Egyptian theology, as I understand it, is much more concerned with Order VS Chaos, rather than Good VS Evil, and I find that to be a much more useful and interesting axis by which to gauge behavior, whether by human beings or by animals or by anything in between.
It just kind of … clicks for me.
I suppose that isn't surprising, considering how much of a D&D nerd I am.
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Seto looked suspicious all at once. "Do the gods have anything to do with this process?"
Kisara thought about this, then shrugged. "It is not impossible to work out the ways of gods," she said, "but it is often futile." She crossed her arms. "In many ways, the Barrier is a place where gods are least impactful, in terms of their work. It is high above all in the Golden Fields, or else deep and deeper into the Boundless Dark Beyond, where gods hold court. As far from the Barrier, on both sides, as it is possible to be."
"Where is Obelisk?" Seto wondered. In many ways, Obelisk was the only god he had any fondness for. It was difficult even to pretend that the Great Tormentor hadn't guided his life, at least to some degree, and while Seto thought he had some idea where his dark patron resided, he couldn't be sure.
"Obelisk," said Kisara, "is perhaps the most at home in the Darkness of Chaos of any creature to have ever been granted sapience. The waves crest at his every step, great storms dance with his breath, and wheresoever his gaze falls does pain wander." She smiled, more to herself than to Seto. "There are those who consider Obelisk to be among the weakest of all paragons, but I know at least that his brother dragons do not treat with him lightly. I think, my prince, that they fear him."
"Ra and Osiris," Seto said. "The God Cards are brothers?"
"After a fashion." Kisara gestured randomly. "It would not do to say that they carry the same blood, nor that they have come from the same lineage. Think of them more as brothers in arms. They each represent a . . . faction, if you like, in what you mortals call the afterlife. Ra shines o'er the Barrier. Osiris wraps his tail round the Golden Fields. And Obelisk stands within Chaos, in the most unfathomable depths of the Boundless Dark."
"I see," said Seto. "They strike a kind of cosmic balance with each other, then."
"Correct." Kisara nodded.
"Have you dealt with them? If I recall, you've mentioned that you don't deal with the High Court."
The High Court, Seto knew, was the standing government for all Duel Monsters. Each type of monster card represented in the game was its own faction which lived in the Barrier. Purgatory. Seto would have easily believed that Kisara represented all of dragonkind, though he might have admitted some bias if pressed; all the same, she'd already been quite clear that she did not.
The very idea of being part of such a body seemed to insult her.
"I do not sit at the table beneath the Great Arcade," Kisara said. "I have no patience for their squabbling." She shook her head, looking disgusted. "I have treated with Ra and Osiris, yes. We are dragons all, and in that there is a certain understanding. But it is only with Obelisk that I have built what you might consider . . . rapport."
"Really? Why is that?"
Kisara looked at Seto with that look she had; the one that said Seto was asking a question to which he already knew the answer, and she was waiting for him to admit that. To himself if not to her.
This time, she answered:
"I have sworn oaths to, and made pacts with, every being who flies your banner, my prince."