The forest on the outskirts of Goa Kingdom was incredibly quiet that afternoon. The wind blew gently through the leaves, causing the branches to sway softly as sunlight passed through the gaps in the canopy and fell in scattered patches upon the ground. There was no sound of human life there, only the occasional chirping of birds and the rustling of the wind sweeping through the wild grass.
In the middle of the forest stood an old treehouse. Its wood had long since lost its color, several planks had begun to rot with age, and the ropes holding parts of the roof together had loosened here and there. The treehouse had been built years ago by three young boys who had sworn to become brothers. Now, two of them had gone off to travel, leaving behind one person who still faithfully used it as a place to escape from the outside world.
Luffy was sleeping inside, lying down with one of his legs dangling out of the small window of the treehouse. His straw hat covered his face, rising and falling with his steady breathing. The atmosphere was so peaceful, as if time itself had stopped for a moment just for him.
However, that peace did not last long.
Without warning, the world around Luffy turned completely dark. It was not darkness like that of the night, but a deep, empty darkness that seemed to have neither boundaries nor direction. His body could not move even slightly, as if he were bound by something invisible.
In front of him, a shadowy figure appeared. Its form was vague, like a human but not entirely real, as though it had only just been formed from fragments of incomplete light.
"You're... Luffy, right?" The voice sounded strange, flat yet full of certainty, like someone who had been planning something for a long time.
Luffy tried to answer, but his own voice felt heavy and difficult to force out. "How do you know my name?" he finally managed to ask, though his tone carried more confusion than fear.
The shadowy figure did not answer immediately. It merely chuckled softly, as if enjoying the moment.
"Sorry," it said afterward, "but I'm going to borrow your body for a moment."
Before Luffy could understand what those words meant, the figure had already moved and attacked him.
A strange pain immediately spread throughout Luffy's entire body, as if he were being torn apart from the inside. Tiny fragments of light began to emerge from his body, floating slowly into the air before disappearing completely. His consciousness gradually began to fade, like the flame of a candle growing dimmer as the wind blew against it.
He tried to move. He couldn't.
He tried to open his mouth and scream. No sound came out.
Stop it... stop it...
That was the only thing he could scream in silence, a cry that never reached anywhere except deep within himself.
Just as his consciousness was about to fade completely, something inside him seemed to refuse to surrender. An invisible power exploded from his body, forming strands of black lightning that crackled wildly through the air, forcefully pushing the shadowy figure back.
Luffy himself did not realize it, but at that moment, his hair turned white, his eyebrows curled into a spiral pattern, and his body became covered in a thin white mist that moved like living flames.
He clenched both of his fists. Something was different this time. His body felt overflowing with energy, far stronger than before.
"What... how is this possible?!" the shadowy figure shouted, clearly shocked. A blue protective layer appeared around its body, trying to withstand the barrage of black lightning that continued to strike from Luffy's direction.
Luffy grinned, revealing his teeth. There was not the slightest hesitation in his movements as he shot forward. His instincts were enough to tell him that the creature before him had not come with good intentions, so he had no intention of holding back even a little.
Years of training under his grandfather since childhood, combined with his experience fighting various wild beasts in the forest, made Luffy's body move almost without thinking. He continued to force the figure backward, punching and striking without pause, until his opponent's body finally began to crack like glass under excessive pressure.
In an instant, the figure shattered into countless pieces, turning into fragments of white light that floated through the air before being drawn in and absorbed into Luffy's own body.
A warm sensation immediately spread from his chest, slowly flowing throughout his entire body like warm water being gently poured over him. His mind, which usually felt clouded, suddenly became much clearer, as though the thick fog that had been covering his thoughts all this time had just been split apart by sunlight.
For some reason, he felt certain that if Makino taught him how to read again right now, he would definitely be able to understand it easily.
At that moment, he woke up.
Luffy's body was drenched in sweat. He was lying on the ground, surrounded by scattered pieces of broken wood. The treehouse that had once been his playground with Ace and Sabo was now completely flattened, reduced to a pile of wooden planks and broken branches.
What Luffy did not know was that while he had been fighting the figure earlier, the burst of Haoshoku Haki that erupted from his body had been so powerful that it caused the wooden parts of the treehouse to crack and break one by one, until the entire structure finally collapsed on top of him.
"What... what was that?" Luffy muttered, still confused. He held his head, which felt like it was about to split apart. Not because of pain, but because fragments of unfamiliar memories were suddenly flooding his mind, memories that clearly did not belong to him.
Before he could process all of it, a transparent blue screen suddenly appeared, floating directly in front of his face.
[Host detected.]
[Beginning connection to the system...]
[1%...]
[40%...]
[60%...]
[100%...]
[System connected.]
[Does the host wish to open the starter gift package?]
Luffy stared silently at the strange screen floating in the air, his eyes widening in shock.
"Huh?!"