He rolled onto his back, ribs pressing sharp against skin, breath shallow and weak. His body felt like it had been abandoned for days — muscles stiff, throat dry, stomach hollow and tight. Hunger didn't just ache; it throbbed, deep and steady, like his body was chewing on itself from the inside out.
His arms moved too easily. Longer. Stronger. Like they belonged to someone else who had grown up fighting for every scrap. The bones weren't his. The reach wasn't his. But the pain? That part felt real.
He sat up slowly, swaying. The stone beneath him was hot, baked by a sun that seemed too bright, too clear. Around him, a street stretched in both directions — faded signs, crumbling stalls, sun-warped wood. People walked past without a glance. A woman with pink hair in tight braids. A man with green skin — or maybe tattoos — too tall to be natural. None of them looked twice at the half-dead kid lying in the dust.
It felt unreal.
This had to be hell. Not the fire-and-demons kind. Something worse. A quiet kind of damnation — starving on the side of a street, ignored by a world that clearly didn't care. Was this punishment? For what? Being loud? Laughing too hard while everything burned?
He tried to remember how he died.
It came back in stupid pieces. Rain. Sirens. Shouting. He was laughing — of course he was. Riots always brought out the best in him. Someone had thrown a Molotov. Someone else was screaming. Then pavement. Skull. Silence.
He snorted. "Slipped on a curb during a riot," he muttered. "Real anarchist ending, huh?"
Back home, chaos was a weekend hobby. Something you dipped into, stirred up, then walked away from. Here, it was survival. Here, it was the air.
A punishment would've made more sense if it had come with meaning. A courtroom. A sentence. Not this — not waking up in a half-dead body surrounded by strangers with anime hair and swords the size of his torso.
Then came the memories.
Not his. Wrong body, wrong fears. These belonged to a kid who'd known hunger and silence his whole life. The kind of silence that meant staying unseen was the only way to stay alive. He saw glimpses — scraps of torn bread, boots stomping down alleys, the glint of a Marine rifle under a red sunset.
A sharp snap echoed in his head — the memory of a whip cracking in a back alley. The air had reeked of fish and blood. Someone was crying. No one stopped it.
And flags. The World Government's symbol fluttered over everything like it owned the sky.
People vanished in the night. Families whispered about "reassignments." Marines didn't patrol — they hunted.
There were names too. Not ones he knew well — not from the fan-wiki pages, not the flashy poster boys with spiky hair. These names came like warnings.
Roger. Garp. Rocks.
He saw them through the kid's memories — not in person, but in news sheets. In rumors. In blood-soaked stories that people pretended not to repeat. A pirate with a laugh like thunder. A Marine who shattered mountains with his fists. A monster who gathered devils under one flag.
It wasn't the world of adventure.
It was the world before.
The world where legends were still alive — and too close for comfort.
He leaned against the wall, breathing sharp and uneven. His own thoughts fought to the surface. The name Roger. The mention of God Valley. That was the year, wasn't it?
Not paradise. Not dreams. The age of monsters.
And here he was.
Dropped into the middle of it, in a starving kid's body, on some nameless island that no one would remember even if it burned down tomorrow.
"Fucking karma," he muttered. "So that's real now. Reincarnation. Great."
A dry, broken laugh tore out of his chest. His shoulders shook with it. It started as a wheeze, then turned into something cracked and wild.
"Dope," he added, breathless.
Then he slumped against the wall, still laughing — a hollow, open-throated sound echoing off the stone.
This world's already broken, he thought.Guess I'll fit right in.
The laughter faded, but the hunger didn't.
He'd been hungry before — skipped meals, slept through dinner, lived off vending machine trash during lockdowns. But this? This was different. This felt carved into his bones. Like he hadn't just missed a few meals, but like he'd never been full. Not once. Like his body didn't even remember what fullness was.
He pushed himself upright, bracing on the wall. His legs shook but held. Every step was stiff, careful. He moved like someone learning how to exist again. Not because of the new body — that part was already syncing. No, this was survival. Simple and ugly.
First things first.Food.
He scanned the street. The people still ignored him, but he watched them now — closely. The way their eyes moved. The way they carried themselves. That woman with the basket of crusty loaves. That man selling something fried on sticks. But most of all, the dock at the end of the lane — crates piled with silver-scaled catches, men shouting over prices. The fish weren't guarded.
Uncooked. Unsalted. Probably still twitching.Didn't matter.
He set his eyes on a crate near the edge of the dock — half-filled with smaller fish, left out while the fishermen worked. Easy. But easy came with risks.
Back home, stealing got you a slap on the wrist. Community service. Maybe a night in jail if you were really unlucky.
Here?
He looked again at the Marine flag fluttering on a post. Weather-worn, but visible.
Here, they'd cut off your hand if they were feeling generous.
Still, his stomach twisted again — a cold, sour knot.
He licked his cracked lips and exhaled through his nose.
"Fuck it," he muttered. Then didn't move.
He stood by the barrels longer than he meant to — still watching, still shaking, still pretending he wasn't about to do something that could get him killed.
