"What if he zeroes me anyway?" David asked panicked.
"He shouldn't. Maine can be a hardass and ruthless sure but once he knows who you are and why you chipped in the Sandevistan he'll at least not kill you if you give him an alternative." I said seriously.
"What if he presses for the sandy still?" he asked a little more calm but still not in a great headspace.
"If you absolutely have to hand over the Sandevistan ask him to at least wait for you to find something to put in it's place. In case you aren't aware that bit of tech has entirely replaced your spine. Without a replacement you die, plain and simple. It'd be best if you kept the Sandevistan though so If he'll accept repayment at a high interest take it. Any problem money can solve I can cover easy, just whatever you do DON'T try and join his crew. The man's on the fast track to cyberpsychosis and you'll get burned hard." I said seriously.
"Fuck choom, this all sounds like a mess." he said scratching his head in frustration.
"This contact has no time limit so take some time to steady your nerves before repeating what you should do back to me." I said trying to reassure him.
"So you must be like super rich to be able to get gold so easy right?" he asked trying to make small talk to calm down.
"Not really. Most of my money is in Gringotts, the wizard bank, I definitely don't have enough on hand to get you out of this mess. Luckily for you I happen to have another customer who can get bars of gold as easy as turning over his hand and will have no trouble at all helping me bail you out." I said honestly.
"Damn choom! Sounds like one of those real high roller types." he said impressed.
I chuckled "He's actually one of the most down to earth people i've ever met. Monstrously powerful but chill most the time." I said with a smile.
"For real? I always thought folk like that were all stuck up and stuff." he said surprised.
"Stereotypes can useful when you don't know anything about someone but it's best to learn for yourself. In the end they are all just people, some are fine and others... well you get that picture already." I said with a shrug.
"Some are like Katsuo yeah." he said nodding in agreement.
I considered telling him that the guy he mentioned was only like that because of his home life but chose not to in the end. It didn't matter in the end, their lives weren't likely to cross in the future anyways.
"I think i'm ready. Still nervous though." he admitted.
"That's totally understandable. Now tell me what your plan is, just to make sure it's solid." I said seriously.
"Gotta try to keep my cool and play for time. Time to get something to replace my spine or scratch up the repayment right?" he asked to make sure.
"That's the end goal yeah. Like I said though no matter what DO NOT join his crew." I said with a nod.
"Got it. so how does this whole thing work?" he asked motioning to the screen.
"I'll end the contact now and get into contact with my other customer. See you on the other side mate." I said before cutting the contact and hoping against hope everything went well enough.
The moment the world returned to normal I didn't hesitate to spend another fifty coins to open up a contact with Whitebeard. The world greyed out once again and that familiar screen appeared and soon showed me Whitebeard sitting leisurely as he does most days.
"Gurarara! I was just talking about you brat!" he said with a wide grin.
"Only good things I hope." I said amused.
"Just settling the last minute stuff before our trade is all." he said casually.
"That works out for me then. I need you to throw in a bit of gold with it. My newest customer is up a creek without a paddle and needs some liquid funds to save himself. Most of my stuff is in the bank and I'm laid up in bed so I can't get the gold I'd need to fix his problem myself." I explained seriously.
"Sounds like an interesting story. Just take the gold, I have plenty. Now for this batch of fruits one hasn't been eaten but we can't find it in any encyclopedia. We've been able to roughly tell it's probably a paramecia but that's it." He said casually.
{Trading partner: Edward Newgate wishes to give the user items: 5X gold bars Accept items Y/N?}
I accepted the gold without skipping a beat and moved on to the topic he brought up.
"An unknown fruit? Could be anything really. I don't blame you for wanting it checked out first." I said honestly.
"Gurarara! There's no weak fruits but some of them are pretty weird." he said with a laugh.
"Yeah, I'd definitely not want to get stuck with something like the jacket fruit. Can you imagine having other people wearing you like a coat being your power? Might as well not even have one at that point." I said with a slight shudder at the idea.
"Mhm, thankfully we have you to check for us." he agreed.
"So what fruits did you snatch up the users for this time anyways?" I asked curiously.
"Swamp logia, rust paramecia, blade paramecia, salt logia and black mamba zoan." he said casually.