Kaya's Father

Outside of studying, he joined several hundred chat groups for idle chatter, followed dozens of popular online communities and forums, and even downloaded Kuaishou and Douyin, apps he had never used before. Worried that superpowered people might appear overseas, he even set up a VPN to access the foreign internet.

But after observing for over a month, he still had not found a second superpowered person.

He did not know whether they did not exist, whether they were hiding like him, or whether they had already been recruited by the authorities.

"No more waiting!" Zhou Qi shook his head. Faced with the temptation of an entire world, enduring for a month had already shown considerable restraint.

The second time he opened a cross-world portal, Zhou Qi's mindset had shifted from curiosity to anticipation, with a touch of wariness.

It was still that herb garden. All kinds of medicinal plants grew lush and verdant within it, seemingly no different from when he had last visited.

"So not much time has passed!" Zhou Qi lowered his head and tried to identify the herbs.

Ginseng, atractylodes, licorice, Chinese yam.

Of course, a month was not enough to turn him into a master of traditional Chinese medicine. He had taken pictures during his previous visit, then used image-recognition software to look them up one by one afterward.

"They're all herbs for replenishing qi and nourishing the blood!"

He opened another Space Gate the size of a basketball. At the same time, another Space Gate unfolded in the sky more than a thousand meters above his head.

Through it came a view looking down from sixteen hundred meters in the air. Zhou Qi was nearsighted, but he had bought binoculars.

This was an island situated on the sea. All kinds of brick and stone buildings stood in neat rows across it. At a glance, it was clearly a planned city. The buildings also shared a unified style, showing that this was a fairly advanced civilization.

At the center of the city stood a complex of buildings with a training ground.

Zhou Qi adjusted his binoculars and looked at the triangular flag hanging from one of the buildings.

It had a white background, with a dark blue, stylized seagull emblazoned upon it.

"So it really is the Marines from One Piece..."

Zhou Qi turned his binoculars toward the front of the Marine base. There was a wide-open plaza there, and in its center stood a square wooden platform roughly as tall as the surrounding buildings.

It was an execution platform.

"Loguetown?" Judging solely from the flag and the structure of the execution platform, it did match Loguetown. But it was hard to say for sure.

What if every Marine base had the same layout?

"Y-you! Who are you? How did you get in here!?"

"Hm?" Zhou Qi had been so absorbed in watching that he had not noticed someone entering.

When he turned around, he saw a middle-aged man in a white shirt and baggy trousers, holding a medicinal hoe. The man stared at him with terror written all over his face.

He was afraid of me?

Zhou Qi looked at the Space Gate behind him, which had yet to close and showed a white wall, then at the Space Gate in front of him, which overlooked all of Loguetown.

Clearly, in the One Piece World, people like him belonged to only one group.

Devil Fruit Users.

The man was not afraid of him. He was afraid of a Devil Fruit User.

Still, judging by his clothes, he did not seem to have much status. Could someone like him know that Devil Fruit Users existed?

Or perhaps...

Maybe most people knew, and it was the pirates who were ignorant and uninformed?

"Go get whoever's in charge!" Zhou Qi closed the Space Gate above his head and spoke calmly.

Though he was panicking inside, he had to remain composed if he wanted to seize the initiative.

"Ah, th-this, yes!" The man froze for a moment, then hurriedly turned around and jogged away.

Zhou Qi did not leave either. The herb garden was not large, and there was only one door leading outside. He could see everything at a glance, so it was relatively safe.

If he went out and there were armed men lying in wait outside, what then?

He did not have to wait long before he heard a clamor of footsteps.

A middle-aged man with an extraordinary bearing entered. He was dressed elegantly and had short, light golden hair.

Behind him followed four or five attendants who looked somewhat timid.

Zhou Qi had already slipped his hand into his pocket. They looked like attendants, but what if they were not?

Better safe than sorry.

