The journey away from Sphinx Island was marked by a peculiar, frantic energy. It wasn't just the excitement of the mission; it was the fact that Maye had become a living, breathing dowsing rod for a dead man's intuition. "Left, Ace! No, your other left, you fire-brained idiot!" Maye shouted from the bow, her eyes squeezed shut as she clutched the ruby pendant. "I am steering exactly where you told me to go!" Ace barked back from the helm, his face a mask of concentrated frustration. "We're in the middle of a rocky shoal, Maye! If we hit a reef, even Marco's flames won't be able to stitch the hull back together!" "Pops says there's an inlet!" Maye fired back, her voice echoing with a strange, double-layered resonance. "He says the 'Old Iron-Wright' lives behind the mist. Just trust him!" "I trust him," Ace muttered, yanking the wheel hard to starboard as a jagged tooth of rock scraped the side of the Empress. "It's the fact that he's communicating through a woman who thinks a waterfall is a 'beautiful sight' that worries me!" The crew watched the bickering with a mixture of awe and amusement. It was a domestic dispute played out on a scale of high-seas navigation. Suddenly, the mist parted, revealing a hidden, ancient shipyard tucked into the hollow of a volcanic island. Standing on the rickety pier was a man who looked like he was made entirely of mahogany and spite, holding a giant wrench like a scepter.
"About time!" the old man bellowed. "Newgate told me twenty years ago someone would come for the 'Black Oak Project.' I assumed he meant after he died, not while his ghost was backseat driving!"
The weeks that followed were a blur of sawdust, iron-shaping, and absolute chaos. The crew didn't just help build the ship; they lived in a constant state of "Whitebeard hazing."
One afternoon, Maye was helping Izo seal the hull when she suddenly stood up straight, her eyes glazing over. "Ace! Pops says the galley needs to be twice as big because 'Luffy's brother eats like a starving Sea King and the rest of you aren't much better.'" Ace, who was currently hauling a massive beam of Adam Wood over his shoulder, nearly dropped it. "Tell him to mind his own business! And tell him I don't eat that much!" "He says your stomach just grumbled loud enough to shake the Den Den Mushi," Maye added, a playful smirk dancing on her lips. "I hate it here," Ace groaned, though his eyes were bright with a happiness he hadn't felt in years. The most "aww" moment came during the carving of the figurehead. They had initially planned for a fierce lion or a soaring phoenix, but as Maye sat in the shavings, she felt a warm, familiar pressure on her hand. Her chisel moved almost on its own, carving a massive, stylized white moustache that curved upward into a pair of defiant, protective tusks. When the tarp was finally pulled back, the crew went silent. It wasn't just a ship. It was a masterpiece of ebony-stained oak and reinforced steel. The sails were a deep, blood-red, the color of Maye's pendant and the main mast was carved with the names of every fallen brother from Marineford. "She's beautiful," Marco whispered, wiping a stray tear from his eye. "What are we calling her-yoi?"
Ace stepped forward, wrapping his arm around Maye's waist. He looked at the ship, then at the ruby glowing on Maye's chest, then at the horizon where their enemies waited. "The Moby's Will," Ace announced, his voice thick with pride. "Because as long as this ship sails, his dream never dies. And neither do we."
The celebration that night was the first true party of the new era. There was a legendary "incident" involving Rakuyo trying to ride a barrel down the new mahogany banisters, resulting in a hole in the galley wall that Maye made Ace fix by hand. Later, as the moon climbed high, Ace found Maye sitting at the very tip of the new figurehead, her legs swinging over the water.
"He's quiet tonight," she said softly as Ace climbed up to join her. "Probably exhausted from all the shouting," Ace joked, sitting down and pulling her into the crook of his arm. He looked at her, the moonlight catching the freckles he had spent the last hour counting in his head. "You did good, Anchor. We have a home again." Maye leaned her head on his shoulder, the scent of fresh lacquer and salt air filling her lungs. "We have a home. Now all we have to do is make sure it stays ours." Ace kissed the top of her head, his heart finally feeling anchored. "Try and stop us."
From the shadows of the deck, a faint, deep "Gurarara" seemed to catch on the wind, a ghostly blessing for the ship that would carry his children into the fire.