[A/N:
I am so sorry for the delay for this chapter — my laptop gave up on me, the touch pad wasn't working and keyboard too, my display simply froze, and it took longer than expected to get everything flowing properly.
Also, I experimented a bit with the tone here. Less narration-heavy, more dialogue-driven. Still mythic, still soft with silence, but I tried letting the characters breathe more on their own.
I hope the shift feels right to you. Feedback, as always, is a blessing. And I hope you enjoy this chapter as well as next one(the next one is the compensation for the delay)]
The sea was quiet that morning — too quiet for goodbye.
Even the sun hadn't risen yet.
The tide rolled in without sound, brushing the shores of Foosha Village like an old story retold with softer ink. Krishna stood alone on the cliff's edge, facing the horizon. Wind tugged at his long coat, and his shadow leaned slightly forward, as if already departing.
And still, he stood at the edge of the cliff behind Foosha, the sea below as silent as his breath. Krishna had no bag, no flag, no written goodbye. Just the long black coat fluttering behind him, a pale ribbon of peacock blue stitched inside the collar.
His face was bare — no mask, no hood. Just his midnight black eyes staring out toward something only he could see.
Sheshika coiled loosely around his shoulders, silent and still. She hadn't spoken since dawn.
"You're not sneaking away, you know," came a voice behind him.
Krishna didn't turn. He knew who it was.
The soft pad of footsteps approached.
Makino didn't announce herself. She never had to.
She approached slowly, arms folded against the chill, green eyes soft but sharp. "You're terrible at pretending you're not trying to protect us by leaving."
He said nothing. Just stared at the horizon.
"I figured you'd leave without saying anything," she said quietly, stepping beside him. Her eyes searched the lines of his face, still too young, still too burdened. "But I also knew you wouldn't leave without looking back. Even if just once."
Krishna didn't look at her. But his posture shifted — just enough. His silence wasn't cold. It never had been. It was the silence of someone holding something in.
Makino raised a hand and gently smoothed his hair back, the way she used to when he was just a strange little boy wrapped in blankets on her porch. "It's grown longer," she murmured. "You're growing into yourself. Every piece."
She hesitated.
"I just hope you don't grow too far away."
Krishna's eyes, those midnight black oceans, flickered for a second. Then he gently bowed his head, just slightly, and allowed her to finish brushing his hair.
"Makino," he said finally, voice low. "Thank you."
Makino smiled. "Then come back when it's time."
"I won't forget the way back," he said. His voice was even, but low. Heavy.
Makino hugged him — not with joy, but with faith. He allowed himself to relax in her warmth, just for a second. "That's all I ask."
Behind them, a loud, purposeful stomp echoed from the house.
Dadan emerged with her arms crossed and her expression scrunched into something gruff and wet-eyed. "Oi! Brat!"
Krishna turned — and got a frying pan tossed at his feet.
"You're not even taking food? Idiot."
"I'll find some."
"You'll starve, fall into the sea, and I'll have to explain to Garp that his golden child got eaten by a sea slug."
"He wouldn't believe you."
Dadan scowled. "No, but I'd still be pissed."
She reached into her pocket, pulled out a handmade lunch wrap, and shoved it into his hand. "You better not be planning to fast your way across the ocean, you weirdo monk."
Krishna took it with a small nod, brushing the dirt from the cloth. "Thank you."
"Hmph. Whatever."
She looked away too fast, wiping her nose with her sleeve.
Ace came next — arms crossed, scowl fierce, eyes unreadable. He didn't say anything at first. Just stared. Then,
"You're not the only one who can fight, you know," he muttered softly.
"I know."
"Then don't go thinking you have to do everything alone."
"I don't."
Ace clicked his tongue. "Tch. Then hurry up and come back before I beat your record."
Krishna raised an eyebrow. "Which one?"
"...All of them."
There was a bit of silence between them, then Ace said, looking away, "You better come back stronger."
Krishna tilted his head. "I thought I was already stronger."
"You are. That's why it's annoying." Ace snorted. "But it'd be more annoying if you got lazy. So… don't."
Luffy barreled out the door right after — bare feet skidding on the grass, hair messy, half-asleep but fully alert the moment he saw Krishna by the cliff.
He rushed forward and wrapped his arms around Krishna's waist, burying his face in his coat. He tackled him so hard it jolted even Sheshika.
"Don't go," Luffy muttered, muffled into Krishna's chest.
"Not long. Not forever." he said. "It's gonna be quiet."
Krishna placed a hand on Luffy's head, ruffling it gently, "You're loud enough for three."
Luffy sniffled. "Promise you'll come back."
Krishna knelt, arms wrapping around the boy who still felt like the sun. "I'll be back before your next dumb idea gets you killed."
"That's tomorrow," Luffy smiled shakily.
"Then I'll run fast."
They both laughed — just a little. It caught Makino off guard. Dadan looked away. Ace clicked his tongue and kicked a rock.
Sheshika flicked her tongue out in a rare gesture of affection and tapped Luffy's nose before coiling tightly again around Krishna's neck.
From the internal comms, Medha's voice crackled,
"Leaving again, hmm? Should I program dramatic background music? Or just overlay wind chimes?"
Krishna didn't speak. But he smiled — not big, not wide — just enough that it reached his eyes.
Makino saw it. Her breath caught.
He stood up, fully now, and began walking to the docks.
His mask had not yet formed.
But every step sounded like the first of something vast, something… inevitable.
At the dock, the fishing vessel bobbed lightly on the tide. Krishna stepped in with nothing but the clothes on his back, the weight of silence, and a peacock feather tucked near his collar.
