OP:FS Chapter 01 (Patreon)

My story started out simple. Born in the north blue, lived a comfortable life until I turned thirteen then was smart enough to know the worl

My story started out simple. Born in the north blue, lived a comfortable life until I turned thirteen then was smart enough to know the world was about to explode because Gol D. Roger made his famous speech. I quickly enlisted into the navy to try and do my part to stabilize the seas and slowly rose through the ranks becoming a lieutenant with talks of becoming a captain after the next big mission.

The next big mission was the buster call used on Ohara. At that point, I knew I couldn’t support the Marines. I did my best to kill the more bloodthirsty marines without being caught then loaded up several researchers into barrels and pushed them out to sea. They had slim chances for survival but it wasn’t zero like if they stayed here.

I played my role and pretended it didn’t affect me until it was time to relist at which point I quit and moved to the east blue. It was mainly to see where the pirate king was executed but I quickly became a bounty hunter when I noticed almost all pirates stop here for the same reason. Slowly I gained profits and upgraded my equipment.

I purchased a seastone baton to help deal with devil fruit users and my profits quickly grew. Saving for years I managed to get one of the few dozen devil fruits I wanted. Logia devil fruits were far too expensive and I could spend decades collecting bounties before I could afford one. This fruit was what I would call a pseudo logia as it acted similar but was much cheaper because it was considered a dud fruit.

It didn’t provide much in terms of firepower unless you were clever with it but for utility and survival, it was one of the best in my opinion. After that, I bought many items that would increase the effectiveness of the devil fruit and a ship that used the devil fruit to power it. I started to buy different machines to fill my ship allowing me to make machined ship parts.

I got another devil fruit for cheap and found one I sold from a pirate crew whose bounty I was after. I stole a bunch of sea stones from the Marines as my devil fruit was well suited for covert acts. It wasn’t enough to coat the bottom of my paddle steamer but I coated the rowboat, sailboat, and miniature speedboat.

All were designed to use my devil fruit powers to their fullest as well and I didn’t understand why if so much of the earth is sea you wouldn’t have multiple forms of travel in case the worst happened. My ship was small, with only two livable rooms with the steam engine and underdeck for miniature cannons and rowing. I didn’t need much more than that and I just drifted in life trying to do my best to make up for previous atrocities I unknowingly took part in and tried to correct.

It has been just about two decades since then. The nightmares had gone away in the first decade and the orphans I helped had grown to adults. After giving the spare devil fruit I bought to the leader I knew they’d be fine in the long run. Loguetown was more peaceful since the new captain Smoker showed up. We’ve had dealings but he didn’t like that I was an ex-marine and bounty hunter. I didn’t like that he was a dog for the world government sent here to never gain enough merits to grow in rank until he was old and bitter he couldn’t do more. I often had to pay for Bartolomeo’s freedom after he got into fights with pirates or marines. Smoker also wanted to process any bounties so they were to be brought to him.

……………………………………………………………………………………………………….

I entered Smoker’s office with the two pirates I caught. I waited for him to respond but he was reading a newspaper. “Got two fresh pirates here. One with a 500k bounty the other his underling worth 200k.” Smoker looked up at the unconscious pirates before saying. “Yea yea, go put them in the jail cells and collect your payment. Neither is of any importance.”

As I did so another marine came running into his room. “Bad news Captain Smoker. We got a big pirate headed here named Monkey D. Luffy.” I smirked as I looked up at him. Most of the time I was shorter than everyone around me, this was one of those times. He responded before another marine came running in saying a pirate was attacking the docks.

He left before I could get more information. If he went then that means Monkey D. Luffy was as good as caught, which was unfortunate. A thirty million berry bounty would put me that much closer to a good logia devil fruit. I had five hundred million saved but if the owner knew it was a logia it would go for more than that.

I got paid and placed the money into a separate sack holding it with both hands before I poofed out of existence.

……………………………………………………………………………………………………

I was standing around the central plaza when Luffy and Smoker fought. Through sheer luck, the very young pirate managed to escape Smoker before he could even use his devil fruit. I finished the meat skewers I was eating before this version of me noted the direction he flew off in. I called out to Smoker. “Hey is he up for grabs or do you still want to try catching him?”

He looked at me with that angry scowl before grunting in affirmation. I smiled as he gave me permission to try and catch him. That version of me puffed away as I was given permission and needed the information.

I watched as Tashigi fought two men before dropping her glasses. Another man picked them up before looking at her shocked and crushing them by accident. Another young boy was about to be fleeced for money from the item store that sold fake items. I convinced him it was a scam and sent him on his way.

I spotted a beautiful woman in the crowd and didn’t approach her but kept an eye on her. A man was openly challenged to a cooking duel which he turned down. Another group of pirates had arrived and were very poorly concealing themselves as pirates.

That was almost always the case though. Wearing a cloak and covering your face made people think that no one would eavesdrop on their conversations and know for sure that they were pirates. I waited for the two to lower their guards before I attacked them firing a sea prism net at both because it was always better to assume they had a devil fruit.

After removing their cloaks I recognized their leader's face and smiled. “Ah, Buggy the Clown. 15 million bounty! It’s nice to finally meet you.” His eyes went wide in fear before I was attacked from behind by another beauty with a gigantic mace. As she struck me my body poofed out of existence and the sea prism net I was holding did as well.