"Should be almost there, right?"
Carrying a huge sack of food on his back, Ozz strolled casually across the surface of the sea, a gentle breeze curling around his body.
In theory, staying out on the ocean all the time should feel damp and sticky. But with the Seagull King manipulating the wind, Ozz's clothes and hair stayed dry and comfortable.
Even when a violent storm tried to roll in from time to time, the Seagull King would simply shift into his beast form and blow it away.
"You are really competent, Seagull King."
Up in the clouds above, a thick blanket of rainclouds was just about to press down over the area, but before Ozz even lifted a finger, the Seagull King, who was standing guard on his shoulder, spread its wings wide.
A sharp cry tore through the sky.
Wild gales surged and gathered between those wings and, a moment later, slowly twisted together into a towering waterspout.
The Seagull King swept one wing toward a direction, and that terrifying tornado dragged seawater up with it, connecting ocean and sky, then roared away toward the horizon.
Masses of dark clouds were sucked up and carried off. Sunlight poured down through the gap that opened in the sky.
Down on the sea, Ozz raised a hand to shade his eyes and glanced at the distant waterspout.
"If a ship runs into that, it is going to get shattered in a really miserable way."
On the other side of the ocean.
With his sister Reiju's help, a young Sanji had successfully boarded a passenger ship bound for the East Blue. Right now, he was working as an apprentice cook, learning the basics in the galley.
He had no idea that the foster father he had not seen for so long had just sent him a very big gift.
Sanji was still clumsily practicing how to cook when the entire ship suddenly shook violently.
By the time he rushed out, he saw that a pirate ship had already latched onto them, seizing control of the vessel.
He tried to resist with everything he had, but he was no match at all for Zeff and the pirate chef crew he led. Just as Sanji was seriously injured and about to collapse...
A massive sea tornado, connecting heaven and ocean and dragging black clouds behind it, suddenly appeared on the distant horizon.
"What is that thing!"
"Full speed ahead! Get us out of here!"
Only the captain, Zeff, who had survived the baptism of the Grand Line, knew what that meant. He looked at the oncoming waterspout, his expression turning grim.
"We are not getting away from that."
…
"Finally here."
After quite a bit of wandering and searching, a tall man with long hair stood on the surface of the sea and looked into the distance, where a small town slowly came into view.
Lots of windmills, a village that looked like some peaceful little paradise, full of the scent of ordinary life.
"I wonder how Lady Rouge and Ace have been all these years."
With a huge sack of food on his back and the Seagull King perched on his shoulder, Ozz walked up toward the shore.
Such a strange combination should have drawn every eye on the coast.
Yet right now, the villagers' attention was captured by something much larger and much more eye catching that was slowly approaching Windmill Village from the sea.
"Oh? What a coincidence. Shanks and his lot actually happened to arrive right now."
Carried on the breeze, a relaxed song drifted across from the incoming pirate ship. The mood aboard the Red Hair Pirates' ship was incredibly lively.
"Yo ho ho ho, yo ho ho ho"
"Bink's brew of wine"
Once the whole crew finished their chorus, everyone lifted Uta up and set her atop a wooden crate, listening to her young but beautiful voice as she sang.
There was no denying it.
She was still just a little girl, but Uta's talent for singing felt like something she had been born with. Her voice was no worse than the professional singers Ozz had enjoyed back in Gran Tesoro.
"Encore"
"One more song"
(Whistling)
"She really does sound good. Right, Shanks?"
"Of course she does"
Shanks answered with an easy smile, but as soon as the words left his mouth, something about that voice tickled at him as wrong.
He turned his head and saw a tall, handsome man with long hair, holding a skewer of grilled meat, grinning at him.
"Eh!!!?"
"Ozz!"
The Red Hair Pirates fell into a brief stunned silence.
"Eh!!!?" came the chorus of voices.
Without anyone noticing, Ozz had slipped aboard and used a high level application of Conqueror's Haki, silently squeezing everyone's observation, cutting off their awareness. It was not until he chose to speak up that the crew finally realized there was suddenly one more person on the deck.
Ozz only smiled and waved cheerfully at Uta.
Compared to the first time he had seen her, when she had just been a newborn baby, Uta had already grown into a lively, pretty little girl.
The moment she heard Shanks and the others shouting Ozz's name, she instantly understood who he was.
She walked over a little awkwardly. The always carefree Uta seemed very different right now.
"No need to be nervous. I even held you when you were a baby. Shanks here was all over the place back then, he had no idea how to hold a child."
"This guy has always been like that since he was young. Let me tell you, when he was a kid…"
Ozz started in on the old stories with perfect social timing, but just as he sounded like he was about to reveal something truly devastating, Shanks suddenly remembered a certain black history. His face changed drastically and he lunged forward, trying to cover Ozz's mouth.
But Uta and the rest of the crew were already in full gossip mode, eyes shining as they stared at Ozz and Shanks.
Uta might be just a little girl, but even at her age she already had the heart of someone who loved juicy stories.
She tilted her head and came right up to Ozz, looking at him with sparkling eyes.
Shanks could only force out a stiff smile.
"It is nothing, just some childhood nonsense. Right, Ozz?"
Ozz flicked Shanks' hand away, his lips curling into a wicked smile, eyes narrowing into a cartoonishly curved crescent.
"Give me a break, Shanks. If it is really nothing, then why are you so nervous?"
He picked Uta up easily and, under Shanks' despairing gaze, leaned in close and whispered something in her ear.
Uta's eyes flew wide open, then she flopped against Ozz's shoulder and burst out in peals of laughter.
For this mysterious uncle who had been sending her top tier music scores and concert tickets from all over the world since she was little, Uta already had a very good impression.
Especially after hearing from Shanks that Ozz had almost become her foster father back then, and had actually helped take care of her when she was a baby.
That made the little girl feel incredibly close to this tall, handsome, ridiculously easygoing man. In just a short time, the two of them were laughing together as if they had known each other for years.
"I have a bit of pull in the Kingdom of Music, Elegia. If you like, little Uta, you can go there and study music properly."
Ozz ruffled her hair.
He might be retired, but whether it was the former Kingdom of Wine or the Kingdom of Music, both countries had once prospered because of him. There was no way they would refuse his request.
"Really!"
Uta's eyes sparkled. She flung her arms around Ozz and hugged him with everything she had.
Off to the side, Shanks felt a stab of jealousy.
"Hey, Ozz, Uta is my daughter. I was planning to take her there myself."
The thing was, he did not sound very forceful at all. In front of Ozz, Shanks simply did not have much face to throw around.
His strength could not compare, and besides...
Ozz was sitting on some very embarrassing stories from their time on the Roger Pirates' ship. If Shanks ever dared to put up the kind of front he did when they first met and tried to demand Ozz give him face,
Ozz would absolutely not mind sharing a few
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The tides are shifting, and secrets linger in the dark... Step into the shadows early on P@treon, where the next chapter awaits before the world sees it.
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