Fan Fic / What's HP? Does It Taste Good?

From the Author "I'll give it to you straight, Doc. This is by far (and I can't stress this enough) the stupidest fucking idea I've ever had for a story. Not only did I write it, but I also went ahead and posted it.

"Why?" you may ask. Now, if you take a glance at the character tags, you'll immediately realize that I'm a shameless individual and that I'll do terrible, terrible things in order to get something that I want.

In this case, the "terrible thing" is making Luffy a Gamer protagonist, and "What I want" is having Yamato in my story before the Onigashima arc.''

What's HP? Does it Taste Good? by xolef225 is a One Piece fanfiction in which Luffy has the powers of The Gamer. What makes this unique is that it is a parody of other Gamer stories. Luffy has no idea what a video game is and doesn't understand most of what the "mystery boxes" he can see are trying to tell him.

Also available on SpaceBattles with illustrations from the author.

Note: Yamato initially introduces themselves as Kaido’s son, but after a three year time skip, Luffy uses female pronouns to refer to Yamato. Yamato’s interactions and appearances since the time skip have been limited and they haven’t yet indicated their preference in this story. “She/her” is the current default in the entries below, but this may be subject to change later and YMMV.

This fanfic contains examples of:

• Achievements in Ignorance: Luffy has no concept of video games or RPG mechanics. He keeps breaking the rules and smashing through the plot contrivances because he doesn't understand them.
• Animal Espionage: Yamato isn't really a dog, but she uses that form to spy on the marines.
• Arbitrary Skepticism: Smoker doesn't believe a dog can learn to play card games. He lives in a world where a starfish can be a noteworthy fashion designer. This might be explained by the fact he is stationed in the East Blue where the fantastical elements of the One Piece setting are toned down significantly.
• Awesomeness Is a Force: Luffy starts his journey having unlocked and mastered Haki. Including the Colors of the Conquerer. That's a power that pretty much runs on this principle.
• Barehanded Bar Bending: Luffy walks out of a marine prison cell after casually moving the bars out of his way.
• Beware the Silly Ones: This applies to Luffy even more so than usual.
• Comically Invincible Hero: Between the effects of the Gamer system and having Yamato as a sparring partner, Luffy is hilariously overpowered relative to everything else in the East Blue when he starts out.
• Costume Porn: Yamato steals a set of clothing from a high-end boutique. When she learns where Luffy is and reveals herself, she looks fabulous.
• Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass: The two things driving most events of this story are how Luffy has leveled up far past his canon counterpart at the start of the journey, and how amazingly dense he is.
• Curb-Stomp Battle: Luffy is starting out on his journey with abilities comparable to what the canon version of the character had after the two-year time skip. Every battle in the East Blue is this if he takes it at all seriously.
• Cutting the Knot: Luffy tends to take a direct approach or third option whenever the gamer menu tries to present him with a puzzle or dilemma.
• Deal with the Devil: When Nami offers to join Luffy's crew and asks him to get rid of Arlong, she thinks she's making one of these.
• Did We Just Have Tea with Cthulhu?: Once people become aware of how powerful Luffy is and how high his bounty is, relative to everyone else in the area, all their social interactions with Luffy take on an element of this.
• Dirty Business: Nami, at least for a while, is under the impression that Luffy is just as much a monster as Arlong, just on a bigger scale. In spite of this, she'll join his crew and do whatever he asks as long as it gets rid of Arlong and saves her hometown.
• Dodge the Bullet: In canon, Luffy at this stage in the story tended to just let bullets and blunt attacks hit him and let his rubber-body powers negate the damage. This version dodges everything and thinks it's obvious that he would do that.
• Dungeon Bypass: The game menu keeps trying to assign and manage quests that have multiple steps and requirements to fulfill before one gets to the end. Luffy tends to either skip to the part where he punches the main bad guy, or grab what he wants and leave.
