I thought I was a noble free man, savoring the romance of the sea with every fiber of my being.
Then, on the fourth day of sailing, I realized deep in my bones that I was nothing more than a slave laborer being worked through twenty-four-hour shifts at sea.
Creeeak—flap!
"Oh, for heaven’s sake, the wind’s changed direction again...!"
I had been about to catch a little sleep, but instead I scrambled onto the deck and threw my entire weight against the taut ropes.
The blisters on my palms had already burst and stung in the saltwater, while the wrists I had overstrained crossing swords with Mihawk creaked with every movement.
Sailing a ship alone was anything but romantic.
Even to change course a little, I had to tie down the helm and run off to loosen the anchor line. And if a gust came up in the middle of the night, I had to cling to the mast and stay up until dawn.
After enduring four days on barely any food and snatches of sleep, the dark circles beneath my eyes felt like they had sunk all the way to my chin.
"A captain ought to be a noble profession—standing with his hands behind his back, a glass of rum in hand, giving only dashing orders..."
I gnawed on my unlit cigar and shook the bottle of rum that was steadily emptying out.
One mouthful of liquor sloshed around at the bottom.
My provisions were running low, and more than that, the exhaustion throughout my body had reached its limit.
Going by the original timeline, the Straw Hat Pirates who had chased after Nami ought to be in Cocoyasi Village by now, having a bloody brawl with those Fish-Men.
It had been a perfect decision to avoid getting tangled up with those noisy fools and head for Loguetown alone, but I had run face-first into the painfully practical obstacle known as the agony of sailing alone.
I need workers. I’ve got to kidnap, swindle, or otherwise snatch up at least three or four diligent lads with enough sense to raise anchors and tend sails.
With bloodshot eyes, I unfolded my map and confirmed that I had nearly reached the waters of Loguetown, gateway to the Grand Line.
That was when it happened.
Boom! Boom! Boom! Ba-ra-ba-bam!
From beyond the horizon, piercing through the thick sea fog,
the frantic blare of trumpets and a boisterous drumbeat began to echo across the water.
"...What sort of circus band is that, in the middle of the sea?"
As I narrowed my eyes and held a hand to my brow in place of a spyglass,
a colossal shadow emerged from the fog.
A massive hull plastered with bright, multicolored stripes.
A huge, grotesquely grinning elephant statue was mounted on its prow, and a festival circus tent stood proudly atop the deck.
It was the flagship of the Buggy the Clown Pirates: the Big Top.
This was the pirate ship from the very point in time when Buggy the Clown, who had been blown away by Luffy and left wandering without his body, had joined hands with Alvida and only days ago managed to reunite with his scattered crew and reclaim his ship.
"Kya-ha-ha-ha-ha! At last, my perfect pirate crew has been reborn!"
Atop the gaudily repaired deck railings,
a clown-painted man in a captain’s coat and skull cap was roaring with laughter.
And in the center of his face...
shone a particularly prominent, gleaming, crimson-red nose.
Beside him, the beautiful Alvida, transformed after eating the Smooth-Smooth Fruit, swirled a wineglass with a giant iron club slung over her shoulder. Cabaji, wrapped head to toe in bandages and riding a unicycle, and Mohji atop Richie the lion stood guard on either side.
"Captain! There’s some little sailboat lurking a hundred meters ahead!"
When a lackey in the crow’s nest shouted down, Buggy rested his chin on the railing and looked at me.
To their eyes, I must have looked like some lowly nobody—hollow-eyed from four sleepless days and nights, draped in an old coat, fleeing aboard a stolen East Blue nobleman’s ship.
"Hmph, how dull! That little rowboat dares obstruct the glorious course of my resurrection!"
Buggy’s cape flapped as he broke into a cruel grin.
"We shall make it an offering to commemorate our return to sea! You there, prepare a celebratory cannon blast!"
"Captain, wouldn’t a little ship like that break apart if we just rammed it?"
"Shut up, Mohji! Everything I do must be flashy! Load the special... Buggy Ball!!"
The crew groaned as they shoved a special cannonball engraved with a crimson skull into the massive cannon.
The vicious shell said to be capable of blowing away an entire village.
That mad clown was throwing a fit about firing it at my precious boat, which I had worked myself to the bone rowing for four days.
"Fiiire—!!"
Booooom—!!!!
With a thunderous roar that shook the sea,
the special Buggy Ball, spewing crimson flames, tore through the air toward my ship at terrifying speed.
Its firepower was so overwhelming that the surface of the sea split beneath the pressure of the blast.
"Haaah..."
I let out a deep sigh.
I hated people who interrupted me when I was exhausted to death and trying to rest more than anything in this world.
There was no way I was dodging. If I did, my hard-won comfortable means of transportation would be blasted to pieces.
Shhk.
I drew my old cutlass from my waist.
Steadying my breathing, I drew Haki into my wrist.
I might have come up short against Mihawk’s monstrous black blade, but twisting the trajectory of a single lump of flying iron was hardly difficult.
