Volume 6: Fighting for the World Chapter 153: The Legend of the Pharaoh
I thought that by helping Khufu advance to the Great Pharaoh, I had reached the highest form of the Mummy clan. Although my level was only upper level nine, which was a bit low in comparison, as a member of the royal family, and possessing the special equipment "Pyramid" bestowed by the system, my strength was far above the average upper level nine undead. At least with my help, I could fully compete with the lower level ten Hell Dragon. Perhaps my ability to defeat or even subdue the first Hell Dragon would depend on Khufu. However, I did not expect that another Pharaoh, who was obviously in a higher form, would emerge. This really surprised and delighted me.
The organizational structure of the mummy clan is actually quite unique. The actual management power is in the hands of many pharaohs. The twelve pharaohs, as the highest-level leaders, enjoy absolute authority, but do not participate in the management of daily affairs of the clan. They are erratic and act alone. They do not have many direct subordinates at all levels and have a fixed sphere of influence like the emperors of other undead races with large numbers of people. Unless there is a major crisis that threatens the life and death of the mummy clan, or special events such as promotion challenges, the twelve pharaohs will not appear easily. This once surprised me. After all, as the largest undead race on the Lost Continent, the pharaohs who rule each population are only some pharaohs of the lower level of level nine at most. Even if their number may not be too small, the lack of high-level emperors is a bit weak. I don’t know why they violated the convention and designed a mummy emperor like the Great Pharaoh who is "indifferent to fame and fortune"? As for the relevant questions, Khufu, who was the pharaoh before, was not able to answer them for me - the Twelve Pharaohs were a mysterious existence, and many things were unknown to outsiders. Even the pharaohs at the king level only knew that they could be replaced by advancing to the next level and challenging others. This was their right and the goal of their lifelong struggle, but they had no way of knowing more information.
Perhaps death, especially death at the hands of Khufu, who had been framed by it, was a relief for Osasura, who had suffered from pain and torture. After learning and confirming Khufu's true identity, it gave up its dying struggle, waiting for the final punishment, and took the initiative to tell many secrets about the Great Pharaoh, hoping to help Khufu, its closest partner more than a thousand years ago, in the future development, as its atonement. It included everything I wanted to know, as well as more unimaginable things. Although as long as it was killed, Khufu would become one of the twelve great pharaohs, and most things could be automatically known, it would take a long time to sort out and analyze the many complicated information suddenly obtained. In particular, the secrets about the mastermind, the most powerful Great Pharaoh Jefferson, were revealed, so that we would not be kept in the dark and face a strong and insidious opponent without any defense.
Everything, in the final analysis, is closely related to a title that is considered supreme, that is, the Pharaoh - a rank that only exists in legends. Only those who become the Twelve Pharaohs are qualified to know of its existence, and only those among the Twelve Pharaohs have the opportunity to become the Pharaoh. It is not known by ordinary mummies or even pharaohs, but it enjoys supreme authority by controlling the other eleven pharaohs. Once you become the Pharaoh, you can obtain 10% of the energy from each of the Pharaohs as an offering. Not only can you have a higher level, but you can also establish a direct spiritual connection with the other eleven Pharaohs, and you can control them to form a formation, fight the enemy together, and fully exert the effectiveness of the twelve "pyramids". Legend has it that the Pharaoh, led by the other eleven pharaohs, will be able to exert infinite power and compete with any top-level powerful existence in the "Dead Space".
Behind the Great Pharaoh's apparent indifference to fame and fortune, he has a greater ambition. Just as the goal of every Pharaoh is to become one of the twelve Pharaohs with a limited number of places one day, the Great Pharaoh also has a higher common pursuit. Controlling other Great Pharaohs who were originally at the same level as himself, he has stronger individual strength. It satisfies personal vanity, and being able to compete with the top powerhouses of any race in the "Dead Soul Space" will represent the Mummy Clan's stronger strength and higher status. Whether it is out of public interest or private desire, the Pharaoh is an irresistible temptation for every Great Pharaoh, attracting them to fight for it.
Of course, it is not easy to have a pharaoh with supreme authority and the ability to dominate the other eleven pharaohs. There are extremely harsh restrictions, so that in the history of the mummy clan, there has never been a pharaoh who can lead the mummy clan, especially the twelve pharaohs, to achieve greater fame. To become a pharaoh, you must obtain the unanimous approval of the other eleven pharaohs without any opposition. The most important condition is naturally to have the strength to surpass all opponents. After going through hardships to become the high and mighty pharaoh, no one wants to be inferior to others and be ordered around. Moreover, they have to dedicate 10% of their energy to the pharaoh and sacrifice their own interests to fulfill others. This is also not in line with the habits of the undead race. In order to obtain the approval of other pharaohs, the most direct and effective way is to suppress them through tyrannical force and force them to submit. The method is to conduct secret challenges under fair circumstances. Only the winner is determined, and life must not be endangered. The losing party must withdraw from the competition for the Pharaoh and support the winner instead. Unless there is death, the agreement will automatically become invalid, otherwise it cannot be betrayed for life.
