1 Year Later, 3 Years After Training
The coated boat bobbed lightly at the edge of Sabaody Archipelago, its transparent bubble membrane glimmering under the light like some strange dream made solid.
It was small.
Very small.
Far smaller than any ship Giovanni would have preferred to entrust his life to.
But right now, size meant very little to him.
Because his mind was occupied by a far more important matter.
Mermaids.
Giovanni stood proudly at the center of the tiny coated vessel, one foot up on the side like some great explorer about to conquer history itself. His coat fluttered lightly in the wind, his sword sat at his side, and his eyes gleamed with the sort of reckless excitement that usually meant disaster was close.
Rayleigh stood on the dock beside the boat, one hand resting on his hip, the other loosely at his side. Shakky stood near him with a cigarette between her fingers, both of them watching Giovanni with expressions that suggested they had already accepted that talking to him might be useless.
Rayleigh sighed first.
"I'm telling you one last time," he said. "Using a coated boat this small is dangerous."
Giovanni nodded immediately.
"Yes, yes."
Rayleigh narrowed his eyes.
"You're not listening."
Giovanni pointed at himself confidently.
"No, I heard you perfectly."
He then pointed dramatically downward, toward the vast ocean and the kingdom beneath it.
"But there are mermaids down there."
Rayleigh stared at him.
Shakky took a long drag from her cigarette and exhaled smoke into the air.
"So that's the state of his mind."
Giovanni clenched one fist and held it over his chest.
"Beautiful mermaids," he said solemnly. "How could I not go?"
Rayleigh rubbed the side of his face.
"This isn't a sightseeing trip."
Giovanni smiled brightly.
"Everything is a sightseeing trip if your heart is open enough."
Shakky gave him a long look.
"That sounded wise," she said, "but it really wasn't."
Giovanni laughed.
"Don't worry, I'll be good."
Rayleigh's brows rose.
"That sentence does not reassure me."
Shakky stepped closer to the edge of the dock and looked down at the tiny coated boat again.
"You don't even have a navigator," she said.
Giovanni waved one hand dismissively.
"I'll be fine."
Shakky's eyes narrowed.
"How do you expect to get there safely?"
Giovanni opened his mouth.
Then closed it.
Then opened it again.
"Instinct."
Shakky deadpanned.
"Ah. So you're planning to die."
Giovanni clicked his tongue.
"Why is everyone so dramatic today?"
Rayleigh folded his arms.
"Because Fish-Man Island isn't a place you drift into by accident. The path down there is dangerous even with a proper crew."
Shakky nodded.
"If you're determined to go, then at least wait for a crew heading down there. Board with them. Follow their route. Use your brain for once."
Giovanni put a hand over his heart, offended.
"I do use my brain."
Shakky raised an eyebrow.
"Then prove it."
Giovanni looked away for half a second.
'It's fine,' he thought. 'I can just copy how Nami navigated to Fish-Man Island in the anime. I remember it properly.'
He nodded to himself once.
Then looked back at them with full confidence.
"See? Fine."
Rayleigh and Shakky both stared at him.
Neither of them had any idea what was going on behind that expression.
But whatever it was, it looked like nonsense.
Rayleigh sighed again.
"Well," he said, "I've done what I can."
Shakky flicked ash from her cigarette and gave Giovanni one last look.
"Try not to drown before you meet the mermaids."
Giovanni grinned.
"That's the plan."
Rayleigh gave the small coated vessel a shove.
The boat drifted free from the dock and began sliding toward the descent route.
Giovanni stood taller and raised one hand dramatically.
"I'll send word when I marry a mermaid princess!"
Shakky looked at Rayleigh.
"He's going to be a problem forever."
Rayleigh smiled.
"Probably."
The boat reached the start of the descent current.
Then—
It tipped.
The bubble coating caught the flow beneath the sea route, and Giovanni's tiny vessel was dragged downward into the blue.
---
At first, the descent was beautiful.
So beautiful, in fact, that Giovanni forgot to be cautious for a while.
He stood inside the bubble-coated boat, one hand braced against the side, eyes wide as the sea world unfolded around him.
Light shifted strangely underwater.
The deeper he went, the more the sunlight above stretched into long, wavering pillars that moved through the water like gods descending through glass. Strange fish swam around the coated vessel, some glowing faintly, others so brightly colored they looked unreal.
Massive coral formations drifted past like underwater forests.
Schools of silver fish turned in perfect unison and flashed like mirrors.
