The secluded beach was a perfect crescent of white sand, sheltered by towering, moss-covered cliffs and a dense jungle that hummed with the chirps of strange insects. The submarine rested in the calm, shallow lagoon bobbing up and down with the waves. As the sunset painted the sky in hues of orange and violet, the crew transformed the beach into a bustling, chaotic camp.
Eliane, having shed her fear completely, was now a tiny, silver-haired general. "The fire pit should be here! No, Jelly, not on the salad! Atlas, can you carry that grill? It needs to be close to the driftwood table! Jannali, the spice baskets, please!" She directed the flow of supplies with the practiced ease of a chef managing a busy kitchen.
Jannali, laden with baskets of pre-marinated meat and vegetables, shook her head with a grin. "Bossiest little rescue victim I've ever met." She swatted a blue, gelatinous tentacle that was sneaking towards a platter of seasoned skewers. "Jelly! Hands off, you wobbly gannet!"
Eliane giggled as Jelly retracted his limb with a sheepish "Bloop?"
Near the growing fire pit, Atlas and Galit were engaged in their own ritual. "Move it a bit to the left, Noodle Neck," Atlas grunted, hefting a massive log.
"My neck provides a superior vantage point for structural assessment, you overgrown kitten," Galit retorted without looking up from his slate, where he was sketching the camp's layout. "Your brute force is, as ever, lacking in finesse."
"Finesse this," Atlas shot back, shoving the log into place with a ground-shaking thud.
Once the fire was roaring and the grill was sizzling, the motley crew settled on driftwood logs and spread-out blankets. The air filled with the incredible aroma of grilled meat skewers and a rich, fragrant curry rice that Eliane had whipped up from the submarine's stores. As they ate, a chorus of compliments rose into the night air.
"This is amazing, kid," Atlas said around a mouthful of skewer, his tail giving an appreciative flick.
"Absolutely top-tier, little chef," Jannali added, helping herself to more curry. "Better than the grub at the Golden Berry Tavern, and that's saying something."
Eliane beamed, her face glowing with pride and validation. "It's nothing special. I'm always just helping my parents with big events back home. They're teaching me everything."
This sparked the inevitable curiosity. Aokiji, leaning back with a skewer in hand, studied her. "A Lunarian... and a Three-Eye tribeswoman," he said, his gaze shifting to Jannali. "The World Government would have the world believe your kinds are myths, or extinct. I'm curious how a community of such... notable individuals has remained hidden for so long."
Jannali's cheerful expression became guarded. "You figured it out."
Aokiji shrugs, "It is pretty obvious once you put the pieces together."
"It's not easy, mate. You learn to keep your head down and your third eye covered."
Before Aokiji could press further, Galit spoke from his seat by the fire, his eyes never leaving the flames. "The world's history is older and far bigger than the World Government and the legacy of the Twenty Kingdoms. There are more shadows to hide in than they could ever hope to illuminate."
Sensing a dead end, Aokiji smoothly shifted his attention to Marya, who was quietly enjoying her food. "And what of the shadows cast by famous names? The daughter of the world's greatest swordsman must have quite a history herself."
Marya smirked, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. "Family secrets aren't shared with those who aren't family," she said, her tone lightly teasing but final. She then turned the tables. "What about you, 'Frosty'? You were a Marine for decades. Any little Admirals running around we should know about?"
Aokiji deflected with a lazy wave of his skewer. "The Marines were my family. A dysfunctional one, but still."
The potentially heavy conversation was shattered by a loud, rumbling "BRRRRRRRRROOOOOOP!" from Jelly. The jellyfish had inflated to twice his size and let out a seismic burp.
"Jelly! For the love of—" Jannali started, but it was too late. Jelly's massive mouth unhinged like a snake's, aiming to vacuum up the entire platter of leftover skewers in one go.
In a flash of rust-red fur, Atlas was on his feet. He scooped up the platter just as Jelly chomped down on empty air. "Not so fast, you bottomless pit!"
What followed was a hilarious chase around the campfire. Jelly, propelled by furious bouncing, pursued a sprinting Atlas, who held the platter of food high overhead.
"Can't even overpower a mutant jellyfish, 'Lightning Sovereign'?" Galit called out, a rare, genuine smile touching his lips.
"Hey, he's deceptively strong!" Atlas yelled back, leaping over a log as Jelly bounced beneath him. The scene devolved into a chaos of laughter, shouted taunts, and Jelly's determined "Bloop!"s until everyone was breathless and the food was safely stored away.
