After anchoring the ship off the island and using my authority as captain to stop the other sailors, who were in too much of a hurry to disembark at once, I was taking in the island’s atmosphere when the islanders came pouring toward the harbor.
Apparently, aside from the heroes who had already made a name for themselves, or those who were already famous, the other sailors hadn’t noticed the stench or the signs at all, and were smiling brightly all the while.
Tch. I wanted to check a little more, but I guess there was no helping it.
After getting off the ship, I quickly changed my expression and bearing, pretending to be no different from the ordinary sailors.
They were all armed from head to toe, making it impossible to tell their sex, and they surrounded the bay where the Argo ship had anchored, staying on guard.
Disgusting. Disgusting indeed.
Knowing the story of Lemnos Island, their reaction was endlessly revolting to me.
It was one thing that, as punishment for neglecting to worship Aphrodite, the goddess of love, they had been made to stink. That wasn’t only the women’s fault. It was also not solely their fault that the men, in jealousy, had stopped looking at their wives and instead turned their eyes to the women of Thrace, loving only them.
And that, out of jealousy, they had gone on to kill all the men.
What I found most disgusting and contemptible was that they had countless chances to learn the cause, and an obvious way to solve it, yet did nothing at all and merely waited for someone to appear and save them.
Even though they themselves had looked down on love, they had shamelessly shown a double standard, treating not being loved as something separate.
And then there was the fact that, to eliminate any future trouble, they had slaughtered every boy and every elderly man who had absolutely nothing to do with all this. Even though they were my family, they had done it without the slightest hesitation!
“First of all, welcome. We are an expedition from Greece, and we only stopped here on our way to Colchis, so please do not be too wary of us. We intend to leave once we have secured food, water, and supplies.”
I was still debating whether I should help these women or ignore them and leave.
But if we ignored the island’s problem and sailed away like this, it was obvious that there would be more victims, just like in the original expedition.
“I suppose there’s no helping it.”
As I made up my mind, the women removed the helmets that had hidden their faces. Along with that, admiration and cheers rose from among our sailors.
“I see. Then, first of all, welcome to this island, Lemnos Island, handsome men?”
Heh?
As they took off their helmets, their long, flowing hair and striking beauty apparently struck straight at our hearts. Well, Greek men, anyway...
How vile.
I forcibly straightened my twisted expression and had all the sailors disembark.
“Thank you for the welcome.”
For now, I needed the sailors to rest if things were going to proceed according to plan, so I did not react to the stench coming from their bodies.
Hipsipyle, the queen of this island who had been the first to welcome us, was at least somewhat less so than the other women. Both in terms of the stench from her body and in terms of her actions.
According to the records I had read before coming here—before Heracles proposed the rowing contest—Hipsipyle, unlike the other women of the island, had not gone mad.
She had not killed her father and cast him out to sea, and she had sent us supplies so that we would leave the next day. That alone made her different enough from the island’s women.
My friends, because they had told me over and over again and because they had noticed it themselves, still had unpleasant expressions, unlike the other sailors who were simply delighted.
They all looked like they wanted to get what supplies they needed here and leave the island at once.
But there was no helping it. I had not given the sailors enough explanation, and I had not properly told them about the situation here, so I could not simply leave on my own.
The women of the island welcomed us with fierce enthusiasm, as if they had never been hostile to us in the first place, and began serving us food.
What was a little surprising was that even the Dioscuri siblings, who were demigods, and Heracles felt disgust toward them, while the Boreads brothers, Zetes and Calais, who held a similar divine status, felt no sense of strangeness at all and just grinned foolishly.
Pathetic. Foolish.
Castor, Heracles, and Orpheus had already noticed before I even spoke. As for Asclepius, Acastus, and Theseus, they came to their senses at my casual, doubtful remark.
And yet, why would gods, beings higher than humans, be distracted by women and the trivial hospitality before their eyes?
“This is why I just can’t like gods.”
It was about time to say it.
“...There are no men here.”
Just as the mood was reaching its peak, the expression on her face—once she realized that I, merely a Greek man, had noticed that fact—froze stiffly in an instant.
And I instantly hardened my expression as well, and just as I had told my friends in advance before getting off the ship, I stopped the men who were trying to force themselves on the island women and pointed my spear at them.
“You disgusting creatures. If you are going to treat us this way, then speak plainly about what you want. Otherwise, we will not help you.”
“You killed your husbands and even your children and fathers. What is it that you truly desire? What do you want from us?”
