The familiar light, the familiar magic circle pattern, and the even more familiar captain's cabin.
Looking at the surroundings he knew so well, and the large group of people almost filling the entire cabin, Ethan could only force a helpless smile.
"As expected, I really screwed up."
By secretly luring away a soul under the God of Death's control without permission, Ethan had indeed enraged this powerful being.
The god had followed Ethan's mana fluctuations and launched an attack.
Ethan was fortunate that this god of death, perhaps used to dealing with mortals, chose first to punish the one who had offended him by using divine authority. As a result, the first strike had no effect on Ethan, an outsider.
Anubis quickly launched a second attack. Unfortunately for him, by then, Ethan had already sensed something was wrong and had decisively activated the teleportation magic circle to escape.
Ethan had been considerate. He didn't escape alone but brought everyone around him with him, preventing them from staying behind and facing the wrath of the God of Death.
Standing still and carefully sensing his surroundings, Ethan confirmed that Anubis, the god of death from the Mummy world, couldn't cross the planar barrier to pursue him into this world. He was safe now.
However, it hadn't come without a price.
"Ethan, your hand!"
Even Logan could see that something was wrong. Ethan's entire right hand, from the palm to halfway up his forearm, had turned black. Even as an untrained druid, he could clearly sense the heavy aura of death. This terrifying energy was not only corroding and destroying Ethan's hand and forearm, but it was also spreading upward.
"Loki!"
Loki and the others had already sensed Ethan's return, accompanied by a terrifying energy fluctuation. Both Loki and Selene realized something had gone wrong. Even without Ethan calling for them, they had rushed over.
Ignoring the crowd of unfamiliar faces, Loki saw Ethan's outstretched right hand, immediately pulled out his Ice Scepter, and cleanly severed Ethan's right forearm with the curved blade at its tip.
At the same time, the Ice Scepter's frost power erupted, instantly freezing the stump of Ethan's arm. The severed portion of the right arm was also encased in solid ice, sealing off the death aura within and preventing it from spreading.
Seeing that, although a trace of black death aura remained on Ethan's arm, it had stopped spreading, everyone breathed a small sigh of relief.
Only then did Loki ask what had happened.
He knew Ethan's current strength was no weaker than his own back then, maybe even stronger. Yet Ethan had taken a hit during his trip to the so-called Mummy world.
This made Loki very curious—what kind of being could have done this?
After Ethan gave a brief explanation of what had happened, Loki showed a rare hint of surprise upon hearing that the being who had injured Ethan hadn't even shown its true form and had attacked from another plane.
"It seems the world you visited this time wasn't as boring as I thought."
Anubis's attack had not been easy to withstand. Ethan had personally experienced the pure death energy it carried. He wasn't at all bothered by losing his hand, because if he wanted to, he could remove the remaining energy from his arm within a short time and then regenerate it completely with his powerful self-healing ability.
He simply found this death energy to be extremely pure, and energy of this purity wasn't easy to find. He wanted to study it carefully.
When everyone heard Ethan's plan, they were speechless. Even at a time like this, he was thinking about studying the God of Death's energy? Wasn't that a little too confident?
Several people in the room were completely confused. Evelyn, her brother Jonathan, and O'Connell were like people who had been shot by dozens of stray bullets—they'd been dragged out of their own world without warning. When they heard that they were now in another world, they thought Ethan and the others were joking.
Imhotep, on the other hand, was silent. But this silence wasn't reassuring. Everyone could feel the explosive excitement hidden beneath it. Fortunately, Ethan spoke up and calmed him down.
"Don't get agitated. Although I angered the God of Death this time, I also successfully summoned Anck-su-namun's soul."
Imhotep, who had been ready to fight Ethan to the death, felt more than half his fury disappear upon hearing this. The remaining anger didn't vanish completely because he still doubted whether Ethan was telling the truth.
If Ethan could prove that he had indeed summoned Anck-su-namun's soul, this anger might instantly turn into gratitude.
If Ethan was lying, then the rage that had dissipated would quickly return, and it might be even more intense than before. At this moment, Imhotep hadn't realized that, because his connection to his gods had been severed, all his mana had disappeared.
Of course, Ethan wasn't lying. He disdained using such tricks. There was a real reason why the God of Death had been so furious.
