Primordial Catacombs

The Primordial Catacombs
The Primordial Catacombs are old. Majestically old. Blasphemers whisper that they might even predate the Black Pharaoh himself, and they are right. The catacombs are ancient, from a time long before dynastic Egypt.

The architecture is refined, and although the Egyptians later carved hieroglyphs into the wall there are traces left of an unknown language below. Only a civilization far more advanced than the Egyptians could have built this.

When Akhenaten's slaves built the temple city, they found several underground chambers close to the pyramid. They were worn down by time and the elements, covered in mystic writing, and scattered with unfamiliar instruments and strange devices, built for a purpose the Aten followers could never comprehend.

Thousands of years before the pharaohs of Egypt ruled the land, these chambers were part of an outpost where scientists measured the hibernation of a dormant horror below. When the outpost was ruined by earthquakes and sank into the ground, the chambers were abandoned.

During Akhenaten's reign, the dark, circular rooms were used as tombs for his most loyal priests and other individuals who showed dedication to the Dark God. It was the final resting place for hundreds of men and women.

This was also the place where the shades were born.

Worshippers of the Pharaoh's sun god were brought here to die, selected to serve as test subjects for royal embalmers gone mad. They were tortured for weeks - beaten, strangled and broken - until their souls were separated from their bodies to be reborn into immortality as terrible creatures called shades.

When Akhenaten died, so did the practices that filled the catacombs with such horror.

Today, 3500 years later, the catacombs are dark places, lined with the remains of those who died in the service of an evil god and haunted by those who were given an unholy afterlife.

Now, few mortal things can survive in this horrific place, and it is populated almost exclusively by the dead, or worse.