When Leona woke up, she didn't remember a single thing from yesterday.
So I had no choice but to explain. I told her—casually, as if it were the most normal thing in the world—that sometime in the night, while she was asleep (probably), she'd transformed into a lion and gone on a rampage.
Around the "transformed into a lion" part, her face went completely blank.
"…A lion?"
As expected. I'd figured she wouldn't remember being a Devil Fruit user.
Still, the fact remained: she was.
"Huh?! No way—what is this?! Is this… me?!"
If she tried to use her power, she could.
Abilities like this aren't only something you remember in your head. Your body remembers, too.
I gave her a rough idea of what to do and urged, "Try it." Leona, half-doubting, half-terrified, took a breath and did as I said.
Fur pushed through the skin of her hand, and in a blink it reshaped into a lion's paw—dense, heavy, and oddly metallic in sheen.
…Metallic?
"Wait. What's with this color…? Are there even lions like this?"
As if answering my question, her whole body shifted.
In an instant, Leona became a lion.
Not silver, not gray—something in between. A strange, weighty shade that looked almost like steel under daylight.
Last night, in the dark, I hadn't noticed. Now it was unmistakable.
Was it just a rare coloration, like white lions…?
Or—
"The power of a Devil Fruit," Leona whispered, stunned. "So… this is real…"
"You seriously don't remember any of it?" I asked. "Well, you don't even remember who you are, so I guess that tracks."
"Honestly, it's a good thing you realized before you fell into the sea," Shuraiya-kun added. "You forgot you can't swim, didn't you?"
He was right.
But the way I'd realized it—last night—didn't feel like ordinary sleepwalking. That had been a nightmare. A violent one.
I had a bad feeling about this.
Leona looked unsettled, like she couldn't decide whether to fear the power inside her or treat it as a bizarre fact of life. Still, since it wasn't actively hurting her, she didn't panic.
She tried shifting back to human—still flustered, still confused, but she managed it.
And now that she'd confirmed her "lion thing" was real, she finally understood that last night's rampage had been real too.
She bowed her head quickly.
"I'm… I'm sorry. I caused you trouble…"
"It's fine," I said. "Nobody got hurt. And the house was fixed right away. By me."
"Ah!" Leona blinked, then looked at me with new intensity. "Sue, your power too—could it be…?"
"Exactly. I'm a Devil Fruit user as well. The Paper-Paper Fruit. I'm a Paper Human."
To demonstrate, I turned my hand into paper and let it break apart into fluttering fragments before pulling it back together.
Leona's eyes widened—then, oddly, her shoulders eased.
Maybe it was relief. Maybe she was glad she wasn't the only one who didn't fit inside the world's rules.
Whatever it was, I was grateful she calmed down.
After that, we ate breakfast—the same as yesterday, pulled from my stored supplies—and talked through what to do next.
Leona had amnesia, no belongings, and no idea why she'd ended up here. Leaving her alone on this island wasn't an option.
So the question became: where do we take her?
I wasn't influential everywhere, but I had connections. There were places that could take in a child with nowhere to go—orphanages, shelters, facilities like that. Some ordinary. Some well-funded. One of them, in particular, was a top-tier orphanage complex on the Gran Tesoro.
If Leona truly had nowhere else, we could leave her somewhere safe.
But the moment you think that through, the problem is obvious.
Last night.
That rampage—whether it was sleepwalking, a nightmare, or something deeper—if that happened again, even once in a while, you couldn't put her in a normal orphanage. Not if there were other children sleeping nearby.
A monster loose in the middle of the night would be a disaster.
So either we find a place other than an orphanage—somewhere that can handle it—or we find an orphanage built for exactly this kind of child.
And yes. I actually knew one.
"I think Gran Tesoro can handle it," I said.
"Yeah," Shuraiya-kun agreed. "The facilities are top-class, and the staff can fight. If things ever got out of hand, Tesoro-san could lock her down with gold dust."
Right. Gran Tesoro's orphanage complex even had sections meant for exceptional or troublesome children. If that was the standard, Leona could be accepted too.