No flag. No crew. No name spoken.
But as the small fishing vessel drifted into the sea, Makino's voice rang from the cliffside.
"Come back changed," she said. "But still you."
Dadan raised her arm as if to say something… but let it drop.
Ace didn't wave.
Luffy did. Twice.
Krishna didn't respond. But just before his mask reformed — seamless and smooth from his nanomachines — he turned his face slightly to the wind and whispered,
"That's the hard part."
And so, he vanished into the dawn.
Not a legend. Not a god.
Just a boy… still becoming.
Time Passed quickly.
They didn't know what to call him.
Not the villagers of Goat Island. Not the fishermen of Three-Point Bay. Not the traveling merchant who arrived a day too late to meet him and found his cargo already returned — and his attackers bound and gagged beside a neat pile of stolen goods. Not the children in fog-drenched towns who whispered of a tall boy in black who never asked for thanks and always walked away.
But they all remembered one thing.
The feather.
Where the feathers landed, silence followed.
Where silence fell, peace stayed.
And where peace stayed… someone had made it happen.
The sun was just a whisper behind the fog as Krishna stepped off a boat barely held together by rope and rust. A ferryman tried to thank him — but the boy was already gone, walking along the mist-covered path through the forest beyond.
He didn't look back.
He never did.
A small village nestled in the trees had been struggling for weeks.
A leftover pirate group — splintered from a bigger crew Krishna didn't care to name — had been bleeding them dry. Not with flashy violence, but with slow, cruel demands. More food. More goods. Fewer people to speak about it.
That morning, as the fog settled low across the fields, the pirates found their weapons missing.
One tripped over a sword embedded in a tree stump — still warm, as if recently drawn.
The leader, a greasy man named Pike, barked orders and turned to grab a hostage as leverage.
That's when he saw him.
A boy — tall for his age, face half-covered in a matte black mask, coat moving as though the mist obeyed him.
Behind him, a single feather floated down. Blue and gold. Not natural. Not normal.
Pike hesitated. "Who—"
The boy moved.
He didn't attack first — just walked forward, calm as prayer.
The mist thickened. And then Pike screamed.
They found the pirates bound and unconscious by the well. No one had heard a fight. No one had seen the boy arrive.
But every child in the village swore they'd seen a shadow standing beneath the well's arch, hand on the rope, eyes glowing like silver fire.
They also swore he left something behind — folded neatly on the bench outside the bakery.
A feather.
Later, as the sun bled orange across the sky, Krishna sat beneath an old tree near the ridge, one hand resting on the earth, the other gently brushing his coat sleeve where some pirate blood had dried.
Below the tree, a stray dog approached warily — ribs visible, limping from some old wound.
Krishna didn't move. He just reached into his coat and placed a rice bun gently on the grass.
The dog sniffed. Then ate. Then stayed.
Krishna started petting it softly, and just sat beside it.
He could feel the wind changing — more than just weather. Patterns in the sea, undercurrents in rumor.
He didn't know it yet, but the world was starting to murmur about him.
Not Krishna.
But the one who walked without leaving prints.
The one who never spoke his name.
The one who left feathers — and peace — behind.
Back in the village, an old woman stood at her door, holding her grandson's hand. The boy pointed at the sky.
"There he goes," he said. "The feather man."
"No, child," the grandmother whispered. "Feathers fall. But this one… he climbs."
That night, the wind changed in three kingdoms.
In each, a story started with the same words,
"He never said a word. But I felt safe."
It began in the hills of a fishing hamlet so small it wasn't marked on any map. A place where no one came unless they were lost — or angry.
Krishna walked into it like he belonged to the trees.
The mist rolled around him, soft and unbothered. His boots didn't leave mud behind. Sheshika rested like a sash around his waist, flicking her tongue only when the path bent strangely.
Ahead, a man yelled.
Behind a crumbling stone wall, three thugs were shaking down a baker — not for coin, but for flour and fishcakes.
Krishna kept walking. He didn't speak. Didn't announce himself.
Just passed the wall like fog.
The men didn't see him until it was too late. Not because he was fast — though he was — but because they were too loud, too alive in a world where something quiet had come to balance the weight.
One tried to draw a blade.
It clattered to the ground, his wrist already numb.
Another reached for the baker's daughter.
He blinked — and she was gone, standing behind Krishna.
The third, wiser than the rest, dropped to his knees.
Krishna said nothing.
Only turned slightly — eyes glowing faint beneath the black matte mask — and raised his hand.
The wind changed.
Later, villagers would find the men strung up by vines behind the inn — not hurt, not bleeding, just… subdued.
A single peacock feather lay folded on the doorstep of the bakery. No name. No message. Just the symbol.
The girl who had been saved whispered,
"His eyes weren't angry. They were kind. But… heavy."
By evening, Krishna sat on a broken pier, legs dangling above the tide, watching Sheshika float lazily in the salt.
She made a ripple in the water with her tail, then spoke through the neural channel.
"That was needlessly theatrical."
"I didn't mean to be," Krishna replied.
"You never do. That's what makes it worse."
He almost smiled. Almost.
Medha chimed in from within. Her tone was drier than driftwood.
"You've hit seven villages this week. You're building a resume."
"I'm not building anything."
"Then why leave feathers?"
He said nothing.
Medha's voice buzzed softly in his mind again.
"You're stacking more feathers than Garp stacks complaints. Want to tell me what you're actually doing?"
Krishna didn't answer immediately. A leaf fluttered onto his boot.
"These aren't battles," he replied. "They're balances."
Medha made a sound like a slow chuckle.
"You sound like a tired monk. Or a bored god."
