SYSTEM NOTIFICATION: Daily Login Complete.
Daily Bonus: "Captain's Favor" (Consumable)
Effect: +10% Recruitment Charm (Duration: 48 hours)
Quest Update: Crew Node Count: 4/10 → Primary Objective: Expand crew to 6.
Active Objective: "Solidify Vinsmoke Memorandum — Draft Terms & Maintain Discretion"
New Objective Unlocked: "Recruit Two New Crew Nodes — Healer & Blade"
MC Status Check:
Name: Vegito
Race: Full-Blooded Saiyan
Age: — (Biological: Prime Adult)
Special: Tail active; Appetite: Colossal
Abilities: Kame Style (Advanced), Advanced Haki Conditioning (Practiced), Gravity Manipulation (Adept), Marine Six Styles (Observer)
Inventory: Compasses x2 ("True" gifted), Spices (Bell-mère's delight), Capsule — Gravity Chamber Accessory
Ship Bonding Level: 38/100
Crew Nodes: 4/10 (Nami, Nojiko, Bell-mère, Reiju)
Current Location: East Blue → En route (Vinsmoke Escort Active)
Mood: Hungry. Focused. Charm in overdrive.
P.O.V.: Vegito
Diplomacy smells oddly like lacquer and boiled tea. It smells of hands folded politely and smiles that curve like knives dressed up in lace. I woke with that scent in my nose and a hunger in my belly that could only be calmed by victory or—preferably—victory served with a second helping of stew. The Vinsmoke escort tracked to port like a metallic shadow; their chrome reflected the ocean in a way that made the Embrace look tastefully home-brewed by comparison. Reiju strolled the deck with a newspaper folded like a dagger and a smile that suggested she had already filed the world under "managed."
"Today we sign," she said, voice measured and precise. Her sleeve clinked as she adjusted the little mechanics she'd added to the sonic rig. "Formally. We show the Vinsmokes that we're useful in public and discreet in private."
"Formally," I agreed, stretching like an actor who loved the spotlight and also the backstage. "Formally with food, and perhaps the occasional dramatic pause."
Bell-mère had a pot on the galley that steamed the kind of stew that made men mutiny temporarily in its favor. Nojiko had already disappeared below decks with a toolbox and a hum of "Ufufu" that implied very practical repairs and softening of nerves. Nami sat above, dusting off maps and tracing the lines of our planned route, her face as unreadable as a map that had never been annotated.
The Vinsmoke delegation arrived with the kind of polite distance only the very rich can cultivate. Their envoy—ace of measured bows and eyes like import papers—greeted us with all the warmth of a silver coin. We boarded each other's vessels, exchanged smiles measured in syllables, and then sat like two parties about to decide whether the world could be rearranged politely.
Reiju and I had already prepared terms in the Embrace Sanctum. The runes hummed faintly as we unfurled clause after clause—controlled testing parameters, limits on publicity, supply allotments, and a training exchange whereby Reiju would provide supervised field trials and the Vinsmoke med-team would supply more than they had pledged in their casual politeness. The gist was simple: technology and medical supplies for a chance to run controlled trials and demonstrate public safety improvements. The caveat, naturally: the Vinsmoke house wanted access to long-term data and a promise of discretion.
I am not the sort of man to lie when the truth will do. I am, however, the sort of man to make the truth itself sound like an appeal.
SYSTEM NOTIFICATION: Diplomacy Module — "Vinsmoke Memorandum" activated.
Tip: Keep public exposure minimal. Legalese and charm increase acceptance. Avoid giving tech schematics beyond agreed prototypes.
Effect: +12% Success on formalizing memorandum if Reiju negotiates and Vegito demonstrates practical utility.
We walked the line between humility and spectacle. Nami kept the maps rolled like prayers, watching the way priorities shifted on the table. Nojiko kept to her hammer and hum, showing how reinforcements were practical and cheap if used cleverly. Bell-mère fed the engineers until they began discussing ethics over second helpings. I performed the kind of captain's theater that had been drilled into me by two years of imagining the moment: self-deprecating jokes, gentle boasts about my ship's sanctum, a modest demonstration of the sonic rig that made the Vinsmoke doctor puff a soft "Ha!" of impressed surprise.
