Alcohol was God's gift.
I believed that the moment liquid fire burned down my throat. But like all gifts from the divine, it came with a price.
Drink too much and you could wind up on the side of a highway, puking your guts out while praying to every god you've ever heard of not to shit yourself.
Or—you might wake up with a mouth full of sand and giant glowing blue words floating above your head as you lay on your back on a beach.
[Welcome, User!]
I turned away from the message and pushed myself up onto my elbows.
A mixture of sand and what felt like a small pool's worth of water poured out of my mouth.
'The fuck happened?'
My head was a mess. I remembered celebrating another one of my friends getting married at the absurdly young age of twenty—and maybe having a few too many beers.
"That's the last time I'm drinking." I groaned, flopping back down onto the hot sand, letting the waves slosh against my toes.
'Where the hell am I? Did I take drugs?'
The hovering blue words just… stayed there. Floating. Doing nothing. Until they flickered and shifted.
[Please Select: [Yes] or [No]. Your decision will determine if you continue!]
"Con... urgh Continue?" I felt bile crawling up my throat again.
[Answer: Whether or not you die here—covered in sand and your own puke, of course!]
Below the message, a blue timer had begun counting down from fifteen seconds.
I laughed weakly and groaned. "Yeah, right. You're not even real. This beach is probably somewhere in Okinawa."
The ocean breeze rolled over me and I closed my eyes, letting myself relax—until I felt a strange tickling on my feet. Not from the waves.
"W-what the fuck!" I shouted, jerking upright.
A crab was clawed down on my toes.
Except… they weren't my toes.
"Fuck off!" I kicked the crab away—only to realize that wasn't my foot either.
I scrambled to the side and brought my hand up.
It wasn't mine. It was smaller. Like a kid's hand.
"W... W-what did you do!" I shouted at the blue text—but it didn't respond. The timer kept ticking. Five seconds. Four. Three…
'I-Is this not a dream? Or a hallucination?'
Teeth clenched, I screamed at the sky.
"I choose Yes!"
The timer hit one. Then disappeared.
Party poppers exploded somewhere unseen.
[Congratulations, User! You have now been promoted to "Host." Please say "Stats" to view "Stats."]
"S-Stats?"
Another blue panel flickered into view, right in front of me.
————
#Stats#
Name: Masaru Fukuda
Age: 8 (19)
Tier: 1
Level: 0
XP: 0/100
STR: 0 (+8)
DEX: 0 (+8)
CON: 0 (+8)
————
#Skills#
Heavenly Restriction
————
I stared at the panel for a moment, then glanced up at the other floating words.
"W-why—What the hell is going on?!"
I stumbled to my feet, almost faceplanting into the sand before I caught myself. With all the strength my hungover body could muster, I glared up at the screen.
[Answer: Host died due to a mistake caused by a drunken construction worker.]
I gaped at the words, hands curling into fists.
"Then why the fuck didn't—urgh—why didn't he get sent here instead of me?!"
[Answer: Drunken construction worker did not die. Host did.]
My mouth snapped shut.
Groaning, I looked down at the unfamiliar body I now inhabited. Small, thin and definitely not mine.
'I don't remember looking like this as a kid either.'
I turned my attention back to the glowing blue text, eyeing the Skills tab for a moment before grunting out a question.
"Am I in Jujutsu Kaisen? And why am I a child?"
[Answer: You are in the world "One Piece." The new body of the Host was the most adaptable for the Error made by the System.]
I wasn't sure whether to laugh or cry. On the one hand, I wasn't in Jujutsu Kaisen—thank god. On the other, I was in One Piece, where people could punch holes through mountains and become natural disasters with a thought.
Then my brain caught up with the last part of the message: "Error."
"What does that mean? Error?! What did you fuck up?!"
[Answer: The System did not realise the Host's new body was unable to handle the strain of another soul's Haki. As such, the System removed both instances of Haki and replaced them with physical attributes and Skills.]
I collapsed to my knees, head hanging low.
I was doomed.
So very, very doomed.
"How the hell am I supposed to survive in a world like this without Haki? I'd rather be in Jujutsu Kaisen without a technique."
Then it hit me—an idea flickering to life like a dying lightbulb.
I jerked my head back up to the floating text.
"Am I bound to Quests?! Do I have to complete tasks or missions to avoid dying? Or... can I just live a normal life?"
'God, if I could just do that, I would.'
Sure, not having a phone to doomscroll on would suck, but it beat constantly looking over my shoulder for walking disasters.
'And with Heavenly Restriction, hard work would be a breeze…'
[Answer: The Host is not bound to Quests. However, in rejecting Quests the Host gives up the ability to gain Rewards.]
I frowned. Obvious enough. Still, anyone with a system like this in a world like One Piece was bound to draw attention—and not the good kind.
Sighing, I rubbed my stomach as it growled.
"If I were to accept Quests... what kind of Rewards could I get?"
[Answer: A Ticket Home.]
•—•—•
"FUCK THIS ISLAND!"
I hurled an unbreakable coconut at a monkey that just laughed while fleeing into the trees.
Four days.
Still no proper food other than berries.
Still stuck in a kid's body that couldn't even throw a rock straight.
I'd tried eating a coconut once—just once. Turns out, cracking them open isn't like in the movies or some dumb social media reel.
First attempt? Smashed it against a rock. Broke the rock.
Second attempt? Tried smashing it on another coconut. It bounced back and nailed me right in the forehead.
So yeah.
Coconut – 3
Me – 0
Letting out a tired sigh, I trudged out of the small patch of jungle I'd explored on my first day and made my way back to the beach. A few logs I'd dragged over from different parts of the island were arranged into a makeshift camp. Primitive, but mine.
I dropped onto the largest log and exhaled sharply, grabbing a few berries that were laid out on leaves—my sad attempt at keeping the sand off them. As I chewed, I opened the first quest I'd gotten when I wandered into the jungle.
————
#Trial Quest#
Survive the Nights!
Count: 3/?
Reward: +5XP
————
I still had no idea what the question mark meant. I asked the System—of course I did—but after the first day, it just stopped responding. No more blue text. No more snarky replies. Just the floating "panel."
Another sigh escaped me as I stared up at the sky.
"Oh well… not all is bad."
I winced as the words left my mouth.
"Except for the fact training does fuck all!"
Yesterday, out of sheer boredom and desperation, I'd decided to try the One Punch Man workout. Why not? Push ups, sit ups, squats. No running—didn't have the energy. This body, while stronger than a kid's back home, still felt like it was made of disappointment.
Yet even after sweating buckets, my reward?
————
#Stats#
Name: Masaru Fukuda
STR: 0.1 (+8)
DEX 0.1 (+8)
CON: 0.1 (+8)
————
Disheartening, to say the least.
'Maybe it'll skyrocket after a few more weeks?'
If I was being optimistic, the gains were probably small because of my age—or, more likely, because I hadn't had a proper meal since arriving. No protein. No meat. Just berries and rage.
"Fuck…"
Just thinking about meat made my mouth water.
I hadn't tried hunting yet—for multiple reasons.
One, I didn't know how to make traps, and the System didn't exactly hand me a starter kit.
Two, I hated the sight of blood.
Yeah, I know. That wouldn't fly in a situation like this. But I grew up normal—never broke a bone, never saw anything worse than a scraped knee.
Still, rubbing my face with both hands, I stood up.
That was going to change.
Tonight, I'd finally start a fire.