Lighthouse Horror Podcast - I’m a Guide for the Pyramids. These are My WARNINGS

Episode Date: July 30, 2025

Story written by Stephen & Rachel of Lighthouse Horror. For usage rights or more information, please contact us at [e-mail] Art from NinerioMore of the artist’s works at ninerioartsOriginal YouTube link: I’m a Guide for the Pyramids. These are My WARNINGS.       Merch: lighthousehorror.shopFor more stories like this one, check out my YouTube channel: Lighthouse Horror | YouTube Patreon: Lighthouse Horror | PatreonSocial MediaINSTAGRAM - @lighthousehorror FACEBOOK -  Lighthouse HorrorTIKTOK - Lighthouse HorrorMusic:Lucas King - YouTubeMyuu - YouTube IncompetechDarren Curtis Music - YouTubeThank you for listening to this scary story! If you enjoyed this new creepypasta story, please check out some of my other horror stories. We'll be uploading new episodes every week, featuring ghost stories, haunted encounters, mysteries, true stories, creepypasta, and anything supernatural and paranormal. Don't miss out on the thrill and suspense that await you in each episode!

My name's Jack. I'm 34 years old, an archaeologist by trade. And yeah, I know what you're thinking. It's a hell of a job, right? It is. Beats the office cubicles and fluorescent lights I used to rot under. Used to be one of those guys in stiff shirts and blue light glasses, shuffling papers and running in circles, chasing promotions that didn't mean anything. Did that for a long time. About five years, actually. Epidemia is like that. You get stuck. See, the thing about studying ancient history is, it's all fascinating. Until you're stuck inside a gray building, talking about it instead of being out there, digging it up with your own two hands. That was the reason I got into this in the first place. I wasn't built to sit still. I got good grades, sure, really good ones. Best in my department, actually. I wrote papers on pre-demeanor.

dynasty pottery forms and the ancient period like they were gospel. But the whole time, I just kept thinking about sand, dust, heat, the sting of the desert sun behind my eyes. I wanted to feel history, not just talk about it. So after I got my doctorate, I walked out of Oxford and I didn't look back. That's when I made the leap. Egypt had always called to me. Something about the place never let go once it got into my head. Maybe it was the movies. Brendan Fraser's The Mummy came out when I was still a kid. And man, that thing lit me on fire.

I must have watched it two dozen times. Something about the danger and the mystery. The tombs hidden for centuries waiting to be disturbed. It never felt scary to me exactly. It felt right. like I was supposed to be there. So I saved up, sold some stuff, packed a backpack, and moved to Cairo. Didn't even tell half the people in my life.

There wasn't anything left back home I couldn't live without. So I started out small, joining local digs as a volunteer. Turns out it's easy to find work if you know what you're doing, and you're willing to sweat. Egypt's full of ruins and relics. and every university or museum wants a piece of it. I didn't mind being the guy holding the brush at first. Being in the field was enough, but it didn't take long before I started leading my own teams,

taking over small sites, collecting samples for research institutions. You earn your stripes one pottery shard at a time. Eventually, I started guiding tours too. Part-time gig, mostly during the summer, when the families flood in with their cameras in big hats, looking to touch history with their own hands. It's easy money.

Honestly, it's fun. You get to see the wonder in their faces when they look up at the pyramids for the first time. And I get to pretend I'm some kind of desert cowboy, walking them through the sands like I own the place. I throw in a little mythology, maybe a curse or two, gets a laugh, gets a tip. Kids especially love my dog, jet some mud, scrappy little black thing that looks like he was stitched together from spare parts.

Bit my ankle the first time I met him. Literally ran up and clamped down on my leg like I owed him money. I don't know what made me take him in, but he's been mine ever since. Goes with me on every dig, every tour. Doesn't bark much, just sticks close and watches people. The kids call him a nubus. He's got a collar with a scarab beetle charm I picked up from a market in Giza. Nothing expensive, just a copper trinket, but it shines in the sun, and it makes him look like he belongs in a museum. Locals like him. Even the old men in the coffee shops nodded him, like he's some kind of guardian.

