Martial Arts Worlds

"Who are you…?"

"No… Who are you?"

Two pirates pressed their foreheads against each other. Their eyes barely stayed open, and they swayed in unison as their ship rocked back and forth on the rough seas.

It was getting quite late, but the party showed no signs of slowing down.

Around the poker table, an angry-looking pirate slammed his cards down and looked at the newcomer, Julian, with a look of hatred.

"Heh, unlucky, boys!" Julian chuckled as he revealed his winning hand.

It was only a pair of twos.

The pirate's face almost exploded in embarrassment. He had much better cards, but he folded because he thought Julian had a straight or something, as he seemed strangely confident.

However, it was all Julian's bluff, and everyone at the table was tricked by it.

Julian snatched the gold coins from the table and smiled as he stood up. Discover stories with empire

"It was a good game!"

"Tch…" The pirates clicked their tongues in frustration.

'We're now slightly closer to freedom.' Julian thought as he pocketed his money. 'At this pace, we will be free in about ten years.'

While enjoying the night air, Kiernan looked to the stars and reminisced about his Irio days.

That place seemed like a distant dream now, and he realized why his teacher talked about World Seas with such wariness during geography class.

It was truly a dangerous and scary place.

'What to do? Is there really no way of returning home?' Kiernan thought with a sigh.

At that moment, someone sat beside him. He thought it was Julian. However, when he turned to the side, he saw a short-haired woman with sharp eyes and long eyelashes.

She was a petite woman.

Her short hair was dyed a dark shade of black, and while her ears were hidden under her hair, her silver earpiercings caught the light as she turned her head.

She turned her head to look straight at Kiernan, allowing him to see her dark eyes staring intensely at him.

She sure was beautiful—a dangerous kind of beauty that drew him in like a moth to a flame.

'I think I've seen her a few times. She is the quartermaster—Ambrose's right hand, I believe.'

The stench of alcohol tickled his nostrils, coming from her mouth, but he brushed it off and continued to watch her.

It was like they were having a staring contest. Neither of them blinked or dared to look away.

'Her name is Wren, I think.'

Kiernan was quite confident that he had heard her name somewhere. The name belonged to the quartermaster of the Silver Hunt pirates.

"Kiernan?" Julian walked over with a drink in hand and saw the two staring at each other. "The hell?"

Kiernan's gaze slightly moved over to Julian.

Wren's eyebrow twitched as she didn't like that their staring contest was interrupted so rudely.

She then reached out her hand and grabbed Kiernan's chin, forcing him to look straight at her, and then she brought her face closer to him and planted a soft kiss on his lips.

"?!" Kiernan's eyes widened.

"Huh?" Julian raised an eyebrow in confusion.

Wren, while kissing him, looked straight into his eyes without blinking even once. He hadn't blinked either, but since it had been almost a minute without either of them blinking, Kiernan's eyes turned dry, and finally he had to blink.

As soon as he did, Wren stopped kissing him and said, "I won."

She then stood up and walked away as if nothing happened.

"How drunk was she?" Julian waved his hand in front of his face and sat beside Kiernan. "I can smell the alcohol from here."

"Good question." Kiernan scratched the back of his head.

At that moment, a hand touched Kiernan's shoulder, and when he looked over, he saw Ambrose looking at him with a smirk.

"So you met our quartermaster, Wren."

"Is there something wrong with her?" Kiernan asked.

"Oh, yes, there is a lot wrong with her." Ambrose laughed. "I wanted to ask. How was your first naval battle? Did you enjoy it?"

"It was alright." Kiernan said and crossed his arms. "I must learn Sea Steps, though."

"Mm…" Ambrose smirked. "I might have a way for you to speed up the things. It's dangerous, though."

"Hmm?" Kiernan raised an eyebrow. "I am listening."

Ambrose opened his mouth, but then a pirate shouted out.

"Yo, new bounties were just posted on the app!" A drunken pirate waved his phone.

When everyone looked over, they saw that the newest members of the Silver Hunt pirates received their bounties just now!

"Haha!" Ambrose laughed. "I guess you two are real pirates now!"

Kiernan looked to the phone with a twitching eyebrow and then turned to Julian, who was whistling innocently as if he hadn't done anything.

The phone showed two new bounties.

***

[DEAD OR ALIVE]

[Name: Tobias Reiner]

[Association: Silver Hunt Pirates]

[Role: Cabin Boy]

[Rank: Martial Champion (Unclear)]

[Bounty: 1001 Gold Coins]

***

[DEAD OR ALIVE]

[Name: Jason Leonhardt]

[Association: Silver Hunt Pirates]

[Role: Cabin Boy]

[Rank: Low Stage Martial Champion]

[Bounty: 1002 Gold Coins]

***

"It's with the fake names as well!" Ambrose laughed with other pirates.

When they looked over to the phone, they saw that the picture in the bounty pictures wasn't really them. It was sketched pictures because they couldn't catch a proper photo of them.

Thus, they were drawn with the cap over their eyes, and it was very hard for anyone to recognize them through the sketched picture.

"Haha, I have a bigger bounty than you!" Julian grinned.

"Bigger? Your bounty is bigger by one gold coin."

"Still bigger!"

Kiernan rolled his eyes and checked the bounty one more time.

'I guess they didn't get a good reading of my martial arts rank. I think they put Martial Champion because they believe my strength is at that range, which is true.'

"This news deserves another drink!" Ambrose filled his cup with beer and raised it high. "Cheers!"

"CHEERS!"

After the pirates cheered and clinked their mugs together, they gulped the drinks down, but almost immediately after, they started dropping down one by one.

Snore~

They started sleeping under the starry skies.

"They all passed out at the exact same time."