The night was deep, and the warmth of last night's oath still lingered as the Oro Jackson sailed across the tranquil sea. Most of the crew had fallen into heavy sleep, carrying a touch of hangover and hearts full of burning passion. Only the footsteps of the night watch and the whispered murmurs of waves remained on deck.
Kyle couldn't sleep.
He leaned against the ship's rail outside the infirmary, watching moonlight scatter glittering silver across the sea's surface.
With a creak, the infirmary door opened, and Crocus stepped out carrying an oil lamp, seemingly wanting to catch some sea breeze. He wasn't surprised to see Kyle there, just walked straight over to stand beside him, also gazing out at that endless darkness.
"Can't sleep?" Crocus's voice was especially clear in the night.
"Yeah," Kyle responded without turning around. "Thinking about some... things that have to be done."
They fell silent for a moment.
"I understood your request," Crocus suddenly spoke up, referring to the information Kyle had conveyed through glances and subtle gestures during the day.
"When I first boarded, I examined Roger thoroughly. That guy's body is as strong as a monster's. Aside from some old injuries, there's nothing wrong. Aren't you overthinking this?"
"Monsters get sick too." Kyle turned his head, his golden eyes startlingly bright in the dim light. "Please, Mr. Crocus. Use your most precise, most thorough method and examine him once more. Consider it... an unreasonable personal request from me."
Crocus looked at him. Those golden pupils held not a trace of jest, but instead settled with an almost prophetic weight.
He finally nodded: "Alright. For the sake of you 'tricking' me onto this ship."
The next day, as Roger was laughing and arm wrestling with Scopper Gaban on deck as usual, Crocus approached with his medical kit.
"Roger, come here."
Roger blinked, then pointed at himself with his free hand, an exaggerated grin on his face: "Again? Crocus, you're not falling for my strong, healthy muscles, are you? That's not my thing!"
The crew burst into laughter.
"Gu ha ha ha! Kyle, this was your idea again, wasn't it!" Roger won the arm wrestling match, stood up, and clapped Kyle on the shoulder with such force it made him stagger. "I told you I'm fine! My body's tougher than a Sea King's!"
After the last examination, Roger hadn't stopped teasing Kyle about it, saying he was young but already worrying like an old man.
"Roger, just think of it as a routine checkup." Kyle's expression was calm, but those who knew him could see the insistence in his eyes.
"Alright, alright, I really can't handle you." Roger casually sat on a crate and rolled up his sleeves. "Come on! Let our ship's doctor see what treasure's hidden in my body!"
Crocus ignored his jokes and put on his stethoscope with a serious expression.
The surrounding crew members gathered around, grinning as they prepared to watch their captain's show.
Listening, percussion, examining the fundus... after a complete examination, Crocus's expression remained unchanged.
"See! I told you there's nothing wrong!" Roger laughed triumphantly.
Crocus said nothing. He took a strange device from his medical kit that looked like a combination of compass and magnifying glass, carefully placing it against Roger's chest.
Everyone curiously watched the contraption, even Buggy leaning in to get a better look at the complex markings on the instrument.
Time passed minute by minute.
When the doctor doesn't smile, life and death hang in the balance.
The laughter and chatter on deck gradually stopped. Everyone noticed that fine beads of sweat had appeared on Crocus's forehead.
His hand gripping the instrument remained motionless, as if turned to stone.
The expression on his face slowly transformed from initial professionalism and calm to confusion, then disbelief, and finally settled into an unmistakable gravity that couldn't be concealed.
The air seemed to solidify.
Even the most carefree Scopper Gaban put away his smile and nervously swallowed.
"Hey... Crocus, what's wrong?" Rayleigh's voice broke the silence as he sensed the seriousness of the situation.
Crocus slowly raised his head. He removed his glasses and wiped them forcefully, as if wanting to confirm he hadn't seen wrong.
When he put his glasses back on and looked at Roger, his gaze was complex.
He put away the instrument, each movement unusually heavy.
"Roger," his voice was terribly hoarse, "you have a... terminal illness that in my decades of practice, I've never seen in any medical text."
"BOOM—"
Those words exploded like a bomb detonating from thin air in everyone's minds.
