His Shadow (One Piece | Reverse Harem)

Chapter 3 | "She's your- What?!"

Chapter 3 | "She's your– What?!"

As he opened his eyes, the first thing Kuro saw was the blue, vast sky sparsely accompanied by white blobs of clouds.

The man made to sit up and immediately regretted his decision when a jolt of pain went straight through his torso. He also regretted the moment he dropped his body back down as it only made the dull throbbing of his head more prominent.

Letting out a small groan, Kuro resigned himself to his current predicament and closed his eyes to get some more rest, in hopes that by some miracle he'd be good as new the next time he woke up.

"Good afternoon to you too." A voice, which he had recently come to familiarise himself with, chimed from his right.

Opening hours eyes once more, Kuro turned to his head, absentmindedly noting the rustling feeling of bandages shifting all over his body. He eyed the hooded women sitting at the base of a tree, waiting to see what she had to say.

Instead, all he got was a stare and a raise of an eyebrow.

After a long moment, Kuro eventually broke the silence. "...Why did you help me?" He croaked, his throat feeling scratchy as shit after how-ever-long-he-had-been-unconscious of unuse.

Scarlett appraised the beaten man in front of her and lifted her shoulders into a shrug, "Who else would?" She remarked simply.

The truth of her words seemed to have been both painful, yet unsurprising to the captain, well... ex-captain now, she suppose. They didn't talk for the rest of the day.

The next day was a bust. It was like how it was after their first altercation, Kuro refused to look at her let alone talk to her.

So she did what she'd done just a few days before — keep him company until he breaks.

And as she predicted, Kuro broke.

✧◝(⁰▿⁰)◜✧

It was late that day, the sun was setting, indicating the end of another day. Scarlett had been coming and going off the cliff every morning for the past six days.

Truth be told, Scarlett wouldn't be able to wait for him for long. She only had until the seventh day to wait for Kuro's answer as that was the time when they'd get the promised ship from Kaya, the rich, young lady whom Usopp managed to befriend. There was no way she would hinder Luffy's journey just for her selfish wish.

So she was quite thrilled when Kuro finally asked, "Does your offer still stand?"

Tilting her head, Scarlett glanced at the man sitting across from her. "Yes." She answered after a beat. "It does."

Kuro took a breath, and then two. "What is your goal? Why search for a companion? It isn't like you're alone." He finally asked the question that had been plaguing his mind for the past week. "Why pick an enemy? Why me?"

Despite the barrage of questions, Scarlett wasn't perturbed. She didn't have any special reason. She merely wished for someone to converse with whilst looking over the captain of the Straw Hat Pirates, and then she met Kuro purely on coincidence. That coincidence was something she took a chance with.

And having nothing to hide, she told Kuro exactly as such.

"I'm only tagging along to keep an eye on Luffy. Swordsman-san and Thief-chan are his, I only want someone of mine to talk to." Scarlett shrugged, "And you're Luffy's enemy. You've done nothing to slight me."

Ignoring her weird choice of nicknames, Kuro focused on the more important matter at hand and looked at her with furrowed eyebrows, "You're only here to keep an eye on the boy?" He parroted, "Then are you not apart of his crew?"