The scene was pure chaos.
"Help me! Ah! No! I don't want to die here!"
A soldier who had stumbled screamed in terror as the sandstorm swallowed him whole. In his final moments, he saw a monstrous face formed from swirling yellow sand, its gaping maw opening wide to devour him.
"Johnson!"
Someone spotted the fallen soldier being consumed, but at that point, everyone was too busy trying to save themselves. No one had the time—or the ability—to help anyone else.
Several soldiers who couldn't run fast enough were engulfed by the storm, becoming food for the monstrous face within the sands.
"For the peace of this tomb!"
A voice speaking an ancient tongue echoed within the storm. Tragically, the HYDRA soldiers who were consumed never had the chance to report what they heard—nor would they have understood the ancient Egyptian words spilling from that face's mouth.
"What the hell is this? A curse of the dead? Damn it! Those filthy ancient Egyptians actually buried a trap like this for us!"
"When we find what Lord Schmidt is after, I swear I'll bring a fleet of bombers and blow every single one of these pyramids to dust!"
The scar-faced commander and seven or eight soldiers managed to blast open the entrance to a small pyramid and ducked inside for cover. They used rubble and statues from within to barricade the relatively small doorway, finally earning a brief moment to catch their breath.
Listening to the screams and the howling storm outside, the commander—like the others—felt an overwhelming sense of relief at having survived.
Of course, while the others were simply grateful to be alive, the scar-faced commander's temper flared hotter than ever.
He began cursing loudly, vowing to one day level this entire necropolis. Clearly, he didn't just fail to understand the true nature of the pocket dimension—he also firmly believed that enough firepower could make even the most ancient and mysterious powers bow to modern weaponry.
"Sir… sir! Over there! Something's moving!"
A soldier, who had been absentmindedly sweeping his flashlight across the chamber, suddenly froze.
At first, he'd only been admiring the architectural details of the ancient Egyptian structure. But then—something shifted in the darkness.
It was vaguely human-shaped.
Yet its movements were grotesquely twisted. Because of the distance and the weak flashlight beam, he could only make out a distorted silhouette.
"Goddamn it! What the hell is that?!"
The trained soldier shouted like a startled bird. In a place that was supposed to hold only the dead, anything moving was a sign of something terribly wrong.
At his shout, the others—including the scar-faced commander—instinctively turned their flashlights toward the same direction.
And under the combined beams of a dozen flashlights, every HYDRA soldier froze.
Inside the small pyramid, countless mummies filled the chamber.
Had the mummies merely been lying still in their sarcophagi, the soldiers might have considered them a valuable find after surviving the storm.
But these mummies were anything but still. At that moment, they covered nearly every inch of the pyramid's interior—on the ground, along the walls, and even hanging upside down from the stone ceiling—dozens of grotesque figures crawling and shifting.
"The living dead!"
"The awakened dead!"
"It's the Egyptian mummies!"
The scar-faced commander's face turned ashen, and the rest of the HYDRA soldiers were equally horrified. The supernatural power within this place was beyond comprehension.
Corpses that had been dead for countless years were moving again—faster, sharper, and far more agile than any predator they'd ever seen.
The sight was terrifying enough to make their skin crawl, shattering everything they thought they knew about life and death.
"Roar! Roar! Roar!"
Agitated by the glare of the flashlights, the mummies let out guttural roars and lunged forward, attacking the soldiers like beasts, crawling on all fours with unnatural speed.
"Fire!"
The scar-faced commander shouted the order immediately, and within the narrow confines of the pyramid, a deafening barrage of gunfire erupted.
Fierce rounds poured from the soldiers' barrels, forming a storm of bullets that shredded the wrappings of the mummies.
However—none of it made a difference.
Every bullet that tore through their linen was absorbed by their dried, leathery flesh, sinking into the mummified tissue as though devoured. The tattered wrappings even began to regenerate, slowly weaving themselves back together like living fabric.
These humanoid mummies moved like an awakened army, their bloodlust ignited by HYDRA's attack.
Under the relentless hail of bullets, they let out guttural roars and charged forward. Their hands resembled claws—one swing was enough to cleave a rifle clean in half.
Despite HYDRA's firepower, the soldiers couldn't suppress the onslaught. Their formation began to crumble as casualties mounted.
"No! These things can't be killed!"
One soldier shouted in panic—only to be ambushed by a mummy lunging out from the shadows. It tackled him to the ground, and his screams were cut short as the creature sank its teeth into his flesh.
"Die, you damn monster!"
