Right now… I'm in an absolutely foul mood.
Without a doubt, it's the worst it's been in years… no, it's bad enough to rank among the worst in my entire life since reincarnating—one of the lowest points in these thirty-four years.
I've already taken it out on the people nearby, beating them down, carving them up, and sinking them into a sea of blood, and even then my anger hasn't cooled. I'm still in a terrible mood. Still, actively, seething.
Ah—don't worry. It's not like I hurt random, innocent civilians. The ones I beat down were the group of kidnappers and bounty hunters who came after me. They tried to "hunt" me and got counter-hunted instead. That's what you call getting exactly what you deserve.
They were scum to begin with, so I don't feel even a flicker of guilt.
All around me I can hear groans—"Ugh…" "It hurts…" "This isn't what we agreed—!"—and even those pathetic whines are enough to sour my mood further.
"…Tch!"
Ugh… my stomach won't settle.
If I stay here any longer, I'm going to start kicking these idiots around like I'm stomping corpses. I should move. Now.
☆☆☆
How did things end up like this? Put simply… I got tricked.
I'll explain it properly, step by step.
As the "Pirate Literary Master," I have several channels through which I receive work requests.
There's my own personal network, of course, but sometimes leads come through Morgans' World Economic News, and sometimes they come via Tesoro at Gran Tesoro.
The problem is… mixed in with legitimate requests, there are always traps. Fake jobs meant to lure me into capture.
The usual pattern goes like this: I show up at the designated location thinking it's a meeting, and it turns out bounty hunters have been lying in wait to spring an ambush.
To prevent that, I'm careful myself, and on top of that, Tesoro and Morgans have been shutting down suspicious requests before they ever reach me—making up plausible reasons to refuse them.
But… this time, it seems they couldn't stop it.
"I'm sorry, Sue! I never imagined it would be a trap… We're confirming everything urgently on our end. Tesoro is furious—he says he's going to grab whoever's behind this by the tail, no matter what!"
"Yeah, it's fine, Stella. They weren't anything special… I already smashed them."
This request came through the Gran Tesoro route.
I came to the specified island for a detailed meeting… and waiting for me there was exactly the kind of group I just described.
I've said it before, but I take pride in my work as a writer. I find it fulfilling. I even think of it as my life's work.
I pour passion into it—more than I could ever fully express in a few words.
Which is exactly why I'm so furious I can't see straight—because someone used that part of me, my identity as a writer, to lure me into a trap like this.
Even if you set aside the obvious points—pirates get targeted, it's my fault for not seeing through it—there's still this:
Damn it… making me waste time when I'm already this busy…
I had to push back the new work I'm writing—or in the middle of planning—just to carve out the time to come here.
That said, it's not like I want to lash out at Stella. She was apologizing over the Den Den Mushi with a voice full of remorse, so I forced myself to speak calmly.
I'll take this as a lesson. One I'll carve into my memory.
…but aside from that—
"By the way… Stella, there's something that's been bothering me."
"…You're bothered too, Sue? Actually, I was thinking the same thing… and so was Tesoro. Who set this trap in the first place… right?"
"Yeah. Something… feels off about all of this."
Whenever Tesoro passes on a request to me, he does what I just said—he treats traps as a real threat, runs checks, layers in safeguards, and only forwards it after confirming it's safe.
And yet these people… slipped past all of that. They managed to deceive both Tesoro and me.
Honestly, this isn't something random bounty hunters can pull off.
To bypass checks that should be tight, you'd need scale. You'd need precision. You'd need a level of fabrication that screams professionalism. Whoever did this is not ordinary.
…And yet the ones who were waiting for me were an utterly ordinary group of bounty hunters.
Sure, they had numbers, but not one of them was a Haki user. There wasn't a single Ability User among them either. Their vibe was exactly what you'd expect from kidnappers or slave traders—just a pack of thugs.
They didn't feel careful. They didn't feel composed. They just laughed like idiots and tried to overwhelm me with numbers to capture me.
Most telling of all was how they panicked when I used my ability and started slicing through everything in one sweep. It was like they didn't even know I was an Ability User. Their intel-gathering was painfully sloppy.
…Could people like that really slip through Gran Tesoro's screening and fool us?
No. I can say it with certainty. There's no way.
They weren't the ones who deceived Tesoro and his crew.
But they also weren't here by coincidence. They knew the "Pirate Literary Master" was coming, and they were waiting for me.
Which means… they were being used, too?
There's someone else. A mastermind.
