From the introduction "Amun-re, last king of a once great culture, became so obsessed with his own death that he set his entire kingdom to ruin to secure his place in Heaven Westward. When the people at last rebelled, he cursed them by the great Star Gem and his Ruling Staff, that the kingdom would wither and die for lack of water until such time as his theft proof tomb... built for him by the Kordan the Archmage... was despoiled. Killed by the shaft of an avenging slave, Amun-re soon found his own curse to be his undoing. The god Osiris refused his spirit admittance to his own tomb..."