Chapter 221. Middle East Journey (3) Monster Extermination

     After entering the temporary conference hall, the seating arrangement showed no obvious hierarchy—except for the host delegation from the Middle East.

     The Indian woman had been right about her teammates’ remarks. Female survivors in the Middle East were pitifully few, and even when present, they stood obediently at the rear of their teams, with little say in matters, relegated to serving tea and water.  

     Was this always the case?  

     Not exactly.  

     Female survivors from war-torn regions of the Middle East were just as fierce as survivors anywhere else. Even in non-war zones, a handful of exceptionally strong women existed.  

     They simply weren’t allowed or couldn’t be bothered to participate in so-called “official Middle Eastern survivor delegation” meetings. Deep-rooted cultural prejudices couldn’t be peacefully resolved overnight.  

     Yet today’s compromise was like the first crack in a dam. Where there was one, there would be more. With the Middle East in chaos, survival crises didn’t discriminate—strength alone, regardless of gender, would earn the people’s respect. This was also an opportunity to shatter old rules and forge a new order.  

     The meeting dispensed with tedious formalities and hollow diplomatic rhetoric, diving straight into negotiations between Middle Eastern nations and major survivor factions over requests for aid.

     Despite the many eyes on them, Ye Mo’s group did not participate in the initial discussions. The negotiations were left entirely to Yin Hong. After all, they were collaborators invited by the Non-Aligned Supernatural Bureau.

     After lengthy deliberations, the Middle Eastern nations finally decided to seek international assistance.  

     However, since survivor factions ≠ sovereign states, they proposed one condition: during the rescue mission, anything obtained in the ancient Egyptian region would belong to the survivors themselves, a necessary incentive to “save the Middle East.”  

     This demand was rooted in a grim reality. Everyone had witnessed the black creatures outside; many present had fought and killed them, proving their strength. Yet after each battle, not a single energy core fragment remained.  

     Countless survivors had already died in ancient Egypt, and so far, no one had gained even the slightest reward from it. Without substantial stakes, who would willingly march to their deaths?  

     This point was unanimously agreed upon.  

     Next, the Middle Eastern nations disclosed all their intel on the “Reality Dungeon.” Since every survivor who had entered it had died, their deductions were based solely on the victims’ final words and actions.  

     Ji Li suddenly interjected, “and the ghosts of these survivors don’t exist either? “

     “No,” a Middle Eastern survivor answered. “It’s as if their souls were utterly annihilated.”  

     The term “soul annihilation”(魂飞魄散, hún fēi pò sàn) had by now entered the lexicon of multiple languages, adopted as a loanword worldwide.  

     The meeting continues.

     The Middle Eastern nations explained that these “Reality Dungeons” were almost all linked to pharaohs’ tombs, primarily concentrated in the pyramid complexes of Cairo’s Giza Plateau and Sudan’s Meroë Dynasty, among others.

     Some millennia-old pyramids had already been destroyed, while others—particularly the larger ones—remained standing but had become nesting grounds for “Dark Creatures,” a term they coined for the monsters that had since been adopted internationally.  

     The Egyptian Ennead^[1]The Ennead, or Great Ennead, is a group of nine deities in ancient Egyptian mythology worshipped at Heliopolis. These deities are Atum (the sun god), Shu and Tefnut (his children), Geb and Nut (their … Continue reading  seemed central to these events, with several death-related deities playing key roles:  

   – Geb, the earth god who imprisoned evil souls;  

    – Nut, the death-guarding goddess depicted inside pharaohs’ sarcophagi;  

     – Osiris, the lord of the underworld, eternally dying and reborn;  

     – Nephthys, protector of the dead;  

     – Anubis, the jackal-headed gatekeeper of the afterlife.  

     Of course, death gods beyond the Ennead also existed, though most were minor or era-specific.  

     Wang Xue muttered, “So many death deities? Why not rule out the ones unrelated to death?”  

     No wonder China’s modern underworld had sought insights from ancient Egypt. In truth, their mission here wasn’t just about potential gains it was about protecting Earth itself.  

     “Protecting Earth” might sound like an empty, grandiose slogan, but it was a very real concern. China existed on this planet too, they couldn’t afford to stand by and watch the world fall into ruin. If they did nothing, China would eventually face the full onslaught of the world’s monsters alone.

     The Middle Eastern survivors added that at least three Reality Dungeons had been activated. The first two had caused localized disasters:  

     – In Egypt, earthquakes struck and mummies rose to slaughter the living.  

     – In Sudan, the most immediate catastrophe was an outbreak of corpse-devouring insects.  

     Before the aftermath of these two dungeons could even be contained, they vanished because a third Reality Dungeon was triggered.  

     The location and exact timing of the third activation remained unclear, for two reasons:  

     1. Too many survivor factions had flooded into ancient Egyptian territories just as they had in Mesopotamia and the Indus Valley. Among the four ancient civilizations, only China had managed to keep foreign survivors out (at least on the surface), forcing them to operate in secrecy.  

     2. Once the third dungeon activated, anomalies erupted simultaneously across all nations housing ancient Egyptian relics—Syria, Palestine, Israel—even unearthing millennia-old tomb complexes in war zones where paranormal events had halted conflicts entirely.  

