The Painful Memories of Albert Blood

Al Blood sat alone at a small table, in the corner of the luxurious drifting restaurant Baratie. The young, red-haired pirate hunter sat enjoying his meal, happy that there were no pirates in the restaurant. It was a calm, quiet day, Baratie not being busy. They usually had pirates from all the seas come for meals, but at this time there were only a couple of marines and a few bounty hunters, and Albert. As he sat, enjoying the expensive meal (paid for by his father's fortune), he started thinking, as there was nothing much to do besides that. He dove into his own world of thoughts while slowly eating his meal.

He started thinking of his current self and state. He was an 18 year old pirate hunter, just now starting his pirate-hunting journey. He was driven by hatred toward pirates and revenge for his father's death at the hands of a pirate. He dreamed of killing all pirates that he encountered or even saw, and making a big fortune from it, to pile on top of his inheritance from his father. He was now nothing like he once was, now being a man full of hate and negative emotion. He then started remembering his joyful life before his father's death. The happy moments with his parents, the adventures with his father, everything he could remember of his old life seemed so happy. Except for his mother's death, caused by an illness. He was very sad at the time, but got over it after a while. But sadly, now Albert was now nothing like he once was. He was now a man full of hate and negative emotion. All because of that one event. His father's horrifying death at the hands of a cruel pirate. As Al recalled memories of his life, he couldn't help but remember his father's death. He didn't want to remember it, but the memory was stuck in his head, now taking over his world of thought, beyond his control.


Flashback

"Good night, dad!" said the 12 year old Al Blood to his father, standing at his bedside. "Good night, Al." said Albert's father, Roger Blood. Roger was an infamous pirate hunter, his name known throughout the oceans during his career. He had retired from his career of pirate hunting, living on a small island with his wife and son. Albert and his father were just coming back from an adventure that day, Roger taking his son out to a nearby island to explore. Almost as soon as Roger left Albert's room, little Al fell asleep. He was exhausted from the day's exploration with his father, and they came back late at night."What a deep sleeper he is...

In the middle of the night, the young, sleeping Al is woken up by a loud bang of thunder. He wakes up and sits up quickly, terrified by the thunder and the flash of lightning. He gets out of bed and stands up, looking outside his bedside window. There is a thunderstorm outside, the rain pouring heavily. Albert exits his room, rubbing his eyes, and walks along the hallway, reaching his parents' room. He goes inside and looks at the large bed in front of him, his father's bed. He walks closer to the bed, to find out surprisingly that his father isn't there. "Huh? Dad's not here?" he asks himself, surprised. He decides that his father must be n the living room. He walks to the living room to find that his father isn't there, either. He then walks around the house, opening doors, searching for his missing father. No luck. He just can't find him. He then walks over to the front door and opens it a bit, to see if the rain had stopped or at least calmed. It had calmed a little, but was still pouring. He then opens the door so that it is halfway open and looks out. Something catches the light of the house and Al squints to see what it is. It seems to him like something lying on the ground, with something sticking out of the ground near it. He summons his courage and walks out a little during the rainstorm to get a better view of the mysterious thing. He gets closer and closer, until he gets close enough to see what it was.

A horrified expression instantly came onto Albert's face, and tears started forming in his little eyes. What lay in front of him was a sight Albert never imagined he would ever see. It was his father, laying down on the ground, with a sword sticking out of his chest, blood everywhere. Albert started crying and yelled at the top of his lungs ""FFFAAAAAAAAAATHEEEEEEERR!!!!! NNNNNNOOOOOOOOOOO!!!" he screamed into the night, tears streaming down his face, his face shocked and extremely sad. He looked up, out into the night, and saw a large ship, sailing away from the island Albert lived on. The most interesting part of the ship was the flag. It was a Jolly Roger, a pirate flag. "Curse those pirates! Curse them! I will get them someday! My dad won't go unavenged! I WILL FIND YOU ONE DAY!! AND I WILL KILL YOU!!" Albert yelled, almost as loud as his first yell. He looked down at his father, who seemed to be opening his eyes."A-Albert, my...son... said the half-dead Roger calmly, as he then coughed up blood. "Father..." the horrified Albert said,as his beloved father took his last breath and closed his eyes and died.



As Albert finished up his meal and his memory session, he found himself with tears filling up his eyes. He wiped his tears and got up, walking toward the exit of the restaurant. He would walk outside on the wing of the ship, before getting unto his own small ship and setting sail, heading for wherever the sea would take him.

Sentence Count: 69

Al sailed away from the floating restaurant on his small, independent ship, which he hoped to soon get rid of, once he began to actually work as a pirate hunter. It was a small boat that paled in comparison to the large Baratie and even any pirate ships he saw. Al hoped it would take him places and last him a while, until he could earn some money hunting pirates and upgrade the boat. But for now, Albert Blood was a lone, wandering pirate hunter looking to work for no one but himself. He absolutely hated pirates, with no soft spot or even indication of mercy toward them. He would slay any pirate he saw and destroy every ship he saw with a pirate flag. But Al had one clear and specific goal in mind: to kill the pirate that had murdered his father. No, he wouldn't just kill the pirate. He wanted to do much more than just simply kill him. But Albert could not think of that right now. He had to gain wealth, and more importantly, power. A lot of it. That's where the other pirates came in; he thought of all the pirates he hoped to kill as training, as practice for the ultimate goal of murdering the pirate who killed his father.

