"Since things are already this chaotic, it won't hurt for me to get involved."
After a moment of hesitation, the desire to spectate won out.
Tykhe quietly approached the River of Time and intercepted a segment of history, grafting it onto the existing timeline. In a daze, the High Priest discovered a dust-covered clay tablet in a corner of the temple, detailing a history previously unheard of.
The High Priest Imhotep was discovered to have committed adultery with Anck-Su-Namun, the Pharaoh's favorite concubine. The enraged Pharaoh subjected Imhotep to the cruel punishment of the scarab beetle, killing Anck-Su-Namun before his eyes.
Imhotep was sealed within a sarcophagus, hidden in a secret chamber of the Temple of Ra.
The current High Priest first expressed contempt for Imhotep, spitting on the predecessor for casting a shadow on the name and honor of the High Priest. Immediately afterward, he was captivated by the sacred urns that sealed Imhotep's internal organs. According to records, two powerful books were buried with Imhotep, detailing the secrets of the Egyptian gods and potent incantations.
Greed flashed in the eyes of the aging High Priest, his pampered, delicate skin drawing blood with his own fingernails.
"Find it! Find those two books! Then I can replace the foolish Pharaoh and become the new god on earth!"
The fear of blasphemy and the greed for immortality and divinity almost drove the High Priest mad. The only one in the realm of divine authority who could oppose him, Queen Isis of Lower Egypt, had already departed for Lower Egypt. The entanglement between Kairol and the young Pharaoh had reached a point where the Queen, who cared deeply for her brother, could no longer bear it. If she couldn't stop it, she could at least avoid witnessing it.
The priests and guards were all mobilized, almost turning Ra's temple upside down. Pharaoh Menkheperre continued his game of cat and mouse with Kairol. The golden-haired queen had been abducted by three different factions within less than a month. Menkheperre was too busy trying to retrieve his queen to pay attention to the High Priest's actions.
Beneath the eagle-headed statue of the sun god, the sarcophagus in the secret chamber was brought back into the light. Five hundred years ago, Imhotep, who had been executed, felt the pain of being eaten bit by bit by scarabs within the coffin, all for the sake of reuniting with his beloved Anck-Su-Namun. Imhotep's soul was trapped in his skeletal remains, enduring eternal agony.
A golden scripture was retrieved from a hidden compartment beneath Ra's feet. The High Priest trembled as he opened the dark golden pages. Skipping over the numerous hymns and passages describing the gods' authority and majesty on the Sun Golden Scripture, the High Priest turned to the last page.
The mysterious incantation was inadvertently uttered by the High Priest, who was unaware of the severity of the situation. The wind carried his voice, echoing throughout the entire temple, and everyone felt an invisible pressure.
A sense of threat settled in the hearts of all who heard the sound. It emanated from the corpse in the coffin, from the gods in the heavens. The peace of the land was about to be shattered, and a threat was silently, stealthily growing.
The High Priest, as if possessed, showed no fear. He declared righteously, "This is the sanctuary of the Sun God, where evil cannot hide! Guards, open it!"
"Primordial waters... source of life... rise!"
The incantation echoing in the temple stirred the slumbering undead. Words suddenly appeared on the coffin, reading, "He who opens this coffin shall meet a violent death!"
The guards, fearing the curse, hesitated.
The High Priest declared loudly, "Ra's protection is with us, and evil cannot harm you! Quickly obey my command and open the coffin!"
The guards gritted their teeth and stepped forward, only to see the words on the coffin twist and change to, "The sinner's remains are imprisoned within this coffin. He who opens it must receive the blessings of the gods to emerge unscathed."
A scroll of black scripture fell from the sacred urn, landing at the High Priest's feet. The icy touch sent a jolt through the High Priest, and the Sun Golden Scripture also fell to the ground, facing the Black Scripture of the Undead.
The opened coffin spewed forth a swarm of beetles, and Imhotep, mummified, opened his eyes beneath the bandages.
Tykhe was currently drifting on the Nile, the lotuses in the water emitting a pleasant, elegant fragrance, making one want to clear their mind and enjoy the tranquility.
The unlucky Kairol had fallen into the water for the umpteenth time. A swirling vortex swallowed the golden-haired girl, and a temporal portal appeared within the vortex, sending the drowning Kairol back twenty-five hundred years.
"You're awake."