A pitch-black aura tightly enveloped the blade.
The instant the cannonball rushed to within inches of my bow,
I turned my waist with my distinctive staggering recoil and, as though swinging a baseball bat, smashed the side of the shell with the flat of my cutlass.
Clang—!!!!
A metallic ring, clear almost to the point of musicality, split the sea.
"...Huh?"
Buggy, who had been snickering on the Big Top’s railing as he waited for the explosion, watched his jaw drop to the floor.
Rather than exploding,
the cannonball had reversed direction by a full one hundred and eighty degrees, racing back toward the Big Top along the very path it had come.
Kraaaaa-boom—!!!!
The special Buggy Ball slammed straight into the center of the gigantic circus tent and main mast—the symbols of the Big Top—and erupted in a massive explosion.
"Aaaah—!!" "Fire! The mast broke again—!!" "The captain’s special Buggy Ball exploded on our own ship—!!"
The splendid circus ship was swallowed in an instant by black gunpowder smoke and flames, turned into utter chaos.
Slap.
Through that thick smoke,
a grappling hook lashed securely around the Big Top’s railing.
Then the shadow of a man made a light leap and landed gently upon the burning deck.
That distinctive loose-limbed gait,
and an old tricorne cocked at a jaunty angle.
With one hand tucked into my pocket, I strode out toward Buggy’s crew as they choked in the smoke, casually resting my old cutlass on my shoulder.
"Ah, gentlemen. I appreciate the welcome of such a splendid fireworks display... but throwing firecrackers at the doorstep of a passing traveler is hardly gentlemanly etiquette, is it?"
"Cough! Hack...! Wh-who the hell are you?!"
Buggy came charging out of the smoke, putting out the flames on his coat as his bloodshot eyes bulged.
Alvida, standing beside him, likewise narrowed her sharp eyes, readjusted her grip on the iron club over her shoulder, and scrutinized me.
"He knocked aside a cannonball with a sword...? Was there someone like that in East Blue?"
"Shut it, Alvida! You dare turn my ship into this mess again?!"
Buggy pointed at me, grinding his teeth.
"Where the hell did a fossil like you crawl out from? Did you think you could deflect my special Buggy Ball and walk away alive?!"
"Captain Jack Sparrow."
I tipped up the brim of my hat,
and stared directly at the large, luscious thing planted square in the middle of Buggy’s face.
Then I stroked my chin, as though genuinely impressed.
"By the way... you have a remarkably appetizing appearance, my friend. Especially that magnificently ripe thing in the middle of your face... that nose of yours, like a bright red tomato."
"..."
In that instant, every pirate aboard the Big Top sucked in a breath and went pale.
"Eek...?" "He said it...! He called it a red nose!!"
Kraaa-boom—!!
Buggy’s face turned scarlet, and steam began to gush from the crown of his head.
"Whooooo—!! Did you say my nose looks like a red tomatooooo—?!!!!"
Whoosh—!
The man’s two wrists detached from his body and came flying through the air, eight sharp knives gripped in their hands as they rushed for my throat.
The power of the Chop-Chop Fruit.
Yet my eyes as I watched those flying blades were thoroughly languid.
Having faced Mihawk’s absurdly massive black blade, the knives floating through the air looked like nothing more than a clumsy circus trick to me.
Clang! Clang—!
Without taking even half a step back, I gave my cutlass two casual swings and cleanly knocked the incoming knives out of the air.
Then I snatched one of Buggy’s floating wrists as it floundered after losing its trajectory, bound it tightly with a stray length of rope, and tossed it onto the deck.
"Uh... uhh?! My wrist?!"
Watching Buggy flail about in midair with his wrist tied up, I let out a snort of laughter.
"What an amusing magic trick, separating your body like that. Fitting for a circus captain. But who exactly were you planning to catch with that clumsy knife work, my red-nosed friend?"
"I’m not red-nosed—!!"
Buggy screamed at the top of his lungs.
"That damned rubber bastard!! I’m on my way to take the head of Straw Hat Luffy! I’ll tear that insolent brat to pieces in Loguetown and offer him up to the sea—!!"
"...Oh?"
At that moment,
the brain cells that had been frozen by four days of exhaustion began to spark furiously to life.
He was going to Loguetown to catch Straw Hat?
Then before long, that place would become a colossal mess, with Luffy’s crew serving as meat shields, this clown’s revenge-crazed gang, and the Marines trying to sweep them all up tangled together.
Well now, the board has been laid out rather nicely.
The corner of my mouth, still holding my cigar, slowly curled upward at an angle—viciously and pleasantly.
"You’re going to take Luffy’s head?"
I slid my cutlass back into its sheath,
then spread my arms in feigned geniality and jerked my chin toward the Big Top’s captain’s quarters.
"What a fortunate meeting... I happen to have some very important business in Loguetown myself. First of all... shall we share some overdue rum and meat while we talk things over, friends?"
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