Chapter 1: Shunet El Zebib

The brazier crashes to the floor as the 12-foot statue begins to rise from its throne. When the Swordsman brandishes his sword at it, the stone leopards turn and pounce in obedience!

Leaving the giant statue to the stone leopards and the collapsing tomb, you hurry up the winding stairs and out into the open. With all of Shunet El Zebib shaking and trembling, the wasps are agitated. What do you do, Jana?

"Go away! Leave us alone!" the wasps threaten with their stings, but only to drive you away and make sure you stay away.

Deep rumbling issues from the tomb as it collapses underneath the sand.

What do you do now?

Swordsman, when you begin to sheathe the Sword of Vengeance in the scabbard, you can almost swear the sword slid itself home of its own accord. The tomb of the Forgotten Warrior is many leagues from here. How could sword and scabbard have ended up apart? And what of the stone leopards at these two sites? Both tombs are now buried, so you may never know. The desert likes to keep its secrets.

You all return to the oasis. What do you wish to do here?

Neither Akh nor Soro have heard of god-pharoahs rising or manifesting in this way. Granted, very little is known of the god-pharaohs anyway. The four of you probably know more of Khut-hotep, and his servant and usurper, Nechepso, than anyone alive.

The Swordsman, however, remembers something...

Something has been niggling at the back of the Swordsman's mind. The name Nechepso seemed vaguely familiar when Akh spoke it. It's only now that the fighter remembers he once heard it in reference to accounts of the exploits of a brilliant general whose name he doesn't remember ever having learned. Might the Forgotten Warrior and the brilliant general be the very same person? The Swordsman came away with the Sword of Vengeance after he and Akh barely made it out of the Forgotten Warrior's tomb alive. The other members of that expedition were slaughtered by stone leopard guardians just like the ones guarding Khut-hotep and Nechepso's tomb. Now, he's found the sword's scabbard, and the stone leopards bowed to him. The Forgotten Warrior... the general... that must be the connection here. But how? Sadly, even Akh is unable to puzzle it out. Not yet.

You've always felt like the Sword of Vengeance has a mind of its own. Now that you also bear its scabbard, that consciousness augments your own awareness in battle.