.҉

.҉

.҉

The eels stop following them as the boat is dragged through the island's river until they reach a lake, where a sacrificial altar in the middle of the water is waiting for them.

"We're being sacrificed?!" Chopper asks in fright as their kidnapper brings the ship to the top of the altar.

"Don't think that might be that problem now" Ana said as they watched the shrimp leave them alone.

.҉

.҉

.҉

"That's because of the sky sharks" Robin says as she points to the rest of the water, where numerous striped sharks' dorsal fins are popping out of the water in preparations of catching their prey.

"We could still get out of here, but the ship..." Nami flinches at the sharks then looks around at the forest that's too far for them to jump from their location. Zoro uses a rope ladder to climb off the boat and sees that the bottom of the ship was damaged from the dangerous trip.

"It doesn't look like we can get far with the Merry like this. Chopper, can you see if you can fix it?"

"Then what are you going to do?" Chopper nods to the request while the navigator looks at him in confusion.

"I'm going to the island to look for the fake god" Zoro smirks at the question before he looks at the island.

"Don't call him fake! You'll piss him off!" the redhead looks at the smirking man in utter shock as she runs behind the mast, in case the god heard him.

"I don't believe in god so why should I care?" the swordsman smirks at her worry as he looks to the island.

"Wow" Chopper stares at the arrogant swordsman in awe while Nami silently prays for forgiveness not noticing how Anamaria was edging the man on to continue from behind her.

"Robin, can you get me that vine?" the man asked the archaeologist as he held his hand out.

"Mind if I come along too?" Robin nods as she summons up an arm on the tree to lower not just that vine, but two more and pushes it towards the ship.

"No problem, just don't get in my way" Zoro says as he catches the vines for them.

"You too Robin?!" Nami asks with Robin nodding "A-Ana?"

"I..." the woman pauses when she see Chopper's teary expression directed at her "...ain't going'" Anamaria shook her head as she yawned widely, thinking of napping for a bit once the others left.

"This altar is at least a thousand years old. I'm really curious about the history of this place" the archaeologist grins at the navigator as she points to the land "There could even be hidden treasure and material we can use to fix the ship"

"In that case I'm in!" Nami perks up the mention of treasure and grins at the island, that she was afraid of just a moment ago.

"You're serious?!" Chopper asks when Nami turns to him with beli in her eyes.

"Of course, we need to learn about the history!" Nami nods to the plan as she points to the whistle for the sky knight, that's hanging onto the mast "Alright, you can use the sky knight whistle if you need it"

Zoro grip on his vine as his clear his throat. Once he's ready, he pulls back and swings on the vine while he yells out as if he's Tarzan.

"AAAAAAaAaAaaaAAAAAAAA!"

Ana cackles at that and the faces of Nami and Robin before they followed him until they land on the island. Once the three of them are safely on land, they look back to the ship.

"Take care, don't let the priests kill you" Robin says as if what she said wasn't scary.

"Don't say that Robin!" Nami says before she waves Anamaria and Chopper off "We'll be back soon!"

"Don't worry about us! Be careful!" Chopper says as he waves them off. Once the three of them are out of their sight, Chopper grabs a hammer along with some nails "Where should we start first?"

"Do I gotta work?" Ana whined out. She sees the look on the doctor's face before sighing and picking up another hammer "How 'bout we start with the outside?"

Chopper knits his eyebrows at the sight of the damage of not only the bottom of the ship, but also a few holes on the outside of the boat. He grabs some lumber to patch one of the holes when he drops the hammer. He tried to catch it, but even when he changed into heavy point it was out of his reach.

The tool quickly falls down the stairs, but instead of hitting the water, it stops at the final step. He gulps when he sees the sharks that are close to the bottom step. He looks up to see if Ana was outside yet, but he doesn't see her, so he doesn't want to risk a shark trying to eat it, he cautiously steps down the stairs. When he's close enough to reach for it, he struggles to grab it while keeping his eyes on the waters for the sky sharks.

Just when his fingers touch the tool, his eyes widened when a sky shark jumps out of the water for him.

"AAAH!"

He keeps screaming as he grabs the hammer and makes a run for it to narrowly dodge the fish. Another one jumps out high enough to catch the reindeer as he opens his jaws for his prey, but instead of receiving a meal, he got a flying side kick to the nose from the tattooed woman who had nearly dozed off inside. Chopper stops running when he reaches the top of the stairs and turns around in shock to the now unconscious shark fall.

