And... after only a week of being taught by Chiron, I never expected to come to understand Asclepius's feelings so intensely.
“...Heh heh heh, what a mess.”
“Right?”
Honestly, I don't even know how to describe this, but the place was a complete wreck. It felt as if utter chaos had been materialized right before my eyes. Hearing my lament, Asclepius quietly began gathering his medical supplies, as if to say, See? I told you so.
I almost felt sorry for him. Just how much had he been through to reflexively prepare for treatment as if this were an everyday occurrence... I had to wonder how many years he had repeated this.
Now I understood why he had chased after the siblings, amazed that there was a day when they hadn't played some prank on him.
What lay before my eyes now was the sight of the Dioscuri siblings activating all sorts of traps on the newly arrived man, Heracles, as a kind of initiation, reducing the center of the forest to something close to scorched ruin.
At that point, I wasn't sure whether to marvel at Heracles for taking all those traps head-on with nothing but his body, or at the Dioscuri siblings for managing to prank him with so many traps and only getting away with a few hits.
“First of all, welcome. I'm Jason. What's your name?”
Apparently not expecting me to be the one to step forward and offer my hand first, Heracles looked flustered, at a loss over the hand I held out to him, and fidgeted awkwardly.
“Are you worried I might get hurt because of your strength? If that's the case, don't worry about it.”
After all, if I did get hurt, Asclepius would just fix me up anyway.
It might sound irresponsible at first glance, but if you looked deeper, it carried this meaning: There is no way you would hurt me. And even if you did, it wouldn't be your fault, but rather my own for lacking training.
Whether Heracles picked up on that or not, he gave an innocent smile that didn't quite suit him and took my hand in greeting.
“Good to meet you. Jason, was it? I'm Heracles. I look forward to working with you.”
“Yeah.”
“...Mm, I expected as much, but his strength is even greater than I thought. Is he having trouble controlling it because he's excited to meet us?”
My arm was starting to go numb and my hand was beginning to ache, but if I showed that in my expression, I would end up hurting the feelings of the first 'friend' who had looked at me as a fellow human being. Heracles was so overwhelmingly strong that there were probably very few people who had ever looked at him as a fellow 'human'—and even fewer children his own age.
Fortunately, at just the right moment, he let go of my hand, and I casually hid mine behind my back before he could see how slightly red it had become.
The siblings, who had been treated by Asclepius after getting thoroughly scolded, also greeted Heracles warmly.
“To take our attacks head-on with your body alone, that's impressive. I'm Castor! Nice to meet you, Heracles.”
“I'm Pollux, Castor's sister.”
“Heh, if anything, I guess this is a relief. Taking that indiscriminate bombardment disguised as a prank and still coming out fine is truly astonishing. Nice to meet you, Heracles.”
Asclepius looked Heracles over from head to toe and marveled that he had no injuries at all.
Well, that couldn't really be helped. After all, like the Dioscuri siblings, he had Zeus as his father, and Heracles had also been born as a war weapon for Zeus to use against the Gigantomachy. Not only was he born stronger than other demigods, but he had also consumed a considerable amount of Hera's breast milk, which was said to grant immortality to anyone who drank it.
“Yes, I look forward to working with you.”
“Another newcomer? Nice to meet you. I'm Theseus. You seem a little more interesting than that flashy-looking guy over there.”
Unlike when I first arrived, Theseus showed a faint liking toward Heracles and greeted him first.
So it really wasn't just a coincidence in the original legend that Theseus wanted to follow in Heracles's footsteps.
“...? R-right. In any case, I look forward to working with you.”
Heracles seemed a little taken aback by Theseus's tone, which clearly wasn't very fond of me, the first person to look at him as a fellow human being.
Well, I also had no idea why that bastard didn't like me.
※
“Hup!”
“Ha!”
As Heracles brought his club down hard, Theseus angled his wooden sword to deflect it, then immediately swung forward.
But who was Heracles? Wasn't he one of the Greek heroes born to prevent the disasters of the gods? The moment Theseus deflected the club, Heracles had already closed in, ready to collide with his body.
He simply stepped back half a pace to evade Theseus's wooden sword, then swung his arm wide and slammed his shoulder into the center of Theseus's now-empty guard, sending him flying.
“Ghk!!”
Even so, Theseus was a hero too. Ordinary people would have been unable to breathe under the terrifying force of Heracles's blow, or would have been sent flying into a tree, but instead he merely took two or three steps back and prepared for the next strike.
“Going for more?”
“If I were, if I were going to go down from that, I wouldn't have asked you to fight me in the first place!”
Theseus, who had clearly learned more and was more mature than Heracles, seemed to bristle at the fact that Heracles still looked completely unfazed despite their nearly equal amount of movement. He kicked off the ground hard and brought his wooden sword down in a fast, heavy diagonal slash from above.
Heracles raised his club overhead to block and pushed back. But Theseus had apparently anticipated that, because even as he was being shoved back, he lashed out with a kick and struck Heracles in the stomach.
After that, the two of them exchanged dozens of attacks as their weapons clashed directly.
“Haaah!”
“Guh!”
And what finally broke that exchange was when Heracles's club landed cleanly in Theseus's side.
Oh wow, that got through cleanly?
