You never expected to share an island with Nico Robin. Not like this. Not quietly, like two scholars chasing whispers of lost centuries while waves licked the shores of New Ohara.

She found you by accident. Or fate — depending on how poetic you’re feeling that day.

You’d lived on the island alone for years. A self-exiled mercenary with a past you’d erased even better than the World Government erased history. Until one day, a ship cast a shadow over your quiet cove, and Nico Robin — survivor, outlaw, genius — stepped down the gangplank, wide-brimmed hat shielding her from the morning sun.

“I didn’t expect anyone here,” she said, the first time you met. “But I suppose we both enjoy ruins.”

That was five years ago.

Since then, you’ve been her assistant. Or servant. Or roommate. Depends on her mood. Sometimes she treats you like a colleague, other times like her personal errand boy. She never raises her voice — she doesn't need to. Robin has this way of making you feel like a clumsy student in a library made of glass.

You call her boss. She calls you “You.”

The two of you built a modest home in the roots of a banyan tree near the coast — her design, your hands. Bookshelves carved into trunks, hammocks slung between thick vines, a clay oven that burns late into the night when she gets hungry for something warm. And of course: a secret underground vault for the Poneglyph rubbings.

But today wasn’t about comfort.

Today was about the Void Century.

“I think we’re close,” Robin murmurs, fingers tracing the edge of a half-deciphered glyph. Her hands are always ink-stained these days. She doesn't mind. “The records say New Marineford was abandoned when the Admirals disappeared. There's a vault below the base — I’ve read fragments of reports. If there’s any trace of the Era of Erasure left, it’ll be there.”

You sigh. “I hate Marineford.”

“You’ve never been there.”

“I hate it conceptually.”

Robin doesn’t laugh. She smirks. It’s different. Softer.

“We leave in the morning,” she says, rolling up the parchment. “We’ll need gear. Climbing tools. Breathers. And weapons.”

You blink. “Weapons?”

“In case we find something sealed.”

“Great. So we’re grave robbers and terrorists now.”

“Archaeologists,” she corrects, patting your shoulder as she walks past. “With flair.”

You catch her gaze. She’s excited. It’s rare. The usual calm detachment in her eyes has been replaced with something closer to wonder. Hope. Maybe even nervousness.

“You think we’ll find it?” you ask quietly. “The truth about what they erased?”

Robin pauses, halfway up the spiral stairs toward her room.

“I don’t know,” she admits. “But I want to live knowing I tried.”

Her voice lingers like dust in sunlight. You don’t follow. Not yet.

You sit by the open scrolls, staring at sigils that mean nothing to you but everything to her. You’ve watched her study them night after night, memorizing impossible patterns, decoding languages dead for centuries. She never grows tired of it. You wish you could say the same.

You didn’t come to this island to chase ghosts.

But maybe that’s what you’ve become — her ghost with hands that carry, cook, and sometimes bleed for her.

Later that night, she finds you on the beach. You’re skipping stones.

“The tide’s rising,” she says.

“So is the moon,” you reply.

Robin stands beside you in silence. After a while, she hands you a thermos. Soup. Still warm.

“Thanks, boss.”

“You’re more than that,” she says absently.

You blink. “More than soup?”

Robin sighs. “More than an assistant.”

That’s the most affection she’s shown in weeks. You try not to make it weird.

“I know,” you say with a mock sigh. “I’m also your emotional support idiot.”

She smiles. “Yes. That too.”

Then she looks toward the sea, eyes reflecting starlight.

“Tomorrow we sail,” she says.

You nod. “To a haunted ruin guarded by cursed history.”

Robin’s smile widens. “Don’t be dramatic.”

“You’re the one bringing explosives!”

She shrugs, wind teasing her hair. “History doesn’t give up its secrets without a fight.”