The forest trembled. The massive bear roared, its scarred face twisted in fury as it lunged forward, earth trembling beneath each step. Its yellowed fangs glistened in the moonlight, and its breath came in hot, ragged huffs.
Ace stood his ground, pipe gripped tight in both hands. Dirt smeared his cheeks, his shirt torn from ducking claws and diving through roots. His chest rose and fell with shallow breaths, but his eyes burned with fire.
Behind him, Sabo stumbled up, clutching a long burning stake with both hands like a spear. He was shaking—not from fear, but resolve. His body didn't know what to do, but his heart did: stand with Ace.
"You ready…?" Ace asked without looking back, sweat dripping from his brow.
"N-No… but I'm here," Sabo replied, voice cracking but certain.
The bear didn't wait. It charged, crashing through trees, claws slicing through the underbrush as if it were paper. Ace leapt to the side just in time, the beast's paw splintering the ground where he stood a second earlier. He rolled to his feet, swung his pipe, and slammed it into the bear's flank—but it barely flinched.
"Tch... it's not even slowing down!" Ace growled.
The bear turned, furious now, and lunged at Ace again—jaws wide, claws raised. Before it could strike, Sabo screamed and threw a rock at its face. It barely did anything, but it was enough. The beast paused, annoyed—and in that moment, Ace dove beneath it, slamming the pipe into its underbelly.
The bear howled and twisted, swiping at Ace, clipping his shoulder, sending the boy flying into a tree with a sickening thud.
"Noooo…!!"
Sabo dashed toward him, barely ducking a swiping claw. His feet tangled in roots, and he face-planted, the air knocked from his lungs. He looked up just in time to see the bear charging toward him now, abandoning Ace entirely. Terror hit Sabo like a wave. He couldn't run. He couldn't think. But Ace could.
"HEY UGLY!!" Ace screamed, blood dripping from his mouth as he stood again, barely. He gritted his teeth and hurled his iron pipe like a javelin, nailing the bear in the back of the head.
The bear stumbled and whirled, fury boiling in its eyes. It charged Ace again, this time faster.
Ace dodged left—but not fast enough. A claw raked across his side, tearing his shirt, leaving three deep lines across his ribs. He cried out and fell.
Sabo, eyes wide with horror, grabbed the smoldering stick again. He wasn't strong, he wasn't fast—but he had to do something. He ran straight at the bear.
"LEAVE HIM ALONE!!" he shrieked, thrusting the burning end forward. The stick hit the bear's snout—but this time it was ready. It jerked its head and batted Sabo aside with its massive paw. Sabo flew like a ragdoll, hit the dirt hard, and lay there coughing.
The bear, enraged now, fur burned and bloodied in patches, snorted. It had had enough of games. The little ones had teeth, yes—but they were still prey. It turned to finish Ace.
Ace pushed himself up on one knee. His vision blurred, the pain in his side unbearable. But he saw the bear rising again. The fight was nearly over. He knew it.
"If you're taking me down," he whispered, "I'm not going alone..."
The bear charged. And then— A flash of movement.
Just as the bear rose to its full height—towering like a wall of muscle, rage, and primal hunger—its eyes locked onto the broken form of the little boy before it. Ace, bruised and bleeding, didn't even flinch. He gritted his teeth, prepared to face death head-on, his pipe clenched even as his knees buckled.
Then— The world shifted. In a single instant, an invisible weight came crashing down upon the clearing. The bear froze. Mid-swipe.
It felt like time itself had stalled—but only for the beast. Ace and Sabo remained unaware, eyes wide, lungs burning, completely spent. But the bear—the so-called king of the forest—was paralyzed by a pressure beyond anything it had ever known.
Its blood ran cold. The hairs on its scarred back stood upright. Its breath hitched, muscles trembling violently as if it had been struck by lightning.
From the shadows, beneath the thick canopy of trees, a figure stepped into view. Old. Weathered. Yet every step carried the weight of oceans.
