The dead of night brought no comfort to the quiet corridors of the ship. The ship rocked gently against the rhythmic, ink-black swells of the New World, its wooden timbers groaning a soft, familiar lullaby. Most of the crew had long since surrendered to exhaustion, but in his dimly lit quarters, Norwell D. Giovanni lay wide awake, his eyes staring fixedly at the dark grain of the ceiling planks.
His body was healing remarkably fast, the severe internal tears caused by the Mink medicine's double-pain penalty finally settling into a dull, manageable ache. Yet, while his physical wounds were closing, his mind was caught in a violent, unyielding storm.
Ever since his high-stakes encounter with King the Wildfire on the ruined plateaus of Dressrosa, a single, isolated island had taken absolute possession of his thoughts: Wano Country.
And with the thought of Wano came the towering, tragic ghost of Kozuki Oden.
Giovanni rolled onto his side, his arm propping up his head as he stared into the shadows. In the original timeline of this world, Oden was an incredible samurai. A man of boundless freedom, unmatched strength, and a heart so massive it eventually became his ultimate undoing. He had danced in the streets to protect his people, swallowed his pride for five agonizing years, and ultimately met a horrific, boiling end in a massive iron pot, executed by Kaido and the treacherous Orochi. And his wife, Kozuki Toki, who had traveled eight hundred years through time just to find the dawn, had perished in the absolute ruins of a burning castle.
Giovanni closed his eyes, a grim, self-deprecating smile forming on his lips. He didn't think of himself as a hero. He knew exactly what kind of soul inhabited his chest. In his past life, before waking up in this chaotic world of oceans and pirates, he had been nothing but a common delinquent. He was a punk who raised absolute hell for the sheer heck of it, fighting in dirty alleyways, breaking rules, and living entirely for his own immediate gratification. He didn't have a grand, sweeping moral compass. He wasn't a saint.
Yet, despite his cynical nature, certain things in this world simply didn't sit well with his gut.
He absolutely hated the tragic death of Kozuki Toki. He despised the fact that Ace was destined to have his chest melted by Akainu on the frozen plazas of Marineford. He hated the unfair, brutal ends that awaited so many of the characters he had grown up reading about.
A profound, heavy question weighed down on his conscience: Was it wrong for him to want to save them?
He knew it was inherently hypocritical. He didn't particularly care about the broader population of the One Piece world. He wasn't sailing across the Grand Line to liberate every single starving village or to dismantle the systemic oppression of the World Government for the sake of humanity. He was indifferent to the faceless millions. Yet, he fiercely, selfishly wanted to rewrite the fates of these choice few. Did that make him a monster? Did that make his ambitions fake?
"Giovanni...?"
A soft, hesitant voice broke through the silence of the cabin.
Giovanni flinched slightly, turning his head toward the side of the berth. Nico Robin had rolled over in her small, improvised cot nearby, her wide, dark eyes blinking sleepily through the gloom. She had been tracking his restless movements, her sharp intellect sensing the heavy, turbulent aura radiating from him even in the dark. She pulled her blanket slightly closer to her chin, her voice laced with a lingering, protective worry. "Are you alright? Are your injuries hurting again?"
The heavy, dark thoughts instantly evaporated from Giovanni's face. His expression softened into a warm, genuinely reassuring smile, and he reached out, gently patting the top of her head.
"I'm perfectly fine, Robin," Giovanni murmured softly, his voice a quiet rumble in the dark. "Just picking a fight with my own thoughts, nothing to worry about. Go back to sleep. Let's get some rest."
Robin stared at him for a long, silent moment, searching his eyes for any hidden trace of deception. Finding nothing but warmth, she let out a soft sigh, nodded obediently, and closed her eyes, quickly drifting back into a peaceful slumber.
---
The next afternoon, the New World sun was blazing brilliantly against a backdrop of pristine blue skies. High above the main deck, Giovanni sat perched on the absolute edge of the ship's crow's nest, his long legs dangling out over the two-hundred-foot drop. The biting sea wind whipped violently through his blonde hair, helping to clear the remaining fog from his brain.
Clack. Clack.
The sound of leather boots ascending the wooden rungs of the mast ladder signaled company. A moment later, the tall, imposing frame of Benn Beckman hoisted himself smoothly into the watchtower. The first mate of the Red Hair Pirates didn't say a word at first; he simply leaned his back against the wooden railing, pulled a heavy, ceramic flask of high-grade sake from his coat, and tossed it directly into Giovanni's lap.
"Hongo said if I caught you drinking, he'd personally mix laxatives into my tobacco supply," Beckman said, a dry, faint smirk playing on his lips as he lit a fresh cigarette. "But you look like you need a burning fluid in your throat more than medical advice right now. Are you feeling well?"