Superstitious bunch, but who might argue? If Jet wants to keep this, spirits away, he is more than welcome to it. By days now, usually mix of digging and walking people around in the heat. It's not glamorous work. You're sweating before breakfast. Your back eggs. And the sand gets everywhere. I mean everywhere. But it's good work. Honest work. You get up before the sun. You stretch out under a tarp while you sip hot tea. And then you get your hands dirty. You dig, you brush, you listen for the sound of stone under your tools, and sometimes, just sometimes, you find something incredible. That's the part that makes it all worth it. You hit something solid, and you don't know what it is yet. Your heart starts pounding, your fingers tremble just a little.

You start brushing faster, careful but eager, and then there it is. A piece of pottery, an old coin, a fragment of bone, something no one's seen in a thousand years, something that belonged to a person who lived and died before your whole country was even an idea. It's humbling. It makes you feel like a speck in the middle of the middle. of something huge. And if you're lucky, you get to preserve it. Document it. Pass it on. That's the part I love the most. I'm not a spiritual guy, not really, but there's something about preserving history that feels important, bigger than you. You're not just finding something. You're saving

it, making sure it stays safe for people who haven't even been born yet. I like that. Of course, not all of it's fun. I have seen some things out here I don't have a name for Egypt's old. I mean old. I don't think most people really understand that. This place has layers Like a hundred civilizations stacked on top of each other, buried under the same sun. You dig in one spot, and you find a Roman floor, a foot deeper. You find a new kingdom burial site. Below that, you might find something even older. And the people here, they know.

I'm telling you they know things. things they don't say out loud. They talk about old tombs like they're alive. They give names to the wind. They leave offerings at the wrong doors. I've learned not to ask too many questions. But I will tell you this. If you sit with the old timers long enough.

Guys who've been doing this since before I was born, they'll talk, especially if there's a little rum in the bottle. They'll lean in real close, eyes squinting under the weight of the desert sun and the years, and they'll start to tell you stories. Some of them are funny. Some are just legends, but a few. Well, a few of them are different.

Anyway, I've got stories. More than a few. Things I've seen. Things I can't explain. So pull up a chair. Pour yourself a drink. It's a cool night in Cairo and we're just getting started. My name's Jack and I work in the ancient pyramids of Egypt.

These are my stories. Let me tell you how I meant Jet. Not the cute version I sometimes tell the tourist. The real version. The one I don't talk about much. It started in Cairo. I just started leading small digs on my own. Nothing big, just a few sites cleared by the ministry. Dry patches of land, a few kilometers from the popular tombs, places the big universities had no time for.

I liked it that way. Fewer rules. Fewer people breathing down my neck. One afternoon, I stopped by a busy market. I wasn't shopping for anything in particular, just wandering through the alleys. picking through old crates of second-hand tools and brass trinkets. That's when I first saw him. Jet. It was small, scrawny little black dog, with patchy fur and ears too big for his head. He was chewing on the corner of a worn-out rug by a spice stand, growling like it insulted his mother.

I walked past him, didn't think much of it, but the little guy followed me. I stopped near a fruit card, and bam, he bit my ankle. Not hard. He didn't have real teeth yet. Just little puppy gums and a few needle point baby fangs. But it surprised the hell out of me. I turned around, and there he was, looking up at me like he'd won something. Like I owed him now.

I tried to shake it off, but he kept following me, right through the market, right to the truck. I didn't take him with me that day. I didn't even pet him. I just gave him a look and said, Don't get yourself killed, little guy. I thought that be the end of it. But like I said, Jet had his own ideas.

A week later, I was out at a dig site in the desert. Nothing impressive. Just a low ridge of rock and some old maps that suggested a minor burial shaft might be nearby. It was hot? My team had taken a break, back under the tents drinking warm soda and complaining about the flies. I should have been there with him. But I wasn't. Instead, I was climbing into a shaft we'd roped off earlier. We hadn't cleared it yet. Protocol said to wait, send down the sensor equipment, run a stability check. But I wanted to look. Just a quick one.

The shaft was narrow, barely shoulder-width, and steep. Dust slipped under my boots. My hand clung to the rope like it was the only thing keeping me on the planet. About ten feet down, I found a ledge and eased onto it, shining my headlamp into the dark. The walls were cut stone, tight and rough, looked like a worker's tunnel. No inscriptions, no paint, just plain limestone. I took one step forward, and that's when the floor gave out. My left foot sank straight through, and my body dropped like a sack of bricks.

