Chapter 46 The Player's Prank
"Huh?! So Katakuri brought so many people on the voyage just to find what you want... mushroom?!"
Cracker, holding a half-eaten pumpkin cookie in one hand, stared incredulously at Violet, who was sitting opposite him leisurely sipping her Perospero-preferred tea.
"How dare you order Katakuri around?!" Cracker slammed his fist on the table in anger, his expression fierce. "Are you looking down on the Big Mom Pirates?!"
Violet: ?
Violet looked at Cracker, which was sparking again, with a strange expression. She felt an itch to throw a water balloon at him to put out the fire.
"Why do you say that?" Vera thought Cracker's thought process was quite strange. "Of course I trust Katakuri, that's why I asked him to help me find ingredients."
Otherwise, if Katakuri fails to bring back the Moon Mushroom as he promised in two days, Violet's mission will fail.
She's now leisurely eating snacks and drinking tea, not in a hurry at all, waiting for Katakuri to bring back the Moon Mushroom. Isn't that because she believes in Katakuri's strength and that he will keep his promise?
Cracker was taken aback by what Vera said, and realized that it made sense.
"Hmph." Cracker snorted coldly, "You do have good taste."
"There is nothing in this world that Katakuri-nii-san cannot do."
Cracker stuffed a few more pumpkin cookies into his mouth. For Violet, the cookies were only the size of her palm, but in Cracker's hand, they were so small that she needed to eat several in one go to be satisfied.
"Couldn't you have made a few more flavors? Didn't I find you so many cookies?"
Cracker gave Wilt cookies that almost filled her rented apartment. Unfortunately, apart from the first one Cracker made himself, the other cookies were just ordinary cookies, without even the pitiful +1 attribute.
"I only know how to make this one kind of cookie."
Cracker grumbled in dissatisfaction. Although the pumpkin cookies were just as delicious as when he first ate them, he wanted to try more!
Cracker remembered the candy she had given Perospero, and as a second choice, ordered, "Then you can make other desserts, right? Make some for me!"
Vera: "No way."
Vera wouldn't waste her materials on an NPC like Cracker, who's so stingy with even a single quest for her.
"Hey, do you even know where you are? Who are you talking to?!"
He, a great pirate with a bounty of over 500 million, one of the three Sweet Commanders of the Big Mom Pirates, the ruthless and fearsome Cracker, actually dared to refuse after being personally asked by this guy.
Vera leaned back in the biscuit chair: "I won't do it, or you can just kill me."
Cracker: "..."
Good for her to be lazy. Is she sure he won't do anything to her? Well, it's true. Putting aside the Sunday family afternoon tea, just the fact that Violet can make such delicious cookies makes Cracker reluctant to kill her.
"Tsk!" Cracker, who had never been so thoroughly manipulated before, clicked his tongue in annoyance. He crossed his arms in front of his chest and angrily turned his head to the side, refusing to look at Violet.
Finally, the noise stopped. Cracker was so talkative that Violet wanted to mute the game.
Violet closed her eyes, savoring the hard-won peace.
"Hello!"
After a brief silence of less than five minutes, Cracker couldn't help but speak again: "Hey, did you just prepare pumpkin cookies and toffee for your Sunday afternoon tea?!"
If that's the case, this guy will definitely get punched into cookie crumbs by his angry mom!
"Of course not. Since it's a 'new product of the day,' I'll definitely make something that none of you have ever tried before."
Cracker was itching to try it: "Hmm, actually, it's hard to judge Mom's tastes. Why don't you make it for me to try first, and I'll give you my opinion?"
How did we end up back here again? This guy is really persistent...
Violet looked at Cracker and suddenly had an idea.
She beckoned to Cracker with her finger, and Cracker's face darkened.
"You bastard!" What kind of gesture is that? Is he teasing a dog?! How humiliating for a great pirate like him to be beckoned to by Violet?!
Violet: "I have a dessert that no one has ever eaten before."
Cracker's fingertip twitched.
Violet: "The ingredients are extremely rare. I guarantee that no one else in the world has ever produced a product like this except for me."
Cracker pursed his lips and switched the legs that were crossed over.
Vera held up her finger: "It's a dessert that's several times better than pumpkin cookies."
Cracker finally couldn't keep up the act any longer. He lowered his brows and pretended to be fierce, saying, "What are you rambling on about?"
"Such arrogance! Hmph, maybe it's just because you're ignorant that you're exaggerating the merits of ordinary desserts!"
Vera narrowed her eyes and beckoned to Cracker again: "Would Lord Cracker like some, a one-of-a-kind dessert?"
"...Wasn't it at the family tea party on Sunday?"
"No."
