84 A disease, capable of killing an empress

3rd Person POV

"Who is it this time?!"

Jackson's strong reaction bewildered Augur and Law, who happened to be on deck at that moment but no one thought much about it. Instead, the former turned his attention back to the ship in the distance and squinted his eyes to better see who was coming.

"Hmm? How unexpected."

He murmured, but it was still loud enough for Jackson to hear.

"It seems to be a ship from Dressrosa. The flag is showing the Donquixote Pirate's jolly roger."

"Eh?"

Jackson, upon hearing that, gave Augur a surprised look. They were just on their way to beat Doflamingo and take away his whole kingdom so why would he send someone to them.

"Ehm... Are you sure that they are sailing towards us?"

He couldn't help but ask. After all they might just be on their way to somewhere else.

'Thinking about it now, who said that they were coming for us, just because our routes crossed.'

"They are sailing in our general direction, so their destination should be the island we departed from, just this morning." (Augur)

"It makes sense. After all he isn't someone to frontally confront an opponent who he knows is stronger than himself."

Law joined the discussion and told them this but Jackson didn't quite get what he means.

"How exactly does this make sense? Sending underlings isn't exactly to opposite of confronting someone directly is it?" (Jackson)

"Perhaps, are you saying it is a trap? Or maybe a trick to assess our power?" (Augur)

"Unlikely. If Doflamingo couldn't solve a problem with raw strength then he would usually go for either blackmailing or the least complicated way to solve something... Throwing money at whatever or whoever troubles him."

Only after listening up till here, did it click insides Jackson's head. It now indeed made sense, that Doflamingo would send someone to look for them.

"He probably wants to try and make a deal to stop you from helping me. Most likely Doflamingo believes that as long as I loose your support, he can take care of me."

Little did Doflamingo know how wrong he was. Law wasn't the weak kid from back then but soon he would learn that the hard way.

Still, from then on Jackson decided to just ignore all the other ships and ordered to dive down, to continue the journey towards Dressrosa under water.

'If he wants to avoid a direct confrontation then let's just not give him the opportunity to.'

Were his thoughts while planning to surprise Doflamingo with an invisible approach. Whatever the warlord of the sea, may or may not have prepared for them, the Jackson pirates just completely ignored it as they dove towards Dressrosa, arriving one and half a day later.

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Sebio. A port town to the south of Dressrosa. Several years ago, this town was attacked and set on fire by the former king of Dressrosa, King Riku Doldo the 3rd who tried to kill all the citizen after growing insane.

Or so the people thought. Of course since they were fed lies all this time, almost every single one is ignorant about what really happened back then.

Still, it was thanks to said ignorance, that they could live happily enough to not notice the darkness lurking beneath Dressrosa.

But for how long will this fragile happiness last? On a day like every other one before, the people were minding their own business with kids occasionally seen running around or playing pranks.

That is, until the water at the port suddenly started rising up. The unusual occurrence quickly got the attention of the people staying at the port for whatever reason they had as a small crowd of onlookers gathered.

Slowly but steadily the water continued to rise until it revealed a big yellow ship under the amazed looks of the people around.

"D-Did that ship just come out from beneath the water?!"

"Holy-! I have never heard about something like that!"

"... H-Hey... there is a Jolly Roger. Look there, they are pirates!"

"So What? Don't you know who protects Dressrosa. Who would cause troub-"

The last person, a woman in her 30s bit on her tongue and shut up after taking a look at the Jolly Roger, at which her friend was pointing at with his shaky finger.

"...No way..."

The flag with the Jolly Roger proudly flattering in the wind was one of the best known on the Grand Line. After his flashy reappearance a short while ago, the pirate who was given the nickname admiral killer (the admirals aren't dead yet) at the age of 12, was in everyone's mouth and mind once again.

The unofficial 5th emperor, Portgas D. Jackson has sailed to Dressrosa and suddenly appeared in this small port town. Those who recognized the Jolly Roger more quickly than others, didn't stay around, as they immediately turned towards in central city's direction and made a run for it that very moment.

On the ship itself, a door opened revealing a tall and young man who was coming out on the deck. Well defined muscles, sharp features, a unique hair color and his cute freckles would have made quite some ladies try to talk him up if it weren't for his identity and position.

Behind him more people stepped out. Everyone was relatively small or tall, with different builds and different kinds of charisma that drew the onlookers gazes to them.

The setting sun in the background reflected on the calm sea, made for quite the picture with these young people as it's main focus... that is until their leader turned to look at them with a wide grin on his face.

Quickly the breathtaking view turned out to be not the only thing capable of cutting off the air from their lungs. Locking eyes with Portgas D. Jackson made them feel overwhelmed beyond reason.

No haki was used, nor any sort of killing intent directed at them, it was just his Overpowering presence, one of the world's strongest pirates.

'Confidence!'

A young man at the front of the crowd who kept looking murmured to himself.

It was confidence that he could see in all of them. Be it in themselves or their friends, everyone on the ship was confident about something. Confident to be able to do whatever they wanted on Dressrosa. Confident that no one on this island could stop now.

And it just so happened that today, Jackson and the others wanted a hunt. The main prize being a blonde Flamingo.

"Let's go, take out some trash and give the WG a large headache while we are at it."

"AYE Captain!"

Everyone replied enthusiastically as they jumped off the ship and started to walk towards the royal palace of Dressrosa.

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Meanwhile, on a certain ship pulled by 2 sea snakes.

Among the crew that consisted of only female warriors, panic and gloom was spreading quickly. Everyone had a concerned expression on their faces and their minds were full of worry for their captain.

Inside the captain's room, a perfect beauty was lying on a luxurious king sized bed. She was sweating a lot while her body was fighting an unusually high fever.

"Just how could this happen. Why did sister get suddenly sick?"

Boa Sandersonia, one of Boa Hancock's sworn sisters asked out loud, while staying besides Hancock's side.

"I don't know. Since yesterday, she didn't want to eat and looked uneasy, as if she was sad or in pain and the next thing we know is that she got high fever ever since this morning."

Boa Marigold, the other sister, replied to the best of her knowledge of the situation. She was just as worried for their sister as Sandersonia since it was incredibly rare for Hancock to become sick.

Moreover the doctor on their ship told them that she didn't know the cause for her sudden sickness and could only help by slightly lessening the pain and symptoms.

"Oh please let us arrive in Amazon Lily on time. Maybe the elder will know a way to help our sister."

Marigold prayed to no one in particular since she didn't believe in the existence of gods ever since she saw the horrors of the 'holy City' yet it was the only thing that came to her mind.

"Ja-...JA-..."

Hancock started calling out something or someone in her sleep as she did every few hours but this only increased her sisters worry for her.

Little did they know that the cure for her condition was way easier than anyone would have thought possible.

(AN: Hey Everyone! Sorry for not uploading regularly, I am still trying to find my way back into writing. My goal would be to go back to daily chapters but probably not more than one per day. By the way do some of you play One Piece Treasure Cruise? If so would you be interested in joining my newly created alliance. It's called 'Great Mugiwara Alliance' has 5 members so far and a total bounty of 46.450.000. I am the leader 'ILovePizza' lv: 250 and a bounty of 23.300.000. People with an ingame bounty of 20 mio or more will be promoted to sub leaders. Ok back to the ff. I plan to release the next one before the weekend (depending on college) and then one more this weekend. Like always I hope you enjoy reading.)