The Berserker and the Sea of Madness

The song is from the movie Belle-A Million Miles Away, not from my creation.

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The sun stood high in the sky, a searing, white disc of indifference above Alubarna, the capital city of Alabasta.

The last of the Whitebeard Pirates had long departed, and Douglas Bullet had been taken into Marine custody.

The real Marines—a disciplined force under the command of the legend himself, Vice Admiral Garp—had formed a wide, respectful circle around Robin, who stood at the center of Alubarna Plaza.

Their presence was a silent, imposing guard, drawing the attention of every single person in the city.

One by one, they began to gather.

From the sun-baked stones of a narrow alley, a boy with dirt-caked feet and sunburned skin climbed onto a broken fruit cart, the wooden wheels groaning under his weight.

He peered above the growing crowd, his stomach rumbling a silent, persistent cry that only he could hear. The lens of a cracked pair of goggles glinted in his hand, a worthless trinket he used to stare through above the sea of tired faces.

Beside him, a girl in rags—no older than ten—still clutched the half-rotten bread she had scavenged from a trash heap, its moldy surface a cruel parody of sustenance.

Her eyes, wide and hollow with an innocence already tainted by suffering, fixed on the woman at the center of the plaza with a desperate curiosity.

More came from the shadow of buildings, their gaunt forms emerging from the heat. The hungry and the poor, their desperation a palpable thing that hung in the air like dust.

A gaunt mother with a child swaddled in worn linens pressed her palm to her belly, not from the simple pang of hunger, but from a profound, physical habit of always being hungry. The child in her arms made no sound; it was too weak to cry, its tiny body a testament to the nation's silent suffering.

A limping veteran soldier, his uniform torn and patched, his face a road map of scars from a conflict that gave him nothing but pain, now stared with a hollow, lost gaze.

A widowed woman, who had just lost her husband in the previous conflict, knelt in the dust, her head bowed in perpetual mourning. She still wore her husband's jacket, its worn, patched fabric a single, faded reminder of the life she once had.

Fathers of the soldiers who had fallen in the conflict, a pointless war that took almost a hundred thousand lives in a single day, looked with haunted gazes that saw not the present, but a future that had died with their sons.

Street vendors who had nothing left to sell, their empty carts a testament to a collapsed economy, stared with hollow gazes.

Guards who had lost their friend still held spears with hands that trembled, not just from resentment, but from the burden of their failures and the sheer, overwhelming weight of the nation's despair.

All of them circled the plaza, their collective grief and quiet suffering a palpable force that crushes Robin.

They stared at the woman at the heart of the plaza, toward Robin, and toward Guts, who stood not far from her.

Guts watched them with a grim expression.

Then, suddenly—he felt it.

Not from without, but from within. A whisper in the depths of his soul. A voice—familiar, achingly dear—spoke to him.

His grip tightened. His breath stilled. "Are you sure?" he asked. He had to be certain.

Then he closed his eyes in a silent, grim understanding.

In the middle of the plaza, Robin's body began to shake, no longer from the chill of the morning but from the overwhelming, accumulating weight of the sorrow she had absorbed. 

She spread her arms and opened her palms. Her long, dark hair, stirred by an unseen current, began to sway. She was using her Whisperer of the World ability, not to listen, but to implore.

She was entreating her friend, the wind itself, to convey the pain of Alabasta's people.

Their sadness, their resentment, their hopelessness, were not just whispers in her mind; they were now a tangible force, a river of emotion flowing out from her, a shared burden of suffering and loss.

And then, she began to sing.

Her voice, clear and beautiful, rose above the tense silence of the plaza, a melody of pure, unadorned hope that carried with it the song of the land itself.

"Light glimmers in a flower,

Like jewels in a dream,

The sky breathes life, love to everything."

As she sang, her Whisperer ability spread through the surrounding area. The clouds, which had been absent all year, began to gather in the vast, empty sky, a soft grey promise against the harsh blue.

And the people, their gaunt faces turned up toward the sound, began to feel something stirring inside their weary hearts.

"At times I feared I'd never be enough,

Bound in silence, chained by scars.

But still—there lies a path through the ashes and the dark."

As she sang, the sky began to darken, the growing clouds swirling into a vast, heavy canopy that stretched from horizon to horizon.

Robin raised her hand, her arm outstretched toward the sky as if to touch a reality beyond her reach.

She sang, her voice now a powerful lament that held the collective grief and anger of the parched land.

"Raining fade away,

Clouds of yesterday,

With no tear to shed,

Is this land worth living?"

With each sorrowful note, more and more clouds gathered, their presence a promise that felt as heavy as it did sacred.

As the people of Alabasta listened, a fragile, trembling hope began to bloom in their hearts.

Robin's voice, a powerful, soaring melody of desperate yearning, swelled to its breathtaking crescendo, carrying the collective hope of the entire nation.

"Come back to us, and stay by our side

feel our heart ache

Come, ease this pain

We're standing over here, reaching for you

A million miles away, come back and stay

No matter how far the memories may be

When we close our eyes, you're all that we see

Come back to us

A million miles away, come back and stay."

As the heartbreaking notes faded into the hushed air, the sky, now a heavy, bruised grey, began to rumble, a low, distant groan of thunder echoing in the distance. The people of Alubarna, their faces now streaked with both tears and dirt, began to clasp their hands together, a silent, desperate prayer rising from the very heart of the desert. The Marines, usually so disciplined and stoic, could only watch in awe and wonder at the miraculous phenomenon unfolding above their heads.