His frame was lined with scars that told tales of wars long forgotten, his cloak tattered but his posture proud. A single eye gleamed beneath his wild silver mane, while the other was sealed shut by an old, deep scar that ran across his brow and down his cheek. He walked with the slow confidence of someone who no longer needed to prove a thing—but still could crush mountains if he chose to.
This was Naguri, the ex-pirate captain who once challenged the Pirate King himself—and lost. Yet even in loss, he remained a monster among men.
His eyes burned through the shadows as he approached, his presence like a blade pressed against the throat of every living thing nearby.
"Hahaha… Garp really knows how to raise monsters….he left a kid like you alone out here." he muttered, eyes briefly scanning Ace's bloodied form.
But his gaze quickly shifted back to the bear. And the force of his Conqueror's Haki exploded. Silently. Invisibly. But devastatingly.
The ground beneath the bear cracked, as if the very earth was rejecting its presence. The wind grew still, the trees groaned, and the weight of a monster's will bore down upon the predator with merciless precision.
The bear's pupils shrank to pinpricks. Its jaw, once snarling, now trembled in abject fear.
It remembered. Oh, it remembered now. The reason it had never gone after that child before. The presence that stalked the edges of the forest, the one its instincts screamed never to challenge.
And it had forgotten. Blinded by bloodlust and hunger, it had believed it could act with impunity.
But now? Now it knew—it had made a fatal mistake.
Every primal instinct screamed retreat, but its legs refused to obey. Its body shook, spine arched in submission. What was once the overlord of the forest was now reduced to prey. It whimpered—whimpered—and slowly lowered its massive frame to the ground, belly dragging, ears pinned back, posture low.
It dared not blink. Dared not move. Because it knew—
If it brought its paw down, it would die.
Naguri didn't even lift a finger. He merely stared, one hand tucked into the folds of his cloak. But the pressure was enough. It wasn't a bluff. It was a promise. One step closer, and death would be instant.
After what felt like an eternity, the bear backed away, never turning its back. Step by trembling step, it disappeared into the forest from where it had come.
Only then did Naguri sigh and allow the haki to fade. The air lightened. The forest breathed again. Birds chirped in the far distance, and the oppressive silence lifted.
Ace and Sabo, still crouched by the fire, blinked in confusion, never once having felt the force that had just dominated the forest. They only knew the bear had fled—and someone had arrived.
Naguri stepped into the firelight, gaze falling on Ace.
"You're lucky, brat. If your grandfather hadn't asked me to keep an eye on you, you'd be bear chow."
Ace, still panting, stared up. "You… scared it off?"
Naguri smirked faintly. "Let's just say… I reminded it of the food chain."
And in that moment, to the boys, he looked less like a man—and more like a giant cloaked in dusk, a relic of the pirate age, still dangerous, still watching. And from the shadows, the forest itself seemed to bow in respect.
"Wooow… you must be really strong…" Sabo whispered, eyes wide in pure amazement. Despite the bruises and cuts across his small body, he stared up at the old man as if spellbound—his fear forgotten, his awe taking root.
Ace didn't say anything at first, but his sharp eyes softened with gratitude. So this was the presence he'd felt before, always lingering just beyond sight. For weeks, he'd sensed something—or someone—watching from the shadows. And now, it all made sense.
"Jiji… you old liar," Ace thought. "Said you didn't care if I lived or died—but you still had someone watching."
Naguri gave a quiet huff, walking over to the fire in the center of the clearing. Without a word, he knelt down and began rummaging through a weathered leather satchel. The scent of herbs and alcohol drifted into the cool night air.
"Come here, both of you," he said gruffly. "Let's patch up those wounds before either of you catches a fever."
The boys obeyed without hesitation, drawn not just by pain, but by the heavy aura of the man before them—calm, ancient, powerful. As Naguri began dabbing at Sabo's wounds with steady, calloused hands, the younger boy blurted out the question burning in his chest.
"How... how did you do it?" Sabo asked, eyes bright with wonder.
"How did you scare off that bear…without even fighting it?"
Ace perked up too, curious despite himself. He had seen strange things growing up around his grandfather, but what happened back there had shaken even him. The bear wasn't just afraid—it had been paralyzed.
