Onwards to Servus Terra

"RAAAAAHH!"

The giant crocodile cried out in pain as someone kept his head pinned to the floor unable to free itself from his strength. In six seconds it stopped moving, it had died.

"I just love it when I get lucky and get its highest stat." Sky said as he jumped down from his head. Jericho nodded and smiled. She would accompany him to find any hidden chests.

After opening the dungeon chest Sky got an expected surprise.

{Earn 1,000,000,000 shells completed}

{Rewards: 1 title, 3x player coupon}

"Finally." Sky was happy to receive the rewards after so long. 

{Title: Flowing wealth: Earn 10% more money when killing and finding treasure}

"Aw… this is not a good title." Sky wanted something better, he doesn't even kill anymore because he instead sacrifices nearly everyone and everything he's fought, and he only kills to level up his death curse on the weaker ones who aren't worth sacrificing. Now most of his wealth comes from chests and clearing dungeons which he does admit would boost his wealth with this title as well with the gold sentient brick.

Sky was expecting something better and was let down. Ironically this was his most useful title as it could be useful in most situations. His other titles are only good for fighting certain types of enemies he has rarely met.

What Sky wanted most was a title that could boost his fighting prowess and help him gain an advantage over his enemies.

"I'll get the stuff from the chest." Jericho said.

"Thanks, Jeri."

"Mhm."

For the past thirty minutes Jericho has been acting strange after she called Sky 'dad' she knew he heard her and it was too late to take it back. What made her uncomfortable is that Sky hasn't said anything about it and she was too embarrassed to bring it up.

Soon after getting the items from the chest they safely made it back to the ship.

Jules was making more potions, while Jay was playing darts using the ship's mast and hitting bullseye without missing a single one, he was so good that he had to use a blindfold to make it difficult for him. Even with that handicap he gave himself he could still hit the bullseye target with ease.

Even those with the same stats as Jay would find it difficult to perform as him without any talent.

"Hmm… I wonder." Jay had an idea to train his mana. With a dart on hand Jay injected mana into the dart and threw it, the dart pierced through the target and pierced the mast.

"O-!" Jay covered his mouth, quickly looking to see if Sky had noticed it, but he was staring blankly at nothing in front of him.

Jay quickly pulled the dart from the mast. There was a hole on the mast not enough to affect the ship but it was noticeable. Jay covered the hole with the target.

"Gonna cook us some dinner, Captain!" Jay waved and laughed nervously as he was about to leave.

"That's great, Jay, make sure to also fix that hole on the mast when you're done." Sky said with a smirk.

"Yes, Cap'n!" Jay quickly closed the door behind him and stood still for several seconds…

'Wait… crap…' 

Sky actually didn't notice Jay pierced a hole in the mast, it was the system who notified him that a crew member damaged the ship and took away 5 HP from the ship.

'Hmmm… clearing dungeons is great but at one point it's gonna become too inefficient to keep going like this. Clearing a purple dungeon could yield me months of hard work. Still, what choice do I have? I think capturing slaves is the best way to go. Oh well, the money I get from these runs is great.' Sky thought.

He could sense Jericho's gaze on him. He sighed before turning to her.

"What's wrong, Jeri?"

"No-nothing."

"..." Sky continued to stare at her.

"..." Jericho.

"Is this seriously because of what you said half an hour ago?"

Jericho turned away, even if she didn't respond Sky had given her an answer.

Sky crouched down to see her eye-to-eye.

"Why do you see me as a father figure? I know I helped you and your family but still, why?"

"I… I don't know. I really don't know. You're cruel, very cruel, mysterious, merciless to your enemies, inhumane, psycho, and."

"Enough with the compliments, Jeri." Sky interrupted her. In truth he knew why Jericho would see him that way, because the system told him as a reward for completing her quest he would have her loyalty and whatnot, of course he didn't know if the system truly had a hand in having Jericho be loyal to him, for all he knows the same thing could have happened even if the reward didn't include Jericho's loyalty.

"It's just you helped me and my family a lot. You gave me so many red scrolls, then you gave us so much money, then you made me strong, you gave me two purple scrolls then later you gave me so many purple scrolls when I went through so much thanks to my dad because I accidentally used a purple scroll, and I… I… I…" Jericho started to tear up uncontrollably.

Sky extended his arms to give her a hug, before he could extend his hands all the way she already ran up to him and gave him a tight hug. She didn't realize how emotional she would become when had to explain why she viewed him as a father figure.

