Far below the Red Line, beneath the crushing weight of the sea, where filtered sunlight drifted down in soft, wavering shafts—
Fish-Man Island shimmered.
The great undersea kingdom looked almost unreal, like something dreamed up by a child who had been told the ocean was full of miracles and decided that still was not enough.
Coral towers rose in spirals of pink, blue, and gold.
Schools of fish glimmered through the water beyond the bubble-wrapped kingdom.
And high above, where the great routes from the surface world descended toward the island, the dark silhouettes of ships occasionally appeared like falling stars from another world.
On a balcony of Ryugu Palace, Queen Otohime stood alone.
Her hands rested gently against the stone railing, and her eyes were lifted upward toward the place where human ships would one day emerge.
She had been doing this for a long time now.
A year.
Every day.
Every chance she could.
Watching.
Waiting.
Hoping.
The soft sound of footsteps came from behind her.
Then a warm, heavy voice.
"Otohime."
She turned slightly.
King Neptune had stepped out onto the balcony, his massive frame filling the archway behind him. Even in quiet moments, he was impossible to mistake for anything but a king. And yet, right now, the concern on his face was not the concern of a ruler for his people.
It was the concern of a husband for his wife.
Neptune moved closer, the fabric of his royal garments rustling softly.
"How long are you going to keep doing this?"
Otohime smiled faintly and looked back up.
Neptune let out a small sigh.
"You have been standing here and staring toward that route every day for a year now."
There was no anger in his voice.
Only worry.
Otohime's expression remained soft.
"I know."
Neptune came to stand beside her, folding his large arms as he followed her gaze upward.
"And still you wait."
Otohime nodded once.
"Shanks told me."
At the mention of that name, Neptune's eyes shifted slightly.
He remembered.
The red-haired human pirate.
The strange boy who had arrived in their kingdom with no hatred in his heart, no disgust in his eyes, and no fear in the way he spoke to fish-men and merfolk. A human who had, against all common expectation, felt… warm.
Otohime's voice was quiet.
"He told me that a friend of his would come here one day."
Neptune looked at her from the side.
"Yes," he said. "I know."
He paused for only a moment before saying the name.
"Norwell D. Giovanni."
Otohime's fingers tightened just slightly against the balcony rail.
Her smile didn't leave, but it deepened into something more earnest.
"I do not want what happened with Shanks to happen again."
Neptune's brow rose faintly.
Shanks had passed through their kingdom. They had spoken. She had seen the possibility in him.
And then he had left.
Otohime turned slightly toward her husband.
"So this time," she said, "I want to be here when Giovanni arrives."
Her voice remained gentle, but the conviction in it was absolute.
Neptune listened in silence.
"I want to see him for myself," Otohime continued. "I want to see if he is also a human we can live alongside."
She looked back up toward the distant descent route.
"A human with a good heart."
Her eyes softened.
"A human without hatred."
She exhaled slowly.
"Like the friend Shanks spoke of."
For a moment, the king said nothing.
Then the sternness in Neptune's face eased.
He smiled.
Not as a king.
As a husband who loved how stubbornly hopeful his wife remained, even in a world that had given her every reason not to be.
Without another word, Neptune stepped fully beside her and rested one hand lightly on the railing too.
If she was going to watch—
Then he would watch with her.
Together, the king and queen of Fish-Man Island stood on the balcony and looked up toward the place where ships from the world above would one day descend.
---
Rusukaina Island.
The jungle of Rusukaina never really slept.
Even when it was quiet, it wasn't truly quiet. Leaves shifted in wind that did not seem to come from anywhere. Branches creaked under the weight of unseen animals. Something snarled in the distance. Something else answered it. The island lived, breathed, and waited.
Up one of the rough, rising paths through the island interior, five figures moved together.
At the front walked Giovanni.
His sword hung at his side, and while he looked calm, there was a brightness in his eyes that betrayed his mood. This was not the face of a man taking a scenic walk.
This was the face of someone leading monsters to a battlefield.
Behind him walked Vista, hands relaxed, expression mild, every inch the composed swordsman.
Beside Vista was Marco, eyes half-lidded as usual, though there was clear interest beneath the laziness.
A little farther behind, Thatch walked with his usual easy smile, glancing around the island with open curiosity.
And beside him, Izo moved with elegant poise, his gaze sharper than the rest as he took in the wild terrain around them.
It had been Giovanni's idea to bring them here.
