Bounty

In the cool, quiet restaurant, only one table still occasionally echoed with the sound of chewing.

"Luffy, are you okay?" Usopp asked worriedly.

Luffy's stomach was already swollen round like a giant balloon.

Yet he still clutched food in both hands, stuffing it endlessly into his mouth.

"I'm totally fine!" Luffy gulped down the food filling his mouth. "I've never had anything this delicious before!"

"I definitely have to get him on the ship! Chomp!" As he spoke, he shoved more food into his stomach.

"...Tap. Tap."

Reiner and Sanji walked out of the kitchen side by side. Sanji exhaled a long stream of smoke. "Fine. I'll go with you."

Luffy turned around, an excited grin gradually spreading across his face. "I won!—Hic!"

"I only agreed to join the ship. I didn't admit defeat!"

"Shishishi, then you won. I can't... hic... eat anymore."

Luffy's voice gradually wilted. After speaking, he collapsed onto the floor, swaying like a roly-poly toy with a blank look on his face.

Nami and Usopp couldn't help themselves. They each stood on one side and pushed Luffy back and forth for fun.

"Honestly." Reiner held his forehead and sighed. "Because of your contest, the bill for this meal is probably through the roof."

A chef with thick arms and a face like Popeye's ran over with a fawning grin.

"Thank you for dining with us~, sir. Your total comes to 1.2 million Beli."

"That's outrageous! You're robbing us!" Nami shouted indignantly before anyone else could speak.

Though Reiner handled the money, it belonged to the entire pirate crew's fund. Of course Nami felt the pain.

"It's fine, Nami." Reiner waved his hand.

This was, after all, a high-end restaurant famous throughout the East Blue. Its prices being high was only natural, especially after Luffy's meal.

"Here's ten million Beli. Use the rest to prepare and pack some ingredients for us."

Reiner took out a bundle of large-denomination bills and handed it over. "Sanji, go pack up and get ready first. We'll set sail soon."

After finishing all that, Reiner went outside the restaurant.

Krieg's fleet was a massive armada of five thousand men. Just feeding them was an enormous expense.

There ought to be some treasure or cash aboard their main ship.

With that thought, Reiner released dozens of Fish-man Undead and had them jump into the sea to salvage it.

These were more than sixty Fish-man Undead he had taken from Arlong Park. To better make use of their affinity for water, he had kept features such as webbed hands and fins.

He could shape ordinary human templates into fish-man forms as well, but he could not grant them their attributes or swimming skills. Those could only be inherited from the templates.

After quite a while, Sanji emerged with Luffy and the others, carrying a huge backpack full of things.

Most of it was ingredients, while the rest was Sanji's cooking equipment.

"Let's go, Reiner!"

"Yeah! Wait a second!" Reiner answered. Dozens of dark shapes gradually surfaced in the sea.

Fish-man-shaped undead emerged one after another with bubbling gurgles.

"Let's see what they found."

Reiner controlled the undead as they came ashore and walked over.

Some had returned empty-handed, while others carried scattered treasures and soggy, wrinkled banknotes.

"Oho!" Nami's eyes turned into dollar signs again as she hurried over.

"Nicely done, Reiner."

"Don't praise me. Being nice won't get you any."

Reiner had the undead carry all the treasure aboard. After saying goodbye to Baratie, the group set sail.

Not long after they began sailing, a News Coo wearing a white cap landed on the ship's railing.

"Did the price go up again? If it goes up next time, I'm not buying it anymore. Got that?"

"You bastard, you're even bullying a News Coo." Reiner laughed and scolded her.

"None of your business." Nami stuck out her tongue, sat down in a deck chair, and started reading the newspaper.

"This is..."

"Your bounty posters!?"

Hm?

Reiner jolted in surprise and sat up, taking the bounty posters from Nami's hands.

Hearing that, Luffy and the others crowded around as well.

The first one was unmistakably Luffy, a half-body photo of him grinning beneath his straw hat. Judging by the background, it had been taken at Arlong Park.

That angle looked like a candid shot. One of Colonel Nezumi's men?

