Chapter 61 Thank You, Lord Space,

  Sound finally returned to the world a few moments after Gilgamesh’s divine level impact with the Tarasque and the ground. Other than Isaac and Klein’s few shared words, the next thing to be heard was the sound of tearing flesh, a sickly squelch and the snapping of rope stretched beyond its limits. A large chunk of grey flesh flew out of the cloud of debris and thudded onto the ground between the impact point and the quartet of onlookers.

  Klein slowly forced himself to his feet and then appeared close to where the chunk of flesh impacted. “Gil! Don’t eat the heart!” He yelled into the still settling debris. At that point the silhouette of the massive golden dragon could be seen standing atop something that was sunken into the ground at least as far as it was tall.

  “Then how do I keep it down?” Gilgamesh’s voice rolled across mana itself as more sounds of tearing flesh resounded across the battlefield.

  “Give it to me!” Klein told him and then appeared next to Isaac once more. Both teleports had looked almost like Isaac had blinked and Klein was simply not where he had been. “I’m sure you have questions while Gil finishes off the Tarasque.” He told Isaac calmly. “I would be happy to answer them, however, I believe that you have a much more pressing matter to speak about.” He nodded towards Lenna who had managed to push herself up into a seated position. Her skin was flushed but her breaths were even. Through their link, Isaac could feel that something had once been wrong but it no longer was.

  “What happened?” Isaac asked his mate with some worry but not an unreasonable amount. She was clearly no longer in any kind of distress about whatever it had been.

  “You died, Isaac.” Lenna told him and then shifted her gaze towards Klein. Her eyes were already squinting through the afternoon sun in order to see him but the intensity in her accusatory glare was still extremely clear.

  “I did not expect that to happen, no.” Klein answered her unspoken accusation. “I would have made the same call even if you had not been fused. Even so, I am not sure which would have been the right call to make. The monster needed to be kept in place and even if you hadn’t been linked, and Isaac had truly died, then I would have facilitated his near immediate resurrection.” He defended himself. Even though Klein was far beyond the duo, he still felt a responsibility to explain himself to the wife of the man he had just gotten killed, even if it was only temporarily.

  There was another tearing sound from the crater and Isaac’s eyes caught the sight of Gilgamesh as clear as day now that most of the debris had finished being blown away or settling. The fifty foot long dragon was mounted atop the Tarasque which had its shell absolutely obliterated. The ground was smoking from the heat that had been imparted into the dirt and stone. Gilgamesh’s front paws were covered in grey blood the entire way up to his elbows and most of his golden head was now grey, dripping, and steaming. Gilgamesh tilted his head back and opened his maw that was large enough to swallow a man whole. With a mighty crunch, clack of his jaws, and gulp, a piece of Tarasque meat that had to weigh more than all four humanoids combined was devoured. Gilgamesh caught Isaac staring but then promptly ignored the young human and went back to tearing the Tarasque apart. He seemed like he was looking for the heart that Klein had mentioned but was also not above having a snack while he was working.

  “Was there no other way to make sure that the Tarasque stayed in place?” Lenna questioned the Demigod of Space.

  “Of course there was.” He replied as if it was a law of the universe that there were always other options, maybe because it was. “But doing so ran the risk of Gilgamesh slipping through my fingers and ascending. He is too powerful of an asset to allow him to ascend at this juncture. Any risk that Gilgamesh isn’t here for the next dragon surge is not one that I am willing to take. Unfortunately for my immortal heart, he seems to care far less, even if he is of the mind to help us deal with the next dragon surge before his ascension.”

  Lenna sighed in resignation. She saw where he was coming from. Someone like Gilgamesh was guaranteed to still be alive by the time the next dragon surge came about and if Klein could use him to take down an untold number of other ancient dragons, then he would be worth far more than Isaac to the demigod, even if Isaac was never resurrected. The fact that he said that he would have hurried to get Isaac brought back was the only consolation that she was going to get and she would just have to deal with it. “Fine.” She stated. “I see your point and will let it go. Just know, I am still not happy about it.”

  “Noted.” Klein told her with a nod. “And I would feel the same if our positions were switched.” He assured her and then turned back towards Isaac.

  Isaac momentarily ignored the demigod as he continued to scrutinize his wife. “Are you okay?” He asked her.

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  “Yes?” Lenna wasn’t sure exactly why he was asking; she was sure that he hadn’t been close enough or in one piece enough to hear her cry of agony when her strand of fate had stretched taut.

  “What happened when I died? How did it feel?” Isaac questioned his wife.

  “Awful.” She told him honestly. “It felt like my soul was being drug out of my body. Thankfully it was only for a moment, but I would appreciate it if it never happens again.”

  “If I may,” Klein cut in. “based on what I just witnessed, Isaac should be effectively immortal as long as you exist. You didn’t end up taking any actual soul damage even if it must’ve felt like pure agony. The main issue that I see for his prospective immortality would be being crushed or otherwise not given the space to rebuild himself. The same most likely cannot be said for you. Depending on how his self-injury-destruction works, he might be able to sustain both himself and your soul even if your body is destroyed, at least until the pain drives him mad, he falls unconscious, or runs out of mana.”