I fell maybe six or seven feet, landed hard. My ankle twisted under me, like a rope pulled the wrong way. Pain shot out my leg, hot and sharp. I tried to stand and couldn't. The flashlight clattered beside me, still on, still spinning its weak beam around the pit. And then I heard it. A dry, skittering sound. The beam of light caught movement.

Dozens of black shapes curling out of cracks in the stone. Scorpions. Thick-bodied, shiny things with claws. They were slow at first. Then one hissed, and the rest came alive. I tried not to move. And then a sound from above. A bark.

Jet? He was up there. I don't know how he got out to the sight. Maybe he'd followed the scent of the truck. Maybe he'd been trailing me for days, but there he was. And then he jumped. I saw him fall through the air like a rock in a storm, legs flailing, ears pinned back.

He hit the pit with a yelp and landed right beside me. Then before I could even yell, he was on them. Now Jet was a puppy. He wasn't even a proper dog yet. But he moved like a wild thing. He tore through those scorpions with teeth and claws and wild snarls knocking them away from me, biting, shaking, spinning in the dust. I tried to help.

Use the broken flashlight to swat at a few that got too close. Somewhere above, I heard shouting. Someone must have heard the barking. Ropes were being lowered. A teammate, Adam, I think, dropped into the peasant. pit and started dragging us out. I was half limping, half carried. Jet was still growling. His fur matted and speckled with cuts. We got pulled out out of the dark. The light hit us, and I remember squeaning at the sun like it was the first time I'd seen it. Then, just before they

got us to the tent, I looked back into the shaft one more time, and I saw something. And I saw something. Down there, in the far end of the tunnel, beyond where the light could really reach, I saw something watching. Two red dots that blinked once before continuing to stare at us. I didn't say anything at the time, but I've never forgotten that. We were rushed to medical after that. I got x-rays, a proper wrap of my ankle. It was just a sprain, but they made me stay off it for a few days.

I got the usual lecture. Don't go down shafts alone. Don't break protocol. Don't be an idiot. All fair. But I kept looking at Jett. He was curled up in the corner of the tent, bandaged and muddy, but breathing. His eyes were half closed.

He looked like a coyote pup, wild and half broken, but proud. like he knew what he'd done. I asked the medic how much it cost to get him all the usual stuff, shots, checkups, whatever dogs needed out here. The guy looked at me like I was crazy. He's not even yours, he said. He is now, I told him. That night, I went back into Cairo,

limped through the same market, bought a leather collar from an old woman who didn't speak much English. It had a scarab charm on the front, worn bronze, with a little crack down the center. I slipped it around Jett's neck when I got back to the tent, and he has never left my side since. Now, not every story is nice. Some of them crawl back into your thoughts when you're lying awake at night, staring at the roof of your tent, wondering what exactly you saw and why it still doesn't make sense. This one's like that.

I've been in Egypt a couple of years by then. Long enough to speak some of the language, long enough to stop calling myself a tourist. I had sand in my boots, paperwork in my truck, and scars on both hands from broken pottery and old tools. I knew the job, but I didn't know everything. I was addicted to strange tales, the old kind, legends. You can always find one if you knew where to look, especially after dark. The men in the bars told them like spooky stories, hands waving in the smoke, half of them laughing, half of them dead serious. The market vendors would whisper them while selling you dates or trinkets.

Everyone had a cousin or a cousin's friend who saw something. I collected them like trading cards, but I didn't believe any of them. Not really. Not until the day I got sick. I picked up lunch at a roadside stall on the south end of town. I don't even remember what it was, some kind of spiced meat wrapped in flat bread. Tasted fine at the time. I even tip the guy.

But two hours later, I was outside the site perimeter, hunched over in the sand, dry heaving until my ribs hurt. I thought I was dying. My throat was dry, my skin burning under the sun. I remember trying to get up and failing, just folded back down on my hands and knees, sweating like a pig. Then I heard footsteps behind me. A voice, Doris, Belly, you're not dying. I looked up, and there it was, this old guy with a gold tooth and a head wrap too clean for the weather.

He had a crooked walking stick and one thick eyebrow that looked like it could bench press me. He squatted down beside me like it was nothing. I didn't answer him. just coughed into the sand. He waited a minute. Then he pulled out a thermos and poured me a cup of mint tea, held it out without saying anything. I took it.