He didn't deny either.
A young boy stumbled down the beach, clutching a fishing rod twice his size. He froze when he saw Krishna — strange coat, strange mask, stranger presence.
Krishna turned his face, half-shadowed by the dying sun.
"Hey," the boy said, nervous. "Are you… a marine?"
Krishna shook his head.
"A pirate?"
Another shake.
"Then… what are you?"
A long silence. Then,
"Someone who walks."
The boy tilted his head. "That's not a job."
"No," Krishna agreed. "But it's something."
The boy hesitated, then reached into his satchel and offered a small shell. "It's lucky. For your walking."
Krishna took it with both hands, bowed gently, and slipped it into his coat.
The boy scampered away before he could change his mind.
That night, Krishna slept beneath the canopy of a tree older than most ships. The stars peeked through like guilty siblings.
Sheshika curled loosely at his side. Medha dimmed her internal diagnostics.
And Krishna — with his eyes to the stars — whispered to himself,
"No one called my name today. But I moved anyway."
In a nearby port town, a merchant muttered to a marine,
"He left nothing behind. Not even footprints. Just… a feather on my coin chest."
A day later, a grandmother told her grandchildren,
"If you see a boy walking with the wind, offer him rice. Or silence."
They didn't know what to call him.
But every story started the same,
"He came when we needed him most.
And left before we knew how to thank him."
And somewhere in the capital, a Cipher Pol analyst circled a dot on the East Blue map.
Not realizing the boy they tracked wasn't leaving signs.
He was leaving balance.
The scent of toasted rice and sesame clung to the air, curling through the crooked alleys of the quiet village.
Krishna walked silently down the stone path, the hem of his coat brushing against moss-laced cobbles. Morning had come early — too early for most — but the bakery was already open.
Small wooden sign swinging in the breeze. Iron kettle steaming gently beside the door. And an old woman behind the counter, wearing an apron patched more times than the roof behind her. She had calloused fingers and a voice like firewood—crackly, warm, and tired.
She didn't flinch when he stepped in. Didn't even blink at the serpent coiled at his shoulder.
"Sit," she said, setting down a tray of rising dough. "You look like you haven't eaten since the last war."
Krishna paused, then stepped forward with a slow incline of his head. He didn't correct her.
She wasn't entirely wrong.
"Storm's gonna roll through tonight," she muttered, tossing an extra bun into the paper wrap without looking up. "You'll need something warm."
Krishna accepted the bundle with a small nod, the weight of the simple gift settling into his palm like a stone. He didn't speak. He rarely did. But his eyes met hers for a moment—midnight black and unreadable.
She blinked.
"Your coat's too thin," she said, softer now. "And that serpent of yours looks like she needs meat, not manners."
From behind his collar, a voice responded—not Krishna's.
Sheshika slithered from beneath his sleeve, uncoiling lazily and lifting her head.
"We've eaten. But thank you, Ms. Baker."
The woman stiffened. "She talks?"
"She judges," Krishna answered dryly.
Five minutes later, he sat across the narrow counter, a half-eaten rice bun in hand. Sheshika curled near the hearth, soaking in the warmth like an old spirit remembering fire.
The baker woman wiped her hands on her apron. "You're not from here."
"No."
"Not a pirate, either."
"No."
"Marine?"
He shook his head.
"Revolutionary?"
"No."
She snorted. "Then you're trouble. Or running from it."
"I walk toward it," Krishna said simply.
Her hands froze for a moment. Then resumed folding the next bun. "You talk like an old priest. The kind that left the gods behind, but still knows their names."
Krishna didn't answer.
He was staring out the window, eyes tracking something only he could sense. His Observation Haki had spread through the village like incense — not aggressive, just alert.
No hostility. No threats. Just quiet living.
It calmed him.
"Where do you come from, boy?" she asked.
"A small village."
"Where are you going?"
"Anywhere the wind pulls."
"You following feathers or leaving them?"
He turned, just slightly. Enough for his midnight eyes to meet hers.
"Both."
She blinked. "Well. That's cryptic."
"I don't mean to be."
"Then you're doing it on accident, which is worse."
Krishna tilted his head, something almost like a smile tugging at his eyes. It never reached his mouth — but the woman saw it anyway.
"You remind me of someone," she said.
"Someone you know?"
"Yes. Someone who left and never wrote."
He dipped his head. "I won't write either."
She studied him. "But you'll leave something behind, won't you?"
His gaze dropped to the peacock feather tucked inside his coat.
"Yes."
He set a few coins on the stall, enough for more than what he'd taken. She pushed them back.
"This one's on me."
"Then let me help."
She raised an eyebrow.
By midday, he was helping her repair the broken awning with thin nails and unspoken efficiency. She didn't ask why he helped. He didn't say why he stayed.
But between hammering and dusting, she told him about her son.
"He joined the Marines. Sent letters. Then stopped."
"I'm sorry."
"I'm not. The silence means he's alive. Dead men don't know how to vanish."
Krishna nodded, as if he'd known that all along.
Inside, he swept the floor. Then realigned the hanging pans by weight. Then, as if drawn by some quiet purpose, kneaded the dough in silence. Sheshika coiled near the warm hearth, eyes half-lidded in contentment.
The baker chopped scallions beside him, casting him a glance now and then.
"You know how to cook?" she asked, raising an eyebrow.
"A friend taught me."
"Must've been patient."
"She was."
"Was?"
Krishna paused. "Still is. Just… distant."
The baker woman hummed. "Distance is funny. You think it changes things. But it only stretches the silence until someone remembers your name."
He shaped a bun.