  “Thank you, Lord Space, but I believe your part of this conversation has concluded.” Lenna told him coldly and Klein took the hint. Everything that he had said were things that her or Isaac would have or had already come to, upon pondering their newly fused nature, which they were definitely already doing and had done. “So, Isaac, you are going to be more careful in the future, not less so just because you can use my soul as an anchor to the mortal realm, correct?” The question was so pointed that Isaac felt like it was more of a sword to his throat than a verbal request for confirmation.

  “Yes, ma’am.” Isaac replied with a gulp. Lenna was officially one of the few things on the planet that actually scared him. Right up there with being bound, watching a tornado move towards him, and staring into the eye of a dragon the size of a country, which put her just a bit below actually losing her.

  “Good.” Lenna stated with a nod. “Now, Klein, I believe you promised to answer Isaac’s questions.”

  Klein cleared his throat and was about to verbally announce his agreement when he suddenly shot to his feet and appeared next to Gilgamesh’s meal. “No!” He shouted at the dragon. “Do not eat that!” Gilgamesh spit out what he was about to swallow.

  “Why?” The ancient gilded dragon questioned with suspicion in his voice.

  “That is the Tarasque’s mana organ!” Klein exclaimed. When Gilgamesh didn’t reply, Klein ran his hand down his face. A small portal the size of a hand mirror appeared a few feet from Isaac and connected to one right next to Klein so the trio could hear the rest of the conversation without Klein having to yell. “The mana organ of a divine beast is full of divinely attuned mana. For mortals this will do little to nothing as it will just flow through their system. And when you were a hatchling it might not’ve done anything to you either. But if you eat that, I will have an even harder time keeping you from ascending.”

  Gilgamesh seemed to pause in thought before he realized that Klein had made sure the trio heard their conversation. Apparently he seemed to think it was fine to give Isaac, Lenna, and Shamesh a bit more context: “Dragons get stronger when we eat certain monsters, but only for the first time. It tweaks our power to age ratio by a few percent. I didn’t think it would matter at this point in my life.” The Guild Leader then turned back to his friend. “So, since you are here anyway, where is this thing’s heart?”

  “You are getting close to it. It is actually a tubular organ. Tarasque’s digestion stops at their stomach, since they don’t actually need to eat, so it should be the only tubular squishy bit you find other than the throat.” Klein explained. “I know you’ve killed one of these before.”

  “I just melted it until there was nothing left.” Gilgamesh replied.

  “It hasn’t been that long, has it?” Klein wondered.

  “Yes.” Was Gilgamesh’s only reply before he went back to tearing the Tarasque apart. It was still technically alive as its body tried to reform around the damage that he was actively doing.

  Klein reappeared next to Isaac and Lenna and dismissed his tiny portal. “Apologies.” He told Isaac with a nod. “Now, questions?”

  “One of my questions was already answered, somewhat.” Isaac said and settled in to begin the lesson after a brief look towards Lenna that seemed to tell her that they could talk more about his quick death when they were next alone. Klein waved Isaac on to continue and he did just that: “Why are you preventing people from ascending?”

  “It is just as you have likely gathered.” Klein began. “My goal is to keep every powerhouse that is aligned with mortals here, on Primatia, the mortal realm, at least until the end of the next Dragon Surge. Right now, we are slightly off balance. On one hand, gods have a lot of trouble interacting directly into the lives of mortals courtesy of the Veil that I am maintaining around the mortal realm, a veil that Gilgamesh nearly melted himself and then blasted himself through earlier. On the other hand, we have many more powerhouses ready and waiting for the dragons to show up. I am more or less running an experiment. If we handle the next Dragon Surge better than if the gods had their normal access, simply because there will be less draconic god intervention, then I will attempt to maintain the Veil indefinitely. If we fare worse, then I will ascend and fight for my place among the greater pantheon.”

  “And the ‘real’ gods haven’t gotten pissed off enough to declare a holy war against you or anything yet?” Isaac couldn’t help but wonder.

  Klein gave him a smirk. “A few of them tried, yes, but the most that they can do is smite me while I’m outside of my own divine domain. That does nothing but piss me off and waste their power. And after I sent Raegen’s divine mace back at him, he stopped.”

  Isaac leaned in with a mix of obvious awe and suspicion. “How?”

  “I kept his portal from closing, the one he sent his mace flying at me through, and used another pair of portals to switch its orientation back around to face through the portal he had opened. It lost a bit of power simply due to distance traveled but it was still flying fast enough that he deflected it instead of catching it, so I took it as a win.” Klein explained. “Obviously I can’t actually make an attack capable of truly hurting a ‘real’ god as you put it. Not right now anyway. If I had all of the power that is technically at my disposal, meaning the Veil would be gone, then I could probably keep from instantly dying in a one on one against one of the old gods. Not the divinities mind you, Lua and her siblings, parents, and cousins are completely unsurvivable, even for me.”

  Isaac mentally filed away what he had just heard for later. While he had Klein there, he had more questions. “Next, why did you look like shit while the Guild Leader was fighting?”