A world blanketed by the ocean.
It had been roughly a week since Yimi was teleported here.
Kuraigana Island was a grim, foreboding place on the Grand Line—the ruins of the Shikkearu Kingdom. A castle stood at the island's heart, and that castle was Hawk-Eyes' home.
Besides him, the island's only living human, it was also populated by creatures called Humandrills—baboons with an uncanny ability to mimic and learn. Raised alongside gentle humans, they would grow into gentle creatures themselves. But this island had known nothing but war until seven years ago, which meant these particular baboons hadn't just turned aggressive—they'd learned human swordsmanship, combat techniques, and even how to use firearms.
Yimi: "Mrow."
The surrounding baboons: "Ooh."
Yimi: "Mrow mrow mrow MROW!"
The surrounding baboons: "OOH OOH OOH OOH!"
They seemed to be getting along just fine.
Not that they had much choice. Before Yimi's arrival, Hawk-Eyes had been the only thing on this island the baboons feared. So naturally, the moment he brought home this little cat and turned his back, they'd gone straight for her with great enthusiasm.
The result: every baboon on the island, from the two-month-old babies to the baboon king who'd spent years imitating Mihawk himself, had been thoroughly beaten up by one small cat. The baboon king was still sprawled in his nest looking like a malnourished, sun-dried monkey.
"Go pick a cabbage." Mihawk's voice drifted down from the castle.
"Mrow."
A flash of white light. Dressed in her beginner's combat gear, Yimi ignored her newly converted congregation of baboons and trotted around to the vegetable garden behind the castle. She picked the smallest cabbage she could find, held it above her head, and ran it up to the cutting board where Mihawk was cooking.
Why the small one? Because cats don't eat vegetables.
Dracule Mihawk. Forty-one years old. Nicknamed Hawk-Eyes for his hawk-sharp eyes.
He also went by many other titles—chief among them: World's Greatest Swordsman, and member of the Seven Warlords of the Sea.
The first needed little explanation. He sat at the pinnacle of swordsmanship—so dominant that he'd once crossed swords with Red Hair Shanks back when Shanks still had his left arm. The outcome of that duel was known to almost no one. In recent years Mihawk had rarely fought at full strength, so the true ceiling of his power remained a mystery even to those who thought they knew him.
The second title was a more ironic fact. To maintain a certain balance of power, the World Government had reached out to seven notorious pirates, offering to cancel their bounties, overlook their past crimes, and grant them certain privileges—all in exchange for a leash they'd never openly admit to wearing.
The seven Warlords varied wildly in strength, naturally, given how different their origins and reputations were. Mihawk was firmly in the top tier.
He glanced at Yimi's tail, swaying left and right.
He'd brought this child back a week ago—or more precisely, they'd fought for nearly two hours with neither able to gain a decisive edge, until the cat simply flopped down on the prow of his ship and ended up here.
To summarize that fight: a cat had suddenly transformed into a ball of light, shot toward him, seized a spear, and launched an attack. For one split second he'd thought Kizaru—one of the Marine Admirals—was trying to ambush him.
The white light carried a deeply unsettling effect. His Observation Haki couldn't read his opponent's movements; even looking directly at her was difficult. But Mihawk's hearing was something no ordinary person could match, and that alone was enough to let him parry her strikes without much trouble.
When he went on the offensive, though, his slashes were warped entirely out of range—deflected from this stretch of sea altogether. Even attacks reinforced with Armament Haki couldn't break through that luminous shell. He'd been stuck purely on defense, unable to land a single effective counter.
There will always be someone stronger. He accepted that. But this was different—his technique and raw power both outclassed hers by a wide margin, yet a simple Devil Fruit ability had dragged the whole fight to a dead standstill. In twenty years he might not have encountered that situation once, let alone from a girl who barely came up to his waist.
He set the cabbage on the board and began slicing it into fine shreds with practiced, efficient strokes. As one of the few who sailed alone, he'd taught himself to be reasonably competent at cooking, art, and navigation alike.