After cleaning up, they settled around the dying embers of the fire. Eliane yawned, her head finding Jannali's shoulder. "Jann? Could you tell a story?"
The camp was quiet. Marya was sharpening Eternal Eclipse with a steady shhhhk-shhhhk. Galit was scribbling on his slate, calculating tides or trajectories. Jelly had nestled next to Eliane, already emitting soft, gurgling snores. Aokiji was reclined, looking at the stars, his mind seemingly elsewhere. Atlas leaned against a log, picking his teeth with a toothpick.
The night had deepened, the sky a vast, black canvas pricked with countless diamond-sharp stars. The campfire, now reduced to a bed of pulsating embers, threw dancing, long-fingered shadows across the circle of faces. The rhythmic crash of waves on the shore was a slow, breathing counterpoint to the crackle of burning wood. Eliane was a warm weight against Jannali's side, and Jelly's soft, gurgling snores provided a bizarre musical accompaniment.
Jannali smiled, the firelight catching the gold in her hoop earrings as she put an arm around the drowsing girl. "Alright then," she began, her voice losing its usual sharpness, taking on a lower, more melodic tone that seemed to pull the darkness closer. "Gather 'round. This one's old. Older than the Void Century. It's the story of the Bobbi-Bobbi, the Sky-Serpent, and the price of stealing from heaven..."
She paused, letting the silence and the night settle in.
"Imagine, if you can, a time before the sky was broken. There was no White-White Sea, no scattered islands of cloud. There was one great continent, up there in the blue, a floating world of soft, walking earth and rivers of mist. And wrapped around the very edge of this world, so vast his scales were like mountain ranges, was Bobbi-Bobbi. A Celestial Serpent, his body woven from the light of stars we don't even have names for."
Marya paused in her sharpening, the shhhhk of stone on steel halting. Her golden eyes, reflected in the blade, were fixed on Jannali, curious. Galit had set his slate down, his long neck tilted in a listening curve. Atlas stopped picking his teeth, his ears swiveling forward. Even Aokiji, who had been staring at the constellations, shifted his gaze to the storyteller.
"Now, the people who lived up there," Jannali continued, "they were peaceful. But they were fragile. All they had to live on was cloud-juice, and they were fading, getting thinner and quieter. Bobbi-Bobbi, from his heavenly perch, felt a sadness so deep it rumbled in the air, a feeling you'd get in your bones before you ever heard it with your ears. In his great, bottomless kindness, he decided to act."
She held up a hand, miming a breath. "First, he breathed upon the clouds. And from his breath, life sprang! The Fox-Bats, creatures of leather and fur, with wings that could catch the high sky-winds. 'Here,' his voice echoed, not in words, but in understanding. 'Here is your sustenance.'"
"But, crikey, the Fox-Bats were clever! Fast as lightning, flying too high and too quick to be caught. Bobbi-Bobbi saw them struggling, and he made a choice. A choice of sacrifice." Jannali's voice dropped to a near-whisper, and everyone leaned in slightly. "With a sound that tore the very air—a crack of divine bone and will—he reached into his own stellar body... and plucked out one of his own ribs."
Eliane, though half-asleep, let out a soft gasp.
"Now, this weren't no normal bone," Jannali said, her eyes wide. "It was massive, curved like a crescent moon, made of solidified sky and woven with a Haki so potent it hummed, a sound you could feel in your teeth. It was bone-white, but it glowed with a gentle, inner light. This, he lowered to the people. 'This is my gift,' he told them. 'My bone. Shape it, honor it, and it will always return to you. It will bring the food from the sky to your hands.'"
"And so, the first Boomerang was born." Jannali made a throwing motion. "With it, the sky-people thrived! They could knock the Fox-Bats from the air, and this beautiful, glowing thing would sing through the clouds and always, without fail, zip back to the thrower's hand. It was a time of miracles. A proper golden age."
She leaned forward, the firelight carving dramatic shadows on her face. "But... curiosity is a hunger that no food can sate." Her tone turned ominous. "Two brothers—let's call 'em Arrogance and Ignorance—they looked at this returning miracle and got bored. They looked past the Fox-Bats, past the clouds, right to the highest heaven where Bobbi-Bobbi himself rested."
"'What's up there?' Ignorance whispered."
"'The Serpent lives there,' said Arrogance. 'He must have more wonders. Let's use his own bone to pierce his home and see.'"
