Lia's POV;

Somehow it doesn't stop to be amusing to see how Lara tries to kill Mrs Chicken Wing. This must be her tenth try today. She just now tried to pierce the hen by throwing a fork at her. It missed and got stuck inside the door frame, right next to Jonny's face. Mrs Chicken Wing was not without fault in this attempt. She jumped on the head of Lara and sat down.

How this chicken can be so easy going with the constant attacks is beyond me. As well as how it survives. Lara tried almost anything by now. She even threw her overboard in a test to see if Mrs Chicken Wing has eaten a Devil Fruit. She has not. The hen just swam for a moment, before evading a Sea King by flying back on our ship.

Of course, Lara threw her overboard more than once, always in hope of her getting eaten, so that she could kill the fish and then cut the dead hen out. That was the day we learned that this bird was perfect prey for Sea Kings. These oversized fish seem to want to eat the hen almost as much as Lara.

Since then we used her at least once a week as bait to catch some meat. She was not bothered by it and even jumped into the water with a head held high and an arrogant cluck. As if we were not good enough to bait such worthy prey.

Strange chicken indeed.

Jonny and Yosaku were kinda fearful of the bird. They tried to attack her once, got badly scratched and had to be patched up by Jo. Jonny even almost got his throat cut open by her claws.

At least she was strangely clean. She used the bath like everyone else and I even once saw her using the shower. She is way too intelligent for a normal bird. Lara once had a nightmare in which we visited a whole island of these chickens.

Had to cuddle her for hours to calm her down, good times.

Anyway, Mrs Chicken Wing just now jumped down from Lara's head and strutted out of the kitchen. She somehow made her walking look like an elegant strut. She passed Nojiko, nodded once and was then gone.

“Mrs Chicken Wing is as strange as always. I have seen her sitting on a chair, sunbathing with a mirror yesterday”, Nojiko told us while sitting down.

“What's up Nojiko?”, asked Lara from her seat. I was behind the stove, making food for everyone. It somehow feels nice to see the delighted faces everyone has when they eat my food.

“Just wanted to grab something to eat.” She took the plate I gave her and started eating. Today I made some bread that I have cut into, not completely mind you. Then I put cheese and tiny salami cubes inside the cuts and added some spices. The whole thing was then baked. Once that was done you could pull out the bread slices and eat.

“Anyway, we should reach Shipstand Island tomorrow in the morning. Thanks to Lia's training we are way faster than what should be possible”, she informed us between her bites.

“Miss Lia, ehem, mimimi, Miss Lia, the food you cook is as brilliant as always. Thank you for the meal.” Igaram, who has just finished his plate, stood up and began to wash the dishes. He claims that it was the least he could do for us helping him.

Normally that was Lara's job, she agreed easily to let him do it. Igaram, well, he has some quirks but is okay at the end. He was able to tell us many great stories about Alabasta and even some of the other island on the Grand Line. He is apparently the leader of the royal guard. But he told us that he was not the strongest. He gained his position because he was a good strategic and came up with plans on the spur. He could barely win a sparring session against Yosaku and Jonny at the same time.

And that was also only because both were not used to his strange attacks. I mean gunshots out of his hair? That is fucked up. Maybe I'm gonna add knives to my braids and learn to use them? They could be manipulated with some pressure and then act as a close range defence. But my hair would become all bloody, blood is so hard to get out once it is dry.

“Cool, I'm out training some more”, declared Lara before jumping up from her seat and running out. She was still training her fine-tuning of her ability. She's now able to make more than electro sounds but is not at the point to make voices or instruments with high complexity.

A drum or xylophone yes, a guitar or violin not. Her goal is to fire light lasers out of her eyes. And then crackle loudly. It's nice to know that she still acts childish, okay, she does most of the time.

“So what are you going to do today Lia?” I looked over my shoulder at Nojiko and thought for a moment.

“I might try to learn a new attack. It should be okay to train it while on the sea”, I then answered. There was this new thing I wanted to do. It needs high precision, but also a lot of power.

By compressing air into a tiny place and then letting it go in a single moment, I should be able to create something similar to Kuma's paw bomb.

The hyper-compressed air will expand rapidly and blow anything away if released. The heat that is generated by compressing the molecules to such a small room should also not be small. With me just putting pressure on it from all sides it will also isolate the contained air, which makes it way hotter than a none isolated container.

The ultimate end of this attack would be the fusion of molecules and then a miniature black hole.

Of course, that is not possible for me, at least not yet, and probably not for a long time.

“That's cool, I'm gonna try to learn this Kami-e some more. The yoga and stretching does wonders to my butt.” She patted her slapped her own ass playfully and it bounced only slightly. It does look firm, but her hips were too wide for me. I like them on the smaller side. At least Nojiko won't become such a boob monster as Nami.

I nodded once and then also stood up. I walked to the stern of the Shadow and sat down. My focus was on the sea. I placed both hands in front of me. They weren't truly needed, but the focus was easier while imagining me grabbing and pushing something. That's why I flick my pebbles. I am perfectly able to just shoot them from my palm, without moving at all.

It also gives the impression of me not having a Devil Fruit power.

Anyway, I concentrated on a ball of football size. This ball had an even pressure coming at it from all sides at the same time. The pressure was only one way and would suck in more air with time.

At first, there was only air, then the place in which my 'ball' was became slightly misty and then turned to a whitish colour. The more air I sucked in the harder it became and the stronger I had to make the pressure.

I increased the strength slowly and gradually. Not in a way that is used in a fight, mostly because I wanted to first see the result. Then after five minutes, I deemed it enough. I was around 75% of my maximum strength. The ball was still as large as a normal football and now almost completely white.

