Chapter 544

Chapter 401: Rescue

“The Church’s ship has arrived. Let’s have another drink here for now. Once things calm down a bit on deck, we’ll go up. There’s no need to rush and get squished right away.”

“Mmm… It’s quite an odd experience to calmly drink coffee on a sinking ship…”

Muttering softly to herself, Nephnis walked over to sit in front of Dorothy. Dorothy smiled and made her a cup of coffee.

…

As time passed, the Church’s fleet finally approached the powerless Shining White Pearl. Maintaining a certain distance, the fleet eventually stopped. Numerous lifeboats were then lowered from the warships and passenger ships. People on these boats rowed towards the sides of the Shining White Pearl. Due to the high deck of the Shining White Pearl and the risk of collision with large ships, wooden planks could not be used to directly transport passengers. Therefore, Captain Jorde chose to use lifeboats as the main means of transporting passengers.

On the Shining White Pearl, Captain Costa was diligently organizing the evacuation of passengers. He directed sailors to lower gangways, allowing people on deck to climb down to the lifeboats below. After countless passengers were transferred to various ships in the fleet, the boats would return to pick up more passengers. Occasionally, someone would fall into the water but would be rescued immediately.

Under effective command, passengers did not rush onto the deck en masse. Instead, they were organized in batches and sent off the ship one by one. The vast size of the rescue fleet provided passengers with a sense of security, so most people followed the instructions. Although there were minor disruptions at the scene, overall order was maintained, and collective panic did not occur.

Although using lifeboats to transport passengers was inefficient, there was still ample time. Through persistent efforts, passengers from the Shining White Pearl were orderly transferred to the Church’s fleet.

As time passed, the Shining White Pearl began to show clear signs of sinking. Although this was dangerous, it lowered the deck height, making the rescue operation more efficient. With lifeboats shuttling back and forth rapidly, the number of people on the Shining White Pearl quickly decreased. After three hours of intense rescue operations, only a few people remained on board.

On the twilight sea, under the guidance of the Parent Zombie Puppet, Dorothy boarded one of the last lifeboats heading toward the Church’s fleet. From a distant lifeboat, Dorothy turned to look at the half-sunken Shining White Pearl, at the massive steel beast she had sent to the bottom of the ocean.

“What a significant loss it is for such a large ship to sink. It’s my first time breaking something this big, which is quite an achievement…”

Looking at the giant ship gradually submerging, Dorothy thought to herself. Suddenly, she wondered if anyone knew she had sunk the ship, whether they would blame her and demand compensation.

“Probably not, after all, I’m only thirteen years old. A child playing around might do such a thing.”

Thinking about this, Dorothy turned her head away from the sinking ship and continued rowing toward the Church’s fleet. Eventually, she docked beside a passenger ship. With everyone’s help, she successfully boarded the ship with her “parent.”

After boarding the passenger ship, Dorothy and other rescued passengers were gathered on deck. Here, several clerics and nuns were conducting simple health checks on the rescued passengers.

While searching through the crowd, a gentle voice sounded behind Dorothy and the Parent Zombie Puppet.

“Sir, to confirm your condition, I will perform some simple checks on you and your daughter. Please cooperate.”

Hearing the familiar voice, Dorothy slowly turned her head. She saw a nun in white robes, wearing glasses, smiling kindly. Seeing the nun, Dorothy responded like an ordinary girl.

“Alright, Sister.”

…

Night fell, and the Church’s fleet remained on the sea. All the people from the Shining White Pearl had been rescued. At this moment, the rescue work was nearing its end.

On the flagship of the pilgrimage fleet, decorated with religious symbols, Captain Costa of the Shining White Pearl was meeting with the highest commander of the Glimmer escort fleet. He was recounting the circumstances of the accident on board.

In Costa’s account, the primary cause of the accident on the Shining White Pearl was a fault in the boiler system. According to his words, the ship’s boilers experienced issues shortly after departure. Initially unnoticed, the problems became apparent only when the ship’s speed significantly dropped. Later, Costa said he sent someone to check the boiler situation, but unexpectedly, before the results came in, a severe explosion occurred, causing the maritime disaster.

“Indeed, it was a boiler problem? I wonder what kind of malfunction caused this…” After listening to Costa’s report, Jorde muttered while looking out the window. Outside the window, the vast body of the Shining White Pearl had already sunk two-thirds.

“Yes, Captain Jorde. My biggest concern is what exactly went wrong with those boilers? What was the specific cause of the malfunction? But now that the Shining White Pearl has sunk into the sea, this answer may never be known… Not being able to prevent the accident and causing such great misfortune is my failure as captain.”

Costa said with a sigh, his expression showing disappointment, as if truly blaming himself.

“This isn’t entirely your fault. On the sea, many crises come suddenly and unexpectedly. Not everyone can handle them. The sinking of the Shining White Pearl was indeed unfortunate, but the silver lining is that although the ship sank, most lives were saved. People are more important than the ship.”

“Mr. Costa, you did a very good job organizing the evacuation of passengers. In times of crisis, you fulfilled your duties as captain. Your performance today was at least acceptable in my eyes. If anyone wants to investigate you regarding this incident, I will speak in your favor.”

Jorde said to Costa. Hearing this, Costa immediately thanked him.

“That is too kind of you, sir. Honestly, without you today, who knows how much worse this tragedy would have become. You saved us. On behalf of all the crew of the Shining White Pearl, I extend our deepest gratitude.”

“Haha… No need to thank me. You should be thanking the Holy Mother. She guided us and brought us here.”

“Aah… Praise the Holy Mother…”

While saying flattering words, a hint of resentment flickered in Costa’s eyes, but he quickly suppressed it.

After a pause, Costa looked out the window at the Shining White Pearl, which was gradually sinking. Then he asked:

“By the way, I have an important question for you. Where is your fleet headed? Where will we be sent?”

Listening to this question, Jorde did not hesitate and replied without thinking.

“Our destination is Ivig, the same as your previous destination. However, due to the limited supplies on the fleet, we cannot take two thousand more people on a long journey to Ivig.

“Therefore, I ordered the fleet to head north at full speed, reaching the shore as soon as possible. We will see the land of Castilla within a day. We plan to dock at the nearest port, Navaha, where all the people from the Shining White Pearl will safely return to land.”