Greek Mythology Stories 9: Theseus 4 - The Road to Athens, Part 2

vs. The Foot-Washing Old Man

After traveling for a while from the Isthmus of Corinth, Theseus arrived at the Kingdom of Megara, a neighbor to Athens.

To be precise, he had arrived at the land where the Kingdom of Megara once stood.
The Kingdom of Megara had been destroyed by Crete in the recent war between Crete and Athens, which was sparked by the suspicious death of a Cretan prince, turning Megara into a frontline base.
The royal family, who had ties to the Athenian royal house, were scattered, and the land had now become one of Crete's satellite cities.
The people living in Megara were suffering under the oppression of their new rulers, and they all wore gloomy expressions.
Public order seemed to have deteriorated as well; shopkeepers were constantly scanning passersby with sharp, suspicious eyes, looking for thieves.
The people walking the streets were all gaunt, and there were many beggars sitting by the roadside.

A country that once flourished as the primary trading partner of the great power Athens could end up like this once it lost a war. Feeling the horror of war firsthand, Theseus felt a sense of frustration and helplessness that he could not resolve the situation immediately with his own strength alone.
After passing through the city and walking for a while, he saw the coastline.
As Theseus sat down to take a short rest, a traveler called out to him.
"Hey there, you should get away from here, it's dangerous."
"Are there bandits or something around here?"
Theseus asked the merchant with a puzzled look. He thought to himself that he had already kicked away plenty of common thieves during his journey, so he wasn't particularly afraid, but he wanted to hear more details and waited for the merchant's reply.
"No, no, it's not something as cute as that. They say the curse of the Megarian royal family attacks people here."
A curse... Could it be that the grudge of the royal family, which had perished just recently, had returned from the realm of Hades, the king of the underworld, to curse the area?
"A royal curse? That suddenly turned into a scary story, didn't it?"
Theseus shrugged his shoulders jokingly as if to shiver.
"That's why I'm telling you it's dangerous. They say if you walk around here at night, a faint light appears, and then you hear it."
"Hear what?"
The merchant gulped, swallowed hard, and spoke in an eerie tone.
"You hear a voice saying, 'Wash my feet~ wash my feet~'. How about that? Scary, right?"
Theseus burst out laughing at the gap in the tone of voice.
"So it's a 'Foot-Washer,' a sea version of the 'Azuki-Washer' yokai?"
"Something like that, I guess. I don't really know."
After they both laughed, Theseus said brightly,
"If it's just washing feet, that's not scary at all."
The merchant waved his hand at Theseus and stoked his anticipation by saying,
"There's more to the story."
"Then tell me already."
The merchant held out both hands toward Theseus as if to calm him down.
"Well, if you go in the direction of that voice, there's an old man, and that old man says, 'Wash my feet~'."
"That's just a weird old man. We have plenty of those back home. The kind that increases when it gets warmer."
"No, no, it's not like that. If you look closely at that old man, he looks exactly like the younger brother of the man who was the King of Megara until recently."
Theseus's eyebrows twitched. He turned his gaze toward the sea as if something had occurred to him.
"The Megarian royal family should have been wiped out. I wonder who it really is."
The merchant continued,
"The King's brother... Does that mean there was a survivor?"
"I wonder. And then, because he keeps saying 'wash my feet,' you end up washing them. Then, they say he kicks you into the sea with those same feet."
"So he really is just a bad old man."
"And the people who are thrown in are eaten by sea turtles, and it seems no one has ever returned alive..."
When the merchant said that much, the two of them froze.
"No one has ever..."
Theseus muttered that, and after a few seconds of silence, he finally opened his mouth.
"Then who heard this story?"
"That's the thing. I heard it from the aunt of my friend's older brother's neighbor, who heard it from a song a drunkard was singing on the road."
"That's just the ramblings of a drunkard."

Parting ways with the merchant, Theseus stepped into the rumored rocky area.
Thinking that he probably wouldn't meet such a strange old man, he still kept his ears open and surveyed the area to get to the bottom of the rumor.
Then, mixed in with the sound of the waves, he heard a mysterious voice from far away.
This is it, he thought, and started walking toward the voice. Then, he discovered an old man who was clearly saying "Wash my feet~" toward him.
"What is it, old man? Do you want me to wash your feet?"
"Who are you calling an old man? I am Sciron, the King's brother, connected to the noble Kingdom of Megara."
"Oh, so you're the King's brother, are you? That's a big deal."
"What kind of attitude is that? Just come here and wash the feet of this noble person."
Feeling that Sciron, who was ordering him around from a high point on the rocks, was suspicious, Theseus climbed up the rocks with a weary expression.
"Alright, I'll wash your feet."
Theseus washed Sciron's feet with the seawater in the bucket.
Seeing Theseus like that, Sciron laughed cacklingly.
"Do you think that'll make them clean! You clumsy fool!"
As soon as he said that, Sciron kicked Theseus with his foot.
"Huh?"
However, he lacked the leg strength to move the well-trained Theseus, who didn't budge an inch.
"Oh, oh, oh, ooooooh!"
Sciron, conversely, lost his balance from the recoil and fell into the sea.
Surprised that Sciron had fallen, Theseus hurriedly looked into the sea and saw a giant sea turtle swallowing Sciron whole.

"Ah, so the drunkard's ramblings were actually true..."
Theseus muttered his condolences and left the rocky area.

If he really was a descendant of the royal family, then the royal bloodline had been cut off, and the future reconstruction of Megara would be a distant prospect.
It was concerning that there was a city with such poor public order in a neighboring country; as a hero, Theseus vowed in his heart that he had to do something about the future of Megara.