Naguri paused, looking into the fire for a moment, as if deciding how much to say. Then he spoke, his voice low, steady, but carrying the weight of memory.
"There's a kind of power that doesn't come from muscles or weapons," he said. "A will so strong it can shake the hearts of beasts... or men."
He leaned back slightly, his one good eye catching the flicker of the firelight like a dying star.
"It's called Conqueror's Haki. It's not something you can train the usual way. You're either born with it, or you're not. It's a king's will—the kind that doesn't yield."
Sabo's jaw dropped. "A... king's will?"
Ace furrowed his brow. "Jiji... mentioned something like that before. Said he'd tell me when the time was right."
Naguri chuckled, gruff and dry. "Of course he did. Your grandfather loves playing things close to the chest."
He poured a bit of alcohol on a cloth and pressed it against Ace's scraped cheek, making the boy flinch.
"You two did well back there," Naguri added. "Stupid, reckless, but well enough. Most kids your age would've frozen or cried for their mothers. But you didn't. You fought. You protected each other."
Sabo looked at Ace, and for the first time, Ace didn't turn away.
"That's why you're alive," Naguri finished. "But if you want to survive out here again... you'll need more than courage."
His gaze darkened slightly.
"The world doesn't care how brave you are. It only respects strength. And if you don't have the strength to protect what matters... then someone else decides your fate."
The fire crackled in silence. Ace's small hands tightened into fists. Sabo looked down, lost in thought. In that moment, the idea of running away from home no longer felt like a childish rebellion. He understood now—out here, in the real world, you had to fight for your freedom.
"Teach me," Sabo said suddenly, eyes blazing.
"I want to learn."
Naguri raised an eyebrow.
"Me too," Ace muttered, as if saying it aloud was hard. "I want to be strong enough to protect what's mine."
Naguri gave a faint, weathered smile—just a flicker—but it held the warmth of distant pride.
"Then you better be ready to bleed, boys," he said, reaching back into his satchel.
"Because out here, every lesson... is carved in pain."
It wasn't on a whim that Naguri decided to take the boys under his wing. No—it was a debt, long overdue. Years ago, he and his crew had been cornered by the Marines, battered and outgunned, their defeat all but certain. But instead of executing them like so many others, Garp had made them a deal: give up piracy and live. That mercy had cost Naguri his pride—but it had given him something greater.
A second chance. He settled down quietly in the shadows of Goa Kingdom, becoming little more than a ghost to most. But when Garp returned years later—child in arms, storm in his eyes—he made a request no man of honor could refuse.
"Watch over him while I am away, old friend. Train him when he is older... when he's ready."
And now, watching Ace throw himself between a rampaging bear and a stranger with nothing but a rusty pipe and raw courage, Naguri knew the boy was finally ready.
As for the other one, the boy with fire in his eyes but no clue how to hold a stick—Naguri saw himself in that reckless heart. That defiance. That hunger to live free. He could work with that.
Naguri blinked out of his thoughts as the two boys, now patched up and sitting by the fire, finally started talking.
Ace turned toward Sabo, squinting slightly, like trying to solve a half-finished puzzle.
"So... who are you again? Don't I know you from somewhere...?" he asked bluntly, tilting his head. "What are you doing in this forest…? Did you get lost in the forest again or something?"
Sabo's jaw practically unhinged.
"Wha—AGAIN?!" he sputtered, eyes wide with disbelief. "You—you saved my life! Last time! In this same forest! The soldiers were going to kill me, and you jumped in and beat them up with a stick! I—I even told you my name back then…!"
Ace blinked. "Huh... that does sound kind of familiar. What's your name again…?"
He stared at Sabo a second longer, then snapped his fingers. "Wait—you were that noble kid, right? The one who cried the whole time?"
"I—I did not cry!" Sabo shouted, red in the face, waving his arms furiously.
Naguri let out a deep, wheezing chuckle from where he sat across the fire, rubbing herbs into a bandage.
"Sounds like a real touching reunion," he muttered, not even bothering to hide the sarcasm.
