A pair of shadows fell from the Flying Dutchman, plunging themselves into the darkest of seas, where light date not follow.
The crushing pressures of the deep pressed aginst them, an endless weight that seemed to only grow the deeper they went. One moved with practiced ease, cutting through the current like a blade. The other followed, uncertain, his cloak trailing behind him like smoke unraveling in the deep.
They drifted downward, swallowed by the vastness.
The first paused, a fleeting light caught the edge of her sight, she turned, and yanked the second's hood down, hiding the stark white of his hair. The fabric slipped over his face, blinding him. He fumbled with it, tugging it back into place just as she spoke.
"You want everything down here to see you?" she snapped.
The boy fixed his hood firmly over his head, cheeks burning. "Eh… Sorry, Miss Karna," he mumbled.
He followed behind her, wide-eyed. It had been weeks since he joined the Flying Pirates, but not once had he been allowed to wander away from the ship, until now, right here in this moment. The change of scenery felt good, refreshing even! "shishishi, Fishman Island here we come!!"
The sea around him was vast, and alien, every stroke forward felt like a step into something new.
In the distance, jagged seamounts rose like drowned titans, their dark silhouettes cut through the sea as rays of golden light slipped over their towering peaks, swelling with brilliance like a second dawn blooming beneath the sea.
No
They drifted forward, passing through the shadow of the seamounts as the light swelled around them. The boy's breath caught as the scene unfolded before him. Fishman Island emerged from the gloom, a radiant jewel nestled beneath the towering mangrove roots that arched high above like a cathedral canopy. Their glowing limbs cast long, golden rays that fell in a quiet majesty.
The sea was impossibly clear, so pristine it felt like they were soaring through the sky. Before him, Sea Kings, diverse in shape and scale, moved through the vast blue with tranquil grace, their immense bodies gliding like dragons in flight. The boy had never imagined such a sight. The scale, the serenity, the sheer impossibility of it all left him suspended in awe, as if the world had slipped into a dream and taken him with it.
The boy froze mid-motion, limbs stiff, eyes locked wide as if his entire body had forgotten how to move. His jaw dropped so far it looked ready to snap off, eyes bulging like they might shoot from his skull. Then—"EEEEHHH!! IT'S… IT'S SO BEAUTIFUL!!" he screamed, the sound burst out from within, carrying its weight in shock.
Karna slowed and turned toward him, her hair trailing behind her like ribbons caught in a golden wind. "Pfft," she laughed, a short burst of air through her nose. "What's with that look," she said, "if your jaw falls any lower, it'll snap right off." A faint smile cracked her cold mask before it faded, sealed away once again.
'You've really never been here, huh... I had my doubts.' She turned. 'But, you're just a kid.' The thought settled as flashes stirred behind her eyes—moments of him in motion, loud, clumsy, full of wonder.
Karna rose from the crushing dark like a figure stepping through time itself—out of the midnight zone and into the lowest noon. Fishman Island stretched before her, encased in a shimmering bubble that held the sea at bay like a second sky.
The boy shook his head, as if surfacing from a dream, and kicked after her. His cloak billowed behind him, stirred by the sudden burst of motion. "Wait up, Miss Karna!" he called, voice bright with wonder.
As usual, she paid him no mind. His childish chatter trailed behind her, full of awe, fading into the hush as the sea grew crowded with shadow and steel.
Karna glanced at the boy. "Let me handle this, don't say a word."
The boy nodded, eyes wide as he took in the line of massive ships that stretched toward the main entrance of Fishman island. "woah… there's so many." He whispered.
They swam past the waiting vessels, slipping alongside the queue. A gruff voice rang out from one of the ships.
"Oi! What d'you think you're doing? Can't you see there's a line?"
Karna paid him not mind.
The boy turned, flustered. "Sorry! We didn't mean to cut—uh, we'll go to the back."
The pirate leaned over the railing, laughing. "Ha! Look at that! At least the kid's got manners. You should learn from him, sweetheart!"
Karna reached out, grabbed the boy's hood, and dragged him forward without a word.
Karna didn't look back. "I thought I told you to shut your mouth."
