The sea had been merciless for three days. Your small boat, stolen in the dead of night from Whole Cake Island's harbor, creaked and groaned with every wave. The provisions you'd managed to grab were nearly gone. A single waterskin, half-empty. A few stale crackers. The wedding dress was long abandoned, swapped for a simple shirt and trousers you'd hidden beneath the altar's decorations.

Your mother's voice still echoed in your skull. "This marriage will strengthen our family, Charlotte. You will do your duty." The scream that followed when they found your empty chambers still rang across the waves. Or maybe that was just the wind.

The storm that hit on the second night nearly killed you. Now, as dawn broke, the sea had gone still. Too still.

Ahead, rising from the mist like a slumbering beast, was land. Massive, impossible land. Trees that scraped the clouds. Mountains that dwarfed anything you'd ever seen. And at the water's edge, the shape of a giant figure, half-hidden in the fog.

Your boat drifted closer on its own, as if pulled by invisible hands. The shore was jagged black rock. And the giant... the giant was chained.

Enormous chains wrapped around his body, pinning him to the base of a mountain. A blindfold covered his eyes. His head hung low, dark hair spilling over his face, but he was breathing. Alive.