"These stabilizers will save lives in refugee harbors," the doctor said, voice soft and honest where her suits had been crisp and formal before. "We can adapt the field dampeners to clinic modules. With a bit of training, villages at the periphery could perform triage until a med-team arrives."
The envoy folded advice like it was a napkin, careful and discreet. "We will supply stabilizers and portable med-kits upon formal agreement," he said. "In exchange, we ask for three months of controlled trials and data logs. We will station a liaison observer for oversight."
Reiju and I exchanged a look that said more than our words. Public oversight meant constraint—and constraint was sometimes a virtue. The Vinsmoke name was a ladder with hooks that could either carry us up or trip us spectacularly on the way down. I signed, with the kind of flourish that would make a poet weep and a bureaucrat sigh like a clock winding.
SYSTEM NOTIFICATION: Diplomacy Result — Vinsmoke Memorandum Signed (Provisional).
Reward: Medical Aid Package (Immediate: Stabilizers x2; Portable Med-Kit x5; Reinforcement Alloys: Medium Crate)
Effect: Vinsmoke Attention (Network) — Access: +1 (Reiju link)
Caveat: Publicity increased. Bounty risk: +5% (Temporarily during escort period).
We had supplies—real ones—and a polite escort that would make certain waters safer. The diplomats left with the patina of a transaction well-made. But money and favors attract rust and the sound of hungry things. As we left the Vinsmoke fleet's bubble and turned toward a string of smaller islands where we had promised to perform more field tests, the horizon spat out a small sail like an insult.
Bounty hunters, petty and organized, slipped from the fog with speed that smelled of money and poor life choices. They thought a ship like the Embrace would be rich in easy coin. They thought I was another easy headline. They were wrong.
"Do we fight?" Nami asked, fingers white on the rail.
"We demonstrate proportions," I said. "We show teeth, and then we close the jaw. Remember: no death if we can avoid it. We make them regret their math."
P.O.V.: Vegito
I kept my voice low because sometimes restraint sounds better than thunder. The Embrace sighed like a big, amused beast. Reiju adjusted a dial on the sonic rig because she'd already decided the world required refinement. Nojiko loaded a rigged grapnel. Bell-mère tightened the straps on the galley's knife harness and gave me a look that was equal parts "be a good boy" and "don't bring me trouble I cannot spoon away."
We let the hunters overplay their hand. They came disrespectful and confident, boarders with a plan to steal something they hadn't inventoried: dignity. We answered with a demonstration of control. Reiju played a low, disorienting note; I pressed a gravity smear to the deck and folded space like a napkin. Men stumbled as if the sea had become a drunk friend. The leader—the one who thought himself brave—tried a bold climb and met a gentle, perfectly aimed shove that sent him sliding into the water with the kind of soaked self-awareness only humiliation grants. His men left with more curses than coins.
From the shoreline we had left behind a small crowd—fisherfolk and villagers who'd watched us leave. Their cheers rippled like buoyant things. No one had died. Noship had been ruined. It was a victory wrapped in velvet.
SYSTEM NOTIFICATION: Combat Avoidance — Success.
Reward: Bonding Pulse +8 (Ship & Escort)
Note: Non-lethal response preserved reputation; bounty interest reduced slightly with demonstration of restraint.
That night, with the world vibrating pleasantly at our edges, I returned to the Embrace Sanctum for a scheduled Haki session. The gravity chamber welcomed us like a cathedral, its runes picking up the rhythm of our breath. Reiju observed like a scientist who keeps a small, secret fondness for theater. Nami and Nojiko were tense, eager, and appropriately suspicious—perfect students.
"Observation instead of reaction," I told them as we settled into the chamber. "Haki isn't about shouting loud and making yourself scary. It's the part that lets you know when the world is going to break your nose before it does."
Nojiko flinched and then breathed slow and deep; the gravity around us hugged like a practiced partner. Nami's eyes were pinched in concentration, her fingers tracing imaginary cartography on the air as if reading the sea in lines and tension rather than tides. I walked them through eye lines and core breathing, showing how a single breath could be a map to an opponent's balance. Reiju corrected posture with the sort of clinical care that meant she already saw a hundred improvements.
