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Chapter 47 - What a Hero Is Made Of
🕑 Added 2025-05-18 01:07:29 +0000 UTCBoom!!
Boom!!
Boom!!
Explosions echoed nonstop outside the prison.
Inside the dark iron bars, a pair of green eyes suddenly opened.
It was Puss, who had risen and turned to the cell window, now lit up by the fires beginning to spread through the city.
Thanks to his feline vision, he had no trouble seeing in the low light, and with his sharp hearing, he noticed the absence of civilian screams, which eased his heart.
Earlier in the day, he had overheard that the governor had escorted the civilians to safety and warned others.
That reassured him. But Puss wasn't going to just sit still — not only did he want to fight, he also didn't want too many casualties or destruction in the city.
Jack and Will got up as well, and Puss noticed Will's face looked a bit conflicted. He seemed relieved that he hadn't made the wrong bet — but also saddened, as there truly was a pirate attack happening.
"Well, time to go. I've got a ship to reclaim," Jack was the first to stand, rushing to the bars and pressing his face against them, looking around — but there were no guards in sight, only a dog holding the cell keys in its mouth.
"Guards! Guards!" he shouted, but no one answered.
"Stop shouting," Puss said. Walking up to the bars, he stabbed his sword into the ground, dropped onto all fours, and slipped calmly between the bars.
Once outside, he looked at the dog holding the keys and smiled.
"Meow!" he said playfully.
"Aww-wooo!" the dog whimpered, flattening its ears before turning tail and bolting under Puss’s amused gaze.
"Ah! Hurry, he's getting away!" Jack shouted in panic.
But Puss just grinned and jumped onto the bars, reaching the lock. Holding himself there, he extended a claw from his paw, inserted it into the keyhole, and with a soft click, opened it.
He then jumped down as Jack pushed the gate open, clearly impressed.
"Oh, didn't know you could do that," he said, eyeing Puss's claw.
"Heh, that's because I wanted to be práctico. Otherwise, they could just slice right through the bars," the cat said, showing off.
Retracting his claw and grabbing his sword — which he had left behind so it wouldn’t get in the way while squeezing through the bars — Puss turned to the two with a serious expression.
“I'll go ahead and kick some ass. Try not to die,” he said, then flashed a grin, turned on his heel, and sprinted off, vanishing around a corner.
With Puss gone, Will and Jack exchanged glances, but just as they were about to run, voices called out to them.
“Hey, wait! Free us too!!” a group of prisoners shouted. Now that the terrifying cat was gone, they pleaded to be released.
Jack simply opened his hands and shrugged indifferently.
"Sorry, mates — the only two keys in this prison just ran off."
…
Puss moved quickly through the prison. He even spotted the pirates who had brought them there locked up in a cell — but with no time to waste, he kept running.
Before long, he exited the prison and sprinted toward the beach.
On the beach, he spotted a black ship slicing through the water, a little way off from the city, dodging cannon fire from the shore. Two other ships were fighting against it, but to Puss's eyes, both seemed to be struggling.
The ships were infested with skeletons causing chaos, unable to even properly fight the black vessel, which kept firing upon them.
Puss looked to the shoreline and spotted several skeletons emerging from the sea, rushing toward the soldiers manning the cannons.
Without hesitation, Puss ran that way.
"AHHHHH!!!" the skeletal pirates screamed as they charged fearlessly, causing the men by the cannons to widen their eyes in terror.
Despite the horror, the soldiers didn't let themselves be slaughtered — they drew their swords and faced the pirates head-on.
Clang! Clang! Clang!
With the melee erupting, the soldiers had to stop firing the cannons to defend themselves… which was exactly what Barbossa had wanted.
Without needing to dodge coastal fire, the Pearl could now focus its full might on the Dauntless and the Interceptor, the two main ships under Norrington's command.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
The two ships were being punctured and blasted apart, sending both soldiers and skeletons flying from the blasts.
But soon enough, the flung skeletons swam back and climbed aboard again, resuming their chaos.
Still on the coast, Puss never stopped running. He arrived just in time to see a skeleton disarm a soldier and level its sword at his chest, ready to impale him.
Puss's pupils narrowed to slits, and with all his momentum, he leapt.
Spinning midair, his body twisted so his boots faced the skeleton.
Then, under the soldier's desperate eyes, an orange blur appeared — a cat crashing down like a missile, smashing the skeleton's skull under his boots and sending it flying into the sea.
The impact slowed Puss’s momentum only slightly. With practiced ease, he drew his sword from his waist and sliced off the armed limb of the skeleton, which had already been toppling from the force of the collision, but was still moving.
Without stopping to acknowledge the stunned soldier, Puss landed and leapt toward the next skeleton.
The next skeleton had its back to him, and Puss, without mercy, shattered its knee with his blade.
As the skeleton collapsed, he sliced through its neck, making the skull fall toward Puss's foot, which he promptly kicked into the sea with a grin.
