Ars and his soldiers made quick work of the marines. Once done clearing the filth, they were going to leave but Ars used his observation haki to try to search the ship. And when he did so he found not one but 2 living children and one adult, in the cruise ship.
Ars went to get them, and before he left, he said to his men.
"See if you can find anything we can use, but won't connect us to what happened here."
His men nodded, and Ars then left to get the 3 survivors.
First he went to the children's location. They were hidden inside a small compartment, where no adult could fit. When Ars opened the compartment the older girl jumped towards Ars trying to bite him, but Ars caught her easily, and hugged her. Anyone with eyes could see that she was terrified, so Ars tried to calm her down. He whispered to her.
"Everything is fine now, it's gonna be alright…"
The girl calmed down a bit, until she saw the dead body on the floor, it was her mother. The girl broke into tears, and Ars didn't know what he should do other than getting the other young girl out of the compartment.
Ars wasn't sure if the youngest understood the concept of death, but the older girl at least seemed to understand that from now on the 2 of them would never see their mother again.
Ars decided it was time to go, the longer they stayed here the higher the risk of being spotted by other ships.
Ars tried to distract them, by talking with them.
"I am Ars Nautical and I'm 17, what about you 2?"
The older girl looked at him, and at first she didn't say anything, just stayed silent, after a little bit more walking she asked a question.
"Why couldn't you arrive a bit sonner… If you had mom would still be able to walk with us…"
Ars didn't know what to say, but after thinking about it he simply responded with.
"I'm sorry, but it was out of my expectations and capabilities."
Ars was telling the truth, he never expected the marines to slaughter a ship full of civilians in broad daylight, for no reason at all. So at the beginning he wasn't too worried about a marine ship being near a cruise ship, if it wasn't for the fact he wanted to know if there was a problem and if he could help, he wouldn't even have stopped. Maybe if he knew what was happening, he could make it in time, but even then he wasn't too sure about it.
Ars suddenly heard the little girl voice again, now answering his previous question.
"My name is Ouki Risa and I'm 4 years old, and my sister is Ouki Rika, 2 years old."
Ars was also curious about why she jumped at him before, even if she sounded older, that didn't sound like something a 4 years old would do, so he asked her.
"Why did you try to jump at me before?"
She looked at Ars confused, and answered.
"Mom said, if someone else, other than her, opens the compartment, I should jump and try to grab their eyeballs, then grab my sister and hide in a different place. Did I do something wrong?"
Ars shook his head, and smiled at her, it was a sad smile, he realized that her mother knew that the marines were killing everyone so she hid them and told that last message as a way to try to protect them one last time, she probably hoped that, if someone checked the compartment and she managed to hurt their eyes they would manage to hide again, and buy time in case someone saw the marines attacking them and decided to help.
They didn't need to buy time but he got what she was thinking. She had failed to consider that the marines would probably sink the ship to hide the proof of their crimes and that the little girls would have probably drowned. He thought to himself sadly.
'While reviving their mother as soon as possible is an option, I will probably wait a bit longer, at least until the older one understands what keeping a secret is… I want to help but don't want to risk everyone's lives for a single act of kindness.'
After walking for a bit, they arrived at a storage compartment, where he said loudly.
"I'm giving this ship and the marine ship a burial at sea style funeral, if you stay hidden in here you will probably be burned alive."
His men were quickly passing by him collecting most things in the compartment, like they were doing in all compartments of both ships, but on this compartment suddenly, a hand appeared from the flour.
The figure was a young man, he was a bit embarrassed about being caught, luckly for him the one that caught him weren't the marines, but Ars.
Ars introduced himself and asked a question that he might not want to know the answers to.
"I'm Ars Nautical, and are you the one the marines were searching for?"
The young man still completely white from the flour showed a complex expression, before answering, a horrifying truth.
"You can call me Sas, and yes and no. Was I the one who escaped from that island? Yes, but I wasn't the one who triggered the slaughter… No… That was the captain of this ship."
Ars now wearing a much more serious expression asked.
"What do you mean?"
Sas then explained what was happening on the island he had escaped from, so Ars could understand what he meant.
"On the island where I previously lived, life used to be good, until a few years when the marine base commander changed. Then it got progressively worse and it got to the current situation when a few years ago, that commander managed to kill the nobles that were responsible for that city and then blamed it on a pirate crew that passed by. After that the people in the kingdom started being treated as slaves and anyone who discovers this, from the outside is hunted down and either silenced or captured as a slave. In my case I faked my death, before escaping. They are basically pirates wearing marine clothes or even worse. Because after pirates attack a town, a city, or a kingdom, once some time passes the majority of them will leave, but not the marines."
