Miss Hebe is Slaughtering Her Way Out of the Lostbelt!

She walked over, seized the two stunned crocodiles by the necks from either side, and effortlessly strangled them to death.

These crocodiles were prison guards of the underworld, but their rank was low.

After dealing with the crocodiles, Hebe walked toward the old man lying on the ground, a staff entwined with two serpents now in her hand.

She tapped the old man with the other end of the Staff of Apep, and the wounds on his body healed.

Yet the old man was so terrified that his face had gone deathly pale. He could not even speak.

"Do not be afraid," Hebe said. "I will not pull out your tongues, nor will I take your lives."

"You are not slaves. You are free people."

"It is only that, for now, I can only win you one chance—a chance to live."

Hebe spoke calmly and struck the ground with her staff. Their wounds stopped hurting at once.

"If you want a glorious death, then stay where you are. Eventually, prison guards will come and take you away."

"But if you want to live, then get up and walk."

The people Hebe had healed lowered their heads. They cowered and did not dare look at her.

Hebe was not angry. She placed the hooks and broken blades from the crocodiles' hands beside them, then turned and walked toward the side away from the river.

The woman holding a child watched Hebe's receding figure. She opened her mouth, wanting to catch up, yet stopped in place.

"This... she really is a witch!"

The old man knelt on the ground, trembling as he looked at the blade whose tip had broken off but was still sharp.

"Only a witch would teach people to defy the king's orders, teach them to reject a glorious death—"

But the woman holding the child crouched down, gripped the sharp hook, and asked hoarsely, "Are you coming or not?"

The old man froze.

He looked at the blade on the ground, then grabbed its hilt. "From today onward, I'll follow the witch—"

"Let's go! Let's go!"

The old man gripped the blade, as though strength had returned to his body as well.

The woman held her child, a pointed hook clenched in her hand.

The child clapped and shouted happily.

"Go! Let's go!"

Thus, more people emerged from the drifting reeds. With their backs to the river, they pursued the direction Hebe had gone.

"Go where there is sunlight, to the land!"

"Go where that witch is going."

The old man heard someone say.

"The Red King has abandoned us. Then we'll follow the witch—she is our king."

The First Demon King

More and more people rose to their feet. More and more began to walk.

Following the figure holding the long staff, they gradually saw the light.

"We are following the light."

"We are following the Demon King."

"The Demon King is light, and light is the Demon King."

The crowd began whispering among themselves, saying strange things. Some fell behind, but more followed. The reeds gradually grew shorter, and several crocodiles lay dead by the roadside.

The starving people walked over and used the blades in their hands to cut the crocodiles into small pieces, passing them back one by one.

The old man held a blood-scented piece of meat, stuffed it into his mouth, chewed it a few times, and swallowed it.

The woman holding the child chewed the meat into a pulp and fed it to the child.

Only after they had finished eating did the old man belatedly remember. "Oh no, this is prison guard meat. The prison guards will come after us!"

"Don't be afraid, don't be afraid," many people said. "We have blades in our hands. We have weapons."

They forced themselves to keep walking, but no crocodile prison guards came to hunt them down.

Then they knew that the Demon King had driven all those crocodiles away.

The figure holding the long staff was not tall, yet she always walked at the very front.

The people saw the Demon King raise her staff and sweep it through the air. Then light appeared.

Supporting one another, they passed through the gates of Thebes, left the Osiris Plague behind, and saw the deep blue sky above them.

There were no reed marshes here, nor any dark blue-green river water. The air was dry, but clean.

For a time, the crowd stood still. They closed their eyes and savored the moment. Gradually, they recalled the memories of when the catastrophe had descended and shared the joy of rebirth with one another.

This delight lasted several minutes, until a young man stepped forward.

He raised a hand and shouted, "I'm going down the path the Demon King walked!"

"I'm going too! Me too!" More people cried out in unison.

"The Red King abandoned me. Egypt does not see me as its child," the young man said. "From this day onward, I am no longer Egyptian."

"So what?" someone said. "The Red King wants us dead, while the Demon King came to save us."

"But the Red King's rule over Egypt is eternal. Without His Majesty's protection, we will lose our homeland."

"So what if we lose our homeland? Was Egypt ever our home?"

The crowd argued. Some people left, heading toward Memphis.

"They'll probably sell us out to those nobles," those who remained murmured.

"It doesn't matter. If they wish to return to the cage, that is their freedom—we wish to leave that cage, and that is ours."

The young man rose to his feet. "If we are no longer Egyptians, then what should we call one another? I think one word may suit us best..."

He cleared his throat and spoke a single word.

"Sarkaz."

Restless, though she did not know why.

Perhaps because events had gone beyond her expectations, or perhaps because she had realized that the girl before her had caused an enormous disaster. In any case, Pepe felt deeply irritated.