"Th-this esteemed sir..." The leading middle-aged man wore a fawning smile as he performed a gesture Zhou Qi did not recognize. "May I ask what you require? I will definitely help you resolve it!"

"Esteemed sir? Why are you calling me that?" Zhou Qi asked.

"Uh..." The man froze, then pointed at the Space Gate behind Zhou Qi. "A noble Devil Fruit User like you should naturally be addressed as esteemed sir..."

Devil Fruit Users were not actually noble, and most of them did not deserve to be called esteemed sir.

Because they were mostly pirates.

And Zhou Qi looked fairly young, so the man quickly came to a conclusion: this was a newly established Devil Fruit User.

Young meant immature. Maybe he had a bad temper too. Say a few words, and he might find you annoying. Maybe he would even kill you...

Pirates had no morals. Some even took pleasure in killing people, and could raise their bounties in the process.

Of course, Devil Fruit Users were not necessarily powerful fighters, but the middle-aged man was no fool. There was no need to test that with his life.

Whatever he wanted, just give it to him, then send him away as quickly as possible. That was the sensible thing to do.

To avoid offending this Devil Fruit User, he had not even reported him to the Marines.

As for why he assumed Zhou Qi was a pirate...

What normal person would steal someone else's medicinal herbs?

Zhou Qi silently studied him for a few moments before asking, "This herb garden belongs to you?"

"Yes!" The middle-aged man hurriedly nodded.

"What's your name?" Zhou Qi asked.

"Tannis," the middle-aged man answered cautiously.

Zhou Qi nodded, then asked, "You deal in medicinal herbs?"

"Uh, my main business is maritime trade. Medicinal herbs are only an industry I entered in recent years!" Tannis quickly replied, though an uneasy feeling rose within him.

Didn't ordinary pirates just take some money and leave? Why was this man asking so many questions...

"By the way, how long has it been since I last came here?" Zhou Qi asked again.

"Uh, one month?" Tannis did not know why Zhou Qi was asking, but he answered honestly.

"You..." Zhou Qi was somewhat speechless. He was being far too cooperative, to the point that Zhou Qi had no chance to make a move.

Weren't the nobles in One Piece supposed to be brain-dead?

Still, a month had passed in reality, and a month had passed here too. Was time synchronized?

That was not good news at all!

"How long has it been since Roger was executed?" Zhou Qi asked again.

"Sixteen years!" Tannis replied.

So it really was One Piece. As for the date, it was Grand Line year 1516—one year before Ace set sail, and four years before Luffy did.

"Who is currently in charge of Loguetown?"

"Smoker..."

"Have you heard of Tashigi?"

"Uh, she is the daughter of Luge, the Marine base's logistics officer? She only joined the Marines this year..."

"Hm?" Zhou Qi was taken aback. This merchant was a little unusual. What ordinary person paid attention to a girl who had just joined the Marines?

"How do you know so much? Are you really a legitimate merchant?" Zhou Qi asked.

"Ah, well, they are the administrators of our Loguetown. As a merchant, it is only natural for me to pay attention!" Tannis hurriedly said. "Besides, when Corporal Tashigi joined the Marines, Lieutenant Colonel Luge held a banquet. I was fortunate enough to attend..."

"I see!" Zhou Qi nodded. It seemed this merchant held no small status in Loguetown. He was not the sort of merchant who set up a stall on the street—at the very least, he was streetlamp-tier.

"You don't need to be so nervous. I'm not a pirate!" Zhou Qi put away the Space Gate behind him and walked over to Tannis. "Let me introduce myself. My name is Lelouch V. Britannia, and I'm also a merchant..."

"Huh?" Tannis's face twitched. Clearly, he did not believe him.

"How about this? Let me show you one of my products." Zhou Qi reached into the Space Gate, then pulled out a glass bottle filled with capsules.

He casually tossed it over, and Tannis hurriedly caught it.

"What is this?"

"Amoxicillin, an antibiotic. It can be used to treat all kinds of inflammation. You can find someone to test its effects first. If you're satisfied, then we can discuss cooperation?"

