In the latter half of the night, around midnight.
Feeling a strange sensation while sleeping, Makoto opened his eyes and found Alice sitting on his abdomen, glaring at him angrily.
"Is, is that you, Alice?" Makoto asked uncertainly. Because after discovering Makoto's preferences, Alice had started growing her hair long to imitate her mother.
Now, with the lights off, it was hard to tell them apart.
"What do you think?" Alice asked with a forced smile. "I was locked in the closet for hours, and you slept soundly."
Makoto glanced at the 'Knockoff Alice' beside him, a rare expression of embarrassment on his face. "It was a misunderstanding, really. I didn't want to either."
"You didn't want to? You dog of a man, you got your wish today, didn't you?" Alice sneered repeatedly.
This might be the first girl besides Nayuta who dared to openly confront Makoto. Makoto felt a bit helpless for a moment and asked back, "So what do we do now?"
Alice glared at him. "What else can we do? Hurry up and carry my mother back! Do you want her to sleep here until morning?"
Makoto then realized and quickly carried 'Knockoff Alice' out from among the pile of girls, taking her back to her own room.
After going outside, Makoto yawned and said, "Alright, let's go back to sleep then."
"Sleep my ass!" Alice grabbed Makoto's collar and pushed him down onto the deck. "You need to compensate me properly right now."
Immediately, Alice's soprano singing echoed across the deck. Nino, who had been about to get up in the middle of the night to use the bathroom, saw this scene and was dumbfounded, 'Seriously? A new time slot now? Are you going to let people sleep or not?!'
…
The next day. Makoto woke up late, which is a rare occurrence.
As Yotsuba finished her morning exercise, she complained to her sisters, "This is the first time I've seen Makoto-kun sleep in."
Hearing this, Nino thought silently: 'Doing that kind of thing at two in the morning, of course he'd sleep longer.'
Remembering the scene she had witnessed early that morning, Nino couldn't help but glance at the artificial turf on the ground.
"Nino, what's wrong?" Itsuki asked, noticing her second sister's strange behavior.
Nino remained silent again. She couldn't very well say she was afraid of stepping on some strange fluid, could she?
Breakfast time. Mrs. Yukinoshita spoke up, "We're going to the town later to buy supplies. But as you all know, those of us in logistics don't have much strength. To avoid encountering criminals like pirates, could anyone spare the time to come with us?"
Although she didn't have any great power herself, Mrs. Yukinoshita had been in charge of the entire group's logistics since coming to the One Piece World.
After all, in the real world, she is Makoto's housekeeper. However, regardless of whether they had standoffish personalities like Utaha and Airi, or gentle ones like Megumi and Marina, none of the women responded to Mrs. Yukinoshita.
This woman's relationship with their man was an open secret on the ship. Although the younger girls turned a blind eye to it, they still didn't like her. After all, this old woman is shamelessly seducing their man!
"Th-then I'll go with Ayano-san." Kotonoha stood up. This was a time for a submissive girl like Kotonoha to step up. The Yukinoshita sisters would naturally also give their mother some respect and said they would go together.
"Yawn~" Just then, Alice walked into the dining hall yawning. "Good morning, everyone."
"Alice, you woke up even later than usual today," Yui said curiously. Reze asked, "Was I sitting on you too long last night and suffocating you?"
Ran couldn't help but kick her friend, 'With so many people around, how can you say such outrageous things?'
As soon as she said this, Alice, Erina, and Leonora, the three female players of the Nakiri Family, instantly had strange expressions on their faces.
And the last member of the Nakiri Family, Mana, had a face full of question marks. She felt inexplicably excluded.
"Um, what was everyone talking about?" Alice forced a change of subject. Mrs. Yuigahama repeated what Mrs. Yukinoshita had said earlier.
"Oh oh, then let's go explore the island too. We've been cooped up on the ship for days, I'm almost bored to death." Alice said, putting on her usual playful expression as usual. "Mom, Erina, let's go together!"
After a brief silence, Erina and Leonora both nodded. This was indeed something they needed to discuss.
Seeing this, Mana was dumbfounded for the second time, 'Good grief, you really are excluding me?'
After landing on the island, the three Nakiri women walked on this island called [Forget Island]. The three walked in silence, without any specific destination.
Pochita followed at their feet, somewhat regretting taking on this tough job. Mainly because these three had low combat abilities and needed a bodyguard.
But the matter they needed to discuss was quite private... calling anyone else would be inappropriate, so they could only call Pochita, being a dog.
"Alice, it's one thing for you to be mischievous usually, but how could you pretend to be Mom?" Finally, Leonora, as the elder, spoke first.
However, this very young mother, despite trying hard to appear authoritative, had left too deep an impression of her usual unserious nature on her daughter and niece.
Even though she tried very hard to look dignified, she still looked like a pouting little girl.
Alice was a bit dumbfounded at being preempted by her mother. She had been locked in the closet for half the night, watching helplessly as her mother, the one she called mom, cuckolded her so blatantly, and now she's questioning her?
But upon second thought, Alice couldn't immediately find a reason to refute her mother. After holding it in for a long time, she could only argue irrationally: "Mom, why were you in the bedroom of a guy half your age late at night? Can you honestly say you didn't have any ulterior motives?"
As soon as she said this, Leonora was momentarily speechless. No matter how unwilling she was to admit it, she had to acknowledge… when she first arrived at Makoto's room yesterday, her heart had indeed been a bit restless.
Catching the fleeting hesitation on her mother's face, Alice pointed at her mother's face and shouted: "See! See! I knew it, Mom, you just couldn't stand the loneliness! Even without yesterday's misunderstanding, you definitely would have made a move on Makoto-kun!"
"Nonsense! How could Mom do something like that?" Leonora's face turned bright red. In her agitation, she pinched her daughter's cheek. "Don't talk about your mom like that!"
"Can't win the argument with words, so you want to get physical, huh?" Alice pinched her mother's cheek in return, and the two started playfully fighting like high school girls bickering.
Erina watched with a dark expression. She thought to herself that these two were definitely mother and daughter.
Finally, under Erina's mediation, the mother and daughter let go, 'Hmph'-ed, and turned their heads away from each other.
"So what do we do now? A mother-daughter thing like this..." Erina was also conflicted, not knowing what to do. The education she had received since childhood made it completely unacceptable for her.
"Mom, you should back out. Pretend nothing happened last night. Or we could have Nayuta delete your memory of last night," Alice said after thinking for a moment. Nayuta's ability to delete people's memories was no secret on the ship. Erina also nodded, thinking it was a good idea.
However, Leonora's heart tightened. Reason told her she should agree, and it was indeed the best course of action. But emotionally, she couldn't forget the feeling of last night.
"Le-let Mom think about it a little more, okay?" Leonora said quietly.
The Nakiri sisters' eyes widened. Alice asked incredulously, "Mom, you don't still want to continue that kind of relationship with Makoto-kun, do you?"
Although Alice had long accepted that Makoto had many women, she had never imagined that her own mother might one day be included. Erina suddenly started worrying about her own mother, who was still on the ship.