Finding Love

26

Two months. Not weeks. Two awful long months passed since Katakuri left. But what pained her the most was the lack of information about his location. No one could tell her, if he was okay. If he was already on his way back. This clueless situation was making her crazy.

"No news (Y/N). Trust him. He will soon come back. Its a long route after all... ", Oven spoke calmly and felt pity for the saddened woman before him, who just nodded shortly and left his room.

Again she walked back to her workplace with this terrible feeling inside her stomach. A few more days and he would be gone for another week.
Exhausted (Y/N) let herself fall onto a chair. Just 5 minutes to rest. Since she started her work at whole cake, she was baking early at the morning till late at night. Sometimes she fell asleep at the kitchen table, but Oven took her to bring her back to her room.

"(Y/N) - san.. Here a hot chocolate.", Pudding came to her side and placed a hot cup beside her. Smiling she nodded gratefully.

"I know it's hard, but my brother sure is doing fine. He is a sweet general after all.", she spoke happily and tried her best to lighten her mood. Pudding could see how exhausted Katakuri's wife was. The lack of sleep, combined with the amount of orders she had to bake, was getting rough. But she knew that the main cause was her fear to lose Katakuri.

"I don't know Pudding... Something's off. Or is it just my mind playing tricks...", (Y/N) spoke with a bitter smile. Getting up she tied her cooking apron around her small form and dusted some flour off.

"We have much work... Streussen needs help with rebuilding the chateau.", she added emotionless and started to prepare her workplace. Pudding sighed deeply and put on her chef hat.

"Thank god Mama left to Wano. So we have more time left.", she spoke relieved and helped with the dough. (Y/N) nodded happily. That was the only thing of the past few days, which let her mood light up a bit. Big mom couldn't accept the fact that the straw hats destroyed her tea party. Her really important tea party. Getting in contact with Kaido, the ruler of the Wano Lands, she offered him an alliance against the straw hats. This lead her to leave whole cake and gave (Y/N) more freedom to get things finished in her way.

Taking the cream from Pudding's hands she watched the crimson color bitterly.

"You won't give me some rest Katakuri... What are you doing right now?..", she thought with a small smile.

xxx

On the other side, far away, across the sea, Katakuri finally stepped onto the mysterious island,which he desperately was looking for. First he wasn't sure, if this map was really trustworthy, because of the simple directions and missing islands on the way, but now feeling the soft sand under his boots, he felt relieved. It was a calm and quiet place, nothing compared to the rough travel with his ship. Giving his surroundings a close look, he didn't sense any enemies. It was really hot and in a way he felt his body slow down a bit. The island was rather small and thick of vegetation. Mostly bushes with large torns were getting in his way. Annoyed he used his spear to get rid of the plants to get deeper into the wood. The place seemed completely untouched by humans, which let him get quite suspicious. A calm island on the route of the Grand Line sure had to be a favorite spot for survivors. Plus there wasn't a single sound of any birds or other animals. There was something he couldn't really tell and his observation haki only showed him darkness.
Stopping before a cave, which literally screamed to be the hot spot of something dangerous, he entered it without any hesitation. If there was something evil lurking around he sure would beat it to a pulp. If it really dares to attack him.
Using his observation haki again he only found hinself like before in darkness. Irritated he shook the strange feeling off and went on to finally get the treasure.
With every minute he got deeper and deeper into the darkness. Luckily he brought a torch with him. After he used some stones to lighten up his tool, he was met with a dead end. The walls glittered with a strange powder and the next moment, Katakuri felt his whole body ingulfed in it. Touching the wall to have a closer look, he suddenly felt weak. Realization hit him too late, after hearing footsteps behind him. Balling his fists in anger he could feel how his devil fruit powers left him.