Chapter 103: The Going Merry's Fate
Blue sky above, fine weather with a gentle breeze, cool winds rippling across the sea surface, causing soft waves.
Sunlight scattered on the sea, sparkling with dancing golden glints. Seabirds occasionally skimmed past.
Rockyard Bay. The beaches here were exposed rock surfaces, dotted with patches of moss, like a giant sapphire inlaid in a field of emerald green.
The Going Merry rocked gently, moored by the shore. Directly above, a hawk summon soared, its wings momentarily obscuring the sunlight.
The hawk slowly descended to the deck. Reiner and the others had arrived first; the undead left guarding the ship were all recalled as they approached.
"The Going Merry will be alright!"
Usopp was filled with excitement, dancing around on deck and yelling inexplicably, "We found amazing shipwrights to take a look at you! You'll get a major overhaul soon!"
"Alright, Usopp. No need to be that excited."
Nami chuckled irritably. "This is a ship, not a person. The way you talk, it's like the Merry has come alive."
"What do you know, Nami! I saw it before..."
Usopp stood under the mast, hands on his hips, about to retort but then trailed off, unsure how to phrase it. "Ai, forget it, forget it. You guys probably wouldn't believe me anyway."
"You're talking about that night, aren't you?"
Reiner looked strangely at Usopp, probing, "The night before we returned from Sky Island?"
"Hey, wait a minute!"
Usopp immediately ran over, face full of surprise. "Don't tell me! Reiner, you saw it too, right!? I knew it was real! I wasn't sleepwalking!"
"What on earth are you two talking about?"
Nami looked at him, completely puzzled. "The night before we returned from Sky Island? The night we were stargazing?"
"Mm, let me think."
Reiner tapped his temples with two fingers, recalling the moment. "You swiped my cigarettes, so I went down to the first-floor storage to get another pack..."
"Hm?"
"Ahem, let me finish first."
Reiner scratched his golden hair, waving his hands with an awkward smile. "Then I heard a noise on deck. Glanced back and saw Usopp about to head down to the dormitory."
"But, in my peripheral vision, I saw a blue, translucent figure sitting right there on Luffy's special seat. I rubbed my eyes, looked again, and it was gone."
Reiner recounted the scene from memory. Actually, his first reaction at the time was, A ghost!? Male or female?
Only then did he realize the figure's appearance matched the vague memory he had of a ship's spirit (Klabautermann).
"Yes, yes!"
Usopp waved his hands in agreement. "I had just gone out to test the Skypiea Dials I'd collected, to research new weapons! I saw it when I was heading back down to the dormitory!"
"Wait, wait, wait! Hold on!"
The more Nami listened, the more panicked she became, her face turning ashen. "Your descriptions! Isn't that seeing a ghost!? Meaning there's a ghost on the Going Merry!?!"
"What are you saying!? Of course not!"
Usopp loudly refuted. "If it was a ghost! It should be white! And ghosts float! They don't have feet!"
Hearing this, Reiner couldn't help but look strangely at Usopp, glancing down.
A precision strike???
At that moment, on the terrifying three-masted ship wandering the Florian Triangle...
Here, perennial darkness shrouded a gloomy, terrifying forest. Deep within, in a young girl's room in an old castle...
"Horo-horo-horo~ Kumae~"
A pink-twin-tailed loli girl sat on her bed, hugging a heavily stitched and patched giant teddy bear... zombie.
"Achoo!"
"Achoo!" Perona wiped the tip of her delicate nose with her fingers, murmuring puzzledly, "Strange. It's not cold, is it?"
"Whatever! Come play with me, Kumae~ Horo-horo-horo~"
The scene returns to Water 7, aboard the Going Merry docked at the Rockyard beach.
Pat!
Pat! Two figures landed on the deck. It was Luffy, returning with Kaku.
Simultaneously, just as they landed, Zoro's and Sanji's groups of four also appeared; turns out they ran into each other on the way back.
"Zoro! Sanji! Chopper! Robin!"
Luffy yelled loudly, standing on the railing and waving his hands, grinning. "You're back just in time! We brought a shipwright to look at the ship!"
"Oh! Perfect timing then."
"We're here!"
Hearing this, the others responded and quickly jumped aboard. Kaku also rolled up his sleeves, preparing to get to work.
"This is the ship, right? Let me take a look first."
He tilted his head up, starting his inspection from the crow's nest, scanning down the main mast, then glancing left and right for a general assessment.
