Amen moans.
Turns his head.
Agony.
Tastes blood on his lip.
He opens his eyes.
Display gone.
Destroyed.
All the information that haunted him for years was gone.
He longs for it. To know how he is doing, where he is, and if he is going to survive.
But it is all gone.
All that remains is a small red dot in the bottom right corner of his eyes.
It blinks, faintly.
That was it. Showing he was online perhaps.
And actually showing his heart beat. Faint, but there.
But that is it. No display, windows, stats, or power.
Amen immediately tries breaking from the ropes that are bound around his hands.
He then looks around his surroundings.
He seems to be in the center of a room, but lower than the rest of the temple around him.
Pillars around him and light shining down.
He sees skeletons and freshly eaten bodies around him.
"Fun," Amen says to himself.
A walkway is around him, so he is in the center of an animal pin or garden.
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He hears growling. It is heavy like he heard before. Guttural. Primal.
"Good thing it's not hungry," Amen laughs to himself, wringing his fingers and wrists in the ropes.
"Who says he's not?"
Bomani walks out of the shadows.
He looks over his shoulder into the darkness, then turns back to Amen.
Amen smiles. Bomani is scared of whatever was in that corner.
Bomani comes into the center of the pin with him.
"Nice fort," Amen jokes, as he continues to try to break out of his ropes, not even pretending to hide it from Bomani.
"You like it?"
"No."
The Archer seems displeased.
Amen's red dot keeps blinking.
Bomani looks around, and then stares back into the shadows.
"This temple was shut down. Its priests were deemed, uh, insane. Too occultic. Devious and evil. They did not follow the high priests and their gods. The forced sacrifices and slavery and mutilation became too much for the Pharaoh. These priests here, they have a game. How many body parts and insides they call pull while being alive. They do it for fun. They laugh and cry at the same time. The winner usually dies."
Bomani laughs.
Amen does too. "You fit in here. So you came upon this temple that was supposed to be closed, and you just kept it going?"
"Oh. They had been going for longer than your life span. I've just insured I have a place to go. They are good company. "
Bomani looks up.
Some of the priests are walking around them in circles on the platform, intently.
They also stare at the dark corner in anticipation.
"They were punished for something else too," Bomani says. "For the breeding, or overbreeding, of our friend over there. Playing god, they were. I’ve seen my friend over there eat whole families. Eaten many of my men. Thieves. Priests I don’t like. Anything he can get to. He’s so big. Can you see him?"
Amen wishes he had his radar and display.
He squints in the darkness to see some type of outline.
Suddenly, it's tail moves
It takes both Amen and Bomani's breath away.
The priests are giddy.
The tail is gigantic. Prehistoric like. A beast that does not exist nor has sense. Scaled and monstrous.
It growls.
Amen nearly breaks his arms trying to get out of the ropes.
Bomani steps back further.
"What's keeping him back?" Amen yells.
"I don't know," Bomani laughs. "I thought you'd be dead by now."