"Am I still blind even after dying? Sigh, where am I? Heaven? Or hell?"
He felt the cold, sinister air around him.
"So it really is hell? Is it because I killed too many people? Heh..."
Barn sat up aboard the ship, sensing this "unfamiliar" world.
"I wonder if Brook and the others came here too..."
With that thought, Barn shouted, "Brook! Mabu! Mondo! Are you here? It's me, Barn!"
Fitz, who had been sleeping soundly beside Barn, woke at his shouting. Seeing Barn walking around and calling out, Fitz tilted its head in puzzlement, then chirped and flew onto Barn's head.
Feeling the familiar weight on his head and hearing those chirps, Barn's unfocused eyes flickered with life, only to dim again an instant later.
"Fitz? So you died too..."
As he spoke, Barn reached up to stroke Fitz, but Fitz pecked his hand away.
"Chirp, chirp!"
"What are you angry about..."
"Chirp, chirp, chirp!"
"What? You're saying I'm not dead? Then where am I?"
"Chirp, chirp!"
"On the ship!"
At Fitz's answer, Barn immediately ran off, feeling around to his left and right.
"This is the mast! This is the fishing platform at the stern! These are the Captain's Quarters! Haha! I'm not dead! Haha! I can be a pirate again!"
With Fitz on his head, Barn raced wildly around the ship.
Thud...
"Ah! What did I trip over?"
Barn reached down toward his feet, but what he touched was a cold corpse. Slowly, his hands worked their way to its face. "Joro?"
He jerked backward, only to touch another corpse.
"Heidi..."
So I'm the only one who survived? Is everyone else gone?
Despondent, Barn felt his heart pounding and the powerful vitality flowing through his body. He clenched his fists.
"Was it the Life Fruit?"
Suddenly, as though something had occurred to him, Barn sprang to his feet.
"That's right, Brook ate the Revive-Revive Fruit too! He's still alive!"
Among the corpses, Barn found Brook, who was only "temporarily dead."
"We'll see each other again in fifty years!"
Holding Brook's head, Barn spoke softly.
Then Barn carried the bodies into the dining room one by one, seating everyone where they had sat in life. Brook sat in the first mate's seat, his head hanging limply. The others were the same. They were only corpses now, every head drooping helplessly.
Barn sat in the seat that had once belonged to Captain York and addressed "everyone."
"My friends, from today onward, I'll be sailing alone. I can't stay with you anymore. You... you have to be happy over there!"
As Barn spoke, he began to cry. For an instant, he almost felt as though everyone had come back to life, each of them patting his shoulder and encouraging him. But when he raised his head, they were all gone... only their corpses remained seated there...
Barn lowered the ship's lifeboat and loaded it with food and fresh water. He took one last "look" at the Rumbar Pirates' ship in the darkness and said with a smile, "Everyone, I'm off!"
Fighting back the tears that threatened to spill again, Barn turned and shouted, "Fitz! Let's go!"
Fitz chirped twice.
Barn took the harmonica from inside his shirt and ran his fingers over the words Brook had carved into it: "Barn Bashut." With a faint smile, he tugged hard on the ribbon around his head, covering his pale, sightless eyes. He raised the harmonica to his lips and once again played that familiar melody from his memories.
"Yohohoho!"
Barn had been drifting at sea for four days. Unable to see, he could only row aimlessly under Fitz's guidance. At last, on the fifth day, just as his food was about to run out, he reached land...
The island was vast, thick with trees and lush vegetation. With Fitz leading him, Barn spent half a month learning its general layout.
It seemed to be a typical tropical rainforest, home to all manner of incredible, exotic creatures, along with many fruits he couldn't name.
At the center of the island stood a great mountain, yet there was a lake at its summit. Around the lake, Barn constantly heard birdcalls unlike any he had heard before.
Perhaps life on this island had once been peaceful, but everything changed after Barn arrived.
Not long after Barn's arrival, a small wooden cabin appeared a short distance from the shore.
At first, the Sea Kings in the shallows and the creatures on the island showed intense curiosity about the cabin that had suddenly appeared. But after countless companions lost their lives, no Sea King dared approach the area around it again...
After defeating the island's three strongest beasts-a lion, a gorilla, and a crocodile-Barn even became its king.
Every day, animals brought food for him and Fitz.
Fitz took full advantage of the opportunity to throw its weight around, borrowing Barn's authority without the slightest hesitation to order about its "underlings," even those dozens, hundreds, or thousands of times its size.
Fishing was a habit Barn had developed over his years with the Rumbar Pirates. As always, aside from training, he spent every day sitting by the sea and fishing.
And, as always, he couldn't catch a single fish.
The difference was that Fitz no longer kept Barn company, because Barn could no longer make its favorite bait. Instead, he had replaced the bait with... fruit. If even Fitz didn't like eating it, how could any fish possibly bite?
What Barn didn't know was that this "island" moved every day. Though it moved very slowly, it was indeed moving.
Because this was not truly an island at all, but an Island Turtle!