Giovanni caught the flask, popping the wooden cork with his teeth and taking a long, deep swig. The fiery liquid burned down his throat, instantly centered his thoughts. "I'm good, Beckman. My body's practically back to a hundred percent. It's just my head that's running a bit slow."
He stared down at the swirling clear alcohol inside the flask, his expression turning uncharacteristically serious. He tilted his head slightly, his eyes locking onto the older pirate. "Hey, Beckman... can I ask you a question?"
Beckman exhaled a thick, lazy cloud of gray tobacco smoke into the wind, his dark eyes scanning the empty horizon. "Of course. Shoot."
"Is it wrong... to want to save specific people from a terrible fate, while completely ignoring the misery of everyone else?" Giovanni asked, his voice dropping into a quiet, intense register. "To look at a burning world, choose three or four lives you randomly care about, and let the remaining millions burn to ash without lifting a finger? Does that make someone a hypocrite? A fake?"
Beckman took a slow, deep drag from his cigarette. He didn't answer immediately, letting the silence stretch as the wind howled around the high watchtower. Finally, he lowered the cigarette, a cold, profoundly pragmatic expression settling over his features.
"Giovanni, you're confusing our flag with a marine charter or a saint's cross," Beckman said smoothly. "We are pirates. We don't sail these seas to establish global justice or to carry the burdens of the innocent. By our very definition, a pirate is an inherently selfish creature. We fight for our freedom, we fight for our nakama, and we fight entirely for our own personal desires."
He turned his head, looking directly into Giovanni's eyes. "Heroes are the ones who are forced to try and save everyone, and they usually die miserable, broken deaths because of it. If there are specific people in this world whose fates rub you the wrong way... if their deaths sit like lead in your gut, and you possess the raw strength to change it? Then you go change it. You don't do it because it's the 'right' thing to do. You do it simply because you want to. That is the only law that matters out here on the sea."
Giovanni stared at Beckman, the older man's words echoing with absolute clarity through his soul. The heavy, agonizing knot of moral confusion that had been tightening in his chest for days completely unraveled. A wide, feral, and thoroughly triumphant grin broke across his face.
He slammed his wooden cup against Beckman's flask in a sharp toast. "Heh. Selfish, huh? Yeah... that sounds exactly like me. Thanks, Beckman."
"Don't mention it," Beckman muttered, taking another swig. "Just make sure Hongo doesn't smell it on your breath."
---
Two days later, the midnight sky was completely blanketed by thick, low-hanging storm clouds, plunging the ocean into absolute darkness. The ship had anchored near a secluded, rocky cove of an uninhabited island to replenish their freshwater supplies.
Inside his dark cabin, Giovanni stood under the dim flicker of a single tallow candle. He quickly stuffed a minimal traveling sack with basic rations and spare clothes, securing Roger's legendary Supreme Grade cutlass, Ace, tightly against his left hip. On the center of his wooden desk, he placed a neatly folded piece of parchment, weighted down by an empty sake cup.
The letter was short, concise, and left no room for argument:
[Shanks, Beckman, everyone—
I've got a personal errand to run. There's an old ghost story in the New World that needs to be rewritten, and I can't sit around waiting for the script to play out.
-Giovanni.]
Slipping out of his porthole like a shadow, Giovanni dropped a small, sleek motorized skiff into the black, churning waters below. Without starting the engine to avoid alerting the ship's advanced Observation Haki users, he used a single wooden oar to guide the small craft out of the cove, vanishing entirely into the thick, rolling sea fog.
---
Five days later, deep within a sunlit, uncharted sector of the New World, the majestic, whale-shaped flagship of the Whitebeard Pirates. The Moby Dick was cruising smoothly through the bright blue waves.
The atmosphere on the massive deck was typical of the legendary crew. Up near the galley, Thatch was loudly berating a group of young recruits for sneaking into the kitchens to steal roasted sea-king skewers before noon. Vista was calmly polishing his twin sabers near the starboard railing, while Jozu effortlessly hoisted a massive, ten-ton iron anchor block to test his grip strength.
"Hey! Small vessel spotted on the south-southwest horizon!" the lookout in the main mast suddenly bellowed, his voice cutting through the daily chatter. "It's a lone skiff! No flag, but it's cutting through the swells at an unbelievable speed!"
Marco the Phoenix leaned his hips against the decorative, white-painted railing of the ship, shading his lazy eyes against the glare of the sun. As the small boat drew closer, a flash of familiar blonde hair and the distinct, imposing hilt of a legendary cutlass came into sharp focus.
A relaxed, highly amused smirk instantly tugged at Marco's lips. "Well, I'll be damned, yare yare... Talk about an unexpected guest. I wasn't expecting to see his face so soon after that absolute madness in Dressrosa."
