Ultimate Fruit

Chapter 92: Momonosuke

While Lucas was talking with Kinnemon, outside the building, Law sighed and shook his head from his depression.

“This isn’t the time for this. Since things have already gotten this far...there’s no need for me to delay any longer.”

Just as he was about to head back in, he felt a throbbing pain in his chest as he collapsed to the ground. From behind, he could hear a person’s footsteps nearing him.

“Gh-!? W-who’s there!?”

“How many years has it been? You’ve gotten big, Law.”

“V-Vergo…!?”

The person who appeared was a man wearing a criss-cross jacket and buzz-cut hair as well as a pair of shades. On his cheek, there was a half-eaten hamburger stuck to it.

“Did you really think he had no idea? We do not trust Caesar, that’s why he carefully snuck Monet in here.”

“When...did you get here…!?”

Vergo looked down on Law and spoke without a change in his tone.

“Just now. I happened to be in Dressrosa and just came here to have a look...looks like I made the right choice. Just now, I happened to see something interesting. For you to let the Revolutionary in...did you think you can get away with it?”

Hearing that, Law gritted his teeth while clutching his chest.

Back then, in order to stay on this island to investigate Doflamingo, he made a deal with Caesar. He would keep his secretary, Monet’s heart, in exchange for his own heart.

Having no other choice, Law chose to gamble on it and gave him his heart. Actually, he had already planned how to take it back from Caesar but...he didn’t think that Caesar would give his heart to Vergo!

Still...judging from what he said just now, it seems Vergo didn’t see Lucas arrive earlier...if so...

Vergo removed his hand from his pocket and showed a cube with a throbbing heart inside it.

Giving it a squeeze, Law felt pain from his chest once again!

With Vergo having his heart, Law could do nothing but glare at him hatefully!

Inside the building, Lucas, Luna, Hina, and the newly completed Kinnemon started to look for Momonosuke.

Lucas could recall that in the original story, Momonosuke was found in the garbage storage room beneath the building.

Still, Lucas wanted to look in other places first just in case.

While on the way, Lucas and the others had encountered some of Caesar’s men but Lucas was too lazy to bother with them so he directly put them to sleep with his Emperor's Haki.

None of them even had time to see Lucas much less report what was happening so Caesar still had no idea. All he knew was that there was a commotion at the entrance and went there to have a look.

Only after finding Law and Vergo there who had explained the situation did he know that the Revolutionary was inside the building.

Casually picking up a gas mask, Lucas wore it and continued to look for Momonosuke.

“Hm? You are wearing a mask? Come to think of it, You had also worn a mask back then...I only recognized you because of your voice.”

“Ah, yeah. Well, I am supposedly dead already and it would be troublesome if people know I’m still alive. Anyway, remember not to call out my name later.”

Lucas figured it was okay to trust Kinnemon and told him his true name earlier and that Akaoni was just an alias of back then.

Kinnemon nodded.

Hina heard their discussion and also kept in mind not to call out Lucas’ name later on.

As for Luna, she was also playing around with a gas mask and wore it.

Soon, they reached a wide room filled with children’s toys. It seems like some kind of playground for children…

Inside, there were dozens of children in all sorts of sizes.

There were regular-sized children and also giant-sized children…

Hina frowned when she saw the number of children.

“...Hina has heard there were numerous children disappearing in the surrounding islands lately. Could it be…?”

“Un, these are probably those children. Caesar is working on an experiment to turn people into giants. These are his products.”

Kinnemon gnashed his teeth upon hearing that and hurriedly looked around.

“Momonosuke! Momonosuke-sama!? Where are you!?”

“K-Kinnemon!”

Turning over towards the voice, they saw a small shadow appear from behind a large stuffed bear.

Looking closely, that shadow was...a dragon!

It was a small oriental dragon having a snake-like body instead of the large one that they saw earlier.

“D-dragon!?”

“Kinnemon! It’s me! Momonosuke!”

Kinnemon was shocked to hear that from the dragon’s mouth. He wondered if this was a trap that was set up to capture him or not.

After all, the Momonosuke he knew wasn’t a dragon!

Before he could continue to think wildly, Lucas patted his shoulder to calm him down.

“Calm down. That must be Momonosuke who ate a Devil Fruit.”

“Devil Fruit?”

Kinnemon calmed down somewhat and looked back at Momonosuke.

“Are you really...the young master?”

“Kinnemon, it’s me! But I don’t know how to turn back!”

At this time, Lucas took out a Seastone cuff that he got earlier. He only took it in case he needed to capture Caesar if he runs into him.

Of course, Lucas still plans on killing him but Betty seemed to want something from Caesar. After Caesar spits out whatever information he can, then it won’t be too late to finish him off.

Tapping the Seastone cuff to Momonosuke, Momonosuke felt weak all of a sudden and his transformation wore off.

“Young master!”

Finally seeing Momonosuke, Kinnemon shouted in excitement.

Lucas let the two of them reminisce for a while as he looked around at the various kids in the room.

These kids have been poisoned with drugs to get bigger...if only Chopper or Kaya were here...well, for now, I can send them to the floating island base and have Doctor Kureha look after them.

Since dealing with a bunch of kids is too troublesome...Lucas unleashed his haki once again to make them all sleep.

“Daddy…”

Luna tugged on Lucas’ clothes when she saw the kids fall asleep.

Smiling slightly, Lucas patted her head.