Sky patted her back with one hand while his other hand was resting on his hip. Her tears and snot were staining his shirt.

'What am I supposed to say here?' Sky thought. 

"NOOOOO!"

Jay's scream of agony could be heard coming below the ship. Immediately Sky, Jericho, and Jules rushed through the door and appeared behind Jay preparing to confront anything.

"I FORGOT TO GIVE IT TO KATELYN!" Jay loudly said as he was holding onto a heart-shaped rock. It was the rock he found some time ago in God's paradise. He had planned to give it to Katelyn but had forgotten about it.

Just then three angry fists connected to the back of Jay's head and left him face down on the ship.

"Sorry. Didn't mean to scare you all. I deserve that." Jay said while still face down on the floor of the ship.

"Fix the hole on the mast asap." Sky said.

"Aye."

Everyone left Jay with a huge bump on his head. They rushed towards him expecting that he was in trouble, but he just forgot something and scared them.

'Well at least this broke the awkward situation we were in.' Sky thought and it's why he held back on his punch.

So the ship sailed to the nearest dungeon where Sky would continue getting richer and stronger by the day repeating the same cycle till he was satisfied.

Two days passed without much trouble for Sky and his crew.

It wasn't difficult hiding from the Caribbean. The ocean was vast and they always docked on islands with a low population and no Caribbean offices.

But something sinister was brewing in the bottom of the ocean.

There were three familiar fishmen and one bound mermaid around her late twenties with beautiful curly hair and that went across her face. The three fishmen were none other than the Warlord and his family, Yok and Juvia.

"Took us two days to find someone at last." Juvia said with her arms folded.

"Makes sense. Everyone is hiding from us that the government's armies are no use against us. We destroyed major cities. Luckily we found her wandering around." The Warlord said while stretching his neck.

They could have used the mermaid slave Yok had but Yok didn't want to use her own slave for what they had in plan for him.

Yok took out a contract and gave the mermaid a pen.

"Sign it please."

The mermaid was unresponsive. 

With a sigh, Jules extended her hand and created a bubble of air around them. She unsheathed a knife from her waist and stabbed the mermaid in her palm causing her to scream and bleed.

Yok backed away realizing that her mom wanted to do it the hard instead of the easy way.

"Sign it with your blood and don't ignore my daughter." Juvia pushed the contract on the mermaid's chest. The mermaid who was crying and in pain took the contract, and applied her thumb print on the contract. 

And just like that she became their slave, or to be exact she is now Yok's slave.

The Warlord grabbed the choker that the skull gave him. The feeling of the choker was horrible since it was obviously made out of bug's feet of all kinds that were still moving and twitching. He placed the choker around her neck and the mermaid didn't utter a word nor resisted.

The bug feet twitched uncontrollably and violently, They stretched far before they pierced her neck as if they were needles that stabbed and stood on her neck. The mermaid twitched and grabbed the choker but it was stuck on her neck and causing her great pain.

The Warlord and Juvia looked at her with stone cold eyes. They both thought she might die and they would lose a useful item.

Yok was glad she didn't use the choker on the mermaid slave boy she contracted, else this would have happened to him.

After a while the mermaid stopped moving and stood up. The choker was still on her neck and the bug feet were still stuck on her throat, to her it felt as if she had hundreds of needles lodged all over her neck.

"Can you speak?" The Warlord asked.

"Yes. I can." She knew he wasn't her master but if she didn't respond to him she would suffer most likely, not like she hasn't already. She didn't show it but the choker around her neck was making her feel very afraid of her own life.

"Good." The Warlord was glad the choker didn't impede her speech.

"I just thought of this, how will we find the kid if the island we were at was not only destroyed when you and Xero clashed, but now he's personally looking for us?" Juvia asked.

"The thought did cross my mind. You're right in a way, we can't go back to the island, Xero knows we had to have a good reason to go to that island and he is most likely waiting for us there, or is somewhere nearby."

"So you're saying that this is useless now?" Juvia pointed to the mermaid slave.

"No, we are still going to use her. For all we know is that this kid may not even be the one we're looking for, it's all speculation but it is very likely it's him. But the fact that he is the one who cursed Balthazor is without a doubt real so we still have to kill him to remove that curse on him either way." The Warlord said.

"So what do we do?"

