaped at her audacious introduction. “U-unidentified vessel, you will submit to an inspection!” He shouted. He appeared to be using his dress uniform, and his hair was very well tended to. His strength was below his second in command, who had a spear in his hand. 

“Unidentified?” Tanya shouted, acting affronted. “I just left one of your own ports after lunch today!” She only spent about three hours with the revolutionaries, and most of that was drinking. Her gunboat haggling technique resolved the whole deal within one. The sun was starting to set, though, she’d like a good spot to weigh anchor. Because they all had vivre cards for her, she wasn’t worried about Ace and Deuce getting lost. They can handle themselves for now. She has those vivre cards Lucy had made up for her to pick them up when it was time to go. “Someone in your communications department is not doing their jobs if you think my very distinctive sail, the only one of its kind in this sea, is unidentified!”

The officer didn’t look remotely surprised. She could see the officer’s eyes drift towards her plentiful jewelry, lingering on Shodai Kitetsu’s gaudy sheath. His eyes gleamed with greed. “Nevertheless, identify yourself and I will inspect your goods!” He insisted, doubling down. 

“I am the Captain of the Argent, flagship of the Grimm Kingdom navy.” Tanya said, tilting her head back so she could look down on the officer of the smaller ship from the cannon. “We are sailing on an extended shakedown tour, braving the seas of Paradise so as to increase the veterancy of its crew.” This was technically true. One of the points of the trip was to expose the humandrills to many varied sailing experiences so they can then share that knowledge with the rest. Kayaku hooted a questioning tone, holding up the artillery shell. Tanya sharply hooted back: “Not yet.” She was quite glad that they couldn’t see Kayaku from their position. 

“You’ve already told me you’re a merchant vessel.” The officer, who has yet to identify himself, responded. “You’ve also neglected to share your rank. Allow yourself to be boarded or I will declare you a pirate and treat you as such.“

Tanya sighed. Yeah, he was not just ‘doing his job’. That was a threat. She didn’t defeat an army of two ton monkeys alone to be threatened by some petty naval officer drunk on his own power. “I’m a direct representative of one of the Seven Warlords of the Sea, of course I’m a pirate!” In an eyeblink, she had Shodai Kitetsu, still sheathed, in her hand and pointing at his face. Only a blind idiot would fail to sense the aura of bloodlust surrounding the still-restrained blade, “Which you would know if you bothered to keep informed of important personages within your territory.”

Unfortunately, she was facing such a blind idiot. He was confused, before slowly moving to grab the sheathed blade. She twitched the weapon, and his coat suddenly popped open, as two of the buttons were cut off. The rest followed suit as his fat gut spilled out. He jolted backwards. His second in command took a combat stance, but also stepped back away from the cursed blade. 

“Now, you’re going to go back to your citadel, and inform them that my identity has been confirmed and whatever alert was raised due to my presence within sight of your fine fortifications should be rescinded, understand?” Tanya said, her words cutting through the panicked din of the other sailors. That was one of her favorite tricks, haki was just so versatile. 

Still, the idiot firmed up. “If I don’t?” He asked, “Attacking the capital of a Kingdom in the World Government would be grounds to get your Warlord’s privileges revoked.”

Tanya laughed. He didn’t know anything at all, did he? “I guess if you’re not going to sail away on your own power, you won’t be needing that mast.” Kayaku, who had already loaded the artillery shell, grinned savagely at Tanya’s hand sign and fired the cannon. 

A normal cannonball would tear through the mast, causing it to fall over. Simple enough. Tanya’s special artillery shells were not so merciful. It drilled into the wooden beam and exploded, creating a massive hole in the middle of their deck. Shrapnel flew off in all directions, severing several of the ropes tying the destroyed mast to the rest of the ship. Simultaneously with the explosion, Tanya cut the rest of the ropes in time for the explosion to fling the broken mast upwards, still not bothering to unsheath Shodai Kitetsu. 

