[The Pirate School: The Master's Spire – Morning]
The air in the High Spire didn't just feel heavy; it felt like the atmosphere had turned into liquid lead. Every time Ato tried to draw a breath, the invisible weight of the man's presence crushed his ribs inward. It wasn't just power; it was the weight of decades of conquest.
????: "You know... I don't like brats."
Ato gasped for air, his gritted teeth drawing blood from his own gums as he fought to lift his chin. The man walked closer, the heavy mahogany floorboards groaning and splintering with every deliberate, heavy step. The vibration of his boots felt like minor earthquakes traveling through the soles of Ato's feet.
????: "Especially brats who don't know their place in the world. You're at the Pirate School now, Dragonaid. And here... I am the only law. My word is the gravity that keeps this island from floating away."
Ato's white aura flickered wildly. His "Beast" instincts—the primal part of his brain that had allowed him to defeat six thousand men—were screaming at him to run, to hide, to vanish. But he forced his knees to lock. It was like a single candle flame trying to push back the darkness of a midnight ocean. He looked up into the man's fierce, ancient eyes, realizing for the first time that there were heights of power he hadn't even dreamed of. The Vice-Commanders he had fought were children compared to this.
Ato: "LIMIT... BREAKER!!"
He roared, the sound echoing off the stone walls. His hair turned a brilliant, glowing white as a shockwave erupted from his body. For a split second, the pressure eased—the wood beneath him stopped cracking. But it was a fleeting victory. The man didn't even lift a finger; he simply breathed. The mere exhale of his spirit was so vast that Ato's white aura was snuffed out like a match in a hurricane.
Suddenly, the crushing weight vanished. The man stopped three paces away, his long red hair settling around his shoulders like a crimson cape.
????: "I'm not here to bully you, kid. But if you're going to carry that name, you need to know how much power the world truly holds. You've been playing in a sandbox."
Ato stood up slowly, his muscles throbbing with a dull, persistent ache. His "Limit Breaker" state had been forcibly shut down by the man's sheer presence. He wiped a smear of blood from his lip, looking at the stranger with a mix of genuine terror and newfound awe. "Who are you? No one in the EDEN records has an aura like that."
The man gave a wild, brave smile—a grin that reached his eyes and spoke of a thousand battles won. "I'm Reno. The King of the Pirates."
Ato's jaw hit the floor. The legendary figure every rookie dreamt of, the man who stood at the pinnacle of the Great Age. "HUH? The King... of the Pirates?! You're the one they say disappeared ten years ago!"
Reno: "I didn't disappear. I just got tired of the noise. You didn't know who I was? That's why you were trying to mess with me. I'll cut straight to the point, Ato. What is your goal? Why are you out here causing a mess for General Ryoto and attracting twenty warships to my doorstep?"
Ato: "Goal? I didn't plan on being a criminal!"
Reno: "You don't even have a goa—"
Ato: "I have one! To defeat the threats who attacked my island! I saw my home burning, Reno! I saw the EDEN soldiers taking everything! I sailed out to make sure those monsters never come back!"
Reno reached into his heavy leather coat and tossed a crumpled, ink-stained newspaper toward him. It hit the floor with a soft thud. Ato scrambled to pick it up, his eyes scanning the front page. His heart skipped a beat as he saw the faces of the two Eden Commanders who had terrorized Nika Island.
Ato: "No... wait. In here it says these 'Commanders' were defeated by a mysterious pirate fleet three weeks ago. But on our island, we called them the Great Threats..."
Reno: "Those 'threats' were just mid-level Eden Commanders. They are strong, so rookies like you address them as threats. But look at the date, kid. Your island has been safe for weeks. The war there is over. The EDEN occupation was broken while you were still busy getting lost at sea."
Ato looked down at his trembling hands. The white-hot rage that had fueled his muscles for weeks suddenly evaporated, leaving him feeling hollow and cold. "Why did I sail out to the ocean then? If it's safe... if my family is okay... I think I should just go back. I don't need to be a pirate. I can just go home and live peacefully."
"ATO!" Reno's voice boomed like a cannon blast, rattling the windows in their frames. "Do you know when I first set sail, what my goal was?"
Ato looked up, startled by the sudden intensity. "To become the King?"
Reno: "And don't you take that title lightly! It has the weight of a million lives behind it! Do you even know the meaning of being a King?"
Ato: "The meaning...?"
Reno: "The meaning of a King is to never give up, even when the world tells you it's over! The meaning of a King is to never fall back when your friends are behind you! The meaning of a King is to protect ALL the people of the Drowned World, not just the ones on your own tiny island!"
The words hit Ato harder than any punch he had ever taken from a Vice-Commander. He wasn't shocked anymore; he was motivated. The fire in his eyes changed from a wild, chaotic blaze to a steady, burning star. He realized that "Pirate" wasn't just a label for a criminal—it was a title for someone who was truly free.
