In Kemet, life is structured, purposeful, and simple. The city gleams under golden sunlight, where polished stone streets buzz with clean commerce and laughter. Families rise with the dawn to work honest jobs, their SoulWaves humming in quiet synchrony. Children attend academies, where they learn not just reading and numbers, but the philosophies of balance, duty, and energy alignment. At a certain age, each child must choose a path: become a Medjay Knight, trained in the discipline of Wave-combat and service to the Pharaoh, or take the path of the Builders, working to develop society through infrastructure, agriculture, and Wave engineering. Both are honored.
Under the firm, revered rule of the Pharaoh, a figure both political and spiritual, Kemet has flourished. Trade routes extend beyond its borders, bringing in spices, knowledge, and foreign energy relics. Cultural ceremonies celebrate unity and wave harmony. On the surface, it is a utopia born from structure and SoulWave regulation.
But perfection has a price.
Behind the walls and flowering balconies, Kemet casts long shadows. And like all shadows, they cling to the edge.
Khaf'Tet, or simply "The Khaf", lies far beyond the well-lit plazas and crystal towers. It is not marked on official maps, nor spoken of in polite society. The roads leading there are cracked, veiled in dust. The buildings—if they can still be called that- are skeletons of former districts, left to decay when development funds ran dry or shifted elsewhere.
In the Khaf, life is survival, not structure.
It's where families too poor to register their children are left behind. Where those whose SoulWaves are erratic, null, or corrupted are quietly relocated, some are victims of crimes; others are perpetrators. And then there are the Defectives, people born with Waves so anomalous they're deemed unfit for integration. They are not studied. They are discarded.
Many of Kemet's elite pretend the Khaf doesn't exist, calling it a myth to comfort their ignorance. But every child hears the warning stories:
"Don't go past the sandstone arches at the city's edge."
"Those who wander into Khaf'Tet don't come back... if they do, they aren't the same."
Yet within this realm of ruin and ash, a different kind of life takes root. Unofficial Wave duels in the alleyways. Black-market energy crystals scavenged from collapsed towers. Makeshift schools run by retired Harmonizers. There is a community here, but it is hard-earned and laced with distrust. The people are sharp-eyed and sharper-waved. They do not expect mercy, nor ask for it.
Khaf'Tet is not evil.
It is unacknowledged.
There are whispers in the deeper sectors of children born immune to dissonance, of strangers who walk through chaos storms untouched, of old gods awakening beneath the ruins of forgotten temples. Some believe the Khaf holds the future, not the failure, of Kemet.
But Kemet doesn't listen. It polishes its towers. Praise its order. And forgets the cost of its perfection.