They reached the security checkpoint, where a Neptune Army soldier stood guard. He stepped forward, arms crossed.
"What do you think you're doing? The end of the line is over there," he said as he aimed his silver Trident into the distance.
Karna pulled back her hood, revealing her face.
The soldier blinked, then straightened. "Oh… it's you."
His eyes shifted to the boy. "And who's this?"
His eyes shifted to the boy. "And who's this?"
The boy blinked. "Huh? Oh—my name is…" He froze, eyes darting. "haha, I guess I don't have a name," he said, scratching the back of his head with a crooked grin.
He let out a nervous laugh that twisted into something theatrical.
Mwa ha ha ha.
The soldier laughed—sharp and sudden.
Sa ha ha ha.
He tapped his chest. "Call me Reefer, kid."
Karna stepped in front of him. "We're here on business, and we're late. If you don't mind, can we get this over with?"
Reefer frowned, then reluctantly stepped aside. "Go on."
Behind them, voices erupted from the waiting ships.
"Oi! Why do they get to go through?"
"We've been out here for hours!"
He sighed, rubbing his temple as the crowd continued to grumble.
Reefer turned, raising his voice. "Calm down! Everyone will get their turn!"
He sighed, rubbing his temple as the crowd continued to grumble. Then, with a sharp motion, he raised his silver trident and pointed it toward the towering gate.
High above the entrance, swaying gently in the current, hung a massive Jolly Roger — the mark at its center bore the crest of the Whitebeard Pirates, it stood as a symbol of protection and a warning to the entire world.
"behave yourselves," he barked. "The days when Fishman Island was lawless are long gone!"
The pirate who had shouted earlier followed the trident's point — and immediately flinched. He stumbled back, nearly tripping over a coil of rope on his deck.
A hush fell over the crowd.
Several others shifted uneasily, their bravado draining away. One muttered something under his breath and turned away, pretending to inspect one of his ships numerous cannons.
He sighed as he turned his head, watching as Karna and the boy crossed into Fishman islands.
'Troublesome girl… always slipping past the rules like they don't apply to her.'
His gaze lingered a moment longer.
'Still... I pity her. That crook Vander… taking advantage of such an honest kid, does he have no shame?!'....
The boy trailed behind Karna, his gaze locked on the structure ahead. A colossal tunnel of bubble resin rose before them, curving upward through the water like the spine of some ancient leviathan. It faintly shimmered under Eve's light, a translucent artery stretching deep into the island's heart. The passage was vast—wide enough for a battleship to pass through without scraping its hull. Inside, a steady current spiraled forward, and with it, the tunnel found its purpose—built not to contain the flow, but to serve it.
"Woah… bubble resin can be used for this too?" he said, eyes still tracking the tunnel's curve. "That's incredible."
He quickened his pace, passing her by, and with a playful spin came to face her. "Could you make one of these, Miss Karna?"
Karna snorted. "Make one?" She drifted past him at a casual pace. "I'm the one who designed this entire system."
The boy stood frozen, the weight of her words sinking in. Today had been shock after shock—Karna kept rewriting everything he thought he knew.
Karna reached back, grabbed his wrist, and pulled him into the bubble tunnel. "I don't have time for this." They passed through the surface in a single ripple, and in an instant the current swallowed them whole.
They shot forward, fast. The tunnel blurred around them, a streak of light and pressure, the current pushing them forward with relentless force.
After several bends and a steep descent, the current slowed. A dark alcove appeared ahead, tucked beneath a jagged outcrop of coral. Karna angled her body and slipped out of the stream, pulling the boy with her.
They emerged into shadow. The silence pressed in. All there was here was darkness and filth—a forgotten pocket of the island, run-down and half-rotted, the kind of place most people avoided, and with good reason. This is where the wicked lie, and hope comes to die.
But more tan anything else it's gate stood out as a symbol that invoked fear. The skull of a Sea King, jaws stretched wide in a frozen snarl. Countless sword-like razor teeth bared at them, framing the passage to
The MAW.
