The ocean deepened. The vibrant turquoise of the shallows gave way to a heavy, crushing indigo. Outside the protective resin bubble of the Thousand Sunny, giant schools of fish moved like synchronized clouds, their scales catching the faint light filtering down from the surface.
Luffy sat cross-legged on the grassy deck, his eyes closed. He was not sleeping. He was listening.
"Temperature is dropping!" Nami called out from the helm, her eyes glued to the log pose on her wrist. "We are hitting the downward current. Everyone, hold onto something!"
"I made hot cocoa!" Sanji danced out of the kitchen, balancing a tray perfectly despite the ship's tilt. "Nami-swan! Robin-chwan! Here is your love-filled warmth!"
"Thanks, Sanji," Robin smiled, taking a cup.
"What about us?" Usopp asked, shivering slightly.
"There is a kettle in the back. Help yourself," Sanji replied instantly, his tone shifting from adoration to indifference.
"You jerk!" Usopp yelled.
Luffy opened one eye. His Observation Haki picked up a slimy, malicious presence approaching rapidly from the rear. It was exactly as he remembered.
"Franky," Luffy said.
"Yo!" The cyborg looked up from inspecting the main mast.
"Is the barrel ready?"
Franky gave a thumbs-up. He pointed to a reinforced, steel-banded barrel sitting near the railing. "Super ready. I lined it with Sea Prism Stone fragments I had left over from my own tools. Whoever goes in there is not coming out."
"Good," Luffy said. He stood up and walked to the rear railing.
"What is it, Luffy?" Zoro asked, cracking one eye open from his nap against the mainmast.
"A pest," Luffy muttered.
From the darkness of the ocean behind them, a ship emerged. It was shaped like a giant snail and was being towed by a terrified-looking sea cow.
"That's a sea cow!" Chopper gasped. "It looks huge!"
"It looks delicious," Sanji critiqued. "Wait. I recognize that cow. Didn't I kick it back in the East Blue?"
"Momoo?" Nami blinked. "It is!"
On the deck of the approaching ship, a man with wet, slicked-back hair and a long, lizard-like tongue stood laughing. His body seemed to ripple like mud.
"Kehihihi!" Caribou the Wet-Haired laughed, his voice muffled slightly by the water but audible through the coating. "Those foolish Straw Hats! They have no idea I, Caribou, am tailing them! I will sneak aboard, kill them one by one, and take their heads!"
"He is coming," Luffy said.
As the enemy ship brushed against the Sunny's bubble, Caribou leaped. He passed through the membrane of the coating with a wet squelch, landing on the grass deck of the Sunny with a confident thud.
"Kehihihi!" Caribou spread his arms wide, his body turning into a swamp of mud. "Fear me! I am a Logia! I am the swa—"
Grab.
Luffy's hand clamped around Caribou's throat before the man could finish his sentence.
Caribou's eyes bulged. He tried to turn his neck into mud to slip away, but he couldn't. The grip was solid. It was burning.
"H-Haki?" Caribou choked out. "You have Haki?"
Luffy didn't answer. He didn't even look angry. He looked bored. He lifted the lanky man into the air as if he weighed nothing.
"You talk too much," Luffy said flatly.
He walked over to the reinforced barrel.
"Wait! Wait!" Caribou screamed, flailing his legs. "I am a captain! I have a bounty of 210 millio—"
Luffy dropped him headfirst into the barrel.
Thump.
"Franky!" Luffy called.
"Super on it!"
Franky appeared with a hammer and a lid. Before Caribou could scramble out, Franky slammed the lid down and hammered six nails into the rim in under two seconds.
"Let me out!" Caribou's muffled voice screamed from inside. "It's dark in here! I can't move! My powers won't work!"
"Sea Prism Stone lining," Franky grinned, patting the barrel. "Comfortable fit."
The rest of the crew stared.
"That was... fast," Usopp said, blinking. "Usually we have a whole fight, then run away, then fight again."
"No time," Luffy said, sitting back down. "We have a schedule."
"Schedule?" Nami asked. "Since when do you have a schedule?"
"Since I decided I want to eat Fishman Island candy," Luffy grinned.
The ship continued its descent. The light vanished completely. Franky activated the Sunny's searchlights, cutting through the pitch-black water. Giant, pale eels swam past, their eyes milky and blind.
"Seven thousand meters," Robin noted. "The pressure here would crush a normal submarine."
Suddenly, the water ahead began to churn. The currents grew violent, tossing the Sunny back and forth.
"Something big is coming!" Zoro stood up, his hand resting on Shusui.
"It's huge!" Chopper screamed, clinging to the railing. "It's bigger than a mountain!"
From the abyss, tentacles emerged. They were thick as skyscrapers, covered in suckers the size of houses. A single, massive eye opened in the darkness, glowing with a malevolent yellow light.
The Kraken. Surume.
"It's the Kraken!" Usopp shrieked, his eyes popping out. "We're going to die! Turn the ship around!"
"We can't!" Nami yelled, wrestling with the wheel. "The current is pulling us toward it!"
The Kraken raised a tentacle, preparing to smash the tiny ship into splinters.
"Lunch," Luffy said.
"It's not lunch, you idiot! It's a monster!" Sanji yelled, his leg igniting with flames. "I'll grill it!"
"I'll cut it," Zoro drew his swords. "Dragon Twister should work underwater."
"Wait," Luffy said. He stood up and walked to the edge of the bubble.
The Kraken roared, a sound that vibrated through the water and shook the ship's keel. The massive tentacle began its descent.
Luffy looked up at the beast. He didn't take a fighting stance. He just stared.
His eyes changed. The pupils dilated, then sharpened into focused points. A wave of red-black energy exploded from him, invisible to the naked eye but felt by every living thing within ten miles.
Haoshoku Haki.
It wasn't a blast of force meant to knock someone out. It was a projection of pure will. A command.
Submit.
The Kraken froze. Its massive tentacle stopped inches from the bubble. The giant yellow eye widened, the pupil shrinking in terror. It looked at the tiny human on the deck, and in that human, it saw a predator far greater than itself. It saw a king.
The beast began to tremble.
"Put it down," Luffy said softly.
The Kraken slowly lowered its tentacle. It backed away, whimpering—a low, rumbling sound of submission.
"Good boy," Luffy smiled. "Your name is Surume."
The crew's jaws hit the floor.
"He... he tamed it?" Usopp whispered. "Just by looking at it?"
"That was Conqueror's Haki," Robin said, her voice filled with awe. "But to control a beast of that size instantly... his will must be terrifying."
Luffy turned back to the crew. "Hey, Nami! Can we ask Surume to pull the ship? It will be faster!"
Nami blinked, recovering from the shock. "Uh... yes. Yes, I suppose we can."
Luffy waved at the Kraken. "Surume! Grab the ship! Gently! Take us to Fishman Island!"
The massive monster nodded eagerly, terrified of disobeying. It wrapped its tentacles delicately around the Sunny, treating the ship like a precious egg. With a powerful thrust of its mantle, it propelled them downward, cutting through the currents with ease.
"We are flying!" Chopper cheered.
"We are sinking with style!" Brook laughed. "Skull Joke!"
Luffy sat back down on the figurehead, looking into the deep.
Next is the Flying Dutchman, he thought. Vander Decken. The guy who threw the axe at Shirahoshi.
His grip on the railing tightened, leaving finger marks in the wood.
I'll deal with him permanently.
The ship plunged deeper into the abyss, carried by the servant of the new King.