Journey to One Piece

325. You will be the man

"Pedro, even if you do take us inside their territory, we will still have to face Big Mom, if not her, then her right hand. Charlotte Katakuri. The one with a billion bounty." Ken replied. Pedro was surprised that Ken believed him when he said that he could bring them. 

"Why are we not going for Wano?" Momo asked. This made everyone take a double take. Even for Ken. For Ken, subconsciously, after Zou, came Whole Cake island so he was thinking of going there. But he had forgotten, the basic reason the Straw Hats were in Whole Cake island in the first place. 

It was because of Sanji. The Big Mom's family had tried to go after Sanji from what he heard, and knowing what transpired, Big Mom wouldn't want to poke at Straw hats. They had already done once and if they wanted to take away Sanji, she herself would have to move and she didn't have that much luxury at the moment. 

Vinsmoke family would probably be ready to sacrifice one of their sons or their daughter to Big Mom for getting the support of theirs. Maybe Sanji, hearing the news would change his mind and go after Big Mom. But at the moment, they really didn't have a reason to go to Whole Cake island. And the liberation of Wano came first. 

"Yosh, then we go to Wano where we have the other Road Poneglyph and then go after Big Mom." Luffy said. "Oye, Ken are you sure that there is another Road Ponelgyph there?" 

"You thought I was lying?" Ken asked with annoyance. 

"No, I meant, do you know the location?" Luffy asked. 

"Yes, but reaching there, you will have to face Kaido. Are you ready for that?" Ken asked. This made everyone silent. During their training, both Ken and Rayliegh spoke about how powerful Kaido was. 

How he was a beast, had future Observation and was known as the strongest creature. Maybe in inherent power, Ken was better, but when it came to Haki, Kaido had almost no opponent. 

Luffy had progressed a lot in Armament Haki and had even learnt Haki that could be exerted outside of the body. But he was falling short on having full control of internal destruction and also coating. Ken was also quite a distance away from achieving that. 

There was silence in the room, while the Mink tribes were terrified thinking that the Straw Hats were even considering going after Wano. 

"So what? Are we scared?" Luffy asked with a smile on his face. This brought a smile on the faces of Ken, Sanji, Jinbe and Zoro. 

"That's right." 

"We are the crew of the future Pirate King, how can we be afraid of one Yonko." 

"Hehehe.. It will be fun." 

But of course not everybody was onboard and they tried to change the mind of the Captain, but he had already thought about it and this would happen one way or the other. Ken too felt excited. It had been a long time since they had actual fight. Kaido would definitely give them quite the challenge. 

And maybe this would help Luffy more and awaken his devil fruit. If the situation became too dire, he would escape with the crew. That was always the back up option, but Ken knew that if he wanted to grow, he would need to push through. 

And Momo, Inuarashi and Nekomamushi, Law and Luffy came forward to establish the Samurai-Mink-Pirate alliance and this alliance would go after Kaido. Of course, it was followed by a huge banquet. 

The banquet was a big one with many of the Mink tribe coming together. Following the Straw hats, Bepo's group, who had been hiding, were also allowed to join since it was an alliance at the moment. The Straw Hats soon got acquainted with the other Mink tribe members, especially Carrot. 

She was quite the energetic kind and Luffy and her instantly bonded. Followed by Nami and others. Ken too enjoyed himself with the rest.

"Franky, can you make Law's ship better." Ken asked. 

"You mean the submarine? Sure. I have never worked on a submarine. Would help me a lot in refitting our ship." Franky said. 

"I didn't ask for help." Law shouted. Franky didn't listen at all as he went on his way followed by Vivi. He was more excited to work on a submarine and that was what he was looking forward to. Ken looked at Law and said. 

"Our ship can climb the waterfall in Wano. Can yours do too?"

This made Law shut up as he had seen the passage to Wano and honestly it didn't look good at all. He wasn't sure if the ship would reach Wano safe. He didn't complain any more and just took a sip of his wine. The mink tribe seeing the interaction, laughed. 

Ken had asked to train for a week before they leave. And the Straw hats agreed as one week would be the time needed by Franky to refit the submarine ship of Law. And thus, the whole week of training started. 

Ken was extremely brutal with training as he used more harsh measures than Rayleigh used. During the 2 years of training, Rayleigh used to call him the ring leader of the circus of how brutal he was with himself and also to others in training. 

In this week of training, Ken showed his ugly face again. And he also forced Bepo and his crew to join him. Bepo, being the cute guy, he showed the cute face to Ken to get away but he didn't get any less time in training. Of course, the Heart pirates revolted and went against the 'regime training' of Ken, only to be beaten back. 

And Law didn't step in the middle while they trained. He had seen how the Straw Hats fought, and if he wanted to reach the Laughtale, he needed to keep up and so did his crew. But Ken wasn't harsh always as he spoke to Bepo too. 

"Bepo, when the Captain falls down, who will your Captain rely on?" Ken asked.