Athem was the chief astrologer and mathematician of pharaoh Rahmen Tah. He is only mentioned in the two books Rahmen Tah and the Vizier I and II, which tell the story of a fraught pharaoh seeking to kill an evil vizier and turning to his astrologer for advice. After a week's worth of thinking, Athem knew what to do. He started building a large machine on top of the Great Pyramid (here) and advised the king to prepare a celebration to invite the vizier to. Once the vizier did the expected by suspecting it to be a trap and declining the pharaoh's invitation, Athem's plan was ready for action. He knew the vizier would be sitting in his tower's observatory in order to find out what was going on and activated his machine, a giant catapult. A huge boulder was hurled across Ankrahmun and hit the vizier's tower dead on, killing the vizier and destroying the tower as well as finally ridding Ankrahmun of the dark magic encapsulating the city.
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