     The corruption was now slowly spreading to other Middle Eastern nations. There was growing unease about when Mesopotamia would be affected, because the collision of two ancient civilizations’ curses could unleash something far worse.  

     In any case, the anomalies in ancient Egypt were anything but ordinary. This likely involved a high-tier Death God’s Reality Dungeon.  

     After briefing the teams, they dispersed to act.  

     Unsurprisingly, most survivors prioritized operations in Egypt or Sudan. After all, these places were most likely to yield rewards. The main force of China’s Supernatural Investigation Bureau was also deployed there. Ye Mo’s trio searched in three waves across Egypt and Sudan, while Yin Hong stayed behind with a small group of people.

     Deputy Captain Jian Xing, meanwhile, led the majority of their personnel to other ancient Egyptian territories. Their goal was international aid, not to break the dungeon.  

     Every operative carried multiple satellite phones.  

     And as an extra precaution, especially when dealing with a Death God. Each of them brought three to five puppet beasts. Even Wang Xue and Ji Li had one: Wang Xue’s took the form of an ordinary black cat, while Ji Li’s was a seemingly unremarkable black beetle, both of the highest grade.  

     Among all survivor groups, only the Chinese survivor group had this level of strategic flexibility, simply because they had the confidence, as their puppet beasts came with spatial coordinates, ensuring no team would ever be truly lost.  

     …

     Separating from Wang Xue and the others, Ye Mo took charge of operations in Cairo, Egypt.

     Her first target was the Giza pyramid complex on the outskirts of Cairo. On her way to the pyramids, she conducted a precise mental scan with a ten-mile radius, and a 360-degree sweep with Hawk Eye over an even wider area. Whether the black monsters were in the sky or underground, they were all her targets for elimination.

     The black monsters in the sky were relatively harder to deal with, they had already downed several international rescue aircraft, slaughtering ordinary survivors.  Ye Mo controlled her flying tiger demon and various flying puppet beasts to engage them, ensuring they didn’t hit the ground, instead disintegrating them one by one in the air.

     There were far more black monsters on the ground.

     Many local residents, who thought they were about to perish, were either suddenly hoisted up by unexpected vines or enveloped by sudden light spheres. Then, those terrifying black demons were burned to death by fire, struck down by lightning, or pierced by arrows, vanishing into thin air. They couldn’t even see who their saviors were, but they knew they had been rescued and that Egypt was saved.

     A small number of people, however, did manage to see their savior.

     Because when the situation was too critical, Ye Mo would directly teleport to rescue, like now: she suddenly appeared in the ruins, her left hand grabbing a little girl, and with a spin, her right hand’s sword pierced the heart of a black lion.

     After the black lion disintegrated into ash, she moved with incredible agility, transferring the girl to a small gathering point guarded by the Egyptian army. This entire process took less than three minutes.

     Many people didn’t even have time to react, but the little girl tugged on Ye Mo’s clothes: “Wait—”

     Due to the developed tourism industry, many locals in Cairo spoke decent English, and children could manage simple conversations in addition to Arabic. The Egyptian little girl took out the last two grapes hidden in her pocket, placed them in her dirty palm, and smiled sweetly, “Thank you.”

     Many areas in the Middle East had lost water and electricity, and the scorching climate felt unbearable. Luckily, the Middle East, including Cairo, is famous for its fruits, abundant in watermelons, strawberries, mangoes, grapes, bananas, citrus, and dates, which could provide some hydration in the short term.

     “Thank you too.”

     Ye Mo accepted the two grapes from the little girl, gently patted her head, and also left 100 cubic meters of purified water for the person in charge of the gathering point before teleporting away.

     Such incidents occurred in many corners, and Ye Mo’s gold mask and black eyes were etched into the hearts of many locals. In this information age, things inevitably spread online.

     Some netizens dubbed Cairo “the luckiest among unfortunate places”, because it was obvious that, besides the Chief Survivor, no one else could awaken so many supernatural abilities or possess such immense power to instantly kill the dark monsters in seconds?  

     Don’t be fooled by Ye Mo’s effortless slaughter. Other survivor squads facing elite predators like the Dark-eagles or hordes of them, could only fight while retreating.  

     Gradually, the locals came to remember both China’s Supernatural Investigation Bureau and especiallyits Chief Survivor. Even their perception of the Survivor App began to shift.  

     After an hour, Ye Mo noticed something unsettling: the shadow-creatures in Cairo didn’t hide from strong opponents. Instead, they kept emerging from dark corners to confront her. Even if she stood still, they would come.  

     She shared this observation:   

     Yin Hong: “Received!”

     Wang Xue: “Really? I was too busy enjoying the slaughter to notice.”

     Ji Li: “Not your imagination. The density around the conference hall was higher, but with more survivors present, we cleared them faster.”

     A Bureau member: “Data shows we’ve encountered 37% more hostiles than other teams in the past hour.”

     For now, this wasn’t necessarily bad news.  

     By the time Ye Mo left Cairo for the Giza pyramids, the city’s dark-creatures had mostly been eradicated, with over 95% of them killed by her alone.