Karnak, Monarch of Death

In a dimly lit underground chamber, thick with ominous darkness, a mound of bones began to stir atop a sinister blood-etched magic circle. The skeletons clashed together before assembling into a humanoid form. At the same time, a ghostly essence enveloped the structure and merged with the bones.

The air trembled with darkness, and a black energy coursed through the remains. A fierce aura, heavy with malice and death, was drawn toward the skeleton’s core, swirling as if sucked into a drain.

A moment later, eerie red light flashed in the sockets of the reassembled skull. The jaw creaked open, and the skeleton exhaled a chilling breath. ”Phew... So, this is the past?”

Here was one of the calamities of the mortal realm, one of the most loyal lieutenants of the Monarch of Death. Here was a being who had reaped countless lives. The western governor of the Necropia Empire, Archlich Kalaf, had returned.

Kalaf shrouded himself in a cloak of darkness before stepping out of the magic circle and addressed the figures around him in a chilling voice. ”So, you must be the agents of this era.”

Given that his remains had been stored here, this must have been a site secured by the Cult of the Black God.

”Where is Lady Elezar?” Just as he was about to continue his questions, he hesitated.

Kalaf’s glowing eyes widened slightly. ”What?”

Standing in front of him were two figures that he never expected to see.

”Lord Demphis? Lord Maloka?”

They were two of his fellow governors. He had only just parted ways with them, or so it was from his perspective. The two were staring right at him.

”How are you two here? Don’t tell me... we all regressed to the same time period?”

He was met with silence. Instead of answering, Demphis and Maloka simply raised their skeletal hands in unison.

Kalaf blinked his spectral eyes in confusion. ”And why are you preparing magic?”

***

In a dimly lit underground chamber, thick with ominous darkness, once again, a mound of bones began to stir atop a sinister blood-etched magic circle.

The scene played out almost identically. A skeleton rose once again.

”Heh heh heh...”

A sinister chuckle echoed as Archlich Tirafar, the Northern Governor of the Necropia Empire, surveyed his surroundings. ”It seems the temporal regression was a success.”

He saw several humans before him, including a dark-haired young man. It wasn’t anything unusual. He naturally assumed they were followers of the Cult of the Black God. However, he saw three gleaming skulls behind them, which was rather strange.

”Lord Demphis? Lord Maloka? And Lord Kalaf as well?”

Three pairs of burning eyes locked onto him. At the same time, their skeletal fingers flickered with growing magical energy.

Tirafar, startled, glanced between his long-time colleagues. ”What... is the meaning of this?”

Unfortunately, no one answered him.

***

Thanks to Maloka, Karnak’s group had been able to partially deconstruct the Anti-Time-Space Transcender, extracting some useful information in the process. To guide a regressor to a precise point in space-time, two conditions had to be met.

The first: The regressor’s past body had to be present alongside the Anti-Time-Space Transcender. Just as a lighthouse must be positioned at a harbor, the past body served as a dock for the regressor, who was akin to a ship drifting through time.

The archliches who had regressed without a Anti-Time-Space Transcender were like ships searching for a harbor without a guiding beacon. That was why, even though they had all set out at the same time, they arrived in scattered timelines.

And what if, for some reason, their past body had been destroyed and no longer existed in the present world? A ship that failed to find a harbor would inevitably drift through a stormy sea.

If fortunate, it might wash ashore in some unknown land. If not, it would sink into the abyss. In the former, the fortunate ones would arrive in the mortal world as spirits, while the unfortunate ones would wander eternally in the void.

The second condition for guiding a regressor was that the lighthouse’s light had to reach the ship properly. Although Karnak had used the lighthouse as a metaphor, the true function of the Anti-Time-Space Transcender was to guide regressors lost in the void to a fixed point in time.

In other words, it had to be capable of precisely identifying the regressor’s presence in the time stream. To achieve this, Tesranach had preemptively provided Demphis and Maloka with magical rites to anchor Leven Strauss and Diogres Kolon.

All of Tesranach’s subordinates bore a Mark of Contract engraved upon their souls, allowing them to be located with certainty. If the designated targeting spell was preloaded into the Anti-Time-Space Transcender, it would activate upon use and guide the regressor to the predetermined point in time and space.

After hearing this explanation, Karnak suddenly had a thought. ”Hey, Maloka. Your target was your own remains, right?”

”That is correct.”

”Then if the Anti-Time-Space Transcender had guided you, you would have followed it, whether it was preprogrammed or not?”

”I suppose so?”

Maloka looked puzzled, unsure where Karnak was going with this.

Then, Karnak grinned. ”In that case, wouldn’t Kalaf and Tirafar come running if we just waved a little light in front of them?”

Currently, Kalaf and Tirafar’s remains were still sealed away. The plan was to erase their old contracts and rewrite their brands the moment they regressed. But their return was unpredictable, which was proving to be a constant source of concern for Karnak. However, what if the timing of their regression could be controlled?

”I think we could use the Anti-Time-Space Transcender to guide them back as well.”

”It seems possible...” Maloka hesitated before asking, ”But wouldn’t that only work if the cube already contained a spell specifically identifying them?”

Only Tesranach, the Monarch of Death, possessed knowledge of that particular spell. He was the one who ruled over the archliches.

Maloka was hesitant. ”How would you control the cube without the spell?”

Karnak shrugged. ”Well, I think I might have an idea of how that spell works.”