Sabo pouted, crossing his arms with a dramatic huff. He had crossed an entire forest, almost died twice, and had been nearly eaten by a bear—all just to find Ace. And now the guy barely remembered him.
"Tch... ungrateful jungle gremlin..." he muttered under his breath.
"What'd you say?"
"Nothing!"
Ace leaned back, arms behind his head, eyes skyward.
"Well... I guess if you came all this way, you can stay. I don't mind sharing the mountain. Just don't eat my dinner."
Sabo groaned. "I didn't come here for your food!"
"Good. Because it's mine."
The two boys locked eyes. For a moment, the air tensed—until they both broke into awkward, tired laughter. Naguri watched them quietly from the fire's edge, his gaze distant. The seas were churning again, and these two... they were just kids now. But in them, he saw sparks. And sparks could start wildfires.
****
Far across the cerulean sweep of the East Blue, two weeks' journey from the Conomi Island chain, there lay an uncharted island—a gem hidden beneath the veil of mist and myth.
The island was untouched by the hands of man. Lush emerald forests blanketed its heart, teeming with birdsong and the chatter of unseen creatures. Waterfalls cascaded from jagged cliffs into crystal-clear rivers that wound like silver threads through the verdant land.
The scent of salt and orchids hung in the air. Wildflowers bloomed along moss-covered rocks, and a soft wind whispered secrets through towering, ancient trees.
Along the southern edge of the island, a vast golden lagoon shimmered under the sun like a coin from the gods. Palm trees swayed lazily along the soft, powdery shore, their leaves casting broken shadows across the pristine sand.
And anchored in that tranquil lagoon was a sight that would make the bravest sailor's heart skip—a massive galleon, its dark crimson sails furled like sleeping dragons' wings. The figurehead of the ship, carved into the fierce visage of a dragon mid-roar, bore the unmistakable mark of one of the most feared and respected crews to ever sail the seas: the Red-Haired Pirates.
The Red Force, the personal ship of the Supernova "Red-Haired" Shanks, loomed like a fortress, a titan of wood and iron, gilded with age and glory.
Beneath the dappled shade of a palm grove not far from the beach, the Red-Haired Pirates lounged comfortably, a half-finished meal spread out before them—roasted turkey, barrels of ale, fire-grilled fish, and all manner of tropical fruits they had gathered from the island.
Shanks, coat draped loosely over his shoulders, leaned against the trunk of a palm tree, bottle in hand, chuckling as he watched his crew bicker and feast like kings. His sour mood didn't stop him from raising a drink or tossing a witty jab at the ever-complaining Buggy, who, as always, was red-faced and dramatic.
"Shanks… you bastard, why did we leave that island?" Buggy grumbled, gnawing on a half-cooked turkey leg. "The food there actually had taste! This thing's drier than a Marine's sense of humor. And look at her; she has barely touched her food…"
Seated cross-legged in the warm sand just beside the ever-scowling Buggy, a little girl with snow-white hair and red highlights furrowed her brows as she dragged a stick through the golden grains.
Uta wasn't interested in the roasted turkey or tropical fruits the crew had prepared. Food didn't matter right now. Not when her heart felt heavier than her stomach. She poked at the sand with frustration, sketching little patterns that made no sense—jagged lines, crooked stars, broken music notes.
Beside her, Buggy grumbled about bland meat, but even his dramatic whining failed to earn a single giggle from her, which was saying something. Uta, the ship's sunshine, the girl who had recently taken a liking to singing and sang louder than the wind and smiled wider than the horizon, had gone quiet.
It had been that way ever since they left Cocoyashi Village. She had barely spoken to Shanks in the past week.
There, on that peaceful island, she had met Nojiko—a girl her age with a fire in her heart and the calm of the sea in her eyes. They had braided each other's hair, played in the surf, sung silly songs, shared secrets under the moonlight. In Nojiko, Uta had found something she'd never truly had before: a real friend. Not a pirate, not a crew member—just a girl who liked her for who she was.
And then, just like that… Shanks had decided to leave. No warning. No goodbye picnic. Just "We're setting sail tomorrow."
