Chapter 40 Perseus?
Argos, the dungeon.
The stench of decay and fishiness permeated the murky, filthy air.
It's even more disgusting than the rotting, stinking fish piled up by fishermen in the shantytowns...
The smell ferments in the air, mixed with human or animal excrement.
With each breath, it felt as if my lungs were boiling and burning.
This was the tenth day that Dicttis had been imprisoned in the dungeon.
The charges included trespassing on noble residences, assaulting nobles, theft, and murdering wealthy individuals...
The nobleman who had kept countless children like livestock received compensation in terms of both spirit and wealth under the judgment... The gold and silver treasures that Dicttis carried were all regarded as stolen money and became the nobleman's wealth.
But Dixtis was no longer interested in any of it...
Or rather, he's become numb...
Every time he closes his eyes in the dead of night, the countless piled-up corpses of children, and their empty, desperate faces, engulf him like a nightmare. A wave of despair, grief, and helplessness washes over him...
His overly sensitive empathy even led him to adopt the perspective of those nobles...
In his dreams, he saw again and again that when the plate was served and the lid was lifted, there was a bloody human head...
He wanted to scream, but found himself unable to make a sound... He seemed to be controlled by some force, only able to lift the head and, like the other nobles in the darkness, put it in his mouth and gnaw on it...
And when he turned the man's head around...
But then they discovered it was his son—
Perseus.
Dick woke up with a start.
Dim moonlight streamed through the prison windows, forming beams of light.
It illuminates the bloodstains and filth that can never be washed away.
However, once the nightmare subsided, the return to full consciousness proved to be the greatest torment for Dick.
He lowered his head and knelt on the ground...
The moonlight brushed against him.
Perseus... I'm sorry, Father didn't take good care of you...
Dixtis gritted his teeth...blood seeped from the corner of his mouth.
The handcuffed hands trembled uncontrollably...
The regret and guilt seemed to be a branding iron, burning Dicttis's heart again and again.
Perhaps... he shouldn't have accepted Arah Messiah's invitation in the first place... to fight that lion...
He should stay there and protect his children.
but...
If Dick had chosen to stay in the shantytown, would his son have been guaranteed to be safe?
Dick had no idea... a sense of despair enveloped him.
It all seemed like a dead end...
He saw no hope...
unless...
Dicttis was like a pilgrim.
He knelt on the ground, facing the moonlight, head bowed, and devoutly chanted—
"Messiah."
...
And just then...
A group of jailers arrived at Dickies's door.
The head jailer looked at Dickies kneeling inside and said coldly:
"Bring him out…"
The jailers opened the cage and dragged out the ragged and haggard-looking Dicttis.
Dixtis's eyes were somewhat vacant.
It seemed that external stimuli no longer had much effect on him.
He was deeply mired in his own grief and unable to pull himself out.
The head jailer, looking at Dick's haggard appearance, said disdainfully:
"You're Dickis?"
Dicttis glanced at the jailer with his desolate, lifeless eyes.
He did not utter a word.
Seeing this, the jailer stopped wasting words and instructed his subordinates:
"Take it to the temple..."
"This is the decree of the King of Argos."
...
Inside the temple.
Under the gaze of the bronze statue of Zeus.
A child with a white cloth covering his head was brought up by the guards of King Argos.
The child looks quite young, about six or seven years old.
However, his head was completely covered by a white cloth, and his mouth was stuffed with something and tied up.
As a result, Yara and the others could neither see the child's face nor hear his voice, and had no way of recognizing him.
The child struggled as the guards lifted him up.
He was tied to a pillar in front of the statue of Zeus.
Yara looked at the child like a bound animal and felt inexplicably annoyed.
He frowned and asked:
"Why did you bring a child with you?"
Upon seeing this, King Argos's killing intent surged, his eyes seeming to see mountains of corpses and seas of blood. He gritted his teeth and roared:
"He is the son of Zeus!"
The voice of King Argos echoed in the empty temple.
Everyone heard it clearly.
