Sarcophagus

The gleam of flashlights shone off the stone walls, footfalls and muffled voices filled the long hall. It had been several centuries since anyone had set foot inside this ancient burial chamber. Around the corner came three men, caked in the dust of a thousand years. Following ancient accounts they came to an antechamber, which was sealed by a giant stone door that was covered in inscriptions of languages that were dead long ago. One of the men pushed his way to the front of the group.

"Make way, let me see!" a smaller bookish man fought his way to the head of the bunch. With a loud thump he dropped his pack to the dusty ground, sending up a small cloud of dust in the light. Closely inspecting the scrawl on the door, he quickly started rifling through his bag and eventually produced an ancient looking black bound book. Frantically flipping through the pages he paused when he came upon a certain section.

In the dim light the pages shone with a zeal, betrayed by the outdated and weathered cover.
"This is the passage, the one that will open the door for us and allow us to pass in peace. Now I need complete silence, any change or mistake in the incantation can have disastrous effects."
With that, the man began to start a low, throaty incantation in some language lost to the winds of time. The words rose and fell in an unearthly fashion, making those in its audience to believe they may have never been spoken before. As the incantation was nearing completion, an odd luminescence stated emanating from the gigantic door in front of them. With a final lurch of otherworldly speech, and all was silent. Puzzled the bookish man started leafing through the book, exasperation marking his features.

"It was supposed to work, it was all right here!!!" The man screeched as he threw his book down in an angry spectacle. Then, loud grinding sounds came from the door, with an unnerving squealing that followed. A loud hiss sounded when the seal of the doors broke, air escaped that had not been free in thousands of years. Torchlight emanated from the antechamber, after a millennium had come and gone, these chambers were again viewed by human eyes. Inscriptions lined the walls, so much so that you would be hard pressed to find room to write anything new. The group of men stared for what seemed like hours, unsure of their next move and transfixed by the scene beyond the doors. The antechamber was sparse, there was no gold sarcophagus, nor was there any other signs of wealth or luxury. Instead of a lavish final resting place for some long dead king, they found a chamber that had but one thing in it, a lead box.
The bookish man took of his glasses and cleaned them with his shirt. With a new clean lens he scanned the room, disappointed at what was contained within.

"This was supposed to be some secret site, unknown and untouched." he said, flabbergasted by the amount of work that had been done just to obtain a small box.
One of the other men spoke up, "Well it looks pretty touched to me. At least they left us one thing." he finished as he walked toward the box.

"What do you think is inside; gold, jewels, statues...?" he trailed off as he began to open the lid.
As the lid opened a blinding white light emitted from the small box. The light struck the walls and simultaneously a part of the inscription upon the walls started glowing. The bookish man pulled out a pocket sized book and quickly began to translate.

"Only those fool hardy enough to not heed these warnings will be consumed by a spirit of vengeance and hunger. Those cursed will be forced to roam the Earth in search of sustenance, but always will they hunger for more."

The bookish man began to scream something, but it was too late. A thick black smoke was swirling out of the lead chest and quickly consumed the man holding it. The smoke remained there momentarily totally eclipsing the man holding it. After a few minutes there was a scream and the sound of a rather hearty breath inhaling. The black smoke disappeared into the body of the man holding the chest. When the rest of the team looked at him they shuttered.
For when he opened his eyes he stared back at his companions with black soulless eyes. For what seemed like an eternity, they had a standoff, except for the bookish man thumbing through pages frantically.