Chapter Text
“It’s you,”
The desert heat reverberated around the priest, gusts of fine sand swirling around him as he turned around to see a man walking barefooted towards him.
“My lord,” he said as he went down onto his knees immediately, sweat rolling down his neck. “What brings you here?”
The mighty god, donning the appearance of a simple man in white robes, wore a lethargic smile on his face as he motioned Kasala to rise. Standing up, the priest met his lord’s amber eyes. Despite his unembellished appearance, the dark-haired man with a skin of bronze held the dying aura of an absolute ruler.
One would have shaken in his presence, but not Hermanubis.
The priest, who otherwise goes by the name of Kasala, is one who is reborn again and again, one who has seen through the birth of the mighty civilization of Ay-Khanoum, its flourish, and its demise. He has been through cycles of life and death to judge the dead throughout millennia, regardless of his appearance or his name. Again and again, he has stood by his lord through the sands of time.
His eternal lord, King Deshret, Al-Ahmar.
“Do you resent me?”
The desert wind howled bleakly around the Mourning King as Kasala looked at his lord in confusion, not quite registering what he had just heard.
“Resent you? My lord, why would I do that?”
The King’s amber eyes crinkled, swathes of regret swirling within its depths as he regarded his most loyal retainer. One who has stuck with him through thick and thin, through wrongs and rights.
“For living in my grief,” Al-Ahmar answered. “For listening to the lies of the Three Magi and bringing in forbidden knowledge. For staining the lands of which the desert children live on.”
King Deshret’s face contorted into a pained look of regret and madness. A god who had slowly brought erosion upon himself through his pain of losing the one he loved. Sabzeruz, the Goddess of Flowers.
“I brought death upon our own people.”
The priest watched his lord lower his head in defeat. The proud, mighty lord of the desert, at this moment, looked nothing more than your average mortal in his moment of weakness. The supreme aura he yielded seemed to sink beneath the dunes of his grief and regrets.
“My lord, do you wish for me to judge you upon the scales?”
King Deshret blinked and looked up at Kasala, who stared at him with the ruthlessness and coldness that he often had whenever he carried out his duties as the weigher of hearts. With the headpiece of a jackal upon his head, Al-Ahmar is addressed by the neutral yet stoic stare of the true owner of the Court of Desolation.
“Judge… me?” King Deshret murmured as he thought to himself. A prickly heat surfaced, the air palpitating.
“I suppose, yes.” He finally answered with a wry smile. “Though it’ll most certainly be a redundant attempt; Ammit will be more than happy to devour my sinful existence.”
“Most unfortunate, my lord,” Kasala remarked as he shook his head. “I cannot judge you upon the scales.”
King Deshret broke into a bitter chortle.
“I see, I’m not even worthy of being placed on your scales.”
“No, my lord,” Hermanubis answered. “It’s because only the dead may be judged.”
Al-Ahmar fell silent.
He looked at the temple of life that stood behind Kasala, one of the many built by Rukkhadevata herself.
“I see…,” He breathed, seemingly a sigh of relief.
He is not yet dead.
Staring into the far-off distance at the sight of sands and desolation, the Mourning King stayed that way for a long while, his amber eyes reminiscing what he had once destroyed. The remnants of his land, saved by the benevolence of his friend, seemed to echo the emptiness in his heart.
“Hermanubis,”
A voice of authority resounded in the desert, the sands and the winds settling down at the next moment. Meeting amber eyes, the priest went down onto his knees before his lord as he waited for his decree.
“I hereby command you to be the Judicator of Secrets, to protect our people and the people of Lord Rukkhadevata. Prevent them from erring in their path to knowledge and seal the forbidden, for as long as life and death exist. Our pact that has persisted beyond the sands of time shall no longer be in effect. Henceforth, you are to act out of your own jurisdiction and purge humanity’s transgressions in accordance with the six ancient deadly sins, until they can finally stand blameless.”
“And this is my final order,” King Deshret stared at the sky, his place of origin. “Do your duty and place my soul upon the scales.”
Hermanubis widened his eyes. Al-Ahmar has made his decision.
“… Yes, my lord.”
“It’s too bad he was held back by his belief in the Scarlet King, but now that that’s changed, I guess we have a few more people on our side.” Dehya sighs as she placed her hands on her hips.
“This is a turn for the better,” the Traveler answers, while Al-Haitham crosses his arms.
“The outcome… at least, is favourable.”
Meanwhile, the General Mahamatra turns around, his eyes staring at the familiar statue of the jackal as an inexplicable emotion rises in his chest.
“We should get going too. Let’s head back, have a proper meal…,”
He soon sinks into deep thought, the voice of the chatty Paimon fading away. Instead, Kasala's voice repeats in his head. It was a voice that he had often heard since he was a child within the temple, alongside the vague faraway memories of no one. Despite growing up in a place of worship, he was never one to revere the Scarlet King.
Yet, when he had heard that King Deshret had sacrificed himself to seal away the forbidden knowledge…
“…,”
Placing a hand upon his chest, the Judicator of Secrets wonders how he should describe this feeling. Sadness? Nostalgia? Or is it-
“Cynooooo! We’re leaving!”
Broken out of his train of thought, the General Mahamatra glances at Paimon.
“… Stop yelling.”
He takes one last good look at the Anubis statue, at the bright pink and purple petals that adorned the ruins.
The petals of the familiar flowers his lord loved.