Following that monumental duel, the citizens of Uruk observed a subtle shift in their great King’s daily routine.
Simply put, the frequency of the King’s solo excursions dwindled, and the stretches of time he spent remaining within the city walls grew significantly longer.
The primary catalyst for this change was, naturally, the continuous presence of his dearest friend, Enkidu.
It had to be said that the deities of the heavens had spared absolutely no expense when fashioning Enkidu.
This newly deployed Chain of Heaven wasn’t merely capable of matching Li Xiang to a perfect stalemate in raw combat; it also demonstrated breathtaking wisdom and unparalleled efficiency when managing convoluted administrative state affairs.
The two of them operated in perfect harmony.
Backed by the seamless assistance of this divine creation, the mountains of cuneiform clay tablets that used to occupy half of Li Xiang’s day were now reliably dispatched in practically half the time.
Yet the core reason Li Xiang was willing to settle down within the city was that he no longer needed to scour the far corners of the mortal earth just to find a decent fight.
His demigod physique generated a near-revolting pool of vitality and stamina on a daily basis.
Previously, he was forced to vent this energy by deep-diving into primeval forests to pulverize ancient magical beasts.
Now, he merely needed to unleash his full capabilities against Enkidu for a few rounds upon the training grounds outside the city to comfortably burn off the vast majority of his over-abundant energy.
Of course, the golden throne of Uruk ultimately couldn’t permanently confine a soul that yearned for the expansive horizons of the world.
The duo maintained a healthy schedule of traveling abroad for adventures.
After all, this mythic, ancient earth still held far too many uncharted realms to map out and an infinite array of wondrous experiences to catalog.
More critically…
before he went to sleep every single night, he still had to journey down to the Underworld to present Ereshkigal with her nightly bedtime story!
If he didn’t constantly wander the world to experience fresh events, his library of storytelling material would inevitably run completely bone-dry!
To ensure the lonely goddess of death never harbored a look of disappointment upon her face, Li Xiang naturally grew increasingly diligent when it came to gathering fresh inventory from the surface world.
Out of the infinite array of adventures Li Xiang and Enkidu shared side-by-side, the encounter that brought Li Xiang the greatest sense of martial satisfaction—and the one that felt the most thoroughly exhilarating—was undoubtedly their clash against Humbaba, the Guardian of the Cedar Forest.
This particular encounter had originally been facilitated by Enkidu.
Prior to descending upon Uruk, Enkidu had wandered the vast wilderness and formed an acquaintance with Humbaba, the terrifying divine beast assigned by the gods to protect the Cedar Forests of Lebanon.
One day, Enkidu offhandedly suggested introducing its old friend to Gilgamesh.
Li Xiang had accepted the proposal with immense enthusiasm.
When the duo crossed interlocking mountain ranges and arrived before the colossal, sun-blotting cedar grove, Humbaba materialized before them, locked in a state of absolute vigilance.
The initial dialogue was actually exceptionally pleasant.
Because Li Xiang’s personal temperament completely lacked the haughty, isolated arrogance of the original Gilgamesh, he exuded a natural, easygoing familiarity.
Combined with Enkidu constantly operating as a smooth diplomatic bridge between them, Li Xiang rapidly established a comfortable rapport with the massive, brutally disfigured protector of the forest.
This creature, widely reviled by mortals as a walking catastrophe, actually possessed an incredibly pure, straightforward mind.
However, as their conversation flowed, the trajectory of the encounter began veering drastically off course.
Because Li Xiang’s hands…
were beginning to itch for a fight.
Staring at the colossal entity before him—which radiated a suffocating divine pressure from the Age of Gods, its massive musculature coiled like cords of tempered iron—Li Xiang’s combat instincts flared violently, crying out for a brawl.
Humbaba was easily one of the absolute finest, top-tier melee brawlers he had encountered since arriving in this world.
Since things had played out like this, and everyone was technically friends now, it shouldn’t be considered an insult for friends to engage in a solid martial sparring session, right?
Battle is glorious!
Upon receiving Humbaba’s bewildered consent, Li Xiang let out a booming laugh.
Snapping his twin colossal greatswords from his back, he transformed into a roaring artillery shell, initiating a wild, frontal charge against the divine catastrophe.
Boom, Rumble—!!!
An earth-shattering cacophony instantly shattered the tranquility of the Cedar Forest.
