A taste of what's to come

“Where did you learn to fight?”, you were observing Zoro's training, to see if you could learn from him.

“Self taught.” You raised an eyebrow at him.

“Koushiro-sensei taught me how to use a sword, but I developed Santoryu myself and learned to fight in unsupervised sparring”, he relented.

“Koushiro-sensei as in Shimotsuki Koushiro, son of Shimotsuki Kozaburo?”

“I never knew, the old man was named after the village. I never met his dad.”

“The village is named after the father, you idiot!”

“How do you know about him?”

“He once visited my dad, when I was about nine. From what I remember my father was once supposed to recruit Kozaburo and later Koushiro for the World Government. Kozaburo was swordsmith from the Grand Line.”

“Really? He never mentioned working for the government.”

“My guess is he cut them. I remember my dad laughing about how Kozaburo was probably the strongest swordsman in all of the Blues yet Koushiro was considered a civilian.”

Zoro was in thought. After a few moments of quiet he spoke again: “Before I left he said: 'I still have so much to teach you, but I don't think you can learn anything more from me'... Back than I thought he meant things like manners, but I remember how he showed me one technique, I didn't understand at all: 'If you want to cut through everything, you have to be able to cut through nothing'”

You nodded. You had heard, that master swordsmen on the Grand Line were able to cut things, that should be harder than their blades and therefor not cuttable.

“Did he teach you about the sixth sense?”

“What are you talking about?”

“When he came over to visit my dad, he said he'd noticed my talent and offered to train me, but I was being arrogant and lazy. I tried to attack him and when he easily countered I immediately gave up and he didn't want to take someone in, who wasn't willing to push herself. I think he gave my sixth sense a name, but I can't remember it.”

“What's with this sixth sense you keep talking about?”

“It's hard to explain...”, you closed your eyes and turned your back at Zoro, “Try to hit me.” You felt him shrug and getting into stance. “WITH THE BLUNT SIDE!”

Zoro grumbled something under his breath and flipped his swords around.

His first swing was slow and aimed at your shoulder, you simply ducked under it. When realization set in, that you were indeed able to react to his attacks in time, he picked up the pace and quickly you found yourself brought to the limit of your physical abilities, as even if you knew about an attack as soon the opponent even thought of doing it, Zoro still swung three swords at the speed he'd defeat most enemies easily. And suddenly there was a fourth sword coming for you, attached to a man you hadn't met before.

While you recovered from Zoro's hit the rest of the crew cleared up the situation with the bounty hunter. His name was Johnny. He and his partner Yosaku had worked with Zoro in the past. Yosaku had contracted scurvy, Johnny had noticed us, when Luffy and Usopp had tested the cannon and when he had seen Zoro and you, he thought Zoro was actually trying to kill you and wanted to help.

“That settles it: We need a ship cook!”, Luffy decreed, “And only the best will do. That way we can eat delicious and healthy meat every day. Also he needs to be strong. We're not a big crew, so if we get into a battle, we'll need all hands on deck.”

“That was Nami's idea!”, You scolded him, but she was more relieved, that he set a good course of action, than angry that he didn't credit her.

“We know just the place!”, Yosaku and Johnny said in unison, eager to repay us for “curing” Yosaku.

It was the perfect storm of idiocy: Somehow none of you had thought of putting up a sail and flag without a Jolly Roger, the marine gunner somehow shot way to high, so that the cannonball would fly over the deck of the Merry without impacting. Luffy attempted to slingshot it anyway. And in his haste he forgot to make sure that his left hand had a good grip and the cannonball hit the Baratie.

“Say, Nami ... How much money do we have right now?”

God was really with us: Luffy ran ahead to apologize for the damages and within only a few minutes we got to see the sous-chef perform some nice legwork on the marine who had ordered his men to fire at us, an excuse for us to stay as long as it would take Luffy to get him to join us (because he was supposed to work off his debt) and meals on the house for Nami and you thanks to said sous-chef being so hopeless around women, that it made you reflect on your pursuit of Nami.

Nami: 30/100.

Nevermind. It was all going well.

You welcomed the stay. The food was not only delicious, but also fullfilling in just the right way. It was hard to tell without barbells but you felt as if your strength had doubled in the three days you stayed.