Watching that group of people gradually depart filled her with an inexplicable annoyance.

"Why did you do this?" Pepe sat atop a damaged stone stele, her legs dangling. "Imma, do you know what cruel punishment you'll face for doing this?"

"Do you know that you are defying the decree of the god-king who reigns over the Great Red Sand Sea and all of Upper and Lower Egypt—the Sun God-King?"

"Do you know that by doing this, even death will become a luxury beyond your reach?"

"Even taking a step back, how long can these mortals survive beneath the Breath of Set that blows from time to time?"

Pepe frowned slightly. "Imma, all you needed to do was bring them back to Memphis."

After she finished speaking, Hebe let out a soft sigh.

"That god-king is destroying Egypt."

"..."

Pepe stared silently at Hebe.

She jumped down from the stele and landed soundlessly on the ground.

That inexplicable irritation had finally found its source. She walked over and fiercely pinched Hebe's cheek.

"Ozymandias is not destroying Egypt. On the contrary, He is preventing Egypt's destruction." Pepe gazed into those beautiful green eyes. "At any time, in any place, everyone must acknowledge this."

Hebe looked toward Thebes, which still lay sunken in darkness.

The Osiris Plague occurred only within the protective barrier. The king who ruled the so-called underworld was not Osiris, but Ozymandias, the Red King.

That was not a natural disaster, but a man-made calamity.

The other Calamities of the Ennead were the same.

The natural disasters the Egyptians fought against and the king they revered had always been one and the same.

"No, you don't understand at all—"

Pepe's voice rose several degrees, and the color of sunset suddenly appeared in her eyes.

The fresh fragrance of water lilies silently spread through the air.

"Do you know what Egypt was like three hundred years ago, Imma?"

"Back then, people still devoutly worshipped the gods, calling for their miracles to descend upon the wilderness. They regarded them as eternal glory. Egyptians believed so firmly that they walked alongside the gods."

"They adorned the gods' likenesses with gold, pleased their priests with spices, and offered the very best of everything to them, because they believed the gods would protect them through every moment from birth to death."

"Every Egyptian was like that, from pharaohs to commoners."

"Then the Nine Calamities descended." Pepe spoke faintly. "The nine great gods of the wilderness brought down nine disasters—without reason, without warning."

Osiris brought down a plague of darkness, Set stirred up an eternal scorching wind, Isis turned the Nile River into blood, Geb unleashed earthquakes, Tefnut made hail fall in the night, and Horus-Ra blinded every Egyptian's firstborn overnight...

"Ramesses II was consumed by regret, for he had foreseen the coming calamities in a dream long before they arrived, yet had not believed it."

"Even Nefertiti, the pharaoh's beloved, died amid the Nine Calamities."

"There were four million people throughout Upper and Lower Egypt. After the Nine Calamities, only one-fifth remained." Pepe spoke softly. "What had they done to deserve such baseless punishment?"

What happened afterward was recorded on murals, sculptures, and Papyrus Scrolls.

Ramesses II cast aside his old name, renounced the title of pharaoh, and abolished all worship of the gods. No one objected, because every objector had already been wiped out by the Nine Calamities.

After that, Ramesses II's life as a human came to an end.

He ascended, becoming both god and king—Ozymandias.

In the name of the Red King, He resolved to rule over the bodies and souls of the Egyptian people for eternity.

"So, Ozymandias was by no means a tyrant."

Yet as Pepe spoke those words, a helpless, bitter smile appeared on her face.

Even she herself could hear how weak and hollow those words sounded.

—To Egyptians three hundred years later, the Red King was no different from the Ennead.

"So that's how it was. His Majesty had been protecting Egypt... by carrying out destruction."

After a long silence, Hebe spoke softly.

Who Else Wants to Tell a Story

After abandoning all faith in the gods, Ozymandias ascended as the Scarlet Crowned God-King.

He unified the world's royal and divine authority. Under Ozymandias's rule, Upper and Lower Egypt flourished anew, and all things steadily developed according to the Red King's grand design.

Until, one hundred years later, Ozymandias lost control.

His desires grew ever more twisted and alien. Forced to visit calamity upon his own people, he used their spirituality to soothe his starving desires.

To that end, Ozymandias unearthed belief in the ancient beast gods once more, such as... Bestet.

The name Bestet first appeared during the Second Dynasty.

She had been worshipped since 3000 BC. At the time, she was Lower Egypt's goddess of war, contending with Sekhmet of Upper Egypt amid the yellow sands, oases, and wilderness.

They argued with blades, claws, flesh and bone, and courage. In those days, she understood every secret within sunlight—and secrets meant power.

Until a god symbolizing royal authority and vengeance arrived, casting them both down from the wilderness.

—February Archon Scarred Father.

This one-eyed, aged, and shrewd god seized their authority over war. Then, as the ages changed, the Brilliant Twins took the sun's place.