Li Xiang’s combat methodology remained a perfect marriage of sheer violence and breathtaking aesthetic artistry.
He didn’t rely solely upon the Gate of Babylon to execute a boring, blanket carpet bombardment.
Instead, under his refined control, the ripples of his treasury operated like a synchronized web of lethal, floating turrets.
While he engaged Humbaba head-on, trading bone-crushing sword slashes against the entity’s colossal claws, he smoothly directed the contents of his treasury.
The divine weapons erupting from the void precisely locked down Humbaba’s mobility, systematically disrupting its kinetic momentum to consistently carve out opening windows for Li Xiang’s devastating heavy cleaves.
Blade meeting flesh, impact drawing blood.
This white-knuckle, adrenaline-fueled melee brawl raged continuously through the entirety of the day.
When the crimson hues of the setting sun finally bled across the fallen rows of shattered cedar trees, the curtains of the match drew to a definitive close.
In the end, it was the blonde youth—wielding his twin greatswords, covered from head to toe in grime and sweat, yet wearing a dazzlingly triumphant smile—who stood victoriously before the collapsed form of Humbaba.
Since the entire purpose of the clash was strictly to satisfy his desire for a martial exchange, Li Xiang had executed his final strike with flawless, pinpoint restraint.
Humbaba did not suffer the grim fate recorded in original myth; it was merely completely drained of stamina and immobilized by deep bruising.
Collapsed flat upon the earth, it panted heavily for air, staring up at the mortal before it as if looking at an absolute monster.
Shortly after, the thoroughly thrashed divine beast wholeheartedly accepted Gilgamesh as a remarkably powerful, honorable new friend.
The two men and the colossal beast sat side-by-side upon a fallen giant redwood, gazing into the sunset as their unified laughter echoed across the canopy of the forest.
However, this spectacular clash on the surface world unleashed a massive shockwave across the celestial heavens.
The deities gazed upon the transmitted images of the battle, left utterly speechless with shock.
Within the rails of established destiny, Humbaba was supposed to be a cataclysmic disaster that required the unified, desperate coordination of both Gilgamesh and Enkidu—further requiring the Sun God Shamash to actively deploy thirteen fierce tempests from the heavens—just to narrowly secure a grueling victory.
Yet in this reality, the King of Uruk had single-handedly, completely solo-farmed Humbaba using nothing but two iron greatswords, all while Enkidu stood entirely on the sidelines casually eating snacks and watching the show.
Even if it was classified as a friendly sparring session, it remained a battle won strictly by Gilgamesh alone.
This reality forced the pantheon of gods to once again confront that deep, brewing sensation of absolute dread known as “losing control.”
Naturally, Li Xiang—currently resting comfortably upon a cedar log, happily calculating what fresh storytelling material he would present to Ereshkigal in the Underworld tonight—didn’t give a single damn about what the gods were plotting.
What he failed to perceive, however, was that directly above the epicenter of the battlefield, at the highest point where the sunlight pierced through the shifting cloud cover, a solitary figure resting upon a magnificent celestial vessel crafted from gold and radiant gemstones was watching his every move with unblinking eyes.
It was a goddess possessing an exceptionally breathtaking, voluptuous silhouette, clad in attire that was incredibly revealing yet dripping with absolute divine majesty.
Her long hair, as deep and infinite as the midnight sky, was tied into prominent twin tails on either side of her head.
That flawlessly beautiful face, currently twisted into a slightly mischievous, wicked smirk, was an exact mirror image of the goddess who ruled the Underworld—yet her overall aura was polar opposite.
The Mistress of Heaven, the Goddess of Venus—Ishtar.
“Oh my?
So he is the King of Uruk whom even Enkidu failed to permanently chain down?”
Ishtar leaned against the edge of her celestial boat, Maanna, her eyes firmly locked onto the golden-haired youth below who was currently smiling brightly with his twin greatswords.
“I originally dismissed him as nothing more than a crude, uncivilized monkey.
Who would have thought…
whether it’s that remarkably robust physique, or that arrogant display of rubbing a divine beast into the dirt, he unexpectedly suits my tastes perfectly.”
A certain heavenly goddess—infamous for her volatile, malicious temperament and an absolute obsession with claiming every single glittering treasure under the heavens as her personal property—let the corners of her mouth curl into a highly dangerous arc.
It appeared she had developed an exceptionally profound interest in this King of Heroes.