"Remember doc, if ya hit a shark in the nose, they go runnin' no matter how big they are" she winked down at him.

"R-really?!" Anamaria nodded as she looked to see if the deer was hurt anywhere. Chopper shake his head before he turns to the ship "I'm ok, but we should get started"

"Ok, which part needs...?!" she cuts herself off when a shadow overcasts the two of them.

"You two are the only sacrifices?" the two of them turn around and look up to see the man that rode the purple bird smirking at them from the back of his bird.

"Doc, get on the ship and make sure the whistle's close..." Ana told the reindeer while she kept her eyes on the new arrival. The reindeer perks up at the reminder of the sky knight's whistle, that's still hanging on the mast, and rushes to climb on the rope ladder.

"And what do you think you're doing?" Shura asks his bird's mouth begins to heat up, but before he can scorch anything, the bird gags as a burst of water hit them both straight in the face making them fly back.

"Now now there, That ain't polite at all don't ya think? Ya didn't even introduce yerself" Ana yawned as she unhooked Fang from her waist without taking it out of the sheath.

"You already met me you crazy woman you...!" the man cuts himself off when he feels the same unique aura that he sensed earlier coming from his opponent. His shock changes to sadistic delight as he grips his javelin "So you're the mantra holder. Fuza!"

The bird knew exactly what his rider wanted, so he activated the heat dial in his mouth and breathed fire directly at her. However Anamaria simply smiled lazily and wiped her hand down, cooling the water in the air enough to blow out the fire as if it were from a simple candle.

"Your mantra's weird, I can't predict your moves as well! But that doesn't matter!" Shura starts heating his javelin up with his dial while Fuza charges towards her. He jabbed the javelin at her only for her to have already moved several staps to his right, dodging the blow before it came.

"What?!" he couldn't recover to the shock in time, until her leg went up and swiftly hit the back of his neck making him spit out in pain.

The bird stumbles down for a moment before he shakes his head and flies off just in time to dodge the next kick despite the certain concussion he would have now. The priest smirks at the enjoyable battle he's having, as the two enemies continuously dodge each other's moves.

"So you're the same as Eneru" he says, making her pause.

"Who?! What kinda crazy ass name is that?!"

"What did you say?!" Shura widens his eyes at the question he took as an insult before anger begins to take over him.

Anamaria easily blocks Fuza's flames with another wall of water, while the bird charges at her. Just when Shura's about to try stabbing her again, his weapon failed because of Ana's own sword blocking him making him instantly retreat his weapon when he heard it hiss as it hit the opposing metal.

Shura snaps out of it when Anamaria axe kicks Fuza on top of the head. The furious bird stumbles down from the blow, but he quickly regains altitude as he shoots flames at her, but she easily blocks them once more.

"That ain't gonna work on me ya big bird" Ana teased him.

The priest glares at the woman as both sides go back into a battle of dodging the others moves. He was starting to get frustrated since he wasn't able to use his weapons against her or threaten for them to get dissolved so he had to content himself with getting Fuza to blow more flames at the woman when he saw the ship behind her.

"I'm sure Eneru would love to hear your opinion of him when I hand you over to him. Still, I'm kind of disappointed. Even with your power, you can't hold a candle to Eneru. At least he has the sense to ally with the strong" the priest chuckles at her as he starts heading towards the ship as fast as he could, him being faster than her on Fuza.

"Doc, get out of there!" Ana shouts towards the Merry when she sees where the man was going, running after him.

The reindeer, who was watching the fight the whole time, flinches as he watches the priests descending to the same level as the ship and quickly blows the whistle for the sky knight.

Shura and Fuza ignore the whistle as the bird's mouth begins to heats up. Fuza didn't hesitate to breathe his flames towards the Merry, but Ana was fast enough to run in front of the flames, raising her arms forward and the water instantly protecting her a bit too late as the palms of her hands burned a bit.

"Ana!" Chopper worriedly calls out to his crew mate, who received various burns on her fingertips and hands from taking the blow, just before he sees some embers flying onto the deck. The reindeer rushes to put out the flames while the woman stared forward angrily at the man and bird hovering in front of the ship.

"All right then, ya want to fight unfair?! That's fine, that's the way I'm best at" Ana growled out, the priest and his bird paling as the cloud sea beneath them turned dark as water raised from under.