Pressed his thumb gently into the center.
"Does it matter if they forget?" he asked.
"Yes," she said without hesitation. "But it matters more if you do."
A warm, comfortable silence filled the kitchen of the bakery.
Then, the old women glanced at him,
"You don't talk much."
"I listen." he replied without looking up from the dough he is kneading.
"And?"
"I hear too much."
She looked at him again—closer, slower. "That mask… that coat… even the way you walk. You're trying not to be known."
"I'm trying not to be misunderstood."
"Same thing in a small town."
She dusted flour off her hands. "You've got the posture of a swordsman, the hands of a healer, and the silence of someone who's been through too much for his age."
Krishna kept kneading.
"And your eyes," she added, more quietly. "They're kind. But they're looking through things. Like you're not really here."
He stopped for a moment. Then resumed.
"I'm passing through."
"Hm. Then leave something good behind."
That afternoon, he repaired the bakery door hinge. Reset the broken stepping stone outside the entrance. Rewrote her delivery ledger in neater handwriting. He didn't do it loudly. He didn't ask permission.
He just moved. Thoughtfully. Precisely.
As if the world deserved to be better just by proximity to him.
Medha's voice flicked on briefly in his mind.
"You're becoming harder to profile. Even I can't define your behavioral arc anymore."
"That's not a problem."
"It is when I want to tease you properly."
Sheshika hiss-laughed.
The baker woman raised an eyebrow from inside as Krishna dusted off his hands. "You smile weird," she called out.
He turned slightly.
"That wasn't a complaint." she said with a raised eyebrow, making Krishna deflate slightly, with Medha and Sheshika giggling and in the serpent's case, hissing.
As the sun began to lean westward, Krishna stepped out the bakery door preparing to depart.
Before he left, she handed him one more parcel.
"Rice bread with scallions and black pepper. Eat it while it's warm. And if you find another god on the road, give them half."
The old woman followed outside of the bakery.
She handed him a small flask.
"For the road."
"I don't drink."
"It's tea. You look too serious for anything else."
He bowed — low and formal — and placed a single coin on the edge of her barrel.
She pushed it back.
"This one's for the silence you fixed. That floor's been groaning for ten years."
She turned to walk inside.
The woman looked at the counter—and blinked.
A peacock feather sat folded atop a napkin. Clean. Sharp. Almost glowing.
Soft as breath.
Folded like prayer.
She looked up, but Krishna was already gone.
Children found the feather minutes later.
Whispers began. The baker never denied it.
And as the sky dimmed and shutters closed and night sighed in, the villagers spoke of a boy,
Not a warrior.
Not a marine.
Not a pirate.
Just a boy who left names untold — and better bread behind.
On a lonely hill just past the village, Krishna paused for a moment.
He touched the shell necklace hidden beneath his collar.
And listened to the wind whisper names he hadn't spoken aloud in years.
Medha's voice broke the silence with the same question the kind old woman from the bakery had asked.
"Are you collecting feathers or returning them?"
She already knew the answer, but asked anyway—because she'd been thinking about that woman ever since. About the way her words had stilled the air, like she'd touched something neither of them could see.
Krishna answered, voice low—
"Both."
Medha gave a faint nod. "Thought so."
Then, after a pause, "She saw something in you, Krishna. Same thing I do. You walk forward, but leave markers behind. Breadcrumbs for hearts."
Somewhere on a distant coast, a Cipher Pol agent examined a report—old fishing village, no casualties, pirate group mysteriously vanished, feather found at the scene.
"Again," the agent muttered.
They didn't know who they were chasing.
They didn't even know if it was a single person.
But they knew one thing.
Wherever he went… the world quieted.
The file was thin. Deceptively so.
A white cover. No name. No crest. No trace of rank.
Just a few crisp pages and a sealed envelope. But it had taken seven weeks to compile, and Cipher Pol agents didn't waste paper on fiction.
It was passed from one gloved hand to another inside a candle-lit chamber buried beneath the Goa Kingdom's inner stronghold. Not even the kings of this kingdom knew what the room was built for.
Two men stood in a quiet intelligence room beneath the Goa Kingdom. No banners. No formal chairs. Just plain metal walls and the scent of ink and gun oil.
The agent in white flipped the first page open.
Photographs — grainy, black and white — feathers. Peacock feathers. Not decorative ones. Not painted or stitched.
They glowed faintly, even in the poor image quality.
The caption was handwritten:
Cocoyashi Village. Reported by 16th Marine Branch.
Another photo — a different village. A broken post. A feather pinned into it with a rusted nail. Same color. Same shimmer.
Another one of them had been pinned to the chest of a corpse — a pirate with a bounty over twelve million who had been found unconscious and tied upright against a broken cannon. His men said they heard no battle. Just silence, then collapse.
Then a sketch. Not of a person. Of a presence.
The agent didn't flinch.
No confirmed identity. No confirmed sightings. Just quotes:
"He left food and vanished."
"Didn't take money."
"Kind eyes. No name."
"What's the field assumption?" asked the man across the table — CP4.
"Not a devil fruit. The energy scan readings don't match any Logia or Zoan profiles. Too quiet."
"Weapon?"
"No signs of burn or impact. No blade traces. No chemicals. No known projectile marks."
The senior officer said nothing for a moment.
Then, "This… is no ordinary bird."
The agent beside him nodded. "Based on reports, it escaped from the Grand Line. No official record of origin. Smuggled in a sealed glass crate. But they were preparing it for the Celestial Dragon that visited the Goa Kingdom. Some claim it resisted transport — violently."
CP4 leaned forward slightly. "What's so special about it?"
