The old man commented lightly.
"That's terrifying, I can't even imagine what happens there…"
Elia and Blinkie were also listening closely. Now realizing that the world they lived in was quite strange, but now, they also understood the grand line was where the strongest existences gathered.
Elia still complained stubbornly.
"I would still come… We are in the north blue, so the chances of finding someone our kingdom can't defeat is pretty low…"
Ars pinched her cheek, annoyed at her and everyone laughed at the image.
The old man looked at Blinkie and said with a sad expression.
"You should go with them."
Blinkie looked shocked and sorrowful. She looked at the old man with tears in her eyes.
"Why? I didn't harm anyone… And I have my life here…"
The old man sighed and simply said.
"Yes, I know…But people that lost someone today will definitely take it out on you guys, i know, and they also know that it has nothing to do with you, your children or your brother, but people will want an outlet to their anger, and most likely will be taken on you guys."
Blinkie actually started crying, and mumbling.
"That cursed woman, even dead, manages to destroy my life."
Nobody knew what to say, she was right from beginning to the end, that woman had destroyed her and all of her siblings' early lives, and now that they were starting over, with new lives she still managed to ruin them.
Elia hugged her and let Blinkie cry on her shoulder for a while and finally said.
"Why don't you come live in our kingdom? It will be a fresh start, away from all the problems that woman ever caused. Think about it, our kingdom is growing very fast and needs people in different jobs everywhere, so you and your husband will find work easily."
Blinkie nodded that it was indeed a good opportunity to start over in a new place. She was still sad but went to speak with her husband, mother in law and her brother.
They all looked sad with the old man's request but they understood why he made it.
They all agreed to come without much hesitation, the old man was sadly correct and in the end they didn't want to get outcasted by some of the residents. So they decided to leave willingly.
Blinkie approached, looked at Ars and nodded, but it was the old lady who commented.
"Thank you for helping us, but where did I see your face? I think I saw it before, but can't remember where…"
Elia laughed, and Ars looked amused and gave a simple explanation.
"You did see me on this island before, though my appearance changed a bit since last time I was here. I was the person that took the rest of the Blinkie family away."
The old woman jolted and looked at Ars face.
"Your appearance changed a lot, but I also didn't interact much with you, I remember getting so angry I started feeling unwell…"
Ars nodded and replied with a simple.
"Indeed."
The old woman looked around and not finding who she was looking for said.
"If you are here, you could have brought at least some of them with you."
Now it was Blinkie, Elia and Altan turn to laugh, she then turned at them confused, about why were they laughing and looked at them trying to understand the motive of their laughter, then since Elia was wearing a mask she associated her to baby 3 and inquired about it.
"Are you Baby 3? That poor girl was always wearing a mask, so i'm not sure, but your body is way more curvy than hers and has no scars, so i'm not too sure…"
Elia nodded and replied warmly, while also hiding the laboratory as much as she could.
"It's indeed me and the reason I'm curvier is I got my appearance healed. Now I live a happy life in my new home. And I also changed my name to Sunhalo Elia."
She took a break and then pointed at Altan and introduced him too.
"And this is Altan, previously known as Baby 9. He is now a soldier apprentice, you didn't recognize him because he put on some weight and muscle besides the normal height growth from children.."
Ars then decided that it was a good time to start preparing to depart. So he ordered his soldiers.
"Start the preparations to return home. We will stop in a kingdom on the way there to cash in the pirates' bounties."
The soldiers nodded and replied orderly.
"Yes, Sir!"
Then one of the soldiers remembered something that they hadn't done yet and asked.
"What about the pirate ships, should we take the one that is in good condition, and investigate the others for items that we can use?"
Ars nodded and commented.
"Indeed we should do that. But be careful, just in case there are pirates in hiding waiting to ambush."
"Yes, Sir!"
Then the soldiers quickly rushed back to investigate the ships, loot them, and then prepare their ship to return home.
After a while, Ars with the others arrived at what had previously been home for Blinkie and her family. The children and the woman broke in tears, this used to be their home, but now it was just a bunch of burned and damaged goods, there was nothing for them to recover, everything they used to have… Gone…
Blinkie's husband closed his eyes, clenched his fists and said to Ars.
"We are ready to depart, we have nothing to take with us."
Ars nodded and started going towards the ships, on the way there a lot of families could be seen crying over their losses.
When they arrived at the ship they started embarking and shortly after, the soldiers verifying the pirate ships came to report their finds.
Ars was shocked by what he heard from the soldiers.
"Sir, we did find a few pirates, they were guarding a group of slaves and according to my comrades who searched the other ships, all ships were carrying at least 10 slaves."
