Landing at Baterilla

TIME SKIP 6 MONTHS~

"How long has it been since we ran out of booze?" Taiga asked in a defeated voice as he crouched on the deck drawing circles.

"It's just been a month!" Cassy snapped, "And we wouldn't have been in such a situation if you and Cliff hadn't been getting shitfaced after every pirate crew we defeated and on every island we landed on since Karate Island!"

"But Cassy! We need to drink after every victory and free-for-all!" Cliff chipped in, "And it's not like you three girls don't join in either!"

"We join in because you started it!" Mio and May sang from their positions of the crow's nest and helm respectively.

Cassy just sighed as a familiar argument started once more. This had been going on for the last month ever since they stopped encountering pirates while they moved north towards Baterilla. Additionally, the number of islands with human presence drastically decreased once they crossed Sorbet Kingdom.

…

"Land Ahoy!" cried Mio from up above.

"Finally!" cried 4 voices from below her.

It took naught but a few minutes for the crew to reach the docks and anchor the ship. The marines stationed at the dock just looked at incoming ship with alarm and went to alert the higher-ups but before they could do anything they were knocked out cold.

Behind them Cassy, Taiga, and Cliff stood having knocked them out. May and Mio jumped down a second later, looked at the knocked-out marines, shrugged and looked towards their Captain.

Cliff looked back at them and said, "Spread out. Collect Information about the marines here. Meet me back here at sundown."

They all nodded and spread out while Cliff stayed back as someone had to guard the ship.

…

…

Sundown came awfully slow for Cliff. He was bored and had nothing to do.

Sure, every once in a while, a few marines would come patrolling and upon seeing their ship try to board it. But they weren't really a challenge for Cliff. Now he sat upon the bodies of 25 marines that had been stacked upon each other. That was how his crew found him.

Seeing them coming he jumped down from the 'leaning tower of marines' and jumped back onto the ship and waiting for them to do the same.

"All good?" he asked.

"Yeah, it's all good especially since this place has some decent booze." Taiga replied while the girls just nodded.

"So, what did you find?" Cliff asked looking towards Cassy first.

Cassy took a second before starting, "The Marine Captain stationed here started first by killing mothers with newborns or those up to 1 year of age that moved outwards. Within a few weeks every mother stopped leaving their houses. The next few months very few children were killed as very few mothers left with their kids."

Mio cut in, "He lost patience soon enough and started ordering marines to break into houses and find any child younger than 1 and bring them and the parents into the main plaza so that he could execute the child himself."

"That's how he's been doing for the last 8 months, ordering an execution or 2 every other week. The marines have spread themselves all over Baterilla to get their 'targets'." May said adding an emphasis on the word 'Targets'.

Cassy nodded and continued, "He's gotten much more brutal as time goes on. The last execution that happened was done by shootout and it was a new born girl he ordered it on!" she finished with a lot of anger evident in her voice.

"He's a bear zoan. I confirmed it with the seedier population in the bars." Taiga spoke. "He transforms into a brown bear and has shown his hybrid form multiple times when fighting pirates or when he wishes to maul a child on his own." He finished with a sour face.

With every word being spoken, Cliff got angrier and angrier and his face showed that. As the report ended his face matched that of his crew, and showed nothing but anger.

"And the next execution is tomorrow. Rumours say he's going to make the father decapitate his child or he'll completely maul his wife." May added one last line that sealed the deal.

Cliff was silent for a moment before he asked one question, "How many marines support him?"

He received his answer from Mio, "Not a lot, but he's completely surrounded by them all the time. The ones who do not typically don't even attend the execution."

"Then every marine present for tomorrow's execution will die and by God we will save that child!" Cliff spoke with a determined voice.

"Aye Captain!" Echoed his crew.

…

…

…

The next day, the entire crew was up early and had stationed themselves around the main plaza. The crew had spread apart to cover all 4 corners of the plaza while Cliff had climbed up on the roof opposite the execution platform that had been built for the child executions going on here.

It took just a few hours before the plaza was completely full and a procession of marines mase their way to the centre. Between them walked a sobbing mother holding her child in a blue blanket while the father walked behind them with a downtrodden face.