Heracles was my next opponent, so I could feel cold sweat pouring down my back. If I remembered correctly, even the Jason of the original legend rarely entered direct combat or engaged in close-quarters fighting.
No matter how different I was from the original Jason, unless I broke through the innate limits of my body, I might not be all that different from Theseus.
Theseus, breathing hard, sprawled out flat and surrendered, and the duel ended after Chiron pointed out a few things in his movements.
“Then next is you, Jason. Do your best.”
“Yes.”
Even so, because our resolve toward fighting and sparring was different, because our sense of purpose was different.
“I'm coming, Heracles.”
“Good. Come, Jason.”
I swung the wooden spear a few times, loosening the muscles in my hands, shoulders, legs, and entire body, then settled into my stance. Heracles also gripped his club with both hands and took a proper guard.
Even after Chiron announced the start, neither of us could move easily. From Heracles's perspective, he had to be wary of my spear, which had the longer reach; from my perspective, I knew both the terrifying strength of Heracles and the spear's vulnerability in close combat.
The one who broke the silence and moved first was me.
After all, the longer this dragged on, the more disadvantageous it was for me as a human. I seized the distance of four fists from the tip of the spear and thrust straight toward the pit of his stomach. Heracles blocked by lifting his club and pushing the spear shaft aside.
The instant he shoved it aside, he immediately changed the club's direction to aim for my side, but I twisted my wrist and let the spear shaft slide past the club. Then, pretending to drive my left foot forward from behind me, I drew Heracles's gaze downward toward my leg.
I kicked off the ground with my left foot and leapt backward, extending the spear in a long thrust.
It was my own attempt to exploit an opening and press in, but as expected of the great hero of future Greece.
With his extraordinary dynamic vision and reflexes, he immediately tracked the spear's trajectory and struck the spearhead hard with the end of the club's handle, knocking it back before hitting my exposed abdomen in an instant.
“Kuh!”
Ugh, unless I did something about that sense of timing, even a surprise attack would just get dodged.
Whoosh!
Damn it! He wasn't giving me any opening at all!?
As I struggled to steady my body after being driven back and my vision blurred from the solid hit, the club came crashing down mercilessly, as if determined not to give me a single opening.
I had a feeling that if I took that blow, it would be over.
And then.
What is this phenomenon?
Unlike a flash of life before my eyes, everything in my vision had come to a complete stop, and in this frozen world, I had the strong sensation that I was the only one who could move, even if only a little.
There was no choice but to try it!
I planted the spear into the frozen world, braced myself, and pushed off.
“What!?”
The moment I drove the spear shaft hard into the ground and launched my body upward, that world vanished in an instant, leaving only Heracles, looking startled that his unavoidable attack had been evaded.
“Haaah!!!”
I did not miss the opening. Gripping the spear shaft, I drove it in fiercely and powerfully, and Heracles tried to adapt again at once. But I immediately pulled the spear back, gripped it farther down, spun my body in midair, and brought it down diagonally from his shoulder.
Clack!
For the first time, an attack reached Heracles without him deliberately leaving an opening.
But Heracles, who erased his surprise at once and sharpened his gaze even further, swung his club as if he meant to smash my spear to pieces. From that immense, wall-like presence of Heracles, I forced my way into yet another opening and seized it.
I deliberately loosened my grip on the spear shaft, let it fly in front of his club to disperse the force, then grabbed the spear with my other hand, made a wide full turn around behind him, and stabbed into his thigh. Not stopping there, I kept the spearhead pressed in and rotated the shaft upward, striking the side of his neck and his jaw to throw off his balance.
Faster! Even faster!
Now was the chance while Heracles's center had been thrown off. I wanted to give him no time to recover, so I held the spear short and stabbed at the points of a pentagram, knocking the club from Heracles's hand. Then I stabbed at the points of a hexagram to keep him from picking up the dropped club, and finally thrust hard into the pit of his stomach.
“Guh!!”
“Hah, hah...!!”
This was probably a draw. If this had been a real battle, even if Heracles had taken a fatal blow, I would have collapsed too from having exhausted all my strength.
“All right! That's enough!”
The moment I sank to the floor, Chiron raised one hand high and brought the sparring to an end.
Confirming that the duel was over, I let my arms hang limply and flopped onto the ground. Even while gasping for breath, I was so exhausted I couldn't even twitch a finger. Chiron, who had helped Heracles back to his feet, then splashed a bucket of cool water over me with a look of pride, wiping the sweat from me.
“This time, you were far better than usual, Jason.”
“Th-tha, th, thank... you, huff...”
Heracles, who had recovered quickly despite being struck in the pit of the stomach by the tip of a wooden spear, came over to my side, praised me for doing very well, and patted my head a few times.
Ah, normally I would have complained about why he was patting me on the head, but I was too exhausted to even think about it.
“Splendid. That was impressive. Especially that slightly faster attack rhythm at the beginning—that was a movement worthy of admiration.”
“...If you ask me to do that again, I don't think I can. That only seems to come out when things are really dangerous...”
“Even so, that does not change the fact that it is your skill.”
When I tried to brush off the praise as luck, Heracles patted my back with his palm as if to cheer me up, and showed me once again the smile he had worn when we first met, rather than his usual stern expression.
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