Rejecting Red-Haired Shanks's Invitation! Shanks Was Stunned: I Recruited You Personally, and You Think My Ship Is Too Small?

Shanks looked at that long neck and covered his face in despair.

He let go.

With a whoosh, Luffy's neck snapped back to its original shape.

"It's all over now."

Shanks collapsed onto a barstool like a deflated balloon.

Lucky Roux clutched his head and shouted.

"That was the Gum-Gum Fruit we worked so hard to snatch from an enemy ship!"

"How could this brat just eat it like that?!"

Luffy was startled too.

He reached up, grabbed his cheek, and pulled hard.

His cheek stretched out half a meter before bouncing back the moment he let go.

"That's amazing!"

"Did I turn into a monster?"

There wasn't much fear in Luffy's voice. Instead, there was a hint of excitement.

Shanks sighed, his tone incredibly grave.

"You ate one of the sea's most miraculous treasures: a Devil Fruit."

"This was the Gum-Gum Fruit. Whoever eats it turns into rubber all over."

"But the price is that the sea will reject you."

"From now on, you're a landlubber. You'll never learn how to swim."

Luffy froze solid.

He couldn't swim?

For someone who dreamed of setting out to sea and becoming a pirate, it was a bolt from the blue.

All his dreams of sailing were mercilessly shattered at that moment.

Ace doubled over with laughter without the slightest mercy.

"Idiot!"

"You can't even swim, and you want to be a pirate?"

"You might as well stay in the village and become a circus clown!"

Sabo sighed and patted Luffy on the shoulder in consolation.

Kahn wiped the grease from his mouth.

He sneered inwardly.

So what if he was a landlubber?

The value of that fruit was enough to make even those five old fossils in Mary Geoise wary for eight hundred years.

But Kahn had no interest in Devil Fruits.

No matter how overpowered a fruit was, it would still be restrained by seawater and suppressed by Seastone.

That was an utterly unreasonable weakness.

How could it compare to his Kryptonian body?

As long as there was sunlight, he could grow infinitely stronger without a single blind spot.

Seeing Luffy's utterly devastated expression, Shanks's gaze became incredibly complicated.

The threads of fate began to intertwine wildly in this remote village in the East Blue.

Shanks sat up again and had Makino pour him a glass of strong liquor.

He needed to calm himself down.

Yasopp leaned over to Luffy, curiously pinching his springy arm.

"It really feels pretty good."

"Like a giant balloon."

Luffy angrily slapped Yasopp's hand away.

His mind was full of the miserable fact that he could no longer swim.

But that gloomy mood only lasted half a minute.

Luffy was pulling at his own cheeks for fun.

His face stretched out half a meter, thin as a translucent sheet of dough.

The moment he let go, it snapped back with a smack.

Other than a few red marks on his face, he was completely fine.

"So cool!"

Luffy's eyes shone, and his momentary depression had completely vanished.

"Even if I can't swim, isn't it fine as long as I don't fall into the sea?"

This guy's train of thought really was a straight line.

As long as he didn't fall in, there was no problem.

The logic was so flawless that no one could refute it.

Shanks rubbed his temples, feeling like he had worried for nothing.

This brat had a heart big enough to hold the entire Grand Line.

"Forget it. Since you've eaten it, you can't spit it back out."

Shanks sighed and sat back down at the bar.

But he no longer paid any attention to Luffy, who was twisting himself into a pretzel nearby.

Shanks pushed his half-finished glass of rum toward Kahn.

"Hey, big guy."

Shanks smiled like a fox that had stolen cream.

"Interested in joining my ship?"

"We haven't made it to Laugh Tale yet, but we're going to cause a huge stir in the New World."

Ben Beckman blew out a ring of smoke, the corner of his mouth curling upward.

He knew his captain too well.

His captain had taken a liking to talent again.

Although the Red-Haired Pirates followed an elite route, Shanks would never pass up a monster-level prospect like this.

Yasopp whistled as well.

