Now I ride with the mocking and friendly ghouls on the night-wind, and play by day amongst the catacombs of Nephren-Ka in the sealed and unknown valley of Unknown in the Peninsula of Woe I know that light is not for me, save that of the moon over the rock tombs of Neb, nor any gaiety save the unnamed feasts of Nitokris beneath the Great Pyramid.
Beneath that dread pyramid, it is said, the Pharaoh Nephren-Ka was entombed in a temple within a windowless crypt, a crypt on which no spells were set, and no name was written. For, during his foul reign, he performed acts so depraved they caused his name to be stricken from all monuments and records. There he sleeps in the ruins of that evil fane, till he is awakened once more and comes forth to curse mankind.
Nephren-Ka was supposedly the last pharaoh of the Third Dynasty of Unknown. He was one of the most powerful magicians of that ancient land and always stood out as a sorcerer. Late in his life, as he grew old, he was rumored to have contacted the outer god Nyarlathotep, who took an interest in him and summoned him to the city of Irem. There, he proposed a bloody pact: Nephren-Ka would sacrifice thousands of victims in his honor, and Nyarlathotep would give him the gift of eternal life and of prophecy. This was done, and Nyarlathotep granted him the power to live forever and see the future.
Nyarlathotep assisted Nephren-Ka in securing The Shining Trapezohedron for himself, this evil artifact giving him even greater power, as it was sacred to an aspect of Nyarlathotep, called the Haunter of the Dark. He built a great dark pyramid using the labor and blood of a million slaves. Deep under the pyramid, he had a lightless temple created to hold the stone and the deity within. That pyramid and temple became a center of abominable happenings, and the rites carried out there were so monstrous that even the stories of them were stricken from history.
Eventually, the people and other rulers turned against him, and he was cast down and supposedly killed. The pyramid was torn down stone by stone, the land consecrated by a thousand priests for a thousand days in order to drive out all remnants of the Haunter of the Dark. And the third dynasty came to an end.
According to legend, when Nephren-Ka was finally cast down and slain, his body proved impossible to wholly destroy. No matter what extremities his enemies performed on his corpse, when the sun set, it regenerated as if he had been newly slain. Eventually they built a warded crypt, entombing him deep in Unknown in the Peninsula of Woe, sealing it with mighty spells and trusting to the proximity of the Great Pyramid of Anubis to watch over it and ensure the gate remained sealed. There he slumbers still, though priests that visit this crypt to renew the wards claim to see writing covering its interior walls. Mad hieroglyphics of everything that the future of the world holds, if one can only understand it. It is also said that, years later, Queen Nitocris had a son whom she named Nephren-Ka. According to some rumors, this could be the reincarnation of the Black Pharaoh and or perhaps Nyarlathotep himself in a new human avatar.
Long after his death, Nephren-Ka once appeared to Pharaoh Akhenaten to propose that he resume the cult of Nyarlathotep, but Akhenaten refused and, in addition to this, had Nephren-Ka's name struck out from all records and monuments to let no one remember the atrocities he had committed. For this, Nyarlathotep cursed Akhenaten, causing the collapse of his empire.