  • He also treats gates, prison bars, and other physical barriers as something to casually move out of the way when they become inconvenient.
• Empathic Weapon: Yamato's kanabo, Takeru, has an aura about it that gives experienced characters an impression of its wielder. Zoro muses on how this is true of most weapons in the world with impressive users or histories.
• Entertainingly Wrong: A lot of characters have theories and speculation about where Luffy is from, his goals, and the reasons behind his actions. Most of them are reading way too much into things and seeing cunning plans when there is no plan.
• Exact Words: Zoro tells Luffy he can’t join his crew because Zoro promised to serve out his punishment in the Marine base. Luffy counters that the base isn’t going to be there anymore when Luffy gets done with it.
• Fearless Fool: This tends to be people's first impression of Luffy. Eventually they learn he has no fear because nothing in this part of the world could possibly be a threat to him.
• I Thought Everyone Could Do That: After years spent training with Yamato, his grandfather, and whatever the Gamer menu came up with, Luffy’s views on what a normal person can do are a bit skewed. Or at least as “normal” is defined in the East Blue. He is confused when people are shocked by his strength. He is also confused when people tell him things are dangerous or impossible, because they aren’t either of those things to him.
  • Yamato expects anyone without a devil fruit to be able to swim to safety if they are tossed into the ocean.
• Innocent Innuendo: The Gamer system initially sets one of Luffy’s respawn points in Yamato’s bedroom. Both of them give people the wrong impression when talking about how he got there and what they were doing.
• It's Personal: Zoro accuses Nami of just wanting to claim Arlong's bounty. She makes it clear how much pain he has caused her and how much she just wants him dead.
• Kidnapped by the Call: Luffy and crew didn't go anywhere near Sanji and so didn't have the chance to recruit him. However, Yamato needs a guide to show her the way when she finds out where Luffy is going. Sanji isn't given a choice in the matter.
• Killer Game Master: Eventually, the game menu gets actively aggressive in trying to thwart Luffy’s efforts to go Off the Rails, going so far as to bend reality to block his path. Luffy doesn’t take that lying down.
• The Mole: Yamato gets separated from Luffy when they start out. She uses her zoan devil fruit to pose as a dog. She is taken in by the marines and spies on the people tasked to find Luffy.
• Not the Way It Is Meant to Be Played: The Gamer menu system is trying to impose RPG rules and plot rails. Luffy exists to break rules.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Nami's behavior towards Luffy changes completely once she sees his bounty. She puts on a cheerful face, but is constantly terrified of the unstoppable monster she thinks he is.
• Off the Rails: The Gamer menu attempts to enforce plot rails. That really doesn’t work on Luffy.
• Offstage Villainy: (Assumed) When people see how high Luffy's bounty is, they tend to assume he's done horrible things in the past to get that bounty.
• Railroading: The Gamer menu system tries to do this to Luffy, either to follow The Stations of the Canon or because it is programmed to structure quests in a certain way. The key word here is “tries”.
• Sequence Breaking: The Gamer system tries to enforce The Stations of the Canon or certain plot structures. Luffy wants the world to be his Wide-Open Sandbox.
• Script Breaking: The menu system of The Gamer keeps trying to follow The Stations of the Canon and make Luffy do things in certain ways in a certain order. When this comes up against Luffy's determination to be free to do what he wants, things get...glitchy.
• Squish the Cheeks: Luffy does this Nami when trying to get through to her that she doesn’t have to make deals in order to get help.
• Take a Third Option: If you present Luffy with a puzzle or a choice with limited options, the result is likely to be something other than what you were expecting.
• Terrifying Rescuer: Luffy, and later Zoro, have a tendency to rush in and save the day while announcing they are pirates and laying waste to everything in their path. Reactions from bystanders and rescued victims range from frightened to confused.
• Underestimating Badassery: Almost no one takes Luffy seriously at first. They call him a foolish boy playing at being a pirate until he shows them what he can do.

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