The Story of Otus and Ephialtes - (3)
Dealing with the giants who had introduced themselves as Otus and Ephialtes was not difficult. I dodged their flying fists with ease, then stabbed a stinging Bident into their arms to calm them down…
“Aaaagh!”
“Otus!”
At this point, drawing out a suitable amount of divine power to intimidate them would…
The body of the giant called Otus stiffened, and fear flooded his eyes. He was fairly strong, but it was obvious he had zero combat experience.
“You’re headed to prison first.”
I leveled the Bident at the fallen giant’s eye. My true target, however, was his ankle. With my right hand pretending to thrust at his face, my left quietly drew the sword of Styx from my waist, ready to sever his tendon—
“Wait! Please, just a moment, Brother Hades!”
“Zeus?”
Zeus had returned to the banquet hall at some point and was calling my name. Ichor trickled from his scalp; it looked like Hera had noticed his scheme and torn out a handful of his hair. The sight of him frantically gathering the fallen strands and trying to stuff them back into his head was utterly ridiculous.
Yet the smile on his lips was anything but comical.
Since Zeus clearly had something in mind, I withdrew the Bident and stepped back. Subduing these giants again would be easy enough whenever I wanted.
“Ugh…”
When I retreated, the two giants climbed to their feet. But their eyes were already steeped in terror and their fingers trembled faintly, revealing exactly what they felt.
Zeus glanced at the bleeding giants, then flashed a razor-sharp smile.
“Ahem. Ahem. Such honored guests have come to Olympus; we must treat them properly.”
It was the sincerity the King of the Gods occasionally showed to those who dared challenge his power.
“So you came to claim Hera and Artemis as your brides?”
A bone-chilling killing intent radiated from that smile and those sunken eyes. Yet Otus and Ephialtes, the two brothers, failed to notice it. They were young, powerful only in strength—mere fledglings. That was why they could not understand why none of the other gods opposed Zeus’s outrageous proposal.
“That’s right! Lord Zeus, we swore upon the River Styx that we would take Artemis and Hera as our wives!”
“Hand them over at once!”
Both looked equally stupid, but the one I had attacked earlier—Otus—seemed to possess the tiniest bit more sense. Still, it wasn’t much. How could he spout such nonsense after being stabbed repeatedly by my spear just moments ago?
I had been about to subdue both brothers and drag them straight to the prison of the Underworld. As the prophecy foretold, they could not be killed, and I had sensed a familiar divine power within them. Zeus could not have been unaware of this, yet the reason he stopped me was not out of mercy. Those who dared challenge both him and Olympus…
“Ah, of course! Heroes and champions such as yourselves are more than worthy of Hera and Artemis!”
“Truly? But Lord Hades here…”
“It seems my older brother Hades and I had a small misunderstanding, hahaha!”
He intended to kill them outright.
“I would love to hand over Hera and Artemis right this instant, but…”
“But…?”
“They are not here.”
Upon learning that the two goddesses they had chosen as brides were absent, the giants flew into a rage. Zeus must have hidden them somewhere or told them to stay out of sight.
“What?! Lord Zeus! Have you deceived us?”
The giant called Ephialtes shouted, face twisted in fury. Nevertheless, Zeus soothed him in a gentle voice.
“Artemis is absent because she is handling an important matter on Naxos island.”
“What important matter?”
“She is investigating monsters known as Gigantes—powerful creatures with the lower bodies of snakes and the upper bodies of humans. Even you two would find them difficult opponents, I suspect.”
Artemis was indeed nowhere to be seen in the banquet hall. Had traces of the Gigantes truly been discovered on Naxos?
“Seeing that she has not yet returned, it appears she has been captured and taken prisoner by those monsters. Hmm… It would be wonderful if some valiant heroes would step forward…”
“Artemis has been captured?! Then, Lord Zeus! If we slay those Gigantes and rescue her…”
“Oh, should you accomplish that, I shall permit a joint wedding ceremony right here on Olympus!”
So that was your scheme, Zeus.
