Chapter 514: Treachery
On the day of the Fire Festival in Wano.
"There's a full moon tonight, but the clouds are worrying. If the moon isn't visible, we won't be able to use Sulong like we wished to," Pedro said.
"Don't worry about that. This bad boy is more than capable of clearing away a few clouds," Nami assured.
"Can such a tiny thing really do that?" Wanda asked, running her gaze along the length of Nami's Clima-Tact in wonder.
"Well, it wasn't quite that good before Cherry got a hold of it, and even now it isn't enough to manipulate the weather out at sea, but for this purpose it'll be plenty," Nami nodded.
"That's crazy," Ace admired. "Clashes between powerful Conqueror's haki wielders have been known to change the weather at times, but a stick doing it is just insane. Just what kind of tech is in that thing?"
"Very little, by my measure," Reiju sauntered over, embedding herself in the conversation. "It's a nifty little device, based on Usopp-kun's schematics, but it shouldn't be capable of the sheer power that it is."
"It's a magic stick!" Luffy declared.
"It's not magic, Luffy! Magic isn't real!" Nami disagreed.
"Is too! Cherry does magic all the time!" Luffy argued back.
"I can't say I have any idea how some of the things Cherry does work, but I don't think 'magic' is the accurate explanation for them," Reiju sided with Nami.
"Can you explain devil fruits with your so-called science?" Ace jumped in, though he mostly seemed bemused rather than serious.
"I can't, nor can my rotten father much to his annoyance, but Vegapunk has apparently made leaps and bounds in the study of devil fruit. No doubt that they're some ancient gene editing technology lost to time," Reiju reasoned.
"How does that explain Cherry's sword, spear, pistol, and armor?" Chopper chipped in, eager to have an intellectual conversation with a fellow scientist. Cherry could keep up in their occasional chemistry and medicine chats, but she came off as more of a mystic than a person of learning.
"Indeed, why? That is the question that has stumped Germa's entire scientific wing ever since Vegapunk came out with the first devil fruit weapon. At the time, they hypothesized that, since the devil fruits in those cases were always Zoan types, that the devil fruits were simply providing the entire genetic profile to the object. That got thrown out the window the moment Cherry entered the public eye with her, I quote, 'Bullshit Lightning Sword'. Judge was furious, ha!" Reiju let out a genuine laugh at the memory.
"Cherry would probably say something about vital energies or arcane inscriptions; the usual run around she'll give you if she doesn't want to answer your questions," Zoro added.
"Well, that's just silly," Reiju shook her head. "My personal theory is that she has somehow fused a living being into each of her trinkets with her own devil fruit, which serve as the true bearers of the devil fruits. Since they are probably simple minded critters, she controls them through similar means that she used to excise Judge's control from my own mind."
Robin kept her eyes trained on her history scrolls.
"Speaking of Cherry, where did she run off to?" Ace asked.
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"Ah!" Brook shambled over. "Cherry told me to give you this note if you asked where she went."
"Hm?" Ace took the slip of paper and unfolded it.
*poof*
Ace got a face full of glitter. He wiped away what he could with a frown on his face, then seeing that there was actually something written in the note, he read, "Wouldn't you like to know, flame-boy?"
His crew thought that it was terribly funny and laughed at him for a solid minute. At least Brook seemed mildly embarrassed for his unwitting role in the prank.
"Did I offend her without realizing it?" Ace wondered aloud.
"No, it's worse than that," Robin said in a dark tone.
Ace gulped.
"I think she likes you," Robin smirked.
--
That evening.
Kin'emon, his comrades, and his future lord stood on the coast overlooking an empty harbor amidst stormy waters.
Cherry could hear them shouting over the wind to each other, expressing their dismay over the obvious lack of their thousands of men and the ships that should have been brought here.
The only one of them that knew the truth was Kin'emon.
See, Kin'emon and Yasuie (mostly Yasuie) had hatched a plan. A terribly dishonest and dishonorable plan that involved lying to their closest allies.
When Kin'emon informed the older man of the traitor in their midst, he agreed that the only way to salvage the plan was to feed false information to the other red scabbards. This false information would in turn be fed to their enemy, be it Orochi or Kaido or both.
Incidentally, Yasuie did not agree with keeping the traitor's identity a secret, even from themselves. He thought it best to kill them and be done with it. Kin'emon did not concur with him; he felt that he would not and could not accept the traitor's betrayal unless he heard it spoken from the traitor's own mouth.
That could only happen if the traitor thought they had already won, for they were willing to be boiled alive to keep their secret before.
So the Red Scabbards gathered here, according to "plan", with none of their other allies in sight. No doubt the traitor thought them destroyed, rather than simply gathering at another
port entirely.
Cherry had her own part to play in the true plan, which was why she was here instead of with her friends.
Kin'emon and his cohort, minus Shinobu and Momonosuke, jumped aboard a row boat and set to rowing themselves to Onigashima, despite the dire weather that could very easily capsize
them.
"We must go! There will be no other chances! It has to be tonight!" Kin'emon shouted over the crashing waves. "We will not give up, Momonosuke-sama! Our fewer numbers will only make it easier for us to sneak inside and slay Kaido before they realize we are there!" "This just doesn't make any sense!" Raizo raised his own voice. "How was our plan found out a second time?!"
"I think we all suspect the same thing, in that regard...!" Kanjuro spoke darkly.
"I did not wish to consider the possibility... That one of us is in league with the enemy!" Kin'emon matched his old friend's tone. "In truth, I do not want to know! It is too late for it, anyhow!"
"Surely we cannot press onwards with a traitor in our midst, Kin-san!" Kiku grabbed him by the lapels. "If you out of any of us cannot harden your heart and cut down the traitor, then
none of us can!"
"How can we know who it is, Kiku?! They will not simply confess their treachery!" KIn'emon
shot back.
"Kiku is right! Let us clear this up right now!" Kanjuro declared, tears streaking down his face.
Kanjuro smiled. "It was me."
The dinghy exploded into shouts of alarm and disbelief, but Kin'emon was quiet. Kanjuro explained the entirety of his crimes, how he managed to deceive them all simply by never breaking character, never hating any of them and sharing in their joys and sorrows. He merely reported all that he saw back to Orochi, and nothing more.
And why did he do it?
"My name is Kurozumi Kanjuro. Need I say any more?" Kanjuro said.
Cherry recalled the Kurozumi clan from Robin's scrolls. Some time ago, the clan attempted a coup to take control of Wano, and they were punished severely. Namely, the annihilation of the entire clan, down to the last man, woman, and child.
A distasteful thing, if Cherry was being generous. Perhaps it could have been left as ancient history if the people of Wano hadn't continued to hunt the few survivors decades after the
fact.
"Wow, I almost pity the guy," Cherry muttered as she watched the drama unfold.