After meditating, he thought back to the old ways and attempts to recall a suitable ritual.

Blood shall spill upon the land, to awaken its thirst. An oath shall be given, to open its heart. Gold shall be scattered, and incense burnt, to expand its mind. An enemy shall be buried alive, to stir its hunger. Finally, something fresh should be planted, to give a taste of the future.. and of the past.

These things done and the land will speak freely, conjurer.

He understood what must be done. However, it couldn't be done immediately, for he did not have the supplies - most of all any enemies yet...

While the insects were exploring, Sura, Al'Amun thought it best if he familiarized himself with his temple, and thus headed off too it.

Sura soon reaches the pyramid, a great monument made of white sandstone, its single entrance adorned with gold and ivory. As the Lord of the Desert got closer, the number of desert insects about the place diminished, and were replaced with the thousand-year corpses of hundreds of ceremonial warriors, their bleached bones grinning towards nothing at all, resting as they would for eternity. They were left mostly untouched, their battle dress plated with yellow gold and painted bone, and the silver of their blades were blinding in the sun.

His men still remain - Sura was pleased. These once eager mortals have been forced into servitude and Sura will hold them to it.

He takes comfort in seeing his great pyramid - Akhenaten. He approached and entered his sanctuary.

The halls of Akhenaten were quiet and cool, a shaded recluse from the blistering sun. The pyramid arranged itself logically for its Lord, knowing that it was he who was it's master, and Sura was not lost; Sura was not crushed to death; Sura was not trapped within an airless room; Sura was not whipped or poisoned or stabbed.

The rooms he passed were filled with all manner of gold objects, priceless artifacts..

The silence was soothing. He began wandering the halls, checking if it was how he remembered.

Akhenaten was silent, exactly as he remembered. The very nature of the pyramid, despite that fact that it was filled with gold and treasure, kept it fairly desolate as far as visitors went. The walls were still shifting horrors.. the traps, centuries - millennia, perhaps - were still in place, and the Room was still there, in its sacred place..

Sura stopped.

The Room?

He recognized it - but couldn't remember exactly what was within. What..?

The only hint that there was something there was a tiny gold marking - an eye inside a sun - on the top of the hidden door. The door was made of stone - for whatever reason, designed not to be opened. The hidden passage, the Room, was within..

Sura Al'Amun examined the wall carefully. He particularly examined the symbol. He ran his hand across the wall and eventually onto the eye.

It was the sign of Osiris-Ra. He remembered that much.. dread filled him upon sighting it, filled with a strange joy. It was a powerful thing, marked by the Dreaded Lord himself..

Sura felt a familiar embrace. He felt secure... empowered. He pushed on the eye forcefully, absorbing all the feelings and memories he could. He had no idea how to open the door.

Sura knew, suddenly, that - in the manner of Osiris-Ra - the door had to be smashed, not opened. It would lead him, perhaps, to the Scepter..

He reformed himself here... out of breath. Much anger rose within him. He formed the sand in the temple into a solid hammer shape and slammed it against the wall.

The sand scattered as soon as it had formed, smashing against the wall with much force. The wall seem to groan in protest, betraying its hollow center and the room that lay within, but otherwise the wall did not change. The stone was to strong. If Sura wanted access, he would have to be as violent as the desert the storm.

And so he did. He created a tonne of sand in seconds, formed it, solidified it and smashed it against the wall.

The wall crumbled, a little, as if it was never there..

Welcome, General.. whispered the walls..

The remains of the door was sand.

Inside the room, the floor was bare, and the only thing that Sura could see was a sort of clean white-stone alter in the center, some sacred piece of parchment atop it.. a map? Sura knew it to be a map. He had drawn it, he knew.. so long ago. At the behest of his master. But a map leading where?

To the scepter?

Sura sent the sand to fetch the map and carefully drew it to him.

The map was ancient - perhaps old enough to crumble at the touch of one who had not, personally, created it. Sura saw it, and read that it seemed to point towards two locations: one to the immediate south, with the scrawled letters begin here written in hasty ink below a more formal The Oasis of the Blackened. The sign above the 'oasis' was a hieroglyphic of Osiris-Ra - it confirmed this, meaning, literally, 'water-hole' or 'oasis'. He should start at the Oasis of the Blackened, it seemed, and then travel to the east, where it was written..

The Tomb of Thunder
and
The Scepter

He carefully stored the map away on his person and left his temple. He looked around the area. He began to travel to this oasis. He also wondered if his insects have made progress.

The insects would not be long, Sura knew. They would have explored at least three-fifths of Desolace.


The Oasis of the Blackened had earned its name. As Sura got deeper south, the sands shifted from a bright golden white to brown, and then silty black. If possible, it got even hotter. The palms, however, in the distance - where, Sura assumed, he would find whatever he needed to find - were strong and healthy. There was a sparkling, as if announcing the presence of water..

Water? In Desolace...? Remarkable to see it. He thought it all gone - obviously not. He Noticed the sands colour and associated it with this Osiris-Ra, who seems to be a greater part of Sura's past than he thought.

The black sands hid small green plants, living off the moisture of the oasis.. it was paradise in a broken land. The water was a dark blue, and Sura saw it to be pure. Fish swam in the center. Palm trees waved overhead, giving shade. Locusts chirped.

This place was.. beautiful.

He didn't mind this new life in Desolace... as much he was at home in the heat. Water still is a natural part of the desert.

Once here Sura consults his map again, getting his bearing.

He also thinks deep and hard - searching his knowledge of mind magic. He seeks a way to restore his lost memories.
This message was last edited by the player at 09:26, Mon 19 Oct 2009.

Sura knows enough to understand that regaining his memories would be a long and intensive process. If he wants to begin, he'd need a long sword made of silver, a large pool of water, and a day of meditation, rest, and contemplation. The things gained, he needs to look into the water and command his mind to give him back what is his: his memories..

Sura consults the map - he in the south, the Oasis of the Blackened.

The Oasis seems peaceful.. it is not immediately obvious what he is meant to accomplish here, but he remembers something about it, something nagging. It was certainly familiar.

A scorpion crawls out of the black sand.

Lord, it rasps in the language known only to the little creatures of the desert.

He ponders whether this oasis is large enough for the memory ritual. He looks to the scorpion, "What is it?" he asks.