Red Sonja: She-Devil With A Sword ☦️

“THE LAKE OF THE UNKNOWN!”
Script: Roy Thomas & Clara Noto • Art & Cover: Frank Thorne • Marvel Comics, July 1977
A savage continuation from the blood-soaked Games of Gita!
Hours after the brutal arena clashes in the decadent city of Athos, Red Sonja—flame-haired Hyrkanian warrior and Mikal, the loyal youth she befriended amid the Zotozian slave revolts—strides from the city gates into the mist-shrouded wilds. Their path leads to a shimmering lake whose waters gleam like polished lapis lazuli beneath the Hyborian sun, an otherworldly expanse that seems to pulse with forbidden life.
From the depths burst grotesque reptile-like beasts—the lurkers of Chimu—twisted forms that have claimed the bodies of woodland animals as vessels. These abominations slither and lumber toward Athos, drawn like moths to the flame of the city’s infamous Theatre of Monsters. There, in a Grand Guignol spectacle of gore and depravity, the fat, bloodthirsty nobles of Athos cheer as the lake creatures perform their macabre entertainments.
But the She-Devil with a Sword will not stand idle. When the beasts turn feral amid the crowd, a thunderous brawl erupts across the stage and stalls! Sonja’s blade sings a crimson song as she and Mikal carve through the horde, steel flashing against claw and scale.
In the chaos, the noble Cyphax—leader of the lake-dwellers, his form a hulking, simian-reptilian hybrid born of alien desperation—reveals the terrible truth. His people hail from a dying solar system, refugees whose fragile bodies could not endure Earth’s savage atmosphere and climate. To survive, they seized the forms of local beasts, possessing and reshaping them into vessels of flesh. Yet this unholy migration carried a curse: their hybrid offspring grew ever more bloodthirsty, slaughtering one another in frenzied breeding wars that threaten to consume the entire colony.
The lake itself becomes their crystalline sanctuary. As Sonja and Mikal descend with Cyphax, the waters part which is like lapis lazuli crystal and as they descend further into the lake it forms a luminous canopy overhead, an azure dome echoing ancient visions of thrones suspended above the firmament. ☦️NASB Ezk 1:26) Now above the expanse that was over their heads there was something resembling a throne, like lapis lazuli in appearance; and on that which resembled a throne, high up, was a figure with the appearance of a man.

But betrayal strikes from within the depths—Cyphax’s own brother, Thatim, drives a blade through his chest in a bid for dominance! Mortally wounded, the dying leader presses his enchanted ring into Sonja’s hand. With his final breath he charges her with his dying wish: use the ring to part the lake’s barrier and escape this accursed realm… then fulfill his quest to free the true leader still held captive somewhere within Athos’ rotting walls.

07/1977

Marvel Comics

07148602945807

4

1

July

1977

Direct

First

United States

$0.30

Bronze Age

English

Magazine

2018-07-02 22:47:59

”The Lake of the Unknown” Writer(s)
Roy Thomas
Clara Noto
Penciler(s)
Frank Thorne
Inker(s)
Frank Thorne
Colorist(s)
Frank Thorne
Letterer(s)
Frank Thorne
Editor(s)
Roy Thomas
Appearing in ””The Lake of the Unknown””
Featured Characters:

Red Sonja
Supporting Characters:

Mikal
Cyphax (First and only known appearance; dies)
Antagonists:

Reptiles from Chimu
Thatim (First appearance)
Other Characters:

Erlik (Invoked)
Tarim (Invoked)
Gita (Mentioned)
Races ad Species:

Humans
Lions
Gods (Mentioned)
Locations:

Earth
Hyboria
Lake of the Unknown (First appearance)
Chimu (First appearance)
Athos
Theatre of Monsters (First appearance)
Hyrkania (Mentioned)
Stygia (Mentioned)
Singing Tower (Mentioned)
Hell (Invoked)

~$18.98

2026-03-08

2018-07-02 22:47:59