At the very end of the marine procession walked a tall man in a white marine coat. He had to have been atleast 8 ft tall, wearing a white coat, shirt and pants with a blue tie. His black eyes glinted maliciousness that was visible from even under his pitch-black hair. His cruel smile only further enhanced it.

As soon as he reached the bottom of the stairs that led up to the execution platform, Cliff gave the signal and his crew opened fire onto the marines.

4 shots rang out and 4 marines fell down dead, their blood spilling from their bodies. From all 4 corners Taiga, Mio, May and Cassy walked forward unhindered as the crowd split apart for them to continue. They walked up to those they shot and finished them off via flintlock, claw, sword or kanabo to the head.

The other marines had barely moved from their positions as they had frozen when the shots rang out. The Marine Captain was the only one who wasn't frozen, he was rather calm and smiling as if losing his men didn't affect him at all.

"Oh! A rebellion finally! Tell who are you?" he spoke with a weird smile on his face.

"Ones who do not support child slaughter." Came a voice from behind him.

The Marine Captain turned around and made a surprised face upon looking at Cliff who now stood in front of him with his cutlass out.

"Cliff Calloway! Who would've thought a 'vicious' pirate captain such as yourself would come to kill me?" He spoke in a surprisingly upbeat voice while still smiling a tad weird. "With how you slaughtered so many sailors a few months ago, I would've thought you would not care for what happened here."

"Those 'sailors' you mention were pirates who attacked us. And just because I'm willing to kill does not mean I lack a moral code." Cliff answered.

The marine Captain chuckled, "A pirate with a 'moral code'? What a joke! No pirate ever has a moral code!" he exclaimed.

Cliff did not answer, instead he stared at the Captain standing opposite him waiting for the fight to start.

The entire plaza was completely quiet as people assembled for the execution slowly inched backward towards the plaza's walls.

The marines slowly positioned themselves around the 4 pirates while the captain spoke with Cliff.

On an unknown signal, a marine shot towards May and the battle began.

…

May dodged the shot and shot forward with her dagger in hand and slit the marines throat before moving onto another. A few more fell before the others around her got their cutlasses out and began to charge her.

She was able to fight much more easily this time around, owing to the months of training and battles that it took to get to Baterilla. She easily ended her opponents' lives, even though they ganged up on her.

'I've gotten much stronger since then, and I'll only get stronger from now on'

…

As soon as the shot rang out, Mio cleaved through the marine closest to her with her claws before starting to slaughter those around her. She was having a decidedly easy time in this fight.

Her claws had been dyed red as cleaved through the marines while they had started to gang up on her, which really made no difference other than making it even easier for her to finish them off.

'Left, right, duck & dodge. And repeat. This is really easy. Now if only I can stop wearing white clothes during such battles. It's a hassle to wash them clean every time.' She thought with a grimace at the last part.

…

Taiga started swinging his kanabo around as soon as the first shot was fired. Each swing of his kanabo resulted in plenty of injuries for the marines if not outright death. The spikes had turned red while a lot of blood splashed onto the rest of his weapon and also on his body. He didn't really care if they attacked him in groups or not, groups just made it easy for him to exterminate them all.

'This is getting really easy. These marines were supposed to be stronger than those of previous islands, but I don't see it. Damn the marines. Scamming me out of a good fight!'

…

The moment the first shot was shot, Cassy unsheathed her sword and started her attack. Every swing of her sword resulted in her getting splashed in blood. She grimaced when some blood got in her eyes, squinting them she continued to fight though obviously one hand was busy rubbing her eyes.

The marines took this as an insult interpreting it as her 'being so bored fighting them that she was feeling sleepy and rubbing her eyes to stay awake.' They put more effort into it and started attacking with more vigour.

By the time Cassy got the blood out of her eyes, a few marines had started getting way to close for comfort with their attacks, so she focused back on the fight and let her sword loose.

… needless to say, the marines didn't stand a chance…

'What's up with them? Why're they so angry at me?... Whatever, their anger's giving me a decent fight, I suppose.'

…

Cliff and the Captain clashed the moment the shot rang out. Cutlass met bear claw in CLANG as they both struggled to overcome the other.