"Well our only lead is being blocked by Xero so there's not much we can do but wait and find the kid in this vast ocean. I am afraid of him, if he uses his vibrations on us underwater we are dead so I don't want any of us to go near him. Can you both go contact our spies in the Caribbean to put the kid in the highest priority? The mermaid is of second importance compared to him."

"What are you going to do?"

"Me? I don't know yet but I can't bring you guys with me knowing Xero is looking for us."

Yok and Juvia nodded. They took the slave leaving the Warlord alone.

The Warlord sighed while rubbing the back of his neck. No matter what he could not think of anything to do but wait which he hated doing. By killing Sky he would free Balthazor of the slowness curse, and possibly net him even more purple scrolls which he desperately needs to overcome the difference in power between him and Xero.

So far there are only a handful of beings who he is afraid of, Xero, the strongest mermaid, and the Fallen God family. Luckily for him those beings aren't a threat to him as of now. Xero can't afford to fight him deep in the ocean as The Warlord can outswim him. The Fallen God family have never meddled for hundreds of thousands of years but he knows they live and are even more powerful than Xero.

And lastly the strongest mermaid hasn't been seen for decades. No one has seen him, many say he is dead, many say he is hiding, no one knows. The Warlord did face him once fifty years ago, and since that day he vowed to never fight him nor make an enemy of him. Luckily for the Warlord the strongest mermaid cares for no one else but himself. 

"What to do…"

Few days later.

It was just like any other day for a normal crew of pirates to be minding their business after a successful robbery of a merchant ship. That is until Sky found them and killed two of their crew, leaving the rest alive but not for long.

Sky just happened to find a pirate crew on the system's map. He had killed a slave and an old man handling a cannon by accident while failing to hold back his strength. Now that his stats were in the twenty thousands and growing by the day, it was getting harder to hold back and now almost no one could face him.

It was the equivalent of handling a piece of wet toilet paper, it could easily break if he wasn't careful.

The rest of the pirates had been tied up and bound by Sky and Jules. Sky needed a few more sacrifices to reach max level on his death curse skill.

{Curse of death: lvl 9: Target has a 5% chance to instantly die if their HP reaches 9% of their total HP}

He could feel it, it was close to leveling up and he could get the hex ability. It is a good ability to have, able to curse anybody with all the evolved curses he knows using only one spell saving him time in combat.

"No please! Don't! I have-"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, a family, like I haven't already heard that one before. Curse of death." Sky ignored the crying pirate as he casted the death curse on him, killing him after using it seven times on him.

Sky turned his corpse into a card and threw it into the ocean never to be seen again. The amount of human bodies he has thrown into the ocean at this point could fill up his entire ship easily. 

Sky looked at the remaining pirates and slaves. Two slaves were also bound while there were only 4 pirates left.

Both slaves were males in their mid-thirties with stats of 10-40 each. Both of them could neither clean nor cook like he wanted nor did they have any talents.

"Do any of you slaves know how to clean or cook?" Sky asked. "And before you lie, know that I can tell if you are lying to me. If you lie I will kill you so be careful."

"I can cook and clean!" One of the slaves said.

Sky grabbed him by the neck and raised him up while pinning down his limbs and body with his telekinesis so he wouldn't move or resist much. 

"I just said I can tell when you're lying you idiot." Sky shook his head out of disappointment.

Soon the slave was killed and tossed into the ocean in the form of a card.

"What about you?" Sky turned to the last slave.

"I… I cannot do either."

"Hmm." Sky stood in front of him closely. "How did you become a slave?" 

Sky noticed the tattoo of the Caribbean on his shoulder, a slave mark. Tattoo marks are meant to show one is a slave, and the only way to become a slave of the Caribbean is if they have committed some kind of crime against them.

There are some special tattoo slave marks that wealthy people can use on others to show who they belong to.

In fact that same Caribbean slave mark would have been on Jericho's family hadn't Sky paid off their enormous debt.

"I… I…"

Sky grabbed his neck and pinned him down. The man looked at him surprised and couldn't move his hands or legs.

"I don't need a serial rapist and killer on my ship." Sky read his mind. The man committed horrible crimes and managed to escape a few years ago until he was recently found by pirates two months ago and was forced into labor.

"Jericho! Set sail to the closest island! We need more slaves to clean the ship and I don't want Jules to focus on such tasks. Hopefully one of them can cook."

"Sure, Sky!" Jericho said as she was playing with a cannonball assembling and disassembling it.

"You don't like my cooking, Captain?" Jay yelled at Sky from the top of the mast.