The rider almost fell off his saddle as water came up and attacked him from the side before Fuza had to fly up in an attempt to escape. Shura looks back to see the whip of water coming after them and the woman with a menacing look in her eyes that made him shiver and nearly soil his trousers.

He snaps out of his thoughts when he senses another presence and moves his javelin to his left, just in time to block the javelin that was about to stab him courtesy of the sky knight.

"I think you had enough fun" Gan Fall says as he pulls back.

"Even the Shandorians are running amok here. Dammit, I have no choice. I need to protect god's land above all else..." Shura clicks his tongue at the disadvantage, when he senses a large number of mantras in the distance.

He digs his heels into Fuza's sides as a sign to make a retreat. The bird gets the message as he charges at the old man while Shura jabs his weapon at the knight. Gan Fall quickly blocks the blow, but he failed to notice that during the strike Shura managed to sneakily loop his invisible cloud string around his ankle. Once Fuza flew past the knight, the string around his ankle pulled him off his bird and starts getting dragged mid air by the priest.

Ana sees Gan Fall dragged by Fuza with his own bird flying after them and her eyes widen when she sees Shura cut the string that's holding Gan Fall. He smirks at the falling knight, that's heading to the ocean twenty feet below them, before he turns his gaze on the woman on the ground under him.

"Don't think you've won! I promise Eneru will want to take care of you personally!" he shouts at her as he disappears into the nearby woods.

"Fuck! He got away" she said to herself.

"Who did?" Ana jumped a bit at Robin's voice behind her and turns around to see her, Nami, and Zoro approaching her.

"Priests, one of them tried attacking the ship, but the sky knight and I fought him off. He got away before we could catch him" she points to a random direction.

She flinches slightly at the searing pain in her arms from pointing, and looks at her hands to see that half of the skin is bright red from the burns even as it was now beginning to heal as the water went back down under the clouds, drizzling over her.

"What happened?" Nami widens her eyes at the bright red marks on her friend's hands.

"That bird tha man was ridin' can blow flames outta it's mouth. But Im fine see?" she raised her hands to show them how the skin was ever so slowly healing over the burns.

"You should still get them looked at" Nami said.

"But they're healin'..." but the navigator interrupted her once more.

"GO SEE CHOPPER NOW!" Nami shouted at her, hitting her over the head.

"All right all right. Im goin' see?" Ana raised her hand to rub at her bump and made a small show of her walking over to the Merry where she saw that Gan Fall's bird had actually managed to catch the knight, then brought him onto the ship for Chopper to treat his ankle.

"Take a seat right there Ana. I need to check your hands out" as Chopper finishes bandaging the knight's sprained ankle, he notices the group coming towards them, and points to an empty spot next to Gan Fall.

"I still don't understand how this works, but I'm glad you're not hurt" Chopper takes Anamaria's hand and inspects it, pouring more water over it to make sure that ir healed along nicely.

"HEY GUYS, IT'S THE MERRY!" the group freezes at Luffy's voice while Nami, Zoro and Robin look to see Luffy, Sanji and Usopp sailing to the lake on a tiny crow raft.

"Nami-swaan~! Robin-chaan~! Ana-chwaan~! No need to fear, I passed the trial of love for you all!" Sanji looks at the ship with hearts in his eyes as he waves for the girls.

"Guys, come up!" Nami sighs in relief that they made it, and throws down a rope ladder for them. The bruised-up trio wastes no time in getting on board, but once they were on the ship they were surprised to see the burnt patches on the deck.

"What happened to the ship now?!" Usopp asks as he cautiously steps onto the fragile floor.

"A crazy priest tried attacking the ship." Zoro says.

"A priest did this to Ana-chwan?!" Sanji asks as he looks at the now nearly completely gone wounds.

"Forget it, it ain't nothin'" she told the blond cook as Sanji ran to her and took her hands from Chopper's own and she called out to the scratched up snake "C'mere Sable love. Oh what did they do to ya?"

"She's right, sit down and let me heal you!" Chopper commands as he grabs his bag and starts working on Usopp's injuries.

"What kind of trial did you guys go through anyway?" Nami asks as she looks down at the crow boat that they sailed on.

"We went through a trial with this weird ball guy. It was nuts, he could predict what moves we were going to pull on him" Luffy chuckles at the adventure they had, as he sits cross legged next to the snake while the doctor gets to work on his injuries.

