"When two gods clash, the land remembers."
— Inscription from the Nri Oracle Tablets
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Enugu Forest Ruins – Night
The air still shimmered with the aftershock of the clash.
The white-blooded boy's body twitched against the fractured earth. His armor—once gleaming with unnatural purity—was now cracked like eggshell, leaking molten light. Obinna knelt, panting, spear in hand, blood smeared across his brow. The earth beneath them had cratered, forming a perfect ring of scorched soil and broken trees.
Azụmiri hovered above in his eagle form, wings spread wide, thunderclouds coiling around his feathers like serpents preparing to strike again.
Silence fell.
Then the white-blooded boy laughed.
> "So… the gods have returned… and they chose you?"
His voice was wet with blood and madness. From his cracked chest, a shard of crystal pulsed—like a heart that didn't belong in a human body.
Obinna didn't answer immediately. His spear hummed in his hand, and the runes down its shaft glowed brighter now—responding not to rage, but resolve.
> "Who did this to you?" Obinna asked.
The boy spat silver blood. "No one does this. You become this… when you have nothing left to believe in."
The response twisted something in Obinna's gut.
He understood.
---
Flashback — Hours Earlier
After the fight, Obinna had searched the boy's fallen satchel—nothing but old drawings. Crayon sketches of family. A younger version of the boy, smiling with a woman in a yellow gele. Another with him holding hands with a soldier, possibly his father.
And the last—crossed out in jagged ink—showed the same family, burning in a fire, with foreign soldiers in gas masks standing nearby.
A Biafran rebel had scribbled on the back:
> "Subject 14A — recovered from orphan raid. Begin phase 2 conditioning."
---
Back to Present
Obinna stood. The flames behind him swayed like spirits listening.
> "You weren't born this way," he said softly. "You were made to forget your name."
The boy's grin wavered.
> "I don't need a name."
"You will," Obinna replied. "Because I'm about to return it to you."
Obinna stepped forward. The Nine Rings lit up in the sky again—faint, like reflections on water, not fully manifest. But the ground heard. The roots beneath stirred. The gods watched.
He raised his left hand. Azụmiri swooped down, merging with him in a flash of divine fire. His body ignited—not in destructive flame, but ancestral flame. Ethereal symbols—spirals, Nsibidi runes, the sigil of Ala—crawled across his skin like blessings from old spirits.
> "I call upon the First Oath," he shouted, voice thick with command. "The Oath of Flames!"
The air around him bent. The ground beneath his feet spiraled outward, carving a fiery crest in the shape of a giant eagle. Trees hundreds of meters away were flattened. Clouds parted. Thunder boomed from the west—but it wasn't natural. This was war magic.
The white-blooded boy tried to rise.
> "Stop—what are you doing—"
> "Releasing you," Obinna whispered.
And then, with the grace of a storm and the power of a godchild, he threw the spear.
It didn't just fly—it tore space. Flames trailed behind like a serpent's tail. The air turned to glass. When it struck the boy's chest, it didn't pierce—it dissolved the corruption.
The shard in the boy's chest shattered. His body arched. And from the crater of light, a name escaped his lips:
> "Chijioke…"
Then he passed out.
Obinna caught him before he hit the ground.
---
Minutes Later – The Forest's Edge
Obinna wrapped the boy in barkweave cloth. Azụmiri had returned to spirit form, circling above like a silent guardian. Obinna stared at the sky—his body sore, his mind clearer.
> "How many others are there?" he asked aloud.
A new voice answered.
> "Hundreds," said a woman stepping from behind a tree.
She wore a red head wrap, a hunter's rifle strapped to her back, and an ankh-shaped pendant around her neck. Her skin shimmered faintly, like she'd been walking between this world and the next.
> "And they're coming for you."
Obinna didn't flinch. "Who are you?"
> "My name is Adaeze," she said. "And I fight for the truth buried under Nigeria."
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📘 Mini-Dictionary (New Terms)
Oath of Flames – A divine vow performed by those bound to a Spirit Beast. It awakens ancestral fire tied to Igbo bloodlines.
Nsibidi – An ancient writing system of southeastern Nigeria, used for mystical, spiritual, and political purposes.
Ancestral Flame – A fire summoned from bloodline mem
ory, not just emotion or cultivation. It cannot be faked.
Chijioke – Igbo male name meaning "God gives strength."
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⚔️ [End of Chapter 8]