"This..." Tannis looked at the medicine in his hand, somewhat doubtful. Still, capsules required a certain level of technical skill. They were not something a small workshop could easily produce.

Could this be some kind of illicit medicine?

After all, if it truly could treat all kinds of inflammation, it should have long since become widespread across the world. He should not have been unaware of it, much less never even heard its name.

If it was illicit medicine, why come to him? Did he want him to smuggle it?

But I'm a legitimate merchant!

Yet when he thought of another possibility, Tannis could not bear to refuse. His face twisted with indecision.

Zhou Qi saw his hesitation and reassured him, "Don't worry. The source of the medicine is absolutely legal and legitimate, and it has nothing to do with any faction. Go find someone to test it first. I'll take a look around outside..."

"Th-then, alright!" Tannis finally nodded. Though he still did not understand what Zhou Qi wanted, if he was a non-pirate Devil Fruit User, cooperation was not impossible.

That was right. He did not actually care much about how good the medicine was. Rather, he felt that having a Devil Fruit User protect his family business could save them a great deal of trouble.

The premise was that this Devil Fruit User truly was not a pirate.

Following Tannis out of the herb garden, Zhou Qi entered the Tannis family villa.

That was right. The Tannis family was not part of Loguetown's densely packed urban district. Their home was one of the many detached villas on the edge of town. They were extremely wealthy.

Beyond the villa was a cliff. Ordinary pirates could not possibly come up from that side, making it very safe.

The entire villa covered more than 3,200 square meters. To own such an enormous villa in a major trading hub like Loguetown, which connected the East Blue and the Grand Line, Zhou Qi could only curse inwardly: damn capitalist.

"You have such a large estate, yet you personally came to meet a pirate?" Zhou Qi asked curiously. "Aren't you afraid of dying?"

Tannis sighed. "I am fairly well-known in the East Blue. Ask around outside, and anyone can tell you whose residence this is. There are also photographs of me in the newspapers. If a pirate learned that I had deceived him, I could not withstand the retaliation that would follow. It is better to be honest from the start. Pirates generally do not kill merchants, after all. Otherwise, who would do business with them..."

He might genuinely have been complaining, but Zhou Qi felt he was showing off.

There were many servants in the villa. After seeing more of them, Zhou Qi realized that the clothes worn by the man holding the hoe earlier were the work uniforms of this merchant family's slaves.

"Your family business is so large, but your herb garden is so small?" Zhou Qi asked. "At that scale, it would not even be enough for a single pharmacy!"

"The herb garden is merely a test field from when we experimented with medicinal formulas years ago. It was kept because of certain reasons." When Tannis mentioned this, his tone visibly grew more subdued. "The real herb fields are elsewhere, totaling sixty thousand mu..."

Sixty thousand mu was quite something.

"Medicinal formulas?" Zhou Qi became interested. "What kind of formulas?"

Medicinal formulas from the One Piece World might not exist in the real world. If he brought them back, they might become a huge industry.

"This..." Tannis hesitated, but after thinking about it, there did not seem to be anything worth hiding.

"Quite a few people know about this, actually!" Tannis said. "Although my family has a considerable fortune, I have not done well when it comes to carrying on the family line. I have only one daughter, and she has always been frail and sickly..."

"Six years ago, we invited a famous doctor to prescribe a formula to strengthen my daughter's body. To give her the best herbs, I thought that rather than buying them from the market, I might as well cultivate them myself."

"I see!" Zhou Qi nodded. "Parents always want the best for their children!"

Wait...

Zhou Qi looked at Tannis's short light golden hair, then at the lavish furnishings and solemn architecture around them.

Rich family, frail and sickly daughter, blonde hair?

"May I ask what your daughter's name is?"

"Uh, her name is Kaya, but she's only twelve this year..."

Who asked how old she was?

But it really was Kaya's father. No wonder!