Across the Ocean (Zoro x OC)

Prologue: Evida

Evida, a free town located in the East Blue.

300 years ago, there was a village called Evihamma at this spot, though the name's origin is not completely explained. Historians nowadays think that the small river, which had provided the village's 100 residents with fresh water, fish and nutritious aquatic plants, is the eponym because linguists already proved that hamma had been a common term for river around that time.

However, the residents soon discovered that the river led to another village, whose people had ensured their existence with primitive agriculture.
Evihamma and Petdane understood the benefits of a friendship between both villages, and they began to exchange goods. They empowered each other with profound knowledge about fishing and agriculture and developed better tools. Of course, this led to deeper relationships between people, which resulted in partnerships and therefore in children. The population grew, and the villages' borders became increasingly blurred. So, the two village elders decided that the two villages should be merged. They agreed on the new name, Evida, as this would best represent the fusion of the two places.

Many, many years passed and, of course, it was not only Evida that was characterized by growth and development; the whole world began to go on discoveries across land and sea with carts and boats. A lot of visitors and travellers stopped by, discovered Evida's estates, and told their families and friends about this place of trade.

When navigation also gained popularity, a very special man came to town. Sitting in a tavern, he told the couple who owned this inn stories from his homeland. The man came from an island in the West Blue called Ohara, where many archaeologists existed. He was one of them, but instead of being proud of his state of being an eloquent man, he was much prouder of their tree of knowledge, a gigantic tree that contained a library, a collection of books about the world. Of course, he also had one or two of these books with him and showed them to the couple as proof of his words. The owner was astonished, but he waved it off when he had a closer look. These strange characters called letters were nothing he could recognise. But his wife enjoyed this secret language as much as she was interested in the funny dialects of their from far - travelled guests. She asked the archaeologist to teach her and in return, she showed him around and offered him to stay for free in one of the tavern's rooms. He stayed longer than expected, but after five weeks or so, the archaeologist left, and he gave his student one of his two books as a present. She promised him that she would continue practising, and so she did: reading the book from the first page to the last again and again and rewriting the paragraphs all over, whenever she had time.

One day, she said to her husband that it was a shame she was the only resident of Evida who was able to read and write: People could not only write down the history of their homeland and introduce it to their children, but they could also capture all the stories of the blabbermouths, the kids and the travellers! What a joy! How much they would learn about the world! And last but not least, they would be of advantage for trading!

The first two reasons were of little interest to her husband, but the last one was definitely stuck in his head: Recently, a group of wealthy men had been travelling through the country more often than other people of Evida. They brought gifts with them, whenever they returned home: maps, which taught the people that Evida was only one city of many on this land. That such a place like Evida was generally called a city elsewhere. And because this group of men was more educated than the other residents, they advised the current council of elders about political and economical stuff. They even called themselves territorial leaders.

In general, they cared about their hometown and were keen to maintain the halcyon days which were of importance to the peaceful Evida, but when it came to coins - they had also introduced to the residents - their attitude seemed to change: at first there were small taxes, a service fee, because of their efforts. Then they suggested that craftsmen, fishermen, farmers and traders should pay taxes depending on their income. Construction work and other things should be enabled with the money, since they could buy supplies, material and tools in other towns. Evida would grow even more! Which happened.