Then, from the corner of Robin's eye, the first tear of the Bringer of Good News finally escaped, tracing a path down her cheek. It landed with a soft, almost inaudible plink on the cracked, sun-baked earth.

And in that same instant, the world wept with her.

"La-la-la-la

La-la-la-la

la-la-la-la"

Robin's voice, which had carried the immense weight of the nation's despair, finally broke.

Her shoulders began to shake, and she started to sob, soft, heartbroken sounds that mingled with the first distant rumbles of thunder.

The song, a melody of healing and hope, faltered and then stopped entirely.

Then, she felt something—a touch, gently, wiping a tear from her cheek.

She opened her eyes, and before her, in the hazy, dust-filled air, a myriad of soft, shimmering lights—like collective sinny fireflies—began to dance and swirl. They coalesced, forming the faint, loving silhouette of a woman.

It was her. 

Olvia.

Her mother.

Robin's hand flew to her mouth, stifling a choked cry. More tears, not of sorrow but of profound, overwhelming wonder, streamed from her eyes.

Olvia, ethereal and beautiful, smiled a sad, loving smile, and then, she continued the song that Robin could no longer sing.

La-la-la-la

La-la-la-la

la-la-la-la

And then, as Olvia's soft melody continued to weave through the rain-soaked air, more lights appeared, a constellation of shimmering, ethereal fireflies.

They coalesced into familiar, beloved forms: Professor Clover, Rint, Zadie, Roche, Busshiri, Hack, Hocha, Gram.

The scholars of Ohara, Olvia's family, had come to stand with her.

They joined in the chorus, their voices, a soft, ethereal melody, creating a beautiful and heart-wrenching symphony that echoed under the gentle rain.

La-la-la-la

La-la-la-la

la-la-la-la

But they were not alone. From the crowd of the living, from the very dust and sand of the plaza, more spirits began to rise. The souls of the soldiers, the regretful spirits of Alabasta, the victims of the war, came out one by one, their forms shimmering faintly in the twilight.

They, too, joined the chorus, a soft, sorrowful melody of their own that mingled with the song of the scholars.

The surrounding people of Alubarna watched, their sobs now turned into choked cries of recognition. 

They saw the familiar souls of their beloved husbands, their friends, their children, their family.

They began to weep, their hands reaching out in a desperate yearning.

A little orphan girl, her face streaked with tears, tried to hug her mother, her small hands passing through the shimmering form as if it were nothing more than a phantom made of light and rain.

Princess Vivi, her young face streaked with tears, watched the ethereal chorus of the dead with a profound, heartbreaking awe.

She walked through the crowd, her small body pushing her way through the Marines, who stood frozen in a mixture of reverence and shock.

Pell, his expression a mix of fear and concern, chased after her, calling her name.

She didn't listen.

She didn't stop until she reached the front, her tiny body now covered in mud from the sudden rain. She stood there, her hands clasped together, and with a voice that was raw with a grief far beyond her years, she too joined the chorus.

"La-la-la-la

La-la-la-la

la-la-la-la"

The orphan girl, her face streaked with tears and dirt, stopped her sobs and began to hum, then sing, the melody.

The hungry and the poor, their voices hoarse from begging, now sang a song of hope.

The soldiers and the Marines stood shoulder to shoulder, their bodies trembling as they joined the chorus. The living and the dead, the enemies and the friends, all sang a song of hope and forgiveness.

"La-la-la-la

La-la-la-la

la-la-la-la"

Robin, her eyes still closed, a single tear falling from her eye, sang as well. Her voice, once soft and beautiful, was now the powerful, soaring chorus of the world.

"Sing, let your heart soar!

Sing forever!

Sad and so happy! Feelings flow over, now

Our world is full of all kinds of colors

Closing my eyes I can still see the sun

Shine in the sky, sing in his harmony

Flowers, they're blooming, oh it's beautiful!"

As she sang, a breathtaking phenomenon unfolded. From her body, from the very core of her soul, her Hana Hana no Mi bloomed, not in the form of disembodied limbs, but as millions of delicate, translucent petals.

They burst forth, a swirling torrent of soft pink and white, filling the gloomy, yellow-ochre air of Alabasta with the vibrant colors of a cherry blossom spring. As the petals touched the ground, the muddy, wet earth began to flourish, verdant green sprouts unfurling, and tiny, delicate desert flowers blooming in an impossible, beautiful display of life.

The petals that touched the people eased their sadness, their pain, their hunger, and their thirst. Their gaunt faces, once so full of despair, were now filled with a radiant, profound hope for tomorrow.

"Sing!

SinG!

SING!

Sing this song, we won't stop now

Sing it through, we love you

The voice carries on!"

The living and the dead all sang together, their voices a single, powerful chorus of hope that filled the entire world.

The pink petals swirled through the air, carried by the new, gentle breeze that had blessed Alabasta. 

In a lonely, narrow alleyway, far from the joyous chorus and the blooming flowers, Kuzan sat alone.

He was hunched over, his massive frame a picture of quiet despair. He had seen the phenomenon, the beautiful, impossible blooming, and it had filled him with a profound sense of shame and regret. He was sobbing, his great, icy hands covering his face, trying to contain a grief that had festered for over a decade.

Then, a single, delicate sakura petal, pink and translucent, drifted down and landed softly on his shoulder.

He paused his sobbing, his breathing hitched. And through his fingers, he heard a voice—soft, clear, and impossibly gentle, a whisper that seemed to come from the very wind itself.

I forgive you.

In that moment, Kuzan's grief, his guilt, his decade-long penance, all broke free. He lowered his hands, his face streaked with tears, and cried like a broken dam, a raw, desperate wail that was lost in the chorus of hope.