The man's name was Malik. We sat there until my stomach stopped trying to kill me. I kept sipping the tea, and he kept cracking jokes. Dumb ones. Stuff about how everyone breaks the first week. and this is why real Egyptians eat dirt before bread. He laughed at all his own jokes. Jet curled up near my boots and slept.

I don't know why, but I liked Malik right away. There was something easy about him, like he'd already survived everything worth fearing. A few days later, we were back out at a dig. The ministry had opened a sealed chamber next to one of the lesser pyramids, and I needed someone local to help me move to Bree and watch the site. I asked Malik if you wanted the job.

He said he was free, and that was that. We entered the chamber in the morning. It was cool inside. The kind of cool that only happens, when sunlight hasn't touched stone in centuries. The air smelled like dried leaves and old cloth. I had my flashlight. Malik had his thermos.

At first it was empty, just cracked stone and dust. But as we cleared the center of the room, we found bones arranged in a weird pattern, laid out in a circle around a large figure, to be exact. The bones weren't all human. Some were animal, long and bent, shaped like they came from creatures that didn't live in this part of the world. Hyena, maybe. Or lion.

Hard to say. But in the center, there was a skeleton with a lion's skull resting on its neck like a helmet. The teeth were too clean, too white. Malik muttered something under his breath. A prayer. I don't know which one. And then the ground started shaking. It was sudden.

No warning. Just a deep rumble that knocked my knees out from under me. Jet barked like he lost his mind, pacing in a tight circle behind us. It felt like a sudden earthquake. I dropped to the ground and covered my hand. My flashlight rolled away. Stone dust rained down from the ceiling. Malik crawled over to the bones with one hand.

And then, right there in the middle of the chaos, He poured his tea right onto the lion's skull. The moment the liquid hit the bone, something changed. The shaking stopped. The skull cracked in half with a dry sound. The ground went still again. Silence. Malik sat back on his heels and wiped his forehead.

I stared at him. then at the broken skull, then back at him. You, uh, you, you, you want to tell me what just happened? I asked. Booby trap. Old one. He said. Like it was obvious?

That's not how booby traps work, man. That's not how any of it works. I said, wiping my brow before checking on my dog. He shrugged. Legend says. if you enter a holy chamber without permission, you'll meet a violent end. Only way to avoid it is to have tea with the king.

I blinked at him. Tea with the king. So the tea, he pointed at the bones. That was the king. I whistled. Hell of a tradition. We sat in the chamber for a while longer. I started documenting the layout, measuring the bone lengths, taking photos.

My hands were steady again, but my head wasn't. I kept looking at that broken skull. The way it cracked, clean down the middle. Jet refused to come near it. Later I filed the report, gave the officials the clean. leaned-up version, told them about the bones, left out the earthquake, and the tea. I don't think they would have believed me anyway. But that night, I went back into town and started asking questions, real questions, because that was the moment I realized the stories weren't just stories.

Not here. Not in Egypt. They were warnings. Well, by now, you know, I worked digs, real work, sweat, sand, research. But like I said before, I also run tours. And I love it. I get to walk tourists through ancient tombs and talk about mummies, pharaohs, curses, all the good stuff. The kids are the best part. They look at me like I'm Brendan Fraser and the mummy, or Indiana Jones with a sunburn. They ask a million questions, and some of them actually listen when I answer. It's a break from the serious work. Makes the long hours hunched over stone worth it. Now most days go fine. Some sunburns, some laughs, some selfies. People go home happy. But not this one. I remember the heat that morning. Sharp and dry. Not the humid kind.

We were doing a tour, small group, maybe 15 people. Some older. couples, two teachers from Boston, and one family with a 10-year-old kid named Milo. Milo was the type who didn't stop moving. He know the kind. Fidgety. Had a little adventure hat on like he came out of a cereal box. Smart, too. Asked about the symbols on the wall before we even reached the entrance. I liked him. The tour started like usual. I walked him through the outer halls, explained the burial customs, pointed out the ancient graffiti scratched into the stone by workers a few thousand years ago. Everyone was hot and sweating, but smiling. We were halfway into the temple complex when I started doing a headcount. That's a habit I picked up early.

