Gilgamesh, led by his "master" Berkut, entered the Tower of Duma, the latter's submissive manner vanishing as he drank in the Tower's magnificence once again. It was a rather annoying habit, but the boy's time was borrowed; there was no need to deny him a final moment of joy.
He couldn't help but smirk as Berkut admired the marble statues of Duma, believed to be the only true carvings of Duma as a live model. They passed through the opening in the center of the tower, and Berkut almost lost his footing as he stared up at the vaults, balconies and landings of the upper floors, the rest was lost in a deep blanket of dust.
Though the air was stale and oppressive, and the bland color of parchment bathed the scene, Berkut's eyes paused on every new sight. He admired the pattern of sharp curves that moved along the perimeter of the central chamber, broken up occasionally by pikes of marble jutting out from the walls. From the perspective at the bottom of this chamber, the Tower looked like a massive predator with multiple rows of teeth, baring its fangs and closing in, but this did not seem to frighten him.
He was still a child, despite the imperious aura he gave off in the presence of lesser men. The image of the young man prancing around the room tore at Gilgamesh's heart.
Gilgamesh wondered how to do it. Right now, with his back turned? Or did the boy deserve to know the truth, or even the fate of his wife?
"Oh," Berkut gasped, as a gargoyle landed in front of him, pointing its scythe at the boy's heart. Though the gargoyles had seen Berkut before, and had been given specific instructions not to impede the prince, the smell of human flesh from any vessel was enough to summon them.
"Leave him," Gilgamesh snarled in their primitive language, and the reptilian creature slowly lowered its scythe and allowed Berkut to pass. One could not be too patient with gargoyles; they were ravenous and stupid, a dangerous combination. Despite the curt tongue lashing from its master, the gargoyle licked its lips hungrily, its scythe screeching along the floor as it took off.
"Since when could you talk to Terrors?" Berkut asked, catching up to Gilgamesh. They paused at the stairwell leading down into the basement, where Duma's ashes had been laid to rest so many centuries before. Until now.
"There are many things I have yet to tell you, but in due time. Right now, we must prepare the rites, before more of those parasites show up."
Berkut initially thought of the gargoyles, but soon realized Gilgamesh was referring to something else entirely.
"You mean...those gems are coming here?"
Their footsteps and voices echoed around them as they descended into the murky darkness.
"That is why the orange one was here, I'm afraid. We will have company, though even I have no idea what they intend to do when they arrive."
The climb seemed to last an eternity, and the smell of dry soil was growing stronger and the air thinner. Finally, they stepped out into the vast darkness of the mausoleum. No torches had been lit yet, and the lack of oxygen was beginning to manifest as shadows, darting hitherto in and out of the darkest corners of the room. With a snap of Gilgamesh's fingers, flames erupted from their torches, and the smell of oil filled the room.
Berkut had already dropped to his knees. Upon the crimson carpet leading up to the altar where Duma was resting, was the corpse of a beautiful young woman. Her hair fell over her eyes in light curls like light blue waves in a pond, and though she was ghastly pale, the minimal light of the two flickering candles on the steps below her managed to capture her beauty in their amber glow.
"R...rin…"
The tears came, as Gilgamesh had expected them to. He placed a hand on the boy's shoulder.
"I'll tear Alm apart limb from limb for this...I'll gut that wench of his as payback."
"There will be no need for that," Gilgamesh interrupted, pacing towards the altar and extinguishing the two candles with his fingers. He picked up Rinea's corpse in his arms, carrying her over to her waiting husband.
"Are you saying Alm didn't do this?"
"No," Gilgamesh said, setting Rinea down at Berkut's feet. "I did."
Total silence engulfed the room. Not one candle or torch flickered. Berkut, who was typically so easy to read, regarded Gilgamesh as if he had never met the man before.
"I...you...what?"
"Rinea has never served you. She never served us. Even when she was ordered by you to poison Rudolf, she could not perform the task. Her mind was compromised with morality. Plain, simple, pathetic morality."
Berkut could hardly believe what he was hearing. But as he rolled his wife's corpse over, the holes in her chest was all it took to convince him. Even in death, she was breathtaking, like a fresco painting. A fresh torrent of tears came forth.
"I understand your pain, but as the retainer of our new world, you will be far too busy to love or begin a family. You must release all of your terrestrial holdings, for none of them will be spared the horror that is to come. Fernand was only the first."
How could Berkut prepare for this reality when, in every fantasy he had ever had, Rinea had been by his side.
"You killed...my wife."
Speaking the words aloud gave him confirmation, and rage mingled with grief in his chest. His head began to pound, in tune with the pounding of his heart.
"Do not make the same mistake as Rinea. You must concentrate all of your energy into…"
"You killed my wife," Berkut repeated, louder than before.
"Do not think your grief permits you to interrupt me…"
"You killed my wife!" Berkut screamed, drawing his sword and pointing it at Gilgamesh. It took a lot to spook the King of Knights, but in his panic to back away from the boy, he had launched one of his swords in the prince's direction. It barely missed Berkut's head, instead crashing into the opposite wall.
"My prince," Gilgamesh said, holding his hands out appeasingly. "I beseech you not to act irrationally. Can you not see how close we are? The world we've always wanted, it's there for the taking. Don't let this fleeting moment of anguish tear you away from the perfect world you've always envisioned."
Berkut's sword trembled in his hands, scattering silver flakes of light around the room. He pushed a lock of brown hair out of his eyes and continued.
