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Last Embryo Volume 6 Interlude Part 5

That simple, honest statement made James quite literally speechless. He knew full well that this was just a metaphorical expression, but even so, there must have been at least a dozen of different ways in which Heracles could have voiced his thoughts. It would have been all fine with him if he simply said the first part of his sentence, that his mouth and his words have a foul stench about them, but he just had to go and add that they also stink! A part of James’ mind understood why he would react like that, but on the other hand, his mind and his gentlemanly heart felt deeply wounded by the fact that Heracles used such strong, highly damaging words without batting as much as an eyelid. And so, without being able to find any kind of clever words that he could use to refute Heracles’ outrageous statement, James simply stared at him with shocked eyes while his lips were moving as if he was silently repeating what he just heard. . .and then he felt silent while covering his mouth with his hands. He remained in that position for about a minute or two, until he bend his body forward and erupted into an uncontrollable outburst of laughter so spontaneously hard that even he himself could not have anticipate how much his belly would start to hurt. That is how unexpectedly outrageous Heracles’ insult was to him.

「Ha, haha. . . hahahahahahaha! I see now! You cannot trust me because words stink! Now it all makes sense! Well, in that case, I guess there is nothing that we can really do about it now, is there? That s right, nothing can be done about you suspecting me as long as my mouth and words continue to emit their pungent smell that is the source of you not trusting me!」

「Yes, you are exactly right, and I am going to be saying that as many times as I need. Your mouth stinks! And it stinks worse than the mouths and words of anyone I have ever met in my entire life and I have lived for quite a long while, goddamn it! The words that you are speaking, the aura of sincerity and honesty that they have, the reveals that you unraveled before me, and even that smile of yours. . . . I cannot quite put it into words how I feel about all of them, but if I were to chose the closest thing to how I truly feel, then I would have to say that they. . . . . . . . . . . yes, that they are giving of a rotten odor that is making me doubt if any of the things that you have said are actually true, and not just some cunning tricks meant to deceive me.」

Give off a rotten odor, he said! Making me doubt your words, he said! And as if that was not enough, then on top of it all. . . he indirectly said that he did not like his smile!

It was his best smile that took him years to truly master, a smile that he learned to use expressly for the purpose of making himself pretend to look like a weak person by means of hiding the usual sharpness and shrewdness of his facial features and warming up the cool air that he usually had about him all the time, features which were typical for someone who knew how manuever around the people’s hearts and win their favor and support for himself.

It was his best weapon meant to captivate the hearts and minds of those around him, and usually the opinions he was hearing about it claimed that it was actually quite charming, and so he did not hesitate to continue using and improving it so that it would serve him even more effectively. And because he was always combining that smile with his innate intelligence to always say what needed to be said in just the right amount at just the right moment, the list of people who praised him for all of his “positive” qualities was miles long and still growing, and James was sure that the same strategy as always is going to be enough to keep Heracles from becoming hostile towards him, but apparently that was not going to be the case, because while Heracles would normally respond to his sincerity just like any other person, his very soul was screaming at him that he was being manipulated and that this man is dangerous, and therefore not to be trusted under any circumstances.

「I now understand that there is something missing in your words, but I do not have the information or the knowledge to theorize what that something might be, exactly. That is why I decided not to fully trust you and follow only what my heart is telling me is right. . . .and right now, that means that I am not going to yield to any of your attempts at persuasion. Instead, I am going to be the one persuading you: release Orpheus’s wife right now, or I will kill you right where you stand.」

That was not a joke or an empty threat by any means. Right now, Heracles’ intuition was really telling him that he should just kill James and be done with him. But if he does that, there will be no telling what might happen to Orpheus’s wife. So instead of killing him, maybe it would actually be better to break every limb in his body so that he would not be able to move anymore and then use him for the purpose of a hostage exchange? For the time being, he prepared himself by uncrossing his legs and leaning forward while sitting on the edge of his bed so that he could start moving immediately when this man tries to do anything unwise.

But James was not about to dig his own grave. Perhaps it was due to the overwhelming aura of intimidation that Heracles was radiating right now, but he felt goosebumps over his whole body that also began to shake slightly as he looked Heracles directly in the eyes.