Dig sites are dangerous, even the ones made safe for tourists. One wrong turn, and you're alone in a maze. I counted once, twice, and Milo was gone. I didn't panic. Not yet. Kids wander off. He probably saw a cat or a weird bug. I called his name. No answer. I asked the parents if he'd said anything. They looked pale, like they knew their kid was the type to do something very stupid. and that's when I felt the fur brush past my leg. Jet? He was already stiff in the ground. Tail still, eyes locked.

He let out a soft bark and took off down a narrow hall, one we hadn't walked the group through. I followed. The hallway dipped down, away from the cool parts of the temple, and into something older. The walls here weren't cleaned up. for tourist. The paintings were chipped. There were spider webs in the corners. At the end of the hall, I saw light, and Milo. He was standing inside a small chamber, barely wider than my bedroom

back in Cairo. His little hand was wrapped around a thin wire, one of the old trip systems that thieves used to trigger back in the day. But this one wasn't fake. It worked. It worked. The sarcophagus in the center of the room slid open with a dry scrape. The lid cracked, and a long, wrapped figure began to rise out of it. I didn't think. I didn't blink. I shouted the kid's name, and he turned around frozen. The mummy lifted one bandaged leg over the edge of the coffin,

slow but steady, like it had all the time in the world. Its head tilted toward the boy. You could still see the sockets where the eyes used to be. Jet, guard, I said. Jet lunged between Milo and the coffin, teeth bared, growling low. I was already digging through my backpack. I pulled out my bug spray, stand. deep stuff for the desert bugs. Then I grabbed my lighter, flicked it. A thin stream of fire caught the mummy

full in the chest. It jerked. I didn't wait to see what happened next. I ran in, scooped Milo into my arms, and backed out of that room as fast as I could, jet on our heels. I didn't stop until we were back in the main hall, out in the light, surrounded by a confused tourist and one furious set of parents. I handed Milo over, told everyone we were ending the tour early due to unexpected sight damage. I filed the paperwork, kept it dry and clean. A few hours later, a cleanup team arrived. But this wasn't normal clean-up.

It wasn't just museum-type guys. This time, there were men in dark leather jackets. Strange, since we were in the desert under the hot sun. They moved in a group, didn't ask me any questions, didn't answer mine. One of them had a case of equipment I didn't recognize. Another had a gun. When I asked one of the ministry reps who they were, he just said, Monster Hunters from the Institute.

No other explanation, no business card. I didn't push it. I let them do their thing. I stood outside with Jet, drinking from my canteen, watching the sun dip behind the ridge. That's when one of the local workers came over. Older man, heavy lines on his face. He'd been around for a long time, helped me on two sites before. You saw it, he said.

Not a question. I nodded. The dead ain't being disturbed. Sleep is all they have left, he said. After that day, I changed how I did tours. I didn't treat it like a sideshow anymore. I still told stories, still made jokes, but I didn't let the kids wander, not even for a second.

I counted heads constantly, before the tour, during every stop, and again at the end. I even made the parents count with me. And Jett? Well, he changed too. He stuck closer to the kids after that, didn't run ahead like he used to. If a kid started drifting toward a hallway, Jett was there before I even saw it. He'd heard them back like a little four-legged guardian, nudging them gently with a little. his nose or plopping down in front of him like a furry wall. The kids loved him for it,

started feeding him jerky behind their parents' backs. One girl brought him a pack of dried liver snacks shaped like tiny camels. He didn't even chew him, just gulped him down and kept patrolling. I still lead tours. Still love it. But I don't take chances anymore. This This next story is one of the strangest things that's ever happened to me. But it also happens to be the story of how I met my wife, Charlotte. Back then, I was still early in my fieldwork. I had some digs under my belt, a few papers published, but I wasn't the polished guy you see on tours now.

My Arabic was rusty. I could order food, ask for the toilet, and maybe argue over the price of bottled water about it. Charlotte joined one of my dig teams as a translator. The ministry had loaned her out to us to read some inscriptions from a side chamber

we'd uncovered just west of the dig site. She wasn't loud, didn't smile much, wore a wide hat and a permanent frown like the sun itself had offended her. I remember the first thing she said to me.

You're brushing the wrong layer. I looked up, confused. I've been brushing layers for years. And that's probably why it's all wrong, she said. And that annoyed me. But she was right. I'd been going too deep, scraping past the pottery level and into the compact fill layer. Could have ruined the whole record if she hadn't caught it.