To Rusukaina.
To this island of beasts and shifting seasons.
The place he was training.
The place he wanted for the duel.
The path ahead opened little by little until at last the group stepped into a clearing.
It was broad enough for a real clash. Packed earth. Broken roots. Enough open sky that one could breathe and enough surrounding wilderness that anything violent done here would feel natural to the island.
And already waiting there was an old man.
Silvers Rayleigh stood in the clearing with one hand behind his back, looking as though he had only wandered there by chance.
Then he saw the newcomers.
And blinked.
For one rare moment, Rayleigh looked genuinely caught off guard.
His eyes moved from face to face.
Marco.
Vista.
Izo.
The Whitebeard Pirates.
Not random members, either.
Men he knew.
Men he had clashed with.
Men he had traded days-long battles with in the age when monsters met monsters on open sea and called it adventure.
Then a smile spread slowly across his face.
"Well now," Rayleigh said.
His voice carried easily through the clearing.
"This is unexpected."
The Whitebeard commanders stopped.
For a heartbeat, even they looked mildly stunned.
Then Marco's eyes narrowed slightly.
"…No way."
Vista's brows rose.
Izo's expression shifted into quiet surprise.
Thatch blinked once, then laughed softly in disbelief.
"The Dark King?"
Rayleigh chuckled.
"It has been a while."
There was no hostility in him.
Only familiarity.
The sort born from surviving the same era as other impossible men.
Marco stared at him a second longer, then let out a short breath through his nose.
"To think you'd be here."
Vista smiled.
"That certainly explains a great deal."
Rayleigh looked from them to Giovanni.
Then back again.
"You all know each other now?"
Giovanni scratched the side of his face with a grin.
"Sort of."
Thatch looked at Giovanni, then at Rayleigh, then back again.
"Wait a minute," he said. "Don't tell me…"
Giovanni pointed at Rayleigh proudly.
"He's training me."
That statement landed hard enough that even Marco's usual laid-back look sharpened.
"You're being trained by Silvers Rayleigh?"
Giovanni nodded once, like it was the most natural thing in the world.
Marco slowly turned his head and looked at Vista.
Vista smiled back at him.
Then Marco muttered, "That explains it."
Izo tilted his head slightly.
"Explains what?"
Marco looked toward Giovanni again.
"That pressure."
His eyes narrowed thoughtfully.
"So that's why Oden feels so terrifying."
Thatch blinked.
"Huh?"
Marco folded his arms.
"This island. This atmosphere. Giovanni's growth."
He looked at Rayleigh again.
"If the Dark King is shaping him, then of course he'd start feeling wrong in the same way monsters do."
Rayleigh laughed softly.
"That's a dramatic way of putting it."
"It's an accurate one," Marco replied.
Then Vista stepped forward slightly, looking from Rayleigh to Giovanni.
"We came because of the duel."
Rayleigh's brows lifted.
"The duel?"
Giovanni pointed a thumb toward himself.
"I challenged him."
Vista smiled.
"As a fellow swordsman."
Thatch laughed. "That's how he said it too."
Rayleigh's eyes brightened at once.
"A duel?"
His smile widened.
"Well then. This is excellent."
Giovanni blinked.
"It is?"
Rayleigh looked at him and chuckled.
"Of course it is. What better way to test you than against a swordsman of this level?"
That made Giovanni's grin sharpen.
Yes.
That was exactly why he wanted this.
Not against random beasts.
Not against faceless danger.
Against a real swordsman.
A named one.
One whose blade and reputation had weight in the world.
Vista stepped farther into the clearing and rested one hand on the hilt of his sword.
His expression remained calm, but there was unmistakable life in his eyes now.
This was no longer a passing curiosity.
This was a proper swordsman's moment.
Giovanni moved to the opposite side of the clearing.
The jungle breeze shifted between them.
Rayleigh stepped off to the side with a smile on his face, arms folded now as he settled in to watch.
Marco, Thatch, and Izo stood with him, all of them suddenly far more interested in how this would go than they had been when the walk up the island began.
Vista drew his swords with elegant ease.
The steel caught the light.
Giovanni followed.
His own blade came free with a clean, ringing note.
The clearing went still.
The beasts in the surrounding jungle seemed to quiet.
Even the wind felt like it had paused to watch.
And there, on the island of Rusukaina, under the gaze of the Dark King and the commanders of Whitebeard—
Giovanni and Vista prepared to engage.
---
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