"Speculation," the agent replied, tapping the last photo. "This feather reacts to light differently. Some said it changed color in the rain. Others claimed it sang when wet."
"It has powers?"
"Unverified. But there are irregularities. Two dead smugglers. No wounds. Just cardiac arrest. Some say hallucinations. Others say… singing."
The officer didn't flinch.
"More importantly," the agent continued, tapping a side column, "wherever the feather appears… a pirate crew has been dismantled. Quietly. Without any official bounty claims. Villagers protected. No ransom. No glory."
A pause.
Then, "Where was the last sighting?"
The agent slid a small map forward. A dot marked Cocoyashi Village, faint and freshly inked.
"A marine outpost captain filed a quiet report last week. He picked up rumors from villagers — said the night after Arlong's sudden death, a child saw a boy in black walking away from the wreckage."
The agent paused.
"He left a feather at the name board of the village. No name. No trace."
"Arlong's death was recorded as a pirate internal conflict," CP4 replied. "Marine command didn't authorize any cleanup. So who killed him?"
"That's the question."
"Was it a bounty hunter?"
"No. Too quiet. No body displayed. No territory claimed."
The men were silent for a long moment.
"So… vigilante?"
"No. Something else. There's no calling card. No ideology. Just the feather. That's all."
Far above them, the sun spilled over Goa's tall walls like the sky couldn't quite believe in what lay beneath.
At a small marine base tucked between the cliffs on Conomi Islands, a junior officer ran his finger over a report. "Ma'am… we've got another report. Peacock feather again." he muttered.
His superior — a stern woman with a long saber scar running across her jawline — looked up from her desk.
"Third one this month?"
"Fourth, ma'am."
She exhaled through her nose. "Same handwriting?"
He nodded, showing her the envelope. No name. No signature. Just two words written on every report that came in:
"Balance restored."
She signed and ran her hand through her hair.
"What do we log it as?"
She paused.
Then tapped the folder twice.
"Unknown vigilante. Possibly independent asset. Mark it as 'High-Tier Vigilante anomaly.' And forward it—"
"To Cipher Pol?"
"To Cipher Pol."
Back underground, the CP field lead rolled up the map slowly. His gloved hands moved with precision. Goa, Shells Town, Orange Town, Cocoyashi — a trail of whispers.
He closed the folder.
"Send a small team," he ordered. "No uniforms. No noise. I want Cocoyashi quietly surveyed."
"Under what pretense?"
"Maritime trade inspection. They'll talk to the locals. Ask about exotic animals."
"And if they spot the peacock?"
"Secure it. If the boy is present—observe only. Do not engage. We don't know what he is yet."
"But the boy—?"
"If the bird is sacred, the one carrying its traces must be sacrilege."
The junior CP agent remained silent, but nodded after understanding why the senior officer only wanted to observe, as they have practically no intel about this anomaly except estimated strength. And even that is not completely reliable.
"Do we have a name?" he asked.
The senior officer looked at the feather again.
"No name. No bounty. Just a pattern." there was a hint of frustration in his voice as he replied, as even after spending a good chunk of the resources allocated by the World Government, they could not find any proper intelligence on this boy.
They didn't know his name.
They didn't even know if he was one boy or several — no consistent description, no confirmed facial image, just stories and villagers who remembered kind eyes and a feather left behind.
But they knew he was real.
And more than that—
They knew he moved.
Without flags. Without claims. Without needing to be seen.
In Cocoyashi, Bell-mère stood near the garden as the wind shifted.
She felt it before she saw it — a strange calm, as if something had been watching the village all morning.
No movement. No figures on the hill. Just the faintest scent of storm-washed cedar.
Inside the drawer of her old desk, the feather Krishna had left weeks ago lay untouched. But that morning, it shimmered again — briefly — as if it remembered something.
Or someone.
Far away, Krishna rested beneath a banyan tree, unaware.
He meditated quietly, letting the sea wind curl through his hair. His eyes closed, Sheshika curled like a loose necklace around his shoulders.
He had no idea the world had begun whispering his name.
He didn't even know it had a name for him.
But Cipher Pol did.
And it was already printing dossiers with one phrase stamped across the top:
"Unclaimed High-Class Anomaly."
The boy walked alone, bearing no name.
They didn't know where he would strike next.
But they knew the wind would carry the scent of rice bread and silence.
And that wherever the feather touched down…
The world turned just slightly toward balance.
And the men who hunted him had no idea—
That he had not yet started hunting back.
The boat was held together by stubborn wood and salt-worn rope. It creaked like a tired elder but moved like it still remembered joy.
Krishna stepped aboard without a word. Sheshika curled loosely along the mast like a garland of living scales, her eyes half-lidded, basking in the late morning light. She didn't hiss. She didn't watch. She just was—part of the silence.
The boat drifted lazily in the soft blue shallows near the edge of the Organ Islands, bobbing gently on the tide. Its owner was a grandfather with sun-spotted skin, wiry arms, and a long habit of not asking too many questions. His grandson, a boy with a missing tooth and seaweed in his hair, called every stranger "mister" and had already named three seagulls circling overhead.
Krishna sat cross-legged near the stern, mask lowered, back straight but relaxed. His presence didn't fill the boat — it simply made it feel… stiller. Even the sea stopped creaking for a while.
The fisherman didn't question Krishna's sudden presence. He just squinted, adjusted his straw hat, and said,
"You got the look of a storm that forgot to shout."
Krishna tilted his head in acknowledgment.
Beside the old man stood his grandson — a wiry, sunburnt boy with an oversized shirt and seaweed in his hair. The boy blinked at Krishna. Squinted. Then jabbed a finger at his chest.