Yara was surprised; he had had a bad feeling about this since earlier.
And when the child came up, the premonition became even stronger.
He looked at his wife, who was being guarded by the king's guards. His wife was confused and didn't know what had happened, but she was still happy to see Yara.
He then looked at Pan and Old Tyr behind him.
Old Tyr also pondered for a long time before he understood all of this. He stepped forward and explained in Yara's ear:
"The son of Zeus... was actually the grandson of the King of Argos..."
"According to the prophecy, the son of Zeus will destroy Argos... therefore, the king of Argos has always wanted to kill this child..."
"However, for various reasons, he was unable to do it."
"However, when Zeus' son was still an infant, King Argos tied him to a stone and threw him into the sea."
"Judging from the situation, the child is probably not dead... and has been found by King Argos again."
He wants to use you...
"With the power of God, kill that child completely."
"To dispel the prophecy that the Kingdom of Argos will inevitably be destroyed..."
Yara was even more surprised.
He glanced at the bound child, then at King Argos...
He couldn't understand it.
Yara asked, puzzled:
In other words...
"King Argos wants to kill his own grandson?"
"Because of a strange prophecy?"
"ah?"
Old Tyr nodded solemnly.
"No...why is that?"
In Yara's imagination, the so-called son of Zeus was probably much like the nymph of the Blood Lake—an arrogant and inhuman messenger of the gods, treating humans as ants and tools for his amusement...
But...it seems the child before us is not like that...
At least, in his eyes, he was just an ordinary child.
Just like Dick's Perseus.
Yara felt a little helpless thinking about Dick. Before they came to see King Argos, they searched the shantytowns but couldn't find any trace of Dick. They didn't know if he had gotten lost on the way... or for some other reason.
Yara put Dick's matter aside for the time being.
"Because he is the forbidden child!"
"A product that shouldn't exist in this world..."
"He will ultimately bring disaster and chaos upon himself."
"Just like the Nemean Lion."
A voice came from deep within.
The high priest, clad in a white sacrificial robe and with completely white hair and beard.
I don't know where it came from.
Leaning on a scepter inlaid with magic crystals, he stood beside King Argos.
He looks a little strange...
There is an inexplicable feminine charm in her every move.
But Yara did not ponder it as deeply.
King Argos drew a sword from a nearby guard and approached Ara.
His cloudy eyes were fixed on Yara, and he personally handed the sword to Yara.
He gritted his teeth and said:
"Kill him!"
"Only you can kill him!"
Yara looked into King Argos's eyes, which were filled with intense killing intent.
Take a deep breath.
He passively accepted the sword.
Looking down at the little fellow beneath the statue of Zeus... known as the son of Zeus...
Is he really a monster?
One step, two steps...
Footsteps echoed through the empty temple.
Yara, sword in hand, his golden cloak billowing slightly behind him, approached the bound child step by step...
The towering statue of Zeus also seemed to grow larger in my eyes...
Until they were almost upon them.
The child, his head wrapped in a white cloth, struggled against the pillar... his hands, feet, and waist were bound, and the chains had already rubbed raw, drawing blood... However, the tight chains rendered all his struggles futile...
The child is having slight twitches...
He seemed to be crying, but because his mouth was gagged, he couldn't make a sound.
The white fabric was slightly damp... those were his tears.
Yara's uneasy premonition grew stronger.
He looked up at the bronze statue.
It was as if Zeus, wielding thunder, was watching his every move...
Yara turned back to look at the crowd, and everyone was watching him.
He is the focus of attention here...
Whether human or god.
now.
Everyone was watching him...
Yara, her hands were trembling...
He slowly raised the sword in his hand...
Until it's higher than your arms, higher than your head...
And all he needs to do is swing—
All glory and wealth will belong to him.
A flash of sword light.
Sizzle—
Just as everyone held their breath...
The white cloth tore open with a snap.
The boy's tense, fearful blue eyes and handsome face were revealed...
"What?"
Perseus!?
...