As soon as the voice faded, the black liquid finally finished taking human form.
A woman appeared.
One foot rested on the edge of the deck. A jade pipe hung from her lips. In her right hand was a wooden cup of wine, and in her left, a matchlock gun. Draped over her body was a hooded linen cloak.
The moment Kurogane Ren saw her face clearly, he blurted out, "Miss Xu Nian!"
Then he pounced on her.
Only to get slapped away in the next instant.
Ren clutched his face, tears practically welling up.
Staring at the heroic, sharp-eyed woman in front of him, he couldn't help swallowing.
Xu Nian.
A character from The Journal of the Mysterious Nations.
She was a true master of firearms, combining the strengths of both Eastern and Western guns.
Her weapons were the Seven Incense, capable of firing seven bullets at once, and a long-range sniper-style matchlock called Long Wind Across Ten Thousand Miles.
But Xu Nian wasn't just a firearms genius.
She was also an extraordinary inventor.
In the anime, she had written a book called Divine Weapons Register, a catalog of all kinds of incredible weapons. Even in the world of One Piece, many of those inventions would still have a place.
Among them, the most useful was likely Xiaoyaoyou.
In the anime, it involved building a warship onto the body of a whale, allowing for underwater travel and high-speed movement.
But in the One Piece world, Xiaoyaoyou could become even more terrifying.
Because here, there were creatures far more suitable than whales.
Sea Kings.
At that moment, Xu Nian, who had just slapped Ren, finally spoke.
"What an interesting world."
Then she turned to look at him and asked, "Does that mean you can summon Apothecary as well?"
Ren naturally knew who she meant.
Her beloved.
Back when he had watched the anime, he had practically been force-fed a mountain of sugar by those two.
And yet the production team truly had no mercy.
They never ended up together in the end. Worse, they were separated for decades and never even got to meet one last time.
It really was the perfect example of this:
The sweeter it was at the start, the crueler the knife at the end.
Ren answered honestly, "In theory, yes. But in practice, it would be incredibly difficult. Character Summoning Cards are already rare, and there are countless worlds out there. The odds of specifically pulling Apothecary are way too low. Sister Xu Nian... you understand what I mean, right?"
"I do."
Only then did Ren remember—
Xu Nian was a true genius.
And not just an ordinary genius. She was the kind of genius who stood above a whole crowd of other geniuses.
Setting aside the limitations of her era, Ren knew full well that his knowledge couldn't compare to hers at all.
Then Xu Nian continued, "As long as I stay with you, there is still hope of seeing him again. I've already waited ninety years. Waiting another ninety wouldn't matter."
Only then did Ren remember that, according to the anime, Xu Nian's lifespan had somehow become extremely long, while Apothecary had died early.
Looking at it that way, staying with him really did give her a chance to see him again.
Ren then turned to the system and asked, "By the way, do summoned characters know where they are?"
"During the summoning process, this system implants certain basic knowledge about the world of One Piece into the summoned individual's mind."
"Oh."
Then Ren took out a 98k and the Mauser pistol and handed them to Xu Nian.
"You can use these for now."
Xu Nian took both guns without hesitation and immediately began studying them.
As expected of a weapons expert, she clearly didn't need him to explain anything.
Watching her fiddle with the firearms off to the side, Ren's gaze shifted toward the two remaining Character Summoning Cards.
He considered using them both right away.
But after thinking it over, he decided to keep them for now.
...
"So... how far is the next island, exactly?"
They had already been sailing for more than four days, and still hadn't reached land.
At the moment, Martha was handling the ship's navigation.
Xu Nian spent all day up on the mast with the 98k in her arms, either smoking or drinking.
As for Ren, he had become the one in charge of all three daily meals.
No helping it. He had the Cooking Master title. If he didn't cook, who would?
At that moment, Xu Nian suddenly spoke.
"Captain. Ship ahead."
Over the past few days, Ren had insisted that both Martha and Xu Nian address him as Captain.
"Can you tell who they are?"
After days at sea without seeing another soul, they had finally run into someone.
Xu Nian raised the scope she had removed from Long Wind Across Ten Thousand Miles and took a careful look.
"There's a skull flag on the ship. Pirates."
Ren immediately pulled out his flip-flops from the storage bag and shouted, "Prepare for battle!"
At that same moment, the pirates aboard the approaching ship had already spotted Ren's vessel as well.
"Captain! There's a ship ahead!"
"Oh? What kind of ship?"
"No pirate flag. Looks like an ordinary merchant ship."
The pirate captain burst out laughing.
"Hahaha! Boys, catch up to them at once!"
"OHHH!"
The pirates on board roared excitedly.
"Captain! They're not running! They're actually charging straight at us!"
"What?"
"Captain, should we open fire?"
"Open fire? Are you idiots? If we blow the ship apart, that's a huge pile of money wasted! Since they're asking to die, then don't hold back! Boys, let's show them the might of the Skunk Pirates!"
"OHHH!"
Watching the pirate ship draw closer and closer, Ren turned to Martha and Xu Nian.
"You two stay on our ship and support me with rifle fire. I'll go aboard theirs alone."
Both Martha and Xu Nian were absurdly accurate shots. Leaving them behind to provide ranged support would be far more useful.
Ren stepped onto the bow.
He bent his knees slightly—
then kicked off with all his strength.
The bow dipped violently under the force of the jump.
And Ren shot into the air.
Boom!
He landed on the pirate ship.
The impact was so great that the deck beneath his feet cracked apart.
Then Ren planted his left hand on his waist and pointed a flip-flop at the entire pirate crew with his right hand.
"You're surrounded. If you want to live, hand over your treasure immediately. Otherwise, don't blame me for getting rough."
The entire Skunk Pirate crew stared at him in stunned silence.
Sure, Ren dropping out of the sky had scared all of them badly.
After all, the distance between the two ships had been well over a hundred meters.
But once they got a clear look at him, they couldn't hold it in anymore.
They burst out laughing.
"Hahahaha!"
"He's holding a pair of flip-flops and telling us to surrender? I'm dying here!"
"That's right! What kind of clown is this?!"
...
The captain stepped forward, sneering.
"Brat, looks like you really don't know the height of the heavens or the depth of the earth. You dare order me to hand over my treasure? I'm Skunk Jerry, with a bounty of seventy-five million beli!"
As he spoke, he pulled out a pistol and aimed it at Ren, ready to fire.
Bang!
Before he could shoot, his pistol was blasted out of his hand.
It was Xu Nian.
One perfectly timed shot had struck Jerry's gun.
Ren glanced back.
Up on the mast, Xu Nian slowly drew on her pipe, then exhaled a lazy ring of smoke in his direction.
Ren turned back and said, "Everyone, my crew has you in their sights. We don't want to kill anyone. Hand over the treasure, and we can all walk away peacefully."
By now, Jerry understood perfectly well that the enemy ship had a terrifyingly skilled sniper aboard.
So he immediately raised both hands.
"Alright, alright! I surrender! I'll hand over the treasure!"
Then he turned and shouted, "Boys, go bring out the treasure!"
"Yes, Captain!"
More than ten pirates rushed toward the hold under Jerry's orders.
Even Ren hadn't expected things to go this smoothly.
A single shot had completely cowed the entire pirate crew.
But with his back turned to Ren, Jerry's lips curled into a sly grin.
The next second, Jerry suddenly stuck out his backside and dropped low against the deck.
Before Ren could react, a cloud of yellow smoke exploded outward.
The yellow smoke spread rapidly, blanketing the entire pirate ship.
The moment Xu Nian saw it, her expression changed.
"Not good."