"Captain of the Straw Hat Crew, Monkey D. Luffy, 30 million!"

Seeing the long string of numbers below, Usopp clutched his face and cried out in shock.

Luffy, however, looked thrilled. "Shishishi, what's next? Are there more?"

Reiner impatiently pulled away the first poster, secretly alarmed. I clearly didn't show myself. Don't drag me into this. I really don't want a bounty on my head anytime soon.

"Roronoa Zoro, 16 million!"

"Oh? I got a bounty too?" Zoro couldn't help curling his lips into a smile.

Reiner found it rather strange. If he remembered correctly, Zoro should have first received a bounty of sixty million after the Sand Kingdom incident.

"Was it because he took part in surrounding and killing Arlong?" Reiner pondered.

After Zoro's bounty poster was removed, only one remained. But the figures on it were not Reiner.

"Sword-Chainsaw Duo?" Reiner looked at the two figures on the poster in confusion.

The Sword Devil and Chainsaw Devil had bounties?

That was good news, but why wasn't it the Wolverine Undead that had ambushed and killed Arlong?

"Combined bounty for the duo: 25 million!"

A bounty issued to a pair, like Kuro's Nyaban Brothers?

"The Marines got it wrong, right? Why isn't Reiner himself wanted?"

"No, no, no. This is right. It's absolutely right!"

Reiner looked through the newspaper again and found that the Wolverine Undead had been reported as perishing together with Arlong.

He recalled how Arlong had snapped the undead's neck with a hand blade, leaving its head hanging crookedly to one side.

Meanwhile, the two Sword-Chainsaw Duo undead had been photographed clearly as they slaughtered their way through the battlefield.

Nami had not been given a bounty. The person taking candid photos had probably slipped away once Arlong fell.

Night descended. Across the dark sea, only a single small ship gave off a faint glow.

At that moment, Reiner and the others were drinking and clinking cups in the second-floor living room aboard the Going Merry.

"Let's welcome Sanji aboard. Cheers!"

"Cheers!"

They were celebrating Sanji's arrival. Now Reiner had both a smoking buddy, Sanji, and a drinking buddy, Zoro.

All that was missing was... ahem.

The King's left and right hands, his band of drinking pals.

"Today was quite a haul."

"Yeah! Not only did Sanji join us, Reiner also salvaged a huge pile of money!"

"Stop fishing for information, Nami." Reiner rolled his eyes at her.

The treasure they had recovered today was worth around fifty million in total.

It was a little low. Pirates lived dangerous lives with blades at their throats, never knowing whether they would survive tomorrow, so whenever they got money, they tended to squander it.

A fleet of five thousand men had only managed to save fifty million.

"The Grand Line is very close now."

After taking a sip of wine, Nami said to the others, "We should reach Twin Capes and enter the Grand Line before noon tomorrow."

"However... there's a large town on an island nearby."

"I think you might be interested in it. Should we stop there to resupply?"

"You mean Loguetown, right?"

Sanji spoke with understanding. "It's called the town of beginnings and endings. More than twenty years ago, Gol D. Roger was executed there."

"That's so cool!" Luffy immediately grew excited at the mention of it.

Come to think of it, Reiner had something to take care of in Loguetown too.

After entering the Grand Line, his first target would be the two giants of Little Garden, followed by Crocodile.

He still could not use Armament Haki. Going after Sand Crocodile without it was not very safe.

Loguetown was not the biggest town in the East Blue, but thanks to its location near Twin Capes, as well as its historical significance as the site of Roger's execution, it was exceptionally prosperous.

It was also a place where all sorts of people mingled together. Reiner planned to check the black market for Seastone.

If the rumors that a certain underground organization operated there were true, he might have a chance to buy some.

The night sea was dark, like endless black fog carrying loneliness and fear as it enveloped the Going Merry.

Only dim yellow light remained in the cabin. Interwoven shadows and sounds of laughter brought a trace of comfort to the Going Merry.

It was not alone.

The white sheep's head sailed quietly and slowly through the boundless darkness.

I'll carry everyone there,

no matter where the next stop may be.