One Piece: Dream of Immortality

Chapter 487: Unmasked



"Where are we going?" Toko asked.

"Kin'emon is a busy guy, so he asked me to go see the old man called Hitetsu and ask him about stuff," Cherry explained, not seeing any reason not to be honest with her.

"To ask him if he's related to Oden?" Toko followed up.

"Toko is so smart-" Cherry praised and pinched her adorable cheeks. Toko squealed and giggled, pulling away from her.

"That's right. Apparently little Momo and Tama are having a playdate over there, so maybe you can make friends, hm?" Cherry said, causing the little ball of sunshine to light up even more than usual.

It didn't take very long to cross the wasteland and enter the bamboo forest where the former Amigasa Village resided, even with Toko slowing her down somewhat. A brief scan of her Life Sense was enough to tell Cherry where she could find Hitetsu (at his home, go figure), and also that there weren't any unwanted interlopers hiding in the forest either.

With a hop, skip and a jump, Cherry was knocking on Hitetsu's door.

The door slid open with a thump, the diminutive old man on his stilts and wearing his mask answered the door. "You again. Where's my sword?"

Cherry's eyes widened. "Oh. I don't actually know."

Hitetsu scowled at her.

"Hey, don't look at me like that! It was Luffy who took it, not me!" Cherry defended her honor.

"Cherry?" Chopper walked out, underneath Hitetsu's stilts. The two children, Tama and Momo, followed soon after. Kiku poked her head over Hitetsu's.

"Just come inside! Stop crowding around me!" Hitetsu grumbled.

...

"Who is this girl, Cherry?" Kiku asked curiously.

"Yasuie's kid," Cherry answered simply.

"Yasuie?!" Kiku shouted in alarm. "Is he...?!"

"Still kicking, yup." Cherry sipped the simple tea that Tama had prepared.

Momonosuke's reaction was more subdued, since he hardly knew the man in question, but he was still relieved to know they had more allies in Wano than originally thought.

Neither Kiku nor Momonosuke noticed Hitetsu's reaction. Cherry guessed it was some odd mixture of relief and... guilt?

"Well, I didn't come here just to have some tea, so let's just get right to it," Cherry said, setting down her cup. "Hitetsu, in what way are you related to the Kouzuki clan?"

The room went very still and quiet then. It was less out of shock than it was out of confusion, which was the emotion that played across the faces of Momonosuke, Kiku, Tama, and Chopper.

Hitetsu looked like he was about to draw a sword on Cherry, if only he were wearing one.

"What do you know?" Hitetsu asked her. This time, Kiku and Momonosuke truly were shocked. Of all the ways they could have imagined he would answer, an affirmation was the last thing that they expected.

"I know that you are a blood relation to Momo here, and that it is highly unlikely it is through her mother. So spill the beans already, old man. Who are you?" Cherry reiterated.

Hitetsu held his hard look for a few tense moments of silence, but seeing that Cherry wouldn't let this go and that she wasn't the slightest bit uncomfortable under his glare, he sighed.

"I should have just died in obscurity. That is all that I deserve," Hitetsu grumbled.

Cherry waved her hand, quietly telling him to go on.

"I am Kouzuki Sukiyaki," the old man said as he sat up straight and removed his mask. Kiku sucked in a cold breath. Momonosuke shot to his feet, only able to speak nonsense as a million questions and demands fought to be the first to be spoken. Chopper and Tama's poor little heads swiveled left and right, trying to understand what was happening.

"Right." Cherry nodded. "Who's that, then?"

"He was once the Shogun of Wano, and he is Oden-sama's father..." Kiku spoke wistfully. "And I failed most miserably as both a leader and as a father. I am unworthy of both titles," Sukiyaki spoke with certainty in his voice.

"How are you alive?!" Momonosuke shouted, jabbing an angry finger in Sukiyaki's direction.

Sukiyaki looked upon his grandson with deep sadness. "I do not know. By the time I realized that I was being poisoned, I was too weak to fight back against Orochi and all of the servants allowed near me were loyal to Orochi. Once he got what he wanted, he did not kill me, but imprisoned me. Perhaps Orochi simply wanted me to bear witness to the horrors he would reap upon our home and people. I escaped some fifteen years ago and took on the identity of Hitetsu to hide myself."

"What a scumbag, that totally sounds like something he'd do. The bastard even fed a whole village defective S.M.I.L.E. fruits, making them incapable of expressing any emotion except joy," Cherry told them.

"Yes, it seems that Orochi delights in cruelty for cruelty's sake. Hopefully his reign will end soon, and Momonosuke can take his rightful place as Shogun. Only then can Wano heal." Sukiyaki closed his eyes and tilted his head down.

"About that," Cherry said. "You don't expect Momo to be the best Shogun ever right off the bat, do you? He's going to need help, preferably from someone who both has experience ruling a country and isn't aiming to turn him into a puppet."

"I cannot!" Sukiyaki erupted out of his solemnity. "It is my failures that have led Wano to ruin!"

"And what do you think, Momonosuke-sama?" Cherry turned her eyes on the boy, who flinched back from the intensity of her look and the strangeness of the honorific on her tongue.

"I..." Momonosuke looked around the room, as if searching for an escape. Then surprisingly, he squared himself up and faced Sukiyaki head on. "I need your help to restore Wano to its former glory... no, its former peace!"

He did not bow, nor did he beg. He wasn't asking for Sukiyaki's help, he was telling him to do

so.

Sukiyaki was gobsmacked at how bold the boy was. He had watched him closely in the short time he had stayed here. He had seemed so much like his father, like Oden, that he couldn't help but worry over Wano's future.n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

Now though? Now he saw a sense of duty and responsibility in the boy that he had never seen in Oden. Even when Sukiyaki was young, as serious as he was as a child, he could not compare to Momonosuke. It seemed as if Momonosuke inherited the best traits of both his father and

his grandfather...

Cherry broke the silence with applause. "Good heavens, you might make a good ruler yet! I was half expecting you to piss yourself."

"Wha-?!" Momonosuke instantly lost his almost regal air and started floundering. "What do you mean?! I wouldn't piss myself!"

Momonosuke charged her with the intent to strangle her to death, but Cherry just cackled as she held the boy off by his forehead. Tama came up behind her with a garrote, wrapping it around her neck and giving it a sharp tug, though it was a pointless endeavor as Cherry just

kept on laughing.

Kiku giggled at the sight and Sukiyaki's frayed nerves were soothed as he let out a breath.