Rise of the Fallen Princess (Ahmanet - The Mummy)

Chapter 11 - Temple's Attack

Midnight had passed. Silence and calm had fallen over the temple and its surroundings. Having no need of sleep and having let Mathias return to his cell to rest, Princess Ahmanet returned alone to the altar room, ordering her guards not to disturb her. Sitting cross-legged on the large stone altar, she had plunged herself into deep meditation. 

But suddenly, Ahmanet opened her eyes in an expression that was both worried and hostile. Her superhuman monster senses were warning her of something. The atmosphere in the room became overwhelming and unhealthy, the glow of the flames from the braziers fading unnaturally.

_"I know you're there... Set." Ahmanet then said coldly.

From the dark recesses of the hall, a giant, misshapen, clawed shadow slowly took shape, gliding down the walls and moving like a ghost. A powerful and palpable aura of chaos and death permeated the place from then on, Ahmanet being able to feel it like thousands of invisible arms coming to touch her.

_"Are you having fun with your new toy, princess?" Then growled the cavernous, inhuman and haughty voice of Set. "I thought you couldn't disappoint me anymore, but I guess I was wrong. Have you forgotten the pact we made thousands of moons ago?"

_"Oh no, I could never forget." Ahmanet replied with a contemptuous look and refusing to look at the shadow of the god lurking around her. "Even during these millennia of imprisonment, you were still there, torturing me for my failure. But today is different, I am back and soon the world will know too."

Set's voice rang out in a sinister, belittling sneer towards the fallen princess.

_"What do you hope to prove, little idiot?" he asked. "It's that young mortal, isn't it? He lulled you with illusions with his honeyed words about tolerance and choice. He's just a human like any other, stupid, evil and insensitive. In reality he fears you, he despises you, you are just a soulless beast in his eyes! A murderer!"

The words of the deceitful god were harsh, cruel and crushing like a hammer bringing down a little more his judgment on Ahmanet, who nevertheless clenched her fists and did not let the god influence her mind, although the black magic she inherited came from him. Rising, the princess stood straight and faced her own master.

_"Mathias Parrish is not like them. I read his mind, his heart. He accepted me, as I am and for the first time in my entire existence, thanks to him, I feel alive and accepted!"

But despite the force and firmness of his words, Ahmanet once again heard that mocking, sinister and haughty laughter from Set surrounding her from side to side.

_"The sound of your voice... The beat of your black heart... the way you talk about him... Could it be love that I feel?" Set asked cynically.

Ahmanet did not respond, not wanting to give him this pleasure. She looked away but could not hide the blush on her cheeks, her embarrassed look and the beating of her heart which had intensified and which the god had directly felt it.

_"Interesting..." Set then commented. "It seems that this young mortal has managed to rekindle the last spark of humanity in you... Pathetic, typical of the lesser beings of his species. Do you want to become weak again, princess? Have you forgotten everything that the humans, your own family, made you endure? You were only a cursed being to them, a demon who killed her mother when she was born. I didn't entrust you with these powers to see you ruin everything!"

_"I will never do that to Mathias, you hear me?!" Ahmanet retorted, trying to hold on against the increasingly overwhelming aura of the god over her. "I would rather live an eternity of solitude than betray him!"

_"Your resistance is lost in advance!" Set then roared at him, his voice growing louder and more aggressive. "Sooner or later, this mortal's body will be mine, and I can once again spread my chaos to all of humanity! Mathias Parrish will die, and all your efforts to save him will have been in vain, like the rest of your miserable existence on this earth!"