One Piece: Dream of Immortality

Chapter 86: Doctor Hogback



"He just left us here, and in a graveyard!" Usopp exclaimed.

"We shouldn't stay here or we might get attacked again." Nami said.

They got out of the carriage one by one. When they were all outside they heard the sound of dirt being disturbed. Looking over they saw a multitude of hands and arms belonging to zombies pulling themselves out of the graves.

One tried to grab onto Serene from behind, but she spun around and used cramping attacks on his limbs, causing him to topple over unable to move.

"Huh? Why can't I move?" The zombie was confused, but did not seem to feel any pain from his cramping muscles.

They were quickly being surrounded by the zombies, however. They fought them off the best they could, but even being decapitated didn't seem to faze them. Only Serene's massage arts was able to immobilize them.

"There's too many of them for us to fight, we need to get out of here!" Serene said.

"Let me try something!" Usopp said, firing a flaming projectile that engulfed one of the zombies.

Although it seemed somewhat effective at first, it only seemed to enrage them.

"Okay let's run away!" Usopp said, turning around to find the others already sprinting without him. "Damn it, don't leave me~ AHHHH!"

They ran quite the distance before the surprisingly fast zombies ran out of stamina and got away from them.

"I don't think we'll make it all the way to the shore. We're better off trying to reach Doctor Hogback's mansion. The lights from it are visible in some windows up ahead, do you see?" Nami suggested.

Serene looked as if she bit into a maggot infested rotten apple at the thought, but could not offer any alternatives and so she hesitantly accepted it silently.

Fortunately, they didn't run into any more monsters or zombies on the way to the mansion. They called out, but received no reply. So they went through the unlocked gate and into the tunnel through the ground floor of the mansion.

"Look, there's a light shining on that old well." Usopp pointed out.

They approached the old well and something jumped out of it, startling Nami, Usopp, and Chopper.

"Welcome." The woman said. She had a blonde bob haircut, eerie eyes, and a stitched face. Serene thought the woman looked familiar, but couldn't quite remember where should could have seen her. She thought such a "unique" looking individual would be quite memorable.

The woman started throwing the plates in her hands at Usopp, who started to shout in protest.

"Why are you throwing plates at me?! And why ONLY me?!" Usopp complained as he desperately dodged.

"You weren't invited tot he mansion. You four can come in though." She said, continuing to throw plates.

"Hold on, Cindry~! We can make an exception just this once." A man's voice was heard from the door into the mansion as it opened.

Serene frowned with annoyance, but when she heard the plate woman's name that expression twisted with realization and disgust.

"I'm sorry about that. She was once engaged to a rich man and in order to test... his..." The man started to explain her behavior but trailed off as he looked at them. Particularly when his eyes met with Serene.

"Um... Long time no see?" He said awkwardly.

"I would have preferred if it had been longer. Forever would have been perfect." Serene said, words dripping with venom.

"Um, right... Why don't you all come inside. I am Doctor Hogback, by the way." Doctor Hogback said, retreating back into his mansion with Cindry following close behind. "What was that about?" Nami asked curiously, the others also interested in the answer. Serene looked at them and her expression softened slightly. "He's my father. Don't ask anymore, we can talk later. Just know that you absolutely cannot trust him, if that wasn't obvious enough already."

They entered the mansion and were led to a dining room where they sat down silently. "Ahem! Well, it's seems you've been through a lot given how filthy you lot are." Hogback said.

"Yes, we were attacked by zombies in a graveyard and managed to run all the way here." Nami said.

"I see, you were attacked by zombies. It's good that you're all safe." Hogback replied, sneaking the occasional glance at Serene through his dark glasses.

"You should know something about them since you live here, right? What's the deal with this island?" Usopp asked.

"Well, it's precisely for that purpose that I am here! To learn about the zombies so that I may one day be able to revive the deceased! A noble goal wouldn't you say?" Hogback spoke proudly.

Chopper had to stop himself from inquiring further. He knew such a thing could help a lot of people, but he'd been warned not to trust Hogback so he knew it probably wasn't true.

"I've brought pudding." Cindry said, plopping the putting directly onto the table in front of each of them.

Usopp, Chopper, and Merry slurped the pudding off the table whilst Nami and Serene abstained.

"The bath is ready, should you wish to clean yourselves." Cindry said monotonously.

They followed her to the bath area, where Serene and Nami took the opportunity to clean up whilst they talked.

"There's more to the story about him, right Serene?" Nami asked.Nôv(el)B\\jnn

"Many years ago when I was still a child, Hogback left my mother to chase after some movie star patient of his that he became obsessed with. From what I knew, she rejected his advances since she was already engaged, then she died in a tragic accident about 10 years ago. Her name was... Victoria Cindry." Serene explained.

"Cindry... you don't think..." Usopp said from outside.

"Yes, that woman we just met is Victoria Cindry. Or at least, it's her corpse..." Serene said.

Chopper was so angry he was fuming now. "How could a doctor do such a thing?!"

"I told you, he doesn't deserve to call himself a doctor. He's always been a greedy and selfish man. Now you can add grave robber and pervert to the mix as well." Serene said.

"We aren't safe here. My instincts are telling me this mansion full of zombies, and we can't expect Hogback to treat us well just because of Serene's presence. We should get out of here as quickly as possible." Nami suggested.

...

"Are you sure it was necessary to go that far, Cherry?" Franky asked.

He was referring to the squirming zombie bits on the ground that were cut into a thousand

pieces.

"We need to know what it takes to kill these things. Turns out that answer is a heck of a lot!" Cherry smirked.

The other zombies that had tried to stop the group were quivering in fear. Even if they didn't feel pain, they didn't want THAT to happen to them. Orders were orders, though, so they had

to press forward and capture them.

"Now let's try something else..." Cherry said, appearing in front of another zombie.

She pressed her hand onto its chest and activated her devil fruit. Her goal was to separate the zombie from the devil fruit power she assumed was puppeteering it.

She had to put some "oomph" into it, but she managed to expel the energy. It was easier to do such a thing when she wasn't concerned about being careful not to harm the subject.

The zombie collapsed lifelessly to the ground and she watched a shadow escape from it. Unfortunately it wasn't escaping towards one of the devil fruit users she had picked up with her Life Sense, but somewhere else on the island.

"She's a demon!" A tree zombie screamed.

"She exorcised him!" A four armed zombie cried.

"She didn't even use salt!" A stupid zombie blurted.

"Oh, you can be exorcised with salt?" Cherry smiled at the buffoons who let their own

weakness slip.

"""You idiot!!!"""The zombies shouted at the idiot.

"We've got plenty of salt back on the ship. I'll go get some."Sanji said, casually walking away.

The zombies were desperate to stop them now, but they were no match for the powerhouses

before them.

"Can't we keep some of them?" Luffy said, with puppy dog eyes.

"Absolutely not! They're clearly enemies!" Zoro rejected.

"They aren't even actual people, Luffy. Just puppets of some devil fruit." Cherry said, which

seemed to assuage him somewhat.

"When Cherry 'exorcised' one of them, a shadow escaped from it. Perhaps our new boney friend Brook had his shadow taken to make one of these zombies?" Robin hypothesized.

"No, you're wrong. That isn't correct at all, no ma'am." The idiot zombie said as he squirmed

on the ground with all his limbs cut off. "We'll find out for sure soon enough, I expect." Cherry smiled.