The Straw Hat of the Stars Ch. 21

Ch. 21 - A Dig into Rosemary's Past and Her New Life Lesson! Her Vow on Friendship!

"Gum-Gum..." Luffy shouted as his hand was pulled back, and was about to clash into Golem.

"Stone..." Golem was about to attack with his stone fists.

"BULLET!!" Luffy shouted as his hand was pulled forward, about to clash into Golem.

"FISTS!!" Golem did the same thing, as his fists was clashed forward into Luffy's Gum-Gum Bullet. Their fists clashed.

"I would never allow a friend to get hurt!! Especially by a pig like you!!" Luffy said, as he started to get his fists ready for a Gum-Gum Pistol.

"Oh, really? I was just about to get away with hurting Rosemary and actually getting a promotion and becoming guardian, until you meddling kids had to show up!!" Golem said, as he was gathering much more stone out of nothing.

"...Gum-Gum PISTOL SHOT!!" Luffy shouted, as multiple fists were about to attack Golem. However, the fists were only hitting Golem's stones.

"Hahahaha~! What's the whole point of making that attack if you can't even hit your opponent?!" Golem shouted.

"Grr..." Luffy growled.

"I wouldn't have to worry about that!!" Terrable shouted, as he created earth underneath Golem's feet, capturing his ankles.

"Damn...!" Golem muttered.

"Now Luffy!!" Terrable said.

"Got it!! Gum-Gum Pistol!!" Luffy shouted, as he landed an attack on Golem's face, only for it to turn into stone again.

"Damn it!!! Come and face me, coward!!!" Luffy shouted.

"I'm fighting you fair and square!" Golem exclaimed, while smirking.

"Then why can't I land an attack on you?! Stop cheating!!"

"Fine, I'll play fair and square if that's what you want." 

"Alright then! You can't turn into stone, and you're going to have to actually face me like a man!!" Luffy declared.

Golem smirk. "Oh, but you see, that might be impossible, since I ate the Stone-Stone fruit. I'm technically stone right now, so all of your attacks would be deemed useless." Golem said.

"Cheater!! Coward!!" Luffy shouted, as he and Golem kept on clashing.

Meanwhile, Rosemary was still shedding tears. Lucky was comforting Rosemary.

"...Um...Sir Sanji, how did you guys know that Lady Rosemary-sama was in trouble?" Lucky asked.

"Oh, Ventuswill guided us." Sanji said.

Flashback

"Guys...we need to find Rosemary as soon as possible." Ventuswill said, "It's already enough that Nami went after her, and that Sanji is too busy in his own world to even use his own head right now."

"Yeah! Who knows how long before she strikes again?!" Chopper exclaimed.

"We also have to meet up with someone." Ventuswill said.

"Who?" Luffy said.

"This guy named Golem. Kuroshiwa Ishi Golem is his full name. He said that he would be here in the morning to take back Rosemary. He said he would take her back. However, I have no idea what his true intentions are." Ventuswill said.

"Oh no! He's not taking her back on MY watch!!" Luffy said, as veins started to appear on his forehead.

"Well, enough fooling around! Let's get a move on!" Usopp said.

"Right!" Everyone shouted.

Flashback End

"I see. So Lady Ventuswill knew about Golem's arrival." Lucky said.

"Yeah."

"But wait, you still haven't gotten to the part where you and Lady Nami-sama knew about this."

"I was getting to that." Sanji explained, "But to sum it up, Luffy and everyone else caught up to us, and then that's when Ventuswill told us about Golem and his plan to take Rosemary back."

"Ah. That makes more sense." Lucky said.

Rosemary was still silent, with her eyes now puffy from all of her tears shedding. Then, Nami and Robin walked up to Rosemary.

"Rosemary, may I speak to you?" Nami asked, in a stern tone. Rosemary didn't bother to look up or answer, as she didn't have to deal with any of Nami's rants.

