Boom—gunpowder meeting fire in a roar that tore the sea in half. The cannonball flew with force and speed, with momentum that could rip the threads of time and space itself. A streak of smoke and flame erupted from the barrel, and the echo slapped the sea with the roar of a god angry at silence. My teeth bared themselves.
Nice. I still remembered how to use it. The kickback of the cannon vibrated through the planks under my feet, a beautiful pulse of mechanical death. A single shot, and already the child in me stirred.
Now, what would five cannons going off at once sound like?
The inner child that never stopped loving destruction and explosions screamed back at me—do it. Just do it. Light them all. Give the ocean a show.
I giggled to myself, almost shy about it, like I was doing something I shouldn't. But I kept moving, hands steady, breath calm. I lit each fuse with practiced ease. The ends sparked to life, fire crawling steadily downward like impatient snakes. The smell of gunpowder—sharp, metallic, and unmistakable—filled the air around me. It was the scent of old wars, of smoke-filled memories, of chaos served hot.
And then it came.
Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom.
The ship shuddered with each blast. Each one sent a wave of vibrations through the hull, through my boots, into my spine. The deck creaked, almost whimpered. I should've been deaf from the noise, the sheer volume of it, but instead, I felt it. The sound didn't hit my ears. It hit my bones.
I laughed. A low, rising giggle that turned into a bark of pure joy.
By god, this was fabulous.
If they had fired all these cannons at me earlier, I'd be meat on driftwood. But no, they had to invite me on board. They had to get curious about the wine. Curiosity killed more than the cat this time.
I walked over to the closest cannon, the metal still hot from the blast. I placed my palm against the barrel. It sizzled instantly, burning my skin. The flesh bubbled, and smoke rose from where the skin kissed steel. I didn't flinch. I liked it. The pain anchored me, reminded me I was here, alive.
The sizzling meat on my palm filled the air with a smell that mixed strangely well with the sulfur and fire. I giggled again, that twitchy, feral sound that seemed to just escape from my chest lately.
Then I turned toward the pile of gunpowder and cannonballs.
This was going to be fun.
Familiar motions. Crouch, pack, load—muscle memory laced with madness. Gunpowder first, rammed deep, packed tight. Then the cannonballs, round and solid, loaded into each of the four remaining cannons. I trimmed the fuses to just the right length. Precision mattered. It was art, in its own bloody way.
And then a thought struck me.
A lesson.
Why not turn this into a science experiment?
In what angle does the cannonball travel the farthest?
I adjusted each cannon carefully. The first stayed flat—0 degrees. The second angled to 30, then 45, then 75. For the last cannon, I smiled and tilted it all the way up—90 degrees. Straight into the sky. A bit suicidal? Maybe. But I was curious.
Then I changed my mind and adjusted it down to 80.
Then back to 90.
If I died, then tough luck. Another resurrection gone. But for science? Worth it.
I lit the fuses.
Fire crawled again, brighter now under the waning sun. The sea held its breath.
BOOM. BOOM. BOOM. BOOM. BOOM.
Five more explosions rocked the deck.
The cannonballs flew, each in its own arc. I watched them, eyes wide with childlike wonder. The one fired at 0 degrees skipped across the sea like a stone before vanishing. The 30 and 75 had solid paths, but the 45—oh, the 45—cut the sky and sailed the furthest, the arc a perfect curve of destruction.
Science, bitches.
And the 90?
It soared. Straight up. Higher and higher. A speck against the clouds. I tilted my head back to follow it, eyes squinting.
It hung there for a second. Then it started to fall.
Straight down.
I stood there. Didn't move. Didn't flinch.
If it hit me, it hit me. If not, the gods had a good laugh today.
It didn't.
The cannonball slammed into the cannon that fired it, smashing the barrel with a crunch of twisted metal and shattered wood. Splinters flew. I laughed.
Four more cannons left.
I ran my fingers along their barrels, checking for cracks, for fractures. All seemed fine. Sturdy. Reliable.
More shots?
Oh, definitely.
But not yet.
The ship rocked gently now, smoke still curling upward, the sea mist mingling with the sulfur in the air. The wind carried the acrid scent back into my face, and I breathed it in like perfume.
My hand still burned, the skin raw and blackened. But it pulsed with healing blood. Already new flesh was pushing the charred layers away.
I stared out at the horizon.
The cannonballs were gone, but the lesson remained. Forty-five degrees. That was the magic number. The sweet spot between force and flight.
My hands were dirty, black with powder, red with heat. My clothes clung to me, damp from sweat and wine. My lips cracked into a grin.
I wanted more.
More noise. More fire. More release.
I wanted to load every cannon again, aim them in every direction, and turn this cursed sea into a celebration of smoke and noise.
But I paused.
Only four left.
Best not waste them. Not like previously.
I loaded the cannon once more and lit the fuse.