"You don't talk much, huh?"
Krishna said nothing. Just sat near the edge of the boat, pulling his cloak tighter to shield from the glare.
The boy stared at him unabashedly.
"You look like a monk," he finally declared, pointing his wooden stick like a blade. "But not the boring kind."
Krishna tilted his head slightly, "What kind is that?"
"The ones who don't eat fishcakes."
Krishna's gaze flicked toward him.
"...Do you eat fishcakes?"
Medha's voice bloomed in Krishna's mind, droll and immediate,
"We've reached the most important theological checkpoint of the East Blue."
Krishna blinked once.
A pause.
Then a soft — unmistakable — tug at the corner of Krishna's eyes.
A smile.
Not wide. Not loud. But it was there. The boy noticed.
"You're not boring," he said, satisfied.
The old man chuckled, amused, throwing another net overboard. "That's the highest praise he'll give. Last week he told the mayor he smelled like shrimp."
Krishna glanced out to the horizon.
The water glittered faintly under the sun. Sheshika dozed along the edge of the boat's bow, tongue flicking lazily in and out, tail trailing off into the foam like a river in rest.
Medha's voice pinged into his mind, filtered and amused.
"You've officially been dubbed 'fishcake monk.' I'm updating your database profile."
Krishna blinked once.
"Don't you dare."
"Too late. It's already encrypted. Trademarked. You'll have to duel me to delete it. Do you have the guts?"
He exhaled slowly through his nose, but there was an unmistakable curve at the edge of his eyes. Medha let out a triumphant shout, happy to see him smile twice this day. He had stopped smiling because he does not think he is worthy yet, but that mentality was eroding away slowly. Very slowly. And she and Sheshika already promised each other to make it happen, no matter how slow it was.
Silence resumed on the boat again.
They drifted for an hour or more, the three of them.
No enemies. No battles. Just the sea, slow and forgiving. Nets cast. Water slapped wood in soft percussion. Sheshika let the breeze curl her tongue, tail hanging lazily over the edge of the boat like a ribbon carved from shadow.
"You gonna eat with us?" the boy asked suddenly.
The grandfather shot his grandson a warning look — but Krishna shook his head gently.
"I'd like to, if that's alright."
The boy beamed. "We've got fishcakes. Grandma's recipe. No ghosts in it."
"No ghosts?" Krishna echoed.
The old man grunted. "Local superstition. Used to say if a fishcake sunk instead of floated, it meant a sea spirit had judged you."
Medha whispered,
"Based on current oil buoyancy readings, I'd say your chances of being cursed are low. Unless you insult the batter."
Krishna allowed himself a barely-there smirk.
Lunch was a mess of flavor. Oily batter. Too much salt. But warm — and made with hands that weren't trying to impress gods or kings. Just fill bellies and make someone smile.
The boy talked through the whole meal.
About a dream where he rode a seagull across the moon.
About how his grandma said the sea once sang lullabies.
About how he wanted to be a pirate not for gold, but for stories.
Krishna listened.
Quiet. Open.
He'd fought demons. He'd danced with thunder. He'd broken the spine of a tyrant who sold villages for pocket change.
But here, on this creaking boat—
He just listened.
The fisherman finally spoke when the sun began its slow descent.
"You're not from here," he said. Not a question. "But you're part of here. I can feel it."
Krishna's gaze didn't shift.
"But you'll keep moving," the old man continued. "You're the kind that doesn't get to rest."
A pause.
"Still. You've done something good. He hasn't laughed that much in weeks."
Krishna nodded slightly. "Laughter is holy," he said softly.
The old man chuckled. "Damn right it is."
They ate again, as the sun disappeared towards the western clouds. Simple food. Honest seasoning. No divine sauces or spices, but something better — memory.
The old man told him stories.
About how the sea used to be cleaner.
About pirates who danced more than they killed.
About how his daughter ran away with a Marine and came back with twins who didn't speak for a year but now made the best ink-paper fish in the village.
Krishna listened, every word folded neatly into his mind. These were not strategic reports. Not battlefield wisdom. But they were the kind of truths you only shared when the ocean was quiet and no one was watching.
Before they reached the shore, the boy rummaged through a battered box and pulled out a handful of colorful strings.
He tied one around Krishna's wrist — awkward, too tight, but beaming.
"A luck band," he said. "For the road."
Krishna glanced at it — crooked knots, mismatched colors.
He kept it on.
He would keep it on.
When they docked near a lonely cove by the next inlet, Krishna stood first.
He bowed to the old man.
Then to the boy.
Thank you, it meant.
For seeing me as someone who eats, not just someone who saves.
He didn't say goodbye — only stepped off the boat with a whisper of wind and the creak of old wood adjusting to his absence.
As he stepped onto the dock, the boy shouted behind him,
"Hey, fishcake monk!"
Krishna turned.
The boy held up two fingers in a 'peace' sign. "Come back sometime, okay?"
Krishna didn't answer.
But he left something behind — as always.
By the time the boy looked up again, something had been tucked behind a wooden plank near the oar rest, folded in quiet reverence. It wasn't glowing. It didn't hum. But it shimmered faintly in the shadow.
Like it was smiling.
A peacock feather.
The sea remembered kings.
But it also remembered kindness.
A boy. A grandfather. A god who smiled — barely — over fishcakes.
Sometimes, myth didn't roar.
Sometimes… it sat and listened to a child dream.
The cliff wasn't tall, but it had a view that made the world feel small.
Weathered stone curled into narrow ledges like the fingers of something ancient. The sea lapped below in slow, rhythmic silence—not crashing, not calling. Just existing, like it too was meditating.