"That's called mantra" Gan Fall says which makes every pirate turn their attention to him "It's a special ability that both the priests and their god have. As you've witnessed, it predicts a person's moves and it can also sense someone's location even if they're hidden from plain sight"

"Do you have this kind of ability?" Usopp, Nami and Chopper shiver from the thought while Robin looks at him in confusion.

"Sadly, I don't have this ability. With it getting dark I'm also afraid it would be too dangerous for me to head home or for you all to sail out of here" he shakes his head before he looks up to the evening sky, that's getting darker by the minute from the sun setting.

"I think you're right. How about we go to the shore and camp out there? If another priest shows up, it would be easier to fight there" Sanji puffs a smoke from his cigarette as he looks to the shoreline with one hand still holding Ana's own.

"Yea, let's do it!" Luffy says as he eagerly jumps off the boat to get on his raft with the excited reindeer following him.

"Quit being so casual!" Usopp says as he follows them onto the boat.

The rest of the crew gets to work on setting up the campsite. Zoro quickly sets up a campfire that can last for hours, and Sanji begins to cook up a stew with Anamaria helping set up the few dishes and other things they needed, while Nami explains to the others what she, Robin, and Zoro found out about the Upper Yard from their travels.

"So you're saying that this place was a piece of Jaya?!" Chopper asks in shock with Nami nodding.

"That means the golden city really is here!" Usopp says before he covers his mouth to stop Luffy from hearing, but with one look at the captain, he already knows that it's too late because he's beaming with enthusiasm.

"This is the kind of adventure I was looking for!" Luffy says while he's grinning from ear to ear in excitement.

"If you want to stay, then I have no problems with it" Nami grins at his eagerness when she thinks about all the treasure they can get.

"But what about the angry god?!" Usopp asks with Chopper nodding, but none of them are worried about the god.

"What kind of pirates would we be if we didn't look for treasure?" Zoro asks as he relaxes. Gan Fall's eyes widened at their nonchalant attitude.

"You all can't be serious! This island is..." he stops himself when Ana briefly pats him on the shoulder and jumps off with her captain.

"I made enough for both you and your bird. By the way, do you know if Conis is alright?" Sanji hands him two bowls of stew.

"Both Conis and her father are safe. Eneru can't go after them" Gan Fall nods at the question.

"Do you want me to feed you Ana-chwan?" the cook asks her enthusiastically as he goes over to her with her warm bowl of soup.

"Im fine dar..." she cut herself off as his eyes made some sort of puppy eyes, waiting for her answer "...Fine"

Sanji smiles and start scooping up the food into the spoon, raising it to Anamaria and waiting for her to open her mouth. Ana sweat dropped a little as he stared at her with big eyes until Robin finishes her meal, and looks up at the fire that's the stands out on the dark island.

"Shouldn't we be putting the flames out? It can expose our position to the enemy" she said. Usopp and Luffy widen their eyes at the suggestion before the rubber man sighs in feigned disappointment.

"Did you hear that Usopp? I can't believe she wants to put out the fire"

"Don't be so hard on her Luffy. She's been living her life as an assassin, so she couldn't have known" Robin tilts her head at his disappointment when Usopp comes to her defence.

"What are you guys talking about?" the archaeologist asks while the two boys point to the bright campfire.

"When you're out camping, you need to keep the fire on all night!" Luffy says.

"Really?!" Chopper says with stars in his eyes.

"Even if we die, the campfire needs to burn bright to have a perfect camping night!" Usopp nods as he smirks in pride.

"Don't be stupid!" Nami says as she approaches them "This forest is dangerous enough as it is! Or did you forget the priests and crazy raiders out there?!"

"I didn't forget, but we can't waste a perfect camping night either!" Luffy says.

"If the priests were to attack again they would've done so by now, so we're all safe for the time being"

"We could still attract wild beasts with the fire!" Nami however, still isn't convinced that it would be safe to keep the fire going.

"Oi Luffy, is this enough?" the group stops at Zoro's voice to see him patting a pile of lumber that's taller than him.

"Yea, that's more than enough!" Luffy happily smiles at the pile of wood that can give them a fire that lasts through the entire night.

"Not you too!" Nami says, but Sanji tries to reassure her by grabbing a branch that's on fire.

"It will be alright Nami. Wild animals are naturally afraid of fire" what the chef wasn't aware of though, was that in the darkness behind him began to glow with dozens of bright golden eyes.

"You did attract a beast!" Nami notices the eyes and begins to shake in fright. Usopp and Chopper yelp in fright when one of the beasts come out of the shadows, to reveal a large white wolf with a scar going across his right eye.

