Chapter 134: Little Sanji Wants A Tough Guy Meal
"Goodbye, big brother! Come again next time!"
Outside the orange grove, Nami stood at the entrance with Bellemere holding one of her hands and Nojiko holding the other.
Nami waved happily at Roy as he walked away.
Bellemere had originally wanted to confess that Nami had jacked the price up, but the words never made it past her throat.
Nami felt that selling trees was already a loss.
If people bought the trees to grow their own oranges, they might never come back to buy fruit again.
That would be a huge loss, so she simply quoted higher.
As for Roy…
He knew very well he was indirectly giving Nami's family financial support.
For him, buying a few more trees was nothing. That little bit of money did not matter.
Gaining a bit of Nami's favor was more than worth it.
And honestly, Roy just really wanted…
To sit down properly with her in the future and discuss the meaning of life.
Very seriously, of course.
…
Roy and Hancock left with bags of oranges.
The orange trees Bellemere had prepared would be dug up and brought down to the shore in the afternoon, then ferried back to the ship.
He had bought quite a few trees and paid a hefty amount, so the villagers naturally had to prepare.
On Roy's ship, inside the kitchen.
Roy stood at the stove, working over the pans, while Sanji, a scarf wrapped around his neck, stood on a chair beside him. The boy gripped a kitchen knife with both hands, chopping ingredients in careful, shaky motions.
After so many years of cooking for himself and others, Roy's life had settled into three main hobbies: training, flirting, and experimenting with food.
His cooking skills had grown sharper with every year.
Teaching a beginner like Sanji was no problem at all.
"Are the potatoes done?"
"All done!"
Tak tak tak.
"Where is my beef?"
"It is ready here!"
Sanji washed his hands and handed over the prepared beef, eyes shining with anticipation as Roy took it.
Roy glanced back at him. "What is with that face?"
"No tough guy meal today?" Sanji's stomach growled.
Dinosaur meat was seriously delicious.
"Hancock, do we still have any dinosaur meat left?" Roy called out.
"It is all gone. You ate it all."
Outside the kitchen, Hancock stepped closer and peeked in, giving him a reproachful look.
Between Hancock, young Sanji, Hancock's snake, and Roy's own snake, all of their appetites put together still could not match Roy's.
"Then do we have any dinosaur eggs left?" Roy asked with a laugh.
He already knew the answer, but lying to Sanji was one of his small joys in life.
"You know exactly what is left." Hancock snorted. "And do not think you are off the hook. Come find me after dinner. We are going to talk about Toki."
"If you do not explain yourself properly, I will never forgive you."
"Of course. Absolutely." Roy gave her a fawning smile.
Service with a smile, heartfelt confession, soul stirring storytelling. He was ready to go all in.
He was not the kind of idiot who picked up sesame seeds and dropped watermelons. He treasured every single one of his girls.
Yes. Roy was, in his own mind at least, a very good man.
"I will take you to eat dinosaur meat again later," Roy promised, ruffling Sanji's hair before turning back to the pan.
…
That afternoon, Roy took Sanji with him when he left the ship.
Hancock said she wanted to rest.
…
"Master, why do you take a bath in the middle of the day?" Sanji looked up at him, puzzled.
"Your master sweats a lot when he trains. Summer is annoying. If I do not wash, I feel all sticky," Roy said, rubbing the boy's hair with a grin.
"But why were you and…"
Sanji was about to blurt out the dangerous part when Roy gently pinched his cheeks.
"Mmf…?"
Sanji blinked, wondering why he could not ask the rest.
"Young Sanji," Roy said, dead serious, "you talk too much."
A good chef should focus on cooking, not gossip.
A tough guy with great kicking skills should devote his whole heart to training, not poking his nose into adult business.
"Yes, Master!"
Roy gave him a light push toward an open space in the village. "Get started. Train like I showed you."
Then he turned and walked off toward the orange grove.
"Do not worry, Master!" Sanji shouted at his back. "I will become really strong and beat up all the guys who laughed at me!"
Roy stopped, sighed, then walked back and crouched down in front of him.
"What is it, Master?" Sanji asked, confused.
"Sanji, remember this. You are a chef, not some mindless executioner."
Roy felt he needed to correct this kid's path before it bent the wrong way.
If he was going to steal this disciple from fate, then he had to take responsibility for how the boy grew.
"Do you know what the most sacred thing to a chef is?" Roy asked.
Sanji sat down on the grass, seriously thinking it over.
Then he shook his head.
Roy glanced toward a restaurant in the distance, then smiled.
"For a chef, the most sacred things are his hands and his tools."
"Your hands exist to make food, to feed people who are hungry so they can eat their fill.
As for your tools, they are just as important as your hands. To a chef, his knives and pans are like a navigator's ship. They are partners."
"The happiest thing for a chef is seeing people eat his food, then saying, 'That was really good.'"
Roy's words drew a little from Zeff's teachings, a little from the bond between the Straw Hats and their ship, and a little from the cooking anime he had watched in his previous life, where the main character loved his utensils like they were friends.
All of that melted together, and what came out of his mouth sounded extremely chuunibyou.
But it worked.
Sanji loved this sort of thing.
"Yes!" Sanji nodded hard.
"Your master is not a chef," Roy went on. "So I can use my hands to swing a sword and punch people. But one day you will become the real thing, a chef people love."
"So listen carefully, Sanji."
Sanji immediately sat up even straighter, eyes shining.
"Your legs are for fighting, for protecting yourself and the people you care about."
"But your hands cannot be stained with dirty blood. Your hands are the life of a chef. They should only be used for cooking."
"You must never use your hands to hit people."
"Did you hear me?" Roy asked, eyes firm.
"I understand. I will only use them once I have mastered cooking," Sanji said, nodding earnestly.
He would use his hands only to cook.
To cook for his master.
To cook for his master's wife.
To cook for hungry guests who needed a hot meal.
The boy nodded again and again, his eyes filled with simple, pure resolve.
As expected, a Sanji who had not been corrupted by the pirate chefs of Baratie was much easier to teach.
"What kind of person does Sanji want to become?" Roy asked with a smile.
"Sanji will become the strongest chef in the world and find All Blue," the boy declared.
"And I will become a powerful tough guy. I will use my kicking skills to defeat everyone who makes fun of me!"
He craned his neck and shouted at the sky, every word aimed at his master.
That was right.
Roy was extremely satisfied.
He might have reshaped the gentlemanly Black Leg into a training obsessed tough guy who cooked and kicked, but the name "Black Leg Sanji" would never change.
Maybe his nosebleed problem would disappear in the future, but his fighting strength would climb way higher than before.
Feeling very pleased with himself, Roy gave Sanji's head one last affectionate rub. Then, humming a tune, he turned and headed toward the orange grove.
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