“Gol,” Puss murmured playfully under his breath, then raised his sword and slung it diagonally across his back.
Clang!
An impact struck the sword, and Puss, still smiling, pushed back hard, throwing off balance a skeleton that had attacked him from behind and freeing his blade from the block.
"Huh?!" the skeleton exclaimed, trying to regain balance after the unexpected force—not something that should belong to a kitten—sent it flying back… and that was the last thing it managed to do.
With a spin, Puss didn't even aim. He simply swung his sword with ferocity, slicing through the skeleton's legs and sending its torso crashing to the ground. His blade didn't stop—it severed the arms, and finally, the head.
The skull was still falling when the tip of Puss's sword pierced its eye—the eye that somehow still existed despite it being just a skull. As the socket widened in horror, the skull was flung through the air and into the sea.
Puss placed a paw over his eyes, as if it would help him see the skeleton flying farther, then splashing into the water.
Satisfied with the splash, he turned to his next target.
And so, as he dismembered skeletons and sent heads flying into the sea, the soldiers who had been fighting desperately began to notice the fight growing easier. More and more of them noticed the sword-wielding cat who fought like an unstoppable monster—and of course, the pirates noticed too.
More and more undead pirates rushed Puss, but all that did was grow the bone pile beneath his boots.
It got to the point where even the immortal pirates faltered, fear overtaking them, and they stopped advancing—splitting the battlefield in two.
On one side, the soldiers: exhausted, wounded, barely standing, leaning on one another.
On the other, the pirates: not a bit tired, but staring in fear at the mountain of bones.
And in the middle stood Puss, crushing the hand of a skeleton trying to crawl away with his boot. He was only slightly out of breath, as if he'd just taken a brisk walk.
On that dark night, lit only by the pale light of the moon, Puss lifted his face and stared coldly with glowing green feline eyes at the pirates—who felt a chilling aura radiating from the little cat atop the pile of moving bones.
Then, Puss said one single word—a word that would likely haunt those pirates for the rest of their unnatural lives.
"Miau!"
"AHHHHHH!" the skeletons screamed and ran, terrified, back toward the sea—though Puss had only meowed playfully in Spanish.
Even the bones under his feet scattered, scrambling and rolling into the ocean.
"Hahaha!" Puss laughed victoriously and gracefully sheathed his sword. "I am Puss in Boots, remember that name!" he shouted with a wide smile.
The soldiers stared, stunned at the scene, then looked at each other with joy.
"They retreated!" one of them shouted, raising his arms.
"Long live Puss in Boots!"
"Puss in Boots! Puss in Boots!"
The name echoed through the air, among laughter, tears, and hoarse voices. Some cried in relief, others from the pain of seeing their comrades wounded or dead.
Puss smiled hearing his name, but his gaze soon fell upon the soldiers kneeling beside lifeless bodies. The sound of celebration faded in the presence of mourning silence.
'This battle would have been much worse if not for the change I brought. The casualties would have been much greater if they had been unprepared, and the whole city would have suffered more. Maybe if I had insisted on going alone, I could have prevented more deaths… or maybe I would've lost a few lives to cannonballs aimed at a ship I was piloting. I don't even know what it's like to lose a life—maybe I'd just pass out for a while… and who knows what could happen during that time? So many what-ifs.'
He took a deep breath.
'Soldiers… they're called heroes. But they're just regular men who cry in mourning and despair in the face of death. While I'm a cat with boots on my paws, a sword in my hand, incredible strength in my arm, and a kind heart—but I don't even know if I'm really a hero.' He looked again at the soldiers. 'But I think… I finally understand what it means to be one.'
His paw tightened around the sword's hilt.
'Being a hero doesn't mean carrying the world alone or being perfect in everything you do. It's not about being loved, idolized, or understood by everyone.'
'Being a hero… is about living and fighting for what's right, even if it seems small, even when no one else believes in you. It's pushing forward, even if it costs your life. Never backing down. Never giving up. Even when you don't believe in yourself anymore.'
His eyes locked on the horizon, where the ships' cannons still flashed.
'They can say I, Puss in Boots, am not a hero. They can put up posters calling me an outlaw. They can hate me, curse me… Still, I will fight to be a hero. I will fight to do what's right, because that's what I believe in—and no opinion will change that.'
At that moment, Puss let go of every burden in his heart and fully embraced what he believed in.
"Soldiers!"
He called out, his voice cutting through the uproar of cheers, cries, and celebration. All eyes turned to him—the hero in their hearts.
"The fight isn't over yet. Save the celebrations… save the mourning, for there are still companions fighting for their lives. Man the cannons and resume firing!"
At his command, the soldiers snapped out of it, and without protest, ran toward the cannons with fire in their eyes.
Those who had been holding the fallen gently closed their comrades' eyes and left them behind, sprinting to the cannons with vengeance in their gaze.
Puss's eyes also turned serious as he looked out to sea.
"Time to end this."