There was no visible heat coming off of it and it hovered still at the place where I started. I'm sure that no one on the Shadow could see it by now. I then clapped my hands together and with it stopped the pressure at once.

It blinked white once. Then a small wall of steam shot up from where it was, most of the force was absorbed into the sea. The clouds in the sky were pushed away and an almost invisible wave of air was travelling outwards.

A few seconds later the wave reached us and an extremely loud boom, as well as the shockwave crash, rolled over us. It rocked the Shadow and threw us down. I myself was clutching my ears and felt how blood was leaking from them. It was an eardrum-shattering boom....

I only heard a 'feeeeeep'-ing noise and looked back to see how everyone else was faring. Lara was also clutching her head and glaring daggers at me. Most likely having already assumed correctly that I was the reason.

Nojiko was the only other one on deck. She was rubbing her ear but did not look to be in too much pain. She was kneeling next to Lara and worriedly looking at her bleeding ears. A moment later Josef came busting out of the door that led inside.

He had a medic kit in his hands and run next to Lara before opening it and telling her something. Seems like I can only use this skill when Lara blocks the sound from reaching us.

I turned back to looked at the hole in the sky. The clouds were pushed away and a large hole was now over the zone I used for my experiment.

This would have caused some serious damage if used on land. The large ocean just absorbs most of the impact. The pressure wave was strong enough to throw us off our feet and we were several kilometres away from the origin.

I'm sure it would at least level a small forest or house block. Maybe I can also condense the water and produce water bombs? It will be harder, as it is not as easy to compress as air.

Someone tapped my shoulder and I turned around. Josef was holding a small glass with a pill up to me. I drunk the water and swallowed the pill before he motioned for me to tilt my head. I did as he asked and watched how he started to carefully clean my ear out.

With that done he gave me a small bonk on my head and left back down to do whatever he was doing before.

Well, let's test out my water bomb.

[The next day]

The next day our ears were already healed. Josef was in wonder how it healed so fast. The thing he gave us was antibiotics against any possible infections. He told us this morning that the eardrum can heal on its own and that an intervention was only rarely in need.

He then reprimanded me for making him use precious medications for something that could have been avoided. I had to promise that I would ask Lara for a sound barrier whenever I train this move.

Today I was training Nojiko in using her dial rifle. Her skill in shooting with it was good enough to let her fare against most goons from a distance. But now we were training close quarter combat. I showed her how to use the butt of the weapon as a club or how a bayonet was used.

I also tried to teach her the basics of gun fighting. I gave her two dial guns with a knife attached at to the barrel. She was training the basic moves and to not cut herself with them.

I used her training for my own as well. While she tried to hit or shoot me, I tried to stop her bullets from leaving our training area by applying a pressure cage. Anything that hits its wall will either be stopped or slowed down. It has the side effect that anything that comes at it from the other side will get flung at us with increased speed.

Lara was using this fact to distract us with rubber pebbles. They will only bruise, but it still hurts. At least it hurts Nojiko, I don't get hit by them.

Nojiko was flexible and I think she will have Kami-e down in a few months, if under pressure maybe a few weeks, but attacks were few so far. At most a small fry pirate ship. It gave us some money and the opportunity to teach the three how to kill without too many problems.

Josef already knows. He told us some of his past during dinner. We're using those to get closer. He said that he had to kill marines that were hunting him for betraying them. Also told us that there was a bounty on him. 50 million or so, apparently for his knowledge in whatever he has done.

That was something he did not want to speak about. Lara said that it involved the Pacifista, so human experiments maybe? She also said that he claims to have not known about the use of his research.

Anyway, these evenings are helping in forging a bond between the group. Jonny and Yosaku are more self-secure now. They no longer think of themselves as weak or useless. The pirate raids helped a lot in that. Normally it was them who took out the captain if they were strong enough.

Nojiko makes more jokes now. She had this dead serious attitude at the start. That and some trouble in saying what she thinks. Living under a dictator made her very aware of what she should say and not what she wants to say.

Josef was at first constantly brooding and in his room or office but came out more often now. He seems to give himself the fault for something. Yet, the closeness that we have starts to ease his mind on it.

Lara is still her childish self, but it looks like she is starting to like Yosaku, Josef and Jonny. Which means that she will be affected if they die. Not much as of now, but still some. Enough to really help them train. I think she starts to overcome her aversion to men. That's why I was not against them in our crew. I even suggested it once back when we were still on our home island.

And I am changing as well. At least I think I do. I think I can say that I understand some emotions better and that I can show them. At least a little. Josef told me that my smiling was less forced a few days ago.

And Mrs Chicken Wing is still under heavy, daily and deadly attack from Lara. The hen is moving around the ship as if she was a human. She ate with us on the table, used the bathroom and I think I start to understand some of her cluckings. Lara, to the surprise of us all, was the best of us to understand the chicken. Then again, she uses the most of her free time to hunt her.

The hen was also the most empathic of us. She would let herself pet by Nojiko when she misses her sister. Gives Jonny and Yosaku a pecking when they start to think arrogantly from their wins. Or annoys Lara when she starts to think too bloody. She sits on my shoulder when we fight and clucks in my ear whenever I am 'too brutal'. And drives Josef out of his office when he broods.

“I can see land!”, shouted Yosaku suddenly from the crows nest, ripping me out of my thoughts and making me almost fail in evading a hit from Nojiko. He and Jonny choose this day to rest, so they were the lazing around. The crows nest was Yosaku's favourite place to chill, it's also where he paints.

“Good, let's stop now”, I said to Nojiko who nodded and left to shower. She was all sweaty from the training.