You Be the Pirate King, I'll Be a God

This was a promise.

It was also a wager on an era.

Luffy finally couldn't hold it in anymore. Huge tears rolled down his cheeks and fell into the dirt.

He clutched the brim of his hat and let out suppressed sobs.

Shanks straightened up and turned toward the ship.

As he passed Kahn, he paused.

"Won't you see me off?"

Kahn stepped out of the shadows, and sunlight instantly washed over his entire body.

He glanced at the hat on Luffy's head, then at Shanks's perfectly intact left arm.

Good.

History had taken a turn here.

The wager that should have ended up in a Sea King's belly had never happened.

Because of Kahn's existence, Shanks didn't need to lose an arm to inspire Luffy.

He only needed to see hope.

"Nothing much to see you off with."

Kahn took a wild fruit he had picked in the mountains from his pocket and casually tossed it to Shanks.

"Try not to die too early in the New World."

"Otherwise, when I set sail, it'll be boring if I can't find any opponents."

Shanks caught the fruit and took a bite. It was crisp and sweet.

"Don't worry, kid."

"I'll be waiting for you there."

The anchor chain rose.

The red sails unfurled.

The Red Force slowly sailed away from Foosha Village's harbor with the current.

Luffy stood on the shore, waving his arms and crying like an abandoned puppy.

Ace and Sabo came over as well. Though neither spoke, the longing for the sea in their eyes was impossible to hide.

Kahn looked up at the sky.

The Sun hung at its zenith, when his strength was at its peak.

He could feel that the gears of fate had not stalled just because he had preserved Shanks's arm.

Instead, that tiny deviation had created a future that was even more chaotic and interesting.

"Pirate King?"

Kahn muttered to himself.

He stretched out a hand as if to grasp the Sun in the sky.

"Luffy can become his Pirate King."

"I'll become my god."

"That's a good deal."

He turned and looked at Luffy, who was still sniffling.

"Hey, snot-nose, stop crying."

Kahn walked over and smacked Luffy on the butt.

"Get back and train harder."

"Shanks said 'an outstanding pirate,' not 'an outstanding crybaby.'"

Luffy suddenly turned around and used the Straw Hat to cover half his face.

He was still sniffling, but his eyes had changed.

"I understand, Brother Kahn!"

"I'll definitely defeat you!"

Kahn chuckled.

"First, try surviving tonight's special training."

The screams of little brats rang out through the woods of Mount Colubo once more.

Meanwhile, aboard the pirate ship sailing farther and farther away.

Ben Beckman leaned against the rail and looked at his captain.

"Boss, you chose Luffy in the end."

Shanks sat atop the railing, holding the fruit pit in his hand.

"Yeah."

"Kahn is too strong. A person like him doesn't need anyone to show him the way."

"He is the way."

Shanks looked out at the endless sea.

"But this sea needs a different kind of color."

"A color that can make everyone laugh along with it."

He rubbed the top of his bare head. It still felt a little strange.

"Let's go, boys!"

"Destination: the New World!"

Cheers shook the sky.

In that unremarkable little village in the East Blue, three seeds had been planted.

One would become the future Pirate King.

One would become the future commander-in-chief of the Revolutionary Army.

One would become the future Fire Fist.

And above them, the Sun named Kahn was expanding wildly at a speed that would make the entire world tremble.

At that moment, on the back mountain of Foosha Village.

Kahn sat in a clearing he had flattened with a single punch.

He was trying a new way of circulating his energy.

He was merging the Bio-Energy within his body with that faint trace of "qi."

He discovered that when he entered this state, the gravity around him warped.

Massive boulders weighing dozens of tons began to float soundlessly.

The leaves stopped falling.

Even the stream flowing past began to run backward.

This was not a Devil Fruit ability.

This was absolute suppression by a higher level of life.

"Still not enough."

Kahn opened his eyes.

At that instant, his pupils turned completely golden.

The dust on the ground was blasted away in an instant, exposing the hard bedrock beneath.

"In three more years, when my body reaches its developmental bottleneck, I'll go take a look at Marineford."

"I want to see what Garp's old comrades are really made of."

He stood up, feeling every cell in his body cheering with excitement.

The pleasure of growing stronger was richer than any fine wine.

Not far from him, Ace was dragging a rock three times larger than his body as he crawled through the mud.

Sabo practiced handstand push-ups at the edge of a cliff, blood already seeping from his fingertips.

Luffy was trying hard to control his rubber arm, attempting to hit a fly passing through the air.

Kahn watched the three busy brats, a sense of indescribable contentment filling his heart.

This was his territory.

If anyone dared come and wreck it, he would send them into the Sun for a hot bath.

Whether they were Celestial Dragons or Ancient Weapons.

Before him, they were all trash.

"Hey, move faster!"

Kahn's voice echoed through the valley.

"If you don't finish before dinner, go bask on the mountaintop for an hour."

At the words "bask for an hour," all three brats shuddered at once.

They had seen what happened when Kahn "basked in the sun." The ground around him would melt.

"Got it—!"

Their bright reply pierced the dense forest and flew into the vast blue sky.

Thus, the curtain on the new era was forcibly smashed open by a transmigrator's fists.

No one knew what the future would become.

But Kahn knew.

As long as he stood here.

Justice would rest in the palm of his hand.

And the skies would always clear for him.

The sunlight that year was especially scorching.

The grass and trees of Mount Colubo curled beneath the heat.

Kahn still lay atop that polished, gleaming boulder.

He was nine years old that year.

His height had already surpassed 1.9 meters.

His muscles seemed sculpted from the hardest granite, every line containing explosive strength enough to tear apart sea beasts.

Sweat ran down his spine, only to be evaporated by the heat radiating from his skin before it could hit the ground.

The golden energy in his body had become as dense as a pool of magma.

It was the life essence of Kryptonians.

As long as he stood beneath the Sun, he was the only true god in this world.

Luffy trained in the clearing at the foot of the mountain.

Six-year-old Luffy was still a tiny runt, but his body's flexibility was absurd.

He wrapped his legs around a massive tree trunk that took several people to encircle, turning himself into a giant slingshot.

"Rubber—Bazooka!"

Luffy shouted as his body shot forward.

His head slammed directly into the rock ahead with a dull thud.

The rock did not break, but Luffy's face was flattened.

Then it quickly bounced back into shape.

He repeated this kind of self-destructive training hundreds of times every day.

Ace and Sabo were sparring.

Nine-year-old Ace and ten-year-old Sabo had already mastered the Navy Six Powers with remarkable proficiency.

The two darted through the forest at high speed.

Their toes tapped the air, producing deep sonic booms.

This was Geppo pushed to its limit.

They moved so quickly that they left afterimages.

Their water pipes collided, sending sparks flying everywhere.

Though they had yet to awaken powerful Haki, their pure martial arts skills were already enough to slaughter most pirates in the East Blue.

Such rapid progress was inseparable from Kahn's "kind guidance" every night.

"Too slow."

Kahn muttered without opening his eyes.

His Super-Hearing could catch the slightest irregularities in their breathing rhythms.

That was a warning sign of physical exhaustion.

"If you don't want to die at sea, squeeze out every last bit of strength."

At Kahn's words, Ace and Sabo both paused.

Then they gritted their teeth and accelerated their attacks once again.

Just then, a black dot appeared on the eastern horizon.

Kahn slightly opened his eyes.

His vision could make out the foam atop waves ten kilometers away.

It was the unmistakable dog-headed ship's prow.

The flag of Marine Headquarters flew from its mast.

That old man Garp had returned.