Hello readers! For those of you who had been left clueless by the previous chapter, may find some of the explanations in this chapter as the truth began to unfold. I'm sorry to write such a confusing chapter and maybe too vulgar, but I couldn't hold myself. Haha, I know, I'm a perv! Well, enjoy! and sorry for my english, my beta have been busy so if you find any miss spelling or grammatical error please just let me know, okay? Thanks for reading!

Chapter 7 : A Painful Dream

The straw hats and their two guides followed the rough stone stairs, descending into the depth of the earth. The stairs ended on a large room with a big wooden barrel in the middle of it. There were torches hanged on the walls, filling the room with its bright yellow lights and of burning oil scent. There were old wood benches on the two sides of the wall and there were three figures sitting on one of the bench. The three stood immediately as they saw the groups stepping down the last stair and came forward hurriedly.

"Grand advisor Mahemi! We've been waiting for your return." The huge man said. He looked relief. He was so big and wore white furry robes along with strange hat that the crew thought he was a bear before they heard him spoke.

"Chief Carnel, you worried too much." Mahemi chuckled slightly at him, looked tired from the long journey.

"So this is the kids you're talking about earlier." Chief Carnel's small round eyes shifted to the straw hats. "Hail strangers, I am Chief Carnel and this is my two advisors." The old man and the young woman nodded their heads slightly and smiled at them. "We have heard your trouble and we will try our best to help you. Please, have some drink first. You must be tired from the journey." He waved his hands to the huge water barrel with a faucet in it.

"Thanks, Chief!" Luffy exclaimed happily, approaching the barrel, opened the faucet, and drank from it. The others soon followed (using their hands as a cup of course, unlike a certain straw hat boy). The water was cold and refreshing their exhausted bodies. The Chief smiled, letting the thirsty travelers gulped the water until they all got enough of it.

"Come, follow me." The Chief turn around and walked to the narrow stone corridor in front of them. The others followed him obediently. The corridor widened the more they walked farther and soon they could see intersection that led to the row of doors and another intersections on each end of the corridor.

"Wow, so this is how it looks like in the underground village…" Sanji commented.

"It's like in the tunnels!" Luffy added. The pirates were staring at the surrounding eagerly.

"It is! The buildings were all connected to the corridors, and therefore connected to each other. Just like a mole hole!" The Chief said cheerfully. His energetic and cheerful nature reminded the crew of a rodent, a large one.

"Brilliant! So the villagers can move around and gathers easily! I like this village!" Usopp said.

They were being led through corridors and stopped in front of a row of wooden doors. The Chief opened one of the doors and let them in. Inside, there were beds, bathroom, and a cough with small table. Just like in a motel room. "You can rest here; there are four beds for each of you boys. I'm sorry I can't offer you much, but this room is warm and clean."

"Well, that's good enough for us. We're pirates anyway." Sanji said.

"And as for the girls…" The chief was being interrupted by Sava.

"They can sleep in our house, we have two spare beds! Right Oba-san?" The young girl looked at her grandma hopefully.

"Of course, my dear." Came the reply. The old woman chuckled, knowing that her granddaughter was so excited to meet new friends because she hasn't had a lot of change meeting friends around the same age as her. "but you must ask their agreement first, Sava."

"We'd love to!" Nami said politely. Robin also nodded.

"Great! Follow me, girls!" Sava said while leading Nami and Robin through the corridor.

"Rest well, you've gone through long and tiring journey. We'll serve dinner at 7 and tomorrow we'll begin the ritual in the village hall. You'll need your stamina later."The old woman told them.

Everyone had already sleeping when Sanji headed to his bed in the corner of the room. He lied on his bed and closed his tired eyes, but he couldn't sleep. He turned around and shifted his body to get comfy, but still can't sleep. Finally he turned again facing the ceiling and stared at it blankly. Why can't he sleep? It was supposed to be easy since his body was exhausted from the recent journey and he was supposed to take a rest for another journey. A dangerous one the crew must take for the stupid marimo head's sake. It was his entire fault to be such a weakling he was easily being kidnapped by the demon. What a joke! The ex-pirate hunter who was called demon by some was being kidnapped by a demon? What can be sillier than that? Did he do it in purpose to annoy everyone? Well, maybe it didn't work on Luffy and the others, but it definitely worked on the cook! For some reasons the shitty swordsman always knows how to push him over the edge! Damn him! Damn his annoying cocky grin, his weird green hair, his stupid earrings, and … and his three swords perched forever in his waist… his waist looked better without it anyway, and even better without that old fashioned haramaki! That thing had no use at all, it only concealed his appealing asset. He was lucky he got a good-looking face to save him from terrible sense of style. Wait! D-Did he just think Zoro's attractive?! What the- what was he thinking? He likes women! Okay, maybe he had had some erotic dreams toward the same gender, but it only involved Zoro. And the swordsman was too hot for anyone to resist so it's not entirely his fault. Besides, Zoro seems not attracted to female so that makes him not counted as man, right? In short, Sanji's not gay! The blonde satisfied by his conclusion and finally went to sleep. He had had the same worries so many times before, but he always refused to accept the harsh fact and concealed himself in the safe veil of denial.

