Aaron's Pet

"Oh! I can see the harbor!" Sitting on the Going Merry's sheep figurehead and idly looking around, Luffy suddenly spotted the outline of a harbor in the distance and shouted in delight.

"Oh?!" Hearing Luffy's shout, everyone stopped what they were doing and looked up.

Sure enough, a triangular archway could be vaguely seen in the distance.

"Great, we're finally here." Usopp let out a long breath. "Let's see if there's any new equipment..."

"I wonder if they have any fresh ingredients here... and beautiful women, of course!" Sanji said expectantly.

"I hope I can find two more good swords." Zoro sighed. He truly felt that hope was rather slim.

"All right! Raise the sails, full speed ahead!" Luffy waved grandly and gave the order.

"Yeah!!"

The moment they docked, Luffy impatiently ran off the ship.

"I'm going to see the execution platform!"

"Hey! We haven't decided on a meeting place yet!" Usopp shouted, but Luffy had already run far away.

Meanwhile, Zoro and Sanji dropped anchor. Looking at the strange pirate ships lined up nearby, Sanji said, "I didn't expect there to be so many pirate ships here."

"Of course. This is the only entrance to the Grand Line. Any pirate from the Four Seas who thinks they have what it takes will head to the Grand Line to make a name for themselves, so this place became the final supply stop before entering it. It's normal for there to be lots of pirates here." Nami emerged gracefully from the cabin, with Aaron following closely behind her.

"Hey, lend me some money. I want to buy a sword." Seeing Nami come out, Zoro stepped forward.

"Sure, but there'll be interest. One Beli on the first day, two on the second, four on the third... doubling every day. How does that sound?" Nami said with a smile.

"Hey! Are you trying to make me pay you back for the rest of my life?!" Zoro roared.

"Well~ what can I do? I seem to recall that someone is completely broke~" Nami narrowed her eyes, smiling like a fox.

"...Tch!" Zoro crossed his arms, his expression dark.

In the end, Zoro still borrowed the money.

Well, he borrowed one hundred thousand Beli at an interest rate of 10 per day.

Yes, not 10%, but 10 times—that was 1000% interest. This simple little word game could trap plenty of people.

...Let us observe three seconds of silence for Zoro.

But it made no difference to Zoro.

Because he could never pay it back anyway.

Well... please mourn for him.

"Aaron, is there anything you want to buy? Do you need me to lend you some money?" Nami lowered her head and asked Aaron, who had been looking around nonstop.

"Huh? No need, I have my own." Aaron pulled open his pants pocket for Nami to see. With Nami's sharp eye, she immediately saw that it was stuffed with nearly five hundred thousand Beli. "Where did you get so much money?"

Aaron scratched his head and answered, "Kaya gave it to me when we were in Syrup Village. She gave me all this so I could buy candy. Honestly, I don't even like candy!"

"..." Nami stared speechlessly at Aaron's indignant face.

What was this? Did Kaya see Aaron as her little brother? Was she spoiling him just because he looked cute?! He was already over twenty years old! Nami thought indignantly, then stared hard at Aaron!

Her gaze was so intense that it startled Aaron. He looked at Nami and waved a hand in confusion. When he realized she had not even blinked, he tilted his head, his big eyes fixed on her, and parted his pink lips slightly. "Nami?"

...Kaya, you did the right thing. Nami closed her eyes, unable to stop herself from agreeing with Kaya's decision.

Cute was justice!

Aaron: "Hello, do you sell insect nets that can catch Sea Kings? Or any kind of net that can withstand a Sea King...?"

Shopkeeper One (tool shop owner): "Oh! What a lovely child. Did you come here alone? Where are your parents?"

Aaron: "Uh... I'm not a child. I'm already twenty-one."

Shopkeeper One (tool shop owner): "Hahaha! Lying is wrong, you know. Here, have some candy and go find your parents."

Aaron: "..."

Aaron: "Excuse me, do you have..."

Shopkeeper Two (dock owner): "Who let a kid in here?! Get him out of here already!"

