I held a small but sturdy stick over my shoulder while walking aimlessly, unbothered by the weather which was really hot from what I see and feel while eating a piece of a juicy watermelon I made from a round cactus before. It was how I quenched my thirst so far.
SKREE! SKREEEE! SKREEE!
I heard the annoying vultures, while I continue walking grumbling.
'Three goddamn days, and I'm still going in circles. I fed them meat, they pointed... and somehow, I'm the one who ends up lost? Bullshit.'
SKREEEEE!
'Don't you start. You flapped that wing toward the ridge — I followed it.'
SKREE!
'No, I didn't ignore your second flap. I thought it was a sneeze!'
SKREEEEE!
'Yeah, yeah, laugh it up, feather-for-brains. Next time I'll ignore you.'
SKREE.
'Keep talking, and I swear I'll snipe you with a pebble. Dead-ass.'
He trudges forward, then suddenly freezes. The same weird cactus with a broken arm. Again, the same one he made the watermelon from.
'...Oh. Okay. Maybe, just maybe, I missed a turn. Doesn't make you right.'
SKREEEEE!
SKREEEEE!
SKREEEEE!
'...Assholes.' I couldn't help but curse, admittedly I was embarrassed for making such a mistake.
CHHHRRRK.
He froze mid-step.
'...The hell was that?'
CRUNCH. CHHHRRRK. CRUNCH.
Behind him. Heavy. Chittering.
Slowly, carefully, I turned my head, and I already regret it.
A massive scorpion, black enough to trigger Zoro's minority hunter mode, and gleaming like obsidian, dragged itself from beneath the sand. Pincers big enough to snap my ass in half. A stinger swaying over its back like it was picking targets.
'Of course it's a goddamn scorpion! Why wouldn't it be? Because getting lost wasn't bad enough.'
SKREEEE!
His glare shot skyward.
'Oh, NOW you scream!? Where was this enthusiasm five seconds ago!?' I screamed in my mind, cursing the feathery pricks
SKREE!
'It was hidden underground!? And you couldn't notice!? You scream when the wind changes!' I felt something and instinctively jumped to the side–
THWUNK.
The tail slammed into the sand just beside where I was, leaving a fist-sized hole.
'Nope. Nope nope nope. Time to use the Joestar secret technique — NIGERUNDAYO!'
I bolted, kicking up a trail of dust, effectively skedaddling away from the freaky scorpion.
SKREE.
SKREE.
SKREE.
All at once.
'Don't even think about making commentary!'
The scorpion skittered after me, claws snapping, tail raised high — casting it's large shadow in the blistering sun.
'What the hell does it eat to get that big?! I hope it's not "idiots who get lost in the middle of nowhere!"'
Sand kicked up, I was in full panic mode, I jumped again, barely avoiding another pincer snap.
CHKK-CHKK-CHKK!
'Why does it sound like a blender full of knives!?'
I threw a glance back. It was still gaining on me–
'It's fast! Way too fast! Why is it fast!? I thought monsters were supposed to be slow the bigger they are!'
SKREE! SKREE!
'What now!? I'm a little busy NOT DYING!'
I glanced up — they weren't circling. They were darting ahead, wings flapping like they actually meant something this time.
One tilted low, flapping down at the ground.
'Wait… Are you?—no way. You want me to follow you? You idiots better not be screwing with me again.'
But they kept flying straight. No loops. No laughing skrees.
'Shit. Fine! If this kills me, I'm haunting your nests.'
I turned and bolted after them, the scorpion right behind — loud, and way too fast for its size.
The vultures dove toward a line of boulders — then just... disappeared.
'Where the—?'
Then I saw it. Just past the rocks. A cliff. 'A big-ass cliff!—wait, that could work!'
The scorpion's screech cut through the air behind me — loud, shrill, and way too close.
'Shit, shit, okay! Trust the birds! This is my life now!'
I faced the cliff and turned to the scorpion who was skittering fast toward me. I readied myself. The moment it came too close—
WHIP!
Something flicked past my ribs — fast and sharp, like someone snapping a twig against my side.
'AGH—! What the—?!'
I stumbled, heat blooming under the skin where the stinger grazed me.
At first, it just stung like a bad slap... and then the weird kicked in.
My left leg twitched.
Then my right eye started blinking on its own, rapid-fire like it was trying Morse code.
'What the hell?! Why do I taste purple!?'
The world tilted. The cliff ahead looked... sideways? No, I was sideways. And upside down. And maybe inside out.
The scorpion kept charging — I didn't even have time to panic properly.
'Don't you pass out now! Just one more step, one more—'
I dove sideways, mid-spasm, with all the grace of a drunk spider.
The scorpion didn't turn.
It blasted past me, legs kicking up a storm, tail flailing behind—
THHHHHHRMMMMMMMP!!
Silence.
Then... a distant CRUNCH! far bellow.
I flopped onto my back, limbs twitching in revolt, vision bouncing like a broken camera stabilizer.
'M'fine. Totally fine. Not dying. Just vibrating... aggressively.'
SKREEE SKREEE SKREEE
'Don't laugh! I just got venom-jazzed by a skittering motherfucker!'
SKREE.
'Yes, I did look cool jumping at the end—shut up.'
I sat up, or tried to. My arms weren't responding, only twitching from the pain, I fought it gritting my teeth.