The training was hard and quiet in the best possible way. When Nami finally landed a focused push—a careful, non-lethal strike that telegraphed intention rather than violence—her laugh ripped out like a startled "Ha!" that made the chamber's stones look askance. It was a sound that meant she trusted herself for a beat.
SYSTEM NOTIFICATION: Training Module Complete — Haki Observation (Intro).
Reward: +5 Haki Conditioning (Nami +3; Nojiko +2).
Note: Nami's trust increased marginally. Continue patient instruction.
We closed the session with food—Bell-mère's stew again, the kind of broth that heals more than bones—and laughter. Reiju and I sat like two conspirators who'd just negotiated an armistice. "We need more than tech and med-kits," she mused. "We need people who will stay—not out of obligation, but because they want to."
I grinned and thought about harem plans the way other men plan war—ambitious, slightly delusional, but full of heart. Two crew nodes down... four to go. The system's prompt nagged like an eager friend.
SYSTEM NOTIFICATION: Secondary Objective Active — "Recruit Two New Crew Nodes (Healer & Blade)"
Hint: Healer likely attracted by medical provisions and training. Blade-user impressed by non-lethal skill & moral restraint. Search near port markets and taverns for vets, medics, and wandering hunters.
The next port on our route buzzed with activity: fish markets, taverns, and a chaotic little place that traded in rumor and salted fish. My plan was simple and refined: be obvious but not desperate. Present aid, demonstrate utility, and charm like a man who'd read the handbook on flattery in a dozen languages.
It didn't take long.
She stepped out of the shadows of a narrow alley like a calm notice in the margin of a messy book—a woman with ink-stained fingers and a satchel that bulged with an impossible collection of herbs and bandages. Her hair was the kind of dark that swallowed light politely, and her smile was cautious, stitched with grief and careful pride. She introduced herself as Hana—no grand titles—and the world told me, instantly and unhelpfully, that my heart was not the only thing that prowled for interesting things.
Hana had a reputation whispered by vendors: a traveling medic who'd once kept a small clinic on an island that was burned for reasons not strictly business. She'd fled with a satchel and a patient list and had been patching fishermen and cut-purse lendings ever since. When I spoke to her, she tilted her head and asked, simply and directly, "What makes you different from the rest?"
I dug into something honest and something theatrically charming. "I cook," I told her with a grin, and then softened. "I protect. And I don't sell people for coin. I have med-kits and stabilizers and the intent to teach. I won't make you a prize or a pawn. I want someone to be our healer because the sea is mean and people deserve less pain."
She laughed then—a brief, surprised "Ha!" that tasted like relief and a past of saved lives. She inspected our med-kits with a professional's hand and then looked me in the eye with a warmth that suggested she was as tired of lies as Nami and Nojiko. "I'll come aboard if you let me run a clinic there," she said. "And you train the crew in basic triage. I want to travel and make lists of places that need care, not money."
SYSTEM NOTIFICATION: Recruitment Attempt — Healer Node (Hana).
Charm Roll: +15 (Success).
Result: Hana accepted temporary passage pending demonstration of medical supplies and teaching opportunities.
Bonding Pulse: +6 (Ship — Medical)
Hana joined us with the kind of quiet efficiency that made Bell-mère approve in a way she rarely showed. She set up a corner of the infirmary with the precise sort of chaos that made me feel my life had been elevated by competence. Her laugh was small and sharp when she worked—"Ha!"—and once, as she set a splint, she sang under her breath in an old folk tune that made the Embrace's figurehead seem to smile.
We had one more recruit to find and then the crew would be a proper little band: a healer and a blade. The tavern scene called like a bright and poorly behaved bird. I expected braggarts, and I found them—less interesting—and then, like a cut of moonlight, I found someone else.
She was a blade in every possible sense—lean, swift, hands that had learned to read intentions first, strikes second. Her hair was cropped like a promise of efficiency. She carried no bounty poster but the hint of a history that smelled of contracts and broken windows. The first time she tested me, she did it with a drink and a glance, the sort of test that costs nothing and asks for everything.
"You look comfortable with killing," she said, voice low and steady, and my ears pricked with the old musician's delight. The way people talk about the possession of a blade makes me suspect and curious. "But are you comfortable choosing not to?"