The boy stuck close as Karna dove into The MAW, his cloak sailing behind him like a lazy shadow. As they passed through the Sea King's skull, he glanced up, admiring the frozen snarl and the sheer scale of the thing "woah...". He looked to its teeth—they were massive, almost as big as he was "woah...". He reached out and tapped one with his knuckle. It rang faintly, sharp as a blade "Woah!!". Then it snapped off with a dry crack. Instinctively, he caught it before it hit the ground "...". He froze, staring at the tooth in his hands like a kid who'd just broken a museum piece "I'm dead". After a beat, he dropped it, glanced around to see if anyone had noticed. "Good, nobody saw," he muttered, sighing in relief before he hurried after Karna, pretending nothing had happened.
The boy trailed Karna through the cramped, crumbling lane. It was dark, and the current carried a faint trace of iron. The MAW was on every wall, scrawled in red. Dark figures lingered in alcoves, half-hidden in shadow.
Soon after came by a wall plastered with countless posters and notices, layered and overlapping in a chaotic collage of shapes and colors.
The boy couldn't take his eyes off it, something about it drew him in.
He slowed, gaze fixed. He had never seen anything quite like it — strange enough to stir that flicker of curiosity that comes when something unfamiliar catches the eye. He lifted his hand and pointed toward it, turning as he called out, "Hey, Miss Karna, look at that..." his voice light with curiosity as he began to drift toward it, his body slowly veering off-course.
She heard him, but she held a steady pace, with no intention of indulging whatever had caught his attention — not now and definitely not here.
She turned around the bend and kept going.
The water grew darker as she moved deeper into Fishman Island. The glow behind her dimmed, swallowed by the hush of a shadowed district where the current pressed heavier and the silence settled thick.
Peace hung like a bubble — delicate, stretched thin over the district, then with a sudden burst of noise it popped.
Laughter came in waves from a dark alley, a group of pirates had gathered near a broken archway, their voices echoing off the stone walls.
"Today's the day!" one of them shouted, raising a bottle in celebration. "Yeah baby!!" he screamed out, sticking his tongue to the side.
"Heh, about damn time..." another smirked as he took a swing of his drink. "That old hag's finally gonna die."
A third slammed his head against the wall, a deranged grin plastered across his face as a crack spread on the wall's surface. "Kekekeh! That felt good." .....this one's not normal.
The pirates cheered with songs and laughter as they clinked their bottles, their celebration spilling into the street. "By tommorow morning," another called out, "this place'll be ours again hahaha!"
Karna drew her hood down, casting her face in shadow as the light thinned around her.
Her grip tightened around the strap of her bag as she quickened her pace, keeping low and close to the walls to avoid drawing their attention — or anyone else's. "Stay close," she said — a moment too late, the boy had already left her side long ago.
She passed an alley, then two more, a rusted gate, and a drifting school of fish before the district began to quiet. Soon after, she came before a small store. It wasn't the kind of place you wanted to walk into — a counter jutted out from the exterior, protected by a thick screen made of bubble resin.
Karna stepped up and reached through the resin and rang a service bell before she pulled back and waited in silence.
A moment later, a sketchy fishman shuffled into view, rubbing his hands together in a greedy manner. "Well, if it isn't Karna," he said, voice slick with familiarity.
Karna returned the gesture with a simple nod. "The usual."
As she spoke to the shopkeeper, listing the things she needed, her hand ruffled through her bag — before, suddenly, a thought surfaced in her mind: 'Why is he so quiet?' Her eyes drifted over her shoulder, checking for the boy behind her.
Her brow furrowed, she turned slightly, scanning the space behind her, but still she found nothing. Her hand stalled within her bag, her expression darkened as she muttered, "Don't tell me…" — the words brittle with dread. She turned fully, her eyes sweeping the shadows in a slow, widening arc, searching for any trace of the boy who had been beside her only moments before.
The vendor tilted his head, watching her. "Lose something?" he asked,
Karna turned back to him, sharp and cold. Her hand passed through the bubble screen and dropped a small bag onto the counter that clinked with a dull metalic thud.
"You'll get the rest when you deliver," she said, as she turned away.
The man blinked, his mouth gaping mid-word, caught between breath and intention, but Karna was already gone — slicing past buildings and the dark alleyways that divided them as she retraced her steps in search of the boy.