However, force is not the only solution. Those who can become the Great Pharaoh are not weak. They usually have similar qualifications. The functions and effects of the twelve "pyramids" are also the same. Especially for the Great Pharaohs of the same period, the difference in strength between them is limited. Even if they can defeat their opponents, they will inevitably have to go through a hard battle, which may often result in a loss of 800 while injuring the enemy. Once are challenged by the Pharaoh during the period of being seriously injured, they may lose their position as the Great Pharaoh and their own lives, not to mention plotting to become the Pharaoh. Similar lessons have been learned in the history of the struggle for the Pharaoh. Even the Great Pharaoh Jefferson, who is known as the strongest, has won the support of most of the Great Pharaohs after more than a thousand years of preparation, but he still has two powerful enemies who are almost the same as him, which makes him afraid and dare not rashly launch a challenge, fearing that those Pharaohs will take advantage of the situation and seize his position as the Great Pharaoh, harming others, but also himself. Under such circumstances, it became a must for every great pharaoh to win over a group of pharaohs who were directly attached to him. On the one hand, it could effectively stop those pharaohs who challenged him for promotion and reduce his troubles. On the other hand, it could also arrange for them to challenge those pharaohs who were not in good condition and replace them with their own people, making it easier for him to do things. And suppressing those rising stars with excellent qualifications and greater potential in the tribe was a natural thing to do under the influence of too much selfishness, so that they would not grow up, be used by opponents, or simply form their own faction and hinder his plan to become the pharaoh.
A newly promoted pharaoh like Khufu would inevitably become the target of an ambitious man like Jefferson. With his current strength, he would not be a match for the old pharaohs. Fortunately, in order to protect the fair rights of the newly promoted pharaohs, according to relevant regulations, before Khufu took the initiative to launch the first challenge for the title of Pharaoh, he would not accept the initiative of other pharaohs to challenge him, because a duel with no hope of winning would force him to give up the qualification to compete for the title of Pharaoh.
The challenge between the great pharaohs for the qualification of the pharaoh must be absolutely fair. There can only be two participants, and at most the necromancer who is the master of one of the parties. No other forces will be allowed to interfere. This is the highest order that every great pharaoh must abide by and cannot be violated. Moreover, the twelve great pharaohs act alone. Most of the time, they live in the "pyramid" to absorb the Yin Qi and exercise to improve their strength. The area near the "pyramid" is radiated by the curse light. It is a special equipment, extremely hard, and can automatically recover by absorbing the Yin Qi. Even those top existences, three or two may not be able to threaten them. Perhaps our necromancers can use the human sea tactics to concentrate a large number of high-level men to attack continuously, and it is possible to forcibly break through the "pyramid". However, the act of forcibly attacking the "pyramid" will attract the full support of other great pharaohs and the mummy clan, which can easily trigger a large-scale "undead war". Moreover, this is equivalent to completely destroying the "pyramid". No new great pharaohs will be born. If the twelve great pharaohs cannot be gathered together, the pharaoh will really only become a legendary existence.
After explaining the matters that need to be paid attention to, especially to be careful of the ambitious and insidious Pharaoh Jefferson, I wished Khufu, the genius mummy with excellent qualifications and who could arouse Jefferson's fear, to become the first Pharaoh in history. Osasura calmly accepted the fate of death. This was the inevitable end of the defeated Pharaoh, and no one could change it. According to the procedure, Khufu absorbed the soul energy dissipated by the previous Pharaoh, took over the "pyramid", and then lay in it and entered a dormant state, completing the transformation from Pharaoh to Pharaoh. It took about half a month, and he officially succeeded to the throne as Pharaoh Khufu. Like the promotion of the vampire fang, this is also an extraordinary form of evolution. During this period, it does not need to absorb my mental power, which saves me trouble.
Khufu, who is still evolving, will definitely not be able to participate in the Hell Dragon Challenge on May 15. Dizang and Gonzalez are too slow to move, and their basic conditions are not as good as Silando of the same level. I am afraid that they are not yet able to pass. Although Had's level is higher, reaching the eighth upper level, his movement speed is slower, and it is obviously not likely to be very likely. As for Qitlei, I get angry when I think of it. He is weak-willed and lacks fighting spirit. Since the failure of the last challenge to the Hell Dragon, he has been unable to cheer up. His performance in normal training is very unsatisfactory, even worse than Dizang and Gonzalez, so there is no hope. Without the hope of passing, I don't want to wear down the morale of these promising subordinates and arrange them to participate in the challenge casually. Therefore, I found a seventh upper level subordinate to deal with it. As long as it is not too damaged and demoted, it can slowly recover from the serious injuries it suffers, so as not to have to take time to heal it and delay my development.
