The island came into view in the distance after several days at sea.
Zoro closed the telescope and turned toward the other side of the ship. "Oy. Luffy."
At the bow, Luffy lay face down on the wood with his straw hat covering his face and a fishing rod in his hand, his body swaying gently with the movement of the waves.
"Luffy."
No answer.
"Luffy!"
"...what." His voice was heavy with sleep, not moving in the slightest.
"Island. Visible from here."
This time Luffy immediately jumped to his feet as though he had never been sleeping at all. The fishing rod flew off to the deck on its own, and before Zoro could react the straw hat was already on his head and Luffy was already running toward him with arms outstretched. "Where where, let me see!"
Zoro lifted the telescope out of his reach. "Don't grab it—"
"Come on give it here!"
Zoro exhaled and handed it over. Luffy immediately pressed the telescope to his eye, aimed it forward, then lowered it with a wide smile. "There it is! There really is an island there!"
"I'm the one who said so."
"Zoro get out the oars, let's row now so we get there faster!"
"This is a sailing ship, there's no need—"
"It's faster if we row!"
Zoro looked at him for a moment. Then without saying anything more, he picked up an oar.
They both rowed, the small ship cutting through the waves toward the landmass whose shape was gradually growing clearer. A port town — densely packed stone buildings, a long dock, and a row of ships moored along the waterfront.
But the closer they got, the clearer it became that something was wrong.
The dock was deserted. No merchants, no fishermen, no sound at all except the creaking of the moored ships and the sound of waves hitting stone. The ships at the dock swayed gently on the water with nobody aboard any of them.
Luffy and Zoro exchanged a look briefly.
They kept rowing in.
The mooring rope was tied to a bollard at the dock. Luffy jumped down first, his sandals hitting the dock's wood, then he stood and looked around while scratching his head.
"Strange town," he said. "There's not a single person here."
Zoro came down after him, hand already at the hilt of his sword from habit. His eyes swept along the dock, past the row of buildings with their doors shut tight, past the empty streets that still held traces of life — a shopping basket fallen in the middle of the road, several pieces of clothing left hanging on a fence.
Then his gaze stopped.
"Hey, Luffy." Zoro pointed toward the far end of the dock with his thumb. "That's probably why."
A large ship was moored not far from their own. Far larger, with a tall and solid hull. At the top of its mast a black flag fluttered slowly — a skull with clown makeup, its mouth split into a wide red grin.
Luffy looked at the flag. Then at the empty town. Then back at the flag.
"Oh," he said. "So that's why."
In this era, a pirate flag was not merely a symbol. It was a warning. Townspeople who had lived near the sea long enough knew what to do when they saw one moored at their dock — lock the doors, take what you could carry, and leave before they came ashore.
Luffy looked at the buildings around the dock. Nothing destroyed. No sign of fire. Just empty and quiet.
"They evacuated," he said. "The pirates are still inside the town."
"Most likely," said Zoro.
The two of them were quiet for a moment.
"So what now?" asked Zoro.
"We go in of course," answered Luffy casually, already starting to walk toward the town.
Zoro followed a step behind him. "You know there are pirates inside."
"Yeah. And also our food supplies ran out yesterday." Luffy glanced back with an expression far too serious for a statement that simple. "If we hadn't reached this island today, we might have had to eat raw fish."
"Whose fault is that?"
Luffy laughed and didn't answer.
"That's clearly your fault—"
"At least we can restock supplies here," said Luffy, hands behind his head, stepping into the town without slowing his pace. "Maybe we can recruit a new member too."
Zoro let out a long breath and followed.
The town was quiet in a way different from ordinary emptiness.
Ordinary emptiness had a stillness to it. This was different — this was a quiet abandoned in haste, one that still held remnants of life in its corners. A dining table that hadn't been cleared yet was visible through an open window. A cat sat on top of a wall, staring at the two of them with round unblinking eyes.
Luffy looked left and right as he walked. In the distance, there was a road slightly wider than the others with a row of buildings shaped differently from the ordinary houses.
"Looks like there's a market over there." Luffy pointed in that direction. "Maybe there's food. Come on, Zoro—"
He turned around.
Zoro wasn't there.
Luffy stopped. Looked left, right, at the road they had just come from. No sign of Zoro anywhere. Just empty streets and the long shadows of buildings.
He scratched his head. "...that Zoro, did he get lost again?"
When he thought about it, that wasn't surprising. In Shells Town, the man had managed to get lost on the way to the dock.
Luffy looked toward the market, then toward the road they had come from, then toward the market again. His stomach growled loudly.
He walked toward the market.
The market turned out to actually be there — but was useless.
The shops along the street had been stripped bare. Empty shelves, cabinets with their doors flung wide open, floors covered in broken dishes and overturned chairs. Some shops didn't even have their doors anymore, leaving only doorframes leaning to one side.