On the third day Don Krieg came. It turned out that one of his crewmates had escaped from marine custody and Sanji had fed him. You had no doubt, that the owner of the Baratie, a man named Zeff, would not give him any trouble over that; They both moved in extremely similar ways, suggesting that everything Sanji could do, from boiling potatoes to beating up a marine lieutenant without even taking his hands out of his pockets, he learned from the peg-legged cook.

Your estimation proved correct: Within not even a full minute of Don Krieg asking Zeff gave him enough food for his 100 remaining men to recover their strength. During the entire exchange there was a kind of tension emanating from Zeff, that seemed to go completely over the Don and his right hand man Gin. You were not surprised, that the self-declared admiral would fail to consider the threats of a cook, but Gin struck you as smarter and still he seemed unable to feel the old man's preparedness.

Than you felt another presence and so did Zeff and you were the first ones to witness the man coming: Dracule Mihawk, the best swordsman of the world was not much to look at. Though his presence had an intensity, that made it easy to tell, that he was not to be messed with, his physical appearance was a bit … underwhelming. He was barely, if at all, taller than Zoro and had a smaller frame. Though his black sword was massive, it looked ridiculous in the hands of someone who probably had only twice it's weight.

“Zoro, don't!”, you got your hand on his wrist as he made his way towards what Mihawk had turned Don Kriegs ship into.

“I have to fight him!”

“No, you won't fight him, you'll die, while he sheathes his sword!”

It was as you predicted. Mihawk used a novelty dagger and yet the encounter could hardly be described as a fight. You had to step in.

“Excuse me, Mihawk? Could I try as well?”

He didn't turn around: “What are you doing, young lady?”

“I'm trying to save my friend here, without disregarding his notion of honor.”

“Are you a swordsman as well? I don't see a sword on you.”

Mihawk: -10/100. You'd be lucky if you made it out of that alive

“I can also make good rice balls but you won't catch me calling myself a chef.”

“So you do not want to duel me.”

“After two or three years of intense training maybe, but right now it'd be just a second of disappointment for you.”

Mihawk: -9/100.

“You are already a disappointment. If he”, he nodded a Zoro, who was still standing, waiting for the 'duel' to resume, “had that kind of talent, he could have seriously made me sweat.”

“Life is unfair like that. I didn't want to become a fighter until not even a full year ago, but was gifted with this talent, yet Zoro knew what he wanted from early childhood”, before you could finish Mihawk drew his sword and spoke to Zoro: “This duel has gone long enough. It will end with the next strike. If you still can then, tell me your name and I will remember it. I expect you to challenge me again and when you do, you I expect you to be strong enough for me to take you seriously.”

As Johnny and Yosaku pulled him out of the water, Mihawk was already on his way back.

“I'm not gonna let you do that again, Zoro. If you want to challenge Mihawk again, you'll have to beat me first and don't expect me to go easy on you.”

Mihawk: 1/100. He must have heard that.

Only than did you realize, that Zoro was not on the Merry but on Johnny and Yosaku's boat. The Merry was quickly approaching the horizon and Nami apparently with it. The two bounty hunters and Usopp took Zoro and pursued her, while Luffy and you stayed behind to help defend the Baratie.

It turned out, that you should have gone with them: Don Krieg's third mate, a large man named pearl, relied exclusively on his armor to fight. While he did have remarkable strength by East-Blue standards it was nothing you had not seen before. Indeed he didn't get a single hit on Sanji in before completely losing his shit and trying to burn down the very ship his Captain wanted to commandeer.

Than followed the most interesting fight: While Gin had both the skill and the strength to wipe the floor with Sanji you didn't dare helping him, because Gin was holding back. If you were to interfere you worried he'd use his full abilities.

When he finally said it out loud Don Krieg did very much not appreciate this sudden sense of honor. He fired a gas grenade and ordered Gin not to use his mask.

Since you were out in the open all it took for you and the cooks to be safe was getting inside and closing the door for a few seconds and the gas dissipated. Than Luffy beat up Don Krieg. Until then you had thought Gin was following him due to some 'law of the strongest' mentality, but the Don had nothing but muscle and armor going for him. If he got close enough Gin could easily beat him.

Which he did. After breaking his armor and falling into the sea Luffy had wasted not time falling asleep. Don got back up declaring himself undefeated and Gin, half dead from voluntarily inhaling his poisonous gas, **** the retreat instead.

Sanji finally agreed to join Luffy.

Nami 45/100. Time to see what was going on there.