「No, that is not going to be necessary, Greece’s strongest hero.」

「. . . . . 」

「Very well. If you do not make any movements on your own, I would be the one who is going to get in trouble, and it is not like I expected to secure your cooperation without paying some kind of price from the very beginning.」

Their eyes kept making contact with each other. He certainly apologized for Krishna. He also disclosed the information they learned about the Game to him, and told him what his position in『Uroboros』was. However, he only revealed them to Heracles because he thought that doing so was not going to hurt him, because he is not a Player himself. He also tried to spur Heracles to action by trying to act on his emotions to not pay any price for having him onboard, but that approach was clearly wrong. It was the first time in a long time when James got rejected by someone, but at the same time he did not feel disappointed at all.

Staring at James, who was smiling in a completely different way now, Heracles saw a brand new color of evil.

「That smile of yours just now. It is not a simple, evil one. It is the one of pure malevolence. Is that your true nature then?」

「Fufu. . . I remember that a friend of mine once pointed out exactly the same thing to me. It was certainly when we met on a whaling ship. He said: 「Your words smell more than the whale’s rotting brain」.」

「What a magnificent friend. I am sure that he must be rolling in his grave now, lamenting over his inability to correct your rotten behavior in any way.」

「You might be right about that.」

Saying that, James took out a piece of parchment and began to write on it with a quill. Apparently, it seems to The Geass Roll for the purpose of releasing Orpheus from his servitude to 『Uroboros』. The movements of the quill across the paper felt strangely light to him, most likely because he remembered about his old friend and it made him fall into nostalgia without even noticing it. . . . . although if there was one thing that he could be absolutely sure about, it would be the fact that pretty much no human in existence would be happy to hear other people say that their mouths smell much worse than a dead whale’s rotting brain, but the fact that there was a person out there who would even dare to use such a comparison when describing one of his friends proved the truth of the old saying that the world is a wide and mysterious place, and that it takes all kinds of individuals to make it.
「Before we go and finalize everything here, there is one last compromise that I would like to make: I would like Orpheus to keep helping 『Uroboros』 out for as long as the 『Lost Continent of Atlantis』 Gift Game keeps on going. If you agree to this compromise, then I see no problems with releasing his wife, effective immediately.」

When he received the Geass Roll from James, Heracles started reading through it while going from one end of the hut to another, most likely in an attempt to try and discern if there were any discrepancies, traps or schemes hidden in the entire document, but he found no such things, even after looking thoroughly and re-reading the entire Geass Roll over and over again.

「Now, about that task that I would like you to help us with. . . . 」

Heracles nodded his head heavily, while James raised his index finger with an evil smile on his face.

「Do not worry, it is not going to be anything too difficult or unreasonable. First and foremost, I would like you to return to the original role that you were supposed to be playing out, the role of one of the Organizers for the 2nd War for the Sun’s Authority, and once you do that, then I would like to kindly request you to go and reclaim the Sun Authority that you have released from yourself right before Krishna took control over your body yesterday. Do you think that you can do that without any major difficulties?」

「. . . . . Hmm, I think that it is not going to be a problem, but looking at how you became all obedient and polite just now when you requested me to do that, I am guessing that it would be very much inconvenient for you guys from 『Uroboros』 if even one of Shiroyasha’s Sun Authorities returned to her, right?」

「Usually that might have been the case, but not this time. All that I want is for this Gift Game to return to the state it was in before it has been derailed from its intended course by all of those unexpected things happening one after the other.」

James replied to Heracles’ conjecture with a perfectly calm face.

「. . . . . anyway, let me finish saying what I would like you to do before we get too sidetracked. Once you regain your lost Sun Authority – which is effectively a proof of you being one of the War’s Organizers – I would like you to meet up with a certain Community and go to The Orichalcum Mine together with them, and once you get there, I want you to meet with an outstandingly intelligent, glasses-wearing young man who is going to be there. He is a person of great talent and ability, and if you do not want to take just my word alone for it, then I will have you know that he is someone who was raised for two entire years by elderly Gilgamesh, who is infamous for being a very eccentric, obstinate and stubborn person.」

「. . . . And what is the name of that 「Certain Community」 ?」

Heracles asked, not missing the evil smile that James had on his face the entire time when he was telling him all that. Taking out his Gift Card, James then proceeded to telling Heracles the name of the Community that he was going to cooperate with.

「 . . . .Their name is 『Avatara』 , a gathering of the foolishly gullible yet adorable men and women who think themselves Sun Kings, yet they cannot ever realize that they have been dancing on the palm of our, 『Uroboros’』, hand the entire time.」