And most of the staff were absurdly strong. From what I'd heard, they dealt with rebellious brats day and night as a matter of routine.
If it came to it, Tesoro could forcibly immobilize someone with the Gold-Gold Fruit—but that was a last resort. I didn't want it to come to that.
If I asked personally, I was pretty sure they'd accept her.
Maybe not immediately. There would be procedures, preparations…
…Still.
Leona hadn't spoken much since breakfast started. She kept eating quietly, glancing over with a worried expression and then looking away again.
She wanted to say something. It was obvious.
All this talk—of being handed over to strangers, taken somewhere unknown—must have been terrifying. And we were discussing it like she wasn't even in the room.
But what could she say? She didn't know who she was or where she belonged. Even if she protested, "I don't want that," the next question would crush her.
Then what do you want?
So she stayed silent. Endured it.
She was smart. More than smart—she was the kind of child who swallowed her own fear to avoid burdening others.
And once I realized that, letting her keep swallowing it while we decided her future started to feel… heavy.
No, logically, the facility was the right answer. We didn't know her. She was a stranger. Sending her somewhere equipped to keep her safe—and keep others safe—wasn't wrong.
But—
A child's anxious eyes have a way of grabbing you by the throat.
She still hadn't said anything. I didn't even know if she was putting the words together in her head. But the look she kept giving me—careful, restrained, quietly desperate—felt like it carried one message anyway.
Please don't abandon me.
…Is this what getting older does to you? I used to be more detached.
Then again, I'd already passed thirty.
No. I didn't want to blame age. I wanted to believe this was just… being human.
Leona finished eating. Softly, politely, she said, "Thank you for the meal," and then sat there, waiting for us to decide what would happen to her.
Looking at her, I couldn't help wondering again.
Could we really just leave her at a facility and walk away?
"…Leona. What do you want?"
"…Huh?"
I decided that if thinking didn't give me an answer, I'd ask the only person whose opinion mattered.
"We do know a place that takes care of kids who don't have families or anywhere to go. If you want, we can take you there. But if you don't want that, and there's something else you want to do… we'll try our best to make it happen."
"…That's… but…"
Her face brightened for a heartbeat—at the idea she might not be forced into anything.
Then the light faltered.
She didn't have an answer. Of course she didn't.
And maybe she was also holding back—because we were strangers, because she didn't want to be trouble.
I realized how cruel my question sounded when framed like a choice.
So I softened it.
"If you don't want to go, that's fine. We won't force you. And if you don't have any plans at all… that's fine too. You're overwhelmed. You're confused. It's only been a day."
Leona froze.
Bullseye.
Her eyes widened, startled—and beneath the surprise, there was something else. Hope, flickering like a candle she didn't dare shield with her hands.
So I took a breath and said what I'd been circling around.
"…Then how about this? Come with me for a while."
"!"
"Huh?!" Shuraiya-kun blurted. "Sue-san, what are you saying?!"
"Well, getting dropped into a place like that out of nowhere is a lot," I said. "And there'll be preparations anyway. Until then, I can keep her with me. Maybe traveling will jog something loose and her memories will come back. And honestly… I'm free right now."
Shuraiya-kun stared at me, then exhaled.
"If you're fine with it, I'm not going to stop you."
"But it's Leona's decision," Adele-chan added quietly.
She was right.
So I turned back to Leona.
This time, when I asked again, "What do you want to do?" she looked down, thinking hard.
She was conflicted. I could see it in the way her fingers tightened on the edge of her bowl.
But even with the fear and uncertainty, it felt like she'd already half-chosen.
Finally, Leona lifted her head, met my eyes, and forced the words out with everything she had.
"I-I want to…!"
---
Several hours later, aboard my ship—
"F-from now on… I—I look forward to working with you!"
"Okay," I said, smiling despite myself. "Then you've made your choice. Let's set sail."
And that was how it began—an unplanned, carefree journey between me and a girl I'd only just met.
To be continued...