[3rd POV]:
He was withering in pain, with ragged breath, and pained moans coming out of his mouth, nothing he can do beyond bearing it and hoping his body resist it, his body rolled until he was looking down the cliff
His eyes were heavy and blurry barely making the figure of the accursed scorpion with a pool of bright purple blood bellow it, yet he couldn't keep them open with how his vision was spinning making him feel a vomit inducing nausea
As time goes his pained expression shifted slowly his eyes grow heavy slowly he was drifting into the realm of unconsciousness, until he completely blacked out.
But there was a change in his body that went completely unnoticed by him before he lost consciousness, some droplets of a deep purple liquid, not similar to the scorpion blood started coming out of his body like sweat. It started to release some sort of vapor that was carried by the wind.
---
[Josh POV]:
'...where?....' I woke up feeling calm and a bit comfortable,
I was confused and disoriented trying to remember what happen and then it clicked, the scorpion, the chase, how it managed to sting me, successfully injecting it's venom in me before it fell to it's death and how painful it was.
'wait a minute... I don't feel pain anymore?' I snapped my eyes wide then I took the scene before me, I looked down the cliff 'fuck!' with an abrupt move I pushed myself up, backing away from the cliff and breathed out a sigh of relief.
'I lived?... Fuck yeah I lived bitch! Hahaha! Not even your pathetic venom could stop me!' I cheered internally sighing in relief.
SKREE! SKREE! SKREEE!
'what the fuck do you mean by your food!?! If you ate me there wouldn't be anyone to feed your sorry feathered asses bald motherfuckers!' hearing their horrible skreees was both annoying and relief.
SKREE!
'Yeah, yeah yeah, I am also hungry let's get something to eat' I picked myself up before finally noticing my toga-blanket was covered in purple spots, I gazed at it weirdly, then down the cliff.
Although it was weird that somehow it's blood got on me I had to check, I saw the scorpion blood was a different purple, brighter.
SKREE! SKREE!
'I am going, just wondering what is this crap on me ugh~' I started walking away from the cliff picking Anything I could along the way I picked my trusty stick which I threw when I started running form that Skittering Motherfucker and picked some rocks and cactus,
I started with the rocks turning them into pieces of fresh raw beef, then laid them on a rock and I took some for myself turning some to burgers, others to fries, and other variety.
I sat down on a rock bellow a large cactus which provided me with some shades and started munching on my food while my feathery friends came down to eat the meat I stacked for them, did I forget to mention they were more the 2 meters tall? Yeah, those are not normal Vultures, just like that Scorpion.
After finishing, I looked at them for directions and one of them turned it's head to point in a direction with it's beak, I looked at it directly in the eyes as if asking if it was sure to which
SKREE!
'alright since you're sure of it, I will follow your lead, BUT! If this is not the way I will cook your ass.' I mentally said as they ignored me and took to the sky, and I resumed my journey.
I didn't travel far before my stomache started to get upset and make complains.
GRUMBLE! GROAN!
'ugh! Oh no... don't tell me the burgers are– Ugh... fighting the fries again.'
Another churn — sharp and mean, like a rusty blender in my gut.
I froze, eyes wide. 'Okay, whose bright idea was it to eat five meals after nearly dying?'
A sudden jab of pressure hit me low and deep — urgent.
'No no no. This is a Code Brown. DEFCON Shit. Hold the line!'
I clenched everything, walking stiff-legged as fast as possible toward a nearby boulder like I had a stick up my ass — which, to be fair, I kinda did.
'I swear, if I sit and find bugs under this rock, I'm shitting through the stone.'
With an awkward shuffle, I hiked up the toga-blanket, squatted behind the boulder, and surrendered to the call of nature.
A wet splash followed, then an odd hiss — and something sizzled.
I turned, squinting at the dirt I'd just relieved myself on — and froze.
The patch was smoking. Not from heat. From... something else. It sizzled, and the sand darkened like something was chewing through it.
Then I saw them — little bugs, dozens of them, crawling up out of the ground like they were escaping hell itself. They didn't get far. One by one, they spasmed, twitched, and dropped, legs curling like dying flowers.
I blinked. 'Wait—did I just shit poison or something?' But it didn't stop there.
More smoke.
More bugs crawling out frantically, , like a scene straight out of a horror flick — desperately trying to escape whatever I'd just unleashed.
I used some rocks to wipe my baby bottom, and slowly stood up, still half in disbelief, before letting out a breathless, dry laugh.
'Hehe~ would you look at that? One Shit to Kill Them All.'
Even the vultures were quiet. That's how I knew it was something serious.
---
Ok so I think I got another Devil Fruit power activated, perhaps from the venom of that Scorpion. The Doku Doku no mi, which allowed me to generate and manipulate all kinds of poison, it's what made Magellan feared as the Warden of Impel Down in One Piece.
'thankfully it didn't manifest just in poisonous shit, fart or piss, it was just an unconscious uncontrolled usage.' just like the stains on my blanket-toga which were poison since I tested it on some bugs by putting them on top of it. Result is as expected the bugs died from poison exposure.
I looked at the sky, my GPS were quiet since that display.
Now looking it from the bright side 'I finally have a way to protect myself!' so I stood up puffing my chest like I was some shit, but I know that I still suck.
---
END OF CHAPTER
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• Author Note:
So what do you guys think? I hope it's enjoyable for all of you. It has for me, make sure to comment your thoughts. It helps me greatly knowing your thoughts.