Story

After hearing Locke's words, Annie slowly vanished inside the cabin.

"All right, get up! She's gone." Watching Annie disappear, Locke spoke to Carmen in his arms.

"She's gone? That's good." Carmen cautiously opened her eyes and glanced around. After confirming that Annie was nowhere to be seen, she finally let out a long breath.

However, after saying that, Carmen did not hurry to get up. Instead, she found a more comfortable position in Locke's arms and lay there.

"I say, she's already gone. Are you still not getting up?" Locke asked as he looked at Carmen, who remained in his arms.

Although Locke did not mind Carmen lying in his arms, having her press against his wound like this really hurt.

"What? Can't you let me lie here a little longer?" Carmen complained.

"But it hurts!"

"Bear with it!" Carmen replied.

"If you don't get up, Annie might come back in a moment." Locke could only say helplessly.

"Hmph!" Carmen was extremely dissatisfied, but she still climbed out of Locke's arms, got off the bed, and headed for the door.

Just as she was about to leave the cabin, she turned back and said to Locke, "I'll come see you later."

Annie, who had just said she was leaving, had not actually gone anywhere. She had hidden to one side, watching everything that happened after she vanished. Only after Carmen left did she slowly emerge from the cabin as well.

She kept muttering, "I knew that woman named Carmen liked Big Brother, but Big Brother belongs to Annie. No one can take him away."

As Carmen walked out of the cabin, she was also thinking about Annie. When she first saw Annie, she had indeed been a little frightened, but only a little. The reason for her earlier behavior was entirely because she had noticed Annie's hostility toward her, as well as the way Annie looked at Locke—it was practically identical to the way she herself looked at him.

Carmen had put on that performance to declare her claim over Locke in front of Annie.

Naturally, Locke had not noticed any of this. After Carmen left, he turned to look at the star-filled night sky outside.

He thought about everything he had experienced in his dream. In the past, Locke had often dreamed of returning to his original world, but the memories of those dreams had never been clear. This time, perhaps because of Annie, he remembered everything from the dream.

When Locke had still been young in his previous life, his mother had told him, "Every star in the sky represents a person, and every shooting star that falls represents someone's passing."

He wondered whether there were stars in this other world's night sky that represented his family from his previous life, and whether they were safe and happy in the world he had come from.

When the cabin door opened again, the three bear brothers shuffled in listlessly. Annie floated through the air behind them.

"Big Brother, I brought them all here." As soon as she entered, Annie flew over to Locke and claimed credit.

"Good, good, good! Annie is amazing!" Locke praised her and patted her little head. Although he could not feel anything solid beneath his hand, Annie wore an expression of pure enjoyment.

"Benefactor!" The three men, who had been listless just moments ago, suddenly perked up when they saw Locke. They dropped to their knees before him and kowtowed several times.

"What are you doing?" Locke had not reacted at all.

After they finished kowtowing, the three stood up. The eldest said to Locke, "The lives of the three of us were saved by you, Benefactor. Whatever you ask of us, we three brothers will obey without complaint."

The third brother said, "Big Brother is right!"

The fourth brother said, "We'll do whatever Big Brother says!"

"Could you introduce yourselves first?" Locke asked, thoroughly bewildered by their behavior from the moment they came in.

"My name is Big Bear, and I'm a blacksmith. This is my third brother, Second Bear, who is a doctor. This is our fourth brother, Panda. He's learning blacksmithing from me." Big Bear introduced himself and his two younger brothers to Locke.

After hearing Big Bear's introduction, Locke no longer felt like commenting on their names. He only wondered why they had no second brother. Had he been eaten, or censored?

"Why were you captured by those slave traders?" Locke asked again.

"Sigh!" Hearing Locke's question, the three brothers looked at one another and sighed. Then Big Bear began telling Locke their story.

The three brothers lived in Bear Bear Village on Bisi Island. Although their parents had died, the brothers were united, and no one dared bully them. When he got a little older, the eldest caught the eye of a village blacksmith and began learning the trade from the old smith.

While out playing one day, the third brother saved the life of the village physician, who had gone up the mountain to gather herbs. The physician then took him on as an apprentice.

The fourth brother was the youngest, and both of his older brothers spoiled him. Unexpectedly, he began hanging around with the village hooligans. Seeing that this would not do, the eldest asked his blacksmithing master to let Panda learn the trade alongside him.

Until a month ago, the three brothers had been living fairly well.

But it was at that time that their lives changed. Big Bear's master had a daughter named Ruhua, the most beautiful girl in the village. She had always treated the three brothers well, especially Big Bear, whom she took great care of. The two had secretly developed feelings for each other, and that very day, Big Bear had planned to ask for her hand in marriage.

However, they had no money at home. While the three brothers were worrying over this, a fellow villager named Laifu told them that he had found a treasure map. As long as they found the treasure, they would have plenty of money.

But when they followed him to this island, they discovered that it had all been one of Laifu's schemes. After drugging the three brothers unconscious, Laifu left them on the island and rowed away on his own boat.

By the time the brothers woke up and realized what had happened, it was already too late. With no other choice, they caught fish in the sea every day to stay alive. For some unknown reason, there were exceptionally few fish around the island. Catching even one fish a day between the three of them was considered good.

Three days ago, the three brothers found a tree on the island bearing three fruits. They did not know what they were, but they had gone so long without fruit that they were already showing signs of scurvy. At Second Bear's suggestion, the three brothers divided up and ate the fruits.

They never expected that after eating them, they would discover they had consumed the legendary Devil Fruits. From then on, they could no longer swim in the sea, cutting off their only source of food.

When that slave ship arrived, the three brothers had thought they were about to be saved. Instead, they had escaped the wolves only to enter a tiger's den.

If Locke had not appeared, the three of them truly would not have known what to do.