Aaron: "..."

Aaron: "Excuse me..."

Shopkeeper Three (slave trader): "A child? Such a pretty child?! This is top-quality merchandise. Men, grab him!"

Aaron: "...I have something to do, so I'll be leaving. Sorry to bother you. Goodbye!" He vanished in a flash.

"Looks like this place doesn't have what I want either... Sigh!" Aaron let out a long sigh and wandered down the street with nothing to do.

...He had gone from the tool shop to the docks, then all the way to the slave market. Other than the first place, the other two had absolutely nothing to do with insect nets. Who knew why Aaron had thought to look here?

"Hm? What's going on over there?" Aaron suddenly noticed a crowd gathered outside a shop in the distance. Driven by curiosity, he walked over.

It turned out to be a shop that sold Den Den Mushi.

These naturally occurring magical creatures possessed unique bioelectric signals and could also form matching radio wave signals between each other, allowing individuals to communicate.

When people discovered this trait of the Den Den Mushi, they immediately saw the profit potential. After a brief period of research, they successfully uncovered the Den Den Mushi's various functions.

Spotted Den Den Mushi, black Den Den Mushi, golden Den Den Mushi, surveillance Den Den Mushi, and so on—the various types and uses would not be detailed here. In short, because Den Den Mushi were so widely useful, nearly every island had several shops selling them, making them a decent source of income... And what the crowd was watching was precisely a Den Den Mushi.

However, this Den Den Mushi looked somewhat different from the usual gaudy lot.

Its shell was a rare pink, dotted with pale purple spots, while red spirals wound around it in circles.

Its body was pale blue, and intelligence gleamed in its two huge eyes as it glared furiously at the shopkeeper.

The shopkeeper glared at the disobedient Den Den Mushi, his face extremely unpleasant. Looking at the employees around him, he shouted, "What are you standing around for?! Hurry up and catch that Den Den Mushi and fit it with buttons! Don't keep the customer waiting!"

Hearing this, the employees hurried toward it. One of them quietly circled around behind it, intending to grab its shell and lift it up.

But this Den Den Mushi truly was extraordinary. Its eyes suddenly widened, and it let out a roar to intimidate the employee in front of it. In a crisp, pleasant voice, it shouted, "Cat!"

...What the hell? Did Den Den Mushi sound like that?

Everyone looked utterly bewildered as they blankly stared at the shopkeeper, only to find that he too was staring blankly at the Den Den Mushi.

But the Den Den Mushi was not about to stand there in a daze. Taking advantage of the employees' shock, it spun around at incredible speed and bit one employee's hand. Once the employee jerked his hand back, it quickly crawled away.

It crawled up beside Aaron, climbed his pant leg, and made its way onto his head.

"..." Everyone watched the Den Den Mushi's smooth, flowing maneuver in silence.

"Uh... friend, could you give Uncle the Den Den Mushi on your head? Uncle still needs to sell it..." The shopkeeper looked at the Den Den Mushi glaring at him from atop Aaron's head, cold sweat slowly seeping down his face.

Damn, since when had this Den Den Mushi been so lively? Wait, had I ever caught this Den Den Mushi before? the shopkeeper wondered inwardly.

Aaron tried to take the Den Den Mushi off his head. It did not resist, and Aaron successfully touched its shell. But when he tried to remove it, it began making threatening "woo woo woo" noises, making Aaron afraid to pull too hard.

So Aaron spread his hands. "Sorry, I can't pull him off either."

"Uh... sir, what should we do about this..." With no other choice, the shopkeeper turned toward a man in black nearby.

"Heh heh, it's fine. I'll choose another Den Den Mushi, then." A calm, hoarse voice came from beneath the black robe. He extended an arm and casually pointed at another one inside the shop. "I'll take that one."

"Yes, sir." Seeing that the customer was not insisting on that particular Den Den Mushi, the shopkeeper sighed in relief and directed his men to attach buttons to the one he had indicated.