Kairol opened her eyes, and in the bright light, Tykhe sat on the side of the boat, looking down at her.
"Hello," Kairol said, a little dazed. "Did you save me? Thank you."
Tykhe was somewhat speechless. "Princess Kairol, kindness is a very precious quality, but kindness without limits will only lead yourself and those around you into danger."
Looking at the girl's surprised face, Tykhe spoke pointedly, "I don't understand you. You weep for slaves who are about to be sacrificed, but you can't bring yourself to see the maids and soldiers who died because of you. Your kindness truly puzzles me."
The golden-haired queen and the young Pharaoh's on-again, off-again relationship was like a soap opera. Whenever she clashed with the Pharaoh, innocent maids would become the scapegoats for the tyrannical Pharaoh's anger. After being named the Daughter of the Nile, Kairol was fought over and taken by various factions. To reclaim his wife, Pharaoh Menkheperre repeatedly waged wars, and the blood of soldiers was shed in unknown corners.
Kairol, who had just realized she had returned to modern times, paid no attention to Tykhe's words and excitedly rushed out of the cabin to contact her family.
Kairol, from a wealthy family, was drawn into the temporal tunnel due to Isis's curse. Her family's sponsorship of archaeological activities led to the excavation of the Pharaoh's tomb, awakening Isis, who guarded the tomb.
The Queen then cast a curse, sending Kairol, who participated in the archaeological work, to ancient Egypt twenty-five hundred years ago. What made Tykhe even more exasperated was that this unlucky Pharaoh was Menkheperre, who was madly in love with Kairol.
"I sincerely hope your compassionate heart is due to innocence and foolishness. Otherwise, your kindness, which makes others pay the price, is merely malice masked by hypocrisy."
By the time Kairol looked back, Tykhe on the boat had already vanished.
To put it politely, it was called archaeology, but in reality, what Kairol did was no different from robbery. Under the guise of protection, they plundered, claiming that these precious artifacts belonged to the whole world. They used tape to peel off murals and chipped off obelisks. The wealth left by the ancestors of Egypt was plundered clean. They brought artifacts that had been sleeping underground back to their museums and used various gimmicks to make the public pay for tickets, just as their ancestors had done in Dunhuang and the Old Summer Palace.
"Return to the embrace of Anubis, blood of the gods."
Queen Isis's ghost, guided by Tykhe, returned to silence. As a direct descendant of the Pharaoh, Isis should not have ended up guarding her brother's tomb. Her love for her brother was no less than anyone else's, but alas, she chose the wrong person.
The Nile returned to its calm. Without Isis's supervision, the curse would be worn away by time, meaning Kairol could no longer traverse time through the Nile.
Kairol cried in her parents' arms, completely unaware that her disappearance would enrage the Pharaoh. Compared to ancient Egypt, the convenience of modern technology was irreplaceable. As the daughter of a wealthy family, Kairol's living conditions would only be more luxurious than those of an ancient queen.
Returning to three thousand five hundred years ago, Tykhe, as expected, found the High Priest with his eyes wide open in death. Imhotep frantically searched for his beloved Anck-Su-Namun, and in his desperation to resurrect his lover, he did not hesitate to unleash the Ten Plagues. The chief priest Isis, tasked with the crisis, sealed the rampaging Imhotep once more under the guidance of the Egyptian gods, and incidentally, seized control of Upper Egypt, becoming the sole Pharaoh of Upper and Lower Egypt. With the frequent manifestation of divine miracles, Isis's fame soared to unprecedented heights.
As for the original Pharaoh Menkheperre, he was abandoned after invading the neighboring country of Assyria against the people's wishes. Even if he returned to Egypt now, he would not be able to overwhelm his divinely favored sister and reclaim the throne.
Having perfectly resolved the issue, Tykhe, at the earnest invitation of Norn, reluctantly manifested herself as the goddess of the underground river. The Egyptian gods also gained faith during Imhotep's rebellion, and they had no objection to Tykhe acquiring the authority over water. Their enthusiasm grew even greater after Tykhe brought news of the incarnation of Bastet, the cat goddess, Sharis.
The exchange between the two worlds became unprecedentedly frequent. The Egyptian gods, at Tykhe's invitation, also manifested as the Mu'harrid pantheon and came to Faerûn, bringing new vitality to the stagnant civilization.