The last song of the ancestors

As luck would have it, the wind from the explosion of Hakim's Ofó blew away the flames that were devouring Durojaiye's scales. She fell to the ground, chest facing upwards. Her legs were stretched out and crooked, an arm around her forehead casting shadows over her eyelids. All her desolation was exposed.

He gasped; the heat had affected his windpipe. He had a coughing fit. With his head turned to the side where the explosion had occurred, a cloud of dust and Axé particles rose into the sky like a gigantic mushroom. The blue sky seemed to have been disturbed, the white clouds turned gray. They seemed to have been contaminated with hatred.

Durojaiye didn't know. She had never been inclined to battle, preferring a life of peace and quiet. But the voice of war had called her to battle. War does not allow anyone peace.

She touched her smoky hair. She grimaced. Of the members of the Circle of Sages, she was the vainest.

What? Damn you! Look at my hair! I'm going to kill you, undertaker from hell.

For some reason, when she felt her hair being mistreated by the heat, she let a smile frame her thick lips. For some unexplained reason, it awakened long-forgotten memories.

⸎

In the clan responsible for guarding the Spiritual Key of Generation, sexual identity relations were more fluid. Families without female children used to choose a boy and raise him as a woman. This young man was taught the tasks considered feminine, and spent his days with the women, working with them, absorbing their experience and behavior.

This didn't mean that everyone spent their lives believing they were women; some even married and had children. For the Generation Clan, this was a normal custom, which for other clans was too liberal, but tolerable for the sake of maintaining good relations between them.

With the arrival of Ojwang and the opening up of the country to foreign influences, the perception of Ilu Nla society changed radically. Groups began to harass young travestied as the Generation Clan. Acts of humiliation escalated to physical attacks and even a murder that shocked the country.

Unfounded rumors attributed various social problems, such as youth corruption and Ilu Nla's low birth rate, to the travestied. It was in this context that Durojaiye took up the post of Generation Sage.

However, her acceptance was not immediate…

"Me?"

"Yes! Who else can take over, you idiot?"

"You!"

"Me? No! You're the strongest psychic in the clan now."

"So, what do I do?"

"Take a rocket and go to the moon."

"Aff! Don't be silly."

A young Durojaiye woman turned her back on her aunt. The young medium felt strange. She was older than her aunt, although she sometimes wanted to take advice from her. This was impossible due to her immaturity. Although the other aunt was a woman, she didn't know how to cook, wash, sew, take care of plants or the healing arts.

Her niece did everything better than her aunt, with greater speed and zeal. This led to a sometimes-unfair exchange between the two. Durojaiye did her aunt's housework in exchange for clothes and cosmetics. They were confidants, although the aunt knew that her niece came to visit her more to escape her responsibilities to the clan than to catch up.

"You can't run away forever, Durojayie."

"Is that perfume French?"

"Yes, it is… Stop running away, you idiot!"

Her aunt angrily smacked her niece upside the head. Durojaiye's eyes watered.

I was going to play, you didn't have to hit me!

In her family of four siblings, the medium was the youngest, and the only one to cross-dress. She was averse to mediumship training and ran away whenever she could. Her older brothers were very angry to hear that she had been chosen for the job, but refused to take it on.

Her parents tried to delay the decision of the clan chiefs, but they were resolute in their choice. Durojaiye was a born talent. He had an enormous capacity for emitting Axé, for control, for combining modeling with Ofó like no one else. At that moment, they needed a new leader, a strong young woman who could face the enemy to come.

Her niece continued to distract herself with her aunt's clothes and cosmetics. The young woman became so angry that she shouted at the medium.

"Durojaiye, you can't run away from your destiny."

The medium was paralyzed by her aunt's words. She turned around with moist eyes.

"Especially what we didn't choose…"

"You're a fool, you know that? You can do wonderful things with your mediumship. I was born into this clan, and like many others in Ilu Nla, I was born without this gift. Don't waste the talent you have for comfort."

"Don't say that, snif-snif, I just wanted an ordinary life, snif, I haven't even found myself a crush yet!"

Durojaiye began to cry with her mouth wide open. She hugged her aunt, squeezing her so tightly that she was breathless. The woman began to smooth her broad back and sang a lullaby. She knew exactly how the medium felt.

"Don't be afraid, my dear. Responsibilities come to everyone. I married young and I'm already expecting my first child. I only have the strength of my arms to protect myself and my son. Not you, you have mediumship. You'll be a wise woman. You can protect yourself and all of us. Isn't that incredible?"

"That's a lot of responsibility on my shoulders."

"Growing up means taking on our responsibilities."

⸎

"Have I grown up, auntie?"

The sky was overcast. The heavy clouds heralded heavy rain. Durojaiye wiped the tears from her eyes. He stood up and shook the dust from his clothes with his hands. He evoked all the remaining Axé. Unlike the accusations that had fallen on her, she hadn't resigned her post out of futility, but out of fear of being an insufficient medium.

Excuses that her mind had created to stop her immersing herself in a world of struggles and combats that she thought were meaningless. If she had had a choice, she wouldn't have been a medium, nor would she have been in Ilu Nla, but now she was a sage. She decided to follow Ekundayo, she thought he was the only medium who could bring a new order to Ilu Nla.

At that moment, more than any other, she assumed her responsibility. After all, a spiritual key was not an ornament, it was an ancestral treasure. A force that accumulated memories, experiences that fed the strength of the current user.

"All right, auntie. I'll follow your recommendation. Snake Dive Scales."

Axé molded around his body in hexagonal scales. The armor took on the colors of a sea serpent, black with yellow patterns. Durojaiye leapt into the air, and like an Olympic diver, crossed the ground. With her Ofó, she could swim freely across solid surfaces.

The scales emitted a short, intense vibration that caused the soil molecules to split, giving way to it and then coming together in nanoseconds. The structure of the objects remained as if it had never been disturbed by their Axé. With her Axé spread, amplified by the scales, she could feel the aura of everything above ground.

She advanced against Fadala, seven feet below the ground. The gunman was struggling to walk up the stairs. He seemed to have felt the blow to his torso. She decided to hit his legs so that he wouldn't have a chance to move quickly again.

My chance! You'll have to die today, sweetie.

Above the surface, Fadala was smoking his herbal cigarette. With his sensory synesthesia, he felt a slight disturbance below the ground. He knew something was wrong, but he had no chance of dodging the blow. Anticipating a counterattack would make him lose the surprise effect. He had to hope for a miracle. He was a man of faith, maybe it would come.

No, I have to take this blow. Sacrifice a part of my body to avoid a critical hit and stay in the fight.

Fadala held himself ready. He held the pistol in his left hand by the barrel, as if it were a truncheon, and left the other ready to fire at his left side.

"Your tricks won't work!"

The blow was indefensible, as Fadala had predicted. The medium got off the ground and struck with her flat hand, her fingers linked, her scales like blades. The mortician fired, sending her body crashing into the stone wall. His left arm deflected Durojaiye's hand from his leg to his left shoulder.

Before Fadala could react, the Generation Sage dived through the wall. She applied a rear naked choke to the hired killer. Her opponent put her mouth to Fadala's ear and said:

"Stop struggling, sweetie. It'll make you suffer."