“H-how did you...!?”
“Answer first. Why are you lusting after us? Because we’re stronger than the men who lived on your island? Then there should be plenty of others besides us, shouldn’t there?”
I pressed the women of the island, pouring out my intense disgust without hiding a single bit of it.
Look, Atalanta. Look at this shape. Look, Caineis. Look at this abnormality. Look, Pollux. Look at this tragedy.
What do you think? Women occupying the dominant position, with men standing in the position of the discriminated and victimized. The harm of a balance tilted so heavily to one side that it becomes unnatural.
Amazons? There was no need to go that far. Just look at this place and you would understand.
No matter which side is being victimized, excessive imbalance breeds one-sided suffering in any situation. That had not changed in my previous life, and it had not changed in this world either.
That said, those above cannot always be considerate of and guide those below. Consideration can bring relief to the weak, but at times, under the name of consideration, it can also force the strong to bear more than their allotted rights. You, who are truly strong, have surely experienced this more than once. At those times, what feelings did you bear toward those weak ones?
I asked them silently, looking into their eyes.
Now then, can you truly change these humans’ way of thinking?
They were openly showing their extreme disgust toward the women of the island. Not only them, but everyone I had spoken to was wrinkling their faces and pinching their noses shut.
The sailors who had been drawn in by the island women’s beautiful faces and had tried to approach them also came to their senses a beat late under the pressure I was exuding, and once they caught the stench coming from the women’s bodies, they grimaced and hurriedly backed away.
“The smell of blood—more specifically, the smell of men’s blood and the blood of tiny little girls—vibrates all over your bodies and this entire island.”
Did you think I wouldn’t know?
Unlike my friends, who were venting their anger fiercely, I spoke with a blank, emotionless face, each word dropping like a stone, yet that seemed even more frightening to them, and before they knew it they were backing away.
“So.”
Why did you kill them?
Still pointing my spear at them, without the slightest movement, without any rise or fall in my voice, without any change in expression, each word I uttered was apparently more terrifying to them than a reaper, and their legs gave out before they knew it, leaving them collapsing where they stood.
“Answer me.”
From their perspective, it was understandable that they would want to kill the husbands and lovers who had strayed first, along with the Thracian slaves who had been involved with them.
I understood their anger well enough. If I had been in their place, I would not have forgiven the men who betrayed them first either.
Not only had those men abandoned them, they had continued their affairs only with the slaves they had brought from Thrace, and had fathered children only among the slaves.
But how could I look kindly upon them when, just like the men who had abandoned them, they were now showing no shame at all as they tried to seduce outsiders who had come from another land?
Of course, if that had been the only reason, I would not have vented my anger on these women to this extent. With no men left, they would have wanted descendants, and perhaps they had welcomed us, given that most of our group were men.
Even understanding the behavior they had shown us, the reason I was truly enraged was that after killing all their lovers and husbands, they had—whether out of fear of future trouble or for some other reason I could not know—also killed elderly men so old they could barely move, and male children who had not even begun to recognize what desire was.
All because they were men, and had no connection whatsoever to this affair.
Were they not their fathers? Were they not their children?
What possible reason was there to kill innocent old men and children!!!!
And that was not all.
Let me be clear: on this island, there were no women other than young women and old women. Which meant they had also slaughtered all their own little daughters.
That was not the kind of act one could carry out merely out of fear of future trouble.
“Answer me. Were you afraid of future trouble?”
And yet I wanted to ask. Had they truly killed all those humans because they feared what might come after, or was there some other reason I could understand?
Spitting the words out as if chewing them, I let out a sigh while keeping that razor-sharp pressure in place.
“Haa. Can I take your silence as an admission that you know your own crimes?”
Even if they had feared future trouble, why had they killed your innocent sons and fathers, children and old men as well?
When they still could not say a word after a long while, I quietly lowered my spear and turned my back on them.
Originally, I had planned to solve the island’s problem and take various supplies in return, but I had not expected the island to be this disgusting. I had not expected it to be this pathetic.
“Haa. You are Hipsipyle, the queen here, yes?”
“...For now, yes.”
...As expected, this woman did not stink, and there was no smell of blood either.
“Tell the women of the island this: if they cannot remember what they have forgotten, they will remain alone forever.”
For those who had abandoned even their families, that alone was enough. But the woman before me was not like that.
“Then, as I asked earlier, if you prepare the supplies, food, and water, I will lift the island’s curse.”
