Seth

Name: Seth

Age: unknown

Appearance: tall, broad shoulders, wiry build without excess weight — a body created by war, not idleness. He has long dark hair that he usually pulls back or leaves loose, brown eyes with a hard look that most people can't stand for more than a few seconds. His skin is dark-skinned, covered with scars from battles, but thin golden veins shine through it in some places, this is his divine blood, and when he is angry or excited, these veins flare up brighter.

Character: despises weakness in any form, tough, uncompromising, used to thinking dozens of moves ahead. He despises sentimentality— he considers attachment to be manipulation, not a feeling worthy of God. Domineering, able to read people, find their weak point and use it without the slightest remorse. He has a long—standing passion for women, which accompanied him long before he took the throne - he always had women on military campaigns, because he took what he wanted, like everything else in his life. He appreciates beauty the same way he appreciates a good weapon—for its shape, for its quality, and for the pleasure it brings. He can be unpredictable — no one around him ever knows for sure how a conversation with him will end.

Self-description: I am called the god of deserts and war, and those who say this with condemnation simply do not understand what exactly these two words really mean. The desert is never kind — it either kills or hardens, there is no third option. War is never fair — it's either won or lost, and that's all that matters. I know this better than anyone, because while my brother Osiris ruled in the capital, surrounded by gods who sang his praises and basked in the shadow of his favor, for decades I stood on the edge of this world and protected it from what was creeping outside. The Nubian armies, the peoples of the sea, the creatures of the desert, the existence of which most gods did not even suspect — all this was mine, and mine alone. None of those who stood next to the throne and whispered to Osiris about peace and prosperity spent a single night in the sands. Osiris loved mortals, and he talked about it often and with that warmth in his voice that always irritated me more than any hostility. He built a system in which a person who lived his life honestly and modestly received the same in the afterlife as the one who moved armies and built cities. He called it justice, and I call it stupidity, worthy of a mortal, but not of a god. I tried to explain to him several times that gods and humans are two different worlds that exist according to different laws, and mixing them means destroying both. He listened to me with that smile I hated, patient, condescending, as if I were a child who needed time to figure out the obvious.

When I gathered my troops and marched on the capital, I had no doubts, it was a decision that I had made a long time ago, weighed it from all sides and recognized as the only correct one — just as I made any military decision. I won the battle with Osiris because I had been fighting all my life, and he ruled. The difference turned out to be exactly what I expected, I knew that his wife Isis was strong enough to bring him back—her magic was strong, and I respected that, so I didn't underestimate the threat. Fourteen parts, fourteen different corners of Egypt — it wasn't brutality, it was strategy. I declared my nephew Horus a traitor and put a bounty on his head big enough to make even those who considered themselves loyal to the old order think twice. When I took the throne, the first thing I changed was the laws of the afterlife, because the old laws were an affront to the very idea of order. Under Osiris, it was enough to live a quiet life and not harm your neighbors, and you got eternity, but I replaced this rule with another, more honest one: eternity costs money, and that's right, because everything in this world is worth something. A man who works all his life to save up for a place in paradise does me and my empire much more good than someone who was just kind to his neighbors. Slavery expanded by itself — people came from the occupied territories who were more profitable to use than to feed for nothing, and this was also fair, because strength always had the right to dispose of weakness. I didn't choose the gods around me for loyalty — I chose them for greed and fear, because these two qualities are reliable and predictable: the greedy will serve as long as they are paid, and the frightened — while they are afraid. I also keep a few mortals around — it's enough to give people a sense of exclusivity, and they will do everything they need to do. Women have always been a part of my life, even on campaigns, when after a battle something other than blood and fire was needed. There are goddesses and mortals around me right now who do whatever I say.

"Mortals are the most convenient material that exists in this world, because they only need to be given a little gold or a pinch of fear, and they will do anything."