Marine Recruit Secretly Saves Slaves, Zephyr: I Saw Nothing

On the third night after the fleet returned.

Lin Yuan lay in bed with his eyes closed, but no matter what he did, he couldn't sleep.

Scenes from the island replayed in his mind: the old man's ashen face, the woman's cries, the child's body twitching in a pool of blood, and the Celestial Dragon's grating "Fuffuffuffu" laughter.

"Heh heh heh..." He gave a low chuckle, but there was no amusement in it, only coldness.

He opened his eyes and sat up.

The moonlight outside was bright, falling across the dormitory floor like a layer of frost.

Lin Yuan put on his shoes and slipped silently out of the dormitory.

He went neither to the training ground nor to the cafeteria, but to the docks.

Several warships were moored there, including the one that had carried out the mission a few days earlier.

Lin Yuan boarded the warship and went down into the lower hold.

His Observation Haki was still very weak, but it was enough to sense that several "living things" were being held in the ship's lower hold.

Two

At the very back of the lower hold was a cell reinforced with seastone.

Lin Yuan stood outside the cell and looked through the iron bars.

Five children were locked inside. The oldest looked no more than twelve or thirteen, while the youngest might have been only five or six. They were dressed in rags, covered in injuries, and curled up in a corner, their eyes vacant.

They were the Celestial Dragons' "trophies" from the "hunt."

After each year's hunt, the Celestial Dragons would pick out some slaves who were "pleasing to the eye" to take away, and dispose of the rest on the spot.

This time, the Celestial Dragons had taken three with "good looks," while the other five had been left aboard the warship to be taken back to Marine Headquarters for "disposal."

As for what "disposal" meant, Lin Yuan didn't want to guess.

He raised a hand and lightly drew it across the cell door.

A faintly glowing door appeared out of thin air.

Lin Yuan stepped through and appeared inside the cell.

The children looked up in terror at the person who had suddenly appeared.

"Shh." Lin Yuan put an index finger to his lips. "Don't make a sound. I'm here to get you out."

He crouched down and removed the slave collars from the children's necks one by one. They weren't made of seastone, just ordinary iron locks. He opened a tiny door in each lock cylinder, and the locks sprang open on their own.

"Follow me."

Lin Yuan opened another door in the cell wall.

Beyond it was the beach outside the docks.

Three

Lin Yuan brought the five children to the beach.

The sea breeze blew, carrying a salty, fishy smell. The children stood on the sand, trembling all over, unsure whether to run or stay.

The youngest, a little girl, suddenly burst into tears.

Lin Yuan crouched down and looked her in the eyes.

"What's your name?"

"X-Xiaomei..."

"Xiaomei, you're safe now." Lin Yuan's tone was calm. "There's a fishing village ten li north of here. You can hide there for a while."

"Th-then what about you?" Xiaomei asked between sobs.

Lin Yuan stood up and looked toward the distant warship.

"I still have something to do."

Four

After the warship returned, Lin Yuan had kept an eye on what happened to the five children.

On the third day, word came that traces of an escape had been found on the beach near the docks, but no one had been found.

The Marines assumed they had drowned at sea and didn't investigate further.

Lin Yuan breathed a sigh of relief.

But a bigger problem arose.

Zephyr called him in for a talk.

"Sit." Zephyr pointed to the chair opposite him.

Lin Yuan sat down.

"Lin Yuan, how long have you been in the Marines?"

"Two years, instructor."

"Two years..." Zephyr nodded. "Not long, but not short either."

He was silent for a moment, then said, "You let those five children go, didn't you?"

Lin Yuan's heart skipped a beat, but his face remained expressionless.

"Instructor, I don't know what you're talking about."

"Heh heh heh..." Zephyr suddenly laughed, a low sound that seemed self-mocking. "You know what? I could tell at first glance that what you disguised as Soru wasn't Soru."

Lin Yuan's pupils contracted slightly.

"That was a Devil Fruit ability, wasn't it?" Zephyr stared at him. "A spatial ability."

Lin Yuan was silent for a few seconds, then nodded.

"Yes."

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"Because..." Lin Yuan weighed his words. "Because I didn't know whether I should trust the Marines."

Zephyr wasn't angry. He simply leaned back in his chair and looked at the ceiling, remaining silent for a long time.

At length, he said, "I won't report what happened with those five children."

Lin Yuan looked up.

"But remember one thing." Zephyr's gaze sharpened. "In the Marines, people who are 'disobedient' like you don't live long."

"I know," Lin Yuan said.

"Then why did you do it?"

Lin Yuan met Zephyr's gaze.

"Because I'm human. Instructor, so are you."

Zephyr fell silent.

Then he stood up and walked to the door, his back to Lin Yuan.

"Next time you do something like this, clean up after yourself. Don't make things difficult for me."

"Yes, instructor."

Zephyr pulled the door open and walked out.

The moment the door closed, Lin Yuan heard Zephyr's voice from outside, very soft, as though he were talking to himself.

"That kid... he's just like I was when I was young."

Five

In the days that followed, Lin Yuan became even more cautious.

He trained under Zephyr during the day and developed the Door-Door Fruit's abilities on his own at night.

The radius of his spatial perception expanded from fifty meters to two hundred. The maximum distance at which he could open a door also increased from one hundred meters to five hundred.

More importantly, he developed a new application: Space Folding.

The principle was simple: "fold" two locations in space together to create a shortcut.

The procedure: open doors at the starting point and destination simultaneously, then "overlap" the two doors.

The effect: a journey from point A to point B that would originally have taken five hundred meters now required only one step.

The cost: enormous physical exertion, along with an extremely high demand for precision in spatial perception.

Lin Yuan tried it three times, succeeding twice and failing once. The time he failed, the spatial backlash shook him so badly that he bled from all seven orifices and nearly died.

"Heh heh heh..." He wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth, grinning like a madman.

"Interesting."

Six

That night, Lin Yuan was practicing Soru on the training ground—real Soru, the kind that didn't use his fruit—when he suddenly sensed a powerful presence approaching.

He immediately stopped using his fruit ability and pretended to be practicing physical techniques.

A moment later, a tall figure appeared at the edge of the training ground.

Sengoku.

Lin Yuan stood at attention and saluted. "Admiral Sengoku!"

Sengoku waved a hand, walked over to Lin Yuan, and looked him up and down.

"You're Lin Yuan? The 'Soru' genius Zephyr mentioned?"

"You flatter me, Admiral Sengoku."

Sengoku stared at him for a few seconds, then suddenly said, "Your Soru is a Devil Fruit ability, isn't it?"

Lin Yuan's heart skipped another beat.

Zephyr had seen through it, and now Sengoku had too?

"Don't worry, I have no interest in exposing you," Sengoku said calmly. "I came to see you about something else."

"What is it?"

"On your last mission in the South Blue, you saw the Celestial Dragons' hunt. Do you think... that was just?"

It was a dangerous question.

Lin Yuan knew Sengoku was testing him. If he said it wasn't just, he would be questioning the World Government; if he said it was just, he would be lying.

Lin Yuan chose a third answer.

"Admiral Sengoku, I don't know what justice is. But I know those children didn't deserve to die."

Sengoku was silent for a long time.

Then he turned to leave, walked a few steps, and suddenly stopped.

"Lin Yuan, if you ever leave the Marines, I won't pursue you."

"Why?"

"Because you don't belong here."

Sengoku left.

Lin Yuan stood where he was, watching Sengoku's retreating figure, the corners of his mouth slowly rising.

"Heh heh heh..."

"You're right. I don't belong here."

"And this world shouldn't be the way it is now, either."

(End of chapter 3)