Her deep blue eyes shook, and she looked at me as if to ask why I was going this far.
“If you ignore the problem here instead of dealing with it, there will only be more victims.”
I did not want to do it, but there was no helping it.
She looked as if she had many things she wanted to say, but in the end, I offered one more piece of advice to the island queen, who thanked me.
“If you wanted affection, then it would have been better to give the same affection first.”
The next day, together with my friends, I followed her guidance and came to a shabby shrine deep within the island, a place left completely untended and overgrown with all kinds of vines.
“How foolish indeed. This island was originally one created by a god.”
It had been an island created and blessed by a god, but the humans who first came to live here were exempt, since they had not been born and raised on the island. Everyone after them, however, had been born here entirely.
Those born on the island were subject to the god who had created it. And yet they had looked down on the concept symbolized by that god and failed to worship her, so was it not only natural that they should be punished?
“Goddess Aphrodite, goddess of love. I beg you, please forgive this island. If not for the island itself, then at least for the sake of the countless men who might be captured by these women and never come to know [Love].”
After cleaning the shrine thoroughly with my friends, I placed the prepared offering on the altar and began pleading to the goddess Aphrodite.
“Now that they should have learned their lesson, please lift the curse that hangs over this island, and show your mercy.”
Please show the greatness of affection in another form.
Not the painful, heartbreaking form, but the happy, thrilling form of affection.
※
“...What an extraordinary child, wouldn’t you say?”
“Hmph. He is a man watched over by me, Hera, queen of the gods. If he didn’t go this far, that would be the real problem.”
Far above, in the heavens—the world of the gods, Olympus.
“Not only did he immediately identify the cause, he even prayed for forgiveness on behalf of others... That is something even most kings would find difficult to do.”
From there, three goddesses looked down on Jason as he offered his sacrifice.
“He really is an impressive man. Wise and intelligent. And stubbornly uncompromising when it comes to right and wrong.”
“What do you think, Athena, Aphrodite? If it were that man, I don’t think even my blessing would consume him.”
They were the three goddesses who would later quarrel over the golden apple at Thetis’s wedding.
Hera, queen of the gods, who governed family and marriage. Athena, who governed wisdom, war, and peace. Aphrodite, who governed love and beauty.
“Yes, I think Lady Hera is probably right. That child would swallow a blessing and make it his own, but he would not be swept away by it.”
Though they had been ordered by Hera to watch him, both goddesses had become interested in the man named Jason. Their liking and curiosity toward him had deepened even more because of what had just happened, and they found themselves looking forward to the fate he would carve out.
“Aphrodite, what shall we do about those things?”
“For now, if that child is pleading so earnestly, what choice is there?”
Aphrodite unwound her alluring golden hair and, with a displeased expression, swept her left hand through the air, drawing the curse back. She thought the punishment inflicted on them was justified, and that it was too early to lift it, but there was a significant risk that things would unfold exactly as Jason had said.
And if that happened, the island would never serve her again. She knew, down to her bones, that they would resent her for not lifting the curse, rather than beg her forgiveness.
“Hah, for now the curse itself has been lifted... So. You didn’t call us both here just to look at that, did you, Hera?”
“Of course not. I will use that child as my weapon and kill Pelias, who dared to ignore me first among all the gods.”
“Ah, that arrogant bastard who disrespects the gods?”
Pelias was already famous among the gods. He was the man bold enough not only to refuse to worship Hera, queen of the gods, but also to refuse to worship the other gods as well. He was the man who destroyed the gods’ shrines and had his own palace built on top of them, choosing only deeds that ordinary people would never dare attempt.
Now he even called himself Zeus, king of the gods, and committed blasphemy without restraint.
If Zeus had heard that, he would have punished him on the spot, but Zeus was not here right now.
“Hmm, it is true that Pelias drove out his elder brother, his sister-in-law, and his nephew, and even tried to kill them.”
“Exactly. He tried to destroy the family I govern, looked down on the love you govern, Aphrodite, and defiled the wisdom you govern, Athena. At this point, shouldn’t we crush him thoroughly?”
Hera pointed to Pelias, who was living in luxury in the palace of Iolcus, and pressed the two goddesses for an answer.
“I’m in favor. If he’s such a handsome and outstanding man, there’s no loss in taking his side.”
“I also agree. If that child were to rule Iolcus in Pelias’s place, that country would be able to enjoy a time of peace and prosperity.”
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