As silently as possible, I explored the ship starting from the crow's nest and seeing it empty, proceeded to the captain's quarters.
Opening the door, I took a look inside. There was a work desk and a chair at the back middle of the room, a map on the wall to my left and a drawer under the map with some letters and documents. To my right was a small table with some tools on it. Most likely for navigational purposes.
Walking inside, I took a look at the map and decided to take it down and bring it with me. Rolling up the map, I squeezed it into my belt. Checking the letters on the drawer showed an interesting thing. I could read the letters as they were in english but some of them were in a language I didn't know.
Reading the letters informed me of some things. Like the fact that there was an archipelago nearby being contested by two nations.
One was called 'The Kingdom of Melianor' and the other was called 'The Glenmora Theocracy'.
There wasn't much information about them aside from the fact they frequently clash with each other and their recent disputes have been fought over the Surtona Archipelago.
Apparently, this ship was a passenger ship going to the Island of Sursa. The letters were a correspondence between two captains, one being the captain of this ship and the captain of another ship who was worried about the continued fighting of the Kingdom and the Theocracy affecting their usual sailing routes.
I had a contemplating look on my face as I considered this information. This was both interesting and concerning news. Coming across any of the nation's ships or patrols would be problematic.
When I said the Devil's Queen was a big ass ship before I meant it was a capital A 'BIG ASS SHIP'. My measurements were not accurate since I didn't have any measurement devices but from what I could tell, Queen was a minimum of 70 meters (229ft.) in length and around 20 meters (65ft.) in height with around 128 cannons or at least cannon placements.
Why do I know this? I counted. There wasn't much to do on the ship aside from training my armament haki as I couldn't fish with my harpoon anymore to train my observation haki. Conqueror's Haki was difficult to train without anyone to use it on.
*sigh*
"Whatever, I'll think about all this later. Let me check the lower decks as well. Maybe I'll find a clue as to what happened here."
I walked back outside and found the ladder leading down to the lower decks. The lower deck was for passengers so there were some tables, crates, playing cards, bottles of drinks, plates and bowls of food, luggage and hammock or floor beds.
Still no one. Checking a few bowls and plates revealed the food had gone cold so it must have been some time since everyone disappeared. If something took them away then they must be long gone by now.
Just as I was thinking of what to do my observation haki caught something. A barrel. No movement but there was something there. I got this feeling as if it was living, though I wasn't sure. Now my whole concentration was on it.
Slowly moving closer to the barrel while listening intently to any sounds I reached for the handle of the barrel's lid with my left hand while holding my harpoon in my right hand.
Suddenly before I could even grab the handle the lid flew off towards me. Quickly stepping back I brought the harpoon in front of me to defend myself. When the lid hit me the force somehow sent me stumbling but instead of flailing around I let myself fall and did a backwards roll and immediately stood up.
What greeted me was the sight of a girl, young but definitely an adult. Blue eyes, silver hair done in a ponytail, white crop top kind of shirt, blue jacket, jean-like shorts and quite decently muscular.
She jumped out of the barrel with a snarling face, ready for a fight and upon seeing me halted in surprise. She chose that moment to speak.
"Wait, you're not Hyrisian? Oh man, you really scared me there. How did you escape those guys' notice?"
She immediately went from angry and confused to smiling and relieved. I wasn't sure what to say to that question but nonetheless tried my best not to give away that I was clueless about everything.
"That's the neat part, I didn't. I wasn't even here."
She squinted her eyes and took another look at me and asked.
"Huh, you're right. I don't remember seeing you among the other passengers but then how did you find this ship then?"
I considered what to tell her. I didn't feel like leaving her to die here so I will most likely take her with me which means she will see The Devil's Queen sail by itself anyway.
I remembered all those stories that were similar to my situation that I read in my past life. Those stories protagonists would most likely start making up excuses or stupidly fucking tell the truth.
Me? I subscribe to the idea that if I don't want to tell or explain to you something, I just won't fucking tell you or explain. We just met, why would I try to justify myself to this woman?
So I said "With Nunya".
She asked "What's Nunya?"
My answer was prepared.
"None of your business."