”In my timeline, I was the one who raised you as riches. And so far, there aren’t any noticeable differences between the Maloka of my timeline and the Maloka of Tesranach’s timeline.” If that was the case, wouldn’t it be possible for Karnak to recreate the spell himself? ”And it’s not like we lose anything if it fails, right?”

”Well... that’s true.”

With the decision made, Karnak called for Demphis. He had a reason for summoning Demphis, even with Maloka present. Kalaf and Tirafar were both ninth circle masters. Thus, Maloka alone wasn’t enough to handle them.

Besides, it was a well-established fact that Maloka was the weakest among the four governors in direct combat.

”But if two ninth circle masters work together, it shouldn’t be too difficult to subdue them, right?”

Thus, with all preparations complete, he summoned Kalaf and Tirafar to this era, and this was the result.

***

Archlich Kalaf knelt. ”My master.”

Archlich Tirafar knelt. ”I pledge my loyalty.”

Karnak smiled in satisfaction. ”Good. That’s two more subordinates secured.”

With this, all four governors of Necropia’s past, Maloka of the East, Kalaf of the West, Demphis of the South, and Tirafar of the North, had been reclaimed as his followers. The dark-haired youth stood amidst four terrifying archliches, exuding an eerie aura of malice and death.

Serati let out a deep sigh. ”Hey, Lord Karnak.”

”Hm? What?”

”You really have no intention of living like a normal person, do you?”

***

Standing before the archliches, Karnak declared confidently, ”From this moment on, you four are the Elders of the Twilight Cult!”

Naturally, the two newly revived archliches had no idea what he was talking about.

Kalaf cautiously asked, ”Excuse me, but... what is the Twilight Cult?”

”A religious sect that worships the Goddess of Twilight, Serakal.”

Karnak’s answer only deepened their confusion.

Tirafar followed up with another question. ”Then... who is the Goddess of Twilight, Serakal?”

Karnak gestured. ”Her.”

The archliches turned their glowing eyes toward Serati. Their expressions grew even more bewildered.

”That young lady?”

”But she’s human, isn’t she?”

Moreover, Kalaf and Tirafar had even more important questions to ask.

”More importantly...”

”Just who exactly are you, Master Karnak?”

It seemed a long explanation was in order.

Karnak glanced around, searching for the right person for the job. ”Serati!”

”Yes, yes.” She had already expected this.

Calmly, she began her explanation. ”Once upon a time, there was a lousy bastard named the Monarch of Death Karnak... Oh, oops, that slipped out.”

”That didn’t sound like an accident.”

”Oh, come on, it was an accident.”

After pacifying Karnak, Serati calmly explained the situation to Kalaf and Tirafar. Having already done this twice before, she had become quite adept at it. She had done it for Maloka as well. Once her explanation was finished, Kalaf and Tirafar nodded in understanding.

”I see.”

”So, we need to expand the Twilight Cult while weakening the influence of the Cult of the Black God?”

”That’s quite similar to our usual duties.”

As former governors of Necropia, managing and expanding an organization was second nature to them.

”In reality, that’s what you were all best at. It’s far more practical than making those strange black cubes.” Karnak chuckled before adding, ”Oh, but do go ahead and make more Anti-Time-Space Transcender. Just make sure to hand them over to me afterward.”

There was no reason to waste such excellent external mana reservoirs. Having more of them would undoubtedly prove useful.

”Of course, I’m not saying you should use them to summon people from the future. By the way, who were the ones assigned to you two?”

Kalaf and Tirafar responded in turn.

”Giyen Ren.”

”I was assigned Malican Thun.”

”Alright, don’t engrave any targeting spells into the cubes. Just create them and hand them over.”

”Understood, my master.”

The two archliches bowed respectfully.

At that moment, Tirafar hesitated before asking a question. ”Would it be an issue if we harvested unrelated lives as well?”

”Hm? Why?” Karnak responded.

”Simply put, eliminating only the Cult of the Black God won’t provide enough sacrifices to create the cubes.”

”Wa-Wait a moment!” Leven, who had been listening from the side, exclaimed in shock. ”Are you saying that making one of those things requires human lives?”

Kalaf responded as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. ”Naturally. It is necromancy, after all.”

”Then how many people need to die for a single one?”

”Around a thousand?”

Leven wasn’t the only one left dumbfounded. Serati, too, stared at the archliches in stunned disbelief. After all, Demphis and Maloka had already created theirs.

”You... You killed that many people?”

”Of course.” Demphis blinked as if surprised by the question. ”How else would one practice necromancy? You cannot expect to wield such power without cost.”

Silence followed. Right. For a brief moment, the conversation had been so casual and friendly that they had forgotten. But these were archliches. They were creatures of darkness that defied the natural order, those who had long abandoned morality.

”Lord Karnak.”

”I know, I know.” Sighing, Karnak waved a hand dismissively. ”Forget it. Just don’t make them.”

He also retrieved the Anti-Time-Space Transcender he had previously entrusted to Demphis and Maloka. After all, recharging those would require sacrifices just the same.

”I’ll just replenish these myself.”

Fortunately, he could refine chaos mana on his own, allowing him to recharge the cubes without the need for bloodshed.

Holding the cubes in his palm, Karnak let out a weary sigh. ”Ugh, I thought things were finally getting simpler, but of course not.”