Chapter 14 - 14: Brotherhood.

The next day.

Edam was currently lying on the branch of a tree in the forest, alone.

Sometimes he would lie on the ground, sometimes on a branch and sometimes on the soft fur of a giant animal.

And sometimes he would walked around in the woods like a lost soul with only two rabbits who were following him.

And why was he alone ?

Because when he woke up this morning, Luffy, Sabo, and Ace were already gone.

They didn't woke him up .

He thought that they had abandoned him because he would become a marine while they were going to be pirates.

His heart had really took a heavy hit as he then go to the forest to console himself.

As he was walking in the forest, he noticed something that had already took his interest.

Everytime he would walk in the forest, every beast would come out of their lair to look at him. Even in the past days, when he would walked with Luffy & co, every animals would still come out to take a look.

He had already noticed it but he didn't take it to mind as he wanted to enjoy the little time he had with Luffy & co.

Since the last time he transform, he had felt a huge change in his body, as if everything has evolved.

Even his nose has "grew up" as he could now smell a lot of things that he never smell before and he could smell it from really far away. He could even distinguished accurately a lot of smell even when mixed together.

That was an incredible advantage as well as an disadvantage because, well, that would be useful to hunt someone or something yet not really because he would have to suffer everytime someone would fart, and when he said that he obviously thought about Sabo as he would fart often.

His hearing too had been enhanced as he would hear anyone who shouting at a maximun of one kilometers when he focus on it. The advantage was obviously when someone would cry for help he would hear them. The disadvantage was that when he sleep he would hear everyone's snoring making him unable to sleep. The worst torture possible.

Concerning his sight, he could now see a ant crawling a tree at a distance of about five hundred meters.

Overall, all of his sense were enhanced.

At first it was truly a burden but he quickly learned to control his sense, slowly but surely.

Right now he was lying on a branch with his eyes closed as he was training his newly "super senses".

He was not far away from the house, so he could hear rather clearly the sounds of the bandits drinking, sleeping, and eating while Dadan was complaining about them to Magra and Dogra who were defending them.

His super sense were really disrespectful of other's privacy he thought while he giggle quietly, alone.

As he was listening to the bandit's party his sense of hearing picked up the sounds of big step closing on the house.

He opened his eyes suddenly and jumped off from the tree to fall face to face in front of a huge tiger.

Like all the normal tiger, it was orange colored with black stripes on his fur.

As it was moving through the forest, some trees were falling down as the beast was too huge.

"Oh, is that the tiger king or something like that ?" Edam wondered about it's presence here.

He wasn't afraid in the slightest. That was another change that he found out too. Whenever he would face a ferocious beast now he would not feel a single ounce of fear in his heart.

Before he could still feel a little trepidation in his heart but now it was as if everytime he would encounter a danger, his heart would beat excitedly as if to push him to fight against this adversity that he was facing and win over it.

"He is not here for my food right ?" He asked that because just behind him was a campfire where a delicious soup of chicken that he had made himself was being stewed for a rather long time now.

Even the bandits at home didn't dare to touch his food as they knew that Edam treasured his food like the apple of his eyes.

There was even a rumours circulating around that an arrogant bandit ate a chocolate cake that Makino had prepared and send especially for him and his brother. Even though the bandit knew that it was Edam and Luffy's cake he still ate it.

This man strangely disappear the next day, never to be seen again.

Since that day nobody tried to touch his food ever again.

However, now here was this puny tiger who was trying to eat his food ? Truly courting death.

Since the tiger had arrived he never looked at Edam for a single moment even when the latter jumped off the tree, his eyes were clearly fixed on the cooking pot as he was salivating a bit.

Seeing this, Edam anger shoot up instantly.

You have to know that Edam had never shared his food with anyone other than Ace, Sabo and of course his little brother Luffy.

He could shared nearly everything with anyone other his food, that was his bottom line.

So seeing this tiger targeting his food that he had made himself, with the ingredient that he had hunted himself, this had angered him a lot.

Well, no need to say that he was pretty pissed off.

"Oy, what are you looking at ?" When Edam said that he didn't realized that his two eyes had shone a threatening pale yellow light for a moment before fading away.

He didn't see it but the tiger had seen it.

The beast who was acting like an arrogant king was frightened to the depth of his bones, so much that it started to tremble like leaves.

Edam who saw this blink his eyes rapidly while wondering what happened with a curious face.

"Oy wh-..." before he even finished the huge tiger turn around and runned as if his life was on the line.

When he was going to turn around to see if his food was cooked he heard the sounds of voices and footsteps coming from behind as he look at it.

It was Ace, Luffy and Sabo who were returning.

They were obviously surprised to see the tiger king running without caring for them as if his life was in danger if he stayed here one more second.

"Edam was it the tiger king that we saw just then ?!" Sabo asked nervously.

"I don't know and I don't think though, it started to tremble before we even started to fight so..." I replied.

"Anyway come with us." Ace said while walking away.

" Yeah we're going to be-..." before luffy finished Sabo put his hand on his mouth while dragging him and saying with a somewhat nervous face.

" Just come we will show you something." Sabo said while berating Luffy quietly.

In response I narrow my eyes without saying anything, wondering what the three of them were up to.

I took a look at my soup and saw that it wasn't ready yet to be eaten so I decided to followed them.

I then followed them while they lead me to wherever we were going to.

After walking for a while, we reached a place where the rest of a felled tree could be seen surrounded by a lot of trees

I could see that the tree was cut out not too long ago.

Ace then took four cups of drinks out of his bag and then place them on the "table".

"What is it for?" I asked curiously.

Nobody replied to me.

Ace then brought out big bottle of saké that he stole from Dadan.

He then said " Here the rundown, if we exchange a cup of saké, we four will become brother. We will always be brother even when we grew up. Our brotherly ties will never be broken by anyone or anything even if one of us were to become pirate rival or a marine. We will always be brother before anything else."

When I heard him I was completely stunned as I didn't expect him to say that.

'What the hell is he talking about ?'

When I looked at Sabo and Luffy, I didn't see a single hint of surprise on their faces, obviously they were already aware of it.

"Oyy you three what-..." I was about to asked what was happening when they all smiled widely at me with a "Hihihi" sound.

Sabo then said " We thought that since you're going to go at the end of this month, why don't we made a surprise for you ?" he smiled.

" And since you declare that you will be the big bro, we thought that we might as well become officially brothers." Ace said again with a grin.

Luffy him just stood on the side while giggling like an happy idiot. He was clearly extremely happy to become brothers with Ace and Sabo too.

" So just drink this cup already and don't ask any question Edam." Ace said while pouring the saké in the four cup.

I stood there silent for a moment before exploding in laughter with a " pfff hahahah, you three are really something...haha..."

I laughed so hard that a drop of tear came out of my eyes.

I nearly died of laughter as I wiped my tears while saying.

"So that's all ? We just have to drink this ?"

They all nodded at my question.

Looking at them I smiled widely and said.

"So ? what are we waiting for ?"

The three smiled widely and lift their cup while I did the same.

Ace then exclaimed happily while smiling "From now on we're brothers !!!"

We then clink our cups while shouting

"YEAH !!!"

Then we drank our cups down in one go.

Since that day I had gain two more brothers to protect.