He jumped up the stairs to the stern deck behind the living quarters, looked around for a bit, then walked back and said slowly:
"Well... the surface condition is already quite bad. It'll need a new 'skin' at the very least. Don't know if you understand what I mean by that."
"Roughly, yes."
"Makes sense." The crew nodded in agreement.
Even without professional knowledge, they could feel from the constant creaking of the wooden planks as they walked that the ship's surface was already dilapidated.
"I've given it a rough look. This ship has been sailing for quite some time, hasn't it?" Kaku said, having inspected the ship from bow to stern, now standing mid-deck facing the crew.
"There's a lot of surface damage. The two most severe areas are: one, the main mast. I'm afraid after a few more storms, it might just snap completely."
The main mast, they could understand. When going to Sky Island, they rode the Knock Up Stream, relying on its upward wind to ascend ten thousand meters in one go.
That kind of maneuver placed extreme strain on the mast and sails; severe damage was understandable. But two spots...
Reiner asked bluntly, "So besides the mast, what's the other spot?"
"The stern deck."
"Hm?" Reiner was puzzled. "Zoro and I train there often. Haven't noticed anything unusual."
"Please trust my judgment."
Kaku pointed towards the stern. "I am a foreman carpenter from Dock One. I just knocked around a bit and found that those planks are actually on the verge of collapse."
"It's just that the mizzen sail is located right there, and the surrounding hull structure is still relatively solid, barely managing to support it. In reality, the signs of heavy pressure there are very obvious."
Hearing this, Reiner was shocked!
Holy crap! So I'm the main culprit!
"Nani! I knew it!"
Usopp grimaced, roaring at him and Zoro, "You two bastards! With your ridiculously intense training all the time, how could the Going Merry possibly withstand it!?"
"Aiya~ But don't worry just yet."
Kaku raised a hand to stop Usopp, comforting him, "Anyway, the entire surface needs a major overhaul. We can just replace it all together. Including the main mast, that needs to be completely replaced too."
"Fine. That's no problem."
Reiner also felt somewhat embarrassed. He hadn't expected the blame to fall on him. He said sheepishly, "Since that's the case, I'll pay for half of the Merry's repair costs this time."
"That's more like it."
Nami shot him an irritated glare, then put her hands on her hips and looked at Zoro. "What about you? Not going to offer anything?"
"Uh!" Zoro's old face instantly flushed red. He didn't have that much money!
Any money he got immediately went to booze!
Zoro could only look embarrassed, then stubbornly yelled at Nami and Usopp, "Wait a minute! Doesn't my training to get stronger also protect you guys!? Why is this being pinned on me!?"
"Oh? Is that so?"
Nami directly looped her arm through Reiner's, pressing her body against him, and flashed a cunning smile at Zoro. "Isn't it always Reiner who protects us?"
"Damn it! You stinking woman!" Zoro gritted his teeth, unsure how to refute.
Only Nami and Robin could leave Zoro this frustrated.
"Ai~~ Alright, Nami."
Reiner sighed. "Don't you know whether Zoro has money or not? I'll cover all the ship repair costs this time."
"Heeheehee! That's truly wonderful!" Nami smiled cunningly.
"The atmosphere on your ship is really nice," Kaku chuckled. "Next comes the main point. I need to go into the hull to check the condition of the keel and the main structure."
"Okay. Sorry for the trouble."
Reiner pointed towards the spot where the mast connected to the deck. "You can go down there. It's the men's dormitory."
"Mm." Hearing this, Kaku lifted the wooden hatch and climbed down the ladder.
"That's great! If Reiner is covering all the repair costs..."
Nami couldn't help thinking about the gold they had just exchanged. "Nine hundred million Beri... Split evenly according to who 'stole' what share... then deduct for replenishing ship funds..."
Nami began counting on her fingers.
As pirates, they naturally had rules for dividing spoils. Each ship's situation was different, so practices varied.
Among them, for small-scale pirate crews like theirs, generally only a few methods applied.
One: The captain handles distribution... Okay, we can rule that one out right here.
Two: Finders keepers. Each person contributes a portion proportionally as common ship funds, the rest is their private stash.
Three: ...
They used the second method, initially proposed by Reiner. Everyone had agreed, but Reiner now regretted it.
The treasure everyone else collected combined wasn't even as much as his contribution to the common funds! And!
Luffy ate a colossal amount!!!
It basically ended up with him constantly using his private funds to support everyone. Later on, aside from Nami, everyone else just slacked off, waiting for handouts!
Finally, on Sky Island, they saw a chance to get rich, which motivated each of them to actually go out and plunder.
