Ankoku Kishi Monogatari (WN)

◆Black Haired Sage; Chiyuki

Nabate Mountain was a rocky mountain located on the borders of Apophis and Gypseal. The rocky mountain wasn’t very high and had several valleys that stretched from the eastern side to the western side.

We would enter the Apophis territory once we crossed this mountain. The pyramid we were looking for was located right at the very end of Gypseal's border. The Serpent Queen, ruler of Apophis, had snatched it when it was still under construction. And this all happened because of a certain prince’s idiotic impulses.

The original people in charge of the construction progress were Harsesh and Isdes, with Harsesh being the person in charge of supervising the construction. According to him, he had already put a flawless defensive measure and yet, the enemy was able to bypass it.

That's why it sounds like a blatant poor excuse.

Our flying ship descended on a huge valley of the rocky mountain.

We wouldn't attack the pyramid right away. We pretty much knew that our enemy would be expecting our arrival, so a surprise attack would only make it easier for them to turn the tables against us.

That's why we scrapped the surprise attack from our plan.

Since that was the case, the only way left for us was building a good strategy for our raid.

We hid our flying ship and walked to the valley.

「Is there a reason behind us descending into the valley? There seems to be nothing here.」

I asked the one thing that piqued my curiosity in our raid plan.

It seems both Ishtar and Reiji felt the same way as me.

It was obvious once I saw their faces.

By the way, I had no idea what was in Totona's mind since she was as expressionless as ever. Nelfriti didn't seem to be that interested in this matter, and Medjed's face was covered by a piece of cloth.

「You're wrong in that regard, Chiyuki-dono. There is something in here.」

The one who replied was Isdes.

「What’s here then?」

「Humph!! You will naturally know once we arrive. Just follow us for now.」

Harsesh pouted as he replied to Reiji's question.

Harsesh had been in a bad mood since a while ago.

It seems he was completely displeased by the fact that Reiji could summon the high rank spirit of light, Bennu.

And then, after walking for a while.

「UWAAA!」

My voice leaked out spontaneously.

It happened a while after we walked into the valley. A structure made by carving the cliff vertically appeared before us.

It was an extremely fine structure with a lot of ornaments.

「This is Kazunel Palace. One of the locations the dwarves created as an anti-Apophis measure. Our operation will start from this place.」

Isdes explained to us the structure.

"Hee~" That's what I thought when we were about to enter the palace.

A lot of armed skeletons appeared from the ground. Skeletons could stay active in this place since no sunlight entered the Palace.

「What are these skeletons doing in this place?」

Reiji unsheathed his sword as he spoke.

「Hold on, these skeletons aren't enemies. O Nephthys!! Come out to greet us!!」

Right after Isdes shouted those words, people with bandages coiled around their bodies appeared from inside the building.

Their figure looked like that of a human. But, they were not living creatures.

They might be the undead–mummies.

The mummies went on their knees immediately with their hands crossed in front of their chest.

It seems the skeleton were Isdes' subordinate too.

I knew about mummies when I did some investigation about the pyramid.

The mummies were the undead created by Isdes to act as the wardens of the pyramid.

Their intelligence was about the same as vampires.

One thing that distinguished them from vampires was the fact that they didn't need to suck blood like them.

Since the pyramid was built in a rather desolated place, the mummies who had no need for supply were the best choice as wardens.

Normally, they spent their time inside their casket, only waking up when they detected something unusual.

Maybe because there were corpses called mummies inside the pyramid that people often mistook it as a tomb.

And since the pyramid was made with gold, many tomb raiders were trying to steal it to get rich.

Nevertheless, those invaders were put into eternal slumber by the mummies’ greatest forte, the death curse.

Even if some of them managed to escape due to their devil’s luck, they had to wear a magic cloth for the rest of their lives even if they lived in a place with sunlight.

Reason being those survivors would be hunted down for the rest of their lives.

