The Game (luNa)

14

About half an hour after their fight with the snake, the boys were woken up by a scream. Both sanji and zoro were up in an instant, racing off in the direction the soul had come from. A short distance away, a young man who Zoro decided must have been their guids, was pinned against the floor by a beast that vaguely resembles a sabre tooth tiger. 

'I thought they were extinct.' Sanji muttered.

'They will be soon.' Zoro replied.

The man saw them charge through the brush and panicked.

'No, don't kill her! She's the last of her kind.' At the very last minute, Sanji was able to redirect his hit and Zoro flipped his blades over so he was striking with the blunt side. The beast was flung into a nearby tree and went scampering off. Sanji landed gracefully while Zoro sheathed his swords. Both men turned to the guid and stared down at him, offering a hand each. The man, knowing he would be making a grave mistake to pick one over the other, took them both and allowed himself to be lifted to his feet with unnatural ease. 

'Thank you.' he said, breathless. 'She must be hungry. She usually does not attack us rangers.'

Zoro turned away, uninterested. Sanji just brushed him off.

'Don't worry about it. Are you the one who's supposed to lead us out of this weird place?' he asked. The man nodded, regaining his composure. 

'Yeah. follow me and i'll bring you back out.' he turned and started to follow a faint trail back the way he had come. The boys had both been too careless to notice it, but they were seeing now that this place wasn't as wild as they thought. 

'I've been instructed to ask you guys a few things.' the man said as they continued. 'Please don't fight about the answer. Being caught in the middle of an exchange like that would probably kill me.'

'Fair enough.' Sanji said glaring at zoro. 'I won't be a problem.'

Zoro returned his gaze, but didn't raise his tone.

'Same here.'

The man waited a while before continuing. 

'First off, it's pretty late, so the master would prefer it if you stayed in the village for the time being. If you wish to,  however, you have been granted permission to take the grasslands through to the shanty town and share a room with your companions usopp and chopper.'

He left the two to make a decision. They both agreed to stay the night in the village, as neither of them could be bothered walking to a new town. 

'Good. The second thing is, the game master wanted to know about the relationship between your captain and the navigator. '

Both boys tripped on a root in the path. 

'WHAT!' they both yelled. Zoro burst out laughing while Sanji went completely pale.

'There is nothing there.' the blonde said, looking cross.

'Oh yes there is.' Zoro chuckled. 'Hate to break it to you love cook, but the captains have been eying Nami up for a while now, and she's as good as his.'

'There is no way Nami would ever choose someone like Luffy over me!' Sanji countered.

'Oh yeah? How can you be so sure?' Zoro teased.

'Why you little...' Sanji growled, turning to have a go at Zoro.

'Woah, woah, woah!' the guide intervened. 'That's all I need to hear,' he said. They walked on in silence for another 15 minutes or so until they reached the main door. The man knocked on it three times and it swung open with a satisfying clunk. The man walked out first, with Sanji and Zoro coming out behind him, looking as badass as ever. The guards themselves took a step back to let them pass. The sun had disappeared long ago, and the streets were pretty much empty. Zoro and Sanji were led to a pub, where they were to stay the night. They were told to get up early in the morning to get taylored for the final event. Knowing this, they were very quickly asleep.