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The body in his arms was warm, her breath brushing his neck.
The girl froze for a few seconds before slowly raising her hands.
Her skin was smooth, free of the pale marks that had once spread across it.
She cupped her brother's face, trembling fingertips tracing his cheekbones, eyelids, and forehead.
"The spots... they're gone?"
"Yes."
Luo nodded, that single word carrying an immense weight.
Sobs rose around them, gradually joining together.
The boys and girls standing throughout the cabin covered their mouths as tears rolled down their faces.
They had trained day and night, driving their fear deep into their bones, but the shadow of death had always hung overhead.
An attack, sleep, then waiting-waiting without knowing whether they would wake.
And now, the first person to awaken stood in the light.
Cheers finally erupted, mingled with sobs, striking the metal walls and echoing into a roar.
For the first time, the word "future" had taken a definite shape.
At the doorway, Jora watched it all quietly.
A smile spread through the fine lines at the corners of her eyes, more genuine than any words.
She had raised these children in her care and remembered every sleeping face.
"I told you he could do it."
Rossi leaned against the wall nearby, his tone as casual as if he were discussing the weather.
His gaze swept across the room, passing over every tear-streaked face before settling on the embracing siblings.
When Luo had only twenty-one days left to live, he had swallowed that Devil Fruit.
Inside the cave, there had been only the faint sounds of a blade scraping against flesh.
He had cut open his own chest and stripped away the lead-gray poison bit by bit.
Things were different now.
Resources supplied by the Donquixote Family filled