"This was the betrayal," Jannali said, her voice hard. "They didn't need food. They didn't need help. They wanted to take what wasn't offered." She mimed a powerful, upward throw. "They took the sacred rib-boomerang, the very essence of the Serpent's kindness, and hurled it not for food, but straight up. They threw it to pierce, to invade."
"The boomerang, bound by its divine nature to fly true and with impossible power, tore into the highest heaven. It ripped a gash in the fabric of the sky itself—a wound of swirling, empty black, a hole into the cold, airless void beyond. The first and most terrible tear."
"Bobbi-Bobbi, who'd been watching with quiet pride, was startled to his core. The violation was so deep, so unexpected, that he recoiled. And in that moment of shock... he fumbled. He failed to catch his own returning rib."
"The boomerang fell from the hole it had made, a falling star of terrible consequence. It didn't return to the brothers' hands. It returned to the spot from which it was thrown."
Jannali slammed her fist into her open palm. A few embers leaped into the air. "It struck the earth between them with the force of a meteor. But this was no ordinary impact. It was a divine punishment. The energy released wasn't fire and shockwave... it was the concept of an ending."
"A greyness spread. It touched the two brothers, and they didn't scream. They just... stopped. Their light went out. Their hearts fell silent. They were the first to know it. The first to know Death."
"The sky-continent shook. Bobbi-Bobbi, feeling this horrible, final silence seep into his perfect world, let out a roar of grief and fury that shattered the land beneath him. The single sky-continent broke into a thousand pieces, becoming the scattered sky islands we know today."
Jannali leaned back, her story complete. The fire popped. "And then... he withdrew. His great, starry form, which had always been a comfort in the upper air, coiled in upon itself and vanished behind the mended sky. He offered no more ribs. He sent no more Fox-Bats. The age of gifts from the divine was over, ended by a reckless thirst for what was forbidden."
A profound silence hung over the camp, filled only by the waves and Jelly's snoring. Eliane was fully asleep now, a small, peaceful smile on her face. The story, a fragment of a world lost to time, seemed to linger in the salt-scented air, a timeless warning whispered from the depths of history.
Eliane murmured, half-asleep, "Thank you... everyone... for coming to get me." Jelly's snores provided a soft, squishy counterpoint to the crackling fire.
A comfortable silence fell. Then, Aokiji sat up. His reflective mood was gone, replaced by his sharp, Admiral's gaze. He looked directly at Marya, his eyes then scanning the motley crew—the sleeping Lunarian, the joking Three-Eye tribeswoman, the bickering Mink and genius long-neck helmsman, the snoring mutant jellyfish.
"Alright," Aokiji said, his voice low and serious, cutting through the night's peace. "The stories are over. I'll ask you directly, Marya. Why are you going to Ohara? With... all of this." He gestured at the unlikely assembly. "What are your exact intentions?"
The comfortable silence following Jannali's story shattered under the weight of Aokiji's question. The fire seemed to burn a little lower, the night air growing still. All eyes turned to Marya.
She didn't look up immediately. The rhythmic shhhhk-shhhhk of stone on Eclipse's obsidian blade continued for three more deliberate strokes. Finally, she paused, glancing up at Aokiji through her lashes before returning her gaze to her work, as if considering the metal itself. The rest of them—Jannali, Atlas, Galit—had gone completely still, waiting.
With a soft sigh that was barely audible over the waves, she conceded. "Well," she said, her voice calm. "I guess you should know what you've signed up for." Another stroke of the whetstone. "I'm looking for the parts of an ancient compass."
Aokiji stroked his chin, the gesture slow and thoughtful. "There is nothing left of Ohara. The World Government saw to that." His voice was flat, devoid of its usual lazy drawl. "I would know. I led the
Marya let out a dry chuckle. "Typical World Government and Navy ignorance. You burn a library and think you've erased knowledge. You just scattered the ashes."
"You know where this artifact is, then?" Aokiji pressed, his brow furrowing.
Marya smirked, finally sheathing Eclipse with a definitive click. "Nope. But I'm pretty good at figuring this kind of stuff out."
Atlas and Galit nodded in perfect, silent unison, a testament to their shared experience with her particular brand of chaotic problem-solving.
Jannali leaned forward, her expression a mix of curiosity and concern. "Alright, I'll bite. What does this artifact actually do?"
Marya's eyes immediately shifted back to Aokiji, a scowl touching her features. It was his turn to smirk. "Still don't trust me."