I told her the story of the water shove—the man that slid into the ocean like a sentence corrected. I told her how restraint had built more allies than thunder could. I always admire those who read the fine print: a blade that can be chosen not to draw is better than one that cannot.
Her name—Kasumi—slid out between drink and laughter like a seal in a river. She'd been a bounty hunter once, or nearly; money ran through her history, and so did a streak of tired honor. She came aboard to test us and stayed to watch Reiju demonstrate sonic rig maintenance like it was a lullaby for engineers. She met Nojiko on the lower decks where Nojiko was teaching patchwork to a villager, and something softened in her jaw.
"Join us," I told her plainly, the way one asks a capable person to take up a job that matters. "We need someone who understands force and discretion."
She weighed the world on the edge of a glass and then grinned with a dry "Ha!" that made me fall for her a little too quickly. "I'll come," she said. "Under one condition: I keep my freedom, I keep my coin splits, and if we ever face a decision where blood might be spilled unnecessarily, I get the final say on the non-lethal options."
I agreed. She held me to it with the kind of eye that makes promises heavy and honourable.
SYSTEM NOTIFICATION: Recruitment Success — Blade Node (Kasumi) recruited.
Reward: Bonding Pulse +10 (Ship & New Nodes)
Effect: Crew Nodes: 4/10 → 6/10 (Nami, Nojiko, Bell-mère, Reiju, Hana, Kasumi)
Note: Recruitment Charm Buff Active: "Captain's Favor"
The sanctum hummed like a cathedral that had gained more choir members. We drank once—lightly—and sang the absurd victory songs that make sailors sound ridiculous and warm. Nami's laugh that night was bright and real: "Ha!"—it carried like a bell over the water. Nojiko's "Ufufu" came like a small, private fire. Bell-mère's "Ha!" was a laugh that trusted a pot and a pan and now, cautiously, a captain. Reiju's laugh—the precise, delighted "Ha!"—sounded like someone who'd placed a complex bet on the world and found it paying out with interest. Hana hummed a healing song, her voice low and small. Kasumi's laugh was a dry cut of amusement, a "Ha!" that suggested grudging fondness.
SYSTEM NOTIFICATION: Bonding Update: Crew Nodes: 6/10 achieved.
Achievement Unlocked: "First Fleet Hearts" — Small. Ship Capability Increased (Minor).
New Objective Unlocked: "Teach advanced Haki drills to Nami & Nojiko (Sanctum session scheduled)."
Hint: Keep Vinsmoke memos private; public demos require controlled settings to avoid bounty spikes.
P.O.V.: Vegito
That night I lay on the Embrace's deck and let the moonwalk the wavering water. My tail curled around the rail like a comfortable punctuation mark. The ship creaked in a language that suggested it approved of my choices—not just because they'd filled a roster, but because they'd done so in a way that stitched people together instead of sewing them into trophies. There was a kind of poetry to building a family of misfits: done badly, it becomes a prison; done carefully, it's a cathedral of consent.
My hunger felt like a small god at my ribs; so did my gratitude. We had taken for ourselves two deserving stars: a healer who'd never asked to be saved but who saved others anyway, and a blade who kept her oath to not spill unless necessary. They were exactly the sorts of people I wanted aboard—a ship that would not only be defended by force but healed by hands that understood preservation.
Tomorrow we would teach more Haki drills. We would ship out to the sites the Vinsmoke liaison wanted tested. We would teach villages how to set up stabilizers and how to mend wounds without surrendering dignity. And when the world looked at the Embrace, it would see a ship that both fought and fed, that defended and fixed, that charmed and knit.
I let out a quiet laugh that was equal parts pride and mischief. "Ha!" I said to the night, because I'd always been better at both being ridiculous and being sincere.
SYSTEM NOTIFICATION: Daily Summary Saved.
Achievements: Vinsmoke Memorandum Signed (Provisional); Healer & Blade Recruited; Crew Nodes: 6/10 reached.
Resources Gained: Stabilizers x2; Portable Med-Kits x5; Reinforcement Alloys (Medium Crate).
Next Goal: Maintain discretion; teach Haki; complete Vinsmoke field trials.
I slept then, not perfectly, but like a man who had assembled the first chapter of his absurd, kind empire. Outside, the Embrace breathed. Inside, the runes settled like a lullaby.
End of Chapter 6