"Come on, kid. Life on this ship is pretty fun."

"You don't seem like someone who can stay in a backwater like this."

Lucky Roux chimed in indistinctly while gnawing on meat.

"That's right, that's right! We've got plenty of meat!"

The air in the tavern seemed to freeze for a second because of that invitation.

Shanks's hand was still suspended in midair. The unfinished rum in his glass swayed, amber liquid reflecting a faint glimmer.

Everyone stared at Kahn.

This was an invitation from Red-Haired Shanks.

Though Red-Haired Shanks had yet to become one of the Four Emperors who would shake the world a few years later, his ship was already something countless pirates dreamed of boarding after he had made such a name for himself in the New World.

Beckman blew out another ring of smoke, amusement in his eyes.

Yasopp toyed with the musket in his hand, seemingly waiting for an affirmative answer.

Kahn cut off a piece of grilled meat still sizzling with grease and put it into his mouth.

He chewed.

He swallowed.

His movements were unhurried, as if he hadn't heard the invitation that could shake the East Blue.

Only after swallowing the meat did he raise his head, those black eyes looking directly at Shanks.

"Not interested."

Three words.

Crisp and decisive, like a hammer slamming down onto the table.

There was no polite refusal, no trembling excitement—just a simple rejection, like turning down a cup of cheap beer that didn't suit his taste.

The smile on Shanks's face stiffened.

"Huh?"

He let out a single syllable that sounded like he was questioning his entire life.

"Why?" Shanks refused to give up. "My ship is big, our cook makes great food, and we're going to sail around the world."

Kahn picked up a napkin and wiped his mouth.

"Your ship is too small."

Kahn pointed upward, toward the sky, the Sun, and dimensions far broader.

"Besides, I get seasick."

That was complete nonsense.

But the excuse was so perfunctory that even Luffy, a single-celled organism, could tell it was a lie.

The tavern fell silent for two seconds.

Then a burst of laughter erupted, enough to blow the roof off.

"Pwahahaha!"

Lucky Roux laughed so hard he could barely hold onto his meat, his fat body shaking wildly on the chair.

"Boss! You got rejected!"

"That's so embarrassing, Shanks! Even an eight-year-old brat doesn't want your lousy ship!"

Yasopp laughed until tears flew from his eyes, frantically slapping the table.

"I told you, that face of yours looks way too ordinary! You don't have even a shred of a captain's dignity!"

The pirates mocked their own boss without restraint.

There was none of the stiffness of a hierarchy between them. That was simply the atmosphere of the Red-Haired Pirates.

Shanks didn't get angry either.

He scratched his red hair and slumped over the bar with a dejected expression.

"That hurts."

"I thought I was pretty charming."

He poured himself another drink, trying to numb the pain of being rejected with alcohol.

"Since this young man doesn't want to, then forget it."

Shanks could take it and let it go. He didn't fly into a rage after being rejected.

That was true magnanimity.

Kahn watched the scene and gave this future Emperor of the Sea a score in his mind.

Not bad.

A man with that kind of broad-mindedness was indeed worthy of that straw hat.

But he truly wasn't interested.

Following a ship around at sea?

Seeing nothing but that tiny patch of deck every day?

That would seriously affect his efficiency in soaking up the Sun.

Besides, being someone else's underling could never be as comfortable as being his own master.

Just then, an inappropriately excited voice came from beside him.

"I want to go!"

Luffy raised both of his rubbery hands and bounced in place.

"Shanks! Take me with you!"

"I can fight too! Even though I'm a landlubber now, I can be a... that thing!"

Luffy racked his brains but couldn't think of what he could do on a ship.

But his desire for adventure was impossible to hide.

Eating a Devil Fruit hadn't discouraged him. Instead, it made him feel that he had become stronger in another way.

Shanks glanced at Luffy.

"You?"

"No, no."

Shanks waved his hand, looking disgusted.

"You're too weak."

"And you're only five years old, just a brat who only drinks juice."

"Come back when you can wipe all that snot off your face."