Fifteen minutes later, at the port of Orange Town.
The three of them had successfully escaped from the townspeople's pursuit and hurriedly boarded the ship while panting heavily. Not long afterward, the sound of numerous hurried footsteps echoed from the direction of the pier. The townspeople chased them all the way to the end of the wooden bridge, shouting angrily as they watched their ship begin to move away.
"There they are!"
"Don't let them get away!"
Nami, who saw that, panicked and hurriedly urged Luffy and Zoro to move faster.
"You two, hurry up and raise the sails!" she shouted, occasionally glancing back toward the crowd that was still shaking their fists in the air.
Luffy and Zoro did not say much. They immediately raised the sails in a panic, and the ship began moving away from the port.
After the ship had sailed far enough, with the townspeople's angry shouts becoming increasingly faint, the three of them could finally relax a little. Right at that moment, a familiar elderly voice came from the pier.
It was Mayor Boodle. He ran from the town toward the pier while removing the various parts of his armor one by one along the way so that he could run faster, chasing after Luffy's ship to thank him.
"Hey! You brats!"
Hearing that voice, Luffy turned around and saw Boodle standing at the end of the pier, in front of the crowd of townspeople who were still angry. His eyes immediately lit up with happiness. He told Nami and Zoro that Boodle was there.
"Hey, Old Man!" Luffy waved cheerfully.
Boodle cupped both hands around his mouth and shouted at the top of his lungs.
"Thank you! Take good care of yourselves!"
Hearing that shout, the crowd immediately stopped their anger and stared at their mayor in confusion. Wasn't the person they had been chasing just now the one who had beaten up Boodle and was suspected of being a member of Buggy's pirate crew? Why was he thanking them now?
Zoro and Nami smiled when they heard that. Luffy pressed down on his straw hat, revealing a wide smile with two rows of teeth, while waving his hand.
"Yeah! You take care of yourself too, Old Man! I hope we meet again someday!"
Mayor Boodle continued waving until Luffy's ship completely disappeared beyond the horizon.
...
Out at sea, Nami was recounting their supplies when she noticed something. One of their sacks of treasure was missing.
She turned around and looked at Zoro, then at Luffy.
"Where's our other sack of treasure?"
"I left it in the town," Luffy replied casually, as though it were not a big deal.
Nami froze for a moment before grabbing Luffy by the collar and shaking him angrily. "Why did you do that, idiot?! Do you know that sack was worth five million Berries?!"
As he was being shaken back and forth, Luffy calmly explained.
"But they need the money more. They need to rebuild their town."
"But if you want, we can go back and get it."
Nami fell silent for a moment, her hand slowly releasing the collar of Luffy's vest. She let out a long sigh, finally giving up on the sack of treasure.
"Never mind. But if you're going to do something like that again, tell me first, okay? Understand?"
"Okay," Luffy replied casually. A few moments later, he asked again, "Oh yeah, Nami, where are we going next?"
Nami, who was checking the remaining supplies, stopped for a moment. She unrolled the map and glanced over it before answering.
"If we sail south, we should reach Gecko Island."
"Oh, I see. Hopefully, we can buy a better ship there," Luffy muttered, actually more curious about where he would meet the ship that had continued appearing in his thoughts, the Going Merry.
From the fragments of memories he had absorbed from Kevin, he knew that he was supposed to meet the Going Merry before eventually reaching the Grand Line. Unfortunately, those memories were not clear enough to tell him exactly where that meeting would take place. There was also Usopp, who was supposed to join around the same time he obtained that ship.
So he guessed that perhaps Usopp and the Going Merry were in the same place. He hoped that on the next island, he would be able to meet both of them at the same time.
Nami held her chin, thinking as she carefully observed their ship. The ship was actually not too cramped, but if the three of them recklessly sailed straight into the Grand Line in a makeshift ship like this, it would be no different from courting death.
"Yeah, we need to find a bigger ship before we dare enter the Grand Line."
Luffy nodded in agreement.
After that, the three of them returned to their respective activities.
Nami continued checking their supplies and recording the items they had.
Zoro sat on one side of the ship while resting.
Meanwhile, Luffy leaned against the back of the ship and closed his eyes as if he were sleeping, when in reality, he had entered the Simulation Room to begin training.
After successfully copying Buggy, Luffy could not wait to try fighting him at full strength. Inside the Simulation Room, Luffy immediately chose Buggy as his first opponent.
It did not take long for him to defeat Buggy easily. But once the battle was over, he instead felt a little disappointed. Buggy turned out to be not as strong as he had imagined. His Devil Fruit ability did make the fight quite interesting and full of tricks, but aside from that, Buggy's own combat ability was ordinary, slightly above that of a normal human, but nothing special.
In Luffy's opinion, what made Buggy's bounty fairly high in East Blue was purely his Devil Fruit, not his personal strength. Realizing that, he felt somewhat disappointed. Earlier, he had hoped that Buggy could become a fairly challenging training opponent.
After that simulation session, Luffy continued with his other training. He began focusing on awakening his Kenbunshoku Haki, while also looking for a way to awaken his Busoshoku Haki, and started searching for a training method for Seimei Kikan.
For Busoshoku Haki, he already had an idea of how to awaken it. As for Seimei Kikan, he also had an idea for training and began trying it little by little.
For the rest, he usually spent his free time fishing with Zoro, or occasionally playing cards with Nami and Zoro on the deck, accompanied by the sound of the waves and the gentle sea breeze.
Without them realizing it, five days passed just like that. The three of them finally arrived at Gecko Island.