Chapter 3

If someone had told him yesterday that he would be dangling outside a ship's rail, climbing, he probably would have taken it as an absurd joke.

But now, the feel of the blade biting into wood was so real, the splinters packed beneath his nails were so real, the burning emptiness in his stomach was so real.

Survival was never a multiple-choice question. It was the hand the body instinctively reached out before a fall.

The scrawny figure on the windowsill finally stopped moving.

When his fingertips hooked over the edge of the window frame, he could barely feel his body at all-apart from the faint, burning rise and fall in his chest, everything else felt submerged in ice water. He could not even bend his knuckles.

Still, he gripped the little knife's spine between his teeth, wedged its edge into the gap in the wooden window, and pried, little by little.

The instant the window sprang open, he pitched forward through it.

The kitchen floor rushed up to meet him, carrying the mingled smell of old grease and flour.

He lay there with his ear pressed against the planks, hearing only the bellows-like rasp of his own breathing.

A long time passed before he slowly drew up his legs and reached to untie the rough hemp rope around his waist.

The knot had stiffened with sweat and blood. It took several attempts with his nails to loosen it.

He tied the other end of the rope to the heavy iron leg of the stove, securing it with a tight knot. Only then did he push himself up and bring his face to the window.

Moonlight slanted in from the sea, illuminating the hand he held outside-three fingers curled in, his thumb and forefinger forming a circle.

On the rope hanging outside the window, another figure moved.

Hanging upside down, the figure used both hands and feet, moving along the rope with inhuman speed.

Moonlight outlined Sanji's tousled blond hair and oversized clothes. Like a nocturnal monkey, he swung to the window in a few bounds, flipped lightly inside, and landed without a sound.

But the moment he entered, his eyes fastened on the wooden shelves against the wall.

Things were piled on them-dark strips, round chunks, and stacks wrapped in oiled paper.

His gaze locked onto them, and he even held his breath.

"Here."

The child who had climbed in first pulled something off the shelf and handed it over.

He grabbed a long, dry, hard strip for himself and stuffed it into his mouth. His teeth closed with a crisp crack, as though snapping some tiny bone.

Sanji froze as he took the food.

"...Did it stop working?"

He kept his voice low, an incredulous tremor running through it.

The child already eating shook his head and raised a finger to his lips.

"Listen."

Only chewing remained in the kitchen-dry, hurried sounds, almost greedy gulps.

Apart from that, there was nothing.

No muffled thud of waves against the hull, no wind howling through the rigging, no groaning creak of planks. Even the snores that might have existed in the distance had vanished.

This space was wrapped in an absolute "emptiness,"

as though it had sunk inside a clam shell in the deep sea.

Sanji slowly relaxed his shoulders.

"Is this... a 'wall'?"

"Yes. A soundproof wall."

The explanation was brief.

The ability really was not much use, but at least it was easy to handle-unlike powers that required precise control, it needed only a thought to cut this room off from the outside world.

It did not make sound disappear. It stopped sound from passing through these four wooden walls.

"Ha..."

Sanji suddenly laughed. The sound was quiet, but his shoulders shook hard.

He lowered his head and bit fiercely into the food in his hand, his white teeth sinking into its golden-brown crust.

He ate without restraint, as though the two of them were the only living things aboard.

The child who had eaten first went to the corner, where several wooden barrels stood.

He lifted the lid of one, scooped up half a cup of liquid with the iron cup hanging from its side, and tipped his head back to drain it.

Warmth burned from his throat into his stomach, then spread through his limbs. His frozen fingertips began to tingle, an itch that almost made him moan-it felt like coming back to life.

"Don't just eat one thing,"

he reminded him hoarsely. "Take a little of everything. It's less likely to be noticed."

The two children got to work, feeling their way through the shadows beyond the moonlight.

They took small pieces of bread, broken dried fish, and crumbled flatbread off the shelves, stuffing them into their clothes and their mouths alike.

The moonlight illuminated only their rapidly working jaws and bulging cheeks, like two young mice stealing food.

Neither noticed the thick wooden kitchen door trembling slightly.

An extremely faint scrape of metal came from the hinges-a key turning in the lock.

But the sound could not enter. Even the creak of the door opening was swallowed by the absolute silence.

The door opened.

An obese figure blocked the doorway, backlit, like a mountain of flesh that had suddenly descended.

Both children in the kitchen froze, their mouths still full of unswallowed food.

The man in the doorway froze too, his eyes widening on his round, fat face, reflecting two oily gleams in the darkness.

Time stood still for a second.

Then the fat man opened his mouth wide-there was no sound, but his entire face contorted and veins bulged in his neck. He was clearly roaring.

His enormous body charged inside with unbelievable agility. His right hand swept over the nearby shelf and drew out a long, narrow, pointed knife. The blade flashed in a cold arc beneath the moonlight, slashing straight toward the nearest child-the one who had climbed into the kitchen first, who still held half a dried fish.

A cold gleam filled Rossi's vision.

Almost instinctively, he tensed. That dormant power surged within him, but proved as futile as waves crashing against a reef.

The cold metal was already descending toward his forehead-

Bang!

A dull report burst out.

The massive body in front of him suddenly bent backward. Something warm splashed onto Rossi's cheek, carrying the metallic tang of rust.

Then came the tremor of something heavy striking the floor. Several kitchen knives bounced with a clatter, tracing brief silver lines through the dimness.

