The next day after getting the 5.000.000 berries from the reward and 280.000.000 berries from all the bounties, he started to sail away from the island. All of the royal family and a good part of all the civilians on the island, had come to say thank you and goodbye.
The king was very happy about Ars decision to let the kingdom keep most of the ships, there were quite a few in good condition remaining, ships he could use or sell. With Ars only taking with him 3 of all of the ships.
During the farewells the inhabitants of the island were calling Ars a hero. After leaving one of his soldiers noticed Ars' displeased face, so he asked.
"Your majesty, is everything alright? You seem displeased about something."
Ars' face relaxed a bit, before he explained.
"I hate the word hero and its meaning, is a publicity stunt, and depending on who says it, sometimes becomes worse, like in this case they call me a hero because I saved them, but lets say it was a pirate they didn't know that saved them because he wanted the other pirates treasure, for them that pirate would still be a hero."
Ars sighed and continued feeling conflicted.
"The word hero changes its meaning through time and perspective. Sometimes saving someone makes you a hero, but sometimes all you need to do is to kill. Even an invading soldier that killed hundreds of innocent lives can be called a hero, by the kingdom behind it, that is the sad truth about that word."
The soldier nodded, he didn't really agree with it but he understood what Ars was trying to say.
The ship went towards the closest troubled island, in this case the neighboring kingdom, But when they got there, there was no more kingdom.
Apparently pirates were here before them, he thought about it and ordered his men.
"Prepare to disembark and start organizing yourselves to search for survivors."
"Yes Sir!!"
He then looked at the medical assistant and asked her with a serious face.
"What would you prefer to do? Stay on the ship or come with me?"
She thought about it and answered.
"I will go along with your majesty."
After a few minutes they approached what remained of the dock, and started disembarking.
While his soldiers searched the town, Ars dislocated himself to the biggest building. The place was completely ransacked, with several dead bodies on the floor.
He was here just to search for any survivors, and he somehow could feel that there were a few people hiding and moving in the shadows. So he looked at the medical apprentice and warned her.
"Stay close, there are people here, and they might attack."
She nodded and got a bit closer.
As they kept searching, more and more sounds were being heard, either more people had arrived or the people following them were becoming agitated.
He reached what looked like a tightly closed metal door, which was unusual, until now all doors were opened or damaged enough that with a light push they could be open, he tried to open it like the others, but it was tightly locked, so he took his blade and chopped it into pieces.
Then all hell broke loose, the people following them attacked and the people inside started screaming.
A small group of female knights appeared from behind them, they rushed in and tried to put themselves between Ars and the survivors inside the room, one of them looked at him while screaming.
"Make sure he doesn't reach the children and the surviving maids."
But he quickly moved and destroyed their weapons with finger flicks, much to their horror, and knocked them all out without too much difficulty.
The small group of children and maids stood frozen in terror, but some of the maids stood in front of the others, while lifting kitchen utensils to deter Ars. He was looking at them undecided if he should praise them for their courage or call them dumb for their recklessness. Then he couldn't help but question them.
"You serious??? You know that won't help at all… Right?"
He didn't need to tell them, they knew it was useless, but if they were gonna be caught and probably sold as slaves, or used as toys by these pirates, they would try to go down swinging.
One of the older maids who were here, who until now was still beside the children, got up and spoke to him.
"If you give us your word you won't harm the children we will go with you."
"Sure, I promise I won't attack, or hurt the children, unless they attack me, if they do i will have to knock them out. "
The younger maids were not exactly satisfied with the old maid's decision and opposed it.
"Head maid, please we can't surrender, god knows what they will do to us."
Before anyone spoke anything else, another one of the maids that were sitting with the children got up and said calmly.
"Let's all calm down, we will follow him, I have been thinking and the pirates left for almost a day, it makes no sense for them to come back for no reason… After thinking about it I suspect he isn't one of the pirates that attacked us."
Ars just smiled, and introduced himself.
"I'm Ars nautical, and i'm here to take you with me indeed, but i'm not a pirate, but a king of a very young and small nation, we saw the place was destroyed, and came searching for survivors."
All of the maids felt relieved and visibility relaxed a bit, except the one that got up the last, she had a conflicted expression, but then she introduced herself properly.
"I'm queen Mulberry Logi, it is a pleasure to meet you, and we thank you for your aid."
