The Twenty-Two Signs

Requirements

• Complete A Stranger in Men-nefer
• 20 Scribing

Items

You'll be given: Shem-Ba'al's letter, Tjay's reply

You'll hand over: Papyrus sheet, Cakes of black ink, Shem-Ba'al's letter

Walkthrough

The quest journal, step by step.

1. Start

   A miner from Retjenu named Shem-Ba'al is scratching odd little pictures onto the rocks at Serabit el-Khadim. (Requires A Stranger in Men-nefer and Scribing 20.)

2. Stage 1

   Shem-Ba'al wants to write home to his mother in Retjenu, but Egyptian writing has seven hundred signs and he has a miner's patience. He's making his own, with only a couple of dozen. He needs a papyrus sheet and some black ink.

   Updated by talking to Shem-Ba'al
3. Stage 2

   Shem-Ba'al wrote out his signs: an ox head for 'alp', a house for 'bet', water for 'mem'. Each picture is one sound. He wants me to show it to the temple scribe, Tjay, who has never been wrong about anything.

   Updated by talking to Shem-Ba'al
4. Stage 3

   Tjay laughed at the signs until I asked him to read them, and then he stopped laughing. He sent back a reply, written, I notice, in Shem-Ba'al's signs. I should give it to Shem-Ba'al.

   To do: Use Tjay's reply on Shem-Ba'alUpdated by talking to Scribe Tjay
5. Complete

   Shem-Ba'al read Tjay's reply aloud, all by himself: 'To the Lady, a gift.' He says one day the whole world will write with his twenty-two signs. I told him that seemed unlikely.

Rewards

• 1 Renown
• 3,000 Scribing XP
• 1,000 Heka XP
• 800 deben

Items: Deben ×800