"Hey, they said they don't want you anymore. How about getting off my head?" Aaron rolled his eyes upward as hard as he could and tried to negotiate with the Den Den Mushi.

"Cat!" the Den Den Mushi roared, and Aaron felt its grip on his head tighten.

"Please come down already. I'm leaving soon."

"Cat!" The grip tightened further.

"Ahhh, don't squeeze so hard! My head's going to explode! What do you want? Do you want me to take you with me?"

"Cat!" This time, the pressure eased.

"Huh? Take you with me? But I don't have any use for a Den Den Mushi..."

"Cat!"

"Ah, it hurts, it hurts! Fine, fine! I'll take you with me!" Aaron jumped around in pain, but the Den Den Mushi remained firmly stuck to his head.

"Boss, how much is this Den Den Mushi?" Aaron asked.

"You really want to buy it? Don't say I didn't warn you—this Den Den Mushi is extremely strange. It won't even let us attach buttons to it, so there's no way to use it at all." The shopkeeper was fairly honest and kindly warned him.

"It's fine if I buy it and don't use it. Maybe he simply doesn't like having buttons attached to him?" Aaron said with a smile.

"...As long as you understand." The shopkeeper nodded. "I'll give you a discount. Thirty thousand Beli will do."

I was a prince of the Snail Kingdom, the fourth son of the Sineo Family, Sineo Grey.

As the most learned person in the Snail Kingdom, I had already read every book in the country. But I was not satisfied with my current knowledge, so I bade farewell to my royal father and came to land alone, wanting to see this world with my own eyes.

Sure enough! The outside world was wonderful! I discovered countless strange new creatures I had never seen before, as well as many novel things I had never heard of.

Unfortunately, the good times did not last. While I was observing the activities of a group of Den Den Mushi—a kind of land snail related to my species—a group of hateful bipedal creatures suddenly appeared and sprayed me with some strange mist. I fell unconscious in a daze, and when I woke up again, I found myself in a shop.

Oh! Damned bipedal creatures, you actually wanted to embed something into my noble shell. Take your filthy hands away at once!

I evaded the creatures' attack and hurriedly climbed onto the head of a foolish-looking boy.

As for why I had chosen this boy from among the vast crowd, I did not know. For some reason, I sensed a familiar aura from him.

The aura of the deep sea.

Huh? How was that possible? Other than my people, no intelligent lifeform had ever appeared in the deep sea.

I became interested in this juvenile bipedal creature. I had decided—henceforth, I would observe him as my subject of study!

"I'll call you Wo."

...Wo? You dared give the great fourth son of the Sineo Family such a name? A name that sounded like a pet's?! Damned bipedal creature, you clearly had not recognized your place! You were merely an experimental subject of mine, Grey! I would have to teach you a lesson!

"Hahahaha! Wo, that tickles! Stop it, Wo!" After Aaron gave it that name, Wo finally climbed down from Aaron's head and crawled all over his body.

"Looks like you really like the name Wo. Ahahahaha, stop moving, stop moving, that tickles, Wo!" Hearing Aaron's words, Wo crawled even faster, and Aaron was nearly laughing too hard to breathe.

Yet this only made Aaron more convinced that Wo really liked the name he had given it.

Ah... There was absolutely nothing wrong with that understanding.

"Young man!" Watching Aaron play around nearby, the black-robed man suddenly spoke. "Do not tarnish your father's reputation."

With that, he led away the Den Den Mushi he had bought, slowly passing beside Aaron.

"My father?" Aaron repeated in confusion. "Is my father famous? Isn't he just a newspaper reporter?" He turned around to ask, only to find that the man had vanished without a trace in the blink of an eye.

"Did he fall into a sewer..." Aaron muttered.

Rumble!

At that moment, thunder suddenly boomed through the sky, and dark clouds gathered in an instant.

"Ah! It's going to rain! Hurry, hurry!" Aaron looked up at the sky, quickly shielding his head with one hand and protecting Wo with the other. After picking a direction, he lowered his head and ran off.

To be continued.