The world fell silent.
Shanks and Buggy stood with mouths agape, the color instantly draining from their faces.
Scopper Gaban's flask crashed to the deck with a clang, spilling liquor everywhere without him noticing.
Taro, Nozdon, Spencer, Petermoo... everyone's expressions froze as if they'd heard the most absurd joke in the world.
Only Roger maintained his smile unchanged. He just paused for a moment, then...
"Gu ha ha ha ha!"
Earth-shattering laughter once again echoed to the heavens, but this laughter no longer carried its usual bold carefree spirit. Instead, it held a wild, unrestrained quality that made listeners' hearts tighten.
"So that's how it is!" Roger slammed his fist into his palm in sudden understanding. "No wonder I've been coughing my lungs out lately! I thought it was from choking on too much booze!"
He stood up and patted Crocus on the shoulder with steady, powerful force. "So then? How long do I have left?"
Crocus looked at this man who seemed to be discussing the weather and felt a tremendous impact in his heart.
He took a deep breath to steady himself: "Without intervention, at most... three to four years. If I use all my medical skills to slow the progression, perhaps I could buy you five years. But a cure... is absolutely impossible."
"Five years?" Roger stroked his chin as if calculating a business deal. "Hmm... the timing's a bit tight, but... It's enough!"
Enough?
Enough for what?
The crew hadn't yet recovered from their shock, and Roger's heartless reaction left their minds completely blank.
"Captain..." Shanks's voice carried a sob, tears welling in his eyes.
"What are you saying, you bastard!" Scopper Gaban suddenly rushed forward and grabbed Roger by the collar, his eyes bloodshot. "This isn't funny! Not funny at all!"
"I'm not joking." Roger let him grab his collar, his smile finally fading somewhat as he looked at Scopper Gaban, looked at each of his companions, his gaze more serious than ever before.
"How could I die at the hands of some mere disease? Even if I'm going to die, it'll be at the finish line I choose for myself!"
Kyle had been standing at the edge of the crowd, silently watching it all unfold.
In the original story, Roger only found Crocus after being diagnosed with his terminal illness. Now, despite his intervention that brought Crocus aboard early—even at the cost of revealing part of his "prophetic" abilities—Crocus still couldn't cure Roger?
He needed the world's finest doctor, not to treat flesh wounds, but to "borrow" a little time from Death for his captain.
Though he'd been mentally prepared, when this cruel truth was spoken aloud, when he saw Roger's laughter that seemed ready to shatter the very sky, an indescribable bitterness still rose in his throat.
That wasn't fear, wasn't escape.
That was a man's roar of defiance against fate upon learning where his life's finish line lay.
Kyle silently clenched his fists, nails digging deep into his palms.
Crocus looked at this group of people, especially that towering captain, and suddenly understood the true meaning of boarding this ship.
Finding the Rumbar Pirates was a promise, but extending this man's life and witnessing his final brilliance would become the most important—and most brutal—battle of his medical career.
"Everyone snap out of it!" Roger shoved Scopper Gaban away and stood at the bow with hands on his hips, raising his arms high. "It's just five years! I'm going to make these five years more spectacular than what others couldn't achieve in fifty!"
He spun around sharply, his gaze blazing as it swept across every face—sad, angry, or confused.
"Listen up!" his voice drowned out the waves. "We don't have time to waste on boring islands anymore! Put away those funeral faces!"
"Our journey, starting now—"
"Is going into overdrive!"
"Hoist the sails! Full speed ahead! We're going to use whatever time we have left to find the final island and turn this whole world upside down!"
"OHHHHHHHH!"
After a brief deathly silence came volcanic roars.
The crew screamed with every ounce of strength in their bodies, as if trying to bellow out all the grief and unwillingness in their chests, transforming it into the wild wind that would drive their ship forward.
The sadness didn't disappear—it was simply transformed into something more scorching, more resolute.
The Oro Jackson's sails instantly filled to bursting, the bow cutting through the blue waves as the ship raced toward the unknown, storm-filled depths of the Grand Line at unprecedented speed.
The journey's destination hadn't changed, but everyone knew that from this moment on, the countdown's hands had begun spinning at breakneck pace.