The sun was higher now. The fishermen were busy with ropes and knives, gutting larger catches and barking over coin. One of them had a blade longer than his forearm. The other had a gut and a voice like gravel.
He watched. He counted seconds.And his stomach twisted again.
The pain wasn't sharp anymore. It was dull and heavy, like a stone inside him. His legs shook even when he wasn't moving. His arms felt like sticks. His fingers trembled every time he clenched them. He hadn't realized how weak this body was until now — until standing still started to feel like work.
I'm starving.
So what now? Just lie down and wait?
He exhaled slowly. The answer came quietly, grimly.
No. I steal the fish.
His old self would've planned something better — timed distractions, maybe a thrown rock. But now? He didn't care. Not really. The fear was still there, yes, but it didn't hold him.
Worst case? Maybe I reincarnate again.Maybe next time I'll get a better body.
He barked a soft, breathless laugh under his tongue. It was either that or collapse.
And then he moved. Not from courage — from desperation. One moment he was crouching. The next, stumbling into the open.
He crossed the space in a crooked rush, fingers already grabbing before he was halfway there.
The fish were slick and cold in his hand. He snatched what he could — four maybe, maybe five — and turned to run.
Then a voice.
"Hey—!"
One of the fishermen had turned just in time. The man moved faster than he had any right to — boots pounding wood, knife still in hand.
D. didn't wait.
He ran.
Pain lanced up his calves as soon as he pushed off. His legs weren't ready for sprinting. His body wasn't ready for anything. But he ran anyway — awkward, wobbling, one arm holding the fish tight to his chest.
Something slammed into his side — a stone, a hook, maybe a tin bowl — it didn't matter. It knocked the wind out of him. He stumbled. Nearly dropped the food. But he kept going.
Pain meant he was still alive. That was enough.
He didn't head deeper into town — not that it deserved the name. This rotting port. This nameless shithole with one dock and no second chances. He was done here. The second he was seen stealing, the second someone pointed and remembered his face — he was marked. That was it. No hiding in alleys. No slow approach.
That door was shut. Just like the last one. Just like always.
He veered off the street, past the last crooked fence and into the treeline.
Boots thundered behind him, but they didn't follow far. Maybe they weren't paid enough. Maybe they just didn't care.
Either way, he didn't stop running.
Not until the trees swallowed him whole.
The trees closed in behind him like a gate.
Branches clawed at his arms as he pushed through the undergrowth, stumbling over roots and patches of dry moss. The light changed — fractured through leaves, sharp and gold and green. Birds scattered. No one followed. The shouting from the village faded like a bad dream.
He kept moving until he couldn't anymore.
When he finally dropped to the ground, breath ragged and legs shaking, he found himself under the crooked shadow of an old tree stump. Half-hollowed by rot, damp inside, but dry enough on top to sit. He sat.
The fish were still pressed to his chest, limp and leaking. He peeled them free one by one and stared at his haul — five skinny, sun-warmed things. Heads intact. Eyes clouded. Barely enough meat to feed a cat.
He laughed once. No humor in it.
"Seriously?" he muttered. "Risked my life for five fucking fish?"
He tossed one aside, then pulled it back. Still food. Still calories.
Back in his old life, he stole for fun. He remembered that clearly — boredom, adrenaline, the rush of watching security tags beep as you walked past. Stupid shit. Candy bars. Phones. Once a bike, just to see if he could. Never because he had to.
Now he was the fish bandit.
He tore off a piece with his teeth — raw, cold, slimy — and forced himself to chew.
Slowly. Deliberately.
He didn't want to be the idiot who died after surviving all this. He remembered what happened to starvation victims when they ate too fast — Holocaust survivors, disaster zones. The body couldn't take it. It shut down. Collapsed.
So he ate in strips. Small bites. One fish at a time. Letting the pain in his stomach fade one layer at a time, not all at once.
He leaned back against the tree. The leaves barely moved above him. For once, there was no yelling. No footsteps. Just the buzz of flies and the slow tick of survival.
As he ate, his thoughts wandered.
This world… it had potential.
It was brutal, sure — crawling with monsters, crooked Marines, warlords with castles. But that just meant it was open. No rules. No ceilings. If you had power, you could rewrite everything.
He remembered the kid's memories again — the whispers of Roger, the fear behind the name Rocks. The stories hadn't finished yet. Not even close.
Roger hadn't made it to Laugh Tale yet.
The Pirate King was still just a man on a ship.
And him? He wasn't even on the board.
But five fish was enough to remind him what desperation felt like — and why he'd never stay this weak again.
He liked what pirates did. The chaos. The freedom. The idea of it. But the thought of sailing around with a bunch of strangers, chasing treasure and pretending to care about some crew bond?
No thanks.
But blowing holes in the World Government?
Becoming the strongest thing walking?
That, he wouldn't say no to.
He swallowed the last bite, slow and steady. His stomach still felt like a hole, but it wasn't screaming anymore. The shaking in his hands had stopped.
The world was wide open — brutal, bleeding, and begging to be reshaped.
And this time, it was his turn.