Haruka & The Great Pirate Era
"Hey, guys, can you keep a secret?" Haruka asked her crew, who were gathered around the table. She got mixed responses.
"I'D DO ANYTHING FOR YOOOOOOOOOOU HARUKA-CHWAAN!"
"I'd take it to the grave! But I'm already dead… Yohohoho, SKULL JOKE!"
"A true swordsman can keep a secret."
"What's the secret? I can keep it for a small fee… say 600 Beli."
"That reminds me of the time a woman once asked me to keep a secret and it turned out that she was a princess!"
"AWESOME! Haruka, are you a princess?"
"That would be SUUUPER!"
Only Robin remained silent. Haruka sighed.
"GUYS! I'm not a fucking princess!" She yelled. That quietened everybody down. "Thank you."
"Well, whatever it is, we can keep the secret." Zoro announced.
"Alright. It's about my name." Haruka started.
"Roze D. Haruka isn't your real name, is it?" Robin smiled knowingly. Haruka stared in shock at her.
"How did you know?" She demanded.
"The way you sometimes don't respond to the name, and act like we're addressing someone else." Robin explained. Haruka sighed and nodded.
"My name isn't just a name anymore." Haruka looked directly at Robin. "Your dream is to find out what happened in the Void Century, right?"
Robin nodded, wondering where this was going.
"To find that out, there will be many secrets for you to uncover. I am the key to one of them." Haruka looked directly at Robin.
"What're you going on about? What does the Void Century have to do with your name?" Nami asked irritably.
"Everything and nothing." Before Nami could punch her over the head, Haruka quickly added. "I don't have anything to do with the Void Century. I simply hold a secret that's key to unlocking it. My real name is Monkey D. Luffy. I died thirteen years ago, on Spring Flower Island. Do you know what Spring Flower Island was destroyed over?"
Everybody shook their heads. Haruka/Luffy sighed. "The people of Spring Flower Island developed a way to distort and warp reality with the use of music. They called it the devil's music."
"I've heard of the devil's music. It is rumored to be able to destroy the world." Robin mused.
"I still don't see what this has to do with your name." Usopp grumbled.
"Alright, back-story time. After Spring Flower was destroyed, me and my mom fled to Dawn Island, which was nearby. Mom died a year later. When I was seven, I sold myself into slavery to keep everybody I knew alive. Four years later, with the help of my friend and sworn brother, I escaped. I adopted the name Roze D. Haruka, and boom, that's the story of my name."
"But what does you being sold into slavery have to do with the Void Century?" Zoro asked, looking interested for once.
"Nothing at all. I never said my name was the secret. I am the secret. I am the last person alive who can play the devil's music. And also, for the record, Robin's wrong. The devil's music alone cannot destroy the world. It can give the world back something that the World Government destroyed in the Void Century, however."
"Something that the World Government destroyed?" Brook asked, interested as soon as he heard the name devil's music.
"800 years ago, during the Void Century, the ancients created a tree. The Tree of the Devil's Soul. Which, while destroyed, could always be called back to the world with the use of devil's music. And if used correctly, it could, potentially, plunge the world in chaos."
***
12 years ago…
"YOU!" Luffy cringed when she heard that voice. It was the you-are-going-to-be-in-pain voice. She slowly turned around to see her insane mother with a knife. Slowly reaching up to the spot below her eye, where it had scarred, she gulped.
"You little pain in the ass, get over here now! I'm fucking sick of caring for your useless ass!" Ignoring her mother's ranting, she focused on the happy memories, before her mother had gone insane after seeing everyone dying.
"You're a little demon child aren't you? Congratulations! You've killed your own fucking mother!" Luffy snapped back to the present, just in time to see her mother sink the knife into her abdomen and collapse. She rushed forward and put a hand on her heart.
"Mom…" She whispered, letting her tears drip down onto her mother, mixing the salty liquid with blood.
"You promised me this. You'll stay alone, and you die alone. Got it?" Her mother narrowed her eyes, smiling insanely, then they grew cold and lifeless. Luffy cried loudly, yanking the knife out and hugging her mother's dead body.
"Mom! You can't be dead! You.. you.. you can't…" Luffy broke down sobbing, clutching the knife. She didn't notice the door burst in, and didn't notice the concerned shouts.
"Luffy! What happened?" A man asked. In Luffy's daze, she didn't remember him.
"I-I killed her… Oh my god.. I killed her…" Luffy cried, grabbing her mother's body.
***
6 years later…
"Law-san! What happened!" A woman asked as Law looked up at his so-called 'Older Brother'.
