Chapter 63: Tiamat's Smile
The eye contact with the Mother Goddess Tiamat lasted only an instant.
So brief that Rowe almost wondered if he had imagined it.
He knew he had not.
Tiamat was watching him.
Was it because he had "killed" the gods? Because he carried their curse inside his soul?
Those were the only reasons he could think of.
Yet no matter why Tiamat had come, that gaze did nothing to change the simple, overwhelming fact.
A primordial god had stepped into reality.
The power of such a being existed on a planetary scale. It twisted the very rules of the world wherever it walked, forcibly rewriting the environment into one suited to its own existence.
Which meant that wherever Tiamat stood, the world reverted to the age of its birth, when stars were still being forged, when nothing had yet truly taken shape and life could not exist.
The vast sea, dragged into motion by her mere presence, began to boil.
Water brightened into molten rock, rolling and surging.
Black mud frothed, chaos rose in tides.
The corner of the sky above Tiamat turned wholly black and red, and as she slowly advanced, that stain spread with her.
A crushing pressure descended.
Even Gilgamesh, with his infamously bad personality, had no room left for arrogance in that moment. His expression sharpened in an instant.
There was no need to mention the others.
So Gilgamesh could only say one thing.
"Arrogant wild dog, can you still extend your claws?"
His scarlet eyes cut to Rowe. He knew the question was meaningless. Now that Rowe had come here in person, he would never run.
As a king, he could not betray the loyalty of his subject. A king ought to draw out every last ounce of his subject's strength.
"No problem… cough, cough." Rowe doubled over with a couple of light coughs, then straightened.
"Then bite her." The young King of Uruk declared coldly, arms crossed.
Close the gates. Release Rowe.
Rowe cheerfully raised his middle finger at his nominal king.
Still mouthing off at a time like this.
Even so, the substance under Gilgamesh's crude words was correct. In the current situation, Rowe was the only one who actually had the potential to defeat Tiamat.
As long as he called forth the Key of Heaven.
As long as he turned it into the Sword of Rupture.
Like before, if they gathered everyone's strength and let that world shattering blade reach full output, they might not be able to truly slay Tiamat.
But forcing her back into Imaginary Number Space should still be possible.
That, at least, was Gilgamesh's thinking.
Not that the King of Uruk planned to sit idle and watch. He had already declared he would bear most of the burden himself.
"Do not forget. I am the one and only King beneath all the heavens."
The blond youth, armored in gold and arms still folded, spoke with a stern face.
"A mere mongrel has already overreached himself far too many times. It is only because of this King's vast mercy that you have not yet been punished."
"This time, you will absolutely not be allowed to rampage through the world that belongs to me."
"Fine by me." Rowe laughed. "As long as you can actually lift it."
"Besides, we do not have time for elaborate theatrics."
His robe snapped in the chaotic sea wind as he lifted an arm and pointed toward the horizon.
"If the primordial Mother Goddess Tiamat sets foot on land, the earth will turn into magma, the sky will fall into pure chaos, and the people of Uruk, everyone except us, will die."
He had spoken the critical truth.
He was not eager to die anymore. He no longer cared who took the spotlight, but this was not something anyone could ignore.
Their goal was to intercept Tiamat.
They could not let her set foot on the shore.
If she did, the land would be remade into a molten hell in an instant.
Everyone except the handful who stood here would be wiped out.
How could Gilgamesh, who treated all of Uruk as his own courtyard, allow anyone to touch the lives of his subjects?
"Why are you two talking so much?"
Ishtar cut in from the side.
"Would it not be enough if I just use this?"
She lifted the Bull of Heaven that had now been shrunken to a miniature form, completely ignoring the way it trembled the moment its eyes landed on Rowe.
"This goddess can tell that Mother Goddess Tiamat has not fully unleashed her power. That is the only reason she is not holding back her presence. As she is now, using this will be enough to block her."
Rowe blinked, then quickly followed her reasoning.
By sheer size and force alone, the Bull of Heaven could indeed obstruct Tiamat for a time, as long as she remained in this restrained state.
"Rowe."
Enkidu tugged lightly at his sleeve.
He turned and saw her brows drawn slightly together in unease.
"Do you not feel it… that it is a little too quiet?"
Quiet.
Now that she pointed it out… it was too quiet.
Tiamat's voice had vanished.
The roaring wind and crashing surf had fallen still.
A thin, prickling sense of danger climbed up everyone's spine.
Rowe instinctively looked up.
And found himself staring directly into a pair of enormous pink eyes, like twin suns hanging in the sky. Their depths shimmered with a starlike light, and beneath them, pale lips parted slightly to reveal a few sharp fangs.
Tiamat was already standing on the shore.
She had leaned down a little, watching them calmly as they argued.
"Aaaa."