"Hey, wake up!" Sanji awoke from his brief dream upon hearing a voice. "Huh?" he grunted. "I said, WAKE UP!" The voice kept bothering him. The cook opened his eyes and stared at Luffy. "What the fuck Luffy! I was just having a nice short nap!" He barked at him. "There's something you need to see. Come on, I'll show you!" The captain said and rushed through the door. "What? Hey wait a second!" Sanji yelled while getting off the bed and cursed at the blanket stumbling his feet. The monkey boy was already running half the corridor length when Sanji shouted at him from the door. "Wait for me, idiot!" Luffy turned around and waited him for a moment to catch up. "What is it?" The cook demanded an explanation. "No time to explain! Hurry, follow me!" the energetic boy started running again and turned right. "Hey!" The cook hated it when his captain was acting this way.

The cook rushed to the same direction and caught a glimpse of his captain's red vest heading left on the next intersection. "How could I possibly follow you if you run TOO FAST?" He continued yelling at him. Sanji lost him right after turning left. "Where are you?" the cook stopped to catch his breath. "Here! Quick!" Luffy's voice echoed on the stone corridors. "I lost you, moron!" He yelled back and waited for the reply. Luffy shouted something from the distance but the echoes made the cook failed to catch his words. "WHAT? Can't hear you!" he replied and heard his own voice echoed.

"Shit-head!" He sighed and looked at the intersection ahead of him. The corridor was much longer than the last one he took. He decided to go straight so he wouldn't stray too far in case Luffy took right or left turn. "Oi, Luffy!" He yelled once more but there was no answer. He was on his own now. There was another intersection in front of him and he was considering whether he should go straight again or take a left/right turn. Suddenly he heard footsteps from the right and stopped to listen carefully. It might be one of the villagers he could ask for help so he ran after it. He saw a shadow moving to the opposite direction. "Excuse me, may I ask you something?" the cook asked. The shadow kept walking, apparently didn't hear him. "Excuse me." The cook repeated while walking hurriedly toward the shadow but the other person still couldn't hear him and continued walking away. "Hey!" Sanji quickened his pace then took the same turn as the shadow and ended in a large chamber with no lights. The cook fetched the nearest hanging torch and stepping into the darkness. "Hello? Anybody here?" The cook turned when he heard something was moving on his left, he lifted the torch toward the direction. "Hello?" he called. He heard it again. Soft dragging voices and breathes. Sanji move closer and held his breath as he saw two lovers were doing inappropriate thing on the floor, half naked. The blonde was about to mumbled a quick apology and turned away when he realized one of them oddly had a familiar green hair. He looked back to identify the couple's faces and his eyes almost popped out as the man with green hair turned out to be the swordsman of the straw hat crew. A stinging pain suddenly hit his chest, he didn't know why, but it pissed him off. "WHAT THE HELL?" He barked at the man. "We thought you were being kidnapped, asshole! You'll pay for making Nami and Robin worried so much!" His anger doubled by the thought that he even more anxious about Zoro than anyone else on the crew. The unknown raven haired man saw him indifferently for a moment while his friend didn't even bother to look at him. "ANSWER ME, you son of a bitch!!" Sanji had the urge to kill his green haired friend and the guy on top of him but then he sensed there's something terribly wrong. The swordsman didn't kiss back while the other continued kissing and touching him. He just squirmed a little and let out low moans in return. Low painful moans. His heart beat almost stopped as he realized what's going on. There was a pool of blood staining the dark floor around the swordsman and he didn't dare to guess what horrible things had been done to him. The now smirked man was the demon who kidnapped Zoro, and for an unknown reason he brought the swordsman here and molest him in front of the cook. His blood was boiling from watching the green haired man miserably lied there defenseless.

"Get your hands off him you foul creature!" He yelled dangerously.

The said man looked at him and grinned. "Well, well … it must be none other than the famous Sanji."

"So you're the 'men-kidnapping demon' they're talking about, I thought you would be much taller and bigger than this." The blonde said sinisterly.

"Really? I could be, but I don't have any desire to scare you off right now. I'm just curious to meet you on person after your friend here had done me a great favor for your sake."