Ars unconsciously shivered, that sounded like hell with extra steps. He started thinking what he could do to help, after contemplating for a while he reached a few answers.
The first was direct, go to that city right now and annihilate all the marines there. The problem with this approach was that, once the marines headquarters lost contact with this base, they would investigate and if something went horribly wrong he could be declared a criminal by the marines.
The second was calling Dragon and letting him know what was happening here, he probably would be more than happy to get a reason to throw dirt on the marines and the world government.
The third was to get some photos and proof of the marines' corruption and send it to Morgans, the president of the world economy newspaper, also known as 'Big News' Morgans, with such a juicy story, there was no way he would let it go without publishing it.
The fourth would be contacting the marines superior brass and hope it reached the right ears, but Ars wasn't too sold on this one, in the worst case scenario live on that hell might actually become worse…
The final option was a combination of 2 of the previous options. Combining the second and the third option.
While he thought about it, Ars left the cruise ship with the 2 little girls in his arms and was followed by Sas.
Ars looked at 2 of his soldiers and ordered them.
"Keep an eye on this guy, at least until we confirm his story is true."
He pointed at Sas, who didn't seem surprised. Then he quickly moved to meet the medical apprentice and the moment she saw the children, she quickly demanded answers from Ars.
"Hoy! What happened? Where did you get those 2 little angels?"
Ars laughed with a sad expression and explained what happened on the cruise ship much to her horror. Ars then looked at the little girls and said to them.
"You are going to stay with this big sister here, okay?"
They both nodded and Ars left, outside he quickly prepared a torch to burn the ships before sinking them.
Ars made a short eulogy and then burned the ships.
After that they kept sailing to get his bounties. Once they arrived Ars quickly went to change his bounties and the moment he got them, he left just as quickly.
Right now he didn't want to look at marines and have to think if they were corrupt or not.
He started sailing toward his destination once more, but unlike the previous jolly mood, now the ship had a sadder and somber mood in the air, what those marines did to those civilians was weighing on everyone.
They arrived at the destination a few days later, unexpectedly, besides the pirate ships that were already predictable, there was one marine ship.
Ars soldiers anchored the ship and Ars left with a few men. The moment they started moving towards the center of the town, Ars couldn't help but show an impressed look at his surroundings. Unlike what he expected, the surrounding area was actually pretty well maintained. He saw someone and thought he might be a local, so he approached, and inquired about the situation of the island.
"Excuse me, sir, I would like to ask you a few questions, if that would be possible."
The man looked at him and he could tell he was confused about the condition of this town; he wasn't the first visitor that reacted like this, so he smiled as Ars nodded and answered him.
"Yes, you can ask a few questions, but I will answer one of them right now. This town allows everyone and anyone to buy and sell things at fair prices no matter your background, as long as you don't cause trouble here you are welcome to come and stay here. Because of this, many pirate crews come here to trade, so there is an unspoken rule between them, that no pirate crew is allowed to cause problems here."
Ars smiled back and nodded, that was indeed one of his questions, then he posed his other questions.
"In that case, nobody in this kingdom would want to live on a different island, right? And now, I will be the one who will answer the question that has yet to be made. I have a new kingdom that needs workers, anyone who wants to start a new life is welcome to come. My second question is, how often do you see marine ships on this island?"
The man was surprised and quickly replied, now a bit worried.
"Indeed there are not a lot of people that would like to live and what do you mean marine ship, i dont think i saw a marine ship on these waters in over ten years."
Then Ars showed a disappointed smile, and then pointed at the docks. Before clarifying.
"We just came from the port, and there was a marine ship there."
The man then got up and started moving towards the interior of the island, until he found a large crowd surrounding a tavern and like Ars had said he could indeed see some marines in the crowd.
From the inside of the tavern, two voices could be heard, one female and one male.
"You cute little marine, why not give me a lap dance, that is your only use…"
"Hina, would prefer to die, than to touch a man like you unless it is to arrest him."
Ars, who had followed the man here, could only think of one marine that was named Hina and talked in third person, but until he saw the owner of the voice, he wasn't 100% sure if it was her or not, even if he was 99% sure it was her.
Suddenly a few guards approached and moved through the crowd quite easily, they entered the tavern. Soon after the pirate and the marine came out.
It was indeed the Hina he thought of. She was not too happy about the situation and looked ready to fight.