No ships. No calls. Just the hush of endless blue reflecting the moon like a god's single watching eye.
Krishna sat near the edge.
Legs crossed. Back straight.
Mask off. Eyes closed. Still.
The wind rolled over him in cool pulses, brushing through his cloak like a mother's hand checking for fever. His hands were folded in his lap, one palm resting over the other. A sitting posture not learned from monks or soldiers, but born from the strange stillness he always carried within — like his soul remembered a silence older than his body.
Sheshika was behind him, curled around the base of a weathered rock, her head rested on a flat patch of moss, tail flicking every few minutes in rhythm with the waves. Her breath slow, heavy.
She didn't speak. Not tonight, because her silence was not withdrawal—it was witness.
Neither of them spoke.
It wasn't the kind of quiet that begged to be broken.
Medha, soft as nightfall, finally spoke.
"Five villages helped. Nine lives saved. Two pirates stopped. One prayer answered."
No response.
He simply reached into his satchel and pulled out a tattered, handmade drawing.
One of Luffy's.
A stick figure with three messy heads: him, Ace, and Krishna standing under a scribbled sun. Sabo was drawn as a cloud above them, ever watching. Krishna folded the paper with careful hands, tucked it back, and let out a slow breath.
He was not sure if Sabo would ever remember them.
He was not sure if he would ever remember who he was trying to become.
The cliff offered no answers. Only waves.
Krishna looked down and whispered something in Sanskrit—something that might have been a prayer, or just a line from a memory he could no longer place.
Sheshika shifted behind him, eyes half-lidded.
"You are chasing something that won't stop running," she said softly.
"I know."
"And when you catch it?"
"I'll ask why it fled."
Sheshika hummed, a low rasping sound like ancient wind through bone.
"You're allowed to rest, you know."
"I do rest."
"No," she said, gently now. "You pause. That's not the same."
A breeze rolled in.
Medha's voice flickered once more—this time with a smile:
"You've left a trail the world can't explain."
"A fisherman called you the 'silent god with the kind eyes.'"
Krishna didn't smile, but the wind around him seemed to soften.
"You may think no one calls your name," Medha continued, "but they do."
"They just don't know what to call you."
He remained silent, eyes looking beyond the ocean, beyond the horizon, as if searching for the answers to his questions no on knows, but has to find them himself.
"You've done well. You've moved like breath through the East Blue. Gentle. Unseen. Like you were never there."
Still, Krishna said nothing.
"And yet… you look like you're still drowning, carrying the same question, aren't you?"
His eyes opened slowly.
They were the color of midnight — not empty, but deep. A lake with no bottom.
He didn't answer.
Because she was right.
"Why do I walk?" he finally whispered.
The sea didn't answer either.
Because sometimes, it already knew the answer.
The breeze picked up slightly, brushing his hair across his cheek like a passing thought.
"I have strength," he continued. "I have purpose. But I don't know what I am walking toward."
The moon hung overhead, quiet and unjudging.
He tilted his head up slightly, as if waiting for it to respond.
When it didn't, Krishna closed his eyes again and exhaled.
It wasn't frustration.
It was resignation.
Behind him, Sheshika uncoiled slowly and slithered forward until her head was beside his shoulder. She rested her jaw on his shoulder and looked up at the sky with him.
"You keep leaving pieces of yourself behind," she said.
Krishna didn't deny it.
The feathers.
The fixes.
The meals shared without names exchanged.
Tiny gifts. Little altars of silent kindness.
"You think you're empty," she added, "but the world is starting to echo your name. Just not out loud."
Krishna's hands moved — not fidgeting, but tracing an invisible shape across his palm. A spiral.
The shell the boy gave him sat beside him, its edges glinting under moonlight.
He picked it up and turned it slowly between his fingers.
"Why does that small kindness mean more than every victory?" he murmured.
Medha answered,
"Because it wasn't asked for. Because it wasn't earned. Because it was given."
The cliff sighed with the weight of the sea beneath it.
Krishna placed the shell against his chest and closed his eyes once more.
For the first time that night, he didn't think of battles. Or strategy. Or evolution. Or the next island.
He thought of the boy's grin.
The warm fishcakes.
The callused hands of an old man who fixed nets while telling stories no one remembered.
A thought crossed his mind, light but sharp:
"I am not who they see."
But another followed quickly,
"...But I want to be."
Krishna opened his eyes.
Dark. But not empty.
Above him, the stars scattered without order, like the world's oldest wounds had never fully closed.
"I am still becoming," he murmured.
The words didn't echo.
They sank.
And so he sat.
Until the moon dipped low.
Until the wind grew cold.
Until the feather he had set beside him lifted slightly in the night breeze and danced for just a moment — like it was saying:
Go. You're not done yet.
He didn't need applause.
He didn't want statues.
He just wanted the sea to feel a little less heavy,
every time he left it behind.
The wind carried salt and memory.
Krishna had left the cliff and walked deep into a quiet pine hollow near the shoreline—dense with sea-cracked trees and moon-touched underbrush. He settled beside a large root that rose from the earth like a cradle, and sat with a grace that spoke of ritual.
The sky stretched open above him, and for once, the stars seemed to listen.
He reached beneath his outer cloak, fingers brushing across a slim, rolled-up parchment. It was bound with red thread, soft with age, but the knot was tight.
As if the hands that tied it had never wanted it opened again.
Krishna loosened the knot.
Unfurled the parchment.
Even in the dark, he knew every line by heart.
ASK Brotherhood Contract
We agree to:
– Share food.