"What? What are you talking about?" Sanji's eyes shifted to his green haired friend lying across the floor.

"He agreed a contract with me to save you from tragic death, such a tough decision to make for a proud man like him." Baalbisan gave a fake sympathetic face to the swordsman.

"What contract? … what tragic death?"

"I tricked him into believing that I will slit your throat if he didn't agree being my mate. A man like him would never give his honor even if he was being tortured to death, unless … I threatened to harm a person he cared. Or should I say the person he loved? … I was amused how easy it was. He'll do anything to save you. He had been so cooperative during the process too, though I doubted he would be that willing if I wasn't disguised as you." The demon grinned a mischievous grin.

"YOU DID WHAT?!"

"Now now, I know you're jealous. But at least he thought he was doing it with you."

"Shut up!! Why me? Why didn't you choose somebody else?" Anger and shame were evident in the blonde's face.

"Well, I wasn't watching him for nothing. In fact, it surprised me you didn't notice the way he looked or acted towards you. He tried so hard to deny it that any fool would have realized something's going on, that, of course if the person didn't go on the same self denial." Baalbisan glared knowingly at the cook. "That disgusting mortal feeling always sickens me." He murmured in disgust. Sanji didn't respond to the mockery; he was trying to digest all the information given and struggling to decide whether he should trust him or not. It would be very wrong to trust a sly creature such as him, he could just twist all the fact, or even made those up… but for what? What did those lies done any good for him aside playing around with the cook's feelings? Did he just want to make him feel guilty and pissed? Why?

The demon chuckled; his foot kicked Zoro lightly on the stomach. "Mankind is truly pathetic." He said. The green haired man was just groaned a little and coughed dark blood from his mouth. He even couldn't move his hand fast enough to lessen the attack. Sanji couldn't take it anymore, watching the swordsman being treated as if he was just a bag of trash. Zoro was never the one asking for help, he never needed to be saved; he was a prominent fighter after all, not that the cook would ever admit it. The blonde never thought he would watch him so defenseless and vulnerable and his current condition clearly broke the cook's heart. Knowing that he was the one causing it hurt him even more.

"Well, I'd like to stay and chat a bit longer, but unfortunately our time is up. Come my little slave, we had other things to do." The demon suddenly turned, pulled the swordsman by the wrist and carelessly dragging his limp body across the floor, leaving the dark trail of blood.

"Wait!" He ran after the two figures but either because the demon was too fast or he's too slow, he couldn't catch up the leaving figures until they disappeared into the darkness. "ZOROOO!!" He cried. He lost his torch in the way but he kept running to the darkness until he lost his stepping and fell to the bottomless shadows.

Sanji woke up from his sleep, sweating and panting. Three faces were watching him worriedly as they gathered around his bed. Luffy, Usopp, and Chopper looked at him while the blonde looked back, still dazed and confused in an attempt to separate the dream from reality.

"Are you okay Sanji? It seems you had a horrible nightmare." Chopper started.

"… yeah, I'm fine." The cook sighed, extremely relieved knowing that it was just a dream.

"Well then, you better have a shower and get ready for dinner. It's almost seven." Usopp informed him.

The cook nodded, got off his bed and slowly headed to the bathroom after he fetched a towel, trying to look as normal as possible. Their voices could vaguely be heard from behind the bathroom wall, so he listened carefully to find out if they noticed anything unusual about him.

"He looked so sad..." Said a little voice, definitely belonged to the little reindeer. Shit! They know it.

"Yeah … but I think he's gonna be okay, right Luffy? Eh, what is it?" The sniper asked. His question raised the blonde's curiosity, and leaned closer to the wall. The straw hat boy hadn't said anything yet, and it was rare to come across the silent Luffy.

"Well, I was just thinking; … it's strange to hear him called Zoro by his name." Came the innocent reply.

Sanji almost tripped by his own foot. He screamed his name while sleeping? Did he say it out loud? Damn, this is so embarrassing! He hoped he didn't sound as hopeless and desperate as he actually did in the dream. The blonde's face went crimson red in embarrassment and fury. How come a dream had a strong influence over his mood? It's just a dream, God damn it! His heart was still aching as the scenes came flashing back before his waking eyes with every single spoken word. He had to admit that if he woke up alone in the room he would've cried. Oh yes, he would definitely cried. He shook his head forcefully and kept telling himself that it was just a dream thus he didn't have a reason to cry for. He then cupped his hands below the running faucet and poured his face with the water over and over again, washing his warm flowing tears with the freezing water.

"I'm sorry Zoro... I'm so sorry …"