Farther off, shadows of larger creatures moved slowly through the blue, too distant to make out clearly, but enormous enough that Giovanni decided not to look at them for too long.
"…Whoa," he breathed.
The coated boat creaked softly as it descended.
Bubbles rose around him in steady streams.
The world above felt impossibly far away now.
And down here—
Down here it felt like he had slipped into a different universe.
Giovanni moved to the front of the boat and pressed a hand lightly against the bubble membrane.
"This is insane."
A fish with transparent fins and glowing yellow eyes swam past him, blinked once, then sped away into the dark.
Giovanni laughed quietly to himself.
"Mermaids really live down here…"
His excitement only kept growing.
At one point he even tried fixing his coat and hair a little.
Just in case.
You know.
Mermaids.
He cleared his throat and practiced a smile against the bubble reflection.
"No, too much."
He tried again.
"That's better."
Then he blinked and looked around.
"…Wait."
The descent current had shifted.
Not in a dramatic way at first.
Just enough for the boat to tilt slightly.
Giovanni frowned.
Then the water ahead twisted.
His eyes widened.
A whirlpool.
Underwater.
And not a small one either.
The current around the coated vessel jerked violently as the little boat got caught in the edge of it.
"What?!"
The vessel spun.
Hard.
Giovanni slammed shoulder-first into the side of the boat as the entire thing was dragged downward in a spiraling rush.
"AH—!"
He grabbed for something. Anything, but the inside of the little coated boat offered him no real anchor. The current hurled the vessel around like a toy, sending him crashing from one side to the other as the world outside became nothing but flashing water, streaking light, and violent motion.
The boat skidded through the whirlpool's pull, its bubble groaning in protest.
Giovanni's head smacked hard against the inner edge of the hull.
Pain burst behind his eyes.
His grip loosened.
The spinning got worse.
Or maybe his senses did.
He couldn't tell anymore.
'This is bad,' he thought dimly.
Then everything went dark.
---
When Giovanni's coated boat finally drifted the rest of the way down and made its battered arrival near Fish-Man Island, he was unconscious.
The vessel bumped against an outer rock shelf on the island's more shadowed side, rolled once in the water, and settled at an angle against the coral edge.
It was not the beautiful, welcoming side of Fish-Man Island.
No.
This was rougher.
Darker.
The architecture around it was harsher, older, more broken in parts. The routes were less polished. The people less hopeful-looking. The sort of place where smiles were rarer and resentment felt older than stone.
And unfortunately for Giovanni—
He had been seen.
A group of fish-men had already gathered by the time the battered little coated boat came to a stop. They wore expressions ranging from disgust to open hostility, and their eyes lingered on the unconscious human inside with no warmth at all.
At the front of them stood two figures.
One was a blue saw-nosed fish-man with a familiar brutal look in his eyes.
Arlong.
Beside him stood a younger but no less hateful presence, eyes cold and shark-like, posture filled with the sort of ugliness that didn't need age to mature.
Hody Jones.
Arlong looked down at the coated boat and sneered.
"A human."
His voice dripped with contempt.
Hody's gaze narrowed.
"What's one doing on this side of the island?"
Another fish-man spat into the water.
"Probably got lost."
"Good," one of the others muttered. "Let him drown."
But Hody stepped closer and looked through the bubble at the unconscious Giovanni.
His expression didn't soften.
It got worse.
"Humans always crawl where they don't belong."
Arlong snorted.
"That one looks young."
"That doesn't change what he is," Hody replied coldly.
There was a brief pause.
Then Hody gestured with one hand.
"Take him."
The other fish-men immediately moved. They dragged the unconscious Giovanni from the boat with no care for gentleness whatsoever, hauled him through the rougher streets of that district, and eventually tossed him into a crude holding cell made more for punishment than imprisonment.
It smelled damp.
The bars were thick.
The floor was cold.
And Giovanni remained unconscious through all of it.
---
Several hours later—
A bucket of ice-cold water slammed into his face.
Giovanni jolted awake violently, gasping as freezing shock ran through his whole body. He coughed, spluttered, blinked hard, and tried to orient himself as water dripped from his hair and face.
His head hurt.
His shoulders hurt.
His dignity definitely hurt.
He pushed himself up slightly and looked through the bars.
A figure stood there waiting for him.
Hody Jones.
The young fish-man's expression was flat and full of contempt.
When he saw Giovanni finally focus on him, Hody smiled.
Not kindly.
Just enough to make the hatred in it clear.
"So," Hody said, voice low and cold, "you are finally awake, human."
---
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