Cabbage done. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed the small girl had climbed onto the edge of the stove and was staring motionlessly at the top of his head.
"What are you looking at?"
"You're so ugly without your hat." She pointed directly at his head.
"..."
Mihawk didn't dignify that with a response and kept cooking.
Left with nothing to do, the little cat started reaching for the Sea King meat on the cutting board. Mihawk moved her paw away.
"If you're bored, go find the baboons to play with. Don't grab the food."
"You're the bored one." She shook her tiny fist at him and ran off.
It wasn't that she wanted to be bored. She'd looked at Mihawk's maps the moment she arrived on the island and understood nothing—except that the blue parts meant ocean.
It was around that moment that this cat had a realization: the main quest of beating a Yonko and an Admiral wasn't actually difficult because of the beating part. The difficult part was finding them.
As for her handy teleporter, Emon… she still owed it a crystal she hadn't paid back yet. Of course it wasn't going to run errands for a deadbeat cat.
Yimi padded back to the kitchen doorway and peered inside. "Are you sure you're not a Yonko or an Admiral?"
This cat is very clever. Don't even think about tricking me.
"Is that a question you plan to ask every single day?"
Yimi retreated in disappointment.
The fight with Hawk-Eyes had also made her realize something: without her Extinction Angel, she'd lost her strongest offensive option. Even with Love Train keeping her undefeated, under normal conditions her Insect Glaive and Stand abilities alone weren't enough to beat an opponent like Dog-Eyes Mihawk—someone whose technique and raw power were both top-tier. He could parry everything she threw at him.
The Insect Glaive was, after all, designed for hunting massive creatures like Elder Dragons. In a fight against a person, its effectiveness was honestly questionable. And the aerial combat style that formed the Insect Glaive's core was best suited against enemies of enormous size. Hawk-Eyes was only about two meters tall—a complete shorty.
Yimi sat down on the ground and spread out her imprecise map, eyes tracing the marked locations of Totto Land and Wano Country—territories belonging to Yonko Big Mom and Yonko Kaido respectively. Among the Four Emperors, only these two had something resembling a fixed address, and both were inconveniently far away.
Over the past few days she'd pumped Dog-Eyes Mihawk for information and gotten a reasonable picture of her objectives. To reach the Yonko: pass through some underwater Fishman Island to reach the New World. To reach Fishman Island: get a ship coated with some kind of special film for deep-sea diving. To get the ship coated: first need a ship. To have a ship: need crew members for various roles. To have crew members: need funding…
(There was technically a second official route, but still.)
Very troublesome.
The three Admirals and the Fleet Admiral, at least, were easier to locate—unlike the Yonko, who each ruled their own territory. The Marine brass all worked together. Same side.
But she hadn't even managed to beat Dog-Eyes.
Lost in thought, she felt the back of her collar get grabbed, and was hoisted into the air.
"Don't sit on the ground."
She looked up at him. "Do you want to become a Yonko?"
"Why?"
"I want to fight you."
"..."
Mihawk ignored her again and carried the finished meal to the dining table, plated in the Western style.
It wasn't just Yimi asking him questions—these past few days, he'd been forming his own impressions of this girl who was somehow weak (relative to him) yet had inexplicably forced a draw. Like when he'd asked why she wanted to fight the Yonko and she'd answered: to go home.
His working theory: she was a princess from some kingdom destroyed by Kaido or Big Mom. Her parents, as royalty, had probably sent her away with something like "when you've grown up and defeated the Yonko, you can come home"—and this child, being very young, had taken it entirely literally.
The bizarre range of her abilities was likely the power of a Mythical Zoan Devil Fruit: a rare and powerful classification.
He glanced at Yimi again. She'd pressed herself against the windowsill and was staring out at the view, utterly indifferent to the smell of food.
He closed his eyes briefly.
"I'm heading out to sea tomorrow. Do you want to come?"
"Yes."