So I grumbled and fixed it. She didn't say anything else after that. just kept working. As the days passed, we started talking more. I'd ask her about glyphs on the wall, or she'd correct my numbers when I miscounted an artifact bag. Her Arabic was smooth, effortless. Mine was the broken, clumsy kind

you get from half-learning phrases on construction sites. She never laughed at me for it, though. Just corrected me and kept going. There was one day in particular that changed everything. We'd found something strange, an alabaster jar sealed with wax and pressed into a small hollow in the wall. No decorations, no markings on the outside, looked smooth and pale, like a giant egg. Charlotte stepped forward, brushing the dust off the rim with her fingers. There's writing underneath it.

She said. She tilted the jar gently, just enough to read the inscription carved into the base. She spoke carefully translating. It says, the breath of the coil shall remain sealed, break, and it shall strike. I looked at her. You think that means gas? She shrugged. Could be.

Could also be religious poetry. Everything's dramatic and old Egyptian. I was already reaching from my gloves. I wouldn't. She started. Too late. I cracked the wax seal with my trowel and gently pulled the lid off. That's when the cobra came out.

It didn't slither. It launched, coiled up and struck like it'd been waiting a thousand years just to bite someone stupid enough to open that jar. Its body wrapped around my forearm in one smooth motion. Black scales, thick and cold, coiled tight around my skin. I stayed completely still and didn't panic. Jet barked once sharply. and Charlotte was already moving. She didn't go for the snake.

She went for the jar. In one quick movement, she grabbed a nearby trowel and stabbed it into the side of the alabaster. Not hard, just deep enough to shatter it. The moment the jar cracked, something changed. The snake didn't bite or try to strike again. Its muscles went soft. Its head dropped.

The body fell off my arm like dead weight. I looked down, and it was already starting to shrivel, like a dried-out branch in the sun. The whole thing took maybe ten seconds. I looked at Charlotte. She was still holding the trowel, breathing hard. Calm, though. Eyes sharp as ever. You okay?

Yeah. Yeah, just bruised, I said, staring down to my arm. She stepped closer and pointed at the wall behind the jar. This chamber wasn't just a burial spot. It was a guardian vault. These snakes weren't pets. They were protectors, meant to strike anyone who disturbed the seal. I rubbed my arm.

So it wasn't poetry. She smiled just a little. Nope. There was a long pause. The team was still watching us from the edge of the chamber. Nobody moved. Jet sniffed the dead snake and sneezed. I turned to her.

So, uh, dinner? She raised an eyebrow. That's your move after almost dying? Well, you know, I figured I should ask before something. else tries to kill me. I replied. She looked at me for a second, then nodded. Okay, but you don't get to open anything else without asking me. Deal, I replied. We got married not long after that. I was never one for waiting. Neither was she. One day we were brushing sand off broken pottery, and the next we were signing papers in Cairo.

and drinking warm champagne out of a thermos. Jet was there too, of course. He wore a little scarf for the occasion. After that, the two of them became my constance. Wherever I went, they went. Charlotte, Jet, and me. One strange little team. We kept digging, kept finding things.

Egypt had more stories to tell. Well, I'm still going out there in case you're wondering. Still brushing bones, still leading wide-eyed tourist through narrow tombs, still squinting at broken bits of pottery, trying to make sense of them. Jett's a little older now, grayer around the muzzle, but he still runs faster than most of the kids on tours. Charlotte works with me when she's not off consulting for some museum or translating weird inscriptive. nobody else can read. And I am still careful about opening things. We've got a little house near the edge of Cairo. Nothing fancy, but it's ours. Cool tile floors, a lemon tree in the yard,

and shelves full of artifacts we probably weren't supposed to keep. It's the kind of place you want to come home to after a long day with a sun beating down on your neck. I figure I'll be doing this job for the rest of my life, if I can help it. Strange things still happen in Egypt. Always have. The heat plays tricks on your eyes, sure. But some of them aren't tricks. Some of it's real.

You just have to stop and look. You have to listen. The stories are still there. Buried under rock and dust. waiting Anyway, I have talked your ear off long enough Wherever you're headed next Whether it's back home or somewhere stranger

I wish you safe travels And if you ever find yourself wandering the edges of the pyramids again Look for the guy with a sun hat And the little dog