– Protect each other.
– Kill all mosquitoes.
– Build the best fort ever.
– Not betray each other, even for pie.
– Share Maggi during celebrations.
Signed:
Krishna, Sabo, Ace, Luffy
He remembered their faces as they read it aloud the first time.
Sabo had corrected the spelling of "mosquitos" but laughed too hard to care.
Ace had snorted at the pie line but signed anyway, his name large and tilted.
Krishna had written his with careful penmanship, centered like a vow.
And Luffy—Luffy had found about it when the three of them were reminiscing of the time when they signed it, and had shown up later with a crayon and said, "Why am I not on this?!"
He'd scribbled a giant L beneath the contract and scratched out "ASK" to write:
"ASKL – now it's complete!"
No one had argued.
No one could.
Krishna stared at it for a long time.
Now, sitting alone with only the moon and the wind and the slow curl of waves in the distance, Krishna let his fingers hover over their names.
Slowly. Reverently.
Luffy.
Ace.
Sabo.
Krishna.
He didn't need to say them out loud. The world already carried them.
Still, his voice broke through the hush of pine leaves anyway.
"Wherever you are… we're still brothers."
Sheshika slithered beside him, not wrapping around, just resting close.
She looked down at the contract and blinked slowly.
"You always take this with you?"
Krishna nodded once.
"Even when I don't know where I'm going… this tells me where I started."
Medha's voice clicked through the silence like a chime on wind,
"Paper ages. Ink fades. You do not."
"That's the tragedy and the gift."
Krishna touched Sabo's name. The ink hadn't faded. Not yet.
He closed his eyes.
"Don't let it fade," he whispered.
And then pressed the parchment to his chest.
Sheshika slithered closer, her coils brushing against his side.
"You still believe they're with you," she said softly.
"I know they are," Krishna murmured. "Even if they forget. Even if the world tries to separate us."
He didn't say Sabo's name.
He didn't have to.
A soft vibration.
Medha's circuits pulsed with a faint hum inside his wrist.
"Krishna," she said, voice shifting to low urgency.
"There's chatter on an encrypted line."
He opened his eyes, alert now. Calm, but sharpened.
"Source?"
"Unclear. But the encryption style is high-level. This isn't merchant talk."
She paused.
"...Keyword match: Dragon. Also... Kuma."
Sheshika stiffened slightly.
Krishna didn't move. But his fingers curled slightly over the parchment before folding it shut again.
"They're talking about the Grand Line," Medha continued.
"Healing. Memory loss. A boy found near wreckage. Alive."
Krishna's breath caught.
He didn't speak.
Medha didn't need him to.
"I'll trace more. But it may be him."
The silence that followed wasn't heavy.
It was reverent.
Krishna stood.
Re-folded the contract.
Tied the red thread.
Tucked it against his heart.
"I won't say anything," he murmured. "Not until I know for certain."
Sheshika nodded once, and coiled beside him, her scales whispering against the roots.
From the treeline behind the cliff from another part of East Blue, the moonlight hit a glint of glass.
A pair of binoculars lowered slowly.
A dark silhouette stepped back into the trees and tapped a communicator shell against their palm. Quiet clicks echoed as it activated.
"…Feather confirmed. Three locations so far. Timeline inconsistent. Not enough data."
Another voice crackled faintly,
"Keep watching. Don't engage. The World Government is watching this personally."
The first voice scoffed. "We're chasing ghost stories."
"No. We're chasing something the Grand Line wants back."
Click.
Silence again.
The watcher vanished into the dark.
Down at the shore, Krishna stood once more.
Medha's voice filtered through his thoughts like moonlight across ripples.
"They're closer than you think."
He didn't ask who.
His hand brushed the luck-band tied around his wrist. The one from the boy who ate fishcakes with and called him friend.
He didn't take it off.
As he turned from the sea and walked into the trees, his Observation Haki expanded in soft pulses. Not probing. Just sensing.
Small lives. Small places. Unseen kindnesses.
But something—just beyond the horizon.
A pressure.
Like a string had been plucked.
He felt no danger.
Just a beginning.
Beneath his cloak, the brotherhood parchment rested like a second heartbeat.
Names written not for glory—but to remember.
Above, the stars began to shift—one by one—as if some celestial pattern was finally being rearranged, as if in silent prayer,
"Let none of them be forgotten."
And beneath those stars, in the forest the world had forgotten,
a boy who called himself nothing,
carried the names of his brothers like fire tucked inside ash.
A vow not spoken.
But written.
In the ink of forever.
Author's Note:
Yo, divine degenerates and dharmic believers—
This chapter was quiet.
Not in pacing, but in purpose.
Krishna didn't fight. He didn't unleash his Haki. He didn't face down a monster or a tyrant.
And yet — this chapter might have carved the deepest lines into his soul.
He helped people who didn't know his name.
Left feathers for strangers.
Unrolled the contract of his brotherhood, not to cling to the past, but to remind himself: it still lives.
Sabo's absence was loud — but so was the warmth in a bowl of fishcakes.
So was the name written in crayon: ASKL.
This was a chapter about faith. Not in gods or systems. But in people.
In bonds that outlast maps.
And in the kind of boy who walks alone… not because he must, but because his brothers need him to.
If this chapter made your chest ache quietly — or made you smile at the idea of "mosquitoes and Maggi" being sacred vows — then we're still on the same path.
Next chapter, we move again.
And this time… the ones watching Krishna start to step into the light.
—Author out.
(PS: The old lady from the start of this chapter still insists he looked like her third grandson. She's now knitting him a scarf. Medha is planning a tactical escape route.)