Luffy went from one shop to the next with a face growing increasingly clouded. Empty shelves. Empty cabinets. Tables with only their legs remaining. The pirates had apparently taken everything they could carry.
He came out of the last shop and stood in the middle of the quiet market street. His stomach growled loudly, the sound bouncing off the walls of the buildings around him.
"Hah." Luffy held his stomach. "So hungry."
He looked toward the streets branching off from this market. He needed somewhere higher — easier to find Zoro from above, and he could get a look at the overall state of the town at the same time.
His eyes stopped on a building at the corner of the market that was slightly taller than those around it.
Luffy drew a breath, bent his knees, then drove his feet against the ground. His body rose — not an ordinary jump, there was something different about the way his feet pushed against the air before launching upward. Not smooth. There was a moment where his body nearly tilted before he stabilized himself, and he landed on the roof with one knee hitting the tiles harder than he had planned.
He winced briefly, then stood.
From up here, Orange Town spread out before him. Branching streets, buildings pressed tightly against each other, and in the distance a large building that looked more imposing than its surroundings.
His eyes swept slowly across the entire town.
Then stopped.
On a street to the west side, there was movement. A group of people running — and ahead of them, one person running faster, several steps ahead of the pursuers. From here it was clear that the person in front was far smaller than the ones chasing her.
Luffy didn't think long. He jumped from the roof.
Meanwhile, on a street in Orange Town, a chase was underway.
"Stop, damn it!"
"Catch her!"
A young woman with short orange hair ran ahead of them, her body moving nimbly through the bends of the streets without slowing her pace. Her face was striking, her gaze sharp, and her smile — despite being chased by six armed people — looked more mocking than the situation called for.
"Catch me if you can, idiots!" she called back over her shoulder.
Her name was Nami. A pirate thief who had been at her trade long enough to know that panic was a luxury she couldn't afford in situations like this.
Behind her, Buggy's crew was growing increasingly anxious.
"How is she running that fast?!"
"If we don't catch her, Captain Buggy is going to be furious!"
"I don't want to get hit by the captain's cannon!"
The distance between them was slowly closing. Nami glanced back without slowing — four of the six were still too close for her comfort.
Then from above, a sound.
Boom.
Not the sound of a cannon firing. But the sound of something taking a cannon shot — a hard impact in the air, followed by an explosion of smoke right in front of Nami that made her reflexively leap to the side.
From inside that smoke, someone fell.
The fall was hard enough to crack the stone street into a shallow ring at the point of impact. But the person who fell stood back up while brushing off their clothes as though nothing had happened, picked up the straw hat that had fallen from their head and put it back on, then looked upward with a casual expression.
"Close one, close one." He nodded to himself. "Lucky I managed to survive that."
Nami stared at him.
Her pursuers stared at him.
The young black-haired man in a red vest and blue shorts finally noticed the presence of everyone around him and looked toward Nami — not with a surprised or guarded expression, but with the expression of someone who had just recognized a familiar face in an unexpected place.
Nami recognized that face.
Shells Town. The Marine base. The man who had accidentally pinned her down at the door of Morgan's office.
A smile appeared on Nami's face — not a warm smile, but a specific one, the kind that appeared when an opportunity landed literally right in front of her. She pressed her palms together and walked closer with steps that had instantly shifted from frantic to composed.
"Boss!" she called out, her voice shifting into exaggerated relief. "You finally came to save me!"
The man turned toward her. His brow creased for a moment — then his face shifted to pleased. "Oh! You, from Shells Town—"
"Then I'll leave the rest to you!" Nami had already turned and was running toward the narrow alley beside them before the man could answer anything.
Nami's pursuers redirected their attention to the straw-hatted man. Several of them had already drawn their swords.
"So you're that woman's boss!"
"If we capture you, Captain Buggy will be pleased!"
"Prepare yourselves!"
They charged simultaneously.
Nami found a gap between two buildings, climbed to a rooftop, and peered down from the edge of the tiles.
Buggy's crew was scattered across the street. Not one of them was still standing. They were all lying in ways that looked uncomfortable, and one person had somehow landed on top of a wooden barrel at the corner of the road.
The straw-hatted man stood in the middle of that chaos with his hands on his hips, looking around with a light expression of satisfaction. Then he looked up.
Nami felt his eyes meet hers before she could hide herself.
She stood and came down from the roof.
"You really are strong," she said as she approached him. "Buggy's crew aren't weak."
"Felt ordinary to me."
"Hmm." Nami stopped at a comfortable distance, looking him over for a moment. "In that case, do you want to work together with me?"
The man raised an eyebrow. "What do you mean? Haven't you already joined my crew?"
Nami opened her mouth. Then closed it again. "...what?"
"Just now you called me your boss." He tilted his head. "If I'm your boss, that means you're already in my crew. Right?"
Nami looked at him for several seconds.
His logic couldn't be argued with. And arguing it now would only waste time she didn't have.
"...ah. Right, yes." Her smile slid back into place, thinner this time. For now, this was easier.