"You're good but I would rather you focus on other things. And also it wouldn't help to find a talented chef."

"But, my sandwiches are superb." Jay said sadly.

"Wait! I have information you might like!" A pirate said quickly.

Sky looked at him weirdly. Sky activated {mind of truth} to read his mind.

"And what would that be?" Sky walked towards the man.

{It's in the captain's desk. The top right drawer has a hidden bottom}

"I'll tell you if you let me live, please?" He pleaded.

"Top right drawer in the desk, right? Has a hidden bottom?" Sky said.

The man looked at him horrified. 

Sky walked to the other ship and took a look at the drawer, and sure enough there was a hidden bottom. It was a thin folder filled with possible valuable information.

Sky teleported back on his ship while reading it. There was also a map in it.

"Oh, interesting." Sky was amazed as he flipped through the pages and the map. "You were right, this is valuable information."

"So… Can I go?"

"Well I am a man of my word, but technically you didn't tell me, did you? Unless you have something else that can spare your life?" Sky crouched in front of the man.

The pirate looked down. He had nothing he could use to get him out of this situation.

"Have you been to the island?" Sky waved the folder.

"I… no. Only the captain has as well as other crew members but…"

"Has anybody here been to this island? How do you pronounce it, Servus Terra?" Sky asked.

"I have!"

Sky grabbed his neck and just like the other times he sacrificed him.

"Anybody else want to actually tell me the truth?" Sky said coldly.

Everybody else looked at each other, no one had anything left to say.

"I guess not."

Before he could reach the other bound pirates, Jericho walked up to him.

"Sky." Jericho said. In front of her is the system's map. As the second in command Jericho has access to some of the system's ship's functions.

"Yeah?"

"Is it this island that just appeared on the map?" Jericho showed him the map. She was listening to their conversation and took the initiative quickly.

"Let me see… I think that's the place. It is called Servus Terra."

"Servus Terra… weird name. Is that the dead language?" Jericho read the name of the island. 

"No, it's not." Sky said.

Usually the map can never show Sky any islands he hasn't visited himself, unless he gets the information from somewhere else which updates the system's map, like the map on the small thin folder just now.

"Wait, Captain!" Jay jumped beside Sky accidentally stepping on the head of one of the pirates.

"Ow!"

"What?"

"What's so special about this place?" Jay asked, his adventurous side made him curious.

"It's an island where the largest number of slaves can be found. According to this the island is not under the power of the Caribbean since they are so powerful they have their own little army and force. They provide slaves to all over the world including non-humans. We should still be careful."

From what he could see and gather, the island is bound to have a huge number of people there and possibly powerful beings, maybe not as strong as Xero but most likely stronger than Sky is currently.

There are only two things he wants from that island, slaves who can be used to extract their stats, or slaves with a talent like Jules.

"It's not only heavily guarded but it's also expensive as hell. Just entering costs 3 million shells for a small ship, and 2 million shells per person, a day. A ship this size would cost around… I think it might be 15 million shells? Add that with me, and you two, that's 21 million a day."

"Holy crap, that much in a day?" Jay looked at the folder.

"I guess they don't want poor people there, just the rich and powerful. There's bound to be more than just slaves there, right?" Sky said.

"Do we even have a lot of money?" Jericho asked. She knows Sky can make money but she has no idea how much they have currently.

"Well…"

{Shells: 859m}

"We have a bit."

Sky has been clearing red dungeons every day and killing secret bosses, finding treasure chests thanks to Jericho, add that with his title and the gold sentient brick, the quests he can find from the merchant and the stuff he sells him on a daily basis, and add his two abilities {Greed} and {Greedy adventurer} helped him earn a lot of money in the past few days.

"Jules!"

"What?" Jules yelled from behind the door.

"You better hide before we get there, I know you've been hearing our conversation." 

"..." Jules.

"Understood!"

"Yes…" Jules was found out easily.

"It'll take… wow eight days to get to Terra, that's far. Hm… I can't go that long without clearing dungeons. But it'll be nice to get away from the Caribbean and the Abyss family." Sky hasn't forgotten that Madame told him that the Abyss family was looking for him.

"So what do we do, Captain?" Jay asked.

"Set course to Terra. We will clear less portals than before, it's good money anyways and so what if we take two weeks to get there?" Sky said.

"What about us?" The pirate asked.

"You… you guys are too weak but I have a use for you all." Sky smiled sinisterly. The pirates' fate had already been decided when Sky saw them.