Miss Hebe Is Charging Through the Lostbelts! [39]

Cyno and the others traveled upstream along the Nile.

Their boats were archaic in design, both ends sharply upturned. They were vessels the Ram school had modeled after the solar barque.

Though they could not sail through the air like Ozymandias’s throne and could only travel on water, they were still very fast.

In myth, the great god Ra rode the solar barque across the sky from east to west. At night, the solar barque sailed through the river of the underworld. Along the way, Ra defeated twelve monsters, thereby ushering in the next dawn. That was how a full day was formed in Egyptian myth.

If nothing went wrong, they would reach the vicinity of Abydos in half a day at most.

But things did not go as smoothly as expected.

On the boat, one soldier casually scooped up a handful of Nile water. The water rippled in his palm, its color faintly red beneath the sunlight.

“Something’s wrong…”

Cyno had no time for anything more. He quickly leaned his upper body over the side of the boat, his eyes fixed on the river.

Under everyone’s frightened gazes, the waves spreading from both sides of the hull rapidly began to bubble. The bubbles were pale pink, clinging together like clusters of grapes, but in the eyes of those watching, they looked more like bloody foam spraying from the mouth of a dying man, or exposed alveoli after a chest had been cut open.

Those bubbles quickly burst. Immediately afterward, a dark red churned up and replaced the clear river water from only a few dozen seconds before.

A sharp stench of blood gradually rose into the air. Even their vision began to blur.

One of the Nine Calamities, Blood of Isis!

Just as Horus was to Scar-Father, and Set was to Remnant Wolf, Isis was an Aspect of the Seventh Consul: Holy Grail!

This disaster only occurred around bodies of water. Unlike the Plague of Osiris, it would not seize lives on a massive scale as darkness fell. It would only pollute water sources, causing all water to give off a piercing reek of blood and killing every living thing within it.

“Stay calm! Everyone, get to shore!” Cyno shouted. “Keep away from the blood water!”

He issued orders calmly, and that bearing gave everyone present something to anchor themselves to. The fleet slowly approached the bank.

Yet inwardly, he was nowhere near as composed as he appeared.

Fortunately, the Ibis King is not far behind us. Right now, all we can do is reach Abydos as quickly as possible.

While Cyno was thinking, the hull suddenly began to pitch violently. The blood water surged into a whirlpool, and a tremendous suction came from below, dragging at the boat he was riding and refusing to let it near the shore.

Immediately afterward, a low muttering abruptly sounded from beneath the water.

A crocodilian beast with compound eyes on its head and scale armor over its body broke out of the water, leaping up as it slammed toward the boat.

The portion of its body that emerged above the surface alone was several meters long. Even more terrifying was the fact that this enormous creature could actually survive in the depths of the Nile now that it had turned to blood.

“Fuck!” Cyno had no time to draw his sword. He could only clench his right fist and smash it into the great crocodile’s long snout.

Thud!

The wooden boat spun and crashed against the bank. Dark-red blood water surged up from beneath the hull. The crocodile wailed, threw back its head, and plunged into the river, where it began thrashing in agony.

The power of sorcery roared through Cyno’s fingers, evaporating the splashed blood water in an instant.

He quickly jumped onto the riverbank.

The foul, bloody river churned like a chaotic hell. The huge crocodile sank into the water, and it was unclear whether it had died or gone to lick its wounds.

Their boats also sank into the river one after another, without raising even a trace of spray.

Sinking along with the boats were the hearts of everyone who witnessed the scene—their once-high morale plummeted in an instant.

An unfavorable start was the most damaging blow to morale.

Everyone once again turned their eyes to Cyno, waiting for his next order.

“How much food and clean water do we have left? Have we lost any weapons?”

After receiving an affirmative answer, Cyno said calmly, “Since we have both supplies and weapons, what are you so dejected for? Besides, the Ibis King is right behind us. Do you truly think Your Excellency Imhotep would sit back and watch us march to our deaths?”

The crowd murmured among themselves, drawing confidence once more from Cyno’s certainty.

“Move out. Make the most of our time.” Cyno waved a hand. “This time, we go by land.”

The land route would take slightly longer, but it was safer and more stable… or should have been.

…

After the second encounter with sand bandits, Cyno ordered them to stop holding back.

They had already been delayed long enough, and among all the obstacles on this road, sand bandits foolish enough to get in their way were the easiest to deal with.

If they encountered a disaster, they could only take a detour.

And on this journey, what stirred the most unease and anxiety was the large-scale beast packs.

These monsters, which ordinarily hid all traces of themselves, appeared before them in groups, and the closer they drew to Abydos, the more frequently they appeared.

Something has happened in Abydos, Cyno thought.

He was unwilling to indulge in endless worst-case speculation. All he could do was lead the group onward. At the end of their silent march, they finally saw their intended destination.