「WE HAVE BEEN WAITING FOR YOU, OUR GOD!!」

A hooded figure wearing the most gorgeous Nemes attire appeared from within the crowd of mummies.

He’s probably Nephthys.

From his attire, it was fairly obvious that he was the mummy lord, a superior species of the mummies, maybe an existence that should be hailed as the tomb king.

「Nephthys, how are preparations going?」

「Our God, we've already put as many mummies as we can around the vicinity of the pyramid.」

The mummy lord, Nephthys, bowed as he replied to Isdes.

Seeing that situation, I saw a strong bond between Isdes and Nephthys.

Nephthys might be the creature that was created by Isdes.

The God of War Isdes was the best swordsman in Gypseal. At the same time, he was an excellent necromancer. Strong warriors in Gypseal could gain immortality by becoming mummies under Isdes.

For that reason, Isdes was revered as the God who created mummies.

In that regard, they're regarded as the valkyrie version of Gypseal.

The majority of mummies were ex-humans who chose to become one for their own different reasons.

Maybe it was simply because they faced some problems, or maybe they had some reservations, but non of the mummies were previously of the beast kin.

「Well then great being. Please follow me.」

When Nephthys said so, the mummies stood up and split to the left and right, opening a path for their lord.

Upon entering the Kazunel palace, we arrived in a vast hall.

It seems the scale inside the palace was worlds apart compared with the entrance.

「Nephthys, how's the latest situation inside the stolen pyramid?」

「Yes!! I shall show you the image.」

After Nephthys said so, the mummy sorcerer by his side recited a spell.

The light from the dome-shaped ceiling projected an enlarged image.

The screen reflected the image of a black pyramid shrouded by black fog.

Since there were countless will-o-wisps flying around the black pyramid beneath the night sky, it was possible even for someone without night vision ability to see the surroundings.

Moreover, there were skeleton knights emitting a pale blue light, riding on black horses around the pyramid.

They were a superior race of undead called specter knights.

These undead could use the mid-rank spirit of darkness, the nightmare horse, and were adept in both close range and long range combat.

I also saw other monsters such as wraith or ghosts.

There were a lot of them.

They might be on high alert.

「How dare those bastard paint our prided pyramid black!!」

Harsesh cursed annoyingly.

So the pyramid's original color wasn't black eh.

On the other side of the pyramid, the crest of the evil eye, the symbol of the Serpent Queen Diadona, was painted in white.

As if to tell the others that this pyramid was their property.

「What's happening? The image seems to be disturbed?」

「My apologies, Our God. It seems the invocation of our magic got disturbed by a powerful wave of magical power.」

Nephthys was apologizing to Isdes.

Maybe not even my magic could help stabilize the image.

From the image, I felt a powerful wave of magical power from the pyramid.

「Hey, don't you think that the size of the pyramid is bigger than usual?」

I voiced my impression after I saw the pyramid.

Many pyramids that were built in Arnak and Gypseal were simply the copy of the golden pyramid made by God Heibos.

Since the fundamental structure was the same, they should be pretty much similar to each other.

And yet, the black pyramid was obviously at least three times bigger than a normal pyramid.

「You're right, Black Haired Sage. It seems they’ve revised the plan since they reeived full protection from Apophis. But then, the reason it got robbed from us is because the completion got delayed.」

OH NO!!

I almost retorted to Isdes' remark.

「Those guys had never gone inside this far until now. We were very careless, and they used our carelessness to ambush us. The dwarves workers and Harsesh-sama retreated at once.」

Nephthys hung his head down.

Nephthys might have been present during that time.

Aren't they literally inviting Apophis of all people to raid the pyramid that has yet to be finished?

They were too idiotic.

For that very reason, there was an opening on the barrier surrounding Gypseal due to the existence of the black pyramid.

Both Harsesh and Isdes seemed to have gotten chewed up alive by Sekhmetra due to their blunder.