💞 The Foreign Rival

"My lord, we've captured this fella spying around the temple!"

"A spy... in this district? What was he up to exactly?"

"Your lordship, this one was definitely poking his nose into the training area, peeping at our bendy trainees."

"Curious... Wait! Turn him around... Aha! The curvature of his spinal cord! There can't be any mistake... Try to hold him by the shoulders and push them down."

"As you wish, sire."

"Harder! Even harder! Yes! Just as I thought! He's a foreign contortionist sent to our country to steal our unique training secrets!!"

"I am no spy! I'm Jason, the son of Aeson!"

"Oh? Aeson as in the king of Greece? Boy, if we suppose for a second you aren't lying. What's a royal youth doing so far from home, peeping at bendies??"

"Well, what's another royal youth doing sitting on his head instead of his legitimate throne?"

"What do you mean by that! That is not an answer! Besides, in this country being the Headsit Priest of the Snake Goddess is a way higher position than any puny monarch. You can take a throne by force but you can't possibly get 37 vertebrae by other means than the blessing of the Goddess. Only one prince in the whole lineage had this blessing so far. His name is Andremede Alexandrius a.k.a. myself! The most flexible youth in the entire world!"

"Yeah and that's why I was looking for you... See, I'm on a quest for the mythic artifact by the name of the Golden One-Piece but even if I find it, only the ultimately unbreakable can wear that leotard, or else all the bones in their body will be immediately broken!"

"Tell me about it. I've heard about it and I've used hundreds of stretching devices of the most infernal designs, but even I would stay away from that Golden One-Piece. The very sound of its name makes me spinal discs tremble! And the thought of trying it on makes me sick as if an elephant stomped on my stomach! For all I know, Gods must have created that artifact just to laugh at contortionists and their feeble attempts to raise their heads and bend their backs like only them gods can do!"