Someone laid plans with care, stacked layers of fabrication to fool Tesoro, drew me here—and there's no way the "main event" of that kind of scheme is a bunch of third-rate thugs.
So were they a disposable pawn? Or… a way to buy time?
'…I've got a bad feeling about this.'
There's a lot I still don't know, but one thing is clear: I need to move.
"Sorry, Stella. I'm leaving right away. Nothing good will come from staying here… in fact, I feel like something bad is about to happen."
At the very least, getting me here was part of the mastermind's plan.
If that's true… then there's more. This isn't over. I need to get off this island, now.
I'd been talking while walking, and by the time I said it, I'd reached the beach at the island's edge.
I pulled out the ship I'd been storing inside my body and set it onto the sea.
With a loud splash, it surfaced and bobbed… swaying for a while before settling.
"Be careful, Sue. I don't know who did this, but… I don't think it ends here. This has never happened before… I have a really bad feeling."
"I get it. I've got a bad feeling too. Let's hang up for now. Once I catch my breath, I'll call you back and we'll ta—"
A chill crawled down my spine.
"…What—?!"
In that instant, I felt the most violent sense of dread in my life and threw myself away on instinct.
Almost at the same time, the ground where I'd been standing exploded.
A deafening roar. A surge of heat so intense it felt like it would peel my skin off.
"Hot—! What the hell… is that…?"
The sight in front of me stole my words.
"…Huh…?!"
Flames roared skyward.
Black smoke billowed.
The place I'd been standing was gouged out as if the earth itself had been torn open… and the ship beside me was burning, shattered beyond recognition. All from that single explosion.
It wasn't a ship anymore. It was a ship-shaped lump of charcoal.
Inside the hull had been paper clay and a Breath Dial—custom-made so I could fly freely through the sky with my ability.
Papa had given it to me as a commemorative gift when I finally mastered control of Conqueror's Haki…
I'd traveled everywhere with it. Slept on it with my daughters. It meant something to me.
Damn it.
But I don't have time to mourn.
Right now, I need to deal with the crisis rushing in on me.
…Though whether I can deal with it at all is… beyond "hopeless." It's closer to pure despair.
In front of me was a sea of fire.
And beyond that—spreading wider and wider—an ocean of magma.
Staring at it, I couldn't help thinking the same thing over and over.
'Wait… no way. You've got to be kidding me…! Of all times—now?!'
…The thought had crossed my mind earlier, just for a moment.
To pull off deception at this level, it would have to be a massive underworld organization—or else the Marines or the Government.
So I'd considered the possibility that pursuers might show up here—Marines, or Cipher Pol.
And in that brief list of candidates, one name had flashed through my mind… 'that man.'
I dismissed it almost immediately. Someone like that wouldn't come out for small fry like me. And would the Government or Marines even bother with this kind of covert scheme?
I figured it was more likely some other kidnapping syndicate.
…And yet.
Here we are.
"I was told there weren't any ships docked anywhere on the island, and it struck me as strange. So that's what you were doing… You've got a remarkably convenient ability, little girl."
A deep voice rolled across the air.
A voice I absolutely did not want to hear right now. Damn it—more than Luffy's, even… I knew it. I knew exactly who it was.
There was no way I could mistake it.
…I wanted it not to be true, but—
Because the owner of that voice was the one person in this One Piece world I absolutely must never run into.
Parting the flames and black smoke—and the magma itself, as if pushing through curtains—a single man stepped forward.
He was nearly three meters tall.
A crimson suit over a body so powerful it was obvious even through the fabric.
A face more vicious than most pirates, with the kind of hardened features that looked like "ordinary civilian" had never been an option.
A hat pulled low, and a coat emblazoned with the word Justice—proof of his status as a Marine.
And above all, his body seemed to glow red-hot, bubbling as if it were molten from within, radiating murderous heat that scorched everything around him—the power of magma.
After all that, anyone who knows the One Piece world would know who stood before me.
The mad dog of justice who would kill civilians—or even fellow Marines—without hesitation if he deemed it necessary.
The man who, after the Summit War, succeeded the retired Fleet Admiral Sengoku and rose to the very top of the Marines.
And most infamously, the man who took Ace's life—Luffy's beloved older brother and one of the original work's most popular characters.
"Don't even think about running or resisting, little girl. Submit quietly and let yourself be bound… or you'll end up with more than burns, you hear?"
Marine Headquarters Admiral Sakazuki.
Also known as "Akainu."
A Logia-type magma human with the Magma-Magma Fruit.
In this world… for me, a Paper Human… he was the worst opponent imaginable in every possible way.
To be continued...