A Knife to Start

Faced with the wilderness, where all sorts of unknown things lurked, Dawn, a man raised in the city, truly had no idea what to do.

Survival in the wild was fine to read about in books, but when it came to actually doing it, you were doomed.

If not for the memories of this brat's two years of wandering life inherited in his mind, Dawn would have already felt his end was near. After all, surface-level understanding and practical application were vastly different.

Even if, perhaps because of his transmigration, his past life's memories were etched into his mind as clearly as a brand, so what?

Even if he had read the Pirate Chronicle and knew the course of history, so what?

None of it was of any use. His first priority was simply to survive.

To think that a grown man had to rely on a kid's memories to stay alive.

Dawn found it so bitterly ironic he couldn't even force a smile, because only by truly coming to this world could you understand how much bitterness and cruelty lay beneath its surface.

But this vast world was just like that.

Cruelty and brilliance shone together, the good and the bad all mixed into one.

And because of that, this world was so incredibly vibrant. Battle and power, ambition and dreams—all of it converged into a single word: freedom!

Lawless freedom!!

When Dawn confirmed the current year from those Marines, his memories told him.

The era of great upheaval was almost upon them.

Sea Year 1493.

The future Pirate King, Gol D. Roger, was probably already suffering from an incurable disease.

And afterward, the Roger Pirates would seek out the era's most elite doctor—Crocus—to join their crew and begin their final voyage.

And Crocus, wanting to find the whereabouts of the Rumbar Pirates, would join the Roger Pirates as their ship doctor.

Sea Year 1498.

One year after the Roger Pirates announced their disbandment, Gol D. Roger surrendered himself to the World Government, publicly framed as an arrest.

And Roger's execution site was Loguetown, the place of his birth.

But what the Marines didn't expect was that Roger, through his own death, would pull back the curtain on the Great Pirate Era.

The era began to run wild.

Countless heroes and villains set sail, and before the tide of the era, anyone who stood in its way would be mercilessly crushed.

In this approaching era of great upheaval, only three names would resound across the entire world:

The future Pirate King—Gol D. Roger.

The man even ballads sang of as "more terrifying than a monster," called the world's strongest man—Whitebeard.

The captain of the Flying Pirate fleet, known as the "Flying Pirate"—Golden Lion.

In this era about to spiral out of control, one of the future Four Emperors, Red-Haired Shanks, was merely a cabin boy on Roger's ship.

Kaido of the Beasts was just a major pirate, but his reputation was far from the future title of Emperor, let alone the Calamities.

As for the future female Emperor: Charlotte Linlin of the Big Mom Pirates hadn't even gotten fat yet; she was a woman with a passable face.

But after marrying a ton of husbands and popping out kids like a sow, her figure went to hell...

As for the future Shichibukai, they were each sailing the seas in their own right, but some hadn't grown into their roles yet and had left no trace so far.

For instance, the young Crocodile, just over twenty, was currently burning with ambition to take Whitebeard's head.

And Hawk Eyes hadn't yet become the world's greatest swordsman; he was wandering the world, advancing toward that goal.

These young Shichibukai, who would one day make their names known across the seas, were still on the path of growth.

As for the Marines, there were even three Logia users called "monsters."

And the older generation—Admiral Zephyr, Fleet Admiral Kong, Sengoku, Garp—which one of them wasn't a force that shook the seas?

In an era like this, Abraham Dawn knew that absolute peace was impossible.

At the very beginning, when he first came to this world, all he thought about was going back.

Because it was too dangerous here. Countless unfamiliar things made him instinctively wary, and he wanted to find a place he knew.

But when he accepted the reality, he found that his longing for the quiet of his past life wasn't that strong.

In his past life, as a doctor, through his own hard work and the arrangements of his adoptive parents, he had become a young, wealthy surgeon.

Because he was adopted, his adoptive parents were much older than Dawn. Though they regretted not seeing him marry and have children, for the filial Dawn, they passed away peacefully.

After that, alone, Dawn lived each day like a machine.

Numbly performing surgery on every patient.

Wearing a mask, unable to genuinely feel alive, Dawn might be called a drama queen, but he truly couldn't feel the sensation of living.

Only when he saw battles that made his blood boil did it feel like the fighting instinct born within him was burning, stirring him restlessly.

But without exception, it was suppressed by his professional discipline and will.

Because for someone who craved battle, living in a world full of "shackles" meant a lifetime of mediocrity.

Because the brightest light within you is utterly useless in this world—how could you ever compare to those who can display their talents in an age of peace?

Like a general when the warhorses are put out to pasture: he grieves that he will never again charge into battle and kill enemies, but more than that, he rejoices in the birth of peace, knowing his soldiers will no longer die.

Like Zhang Dawn, who longed for the extraordinary yet melted into the ordinary life of a peaceful world.

Because as a battlefield doctor who had participated in humanitarian relief, he knew that war in this world brought only sorrow—so he had no complaints about it.

But if a world war truly broke out, perhaps the solitary Zhang Dawn might have become a hero fighting for his country and people.

Clearly, though, that was impossible.

What Zhang Dawn never expected was that, on the night he was binge-watching Pirate King for the third time, he drifted off into a daze. There was no infinite loop—but when he woke up, he had become Abraham Dawn.

Even if his previous mechanical life had left him numb, the disregard for life in this world and the sheer difficulty of survival were a leap too far.

It even made Dawn want to return to that peaceful, warm world for a time.

Unfortunately, Dawn could only accept reality in the end—and discovered that this world was the one he truly wanted!

But as a child with sound social values, the former Zhang Dawn, Abraham Dawn with his solid moral compass, had no desire to become a pirate in this life.

Not just because of his past life's convictions, but also because he had personally witnessed the pain brought by pirates who burned, killed, and looted along the way—he himself was a victim of pirates.

After all, he could have sailed smoothly to Marine Headquarters for a golden start, but now even a silver start seemed like a stretch.

Becoming a pirate was out of the question—never in this life would he be a pirate! He wouldn't engage in arson, murder, or plunder, and he wouldn't wear the pirate label for no reason while being hunted by the Marines.

If he had to say it, Dawn belonged to the neutral good alignment—but there was no denying that.

In the work Pirate King, although the Marines were treated as antagonists, it was always the Marines who maintained order on the seas.

Unfortunately, this world wasn't a story told from a pirate's perspective.

Weapons, assassinations, slavery, even the destruction of nations—such darkness was everywhere.

So Dawn felt that joining the Marines to uphold justice was a decent choice.

Grow strong enough to ignore threats, fight the strong of this world, savor its cuisine, and experience the different flavors this unique world had to offer.

Then find a beautiful young woman, and when he grew old, choose a small island to act as its protector, spending his remaining years in peace—that would be excellent.

But all of this depended on one thing: surviving.