The Great Pirate Era had begun, but my life continued on without anything in particular changing.
Every day the newspapers reported some incident or another, and reading them I'd think, 'Ah, yeah, the number of pirates really is increasing.' Even so, our own town remained peaceful, so I thought about it all as if it were someone else's problem.
Well, I mean, it literally was someone else's problem, but... how should I put it? Like a fire on the opposite shore, like I didn't have enough sense of crisis. That's how it felt.
Just in case something did happen, I never skipped my training, and everyone else in the Self-Defense Corps kept honing their skills day after day.
But the chance to put that strength to use never came.
Because of the powerful shield that was being in the Kuja Pirates' territory, no pirates ever attacked this island.
That state of affairs continued for seven whole years, and... I'd grown accustomed to the peace. I'd forgotten. Even though I should have known. Even though it had been driven home to me before. I had completely forgotten.
...That when peace shatters, it shatters in an instant.
***
[Third-person perspective]
"P-pirates! Pirates are coming!"
"What!? Do they not know whose territory this is... can't they see the flag!?"
"There's no way they can't see it! But they're... heading straight for us!"
"Damn it, are they serious...!? Get word to the Self-Defense Corps. If they're coming to raid us, we've got no choice but to meet them head-on!"
The reason this island where Sue and the others lived, this town, had never been attacked by pirates until now was because it was protected by the Pirate Flag that marked it as Kuja territory.
Attacking an island flying a Pirate Flag was, in effect, the same as picking a fight with the owner of that flag, the Pirate Crew that claimed that island as their territory.
There were virtually no pirates reckless enough to encroach on Kuja Pirates' territory anywhere in the First Half of the Grand Line, feared as they were even on the Grand Line itself. And so, the peace of this town had been preserved.
But the pirates attacking this time were, to put it simply, pirates who weren't afraid of that.
More precisely, they were thoughtless idiots who couldn't take the threat seriously.
They knew full well this was Kuja Pirates' territory, yet felt no fear whatsoever. 'So what? Let them come.' They'd decided to make the island a target for plunder regardless.
A Pirate Crew full of women? Nothing to be scared of. They'd turn the tables, capture them all, sell them off. Baseless confidence drove every decision, and they'd acted on it without hesitation.
Pirates like them, though, were actually not rare these days.
Since the dawn of the Great Pirate Era, pirates had vastly increased in number across the Four Seas and the Grand Line alike.
They were, in a word, a mixed bag. Some strong, some weak. Some relatively honest and proud, others who wouldn't balk at the vilest evil.
And just as there were cautious ones who knew their place, there were ignorant, thoughtless fools.
Such fools, underestimating the strength of famous pirates, would raid and plunder territories marked by flags without a second thought. Lately, this had become far from unusual.
Of course, the vast majority of them met their end being purged after the fact by the pirates whose reputation they'd trampled.
Naturally, the Self-Defense Corps, Sue included, had been training daily in anticipation of exactly this kind of situation.
So despite their agitation, everyone took up arms and bravely stood to defend the town from the pirates.
But between civilians who only knew "battle" from training and pirates for whom combat was essentially their profession, pirates who could hold their own on the Grand Line no less, the gap was simply too great.
At first, the men of the Self-Defense Corps tried to prevent the pirates from landing by shooting at them as they approached in small boats, and by blocking them with swords and spears at the water's edge.
They suppressed their fear and fought on, desperately rallying their own courage.
But when the enemy Pirate Ship fired just a few cannon shots at them, the Self-Defense Corps was thrown into total chaos and their lines collapsed entirely.
Pirates poured ashore through the gap. Close combat ensued, and the Self-Defense Corps was annihilated in an instant. The defensive line was torn apart.
After that, the reserves tried desperately to prevent the pirates from entering the town, but they too were hopelessly outmatched.
Before long, the final line of defense would also fall, and the pirates would come flooding in.
At that point, the senior officers directing the defense determined that the town could no longer be held.
They made the decision to abandon the town and flee while protecting those who couldn't fight.
"This town is done for... get out and run!"
"Hurry! Anyone who can move, help the elderly and children!"
"There's no time left. Leave your belongings behind! As long as you're alive, you can manage!"
"The pirates are coming! Self-Defense Corps, protect the women and children who can't fight!"
Carrying only the barest essentials, or sometimes nothing but the clothes on their backs, everyone scrambled to flee. They ran desperately in the opposite direction from the port where the pirates would be coming from.
Among those who steeled themselves and took up arms to protect the fleeing civilians was Sue.
"...Sue-chan, it's okay if you evacuate with the others, you know."
"That's right. You're still only eleven. There's no reason for you to be here..."
In the eyes of the town's men, Sue was still very much a young girl, a child at the most endearing age.
Self-Defense Corps member or not, they wanted her to run rather than fight. Many adults felt they didn't want her exposed to danger in a place like this.
But Sue shook her head.
"I just turned twelve, actually. I'm a member of the Self-Defense Corps too. I decided long ago that when the time came, I would fight to protect everyone."
Through years of steady training and instruction from the Kuja Pirates, Sue's skill ranked among the best in the entire Self-Defense Corps, adults included. In an actual battle, she had always been expected to be a valuable fighting force.
Of course, it would have been best if such an occasion never arose.
Down at the port, the male members of the Self-Defense Corps should have been putting their lives on the line to hold the pirates back.