"Did you even stop to think, for a moment, why I wanted to rule the world?"
Though his voice was strained, every syllable he spoke had meaning. It was a quality Gilgamesh had yet to hear out of the boy. It was not the superficial voice Berkut adopted around commoners, but it was somehow even more powerful.
"I don't hate the peasantry, like you do. I don't hate humanity, even though I've seen the depths to which it can sink."
Berkut wiped the tears from his eyes, but they sprung out again as he looked at the beautiful corpse in his arms.
"Rinea grew up in a peasant family. Every day, her father would abuse her in a drunken stupor. That was how I met her, you know. I came across her father, flogging her simply because she had allowed a basket of eggs to fall from her hand. That day, I saved her, and Rudolf allowed her to live in the castle with us. Two months later, I proposed.
"It's taken me all this time to realize I was wrong to blame her father for the life she led. The Gods have forsaken this planet, left millions of people to starve and rot in their own squalor. That basket of eggs Rinea was carrying? That was their dinner for a week. I would never defend anyone who abused Rinea, but somewhere, deep within my soul, I can understand the pressure of having a family to raise. I may never have experienced it myself, but having traveled the Rigelian countryside with you, his actions are mere child's play to what I've seen."
For the first time, Berkut felt comfort in the words he spoke. They did not come from the mouth of a false prince, but from the very recesses of his heart. Though Gilgamesh's crimson eyes flickered venomously with every word, Berkut continued, knowing every word was keeping him at bay.
"When Duma spoke to me all those seasons ago, when I first came to this part of the country, he told me you would be the key to changing the world. To make a world where people didn't have to cross blades in the name of selfish politics. A world where people didn't starve themselves, simply to allow their children to survive. Like you, I wanted to change the world...but only to make it better. I can see now that you only care about the destruction of humanity. And I can see now that Duma was wrong!"
Berkut kept his sword raised, prepared for a weapon to be launched at him for speaking out of turn. For speaking ill of Duma. Instead, Gilgamesh lowered his head appraisingly, and nodded calmly.
"I must say, I am most impressed you have deduced at least a portion of my true purpose. You have provided me the human blueprint for changing the world, a simple set of ideals that only a human could comprehend. Allow me to share the true desire of the Gods.
"Humanity is but a fleeting stain in the passage of time. A stain of impressive technical feats, definitive works of art, sure. But also of bloodshed. Of charity, and foolhardy conviction. The ballad of humanity is a confusing one. Capable of doing good, but unable to help themselves when the opportunity to commit evil appears. With humanity gone, the Gods can impress their mores upon the world once again. There is simply no such thing as a utopia where humans rein."
Berkut shook his head.
"You're insane."
Gilgamesh's forehead bulged impatiently.
"On the contrary, you simply cannot understand the methodology of the Gods. The pain of watching the world that we once traversed, and charitably handed over to mortal beings, go to waste."
"Unless you've forgotten," Berkut said with a savage smile. "You are still my servant."
"The command seals were in your wife's employ. Now she is dead. You're smart enough to know what that means.
Berkut closed his eyes, and inhaled deeply.
"I will prevent you from accomplishing what you desire."
"Berkut, I will give you one last chan-"
"Save it!" the prince snapped. The torches in the room flickered ominously. "Right here and now, I will put an end to this."
But the instant Berkut raised his sword, there was a flash of golden light, and a dagger pierced his hand. His sword fell to the ground, and clutching his hand, Berkut followed. Rinea tumbled out of his grip, rolling delicately across the floor.
The light of the Gates of Babylon had obscured Gilgamesh's features, although Berkut could tell the King of Heroes was not enjoying himself like he typically would. Using his good hand, Berkut attempted to pull himself towards his sword by wrapping his fingers around bumps in the uneven flooring.
"Do not struggle," Gilgamesh said in a monotone voice. Berkut only turned his head in response, baring bloodstained teeth at him, while still inching closer to his sword.
A second, larger weapon skewered Berkut's shoulder blade, and howling in pain, he finally gave up his pursuit. His head lolled to the side, so that he was face to face with Rinea. His wife, who would've ruled their new world together with him. The woman he had loved from the moment he had helped her to her feet that fateful day, and the woman he would be joining soon enough.
Gilgamesh closed his eyes, unable to watch as the killing blow, in the form of an ancient spear with Sanskrit origins, crushed Berkut's skull. For the better part of an hour, Gilgamesh merely sat on the stairs leading up to Duma's altar, looking back and forth between the two young people whose lives had been cut short because of him.
He had already committed so many atrocities (at least in the human sense) to that point, and these two murders had hardly been the worst. Nevertheless, there was a sort of innocence to the way the two corpses were looking at each other that made Gilgamesh's chest hurt.
The sound of heavy wingbeats, echoing off the walls of the mausoleum, indicated that he was about to be visited by gargoyles. The creature studied the two corpses hungrily, before telling Gilgamesh in its screeching drivel of a language that Alm was on his way.
Alm…
Before Berkut had died, Gilgamesh had not revealed that Alm was, indeed, his true master. Whether the boy prince had any idea of this did not phase Gilgamesh, however; it was too late. His strength was far too great to be contained by a mere command seal, and Duma would crush the boy in his iron maws.
Suddenly, a horrific idea came to Gilgamesh, one that brought an abrupt end to his brief moment of humanity. Perhaps Berkut and Rinea could still be useful after all...