He nodded and started to wake the unconscious knights. When they woke up at first they felt lost, they didn't remember why they were sleeping, but when they looked at Ars they suddenly remembered. jumping in between Ars and the survivors, to defend them.Before declaring.
"Everyone please run and leave us behind! We will buy you as much time as we can, even if we pay with our lives."
The queen grabbed their shoulders, hugged and informed them.
"No need, we already talked with them and they are here to help."
The queen proceeded to explain the situation, and the knights finally relaxed.
Ars signaled them to follow, he kept going further in to search for more survivors, the queen seeing this, commented sadly .
"If you're looking for further survivors inside, please don't, that was the only safe room and they kept trying to break in for at least 2 days. Luckly for us, they didn't manage to get in, but in the palace everyone else should be dead."
Ars nodded but said.
"I think I already checked over 95 % of the entire palace, the last 5 % won't take long."
The queen nodded, but didn't expect to find anyone, but much to her surprise, when they were passing by her oldest daughter's room, they realized she was still breathing.
At first she was happy that her daughter was alive, it wasn't until she realized her condition that she felt horrified. Her daughter used to be part of the knights and when the attack began she went on the front lines to fight.
Unluckly for her she got captured alive, and after they killed most of the kingdom they had started having fun with her.
From mental torture, to physical torture, in all shapes and forms, her entire body was covered in dried fluids, and her mind was completely broken. The queen could only contort herself in horror at her daughter's condition and finally, her mind stopped on a single thought.
'How many times was she assaulted by them, it was probably hundreds of times…'
The queen started crying, Ars looked at the medical staff at his side and she advanced to check her condition. After examining her she also felt horrified by what happened to the girl. Previously she was already horrified but it was only after inspecting her and checking on the extent of the girl's injuries that she felt even worse. She tried to calm herself down before explaining.
"The wound on her neck which made her lose a large amount of blood, was made after everything else, probably to finish her off. The pirates thought she would die from the bleeding but she didn't."
She hesitated but Ars pressed her for answers.
"She will live but…I'm not sure if she will ever be the same as she was before… Her mind isn't reacting to stimulus properly, no matter if I stab her with needles or make cuts she doesn't react at all, it will take a while until she recovers."
Ars then pointed at the queen and the knights and ordered them.
"Help her get her dressed and let's keep going."
They nodded and they went to help her, while crying for her.
After a while they were done with the search on the palace, they started going towards the ship.
By the ship close to 100 people were already waiting there. Ars looked at the medical apprentice and said.
"Go on, it seems you have your job cut out for you in the next few hours."
She started checking on everyone's conditions, and solved them the best she could.
Ars while waiting, started talking with the queen a bit more.
"So Madam Mulberry, have you ever thought about what you would like to do if you were not the queen?"
She looked a bit sad when she heard Ars' question, but it was her knights and maids that were the most indignant, they were about to say something when their queen spoke.
"Honestly… No… Until now I never thought something like this would happen to us, but I understand why you ask. I will think about it, since I won't be a queen anymore, I will try to find something to do."
Ars nodded and her entourage went silent, they also understood why he asked that, they simply felt that he was pouring salt on the wound way too soon, and couldn't accept it.
One of the knights then remembered something that might have escaped their brains until now and asked.
"When we leave this island… We won't be her majesty knights anymore, at least officially, right? But will we be allowed to help her, the children and the maids? We have already failed them once, I would prefer not to do it again."
Ars calmly replied.
"You're correct and yes, you will be able to help them when you want as long as it doesn't cause trouble for others. You don't even need to be a knight anymore if you don't want to"
The knight nodded and went to hug and promise the queen that she would help her, and every single knight and maid followed her actions.
Ars didn't quite listen to what was said but from the emotional response from the queen, he knew they wanted to help her.
The queen looked at them with tears in her eyes.
"You don't need to do this, I am thankful for your intentions but I will be able to find something to do."
They all shook their heads and one of them answered warmly.
"We don't but we want to!"
All the others followed and nodded their heads. Ars laughed and said with a warm smile.
"You are loved by them, just accept it."
Then the oldest princess started shivering, seeing this the queen quickly went to hug her.
Then when she felt her mother embrace she started weeping, one of the children also went to hug her, which led to even more tears.
Some of the maids and knights also started crying emotionally, Ars seeing that, decided to leave, if they needed they could talk more later.
His maid who had come with him but stayed on the ship until now commented.
"She should have been a fine queen until now, for her to be loved like that."
Ars simply nodded.
After everything was finished, Ars ordered the return home.