Luffy woke before sunrise.
Not because of the uncomfortable feeling that usually pulled him out of sleep. Not because of a dream he couldn't remember. Only because today was a day different from every day before it and his body seemed to already know that even before his mind was fully awake.
He lay there for a moment staring at the ceiling of his room, so deeply familiar now. Every crack in the wood, every stain nobody had ever bothered cleaning, every corner he had memorized without ever meaning to.
Then he got up, picked up his hat from beside him, and put it on.
In the main room of the hideout someone was already awake.
Dadan sat in her chair with a cigarette in her hand, her eyes staring forward at nothing in particular. The smoke rose thinly toward the ceiling. Around her Dogra and Magra sat in their respective corners, not asleep but not talking either.
Luffy stood in the doorway of his room and looked at all of them.
"Hey hey, Dadan." Luffy hung off the doorframe, his smile wide. "Aren't you going to see me off? I'm starting my journey today."
Dadan didn't turn. Her eyes stayed fixed on that nothing in particular ahead of her.
"I don't care what you say. I'm not seeing you off."
Her voice was flat. But Luffy, who had known Dadan long enough, could see from the corner of his eye that the large woman's eyes were slightly glistening.
Luffy let go of the doorframe and stood straight.
"Alright then." He looked around the room once, at Dadan, at Dogra, at Magra, at the faces he had known for nearly as long as he could remember. "Everyone, I'm heading out. Thank you for everything you've done. Let's meet again in the future."
He turned and walked out.
Behind him Dogra and Magra waved. One of them had started making a sound like someone trying very hard not to cry.
And Dadan, who hadn't turned around this whole time, who had said she wouldn't see him off, who sat in her chair with a cigarette in her hand and eyes staring straight ahead, finally turned toward the open door after the sound of Luffy's footsteps had already faded.
She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand.
"That stupid kid." Her voice was quiet, almost a whisper. "Why does he go and say things like that."
Luffy ran down the mountain using Soru.
The forest around him blurred past, trees he had come to know one by one flashing by at his sides. Among the still-standing trees were marks that wouldn't be visible to anyone who didn't know to look for them. Trees with punch marks in their trunks. Rocks cracked or shattered at various spots. Ground that still sat slightly caved in at certain points where he and Garp had once slammed into each other.
Luffy running past saw all of it in one fast flash and smiled.
Nine months. A lot had happened in this forest.
But today was a different day. The day this forest became a memory and what lay ahead was something that had no name yet because it had never happened before.
He picked up his pace.
Foosha Village in the morning was busier than usual.
Not because of a market or a celebration. But because the news had spread the way news in a small village always spreads, mouth to mouth, window to window, until nearly everyone knew that today the boy with the straw hat they had known since he was small would be setting sail.
The villagers had gathered along the road leading to the dock. Familiar faces, Mayor Woop Slap with his usual expression full of complaints but today looking only old and tired, the fishermen who normally left for sea before dawn but today were still on land, women standing in front of their homes with expressions of every kind.
Luffy walked among them with his hands behind his head, waving right and left.
In front of Makino's bar, the woman had been standing at the door since before Luffy arrived, as though she knew exactly when he would pass. In her hands was a bundle prepared ahead of time, provisions for the journey.
Luffy stopped in front of her.
Makino held out the bundle without saying anything. Luffy took it, looked at it for a moment, then tucked it among the things he had already prepared.
"Thanks, Makino."
Makino smiled. Not a forced smile, not a smile hiding something. Just an honest smile from someone who had known the boy in front of her since he was very small.
Luffy had already started walking again when Makino's voice called after him.
"Luffy."
He turned around.
Makino looked at him for a moment from in front of her bar door, the morning wind moving her hair slightly.
"Take care of yourself."
Luffy grinned wide. "Of course."
He turned and walked again. Makino watched his back from the doorway of her bar until his figure disappeared at the far end of the road leading to the dock.
His boat was already waiting at the dock.
Not a large ship. Just a small boat sufficient for one person with modest supplies, bought with money gathered over the past week. Simple but fit for sailing.
Luffy placed his belongings inside the boat, made sure everything was there, then stood at the edge of the dock facing the sea.
The East Blue spread out before him, blue and vast, its edge invisible from where he stood. Wind from the direction of the sea hit his face, carrying the smell of salt and something that couldn't be named, something that felt like possibility.
Behind him the villagers still gathered began shouting things, some waving, some cheering, some calling out his name.
Luffy didn't get into the boat right away.
He turned around one more time, looked at all the faces there on the dock, then raised his hand high.
"See you everyone! Let's meet again someday!"
Shouts and waves answered him from every direction.
Luffy lowered his hand, jumped into his boat, and began to row.
At the dock the villagers kept waving and calling out until the small boat grew smaller and smaller between the blue of the sea and the blue of the sky. One by one they began to disperse, returning to their morning routines.
Makino still stood at the edge of the dock, watching that shrinking point in the distance.
On his boat Luffy rowed without hurrying, letting the dock and Foosha Village slowly disappear behind him. Wind from the direction of the sea hit his face, the smell of salt growing stronger the farther he moved from land.
He didn't look back.
Until something moved beneath the surface of the water ahead of him.
Luffy felt it before he saw it. The pressure shifting beneath his boat, something large moving upward from the depths. The water around his boat began to swirl slowly then faster, small waves that suddenly became large.
Then the Lord of the Coast appeared.
He hadn't seen the black shadow rising beneath the surface behind his boat. Hadn't seen the seawater starting to swell and spin. Hadn't seen it until the massive shadow had already broken the surface and blocked out part of the morning light behind him.
But he had felt it.
Something large. Something familiar.
Luffy turned around.
The Lord of the Coast burst from beneath the surface with a roar of water, its eel-like body rearing into the air, its mouth gaping wide. At the dock the sound of panicked screaming broke out, villagers who had just been cheering now running in every direction.
Luffy looked at the creature with an unchanged expression.
"You finally came." His smile appeared slowly, not a panicked smile, not a nervous smile. The smile of someone who had been waiting for something for a long time. "Ruler of this sea. You've chosen the wrong opponent this time. I'm not the same crybaby I was ten years ago."
The Lord of the Coast didn't listen.
The creature lunged forward, its enormous mouth swallowing all the space in front of Luffy in one motion.
Luffy pulled his arm far back.
"Gomu Gomu no Pistol!"
The fist shot forward and struck the Lord of the Coast squarely in the center of its head with a sound of impact that cracked the morning air. The creature's body was thrown backward, its head slamming into the surface of the water and sending seawater spraying into the air like rain suddenly falling from below.
Silence.
Then the Lord of the Coast fell into the sea and didn't resurface.
The water that had sprayed into the air fell back to the surface with a soft pattering sound.
At the dock there was no sound for several seconds.
Luffy lowered his hand, looked toward where the Lord of the Coast had fallen for a moment, then raised his head toward the sky.
The East Blue sky stretched above him, blue and clear and impossibly vast.
Luffy raised both hands.
"Sabo." His voice wasn't too loud. Not a shout. More like someone speaking toward somewhere far away with the hope that their voice would reach. "Look at me. I'm going to become King of the Pirates."
The wind blew from the direction of the sea.
Luffy lowered his hands, jumped into his boat, and began to row toward a horizon with no visible end.
At the dock Makino watched the small boat until it became a point growing smaller and smaller between the blue of the sea and the blue of the sky.
Then it was gone.
End of Chapter 7