"Look Rosemary, you've caused us a lot of trouble recently. First you decide to argue with me, twice in one day, and disobey my orders, and then you start running away all over the place, the next day. Next up, you appear when Ventuswill was about to get killed by 2 gigantic lions. And then, you made us go chasing after large monsters just for YOU! And now, I hear that you're worth 95 million just from killing a bunch of marines and pirates?! Talk!" Nami scolded.

"...Why on earth should I have to tell you anything?" Rosemary asked.

"Nami go easy on her, she just had a breakdown." Robin warned.

"...Fine. But still, you need to explain yourself. There was really no reason to cause us all of this trouble, when you should've stayed with us in the first place!" Nami said, "So, why did you run away?" 

"...It's because I didn't trust you." Rosemary explained.

"Huh?" Nami and Robin asked simultaneously.

"What do you mean, you didn't trust us? We took you in didn't we?" Nami asked.

"That may be true, but how do I know you're not just a bunch of killers who go after random and innocent people?" Rosemary asked.

"So that's what this was all about." Robin said.

"I don't trust you humans, because you humans took something precious from me!" Rosemary shouted, with more tears coming back. Now, it was Nami's turn to become silent.

"A human controlled the Iblis Monster, and the Iblis Monster killed my own mother! How on earth could I possibly trust you after what you guys did?!" Rosemary asked.

"I see. So this grudge is all because you lost someone important to you?" Robin asked. Rosemary nodded.

"You know Rosemary, I can actually empathize with you, because I started hating pirates because my foster mother was shot by one." Nami explained. Rosemary looked up at Nami. Nami nodded.

"...I see. I guess I have a hard time empathizing with others." Rosemary said.

"But, now I guess I can see why you ran off why you did." Nami said, "But once you join our crew, there won't be anymore running! You have friends now who you can come to." Rosemary's eyes widened.

"That's right. You can come to us for your every problem, because that's what friends are for." Robin said.

"...Alright. Do you guys promise not to bully me?" Rosemary asked.

"What are you talking about?"

"...You see, when I was born, I was sealed with the most powerful spirit of all, so that caused everyone to hate me..." Rosemary explained.

"Oh my. You poor thing." Robin said.

"But, I don't understand." Nami said.

"The Chimera destroyed all innocent and beautiful life in the past." Rosemary clarified.

"Oh."

"Anyway, I grew up hated by everyone." Rosemary said, "And everyone wanted me dead. However, my mother was the only person that actually cared and protected me, until she died because she was killed by another human being." Rosemary explained, "The human set off a bomb, and then that's where she died. And then she gave me this necklace, as a way to remember her." 

"Oh, dear." Robin commented.

"But, about that bet you made with Luffy, why were you willing to give that necklace away if it was really that important to you?" Nami asked. 

"...I don't know what came over me. I think it was just the cockiness talking, but in reality, I didn't want to give up this necklace." Rosemary admitted. 

"I see." Nami said. 

"But, back to the subject, the bullying got worse, and then somehow my relatives started being nice to me. Believe it or not, Aunt Ventuswill, and Uncle Terrable and Uncle Aquaticus weren't always nice to me." Rosemary admitted.

"Wow, even they were mean to you?" Nami asked.

"Yeah. And then Sir Flexide even admitted to plotting to kill Lady Rosemary-sama, so that's the main reason why she ran away from here in the first place." Lucky said.

"...I see. You know Rosemary, you can't run away from your problems. Running away will only make it worse, because it'll keep on sticking to you." Nami said, "So from now on, you can't run away any more." 

"...Alright. Just don't bully me, got it?" Rosemary asked.

Nami smirked, and Robin chuckled, and Sanji blew his cigarette.

"Don't worry about it. We would never hurt our friend." Nami said.

"That's right. So you won't have to worry about us hurting you." Robin said.

"Alright! Now I need to defeat my uncle!!" Rosemary said, as while getting up and ready to finish this fight once and for all. 

TO BE CONTINUED...