Uta hadn't even said a proper farewell. Nojiko had waved until the ship disappeared into the fog. Uta had kept her back turned the whole time. She stabbed the stick into the sand and scowled.
"Stupid pirates…" she muttered under her breath.
Shanks noticed. He always did. His one open eye drifted toward her, watching her silent protest from where he sat with his bottle. The others laughed, bickered, ate—but his gaze lingered on the girl he had raised, not just as a captain, but as a father.
He hadn't missed the way she avoided him lately. He sighed. "Uta," he called gently, as if trying to find the right thread to pull on. She didn't turn around.
"We've talked about this…"
Still nothing. Buggy glanced up from gnawing on a bone. "Hoo boy," he muttered, scooting just slightly away—he could smell the emotional storm brewing.
"I didn't want to leave either," Shanks continued. "But we can't stay in one place forever. You know that."
Now she turned, slowly, eyes shimmering with unspoken words and a storm of disappointment.
"You promised me we'd stay for a while," she snapped, her voice small but fierce. "You said it was safe there. That we could relax."
Shanks winced. He remembered saying that. It had been a moment of peace, and he'd hoped to give her a glimpse of a normal life, even if only for a time.
"It was safe," he said softly, "until it wasn't."
"No, it was safe!" she insisted, rising to her feet, fists clenched at her sides. "You left because you thought something might go wrong! But it didn't! And now I'll never see Nojiko again!"
There it was. The heart of the wound. The first true friend she ever had—taken away by the tides of pirate life.
Across the fire, Lucky Roux was happily chewing meat straight off the bone, grease slick on his cheeks but utterly content. To him, food was food. If it filled the belly, what more did you need?
Even Benn Beckmann, ever the calm and calculating right hand, had to admit—he couldn't help but empathize with little Uta, but the little girl failed to see what Shanks and most of the crew did; even Buggy had seen it.
The villagers of Cocoyashi Village had shown them hospitality beyond measure. After Shanks and his crew had rescued Bellemere and her two daughters from the jaws of a sea king and helped her reach her village safely, the Red-Haired Pirates had intended to leave immediately.
But Bellemere, fiercely independent yet honest to the bone, had realized her mistake—she had judged them like every other pirate. And she'd been wrong. She had apologized. Then insisted they stay for a meal.
One meal became three. Then a banquet. Then a month. Even the villagers—once cautious—grew fond of them. The children had played on the beaches with Yasopp and Roux. The old men had laughed and shared drinks with Shanks. For a time, it had been… peaceful. Idyllic. A pirate's dream.
But even dreams wear thin beneath the weight of reality. Beckmann took a long drag of his cigarette, exhaling toward the sea.
"You made the right call, Shanks," he said quietly.
Shanks didn't answer immediately. He simply looked up at the sky, where gulls cried overhead, wheeling through the warm ocean breeze.
"Yeah… I know," he said at last, voice soft. "The smiles were still there, but the unease was growing. Some of them started looking at us like we might never leave."
He swirled the rum in his bottle, eyes shadowed beneath the brim of his hat.
"No matter how kind we are… we're pirates. In their eyes, there's always that fear—'what if they change?'"
He let out a long sigh, then smiled, though it didn't quite reach his eyes.
"I'd rather leave while they still look at us with gratitude… not suspicion."
Buggy clicked his tongue, tossing the bone into the sand. "Tch. That's the problem with people—they forget who saved who real quick."
"It's not their fault," Beckmann added. "Fear does that. Even good people fall prey to it."
Shanks chuckled again, lifting the bottle to his lips. "Well, we enjoyed their hospitality as long as we could."
The warm glow of the fire danced across the crew's faces, a quiet silence settling over them.
Then Beckmann's voice broke it, wanting to divert this heavy mood.
"Shanks… there's word that both Mihawk and Rosinante are in the East Blue."
The bottle paused halfway to Shanks' mouth. For a moment, the carefree glint in his eyes darkened. The sea breeze stilled. Even Buggy looked up.
Shanks slowly set the bottle down, the firelight reflecting off the edge of his blade where it rested beside him in the sand.
"Then it's going to get interesting."