"Everyone, be careful! That's a cloud wolf, these creatures are dangerous!" Gan Fall widens his eyes at the creature before he tries to warn the others.

The crew, except for Robin and Ana (who was hoping the large canine would allow her to pet its cloudy fur), start getting their guard up, when the wolf narrows his eyes at the group of humans as he begins growling in irritation.

"What's he saying Doctor-kun?" Robin blinks at the growling animal before she turns to Chopper. Chopper listens closely to the angry wolf before he copies his scowl and his tone of voice in the translation.

"You damn humans are keeping us up with your shouting! Shut the hell up already!" 

"WHAT WAS THAT?!" Luffy and Sanji ask but Chopper flinches.

"It's not me, it's the wolf!" Chopper stops when he hears him growling again and translates "'If you humans want to live then get out of our territory! Everything from the grass to the trees on this island belongs to...'" the wolf's rant was cut short, when Nami's fist crash landed on his head to knock him out.

"You're not stopping me from getting the treasure!" all the boys were speechless while Ana cheered at Nami's punch as the woman glares at the animal she attacked.

Robin sweat drops when she hears growling all over the place and sees that the rest of the pack, that consists of dozens of wolves, starts approaching the crew. Usopp and Chopper hug each other, and Sable's head, in fear before the sniper glares at Nami.

"Why did you have to piss them off?!" they cried out.

"Forget that, just think of something!"

"What do you think I can do here?!"

Before the pack can pounce on the campers, the leader wakes up and raises a paw in the air to stop them. Chopper blinks at the growling leader before he translates for him again.

"'Don't bother, even if you attack all at once you're no match for her'" he translated. Nami freezes at the compliment, as she and the others see the wolf wiping his mouth with the back of his paw and a smug look on his face "'You got a great punch babe. I like you'"

Nami mirrors his smirk as they clasp hand and paw together to show the new bond they formed.

"So they're friends now?" Usopp sweat drops at the new friendship before he turns to Zoro.

"I guess so" the swordsman answered.

"Then let's have our campfire now!" Luffy grins at the wolves before he throws a log into the fire.

Most of the crew along with the entire pack howl in agreement as they join the fray, and begin to party like there's no tomorrow. Gan Fall blinks at the new development as he watches Usopp strap on a bongo drum and starts pounding it for the music.

"I can't believe they just tamed cloud wolves..."

"As you've seen, we're not your average pirate crew" Robin giggles at his surprise as she sits beside him and watches the party with a soft grin.

"I agree, you all might make it to the golden city after all" he sighs in relief, of the situation not getting worse, as he relaxes and enjoys his evening.

"Let's get this pre-gold hunting dance festival started!" Usopp says as he happily dances around the fire with the rest of the crew, except Robin and Zoro, and a line of wolves following behind as he bangs on the bongos.

Zoro chuckles at the party as he sits it out and grabs a bottle of booze, but stops when he sees the pack leader sitting next to him with a cup of wine. The two warriors stare each other down for a moment before they grin at each other, clank their drinks together, and chug it down as a sign of friendship.

Luffy copies the wolves' howling as he dances along with them, while Sanji and Chopper dance to Usopp's song about getting the gold. The cook spots Anamaria alone in one corner leaning against the trunk of a tree before he approached her with the doctor and pulled her into the light of the bonfire.

Nami happily drinks a mug of liquor before she follows the party animals in the fire dance and keeping her eyes on the pair that was now twirling happily around the bonfire, shooting Robin a 'you see' look that made the archaeologist roll her eyes with a smile.

Sanji concentrated on the look the woman he was holding was sporting in her eyes as they danced, smiling softly at how she was having fun with him (and Chopper). He froze a bit when she went close to him and smiled lightly, kissing his cheek softly before pulling away to dance once more.

Ф

After a while Anamaria, Nami and Robin were one of the few people that was still fully aware of everything so she and the other two women took care of taking the boys to their small corner of the camp.

Ana plopped herself down besides them before Sable came around to lay her large torso over her, earning a grunt from the woman as Chopper huddled up in between the two and then Sanji took it upon himself to still be holding Ana's hand.

The woman sighed and watched as the other two made themselves at home and fell asleep next to each other so she tried to at least stay awake herself since Zoro was also knocked out cold but the warmth of the three that were surrounding her made sleep slowly claim her as well.

.҉

.҉

.҉