Formation of the Spade Pirates
Washed up on the shores of a deserted island at the edge of the East Blue Sea, two men from different backgrounds unite in their shared thirst for adventure.
One of them, Portgaz D. Ace, will follow in his infamous fa...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
Gradually the sky turned darker and darker red. Another day was coming to an end. Ace and I finished eating our fruit, complaining about the taste all the while, and sat next to one another, watching the sun set over the horizon.
As usual, the island was breathtakingly beautiful.
I recalled the skeleton I found earlier near the bushes at the edge of the sand-when he washed up here alone, did he also gaze out at the sunset this way?
All alone. No one to talk to.
With that in mind, how lucky was I that at least Ace was here with me? It had taken me all this time to realize that I wasn't alone. Thanks to Ace, I could survive on my own. It was knowing that someone else was on the island with me that led me to choose solitude, to make it on my own. Ace seemed to be thinking about it the same way.
"Look at the sun," he said abruptly. "If I think 'Man, that's gorgeous,' but it's just me all alone, then what does it matter? If nobody else is seeing it with me, what's the point of it all?'' He chuckled to himself.
The sun would be going down in minutes, but it didn't feel as cold as it usually did at this time of day. Must have been because I finally had some food in my stomach. Or maybe it was having Ace sitting near by.
It was a mysterious feeling. In fact almost felt warmer than i t was earlier in the day.
I turned to look at Ace. He was burning. Not emotionally. He was actually burning. He was literally on fire-flames were shooting from his skin.
"Yeow, it's hot! What's going on?!" I screamed, just as Ace also realized something was amiss.
"Whoa! W-what is this?!" Ace yelled and panicked on the spot.
I picked up some sand with my hands, and hurled it at Ace, but it had no effect on the flames on his skin. If anything, they seemed to get hotter.
"W-why did you suddenly catch on fire?!" I yelled, as I continued shoveling sand onto him. But something about it struck me as odd.
Ace's body had caught fire, but it didn't seem to be actually burning his clothes or skin. Strangely enough, it was as though his entire body-and everything he wore on it-had actually become fire...
"Aaaaah! It's hot! It's hot!! It's...not hot?"
Ace instantly regained his cool. And in a matter of moments, the flames covering his body became noticeably smaller and finally vanished. There wasn't a single burn on his skin, and no damage to his cloches or hat. Not even a speck of soot.
"Do you think that fruit," I murmured in a stunned daze, "could have been a Devil Fruit?"
The forbidden fruit. An uncarnaton of the devil of the sea. Whether true or false, the legend was that if you took a single bite, such a fruit would impart demonic powers. In exchange, the person who ate the fruit brought upon themselves the wrath of the sea. They would never be able to swim again.
