The Spell-warded Wrappings of Nitocris
[ The Spell-warded Wrappings of Nitocris 
| |
|---|---|
| Base item | mummy wrapping |
| Appearance | (same as base item) |
| Affiliation | |
| Generation | |
| Wishable? | no |
| Properties |
|
| When carried | (none) |
| When worn |
|
| When invoked | (none) |
| Base size | (base item standard) |
| Base price | 5000 zm |
| Weight | 20 |
| Base material | cloth |
The Spell-warded Wrappings of Nitocris is the name an artifact that appears in dNetHack, notdNetHack and notnotdNetHack. It is neutral in alignment, and its base item is a black mummy wrapping.
Generation
The Spell-warded Wrappings of Nitocris cannot be wished for.
Nitocris is always generated wearing the cursed, fireproof +7 Spell-warded Wrappings upon being released from the cursed and trapped metal sarcophagus containing her.
Description
While worn, the Spell-warded Wrappings of Nitocris block invisibility as normal mummy wrappings do and also grant magic resistance, curse resistance and immunity to the "Masks of Nyarlathotep" madness inflicted by killing certain monsters (i.e. Nitocris, the Hmnyw-Pharaoh or the Good Neighbor). A hero wearing the artifact will also block the massive luck drain that occurs from the Good Neighbor moving onto their square.
Both Nitocris and the Hmnyw-Pharaoh have specific behaviors that depend on whether or not the former currently has the artifact worn:
- If Nitocris is alive (i.e not in her Ghoul-Queen form) and wearing the Spell-warded Wrappings, and the Hmnyw-Pharaoh is not visible to the hero (which requires 40 insight), then he will warp to her location and enable her to cast a clerical monster spell on her next turn, done in place of the mage monster spell used by her normal attack routine. If the Hmnyw-Pharaoh is visible to the hero, he will do so without warping.
- If Nitocris is alive but she is not wearing the Spell-warded Wrappings and the Hmnyw-Pharaoh is not visible, he will warp to her location followed by the "dark waters" claiming Nitocris, which instantly kills her and causes her to rise as Ghoul-queen Nitocris (destroying the artifact in the process). If the Hmnyw-Pharaoh is visible to the hero, he will do so without warping.
- Should Nitocris die while wearing the artifact, a life saving effect will occur that first has a 2⁄3 chance of attempting to "fray" the artifact wrapping if she is still wearing it, and maximizes its erosion level if it succeeds—if this fraying occurs while the wrappings are already eroded, the life saving will fail and Nitocris will die, transforming into Ghoul-queen Nitocris as above.
As an artifact, attempting to wear the Spell-warded Wrappings of Nitocris while the spirit Shiro is bound will not destroy them in the process of unbinding him.
Strategy
A hero that wants to preserve the Spell-warded Wrappings of Nitocris for themselves will have to find a way to steal them off Nitocris before killing her, since they will be destroyed if her transformation into Ghoul-queen Nitocris occurs while she is still wearing them. One particularly reliable item for this purpose is the doll of stealing, which can rob her of her entire inventory when applied.
Origin
Nitocris, or Nitokris, is a legendary figure in the Cthulhu Mythos that is based on the account of a possibly-historical queen of Ancient Egypt, who may have ruled at the end of the 6th Dynasty from 2184–2181 BC. Her name is found in writings long considered as relatively accurate resources: a major chronological documentation of the reigns of the kings of ancient Egypt that was composed in the third-century BC by Manetho, an Ancient Egyptian priest, and the Histories of the ancient Greek historian Herodotus, written in 430 BC.
Nitocris is thought to be the daughter of Pepi II and Neith and to be the sister of Merenre Nemtyemsaf II. Her historicity has been questioned by some with speculation that, if she was a historical ruler, she may have been a regent. Another view, by the Egyptologist Kim Ryholt, argues that Nitocris is legendary and derives from the historical king Neitiqerty Siptah who succeeded Nitocris's brother, Merenre Nemtyemsaf II, at the transition between the Old Kingdom and First Intermediate Period. Manetho claimed she built the "third pyramid" at Giza, while modern historians and archaeologists attribute that pyramid to a king of the Fourth Dynasty, Menkaure. According to Herodotus, Nitocris invited the murderers of her brother, the "king of Egypt", to a banquet, then killed them by flooding the sealed room with the waters of the Nile—to avoid the other conspirators, she then committed suicide, possibly by running into a burning room.
H. P. Lovecraft incorporated the legend of Nitocris into his works, first mentioning her in his story "The Outsider" (written in 1921 and first published in 1926). The piece refers to "the unnamed feasts of Nitokris beneath the Great Pyramid," in a passage that also evokes the "catacombs of Nephren-Ka" and "the mocking and friendly ghouls on the night-wind." Nitokris also comes up repeatedly in "Under the Pyramids", a story which was ghostwritten for Harry Houdini in 1924 and published that same year, and invokes both the legend of her drowning her enemies and her connection to the Third Pyramid—this story also links Nitokris to the Pharaoh Khephren, telling of rumors that he "lives far underground wedded to the ghoul-queen Nitokris and ruling over the mummies that are neither of man nor of beast". Toward the end of the story, the narrator Houdini actually sees the "beautiful Queen Nitokris," and notices that "the right half of her face was eaten away by rats or other ghouls".
The presence of Nitokris in the Cthulhu Mythos is part of the basis for the depiction of Nitocris and the Hmnyw-Pharaoh in dNetHack and its derivatives—in the Mythos, Nitocris had a son whom she named Nephren-Ka, and Nephren-Ka was rumored to be the reincarnation of the original (also known as Nophru-Ka and the "Black Pharaoh") after his death and merging with the Outer God Nyarlathotep to become one of his human avatars. Additionally, according to the 6th Edition of the Call of Cthulhu game, Nyarlathotep himself can be physically slain by normal means in human form, and any such avatar that is slain this way will have their body quake and swell before it bursts to release a huge clawed monster; the monster rises from the split corpse and then disappears into the sky without attacking the killer.
In dNetHack, these are incorporated into the mechanics of both monsters: Nitocris has bound an avatar of Nyarlathotep inside her as a method of attaining immortality, and the Hmnyw-Pharaoh–himself an avatar of Nyarlathotep–seeks to free this trapped aspect from within her. If The Spell-warded Wrappings of Nitocris that bind the avatar either fray too significantly and fail to revive Nitocris, or else they are stolen off her, Hmnyw-Pharaoh will then murder Nitocris to free the avatar and cause her to take on Ghoul-queen form.
Messages
- Dark waters pour into <Nitocris>'s mouth and throat!
- <Nitocris> drowns!
- Nitocris is killed by the Hmnyw-Pharaoh after losing the Spell-warded Wrappings, but the latter is not visible.
- <The Hmnyw-Pharaoh> smirks grotesquely and gestures for the dark waters to rise.
- The waters pour into <Nitocris>'s mouth and throat!
- <Nitocris> drowns!
- As above, but both of them are visible.
