The Shelves

New chapter is live.

Settle in, take your time, and let's see what waits in the dark 🖤

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The next morning, Corvin opened his eyes with exhaustion written across his face.

He had stayed up sorting through information the night before and, without noticing, had worked until just before dawn.

He had fallen asleep from sheer fatigue, only to wake less than two hours later.

Fortunately, he had completed one hunt yesterday. Otherwise, this body might not have endured the strain.

Once awake, he could not fall asleep again.

He pushed off the thin blanket and got out of bed.

He had no idea what work Sol would assign him.

Either way, to settle in as quickly as possible, he had already accepted his role as the shop's hired help.

After rubbing his face, Corvin opened the door and stepped out.

The corridor was so quiet that the floorboards creaked faintly beneath his steps.

At the dead end of the hall, a window had been boarded over. Morning light slipped through the gaps between the planks and fell across the floor in thin, spotted beams.

Corvin glanced at the other closed doors but did not linger. He walked toward the stairs.

He followed them down to the first floor.

The corridor on the right led to the shop. The one on the left led toward the living room and kitchen.

Perhaps because it was still early, the shop doors had not been opened.

Sunny, however, was already awake. She sat at the dining table, eating breakfast.

Corvin washed up quickly, then came to the dining room connected to the kitchen.

He was starving.

Yesterday, he had been able to endure it. Today was different. Maybe his recovering body was finally demanding fuel.

Sunny looked up at his hungry expression, pushed a cup of milk toward the empty seat, and motioned for him to sit and eat.

Corvin did not hesitate. He pulled out the chair and sat down.

Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed another empty place setting with a bowl and plate that still held a few scraps. Sol had clearly eaten already.

Corvin lifted the wooden cup and took a mouthful of milk.

His brows drew together.

The raw, animal taste filled his mouth.

He forced himself to drink it anyway, then tore into a slab of meat and finished it in a few bites. For a moment, he felt as if he had come back to life.

The shop looked shabby, but the food was surprisingly good.

What put him most at ease, though, was Sol and Sunny's casual attitude. They were quite different from the pirates he had expected.

Sol had saved his life, after all.

After swallowing several pieces of meat in a row, Corvin finally slowed down.

He looked at Sunny, who had nearly finished eating, and thought of the rule she had written yesterday about not going outside, day or night.

An idea stirred.

"Sunny, what kind of place is Mad Hatter Town, exactly?"

"Go outside and see for yourself."

Corvin stared at her.

Yesterday's paper was still clear in his mind.

Looking at Sunny's blank expression, he wondered if she was taking revenge for the way he had brushed her off yesterday.

Before he could think further, Sunny pushed back her chair.

"When you're done eating, clean this up. Then clean the shop. You have half an hour."

She left that instruction behind and went upstairs without looking back.

Corvin shook his head, finished the rest of breakfast, and started cleaning.

If sweeping and wiping things down was all the work required of him, his job as hired help was almost too easy.

After clearing the dining table, he carried the cleaning tools into the shop.

He was especially careful while cleaning the shelves.

After all, one of Sunny's written rules had been that he was not allowed to touch the weapons for sale.

Touching was forbidden.

Looking was not.

There were three shelves in the shop.

The first held blades of various styles. The second held flintlocks of different lengths. The third held a mixture of blades and firearms.

If he remembered correctly, the bloodstained long blade Watt had carried yesterday had been wiped clean by Sol and placed on the third shelf.

The third shelf was by far the fullest. Remembering Sol's practiced movements from the day before, Corvin quickly understood its purpose.

'A secondhand shelf?'

Its source needed no explanation.

Strictly speaking, though, bladed weapons such as swords and knives did not change much just because they had previous owners, so long as they were not damaged.

Corvin shifted his gaze away from the third shelf and looked at the one holding a dozen or so guns.

There were not many of them, which made the shelf look a little empty.

He studied the firearms.

Whether on Earth or in the Hunter world, firearms had always overshadowed melee weapons.

Compared with blades, Corvin understood guns far better.

Back in the Hunter world, even after his own training had reached the point where he no longer needed to rely on firearms, he still carried a handgun with him.

He would not call himself a master marksman, but he could guarantee basic accuracy.

That said, he also knew that in the world of One Piece, blades had far more presence than guns.

Among truly dangerous fighters, most favored blades or other melee weapons over firearms.

But that did not mean firearms had a low ceiling.

It was just that very few people shown in the story had ever pushed a gun's range advantage to its limit.

'Is Kinu's gun somewhere here?'

Corvin suddenly thought of Kid, who had come to the shop yesterday.

If the gun mattered that much to Kid, it had to be exceptional.

He moved closer and carefully examined the few guns on the shelf.

Unfortunately, Corvin only knew modern firearms. With these flintlocks, he could not make out anything useful.

With his current understanding, he could not tell which of the dozen flintlocks were good or bad, let alone identify Kinu's gun.

'I need to get one as soon as I can.'

A flintlock was not as powerful as a modern gun, but that did not make Corvin value it any less.

For early hunts, what he lacked most was a simple, brutal killing tool.

Resisting the urge to steal a secondhand flintlock from the third shelf, Corvin quickly finished wiping everything down.

When the cleaning was done, he threw the tools back into the storage room.

Exactly half an hour had passed.

Sunny came downstairs on time and entered the shop.

Corvin noticed almost immediately that she seemed to be in a good mood.

He had no way of knowing the reason: for the foreseeable future, she would no longer have to do the dirty, tiring work herself.

If Corvin did not die young, that future could stretch on indefinitely.

While Corvin watched, Sunny took a thin ruler from the counter, walked to the shelves, and began measuring the positions of the goods one by one.

The sight made him uneasy.

'Is she really going that far?'

At first, he thought she was measuring the items to check whether he had touched them without permission.

But as he watched, he realized that was not it.

Sunny measured each item, then adjusted it carefully until it sat straight.

The longer he watched, the more unsettling it became.

He did not dare interrupt her and simply waited off to the side.

An hour later, Sunny finally finished.

Only then did the shop open for the day.

"Where's Sol?"

Seeing that Sol still had not come down, Corvin found it a little strange.

Sunny sat behind the counter and looked at him without expression.

"Sol went to the pleasure district for morning training. He usually comes back before lunch."

"Oh. Morning training."

Corvin understood at once. No wonder Sol could maintain that level of strength despite his age.

Then he paused.

Wait.

Something about that was wrong.

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