Age of Sango(Naija Demigods Chronicles #1)

Redemption

Kola looked around for a guardian he had to defeat or an obstacle but couldn't find any. He waited patiently for a few minutes before he proceeded to retrieve oshe. As he moved an apparition appeared in from of him. An ethereal black man with wide toad-like lips and a noose around his neck. The evil spirit projected a paralyzing aura of compunction.

A powerful wave of regret and shame washed over Kola, a troubled emotion that diffused through his skin into his innards causing him to tear up. He knew it wasn’t his emotion exactly but was coming from the being who was a shade that inhabited the forest. The man had probably committed suicide and his family must have thrown his body in the forest.

Kola wept deeply as he began to feel sorry for himself. His life had been so pathetic. Old pangs of guilt began to surface. He had cheated people, snatched phones from women purses and pawned them for money to eat, he had even stolen from a beggar. Sure he had only done those when he was desperate and starving but that was no excuse. He had done some really bad things and deserved to die. Kola felt like killing himself and leaving this evil, sad and hopeless world.

The spirit handed him a rope and Kola started up a tree to tie it. Images of his victims flashed before his eyes, like the blind old man he had stolen from and then Sangosakin face flashed mouthing to him to fight it. Kola saw his parents deformed corpse and ached to be with them in the afterlife.

“What about us” heard several feminine whispers but he could not pinpoint whose voices he heard.

Then he heard Dada’s voice,

“Will you be like the fabled Alaafin who pit his general against one another because of his insecurity and had a very short rule which ended with hanging himself or the cowardly and weak womanizer lazing around having been blessed with one of the most vibrant ashe in the cosmos…”

Kola wanted to be powerful like the spirit whose ashe resides in him. He didn’t want to be weak or cowardly but he had been such a bad person his conscience seemed to tell him.

His hands had already tied the rope to a higher branch and was putting the noose on neck. He could not bear his new family finding out what he’d done.

“Suicide is a coward’s way out. Prove yourself boy.” he heard Ogun whisper.
Kola didn’t want to be a coward. He began to resolve not to jump when the spirit appeared behind him and pushed him. With hands still on the rope, the entire twine caught fire as Kola dangled from the branch struggling to survive. The flames consumed the noose causing to break and Kola fell flat on his face on the mulchy forest floor.

When he finally arose, he searched around for the evil spirit but it was gone. The day seemed much darker than he remembered. Kola pulled oshe out of the timber and thunder seemed to laud the return of the weapon to its owner. He returned back to the river wondering how he was going to cross its waters.