Vol 11: Chapter 9-2.

"Made up your mind? Going to burn them all?" Xuan was looking at a document.

Zheng said. "Yes, all of them. F*cking, there’s already sniper rifles. We would be facing a modernized army if we don’t kill them. I am curious what Imhotep is up to though."

Xuan replied without raising his head. "70% chance he’s already inside the pyramid. 20% chance he’s watching us from nearby. 10% chance he went to Hamunaptra. Which one do you think is more beneficial for us?"

Zheng answered without thinking. "Of course inside the pyramid. So we can take care of him on the way. Otherwise he might show up during the fight. What are you looking at?"

Xuan raised his head. "Information about Egyptian mythologies I got from Evelyn. I am looking for ones that might be true. If this is an actual world, this shouldn’t be the only treasure. Perhaps other treasures have similar quest items that can increase our strength."

Zheng immediately said. "And the result?"

"Give up on all of them."

He adjusted his glasses and took a drink from a glass. "The cost to reward ratio is too low because we don’t know if these mythologies are true. Second, there are expenses such as time, bullets, and expendable items. Third, they belong to plots that we are not familiar with. We don’t know where the dangers will come from or how to use the quest items. Unless we have over 50% chance of success, I won’t consider these mythologies."

Zheng wanted to laugh but held it to himself. "Then why are you so focused on the document? Aren’t they useless to you?"

"I had Evelyn wrote them in both hieroglyphs and English. I am getting the structure of hieroglyphs and how to go about translating them. We need to let ourselves accept new knowledge under any situation."

Zheng nodded. "Right, right. I understand. So how are we going to burn the forest? Aren’t you worried about the wind?"

Xuan grabbed a map looking paper. It was hand drawn. "I flew around while you were inside the forest and drew its terrain. It may not look like it but this forest is a triangle. We need to use incendiary bombs at these four places. Spread the bombs out the among 100 square feet in each place and detonate them with your grenades. It will be the most effective. We will be able to burn down the whole forest regardless of wind direction, unless God cause some accident."

"It sounds easy but what kind of accident? I have a bad feeling about it."

"Uh, killing too many pygmies and God evolves them into something else, like King Kong." Xuan suddenly laughed lightly. "So, this is a gamble. We are dead if we lose the bet. Because there might be other ways to enter the pyramid that don’t require killing all the pygmies. There’s a 30% chance we will die from God interfering."

Zheng didn’t thought much about King Kong but then he imagined a pygmy piloting a Gundam, especially his favorite Providence and shook his head. "Anyway, just try our best. Uh, you know how to laugh?"

Xuan laughed and said. "Yes. Pull muscles upward. However, crying is more difficult. Even though I can do the expression, its difficult to stimulate tears. If there’s available device, crying is also possible."

Zheng tapped his shoulder then walked out of the tent. "Don’t worry. You will reach the fourth stage. Comrade."

"Comrade?"

They finished setting up the incendiary bombs by evening with the help of the movie characters. Zheng used a simple detonation device Xuan created then detonated them. They looked down from the dirigible and saw the forest began burning at four locations. Black smoke rose up to the sky then the fire moved into the inner forest.

"This is the basic situation. Judging by the size of this forest, it will take three to four days for the fire to reach the pyramid. Then three to four more days for the forest to cool down. Which means we need to wait eight days. How much time do you have left?"

Zheng said. "Fifteen days. If we count eight days including today, we will have eight days left. It should be enough time to enter the pyramid and kill the Scorpion King."

"Then the probability of my plan should be a bit higher. The reason God gave you sixty days might be to give you time to burn the forest and wait for it to cool."

Ardeth sighed beside them. "It’s unfortunate for this forest. If we could preserve it, then the whole Egypt..." He shook his head.

Zheng tapped his shoulder and said. "Let it go. Even if we don’t burn the forest, your tribe wouldn’t be able to take care of the pygmies. Furthermore, the forest might disappear without the magic power from Anubis after we defeat the Scorpion King. It’s not something that belong to us, so it’s better to not think too much."

Ardeth could only sigh as he shook his head. A man that grew up in the desert had a desire for the green desert that others couldn’t imagine. If he didn’t understand this forest could never belong to them, he would have stopped Zheng.

The fire burned for several days, leaving black and white ashes behind. One might step into a fire when you step into the ashes. There were still bits of fire burning underneath. So they had to keep waiting. Zheng and Xuan never heard any notification from God, so they were not getting the points from killing the pygmies.

They didn’t rest during the days of waiting. Zheng kept training his Explosion technique and combat techniques non stop, while Xuan was reading mythology related documents in hieroglyphs. Evelyn complained that she were working on deadlines.

Eight days passed. Zheng entered the forest alone. After advancing for a few kilometers without any danger, everyone decided to head to the inner forest. There were still some fires further in so the place had a layer of smoke. They couldn’t find the pyramid in the mean time.

"Keep heading to the center of the forest. The pyramid should be there." Zheng made the decision and walked a few hundred meters in front of everyone else.

They found burned bodies of animals on the way. As they came nearer to the center of the forest, the number of animal bodies decreased as pygmy bodies took over. The pygmies died in clusters. Beside their bodies were deformed firearms ranging from pistols to sniper rifles to RPG. The crucial part was there were just too many pygmies. They saw tens of thousands on the way already. The pygmies would be no different from an army if they were all armed. Guerrilla forces fighting at their home terrain.

𝕗𝚛𝚎𝚎𝐰𝗲𝗯𝗻𝚘𝚟𝚎𝗹.𝕔𝐨𝕞

They felt unease looking at the numbers, especially Zheng. If they tried to kill these pygmies off a little at a time like he thought, there was really a possibility of the pygmies piloting Gundams. Then burning the forest wouldn’t be able to take care of them. Fortunately, that didn’t happen and they came so far safely because of Xuan.

A pyramid that looked like it was built of gold came into view.