The other soldiers all nodded and one of them added.
"We also found this journal that shows that they were doing business with a man, with the alias of, Joker. "
Ars was surprised and quickly questioned, trying not to panic.
"Are you 100% sure, the name you saw written was Joker?"
The soldier nodded, confused by the panicked face Ars had, but then Ars explained.
"The Joker is the codename of one of the underworld brokers, in this case Donquixote Doflamingo. He is a very dangerous man that will happily kill entire islands without even thinking of the consequences."
The soldiers finally knew why Ars was a bit pale and panicked, that was indeed someone they probably didn't want to fight. Then Ars took the journal and started reading, much to his relief, they were trading with someone under Joker not with Joker himself, it was just one of his auction house minions that bought slaves from pirates to sell them in the auction house.
Ars felt a tremendous relief washing over him. He knew he wasn't even close to ready to try and fight Joker, he didn't have any type of haki awakened yet, so there was absolutely no way of winning if it really was Joker.
Ars, now feeling relieved that it wasn't the Joker, decided to go meet the slaves.
As expected the slaves were still scared of what was happening, at first they thought it was the marines and that they would be saved, but after they saw the people who had arrived, they were now questioning if these people were pirates who were all dressed in the same unknown uniform for some strange reason, or most likely scenario, the soldiers of some kingdom they didn't know.
They weren't sure which one they would prefer, in most cases no matter who they were, they would still be sold as slaves, or used as disposable items.
One of them had asked their identities but the soldiers did not answer, but then one of the soldiers came back with one young man.
Ars looked around at the scared slaves on the first ship and asked.
"Do you have any place you would like to return to?"
Some of them nodded, and then Ars asked calmly.
"Do you have any way to get there?"
Most of them shook their heads, but one answered, a very unexpected answer that left Ars confused on how to react…
"I can, but I would prefer not to return. I want to be free, or I wouldn't have run away from home… From what I understood from what you said, you are going to release us from our slave collars, right? "
Ars nodded, he didn't know how to handle a run away in this scenario, so he just nodded and asked directly.
"Do you want me to leave you on the next island? Or would you prefer to come live in my kingdom?"
The kid quickly nodded and answered calmly, like until a few minutes ago he wasn't a slave but a veteran at living on the sea and he was just here by coincidence. "I would prefer to be left on the next island."
The other slaves were also showing relieved faces, Ars then gave orders to his soldiers.
"Remove the collars and group them on the deck."
His men nodded and Ars left to check the other slave groups. On the second ship the slaves mainly wanted to return, but had no way to do it. Finally on the third ship there were 2 unusual slaves. Two mermaids who were injured, Ars decided to ignore them for now and talk with them in private later. The remaining slaves were in a similar case to the ones on the second and first ships.
Then Ars moved towards the deck, there, the 2 previous groups of slaves were now waiting for Ars.
Ars got in front of the slave group and quickly explained what it was gonna happen.
"I'm gonna give you all 2 choices, the first you go along with me and work for me in the future. The second choice is to leave you on the next island and we probably won't meet again. Now for the people who prefer the first choice, move to the right, the ones who don't move will choose the second choice by default."
The vast majority moved right. While some of them wanted to return home… They had no way to return there due to the lack of money, they chose to start new lives in a new place, who knew, maybe one day, they would instead bring their families to live with them in their new place.
The few remaining ones who didn't move were in similar circumstances but decided to risk it.
Ars then went to his cabin, with the 2 mermaids following close behind.
Once they got inside Ars quickly offered the mermaids a chair. The mermaids were a pair of mother and daughter. Ars decided to talk with them in private because you normally wouldn't see mermaids around here very often so he was curious.
While he was inside the ships started sailing to a kingdom close to the way home to change the bounties.
Ars was now looking attentively to these 2 unusual guests, and decided to introduce himself.
"I am Ars nautical, and I'm the sovereign of a new kingdom. I apologize if this sounds rude or even forceful but I would like to know why are there 2 mermaids in the north blue? No offense but you don't see your kind very often around this place."
The older mermaid answered shyly and a bit afraid, after all mermaids were a prized possession between nobles..
"Your majesty Ars, it's an honor to meet you, I'm Gluppy and this is my daughter Pecillia. We were captured by pirates returning from the second part of the grand line, they probably thought that Withebeard wouldn't follow them to paradise. But they did and when they caught up to them, they tied my daughter to me tightly, injured my tail and stabbed me in the back, before throwing me in the water with weights, then i lost consciousness and when i woke up was in a island in north blue, my daughter explained the we got a ride from a large sea king who was crossing the calm belt. Sadly thanks to my injuries we got caught quickly again. "