Silence.

He turned his head.

Doffy stood a few paces behind him. A barely visible wisp of smoke still drifted from the muzzle of the old-fashioned pistol in his hand.

Doffy's lips moved without a sound, but the words were clear: Are you hurt?

Rossi lowered his head and bit hard into the dried fish clutched in his hand.

Its salty, fishy taste flooded his mouth, mixed with the stronger taste of blood.

He had arrived in this world only moments ago, and the successive shocks made his stomach spasm.

Silently, he swallowed the food, and the curse churning in his throat along with it.

This damned... place.

"Get out here! You two little brats-"

Raucous shouting shattered the Pinta's

morning the next day.

Orders came down from the captain, level after level, and everyone still breathing was driven onto the main deck.

"Everyone"

covered a broad range.

Not just the sailors whose skin bore deep salt-scoured grooves, but also a dozen or so passengers who had paid their fares, and the two children crammed into the hold like cargo-Doffy and Rossi.

"What's going on?"

"Stop pushing! I paid for my ticket!"

Amid complaints and shoving, the deck quickly filled.

Men in grease-stained headscarves, travelers wearing unseasonably thick coats... faces of every description were exposed to the salty sea breeze.

"Everyone, quiet, please."

A voice rose, not loud, but bearing a deliberately polished inflection.

The speaker was a mustached man with a black top hat firmly in place, leaning on a gleaming silver cane.

He raised his chin slightly as he spoke, surveying the crowd as though inspecting stains on the deck.

This was the Pinta's

owner, Sir Krahorn.

A fallen nobleman whose family fortune was exhausted, forcing him to accompany his ship to sea himself.

"Something regrettable happened last night."

The knight began in the tone of someone discussing afternoon tea, but his gaze was like an ice pick, slowly piercing every face on deck-the boatswain's tight jaw, the navigator's evasive eyes, the passengers' uneasy expressions, and even the two scrawny figures in the corner.

"Our head cook, Dika, met with an unfortunate end."

He paused, lightly tapping the silver head of his cane against the deck.

"Someone was hiding in the kitchen.

When Dika merely went looking for something to fill his stomach, what awaited him was a fatal blow."

"Then his body was thrown out through the kitchen window."

The knight continued, little compassion audible in his voice. "By now, he is probably a guest in some sea fish's stomach."

This was the story the captain had pieced together from the disorderly traces in the kitchen.

Though parts of it did not bear close examination, Dika was dead. That was an indisputable fact.

The kitchen lay directly beneath the captain's quarters.

Anyone who could dispose of Dika without a sound could slip into his room the same way.

Dika? A mere servant.

How could he compare to Sir Krahorn's own life, or his grand plans to restore his family's fortunes?

The sea swallowed every trace. It was the cleanest way to disappear.

Someone actually dared challenge his authority aboard this ship?

Unfortunately, the knight was no detective. He would never have imagined that the tall cook's killers were two children everyone had overlooked.

As the noble captain's gaze scraped across the deck like a blade, the boy named Rossi was staring absently at the sea.

He silently counted out the year: 1494.

The girl named Robin should have just entered this world. As for Hancock, she had only been born last year.

And Doflamingo... what could be glimpsed through those sunglasses?

"Impossible!"

The first objection exploded.

The speaker had a gleaming bald head, and his thin shirt could not contain the contours of his rocklike muscles. "If Dika was murdered aboard last night, were all of us deaf?"

Many heads bobbed in agreement.

Indeed, even the deepest sleep should have been shattered by the commotion.

"Then,"

the noble captain's sinister gaze pinned itself to the bald boatswain's face, "you explain it-how did Dika die?"

"Alec, you shared a cabin.

You should know better than anyone."

"Are you accusing me?"

The bald man's fingers abruptly closed around the hilt at his waist! Several nearby sailors, though unsure what was happening, had already reached for their weapons: the wooden grip of a hatchet, the curved mouth of a saber's scabbard, the cold hammer of a Flintlock Pistol.

"Stop!"

The instant the air grew thick with the threat of violence, even those coat-clad "guests"

lifted their coat hems, revealing the weapons tucked at their waists.

The navigator, wearing a waistcoat and bow tie, stepped forward, trying to quell the tension with his voice.

"Alec, the captain isn't accusing you."

"But surely you should have noticed something unusual when your cabinmate met with disaster?"

The flesh on the boatswain's cheek twitched.

He was this ship's sharpest blade, always at the forefront of every fight and negotiation.

Yet the nobleman hiding behind him claimed half the profits.

His resentment had long since piled up into a reef.

As for why the head cook had been made to share his cabin-it was called looking after him, but it was really surveillance.

Everyone understood that.

So the bald man never paid the fat man any attention.

As long as he was not disturbed, he could not be bothered to look up, whether the other man was passed out drunk or wandering around.

"I was sound asleep. I didn't hear anything."

"The legendary 'Blood Blade' Alec, said to grip his knife even in his dreams, now claims he slept too deeply..."

The navigator's regretful sigh sent veins bulging at the boatswain's temples.

"Shut up!"

The boatswain abruptly raised his hand and pressed it against the saber at his waist. The scabbard struck a metal buckle with a brief, sharp clink.

His bloodshot eyes swept over the two men before him, and a hoarse voice forced its way through his teeth.

"I'll say this one last time-I didn't see that fat bastard."