Marco immediately turned around, his expression shifting into a commanding, sharp register as he clapped his hands together. "Listen up, everyone! Clear out right now! Head to the aft deck or the lower storage quarters immediately!"
The older, seasoned crew members of the Whitebeard Pirates didn't ask a single question. The moment they realized who was occupying that tiny boat, their faces turned visibly pale, a cold sweat breaking out across their necks as they recalled the terrifying, suffocating memory of Giovanni's spiritual weight. Without an ounce of hesitation, the veterans turned on their heels and sprinted toward the back of the ship in a frantic, organized retreat.
The newer recruits. Young, arrogant powerhouses recently brought in from the paradise islands of the Grand Line looked completely baffled by the sudden exodus.
"Huh? What the hell are the senior members running away for?" one cocky rookie scoffed, crossing his arms as he stared down at the approaching skiff. "It's just one lone guy in a tiny rowboat! Is this some kind of ridiculous hazing ritual to scare the new guys?"
CRAAA-RACK!
Before the rookie could even finish his sentence, Giovanni launched himself from the skiff, clearing the thirty-foot vertical drop from the ocean surface in a single, explosive leap. His heavy boots slammed firmly onto the pristine white timbers of the Moby Dick's main deck.
In his right hand, he was effortlessly dragging a massive, iron-banded wooden barrel filled to the brim with premium, aged New World sake.
The moment his feet connected with the deck, Giovanni didn't actively draw his blade or assume a combat stance. However, his Conqueror's Haki freshly sharpened and violently compressed by his near-death struggle against Saint Saturn passively bled out from his body into the surrounding atmosphere.
The air instantly turned thick, heavy, and suffocating, dropping the ambient temperature by several degrees. Violent, localized sparks of black and crimson spiritual lightning briefly crackled across the wooden deck planks.
The arrogant new recruits didn't even have time to gasp. The sheer, gravity-defying weight of his passive presence struck them like a physical hammer. Their eyes instantly rolled back into their heads, their knees buckling as a dozen new recruits dropped like severed trees, slamming face-first into the deck, completely unconscious and foaming at the mouth.
Giovanni walked right past the pile of collapsed rookies, completely ignoring them as he dragged the heavy barrel of sake toward the center of the deck.
Marco stepped forward, his hands tucked casually into his pockets as a wide, relaxed grin broke across his face. "Welcome back to the Moby Dick, Giovanni. You certainly haven't lost your knack for making a completely ridiculous entrance, yare yare."
Giovanni smiled warmly, tilting his head back to stretch his neck. "Good to see you standing on your own two feet, Marco. Looks like Hongo's advanced medical work paid off for both of us after that Dressrosa mess."
"Gurarara! You cheekiest of brats!"
A thunderous, earth-shaking voice boomed from the elevated captain's deck, causing the massive timbers of the Moby Dick to visibly vibrate.
Sitting majestically upon his massive, throne-like chair was the Strongest Man in the World. Edward Newgate, Whitebeard. His legendary Supreme Grade bisento, Murakumogiri, rested securely against the arm of his chair. The old titan glared down at the young blonde pirate with a pair of sharp, fiercely observant eyes, though a massive, rumbling grin quickly broke through his iconic crescent mustache.
"How many times do I have to tell you to stop flexing your King's Haki every single time you step onto my ship?!" Whitebeard barked, his voice a roaring gale of pure authority. "You're knocking out my new sons before they've even finished their morning chores!"
Giovanni chuckles softly, scratching the back of his blonde head as he offered a loose, apologetic bow. "Ah, my bad, Old Man Whitebeard. Old habits die hard, especially when you've spent the last week dealing with the absolute worst monsters the World Government has to offer."
With a heavy grunt, Giovanni hoisted the massive barrel of premium sake over his shoulder and slammed it down onto the deck floor right before the old pirates throne, the wood fracturing slightly under the impact.
"But I didn't sail across the New World just to thin out your ranks, old man," Giovanni said, his playful demeanor completely vanishing as his eyes turned sharp, steady, and dead serious. "I came here because there is a massive matter I need to discuss with you... and standard sake isn't going to cut it for this conversation."
Whitebeard leaned forward, his massive frame casting a giant shadow over Giovanni as the atmosphere on the deck instantly turned dead silent. "Oh? And what could a brat from Red-Hair's crew possibly have to say to me that requires a barrel of premium liquor?"
Giovanni reached down, resting his palm firmly against the golden hilt of Roger's sword, Ace.
"It involves a specific brother of yours," Giovanni declared, his voice echoing across the silent ship. "It involves the legacy of Kozuki Oden."
---
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