“Don’t worry, I just put them to sleep since they are sick. Once they are well, you can play with them, okay?”

“Un!”

Luna smiled brightly and no longer asked.

Turning towards Momonosuke, Lucas lifted his mask for a bit to show himself.

“Yo, it’s good to see you're still alive, Momo.”

“Ah! Uncle Lucas!?”

Momonosuke separated from Kinnemon and tackled Lucas with a hug while crying.

“Waaaa! Mother...my mother…! She…!”

Lucas sighed and patted his back to soothe him.

“Momo. You are the son of Oden Kozuki...what do you think your father will say if he sees you like this?”

“I…”

Momonosuke looked up at Lucas and saw him looking at him as well.

“Don’t worry. I promise you...I will get revenge for Oden and Toki…!”

“Uncle…”

“But you also need to promise me to be strong...your little sister is still out there. You need to be strong so you can protect her, okay?”

Momonosuke wiped away the tears and snot on his face and nodded.

“I will!”

Then, he turned to see Luna peeking at him from behind Lucas.

“This is…?”

“This is my daughter, Luna. Luna, this is Momonosuke.”

Suddenly, Lucas felt his daddy senses tingling as he glared at Momonosuke.

“I’m saying this now...don’t you dare make any moves on my daughter!”

Momonosuke, who was still hugging Lucas, quickly escaped and hid behind Kinnemon with a pale face.

“I-I won’t!”

“Hmph, you better not!”

Snorting, Lucas smiled again and patted Luna’s head.

“Luna, just treat this guy as your older brother, okay? If he makes any moves on you, tell daddy and I will send him back to his parents!”

“Okay~”

Luna didn’t mind it that much and was simply excited to have an older brother.

On the other hand, Kinnemon and Momonosuke both paled in fright when they heard that.

Lucas...his parents are in the afterlife now...are you going to kill him!?

Meanwhile, Hina crouched down and patted Luna as well.

“Luna...do you want a little brother? Or maybe a little sister?”

“Both!”

“Okay!”

This time, it was Lucas who sweated when he heard the conversation between the two.

What’s with that look of determination for, Hina!? What are you planning!?

Lucas vowed to himself that he will sleep beside Luna from now on. If Luna’s in the room, Hina won’t be able to do anything...right?

*BOOM*

While Lucas was planning for the nights to come, they heard an explosion from outside.

“What was that?”

Momonosuke asked.

Lucas stretched his Observation Haki and saw it was Betty and the revolutionaries fighting against Monet, the snow woman.

Monet had turned into a huge winged snow demon and there was a blizzard roaring around them.

The explosion came from the revolutionaries attempting to fire their weapons at her.

Betty was waving around her flag clad in Armament Haki as she fought against Monet.

Lucas smiled and waved his hands.

Suddenly, the snow melted and turned into water which surrounded Monet, trapping her in a water orb prison.

Betty was shocked but then smiled when she figured out who was helping her.

She smiled in his direction and blew a kiss as if knowing that Lucas was still looking at her.

Lucas chuckled and shook his head.

“Come on, let’s go and see.”

Lucas led the others to where Betty and the revolutionaries are. As for the kids, they should be safe for now so he simply left them there.

Seeing Lucas enter the room, Betty waved at him.

“Thanks for the assist. But I had that.”

“Sure you do.”

“Hmph, naughty boy.”

When Kinnemon and Momonosuke saw Betty and her getup, the two of them showed lewd faces.

“H-how cruel! She doesn’t even have proper clothes and only has a jacket! She must’ve been robbed!”

“Pretty sister, are you not cold?”

Kinnemon was looking away but would keep looking back every now and then. As for Momonosuke, he acted like an innocent kid to pretend to get close to Betty.

Betty glanced at the two and asked.

“Who’re these trash?”

“Gh-!? Woman! What did you just call me!?”

Kinnemon was angered and shouted but Betty didn’t care.

“Trash, stop breathing the same air as me.”

“!!!”

Lucas sighed and stopped Kinnemon who was about to get himself killed.

“Alright, stop it. Betty, you should really not trash talk all the time…”

“Fine. Hm? There’s a fly here.”

After saying that, Betty kicked at Momonosuke who had a lewd face and was still trying to get closer to Betty.

“...”

Lucas sighed again and shook his head.

Forget it, there’s no fixing this woman.

After dealing with Kinnemon and Momonosuke, Betty started to argue with Hina again.

Lucas was already bored seeing them fight all the time and simply turned his attention to the harpy, Monet.

Removing the water prison, Monet gasped for breath as she landed on the ground.

Seeing her form, Luna’s eyes sparkled.

“Waa! Daddy, it’s a bird lady!”

“This is called a Harpy.”

“Harpy?”

“Yep. They are people with bird wings and legs.”

Luna nodded excitedly and walked over to Monet to play.

As soon as she was close, Monet turned into a snow demon again to scare her off and take her hostage but contrary to her expectations, Luna didn’t get scared.

Instead, she smiled at her like sunshine in a snowy storm.

“Big sister, you’re very pretty!”

“...”

Monet paused and didn’t know how to respond. She even forgot about her plan to take Luna hostage.

Lucas smiled at the scene as well but his face froze after hearing what Luna said next.

“Do you want to marry my Daddy too? If so, I can have a harpy little sister or little brother!”

“...”

Silence filled the room as everyone stared at Luna dumbfoundedly...

Lucas was especially shocked!