One Piece: Dream of Immortality

Chapter 506: Shutenmaru



"Father!" Toko shouted, refusing to release Yasuie.

"I'm sorry, Toko. I was careless," Yasuie apologized with a sad and sincere look on his face.

"There will be time enough for sappy reunions later. I've got to get you two out of the capital," Cherry landed next to them.

"Right," Yasuie nodded. "There isn't much else I can help with now that my identity is known, aside from joining my cohorts in battle."

"No," Cherry said, leading them away.

"No?" Yasuie was so caught off guard that he didn't know how to respond.

"You aren't joining the battle. You've given up enough of yourself for Wano. It's time to let others pick up the slack so that you can be a father," Cherry explained without looking back at him.

"What?" Yasuie sounded like he couldn't decide whether to be confused or angry. "How can I leave others to do the fighting for me? It would be the height of dishonor to abandon them in the final hour, to save my own skin!"

"Nobody made you take Toko into your life," Cherry spoke with the same calm as before. "You accepted that responsibility. One more sword held by an old man isn't going to change the course of the war, but your presence in Toko's life will make all the difference to her."

Yasuie wanted to argue some more, but his eye caught the way Toko was looking at him. It wasn't an expression of pleading, or one of great sadness or anger. She watched him patiently, serenely, as if she were waiting for him to make a decision.

She was so used to him choosing something greater than herself, no, something greater than the both of them that she had no strong reaction to the possibility of him running off to potentially die... again.

"You're right..." Yasuie admitted. "Ever since Oden-sama died... I've been looking for ways to make up for my failures, to make a martyr of myself even. My first thought when I thought I was going to die today was to be annoyed that my death wouldn't mean anything..."

"Idiot," Cherry said.

"Don't call father an idiot!" Toko complained.

Yasuie chuckled. "Yes, I suppose I am. My past is full of mistakes and regrets, and here I am trying to make some more. Toko will be my first concern from now on."

"That's good. I didn't want to have to dump you both in a foreign country until everything was over," Cherry nodded.

His daughter turned away from Cherry to look at him. She was surprised, he noted; how long had it been since he'd seen that emotion on her face? The surprise turned into unbridled joy, the kind that S.M.I.L.E. fruits could never replicate, and he wondered then how he ever could have chosen differently.

"Hush! They're starting to search the area for us!" Cherry hissed at them, which quickly put a stop to Toko's growing squeals of delight.

-

"It is remarkable how you do that..." Yasuie muttered as they left the Flower Capital far behind them.

"Do what?" Cherry asked.

"Well... all of it, really. This time it was the attacking Orochi in broad daylight, humiliating him in the process, and then sneaking us out of the city without a single person noticing us. We didn't even hide all that much, we just strolled on out like I wasn't a wanted criminal," Yasuie marveled.

"There's a trick to it that makes it much easier," Cherry said. "No, I won't elaborate."

"I see. Where are we going now?" Yasuie asked.

"We can go meet up with Kin'emon, I suppose. Now that you're free, my babysitting job is over and that's as fine a place to leave you as any," Cherry reckoned.

"It will be good to see him again. It's hard to believe, even now, that Toki-sama's prophecy was so literal." Yasuie sighed. "I also had an idea to share with him, since his previous plan was exposed."

-

Hours later.

"There you are!" Cherry threw her hands in frustration. "I've looked all over Wano for you!" "Cherry-dono?" Kin'emon stood up straighter. "And Yasuie-sama! I am so glad that you are still alive!"

The two old friends did as all old friends did and yammered on endlessly. Since they were busy, Cherry decided to busy herself with a fleet of poorly maintained ships docks at the shore here.

"Who are you? You won't touch those ships, if you know what's good for you!" A rotund, pink-haired man threatened.

"Ships? I see no ships here, only shipwrecks that have yet to sink," Cherry shot back. "And who the heck do you think you are, telling me what I can and can't do, or where I can and can't

go?"

"I am Shutenmaru of Mount Atama!" Ashura Doji proclaimed, as if she was supposed to know him by reputation alone.

"You're that coward that tucked his tail and ran when Kaido showed up a few days ago," Cherry countered.

"What?!" Ashura Doji growled. "And you would have charged to your own death, then?!"

"Not to my death, no. I would have won," Cherry smirked.

"Kin'emon, who is this obnoxious brat?!" Ashura Doji shouted over his shoulder.

"Ah, I see you've met Cherry-dono," Kin'emon stopped blabbing with Yasuie and sauntered over. "She is one of the Straw Hat pirates that we have allied ourselves with. Just recently, she bested another of the Emperors of the sea in battle! Having her as a trump card will ensure that even if the rest of us perish that Wano will be free of Kaido and Orochi's tyranny!"

Ashura Doji blinked at him, then blinked at Cherry. Cherry's smirk became even more infuriatingly smug, somehow.

"I also know a thing or two about ship maintenance," Cherry returned to the reason that Ashura Doji shouted at her to begin with. "I can write a summary of the work that needs doing so that Franky will have more time to do the actual repair work."

"An excellent idea!" Kin'emon nodded.

"Er... alright, then..." Ashura Doji said somewhat pathetically.

"Maybe I don't want to, now," Cherry crossed her arms and turned up her nose.@@novelbin@@

"You...?!" Ashura Doji stopped himself from shouting. He then, with far less hesitation than Cherry ever would have expected, planted his head against the ground and said, "I apologize for my rudeness! Please help fix the ships!"

"Way to make me feel bad for teasing you, big guy," Cherry chuckled. "There's nothing to apologize for. I wasn't offended."

"A man should know when to bow his head," Ashura Doji said, and for some reason Kin'emon averted his gaze and rubbed the back of his neck. "I am Ashura Doji. Forgive me, but I hope that you will not have to lift a finger in the coming battle."

"What strange mix of pride and humility you have," Cherry considered him.

"If I am to act on behalf of Oden-sama once more, then I should learn from his example."

Ashura Doji said. "Excuse me."

Ashura Doji walked away after excusing himself.

"That man isn't at all what I expected," Cherry said.

"Indeed. Even after knowing him for so long, I still underestimated him," Kin'emon agreed.