Besides having a soul forcibly taken from his jurisdiction, what truly enraged Anubis was that something had been done that he had explicitly forbidden: drawing a soul from his realm into another world's realm of the dead.
That place was the Holy Light Cross, which had been undergoing mysterious changes.
Ever since the Holy Light Cross began to change back in the Resident Evil world, Ethan had been paying close attention to it. During the forced summoning of Anck-su-namun's soul, Ethan had been surprised to find that the Holy Light Cross had the effect of attracting the dead, and could even host their souls. Using the Holy Light Cross in combination with summoning spells produced remarkable results.
Of course, this act of "soul-snatching" completely enraged Anubis. After the first attack failed, he immediately launched a more powerful second attack. Even though Ethan escaped in time, he still took a hit.
But overall, Ethan hadn't suffered any real losses. He had achieved his primary goal. The only unexpected thing was the significantly enhanced status of the Holy Light Cross.
He swiped his left hand across his chest, then extended it outward. A soft golden-yellow light flashed, and a gate glowing with a holy aura appeared out of thin air in front of everyone.
As the gate opened, a woman who was semi-transparent, existing between reality and illusion, stepped out.
"Anck-su-namun!"
Imhotep rushed forward immediately, but when he tried to embrace his beloved, he found he couldn't touch her at all.
He turned to Ethan. Now, all his hope rested on this powerful spellcaster. Just moments ago, when he tried to cast a spell to resurrect Anck-su-namun, he was shocked to find that he had no mana left in his body.
"This isn't your world. Your mana comes from the deities you served, and from the curses placed upon you," Ethan shrugged. "Obviously, those gods can't reach us here."
Imhotep nodded. But he didn't care about that right now. He was far more concerned about whether Anck-su-namun could be resurrected.
"She can."
Ethan quickly gave a firm answer and pointed to the side. The reason he had taken a hit from the God of Death wasn't because he couldn't dodge—it was because he had taken the strike to bring Anck-su-namun's body back with him.
"I keep my promises."
With her soul, her original body, and Ethan possessing the Fountain of Life that could restore vitality, there were no major obstacles to Anck-su-namun's resurrection.
Especially since there were no "shackles" attached to her soul, the resurrection would be true and complete, with no side effects.
This attempt by Ethan could be considered as finding a workaround that wasn't really a workaround.
Snatch the soul and run before the god reacts.
If it were a world like the Mummy world, where gods clearly existed, Ethan probably wouldn't go back again. But if it were a world like Marvel, where it was unclear whether anyone governed hell, he might only need to dodge the initial backlash from violating a rule.
If the other side was a realm governed by impersonal rules, Ethan wouldn't even need to take a hit. He could use the cross to create the illusion that the soul was simply transferring from one place to another—like ascending from hell to heaven—rather than escaping to the mortal realm and breaking some cosmic rule.
Once the soul entered the Holy Light Cross, whether it was resurrected or left to slumber in this little pocket of heaven had nothing to do with hell or the underworld. Naturally, there would be no further trouble.
Only after figuring this out did Ethan feel that this trip had not been in vain. Even though he had taken a blow from Anubis, he had ultimately gotten everything he wanted.
He even got things he didn't want.
Looking at the suddenly lively Goddess of Dawn, Ethan couldn't help but feel a bit amused and helpless.
"It's gotten so lively, I'm really not used to it."
Logan knew that Ethan hadn't intended to bring so many people back.
Jonathan, who was only good at stealing and stirring up trouble, had no combat power. Under normal circumstances, Ethan would never have brought someone like him onto the ship.
His sister Evelyn was at least a charming bookworm. At worst, she was nice to look at when nothing else was going on. Jonathan, being a man, didn't serve that purpose.
It was the same with O'Connell. Although he was strong and a good marksman, his abilities weren't enough to be useful on the ship. At most, he could do odd jobs.
But since Ethan had dragged them into this, he couldn't just abandon them by dropping them into some random world. He had to take responsibility. Whether they wanted to stay on the ship or be dropped off somewhere more suitable, Ethan would accommodate them.
As for going back to the Mummy world? That would probably be difficult. Ethan wasn't planning on returning anytime soon.
(To be continued.)