Chapter 34
The storm hadn't let up.
If anything, it had gotten worse.
Rain hammered the Going Merry's deck like cannon fire, and the wind screamed through the rigging with enough force to make the entire ship shudder. Inside the cramped galley, the crew huddled around the table where Nami had spread out a weathered chart, its edges curling in the humid air.
"This is it," Nami said, tapping the center of the map. Her voice was steady, but her eyes betrayed the tension.
"Reverse Mountain. The entrance to the Grand Line."
Everyone leaned in, squinting at the bizarre illustration. The mountain rose straight out of the ocean, with water flowing upward through its center like some kind of divine plumbing error.
"Wait," Zoro said slowly, his eye narrowing.
"Water doesn't climb mountains. Not unless the world's gone mad."
"We're gonna die," Usopp declared, pale and already halfway into a blanket burrito.
"I'm calling it now. Death by vertical ocean. They'll find our bones at the bottom of some impossible waterfall."
Sanji took a long drag from his cigarette, the ember glowing like a warning light.
"I've cooked in storms, fought in hurricanes, served meals while dodging cannonballs… but never while climbing a mountain. This is completely insane."
"IT'S A MAGIC MOUNTAIN!" Luffy's eyes sparkled with pure excitement as he pressed his face against the chart.
"That's so cool! Does it really go straight up? Can we fly? Are there sky fish?"
"It's not magic," Nami sighed, rubbing her temples.
"It's the ocean current. The water flows up four different channels and—"
"MAGIC MOUNTAIN!" Luffy insisted, bouncing in his seat like a child on sugar.
Near the galley door, Silas slumped against the wall like a man who'd just survived a war. He clutched a dented frying pan in one hand and stared into the middle distance with the hollow eyes of someone who'd seen too much. His red hair was a mess. His clothes were wrinkled. There were bite marks on his fingers.
"Silas?" Nami asked cautiously.
"Are you… okay?"
"Okay?" Silas laughed. It wasn't a healthy laugh.
"He's tried to steal food seventeen times. Seventeen. It's like guarding treasure from a hyperactive sea king with the attention span of a goldfish."
"It wasn't that many," Luffy said cheerfully.
"I haven't slept. I haven't blinked." Silas's eye twitched.
"He disguised himself as a mop, Sanji. A mop. With googly eyes he drew on with ink."
The crew exchanged glances. Zoro snorted into his sake.
"Sounds about right."
"The ghost act was my favorite," Usopp added.
"Very creative."
"I am a spooky ghost!" Luffy declared, making exaggerated spooky gestures.
"You're a menace," Silas muttered, but there was something almost fond in his voice beneath the exhaustion.
---
The Going Merry climbed through increasingly violent waves, the storm throwing everything it had at them. Silas found his mind drifting despite the chaos. His mother's stories echoed in his head—tales of a legendary figure who would return when the world needed him most.
Mother… is this guy really Joyboy?
The one from the stories? The one you said would change everything?
He glanced at Luffy, who was now trying to convince Sanji to let him help navigate by "tasting the wind."
Because right now, he's licking the air and calling it cartography.
The ship lurched violently. Everyone grabbed onto whatever they could—except Luffy, who just laughed and stretched his arms to keep his balance.
He's smiling.
Why is he always smiling?
What kind of lunatic smiles when we're about to sail up an impossible mountain into the most dangerous sea in the world?
Silas studied his captain's face—that genuine, infectious grin that never seemed to waver, no matter how bad things got. Even now, facing what should be certain death, Luffy looked like he was having the time of his life.
…Or maybe he's not a lunatic at all.
Maybe he's something else entirely.
---
"EVERYONE HOLD ON!" Nami shouted over the roar of wind and waves.
"WE'RE APPROACHING THE MOUNTAIN!"
Through the rain-lashed windows, Silas saw it—a massive wall of stone rising impossibly out of the churning sea, with torrents of water flowing upward against all logic and reason. It was terrifying. It was impossible. It was completely insane.
Luffy pressed his face against the glass, eyes wide with wonder.
"It's so cool!" he breathed.
There it is again. That smile.
Like he knows something the rest of us don't.
Like he's exactly where he's supposed to be.
Silas gripped his dented frying pan tighter and settled in for whatever came next. He'd signed on with these lunatics, after all. Might as well see where this impossible journey would take them.
Even if it killed him.
Which it probably would.
But at least it wouldn't be boring.