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Last Embryo Volume 6 Prologue Part 5

Maybe that was the proverbial stone thrown into destiny’s plans that Asterios’ father mentioned on that day when he took him to the underground cave and told him about the monster that would be plaguing Crete at some point if it ever woke up from its slumber. Or at the very least it might have been, if only the monster that was supposed to be sleeping deep beneath the surface of the island of Crete turned out to actually be the catastrophic volcanic eruption. If that was really the case, then it would have explained quite a few things pretty nicely.

The collapse of the Arta of the Stars is always supposed to be a calamity on an unparalleled scale that humanity can have no hopes of escaping, so it would not be all that impossible for one such event to happen in the 2000 BC era when Asterios was still around.
so when it actually happened, the Gods of the Greek Pantheon must have concluded that it would be much easier for them to summon them all to Atlantis in Little Garden rather than to deal with the consequences and the aftermath of an entire ancient Greek civilization getting wiped off the face of the earth in an instant.

「. . . . If that is really how it was, then I should be thanking the Greek Gods for saving you. I am sorry for doubting them and their intentions.」

「N-No, you do not have to apologize, so please raise your head, my lord! From what I heard it has been more that three hundred years since we have been summoned here. Three hundred long years of living in confusion as to what happened to us and living in harsh conditions while being forced to make an underdeveloped land suitable for harming and further cultivation. . . but for all this time, we were spending our days filled with hope because of the prophecy that has been told to us: the prophecy that one day our king shall return to us.」

The priestess’ face was filled with happiness as she was wiping the tears away from her face, to which Asterios could only make an awkward face as he tilted his head to the side. While it is true that he is undoubtedly the member of Crete’s royal family, at the same time he was Crete’s most famous monster, the bull-headed Minotaur. If someone like him, who went down in history as the centerpiece of a horrific ritual in which he was devouring young children who were offered to him in order to appease his wrath was to be made the king of an entire nation, it would leave an unremovable stigma on the reputation of the people of Atlantis.

「I am sorry, priestess, but I just now realized that I did not even ask for your name. Can you give it to me?」

「Ah, please forgive me, King Asterios! I was so caught up in your awakening that I forgot to introduce myself in the first place, so allow me to fix that blunder! My name is Akashia, and I serve as the priestess for our community here.」

「Well then Akashia. My name is Asterios. . . but since that was originally my grandfather’s name, then I guess it would be more appropriate for me to call myself Asterios II. I also need you to know that I am carrying the soul of The Minotaur, 「The Monster of the Labyrinth」within myself, so I believe that makes me unfit to be leading your people as their king.」

Even more so since The Minotaur was known to be a cannibalistic monster, which would probably made him a member of The Murderous Species, beasts that killed and devoured humankind simply out of sheer malice, and the fact that they tended to be isolated from everyone else even in Little Garden should speak for itself well enough.
Right now Asterios acts as a sentient Sun Authority following Saigo Homura in The 2nd War for the Sun’s Authority after he won his Gift Game so there was no way for him to be running amok like he did before, but even then, they would still have to take into account the vicious rumors that would inevitably start circulating around if he did decide to become their king.

But Akashia simply shook her head slowly and spoke to him thusly:

「Please, my lord, there is no need for you to berate yourself for who you are. We are aware of all of this, and even despite that, we would gladly welcome you as our monarch and leader.」

「But. . .」

「My Lord, I implore you, listen to what we have to say first. This land, The Lost Continent of Atlantis holds the key to the secret to the true meaning of the legend of The Minotaur. . . . . . as well as the reason why your father, King Minos had to sacrifice children to you. These matters are all connected with each other.」

Asterios frowned at her words. The true meaning of the legend of The Minotaur? But he thought that this mystery has already been solved by Homura. Every eight years, children were being sacrificed in memory of Asterios, who died of smallpox, and the repose of his soul, and the one who would devour these children was none other than The Minotaur.

The world in which both history and folklore exist as part of reality is defined as a world whose existence is established by the three-dimensional crossing parallel world theory, so even if the details might differ, as long as the end result remains the same, their influence on the world should remain unchanged. That is what it means to have the same amount of space in the universe.

「My Lord, there is a saying that seeing is believing, so you should come to the palace with me so that we could talk about everything there, including the monster that is sleeping beneath Atlantis.」

Akashia the Priestess took the confused Asterios’ hand and guided him towards the Knossos Palace. On their way, people were welcoming him with cheers and applause in unison with the sound of the drums and flutes echoing throughout the surrounding night. Now that he recalled how the festivals looked during the time when he was alive he noticed that this one right now resembled it to an almost perfect degree, and it invulontarily caused him to curl his lips up into a smile. That would explain why he felt this mysterious sense of nostalgia as soon as he set foot on this continent, which had the same kind of scent as his hometown.

However, Akashia said that it has been three hundred years since they have been summoned here. Surely they must have faced many hardships when they have been thrown into an entirely new environment out of the blue like that, but throughout those three hundred years their civilization did not develop in any noticeable way. In fact, everything looked to be exactly the same as Asterios remembered it. For Asterios, who has seen with his own eyes what the world of the distant future looked like, that fact became painfully obvious. If this is supposed to be an extension of the country that has disappeared from the pages of history, thenwhat exactly did the Minoan civilization managed to accomplish? Or rather, is that stagnation not the proof that they have actually diminished over those years?

Not realizing how Asterios felt about all of this, the feast to welcome his return as the king of Crete has lasted well until dawn.

The Lost Continent of Atlantis: a continent that should not have even existed during the times when Asterios was born.

No one could ever anticipate how harsh the trials that would await the Players there would truly be.