Cracker gritted his teeth, sitting there struggling internally. His ever-changing expressions revealed his inner turmoil.
In the end, curiosity about the dessert—which was "one of a kind," "only for him to eat," and "several times better than pumpkin cookies"—overcame the pride of being a great pirate.
Cracker stood up, his tall figure reluctantly walking to Violet's side.
"Is this distance okay, kid!" Cracker's expression was fierce. "If you dare to lie to me..."
"As I've said before, the most important thing in doing business is integrity."
Violet took the already prepared dish out of her backpack and placed it on the table: "Ta-da! This is it!"
Cracker: "..."
Cracker: "Are you kidding me?!"
Cracker stared incredulously at the "dessert" that Vera had brought out—no, he refused to acknowledge that this bizarre thing was a dessert!
On the table sat a translucent food shaped like a mountain peak, green on top and purple on the bottom. Eerie fluorescent green bubbles occasionally rose from its surface, and then, under Cracker's horrified gaze, it exploded with a "pop."
Like a cat whose tail has been burned, Cracker jumped back to avoid the splashing purple-green juice.
Is Violet thinking she's doomed this Sunday, and has decided to take someone down with her before she dies by poisoning him here?!
Cracker stared in shock at the "dessert" on the table.
As Big Mom's child, Cracker has lived on a pirate ship since he was very young. He has seen countless terrible, cruel and bloody scenes, and his mental fortitude is a hundred times stronger than that of ordinary people.
Even so, Cracker felt a wave of dizziness when he saw the "dessert" that Violet had taken out.
Violet pushed the [jelly salad] toward the cracker, and then smiled and invited it as the cracker took a step back.
"Have a bite."
Have a bite.
Have a bite.
Take a bite.
mouth
...
Cracker felt the delicious cookies he had just eaten starting to fight in his stomach.
Ugh, no, he's going to throw up... No, that's disrespectful to the cookies, but...
Cracker closed his eyes in pain and bent over, enduring the intense nausea.
More than a minute later, Cracker finally recovered and opened his eyes—and was met with a pair of curious black eyes.
Vera: "Are you crying?"
Cracker had glistening tears in the corners of his eyes.
Vera: "No way, you're really crying?"
Cracker: "You..."
With lightning speed, Violet stuffed a bite of [jelly salad] into Cracker's mouth.
Cracker: !!!
Completely unprepared for Violet's actions, Cracker swallowed instinctively. When he realized what he had just eaten, his face was a mix of blue and green, even more so than the jelly salad.
Vera: "Is it delicious?"
What's so delicious about this? This food is terrifying, and he wants... um?
Cracker's anger was interrupted by the sweet taste on his tongue.
Surprisingly, it's not bad?
It's not bad at all?!
Looking at the jelly salad that seemed to be still shaking like a living thing, Cracker couldn't accept that such a strange thing was a dessert, and even more so, he couldn't accept that such a strange thing could taste so good.
So why is it that such a delicious dessert has to look a little normal?
Violet scooped out another piece with a spoon and brought it to the cracker.
The devil whispered before him, "Isn't it delicious? Want another bite?"
The jelly salad on the spoon trembled as if inviting someone out, and two eye-like bubbles popped out from the left and right.
Cracker: "..."
Help! Help! He felt that if he continued to eat this and accepted that it was a dessert, he was about to reach some terrible, dark and depraved end!
But the sweet aroma, mixed with the fragrance of exotic plants, kept wafting into his nose, making the chocolate bar, which had just tasted it, unable to stop savoring the flavor.
"Come on, open your mouth..."
"No, no!"
"Hehe, saying no is one thing, but isn't that being honest?"
"No, no, you bastard, I won't give in because of this!"
"Really? You mean you don't want it anymore?"
"...No, I, I am..."
"You really want to, don't you? Be proactive and come over here."
"Am I... unable to go back to the past...?"
Perospero, who had finished patrolling Candy Island and was preparing to return to his office, was speechless.
Perospero stood outside the door in shock, unsure whether to go in or quietly leave his brother alone.
This conversation was just too awful!
And it sounds like his brother Cracker was the one being forced!
Perospero always thought that, given Cracker's personality, he'd probably spend his life with cookies. Of course, that wasn't necessarily a bad thing. As their mother's children, their marriages were all controlled by her. Being able to avoid being forced into marriages for various reasons and live with their siblings was already a very good outcome.
But Perospero never expected that his younger brother, who was always powerful, loved his family, and whom he trusted, would suddenly make a big move and cause him such a huge disaster!
Due to the overwhelming amount of information, Perospero was stuck in the cat-head universe, completely stunned.
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Author's Note: Cracker: Will I ever be able to go back to the way things were? [crying emoji]
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