The scar-faced commander kicked the mummy off the fallen soldier, then planted his boot on its chest and emptied an entire magazine into its skull.
Yet even that did nothing.
The mummy, riddled with bullet holes, let out a grotesque, mocking laugh. The commander cursed furiously, a wave of cold dread creeping up his spine.
All around him, soldiers were being slaughtered. Flashlights fell to the ground and shattered underfoot, plunging the entire pyramid into darkness.
"Wuuu—"
"No!"
"My throat!"
In the pitch-black tomb, the sound of slaughter continued.
After ten agonizing minutes, the scar-faced commander realized he was alone—the last survivor.
Every one of his men had been torn apart by the mummies. Despite the loss of so many elite soldiers, not a single mummy had been truly harmed.
The power of technology... in this place, it was nothing but a cruel joke.
"For HYDRA! For Lord Schmidt!"
The scar-faced commander was a ruthless man. Surrounded by the advancing mummies, he pulled the pins on several grenades strapped to his chest and detonated them without hesitation.
"BOOM!"
A thunderous explosion tore through the small pyramid. The commander was instantly blown apart, reduced to fragments, while the shockwave hurled the nearby mummies across the chamber.
Several of the creatures were maimed—missing arms or legs—while others were blasted against the ceiling and flattened grotesquely against the stone.
However, despite their mangled forms, even HYDRA's enhanced grenades failed to inflict any real damage. Many of the mummies continued to crawl across the floor, relentless as ever.
They clumsily gathered their severed limbs and reattached them—some even putting them on backward. Arms where legs should be, legs where arms belonged. One even fixed its head onto its torso upside down, yet it moved as if nothing were wrong. It was a horrifying, almost absurd sight—though, fortunately for humanity, no one remained to witness it.
It wasn't just the pyramid the scar-faced commander had entered. The other HYDRA soldiers who survived the sandstorm fared no better, falling prey to the mummies' merciless assault.
In every pyramid the HYDRA troops had taken refuge in, mummies crawled from their sarcophagi and, as if following an unseen command, attacked the invaders. Against these undead beings impervious to bullets, the soldiers stood no chance. The scar-faced commander's self-detonation might have been the last act of defiance among them—a final shred of dignity.
Once every HYDRA soldier had been slaughtered, silence returned to the pyramids. One by one, the mummies retreated to their coffins, resuming their eternal rest.
They seemed like guardians of the necropolis—after purging the intruders, their once-restless forms again lay still and silent.
"Koo-roo-ka-kee-mo-to-koo-la, turkey-gwa-la~"
The last mummy to return to its sarcophagus was riddled with deep holes. Swarms of beetle-like insects crawled in and out of the cavities. If Evelyn were there, she would have recognized them instantly.
Scarab beetles.
Creatures once used in the most brutal of ancient punishments. The mummy, its body crawling with the sacred beetles, hesitated before lying down, casting a worried glance toward the enormous pyramid at the heart of the City of the Dead—Hamunaptra.
The words it spoke in an ancient tongue were obscure, nearly incomprehensible, yet the worry in its two remaining eyes was unmistakable.
This mummy was no ordinary guardian. A closer look would have revealed that its face was nearly identical to the one that had formed within the earlier sandstorm—the same sandstorm that might have been its creation.
Before it finally entered its coffin, the mummy gave one last lingering look, as if fearful that the intrusion of the living had stirred something far more terrifying within the grand central pyramid—something even it dared not face.
Though clearly uneasy, bound by ancient rules, the mummy at last lay down in its coffin. The entire necropolis of Hamunaptra once again seemed to fall into deathly stillness...
But appearances were deceiving.
The special mummy's fears were not misplaced.
Something long dormant had indeed been disturbed.
Within the great pyramid, deep in a vast and ornate ceremonial chamber, faint tremors echoed. It was as if something beneath the rune-covered floor was struggling to break free.
The runes etched into the stone pulsed with intermittent light—each glowing symbol a lock in the ancient seal restraining the entity below. From beneath the floor came a roar, filled with fury and unwillingness, reverberating through the chamber.
The rumbling grew louder, as if an unseen force were pounding furiously at the earth. Yet despite the relentless assault, the glowing runes held firm, unbroken and unblemished.
The reason was clear.
These runes drew upon an endless source of energy—power supplied by a pitch-black ancient tome floating above them.
It was a heavy, stone-like book, its surface completely black, its cover engraved with two opposing scissor-shaped symbols.
With every pulse of energy, faint sparks of fire rippled across its surface, radiating an aura of darkness, stillness, and chaos. Within it surged a boundless, churning tide of chaotic power.
...
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