"Not really," Marya admitted bluntly. "I don't know what your end game is. But I don't know if there's any harm in you knowing, either." She shrugged one shoulder, a deceptively casual gesture. "I could always just kill you if it becomes a problem."
Aokiji chuckled, a deep, rumbling sound. "You could try."
"SO WHAT IS IT?" Atlas interjected, his patience evidently worn thin by the verbal fencing.
Marya looked at him. "It's part of a compass that will tell me where all the Devil Fruits in the world are located."
Jannali let out a low, impressed whistle. "Bloody hell."
Aokiji's eyes widened a fraction. "I can see why you want to keep that a secret."
Galit pushed his glasses up his nose. "The tactical applications are staggering. But why do you need to know the location of all of them?"
"I don't," Marya clarified. "I'm looking for four specific ones."
"What's so special about these four?" Aokiji asked.
It was Atlas who answered, a look of dawning revelation on his face. "They're part of the key. To opening that door."
Marya raised a brow, then gave a single, slow nod of confirmation.
Galit looked between them. "A door?"
Marya smirked. "You sure you want to know?"
Aokiji, still stroking his chin, redirected the line of questioning. "Where are you planning to go after Ohara?"
Marya glanced up at the star-dusted sky. "The Sky Islands. That's where the last piece of the compass is."
"The door?" Galit repeated, insistently.
Marya sighed, a rare show of genuine uncertainty. "Honestly, I don't know what the door leads to." She looked down at the permanent black veins crawling up her wrist. "My mother was researching the Primordial Current. The door has some connection to it. My father and I actually found it—or what we thought was it—but we didn't have the elements to open it." A faint, genuine smile touched her lips. "We did have a good time trying, though. Sort of."
"Maybe it should be left closed, then," Jannali suggested quietly. "If it was locked, it was for a reason."
Marya nodded, lifting Eclipse slightly. "This blade is cursed. In order to lift that curse, I need to open the door and return the being's curse to its home. That's the deal I made with it."
Aokiji retorted, "Cursed blades are typically—"
"This is not a typical curse," Marya cut him off, her voice sharp. "This blade carries a soul that wants to get home."
Galit, ever the pragmatist, asked, "What happens if you don't?"
Atlas answered for her, his voice uncharacteristically grave. "Your life is the price for failure."
Marya gave another single, solemn nod.
Jannali cursed under her breath. Aokiji, however, chuckled. "This could be interesting."
Marya's smirk returned. "It certainly won't be boring."
Aokiji leaned forward, the firelight catching the intensity in his eyes. "What are the other elements of the lock?"
Marya sighed, visibly reluctant. "The four Devil Fruits. The blood of a D., a Sky Islander, and a World Noble. The ritual must be performed by Nika. And a willing member of the Lunarian, Three-Eye Tribe, and Mink races." She took a breath. "Then the three relics: the Celestial Compass, the Mask of the Forgotten Oracle, and the Heart of the Sea Devourer."
Aokiji let out a low whistle. "That's a pretty tall order."
Jannali snapped to attention, her eyes wide. "Wait. You don't intend to have Eliane be the 'willing member,' do you?"
Marya shrugged. "I don't know yet."
"You can't!" Jannali said, her voice rising with protective fury.
Aokiji smirked, reclining back again. "Sounds like you may need to find some other willing candidates for your Three-Eye Tribe and Lunarian."
Marya locked her calm, golden gaze with Jannali's. "I told you at the beginning, I don't take on passengers. And you insisted the 'wind' told you to come."
Jannali swallowed hard, the memory clear. She looked out toward the dark horizon, as if listening for that same guidance. After a long moment, she nodded, seemingly receiving confirmation. "If any harm comes to her," she said, her voice low and deadly serious, "I swear—"
Marya's smirk was infuriatingly calm. "You are more than welcome to try. Or to just step off."
Atlas chuckled and nodded, returning to cleaning his claws with a toothpick. "She told us the same thing," he chimed in. "But I'm along for the ride until the end." He reclined back, stretching his massive frame with a contented sigh. "This is the adventure of a lifetime. And I don't want to miss it."
The fire popped, sending a shower of sparks into the sky. The quest was laid bare, its impossible scale hanging in the air between them. They were no longer just a rescue party; they were a crew, bound by a secret that could shake the world, tied together by fate, curiosity, and the promise of a legend that none of them, not even Marya, fully understood.