21 Merchan

The old man entered the mysterious house that was a beautiful girl before.

After they entered, they saw that the house was completely empty. There was only a table with some chairs in the middle.

The blonde girl appeared like a ghost out of nothing and smiled to the old man.

„Welcome to my shop. My name is Amanda D. Lily and I'm a merchant"

The young woman made a gesture that the old man should take a seat. After he did that, the woman continued with her speech.

„I ate the shop shop fruit, so I can trade everything in this world as long as we are in this house"

She smiled and served the old man tea.

„Do you want the strength of a giant? Then we can trade it. Once I met a giant who wanted the power of a devil fruit, so he traded with me the most astonishing thing that his race was born with"

„Or maybe you want the eyes of a hawk. There was once an intelligent bird race who traded his eyes for something he thought had more worth"

While the woman talked the gentle smile never left her face.

„Maybe you ate a devil fruit in the past but you aren't really happy with it's power. I can trade with you another devil fruit ability, but be warned, a living being can only have one devil fruit ability, even with my power. So you would lose the ability of your current fruit"

„Or do you want your youth back? Even that I can sell. There were many young costumers who traded their youth for various abilities"

The old man frowned.

„Miss, your powers are really astonishing. This old man is poor and has nothing to offer for such amazing goods"

The girl pointed at the hand of the old man.

„This ring with a flame engraved on it. I'm really interested in this. What do you want for this ring?"

„Oh, my ring?", the old man smiled. „This ring is the one my late grandfather gave me. It is nothing special, it isn't much worth. This has more of an emotional worth for me. How can a merchant like you take interest in such a thing?"

The young woman laughed.

„You can think of it like an intuition merchants a born with. I really think this ring is something special, so I'm willing to make you a very good offer for it"

„I'm a little bit confused, young miss. This ring is on my hand since I was a young teenager, and I wanted to present it to my grandchildren so it is really difficult for me to make a decision in this short time"

The old man sighed and continued with his speech.

„But young miss, there is really something that I want to ask. A merchant with such special powers shouldn't live in a place where desire and profit is so worthless. How can you survive on this island?"

The young woman laughed again.

„There are benefits, old man. I'm a merchant that only sees profits or losses. In my world, there aren't enemies or friends, there isn't loyalty or betrayal. I'm always at the place were I would get the most benefit, so this place has more to offer then the first impression you got on this island. Its like you, old man. On the first impression, you seemed like a weak old man. But how could such a weak old man wear a ring that caught the eyes of this merchant? You and this island are the same, there is more than the first impression can show"

The young woman started to laugh again after she saw the nervous face of the old man.

„Don't be afraid, sir. It is like I told you. If you could bring me benefits more than anyone other, I will serve you with all my abilities. But if there are only losses in our encounter, I will be indifferent. Not far away, there is an inn I would recommend you. Think about a deal, I think I can offer you anything you could imagine. I will wait here until you made a decision. Have a good rest, sir. And welcome on Paradise Island"

After the old man arrived in his room at the inn, he had a visible fear on his face.

„Bonney, make me young again. This old body is killing me"

Several seconds later, the old man and his wife turned into Blackflame Ezio and Boa Hancock. The four grandchildren were Bonney, Reiju, Hatchi and Tsuru.

„What a mess, this was so useless"

He watched his crew members and shaked his head.

„I thought we should infiltrate this place with Bonneys abilities so we could get more information about this island. Who would fear two old people and four little brats? But this strategy was completely useless. This place is a mess. This place is so creepy, I don't even have words to describe it"

„What did you find out, Ezio?", asked Hancock with a worried expression.

„Oh, I can't say that I really understand, but I have this feeling that we all will die if we make one wrong move"

„Is it your ‚feelings' that are warning you?", asked Hancock with a strange expression.

Ezio nodded but all the crew members other than Hancock looked confused.

„What are you two talking about?", asked Bonney with a frown. „Aren't the people on this place really good people? Yeah, I admit, they all a lack a little bit of ambition, but aren't they nice?"

„You don't understand, Bonney", said Hancock and then pointed at Ezio.

„This guy is special, or should I say, his observation haki is special"

Hancock sighed and continued to talk.

„Since the first time we trained haki with our teacher, this guy had a special talent for the observation haki. It even scared Kizaru, and it is really difficult for this guy to show emotions"

„Kizaru told us once that some special people developed a special type of haki. They learned this haki only when they had a near death experience. Only if you saw death, such special haki could form. Kizaru was clueless when it came to Ezio. He lived a sheltered life in the holy land and he never faced death. But this guy had a special observation haki since he was born. He has a natural instinct that helps him in his fights and many more other things. When his instincts are on alarm, then we are truly in trouble. Besides that, he doesn't miss any details of his surroundings"

It was true that Ezio never faced a near death experience in this life. Only he knew that his observation haki was developed in such a way because he truly died once.

Hancock looked at her shocked crew members and then her gaze landed on Ezio.

„Tell us, what did you find out about this place?"