BOOM. BOOM. BOOM. BOOM.
Four cannons. One god complex. Let's see what breaks first.
Let the world scream with me.
---------------
What do you do when a single-masted ship comes charging at you full force?
You blow it to bits, of course.
And I plan to do exactly that. No hesitation. No second guessing. I loaded the cannons—still red-hot from abuse. The deck was warm. The air reeked of powder. I was ready to blow the ship to smithereens.
The ship had appeared out of nowhere—like it had erupted from the sea. Its lone sail was wide open, straining in the wind, aimed straight at me like a dagger. The black flag swinging at the top told me all I needed to know: Jolly Roger, skull and crossbones, the classic idiot's invitation to get blasted out of the water. Could've been a rookie crew, still wet behind the ears and drunk on rum and tall tales. Could've been pros who didn't give a damn who they ran into.
Either way, I was ready to make it their last mistake.
Through the lens of my telescope, I watched it cut through the waves, still distant, just under a mile—too far for a clean shot. I waited, patient. Let the wind carry them closer. Let them come to me. No rush. I could already feel the thrill in my bones, that electric pulse before everything explodes into motion.
Then I saw it—movement. Not normal, steady prep-for-battle movement, but chaos. Infighting.
They were fighting each other.
That told me a few things. One, they hadn't seen me yet. Two, they hadn't meant to run into me. Three, this was no coordinated pirate crew.
I scanned the deck through the scope. Swords clashed in the open. Men shouting. Bodies twisting and lunging. It looked less like a mutiny and more like a last-man-standing kind of brawl. Blood was already on the wood. Then I spotted him.
Gun in one hand. Sword in the other. Moving like he'd danced this dance a thousand times.
My target.
One of the Seven. The 18 million bounty.
A grin curled on my face, slow and sharp. Payday. Real one, too. The kind of money that changes things. Buys a brand new ship. Pays off debts. Maybe even lets you sleep without one eye open. Berries swimming around my mind like fish in a tank. I imagined myself counting stacks so high they toppled over. Maybe even a bit of fame to go with the fortune.
But that gleam on the horizon—the glass glint—pulled me out of my daydream. They'd seen me.
The fight stopped like someone pulled the plug. Just froze mid-chaos. One by one, the heads turned. I could almost hear the shift in energy from here. Tension rising like steam from a kettle. Looked like they struck a temporary truce. Survival first, backstabbing later.
If I spoke Japanese better, I could've tried playing mind games. Toss in a quote or two about how words are stronger than swords, break them from within, pit them against each other all over again. But I didn't. I barely knew the phrases I needed to get by. So there was no trickery. No diplomacy.
Just war.
Looked like I'd be killing them one by one. Messy. Slow. Boring.
I took my eyes off the scope for a second and looked around my own deck. The ship wasn't much for it had no crew left, but it had teeth. ME.
I did a stretch as I groaned. Inventory check: three grenades—each with their own little character. One chilly, one itchy, one smelly enough to knock out a dog. Two daggers, both sharp. A sword I hadn't needed to draw in a while. And my old, scratched-up pistol. Still loyal. Still loud.
That would do. I could work with that.
The plan was simple: blast the hell out of their ship from a distance, and pray the bounty stayed alive long enough for me to put a bullet in him myself. Dead or alive paid the same, but I liked watching them fall. Made it personal. Made it real.
So I raised the scope one more time to find the right angle—and that's when everything stopped.
I abandoned my plan of bombarding the ship with cannon. Because I saw a girl, a beauty no doubt even from the lens of the telescope. She was cowering behind one of the big men as all the other looked at her with ravenous gaze but didn't dare to do anything.
I could see her glance towards me when the telescope brought me her sight. Sharp instinct, no doubt.
And if my guess was right, the infighting was caused by her.
Even from the distance I could see a small crafty smile appear as she played the damsel in distress. She didn't need a weapon—just a look. Just a tilt of her smile. Everyone else did the killing for her.
I looked a bit more and there I saw something more. One more girl.
Hiding behind my target. The bounty I was going to collect.
The orange-haired one had eyes like a pickpocket—quick, bright, always measuring angles. The other? Purple hair. Pure con. Soft voice. Big eyes. The kind of girl who could make twenty killers draw blades just by crying in the right direction. Damn good work.
Those two were the cause. And if I hadn't shown up, they'd have slipped off with the prize and left twenty corpses arguing in the wake.
But these girls weren't just chaos-bringers. They were Survivors. Drifters who could outwit killers.
I sighed.
They were chaos in silk. But I wasn't about to let them outplay me.
I put on a mask that should have no problem fitting with them.
A mask of a bounty hunter.
I needed to make a good impression. They were players in this story after all.
I put my telescope down.
The sun caught their hair—orange and lavender. Like warning flares before a storm.
And I stepped forward anyway.