Albert sailed on, not heading for a specific location but allowing the sea to carry him to wherever it may take him. Any pirate he would see on the way he would fight, and would stop at any island he saw to rest, gather provisions, and explore. Fighting and killing pirates was not the only things the red-haired pirate hunter liked; he had a passion for exploration as his father did. His journeys and explorations would allow him to accumulate wealth, knowledge, and money, all of which he would most need to be able to reach his goals. Smiling, Albert sat comfortably at the front of his boat, looking out into the far and vast sea of East Blue, fascinated as the waves carried him on.

After about 5 minutes of mostly pointless sitting, Albert suddenly remembered something important and stood up, turning around toward the back of the boat. He began walking to the back of the small ship excited about what he was about to, as it would greatly affect him in his journeys. It would be an essential part of his life and journey to achieve his goals, making it easier and more possible to do what he wanted to do and capture pirates. Al slowly approached the back of the ship, where a dark brown-colored container lay. It was a fairly small, cubic box that contained two important items and another more important one. Al walked up to the box an stopped for a moment before crouching down, squatting in front of he container. The pirate hunter then carefully pulled off the lid of the container, setting it down beside him and peeking into the box.

Albert reached his right hand inside and carefully picked up the first of the three items that lay inside of the dark container. The item was a small compass, which obviously would be very important in his exploration. It would serve to tell him of the general direction in which he was traveling. But the small golden compass would be nothing without the second item in the box, which Al soon picked up out of the box with his left hand, so that he held the compass in his right hand and the second item in his left. The item was a rather large, rolled up map of the general area of East Blue that he was currently in. The map would not be as purposeful without the compass, and the compass would be almost nothing without the map. Before Albert was going to pick up the third item, he was going to perform a small task that would establish a sense of "knowing where he was going", and would provide for him a set destination. He turned around, so that he faced the front of the ship, and set the rolled-up map and compass down on the floor. He then sat on the floor in front of the two items and unrolled the map, laying it out flat in front of him. The pirate hunter would now begin determine his current location, where he was headed and where he was headed.

Locating Baratie on the map, Al looked at the small compass and the map to determine where he was headed. He traced the path with his right index finger, according to the direction his compass displayed. He then proceeded to estimate his location, based on a guess of how much time had passed, and located where he was heading assuming he would stay on his current course. Albert did not know the name of the place he was headed for, as the map did not name the places on it, but it seemed familiar. Having accomplished his task in using the map to locate himself and his destination, Al turned back around to the wooden brown box for the most interesting and important part: the third item.

The green-eyed pirate hunter reached with gentle arms into the container, in which lay the third item, a fruit. However, this fruit was no ordinary fruit. Al looked at the odd fruit in his right hand, staring at it for a few moments and thinking of how it would affect his life. This rare item would give the new pirate hunter the power necessary to push forward and reach his goals. It would allow him to rise above and stand out from most other people, including pirate hunters. This fruit was a devil fruit, a rare fruit that gave the one who hate it special power and attributes like no other. How was the 18 year old pirate hunter in possession of such an item? His father had passed it on to him as a gift and important treasure to be closely guarded, and regarded as his father's legacy. Al's old man had acquired this rare fruit during one of his many explorations, but had deemed himself too old to use it, having found it during his later years. The father had kept the fruit with him as his treasure, until his beloved son Albert had grown up and was responsible enough to possess and make use of the fruit. For those few years Albert had kept the fruit with him, keeping it close and never forgetting it as his deceased father's legacy. He had been waiting until this moment to eat the fruit that would change his life. And now the time had come for the young pirat hunter to do just that.

"Pika Pika no mi. The Light-Light fruit" he said as he stared at the fruit he was about to eat. The fruit mostly looked like a normal fruit, one that Al recognized but could not name, as he was not one to be interested in food. It was shaped like a normal fruit, and was relatively small and oval shaped, but was distinguished by the odd swirling patters on it that were also present on other Devil Fruits. Albert slowly began to raise his right arm toward his face, the relatively small fruit resting in his hand. He then held the fruit with both hands and began eating it, rushing with excitement as he quickly ate the rare Logia Devil Fruit. He completely ignored the taste, not even knowing what the fruit had tasted like, because he was too absorbed in his thinking of what the consequences would be. How his future would change and what it would bring him.

As he finished eating the Devil Fruit, after swallowing the last bite of the powerful fruit, Albert started to feel a small, odd change in himself. He did not know what it was, but he felt different, like something had changed inside of him. He did not know how to describe the weird feeling, but it was some sort of "spark" in him, like a tingle that expressed the Devil Fruit and its impact. Al felt a though his body had physically changed, even gaining new properties and possibilities.It was like something radiated from his core, a new source of power and potential. This was a result of the Devil Fruit he ate, the Pika Pika no mi, which would give him the ability to turn his body into light. The pirate hunter looked down at his hand, to find it glowing a bright yellow color. The glow was faint, but his hand was definitely glowing. "I've done it!" he exclaimed, grinning the widest smile he'd ever had on his face. Now, the 18 year old pirate hunter Albert Blood was somewhat a new person, possessing the power of the Rumble-Rumble fruit and optimistic that it would bring him the success he so much desired.

Al smiled a grin of wicked delight as he proceeded to walk back to the front of the ship where he sat just a few minutes ago. He had all three items with him now, at the same time; his map was in his right hand, his compass in his left, and the Devil Fruit inside him. He walked up to the spot he sat so comfortably at, and say down at the very spot, laying the compass and map down beside him on the light brown floor of his small ship. The pirate hunter looked beyond from where he sat, at the open sea of East Blue, with a newfound confidence and optimism. He now felt that he could truly achieve and succeed, with the power of his will, determination, and his new Devil Fruit powers. He laughed a bit at himself and his thoughts, before continuing to stare at the sea and be absorbed in the lonely realm of his thoughts.

Sentence Count: 77

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