How about we play a game again?

Shanks and his crew, who had just come from the Partys bar, boarded their ship in the evening. Because it was so dark, they did not realize anything was wrong until Shanks stepped on something sticky on his wooden sandals.

"What's this? Hey, one of you, turn on the light," Shanks ordered, and soon his crew quickly lit the torches that had been positioned all around the ship's deck.

"ahhh, captain! What happened while we were gone?"

"This sticky liquid... is this paint? Why is there so much of it on the floor?"

"Is Uta responsible for all of this?"

All of the red hair pirate crew started making their own speculations. They all looked panicked but also confused, and before long, one of them screamed.

"Come here, Captain. I found something."

After that, Shanks hurriedly approached the source of the sound, and he was taken aback to see a figure of Uta, who was currently sitting in a corner and hugging her legs. Since Uta had her back turned to him, Shanks then yelled out to her:

"Hey, Uta, what are you doing in that corner?"

"Shanks, you're back... *sob... *sob... Luffy... he's bullying me again..."

When Uta turned around and ran towards Shanks, everyone around her suddenly let out a startled scream. They were shocked to see how badly Uta looked at that moment. Her once-lovely face was now covered in brightly colored paint, and her clothes were wet and dirty due to all the paint on them.

"Don't stick your face in my clothes... stop!..." Shanks tried to push Uta away to stop her from staining his clean clothes. But Uta was unyielding, and in the end, Shanks can only ask in wonder:

"So tell me, what happens?" Uta, who had been crying uncontrollably, eventually tried to compose herself and provided an explanation.

Shanks finally understood what was going on after listening to Uta's detailed explanation, and when he did, he couldn't help but sigh as he shook his head and said:

"So you two play a game, the winner gets to ask anything from the loser, and you take that opportunity to make Luffy apologize to you, but in the end, you lose four times to him?"

"Umm..." Uta simply nodded her head in annoyance.

Shanks yelled, "are you stupid? How come you lost 4 of the 4 games you guys made?"

Uta, who seemed surprised after being scolded by Shanks, could only remain silent and didn't dare to say anything, so Shanks then ordered his crew to go to sleep. Benn Beckman, as vice-captain, asked:

"Before that, what should we do with all this paint?"

"Leave it. Tomorrow I will order Uta and that damned kid Luffy to clean it up."

Uta, who was caught off guard by Shanks' words, began her protest right away, "Shanks... why me too? Luffy is entirely to blame for all of this..."

"No, this is also your fault. Who told you to be so stupid as to lose four times to him?"

After that, Shanks and his crew walked to their respective rooms while Uta, who was still nagging and didn't accept it, followed them. Yet, the only response she got from everyone was laughter and ridicule.

"Have fun tomorrow Uta."

"hahahaha... next time, don't lose again."

"Can you believe it, hahahaha... our princess lost again to that brat."

"That boy named Luffy is really interesting."

-

The following morning, just as Shanks had promised, when he and his crew went to the Party's bar, he hurriedly looked for Luffy with a bit of annoyance. Makino even got worried that he would hurt Luffy, but after explaining what happened, Makino just smiled wryly and allowed Luffy to get punched in the head by Shanks before the boy was forced to run to clean up all of the mess he had caused on his pirate ship.

But without anyone else realizing it, all of this was part of the plan that Luffy had created, and even though on the surface he seemed reluctant, in reality, Luffy was really looking forward to this, which is why every step he took felt so light and quick.

-

When he arrived at Shanks' ship, Uta, who had been waiting then, immediately blamed Luffy for everything that happened, and in return, Luffy suggested something by saying:

"How about we play a game again?"

Uta, who was dumbfounded by the word, simply laughed it off and responded, "Do you think I'm stupid? I don't care anymore about your stupid game."

Seeing Uta getting irritated, Luffy quickly added, "Don't worry, those who lose this game just have to work more while cleaning this ship. How about that?"

Uta, who had intended to immediately reject the suggestion, found herself unable to speak. Luffy could tell that this girl was interested in his idea because it didn't take long before Uta agreed.

Before the game started, Luffy made a small loop of rope and said, "whoever goes outside the boundary of this rope loses."

Uta, who didn't see anything wrong with this game, then agreed, and to be honest, she herself already knew that all of the games they had played up to this point were fair, but Uta didn't want to admit it and kept accusing Luffy of cheating and so on.

When they first entered the circle, the first thing that they did was push each other. Occasionally, Luffy would be in danger when he was one step away from going out of the circle, and so did Uta. both of them did their best to get their opponent out of the circle.

"argh, just a little more, Luffy. Just give up!" When Uta finally succeeded in boxing Luffy, she let out a yell of excitement because she knew victory was so close at hand.

Eventually, one of Luffy's feet stepped on the line, indicating that he was out, and Uta hurriedly cheered happily, and she didn't even forget to mock and make fun of Luffy because, for the very first time, this girl managed to beat Luffy who always bullied her.

But, without Uta noticing, the corners of Luffy's mouth lifted as he looked at her, who was celebrating with an unusual glimmer.

"Yeah, too bad, you really beat me this time."