Chapter 16: Damn, I Became a Holy Man?
Aruru froze.
As a goddess entrusted by the pantheon to shape Enkidu's final form, she naturally possessed the power to do so. She was a goddess of creation, one of the Mother Goddesses of Mesopotamia, and her specialty was giving life a suitable shape.
Yet no matter what she had tried before, the divine clay beside her had never reacted.
That was why she had been troubled for so long.
But now, something she could not accomplish had happened in a blink.
The clay surged forward, blocked her path, and then stopped in front of Rowe like it had found a relative.
Aruru stared at Rowe again. Her eyes widened slightly.
"Key of Heaven?"
Rowe understood at once.
Gilgamesh was the Heavenly Wedge, the point of connection between heaven and the human world. Enkidu, meant to restrain Gilgamesh and guide him, was also a wedge of heaven.
There had only been two.
But before leaving Uruk, Rowe had received the Key of Heaven from the High Priest, a divine tool recognized by the gods.
A lock and a key were bound by nature. Even without reason, even without wisdom, Enkidu's unfinished consciousness would instinctively react to something that close.
Realizing that, Rowe pressed his fingers hard against his forehead.
He had a bad feeling he had messed things up again.
Still clinging to the last thread of hope, he looked toward Aruru.
She did not look angry anymore.
Instead, she smiled in a way that made Rowe's spine itch.
Aruru had understood everything.
She was a god. Of course she knew what the Key of Heaven meant.
A person recognized by the gods could not be genuinely disrespectful to the gods.
So Rowe's earlier gesture was not aimed at her. It was aimed at the divine clay. A deliberate provocation disguised as contempt.
His true purpose had only been to force the clay to respond.
And it had responded, exactly as it was bound to.
A newborn Chains of Heaven would never tolerate rejection from something it felt close to. If it sensed that rejection, it would change itself to match the one who rejected it. It would become human.
A human perfectly aligned with its essence, a vessel able to bear its power without breaking.
"A person recognized by the gods…" Aruru's expression softened with relief. "It seems I misunderstood you. You are worthy of praise."
Rowe blinked.
"???"
He understood every word, but none of the meaning.
Then Aruru lifted her chin with serene confidence and said something that hit like a mallet.
"From now on, that child is entrusted to you."
She flicked her long dark hair back, stretched lazily beneath the sun, and in a shimmer of milky white light, her body dissolved into radiance. The light shot upward and vanished into the sky.
Rowe had no chance to stop her.
In the clearing, only scorched earth remained. Around it, the forest stayed lush, and countless Demonic Beasts still lay prostrate, unwilling to raise their heads while her lingering divinity pressed on them.
Rowe exhaled a long, tired sigh.
She had misunderstood him. Again.
She thought his sarcasm hid a benevolent purpose, so she left Enkidu with him.
Why did everything keep turning out like this?
Rowe raked a hand through his hair.
Then a clear, childish sound snapped him out of it.
He looked forward.
The dark divine clay that had just moved in front of him was changing.
Exactly as Aruru predicted.
Rowe's brief show of disdain had stirred resentment inside it. It had sensed Rowe's thoughts and reached toward a shape that existed in Rowe's mind.
The clay hardened.
Its color faded. Under the soft sunlight, it took on an ivory sheen.
First arms formed, then legs, then a head. It was like watching an invisible sculptor carve a masterpiece out of living stone.
"Mm…"
A final breath escaped from newly formed crimson lips.
The clay human opened its eyes.
It was Enkidu.
Just as Rowe remembered, with lush emerald green hair that looked like the forest itself. A delicate face partly hidden by those strands. Bright green eyes full of quiet life. Elegant features, flowerlike lips, a graceful neck leading to a subtle rise of chest.
Its limbs were slender, yet its thighs held a faint fullness. Its waist narrowed like a perfectly shaped vase. Even its posture carried an effortless beauty.
Everything matched Rowe's image.
Except for one detail.
It looked a little more feminine than he expected.
Rowe fell into thought.
To be fair, in his memory, the Enkidu of the Nasuverse always felt closer to female. Even though a divine weapon had no concept of gender, and Enkidu's nature allowed it to take any form.
Because that was how Rowe pictured Enkidu, it was not strange that this first and most fundamental shape followed his imagination.
"Ya ya ya?"
A soft babble came from those moist crimson lips.
Enkidu stepped onto a nearby branch, swaying slightly as if still learning balance. Its expression was innocent and yearning, reaching toward Rowe with a clear desire for closeness.
And then Rowe finally understood why something felt off.
In later epics, Enkidu's transformation was recorded like this:
It was born in an ancient forest, ignorant and undefined. One day, a pure maiden chosen by the gods entered the forest. Enkidu was drawn to her. They spent seven days and seven nights together. Through her, Enkidu learned humanity and gained self awareness. After that, it walked the earth in her beautiful form.
But now there was no maiden here.
The only one directly connected to the gods in this forest was Rowe himself.
Meaning…
"I became the holy maiden… no, wait. Holy man?"
Rowe thought it through again.
Still no answer.
He could not understand it.
But he was very, very shocked.