His words were riddled with holes. The subtly encouraging tone, the condition that they must defeat the monsters before any marriage would be allowed, the deliberately vague answer regarding Hera’s whereabouts. Yet the two giant brothers noticed nothing strange at all. Part of it was their youth and inexperience, but the true reason was that the Goddess of Persuasion, Peitho, stood at Zeus’s side, quietly exerting her power.
The King of the Gods’ flimsy, hole-filled words somehow carried strange persuasiveness, clouding the giants’ minds.
“Then depart at once! Any further delay and Artemis may fall to the Gigantes!”
“U-understood! You must keep your promise, Lord Zeus!”
“Where is this Naxos island?”
And so the two fools, completely taken in by Zeus’s words, descended from Olympus.
It would have been far better for them to have been subdued earlier and locked away in the Underworld prison.
Now that there was no longer any need to hide his intentions, Zeus watched the giants leave with ice-cold eyes and spoke.
When the King of the Gods relaxed his expression and raised high a cup filled with nectar, every gaze turned toward him.
“Though some ruffians appeared for a brief moment, I shall deal with them personally. All gods, do not worry and continue enjoying the banquet!”
“Ooh… Understood!”
“The fate of those who challenge Olympus is obvious.”
“Naxos island, you say? That place shall be their grave.”
“Their final stroke of luck was being subdued by Lord Hades earlier. Hahaha!”
“How many holes does that prophecy have anyway… Tsk tsk.”
As Zeus finished speaking, the gentle sound of Apollo’s lyre filled the hall once more. The nine Muses poured out their artistic souls, and Dionysus created wine to share among the gods.
“Oh… So this is that famous wine.”
“My thanks, Lord Dionysus.”
The Olympian gods now tilted their cups and ate ambrosia as though nothing had happened. Ares, who had smashed his way out of a bronze jar, grumbled that he had broken a precious vessel.
I headed straight for Zeus.
“Zeus. Have Gigantes truly been discovered on Naxos?”
“Ah, you must not have heard yet, brother. Not long ago Helios spotted their traces while driving the sun chariot.”
The Gigantes were monsters created by the Earth Mother Gaia. When their bodies touched the ground they grew stronger and gained tremendous regenerative power. So why had creatures who needed to remain on land been discovered on an island in the middle of the sea?
This was clearly one of Gaia’s traps. She was waiting for careless Olympian gods to descend and begin searching for the Gigantes.
“They infiltrated the island? Deceiving even Poseidon’s subjects in the sea?”
“I already knew the Gigantes were preparing a trap to weaken our forces.”
At my question, he shook his head.
So he had deliberately allowed them to infiltrate and scheme… He had let himself be moderately deceived on purpose. Since he could sink or erase the entire island at any time, he wanted to see exactly what kind of trap Gaia and the Gigantes had prepared.
The Gigantes were divine beings, yet they lacked true immortality and possessed stronger monstrous traits. Whether they could be killed would have to be confirmed in person…
“It doesn’t matter if the giants die there or not. My son Dionysus is present.”
“You’ll drive them mad so they kill each other?”
“Hmph. I cannot allow those who dared challenge me to live.”
So that was it. I had wondered why he stopped me from subduing them and dragging them to the Underworld. He had a use for those strong-but-stupid giants after all.
I had roughly sensed it when Zeus interrupted me, but I saw no reason to openly oppose him. Attempting to seize by force the already-married Queen of the Gods and a goddess who had sworn her virginity upon the River Styx was a direct challenge to Olympus. It was a contest of power, not justice. Should those giants die and arrive in the Underworld, they would not receive favorable treatment.
“Still, they seemed like the children of some god or other.”
“The important point is that they dared challenge this Zeus. They will die miserably there.”
Even if Dionysus, God of Madness, failed to shatter their minds, Zeus would have other methods. He could send clouds transformed into beasts to make them hurl spears at one another, or have Aphrodite, Goddess of Beauty, seduce them.
“It’s an excellent way to confirm the Gigantes’ trap and dispose of a nuisance at the same time.”
“That is true, but…”
“They are slowly walking into Naxos island now. Dionysus! Just in case, prepare yourself as well.”
At times like these Zeus rendered wise judgment befitting the King of the Gods, yet… just like the Sisyphus incident before, why did the moment women became involved he always seem to think with his lower half?