The house Nami chose belonged to a resident who had already evacuated — the door was unlocked, the dining table still there with clean plates left behind just as they were. Nami found bread in the cabinet and placed it on the table.
The man sat down and went at the bread with a speed that made Nami decide not to pay too much attention.
"Are you a native of this town?" he asked between chews.
"No." Nami sat in the chair across from him. "The natives already left because of their fear of Buggy."
"So you broke in."
His tone was flat, not judgmental, only stating a fact. But it still made Nami glance at him. "How rude. I'm a pirate treasure thief. Don't compare me to an ordinary thief."
The man swallowed the bread in his hand. "But a thief is still a thief, right?"
Nami didn't answer. She stood and walked toward the window, her eyes sweeping the streets outside that were still empty. Her hand slipped inside her clothing, touching the edge of the folded map tucked there.
"If I had a map of the Grand Line," she said, almost to herself, her eyes still on the window, "collecting a hundred million wouldn't be a dream."
A second later she realized she had just said that out loud.
Nami didn't turn around. Her hand pressed the map deeper into its place and shifted to tuck it more tightly inside her clothing.
"Map?" the man's voice came from behind her.
She had no choice but to turn. The man was looking at her from his chair — not with a probing gaze, just an ordinary question. But enough for Nami to know he had heard everything she had just let slip.
"Forget it," said Nami flatly. "That's none of your business."
The man nodded and went back to his bread without pressing further.
Nami turned back and tucked the map neatly inside her clothing. Then turned toward the man again. "Are you a navigator?"
The man raised his head. "I should be the one asking you that."
"I asked first."
"Oh." He nodded as though that made sense. "No. You?"
"I am a navigator." Nami crossed her arms in front of her chest. "My navigation ability is better than any navigator you've ever met."
The man looked at her for a moment. Then his smile appeared wide, sudden, like someone who had just finished working something out in their head. "I've decided. You're my ship's navigator!"
"I haven't—"
"You already agreed to join just now."
Nami opened her mouth. Closed it. Then chose not to waste the energy.
For now.
Movement outside the window made Nami stand. Through the curtain she saw several of Buggy's crew walking in the streets — not chasing, but sweeping slowly. Searching.
Her mind immediately got to work.
She turned toward the man and produced a rope. "I need you to come with me to where Buggy is."
"I also want to meet the pirates in this town." The man stood.
"Good." Nami held the rope out toward him. "But you need to be tied up first."
The man looked at the rope. Then at Nami. "Why?"
"It's just rope, right?" said Nami. "You can get free any time. But if I bring a prisoner to Buggy, I have a reason to get inside without being suspected."
The man looked at the rope in Nami's hand for a moment, then shrugged. "No problem."
He even stepped forward first, extending his wrists.
Nami tied the rope there — not too tight. This was only a prop. Ordinary rope wouldn't hold someone who had just taken down six armed people in a short time, and she knew that.
"Let's go." Nami gripped the end of the rope and walked toward the door. "And don't do anything until I say so."
"Okay!" The man followed with steps too light for someone being led on a leash.
Nami opened the door.
And stopped immediately.
In front of the door, a man in dark clothing stood with a face that showed he was just as surprised as Nami. Green hair, three swords at his hip, and an expression that couldn't be determined as either relief at finally finding the right place or confusion at what was in front of him.
"Zoro!" called the straw-hatted man from behind Nami.
Zoro looked at Luffy. Then at the rope around Luffy's wrists. Then at Nami holding the end of that rope. His gaze moved slowly from one to the other like someone piecing together information he didn't want to piece together.
"...what is going on here."
"This is Nami," said Luffy casually. "Our navigator."
"Temporary," Nami corrected quickly.
"And she's holding the rope because we're going to where the pirates in this town are. Where did you come from, Zoro?"
Zoro shifted his gaze to Nami briefly with a look that was flat but not hostile. Then answered without expression, "Got lost. But I ran into some of Buggy's crew on the street. From them I got directions here."
Nami furrowed her brow. "You asked Buggy's crew for directions?"
"I hit them first then asked."
Nami closed her eyes briefly.
Behind her, Luffy laughed. "Cool right, Zoro?"
"No," said Nami.
Zoro glanced toward Nami for a moment with an expression that was barely visible, then looked away. "So what's the plan?"
Nami looked left and right along the street to make sure nobody was watching. Then pulled the end of the rope in her hand and started walking. Luffy followed without needing to be pulled, his steps light, the straw hat on his head tilted slightly to the left.
"Follow me," said Nami. "Don't do anything until I say so."
"Ready," said Luffy.
Zoro said nothing. But he stepped along behind them, and that was enough.
Nami walked ahead, rope in hand, two strangers at her back — one who trusted too easily and one who was too quiet — heading deeper into the town still under Buggy's control.
One hundred million Berry, she thought. For that, I can put up with a situation like this a little longer.
End of Chapter 12