"Luffy committed suicide." He explained.
"WHAT!" The woman, Augusta, her name was, yelled. "But she's one of the most entertaining fighters there is! She can't die!"
"She jumped off the roof and into the water. She's dead." Law announced coldly. It was half of the truth.
"Oh well! I'll find another like her sometime!" Doflamingo cackled, and Law felt his insides clench. Luffy was a special person, and she was his sworn sister. They were talking about her like some curious oddity.
"If that is all, may I go?" Law asked, annoyed.
"Oh, yes, of course!" Doflamingo waved his hand. Law took a sharp intake and walked away.
***
7 years ago…
"Mom, I can't sleep." Luffy complained, reaching up for her mother, who laughingly placed her daughter into her lap.
"Well then, how about I tell you a story?" She grinned, tickling the young child until she squealed.
"Yes! I love your stories!"
"This one is a story from our past."
"Our?"
"The past of the world. Now shut up and listen."
"Shutting up and listening."
"Good. It is a story from long ago…The Void Century is a period of mystery. Not much is known about it, and its secrets are numerous. The Will of D. The Ancient Kingdom. The Great War. The Poneglyphs. And the devil's soul tree. However, the music that we are creating here is capable of reviving the Devil's soul tree."
"What's the Devil's Soul Tree?"
"It is a tree that is the birth of all devil fruits. Contrary to what most believe, Devil Fruits do not, in fact, come from the Grand Line. They come from the devil's soul tree, which was originally placed in the Grand Line. The tree churns out devil's fruits, and when the eater dies, their fruit is put into another nearby, ordinary fruit. Thus, the fruit's spirit lives forever. No two devil fruits can be alike and exist at the same time. However, the tree can be destroyed, and so, the government did. What they did not count on, was that the tree could be resurrected. It took two people with knowledge of the devil's music, and they must be of opposite gender—"
"If they have to be in love, I'm gonna cry."
Rose laughed and ruffled Luffy's hair. "No, they don't need to be in love. But anyways, I digress. So, once there was a devil that could entice anybody to leave the sea forever, and gain an amazing power. But the sea didn't like that. So she decided to warn those that ever ate the fruit that they would be betrayed by the sea, and sink like a stone! Finally, the sea changed the devil into a tree, known as the devil's soul tree."
"WOW! That's so cool!"
"I know, right!"
***
3 years later…
Shanks sighed as he looked around the island he had landed on. He didn't know what possessed him to take a vacation to the East Blue, the weakest of the four seas. Maybe it had something to do with it being his former captain's home. He had also heard rumors of five islands there that mimicked the Grand Line's terrifying unpredictability. Well, he certainly hadn't seen that yet.
He sighed as he slumped down in the bar seat, as the kind green-haired lady poured out some more sake for him.
"Is there anything cool here?" He asked, downing his alcohol. The bar-tender paused, then put her hand to her chin thoughtfully.
"Well, there is a forest with animals that are ten times the normal size. At least, that's what Luffy says."
"Luffy?" Shanks asked, interested.
"You mean the demon who lives in the woods and preys on the idiots who come inside?" A young child asked, looking up at Makino. Makino glares at the young boy.
"You shouldn't call Luffy a demon." She scolds.
"But it's true! I heard she even killed her own mother!" He exclaims.
"And you believed it?" Makino glares. Shanks stands up.
"I want to talk to this Luffy person. She seems interesting!" He grinned. "Benn, come on! Off to the forest!" With that declaration, he and his first mate walk out, his first mate rolling his eyes behind him.
As they walk to the forest, Shanks asked most of the other children playing around about who Luffy was. He got the same answer constantly. A demon who killed her own mother. He's even heard that she was only eight. It was starting to piss him off a bit.
Finally, they made it to the beginning of the forest. A voice asked from behind them, "Who are you?"
The two pirates whirled around to find a small girl, with a deep scar under her left eye. She was eyeing them warily and was poised to run.
"I'm Shanks. Nice to meetcha!" The red head smiled, leaning down to get a better look at the small child. She cautiously took a step back, then took off running, vanishing from the two pirate's sight.
"Did she just…" Benn asked, casually lighting up a cigarette.
"Vanish?" Shanks asked, staring at the spot that the little girl had disappeared from. "I can't even sense her…"
Shanks turned to Benn with a wide smile that Benn immediately identified as the 'I've-got-a-stupid-idea' smile.
"Well, this trip's gonna be more fun than I thought!" He remarked, then proceeded to walk into the dark forest full of giant animals, humming a cheery tune under his breath the whole way.