Tanya took a moment to assess the damage. The idiot’s eyes were bulging, and while several of the sailors were injured by shrapnel, none seemed in serious danger. None of the sailors were stupid enough to stay in the rigging when they saw the cannon pointed at the mast. “W-w-w-w-w-w-w-what!?” The idiot shouted. 

“At the top of the world, all who do not claim the blood of nineteen conquerors are seen as equally worthless!” Tanya shouted, letting her anger at this fact shine through. “The only measure that matters is strength, and your delusions of importance are as nothing in the face of the World Government’s institutional nepotism!”

With a flourish, she drew her blade and launched a furious windstorm with a single swing, shredding the still-midair mast, sail, and ropes into wood shavings and strips of cloth. Point made, she sheathed her blade. “Know. Your. Place.” She hissed. The idiot passed out, foaming at the mouth despite her keeping a firm grip on her Conqueror’s. It was a bit of an effort to do that, too: she didn’t hate self-righteous incompetence any less just because it came from a man, instead of Being X. It just meant she could do something about it. 

She sailed away, hopping back onto her ship and giving Kayaku a high five. Well, it was a high five for her, anyway. Kuina, on the other hand, just looked at her disappointed. “Did you really just destroy a random ship because they were rude to you?” She asked. 

With a hand signal, the sails were released and the ship sped up and away. “He pissed me off.” Tanya said defensively. “Also, he wasn’t just rude to me.” She clarified, “That was an extortion attempt.”

“Strength isn’t supposed to be used so frivolously.” Kuina lectured, “You’re never going to get stronger if you keep punching down.”

Tanya nodded. That was fair. “I have other concerns.” She explained patiently. “I know his type, they’re all over the world.” Especially at the very top. “To submit to his power play would be worse than cutting off his head; I shouted my association with my father quite loudly, after all. I have to uphold the dignity of the Seven Warlords, and the World Government by extension.” She gestured vaguely to the ruined ship. “By jumping at the word of any petty bureaucrat like a common citizen, I demean the position that allows me this latitude. I’m not one to throw around my status for no reason, like some people, but anyone who decides that I’m easy prey just because of my size, or sex, or what have you, are going to learn the error of their ways.”

“You’re just sinking to their level, though.” Kuina pointed out. 

Tanya shrugged. “Perhaps, but I’m not on this world to fix it, Kuina.” She said, staring straight into the swordswoman’s eyes. “Everywhere, there are petty tyrants that flex their power on the weak for their own satisfaction. In the East Blue, on the Grand Line, up in the clouds, above them, even in the Heavens themselves.” She shrugged helplessly. “I could kill them as I find them, true, but… I’m not a Revolutionary. I just want to live in the world, reclaim what’s mine, and maybe, just maybe, I’ll grow old and die, once and for all.” 

Kuina looked at her strangely. She might have caught her little slip in meaning. “That’s… your dream?” She asked, “To die?”

“No.” Tanya said softly. “It’s… complicated. What I have done, however, is inflict substantial material damage that rests solely on the shoulders of that corrupt imbecile. Depending on how earned his arrogance is, it could be grounds for him to lose his position and thus influence. If he manages to muster military forces away from the civil war, that’s good for the Revolutionaries anyway. Helping them directly actually would threaten Father’s position, but I can’t be blamed for the actions of a fool.”

“Ah.” Kuina said in understanding. “I see, that’s clever! Should I start some trouble in the next port, then?”

“No, that won’t be necessary.” Tanya said, “We’re just buying some raw materials, timber, metal, and other shipbuilding sundries.” They were bulky goods, but at sea she could sell them for absolutely ridiculous markups, if she found some poor saps whose ship was damaged at sea. “I hope it’s up to your standards, you’ve been very industrious with the forge.”

Kuina gave Tanya a thumbs up. “Grandpa always said that you should be able to make a quality blade in a state of total zen, acting without thought, before you can have a chance to make a Skillful-grade sword! I’m getting close to what he means, I know it! I just need to keep trying.”

“Good to hear.” Tanya said, smiling. “Now, to Bosco!”