They were happy because they finally had their own little stashes. Reiner was also happy because his 'kids' finally learned to earn their own money.
"This way, the ship's funds increased by nearly two hundred million Beri," Nami said, counting on her fingers. "If Reiner pays for the ship repairs, this money can last us a long time."
"For the rest... based on the share plundered... two hundred million Beri for the seven of us... five hundred million Beri is Reiner's..."
"Bastard!"
Nami pointed at his nose and cursed angrily, "Why do you get to plunder so much!?"
"Uh... well, there are only seven of you, after all."
Reiner gestured around, then back to himself. "But I have over a hundred undead."
"How can it be like this!?"
"Yeah, yeah!"
"That's cheating!"
Faced with the crew's indignation, Reiner remained completely unconcerned, stating coolly:
"If I didn't take a bit more, that treasure would just be left behind on Sky Island; it wouldn't end up in your pockets anyway. What are you jealous about?"
"Emmm... that's true."
"Anyway, what's yours is ours."
"Then it doesn't matter."
"Please remove that second sentence. I thank you all," Reiner said speechlessly.
Screech~~
Just then, Kaku opened the Merry's deck hatch and climbed up from the hull.
"Everyone. There's good news and bad news."
Kaku patted his duckbill cap, shaking off dust, his expression serious. "Which do you want to hear first?"
Seeing Kaku's demeanor, the crew couldn't help but be stunned, including Reiner. Because he and Usopp had checked the Merry's keel just two days ago.
They didn't fully understand it, but they were certain of one thing: it wasn't broken!
"I want to hear the good news!!"
Luffy immediately shouted loudly. Of course, he wouldn't hear the bad news first; or rather, he never wanted to hear bad news at all.
"The good news is..."
Kaku paused, not a hint of a smile on his face. "Centered on the keel, the ship's main structure is not broken or damaged."
"Meaning, the main repair work is on the surface. Inside, just replacing a few more severely worn timbers will do."
"That's great!"
"Yeah!!"
"Long live the Going Merry!!"
The crew jumped up excitedly, unable to stop cheering joyfully. Even the usually composed trio (Zoro, Sanji, Robin?) couldn't suppress smiles from spreading across their faces.
However...
"Then... what's the bad news? This already sounds pretty good, doesn't it?"
Reiner's serious expression returned. Kaku's good news meant the Merry was completely salvageable. Why would there still be bad news?
Hearing this, everyone fell silent, looking at Kaku, beginning to worry about the Merry again.
Because the good news was over. Now, only one piece of news remained – news that could only be bad, news that would inevitably strike a blow to everyone!
"Emmm... about that..."
Kaku looked troubled, pondering for a moment. "Seeing you all so happy just now... it's actually a bit hard to say now..."
Kaku looked around at the crew's gazes fixed on him, then braced himself. "Ultimately, it has to be faced. I won't beat around the bush."
"Even if it's repaired this time... this ship's lifespan... actually won't be very long..."
Swish~
Swish~ The waves still lapped gently against the Merry's hull. A red fish floating on the water surface dived into the depths with a 'thump', leaving behind circles of ripples.
A sudden silence fell upon the ship. Everyone stared blankly at Kaku, until...
"Hey! You bastard!"
Usopp's eyes widened, his voice involuntarily rising several notches. "What do you mean, 'lifespan'!? Are you saying the Going Merry is going to die soon!? Speak clearly, damn it!"
"You haven't misunderstood. That is exactly what I mean."
Kaku's expression was indifferent as he delivered words that were like common sense, yet incredibly cruel:
"Ships, naturally, have lifespans. This ship's main structure has obvious wear and tear. Being intact doesn't mean it can be used forever."
"As long as a ship is sailing, even if it's just docked and never taken out, wear and aging are unavoidable. Just like people – born destined to continuously grow old."
"This is an irreversible process. It's the same for any ship. Your ship is no exception."
Whoosh~ A cool breeze blew past, chilling everyone to the heart.
"But! But!"
Usopp grew more agitated as he spoke. "The Going Merry! We've only been sailing since we set out! It hasn't been that long! How could a ship, so quickly, be... be about to...!?"
"This... is a problem of multiple factors."
Kaku pondered for a moment, then organized his thoughts and said, "For example, although this ship hasn't been sailing for long with you, it wasn't newly built when you acquired it, was it?"
"Not to mention its rather retro design, there were actually some signs of aging inside even before you set sail. I can still tell that much."
"Additionally, ship maintenance is also an issue. Based on this ship's condition..."
"You haven't had a professional shipwright on board all this time, have you?"
(End of this chapter)
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