In the meantime, they had to help as many civilians as possible escape, as many of their friends and neighbors from this town who couldn't fight.
If the final defensive line was breached and the pirates came flooding into town, then it would be their turn to stake their own lives, to stand and fight and buy time for everyone to escape. Though trembling, everyone had resolved themselves. Sue included.
The adults listened to Sue's words, filled with determination, and faltered with a "But still..." on their lips.
But right after that, deep bellowing war cries and the thunder of many footsteps from the direction of the port sent a wave of tension crashing through the group.
The defensive line had finally been breached. The pirates were storming in.
No one needed to point it out. Everyone sensed it instinctively, and steeled themselves.
True to that expectation, within minutes a horde of pirates surged toward them, and the battle began.
The Self-Defense Corps had arranged themselves in formation to meet the enemy, but the wave of pirates that crashed into them threw the formation into disarray, and it instantly devolved into a chaotic melee of friend and foe intermingled.
Front, back, left, right. Attacks came from every direction. A battlefield where anyone could be wounded or killed at any moment.
In that kind of battlefield, the difference in strength between pirates accustomed to real combat and a Self-Defense Corps that had trained but lacked experience was enormous.
One by one, they were cut down, bleeding as they crumpled to the ground.
The defensive line had already vanished without a trace, and the pirates were beginning to sink their teeth into the tail end of the evacuating civilians, now defenseless and stripped of their protectors.
"Outta the way, you worthless trash!"
"You think some little Self-Defense Corps can stand up to us!?"
"Take everything of value! Kill anyone who resists!"
"Don't kill the young women! Kidnap 'em and they'll sell for a fortune, and we get to have our fun first!"
Screams rising, blood flowing. Wails of anguish, children crying.
People fell. Possessions, lives were stolen.
The peaceful daily life was being destroyed and plundered without mercy.
"Hurry, hurry, run everyone! They'll kill you!"
"Damn it... why, why is this happening...!"
"Stop, please stop... j-just spare our lives..."
"Mom... Father...! Waaahh..."
"P-please, at least spare this child..."
Even in this hellish scene, Sue was fighting to act.
Once the battle had devolved into a free-for-all, she decided that rather than fighting pirates here, she needed to prioritize helping civilians escape. She broke away from the fighting and ran through the streets, checking for anyone left behind.
In a situation this chaotic, it wouldn't be surprising if people had been caught by pirates because they were too slow to escape, or if others were frozen in place, too terrified to move even though they hadn't been caught yet.
And in fact, she did spot someone in exactly that situation: a woman clutching a young child, desperately trying to run.
Right behind her, just a few meters back, a pirate with a vulgar grin plastered across his face was chasing her down.
The instant Sue understood the situation, she broke into a sprint and threw herself between the woman and the pirate.
Confronted by the small girl who had suddenly appeared in front of him, the pirate looked momentarily puzzled, and...
"Hah? The hell are you, you little—"
And then he fell silent forever.
Because Sue appeared to be nothing more than a small child, the pirate couldn't perceive her as a threat. As a result, he was unable to defend against the flash of her sword, swung from a low position in an arc aimed at his neck, that came an instant later.
"...!?"
That single moment of carelessness proved literally fatal. His carotid artery slashed open along with his windpipe, the pirate collapsed, blood spurting from his throat.
As for Sue, who had done this:
"...Hah... hah... hah..."
Watching the pirate crumple and twitch, her breathing came in ragged gasps and sweat poured from her like a waterfall.
Like the other members of the Self-Defense Corps, she had only ever gripped a sword in training. Real combat, aside from her time aboard the Kuja Pirates' ship, was something she had never experienced before this.
And even that sole experience of real combat aboard the Kuja ship had ended with her knocking an opponent unconscious by striking his jaw hard with a wooden sword.
She had never cut someone with a bladed weapon.
The sensation of cutting a human being, and the reality of that person dying from the wound, were both things she was experiencing for the very first time.
Still, though the shock was far from small, this was no time to rest.
She forced her inner turmoil down with sheer willpower and tightened her grip on the sword.
Noticing blood on the blade, she whipped the sword through the air to fling it off, then turned toward the woman and child who had been fleeing.
"S-Sue-chan...? Th-thank you..."
"Don't worry about it. More pirates will come, so let's hurry and get out of here!"
The three of them, child included, broke into a run, but pirates were already blocking the way ahead. They detoured through back alleys instead.
Sue chose their route carefully, prioritizing above all else not running into any pirates, not being noticed.
But after rounding one corner too many, they finally ran straight into pirates.
This time, unlike before, there were two at once. They spotted Sue's group too, grins spreading across their faces as if to say, 'Well, look at what we found.'
Sue reacted instantly. She told the woman and child to flee down a street heading the other direction, then drew her sword and planted herself in the pirates' path.
"Huh? What's this, kid? Holding a sword like that... wait, you're not seriously thinking of fighting us?"
"Hey, hey, cut it out. You'll hurt yourself swinging around something that dangerous."
"Yeah, yeah. You've got a pretty decent face on you, so don't go doing anything stupid. ...Bit young, but with looks like that, even a kid should fetch a good price, don't you think?"
"Yeah, let's take this one too. Hey, Missy, take our advice and just come quietly—"
"...Not a chance!"
The moment she spat out that refusal, Sue readjusted her grip and leveled the tip of her sword at the two pirates.
To be continued...