During this period, the Dark Council approved Qingwu Feiyang's proposal and launched a disguised third "Dark Crusade" against a medium-sized mercenary group of 1,000 people in the northern continent. It claimed to have concentrated the elite of the resistance alliance and attacked with all its strength. However, after receiving intelligence from the insider and confirming that the top players of the light, such as Supreme Honor and Real Madrid, did not participate, I also withdrew from the action - more than 10,000 players were arranged to attack the garrison, many of whom were companions of the Tongxin League. There were only 3,000 to 4,000 enemies in the garrison. There was a lack of well-known people, and there was not much oil and water to be made. It was not worth it to compete with Qingwu Feiyang, Xue Wuxia, and Afeng for that little qualification and merit. If I had time, I could make two trips to the Western Continent alone and earn everything back.
The "Dark Crusade" launched in the form of a group battle certainly played a good deterrent role on those forces that tend to the Church of Light, but it also brought some negative effects because of the randomness of the launch. It was entirely decided by the will of the 30 members of the Resistance Alliance or the Dark Council. Compared with the "Light Crusade" of the Church of Light, it lacked constraints, causing panic among many mercenary groups that had friction and bad relations with the Resistance Alliance or the forces affiliated with the Resistance Alliance. They were worried that we would abuse our power, take revenge, and attack them at will under the guise of the "Dark Crusade". Unless they were on good terms with the Church of Light and could get the full support of the Church of Light, even a large mercenary group of 10,000 people would not be able to resist the attack of the elite forces of the Resistance Alliance. Once they fell, it would mean that all their previous hard work and efforts would be in vain, and they would naturally not be willing to accept such a result. In particular, except for the first attack on Huadu, which had a good reason because of Hua Mantian, the Vice Senate President of Light, the two mercenary groups that were destroyed later were not very close to the Church of Light, at least not in the top ten in the East, South, and North continents, and the Church of Light found an excuse to attack. Under their propaganda , they portrayed our resistance alliance as a "terrorist organization" that has no effective rules and constraints, but has extremely powerful power and can act arbitrarily. They expressed great sympathy for the situation and possible fate of the innocent neutral forces in the three continents who unfortunately live under the cover of black terror, and strongly accused and denounced our resistance alliance through "Sky Media" for ignoring the legitimate rights of other forces.
If it was just the public opinion appeal of the Church of Light, we would defuse and counterattack through words, refute their "nonsense", and find various reasons to maintain the positive image of our resistance alliance. We don't need to pay too much attention to them, and it will not constitute any substantial impact. We can still proceed according to our planned guidelines. However, some people can't stand the loneliness and want to stand up to maintain the so-called justice and fairness, restrict the actions of our resistance alliance and the Church of Light, and try to protect the interests of those small and medium-sized forces that remain neutral.
With some people who are interested in the matter running around and threading the needle, it seems that the Church of Light is also secretly fanning the flames. Under the pretext of the struggle between light and darkness, especially the threat posed by the "Dark Crusade", many mercenary groups with no clear inclination ended their scattered situation and united to form a "neutral alliance". Modeled after the organizational structure of the two major camps of light and darkness, the deliberative body is called the Joint Conference, and 30 members are elected from representatives of all forces. They unanimously nominated the top player in the individual competition of the previous "World Heroes Conference", the fearless warrior who holds the artifact "Thor's Hammer" as the chairman of the Joint Conference. They also attracted the other four artifact holders of neutral professions besides Afeng, the Goryeo Warrior, the Lost World, the Wolf in Sheep's Clothing, and Bingxin Yuhun to join, and they were honored as vice-chairmen or members of parliament respectively. It brought together many expert players of neutral professions who did not participate in the struggle between light and darkness, and became the third largest force in "Tianxia" that can compete with the Church of Light and the alliance of resistance forces.
The Neutral Alliance does not accept individual players. Players must join in the name of mercenaries. They clearly state that they will not participate in the dispute between the Church of Light and the Alliance of Resistance. All members are mercenaries who have no intention of getting involved and maintain a neutral position. If the leader or deputy leader of a mercenary group joins the Church of Light or the Alliance of Resistance, they will lose the qualification to join the Neutral Alliance. The purpose of forming a neutral alliance is to restrict the "Holy War of Light" or "Holy War of Darkness" and avoid unfair decisions made by the decision-makers of the two camps, thereby damaging the interests of innocent third parties. The joint meeting on behalf of the Neutral Alliance issued notices to the Senate of Light and the Dark Council respectively, hoping that we can be cautious in deciding our respective holy war goals and fully consider the interests of innocent players. Especially when it comes to mercenaries who have joined the Neutral Alliance, it is best to communicate with them first, resolve differences and disputes through peaceful negotiations, and reach a unified opinion. Don't start a war and rely too much on violence to solve problems. Otherwise it would be disrespectful to all members of the Neutral Alliance. They would consider taking necessary measures according to the circumstances, and would even go to great lengths to assist the attacked jihad targets in order to safeguard the legitimate rights and interests of those ordinary mercenary groups that lacked background.