In rumor, this was a city no lesser than Memphis. The Abydos King List and temples here had created a solemn scale of majesty, and the genealogies of several dynasties were long remembered in this place.

Yet now, heavy clouds circled in the sky above Abydos. A scorching burning wind howled as it shattered the outer walls, turning this city that had stood here for centuries upon centuries into a gray-yellow ruin.

Winged venomous serpents coiled atop the tall obsidian obelisks. On the city streets already buried in drifting sand, tens of thousands of poisonous scorpions made spine-chilling sounds as they laid eggs, hatched, and slaughtered one another without end.

The rooms that had once housed residents had become nests for venomous birds. Their shriveled bodies were covered in greasy feathers, and they let out hoarse, piercing wails, announcing the end of this city.

Abydos was finished.

They had still come one step too late, and could only witness the city’s end.

Cyno no longer had time to think about what this represented. He immediately ordered the group to slowly withdraw farther away—during the time they had spent observing, the great winged serpents circling in the storm had already begun to slither toward them.

…

Cyno was lucky. They had not personally witnessed the descent of the Breath of Set. It was an exceedingly abnormal and terrifying sight; the mere act of seeing it would cause an extremely severe Drift, or even direct Distortion.

Nitocris had evacuated frost-covered Abydos at the first opportunity, but she had not truly gone far.

Though she had some guesses about Hebe’s arrangements, she still could not truly believe that Ozymandias would destroy Abydos.

The reason was simple. The Temple of Kings was here.

It was the place where the pharaohs of every age were worshipped, as well as the site of many pharaohs’ tombs.

In other words, it functioned both as an ancestral temple and as the family graveyard.

It was like a young thug rumored to commit every crime under the sun. No matter how rotten and despicable the rumors made him out to be, surely he would not go so far as to dig up his own ancestral graves… But Ozymandias was no ordinary person.

Long ago, when he renounced the title of pharaoh, he had already burned the past kings within the Temple of Kings as fuel.

So what pressure could there be for Ozymandias in destroying Abydos, now nothing more than an empty shell?

The burning wind and sandstorm arrived just like that.

Nitocris suddenly felt somewhat cold. She was utterly disappointed in the Ozymandias she had once looked up to.

She silently gazed at Abydos, watching destruction descend upon the dead within the city.

…

First came the burning wind and sandstorm, sealing Abydos off completely.

Immediately afterward, all the water reserves in the entire city turned foul and rancid, never to be used again.

Large numbers of flies and maggots bred in the rotten water.

In theory, the dead within the city should not have been affected, but chaos was somehow born among them—these soundless dead actually began resisting Nitocris’s control, attempting to realize “freedom.”

To avoid being discovered, Nitocris cut off her control.

The soundless dead launched a terrible riot. Their shriveled bodies had no blood, yet under the influence of the disaster, they still acted according to the instincts that remained from life.

And so the entire city, from top to bottom and bottom to top, went completely out of control.

The dead swayed silently with that terrible atmosphere. Some of the dead who had developed self-awareness tried to open the city gates and stop the chaos, but it was useless.

Very soon, the mere desire to continue existing became uncontrolled and alien. Under that bizarre, grotesque influence, the dead cast aside all sense of self. The changes appeared not only in their hearts, but reflected from within outward upon their bodies.

Those among the dead who had once loved procreation saw their cheekbones become more pronounced, their arms turning long and strange like wings, while the legs of their lower bodies atrophied from uselessness. Their reproductive organs grew increasingly robust, replacing their wasted legs as tools for movement, until their overall appearance was like that of snakes with wings.

Those who had once loved conflict saw their arms become ever stronger and more powerful, their hands mutating into pincers. As they lost arms fit for climbing, their ribs became nimble rows of legs, allowing them to move freely across sand and sheer walls, while their tailbones extended backward and grew stingers, like scorpions.

Those who had once loved power grew feathers across the surfaces of their bodies, covering the shriveled forms that otherwise had nothing left. They forever held their heads high, either circling in the clouds or perching in the high places of the city. They were easy to identify; aside from their bulging eyes, they looked like enormous birds.

This was the first origin of the monsters. Rather than corruption, it would be better called metamorphosis and atavism. The soundless dead had become the legion under Remnant Wolf’s command, and after several dozen rapid iterations, they had wholly become monsters.

By the time Cyno and the others arrived, the snakes, scorpions, and birds entrenched within the city had already lost all so-called humanity and intelligence.

This was the end of Abydos. Its splendid crown had fallen to the earth, and it no longer existed.

T/N: WHY IS HER BUTT SO??????????

This is a fan translation of 赫柏小姐正在杀出异闻带！ by 青散人 Rights to the original work belong to the creator. Please support them by exploring their original work or sharing it with others if you can. Thank you for reading and supporting my efforts to bring this story to a wider audience!