A clear sound left those lips, one only Rowe could hear clearly.
"…"
Who had said Tiamat was in a self imposed seal?
Could a self sealed being move this quickly?
Could she hide every trace of her power so perfectly, without even a ripple of leakage, and still appear right in front of them?
"So fast… you mongrel, damn it." Gilgamesh exploded, his composure tearing at the edges.
"Child of man."
Enkidu remained the calmest of them all. His robe fluttered and silver white chains shot out from beneath the fabric in an instant.
They twisted through the air, layer upon layer, until they formed a tight net with him at its center and hurtled toward Tiamat.
Ishtar fingers trembled, and she simply hurled the Bull of Heaven outright.
The Bull of Heaven let out a tiny, despairing bleat.
What in the world is this again…
Rowe alone stood motionless.
Because just like before, he realized something that none of the others could see.
The Mother Goddess's pink eyes never moved away from him.
They were fixed solely on his figure.
"Aaaaaa."
The clear sound rang again, light and soft, like humming.
Beneath her hovering feet, the sea churned harder and harder. Its color deepened into a black and red slurry.
Flowing rock and searing flame rose and spread, radiating a chilling sense of unreality.
Tiamat's power was beginning to awaken.
But Tiamat herself did not move.
That was it.
Rowe suddenly understood.
Her "seal" had never been a prison imposed from outside. From beginning to end, it was a lock she had cast over herself, a restraint on the impulse to destroy everything that had blossomed in the wake of the gods' betrayal.
A self seal.
Even after being torn apart, the primordial Mother still loved this world.
She did not wish to break it.
But what if that was not the reason she had come?
What if…
No. There was no "what if."
"I found you."
A soft, clear, gentle voice echoed directly in Rowe's heart.
On Tiamat's face, visible only to him, her pale lips curved upward.
She smiled at Rowe.
She had come for him.
No one else could see that sight.
None of them could see Tiamat's true form, so of course they could not see that inexplicable smile she had just turned on him.
But they were not ordinary people either.
Even if they could not see, they could still react.
After a brief heartbeat of stunned silence, everyone moved at once.
Enkidu, who had never truly panicked, let his chains bloom.
His plain white robe whipped in the wind, and countless links shot forth in every direction. They split and wove together into an impossibly fine lattice, sealing the space around Tiamat and closing in on her from all sides.
Gilgamesh opened the Gate of Babylon.
Treasure after treasure poured out of the golden ripples in the air. Thousands of blades and weapons filled the sky, hovering and aimed.
"AHAHAHAH. Did you think that alone would frighten this King?"
To Rowe, it was obvious that Gilgamesh was simply trying to cover up the fact that he had been caught off guard.
Rowe snapped out of his focus on that smile and prepared to act as well.
Whatever Tiamat's true goal was, they had to stop her here on the shoreline.
She could not be allowed to go any farther inland.
Yet just as he raised his hand, his fingers stalled.
A light pull at his sleeve dragged his attention backward.
"I am scared. I am so scared."
Ishtar shook from head to toe.
Her slim body, wrapped in that crimson jacket, could not keep up with the violent trembling within. Beneath her skirt, her legs had unconsciously crossed, and her chest rose and fell in short, uneven breaths.
The Venus Goddess's face was drained of color, her red eyes wide with naked fear.
The Tiamat before them was not the one Rowe remembered, the fusion of "all the evils of humanity" and the Principle of Regression, that layered core which combined the Beast of Calamity with the primordial Mother of Creation.
She was a pure primordial god.
The chaotic, world creating sea in its original form.
In that state, her power might be somewhat lower than the dual core monster he knew, but precisely because her existence was so pure, the pressure she exuded was more absolute.
An overwhelming superiority.
For any god born from her, it was an inescapable instinctive oppression.
Ishtar Rin might be split off from the original Ishtar, but no matter how many times you divided or diluted it, a god was still a god.
Of course she would be crushed by that presence.
Of course she would be afraid.
"Do not leave me."
Her fingers dug into Rowe's clothing with desperate strength, her long black hair falling in disarray around a face that had lost all its usual smugness. The vulnerability in her eyes was something he had never seen before.
To be honest, Ishtar Rin like this was rare.
Normally, even when she tried seriously to charm him and force him to acknowledge her beauty, her prickly pride always won out over any softness.
She was always more tsun than dere.
Now, however, she looked up at him with trembling eyes, her body shaking uncontrollably, her crossed legs pressing together as if she wanted to disappear into the sand.
The contrast with her usual arrogance made her strangely, dangerously beautiful.
Of course, all of that assumed she was not quietly trying to climb up his body at the same time.
Rowe glanced down and immediately saw her hands wandering higher along his thigh.
He sighed, lifted his own hand, and casually brushed the goddess's fingers away.
"Hands off."
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