Reno: "I want you and your friends to stay in this school for a while. You have the blood of a Dragon, Ato, but you have the brain of a guppy. You'll learn who you are here... and you'll find a goal worth dying for."
[The Infirmary: The Captain's Return]
Ato walked through the stone hallways of the Pirate School in a daze. The architecture was ancient, filled with statues of legendary captains and banners of crews that had long since passed into myth. He eventually found the nurse's office, the sharp smell of antiseptic and healing herbs filling his nose.
Inside, the beds were occupied, but his crew was upright. Manjo was sitting on the edge of her bed, her lightning-scarred arms bandaged. She spotted him first and let out a scream that could have woken the Sea Kings.
Manjo: "ATO! WHERE WERE YOU?! WE THOUGHT THAT RED-HAIRED GHOST ATE YOU!"
Ato: "Stop shouting, Manjo! I'm right here!"
He walked to the center of the room, feeling the eyes of Kojo, Lemon, Faramis, and Poison on him. He looked at their bandages, their tired eyes, and the exhaustion etched into their faces. Then, he did something that stunned them all. He dropped to his knees and bowed his head low, his voice trembling with emotion.
Ato: "Guys... we will be staying here for a while. I'm sorry. Because of my choices, because I didn't know what I was doing, you won't be able to follow your own dreams for a bit. You're trapped here in a school because of my bounty."
The room went dead silent. Kojo was the first to speak. He sat up, his hand reflexively resting on the hilt of his black katana. "Oi, Ato. Get your head up. You saved us from six thousand men and twenty captains single-handedly. You took those sleeping darts meant for us. Your head should be higher than anyone's in this building."
Lemon nodded, a soft smile breaking through her pale face. "Yeah! We're a crew, Ato. Your dream is our dream."
Kojo: "We aren't here because we're trapped. We're here because we follow you. We won't do anything unless you say the word, because you are our captain. If you say we become students to get stronger, then we'll be the best damn students this school has ever seen."
Ato looked up, his eyes misty but his resolve hardening. "Thank you very much... Kojo. Everyone."
[Classroom 1-A: The Shockwave]
Two days later, the crew stood outside a massive, heavy oak door engraved with the crest of a crossed sword and an anchor. Inside, the room was buzzing with the voices of hundreds of young pirates. Teacher Sabrina, a stern woman with a scar across her bridge of her nose, tapped a ruler against her palm.
Sabrina: "Everyone, to your desks! We have new transfer students joining us today. Try not to kill them in the first five minutes."
In the back row, a student named King—his hair a vibrant, messy red that mimicked Reno's—leaned back in his chair with a cocky smirk. "Who are they, Teach? Introduce me to them quickly! I want to see if they're worth the effort of a duel."
Beside him, a boy with cold, calculating eyes and a jagged scar across his nose named Martis growled deep in his throat. "Shut up, King. Your voice is giving me a headache. No one told you to talk."
King: "Watch it, Martis! Me and my crew are gonna eat you alive during the next ranking match!"
Martis: "Like my crew would even break a sweat seeing your red-butted monkey face in the arena!"
King: "WHAT DID YOU CALL ME—"
Sabrina: "BOTH OF YOU, SHUT UP!" The ruler snapped against the desk like a gunshot. She turned to the door and signaled for the crew to enter. "Now... first is Poison. No bounty yet, but his combat scores are off the charts. Then we have Faramis Takanaba, the mechanic, with a 5,000,000 e-coin bounty."
The students whispered. Five million was a solid start for a rookie.
Sabrina: "Next, Manjo Shirashi, the cook, with 10,000,000. Lemon Hyokua, the navigator, with 25,000,000. And the swordsman, Kojo Ren, with 50,000,000 e-coins."
The classroom went quiet. Fifty million was legendary for a transfer student. Even Martis narrowed his eyes, sensing the aura of a true swordsman. But Sabrina wasn't finished. She looked at her clipboard, her own eyebrows twitching slightly.
Sabrina: "And finally... their captain. Ato Dragonaid... with a confirmed bounty of Ninety-three Million E-Coins."
The silence that followed lasted for exactly one heartbeat. Then, the room exploded into a deafening, chaotic roar that shook the very foundation of the school.
"WHAAAAAAAAAT?! NINETY-THREE MILLION?!"
King literally jumped onto his desk, his eyes bulging out of his head. Martis stood up slowly, his hand gripping his blade until his knuckles turned white. To the students of the Pirate School, a 93-million-coin bounty wasn't just a number—it was a ghost story. It was the kind of bounty held by monsters who destroyed islands.
Ato walked into the center of the room, looking at the shocked, angry, and hungry faces of his new classmates. He didn't look like a beast anymore. He looked like a King in training.
Ato: "Hi... I'm Ato. I like melons. And I'm going to be the one who surpasses the King."