Eba-Odan Village was in the middle of the harvest season so the normally quiet village was busting with life. When cock crowed in the morning, Tunde had been awake for more than an hour. His sleep had been interrupted by his mother coming to seat down by his bed while he slept. She looked at him with tender eyes and stroked his head. He mused quietly that his visions had become clearer in Eba-Odan. He didn't even need to be asleep anymore to see the thing he perceived. He performed his morning rites of hygiene and sat in the sitting room waiting for Adigun.
His grandfather came out and asked "how is Funto?", Tunde answered, "she is asleep still". Adigun grunted ad walked out fully into the sitting room. The leopard man was with him this time. His grandfather was dressed in a strange variant of agbada (Traditional Tribal Shroud) that seemed to have some life of its own. It continually belched white smoke which disappeared immediately into the surrounding. Adigun spoke without breaking "Tunde, I have lost my Dawodu (first son), your father and nearly all his family. Your father was on his way to the village to escape those who would bring harm to us". He paused and brought out a kola nut from the living agbada. He bit off a sizeable amount and his eyes immediately lit up with flames. He continued "Our enemies, their blood will form the foundation of death around their abode. I know you are a son of your father but we will go speak to the gods who break the sky for direction. It is time we knew your path, come with me, Tunde."
Adigun and Tunde walked out of the house onto a path of the main road. The road continually whispered with small creatures of light and colours dancing along the roadside. The trees seemed to come to life and whisper Tunde's name but he had been told by his mother never to answer a call from anyone he could not see physically. Adigun walked briskly in front of Tunde until they came to a clearing with a hut made of pure ivory and metals too magnificent for Tunde to describe.
The house was an anomaly in a village of mud houses and thatch. It seemed the magnificence was lost on his grandfather so Tunde kept to himself as usual. Adigun brought out a miniature gourd from the living agbada, he spoke to it and said "Ifa* the living arbiter of all that lives, the skin of our teeth beseeches your servants, the leaves of the palm tree at your feet while the code of fate in your mouth, we have come with the salt you wanted, please divine the roads for us", Immediately, the surrounding chatter of life and the forest went quiet. A young man dressed in a well-fitting suit came out of the house and spoke very harshly to Adigun.
"Adigun, you are overstepping your boundaries. You know I the mouthpiece of Ifa is here yet you dare to converse with a god yourself. You overestimate your audience with the gods". Adigun smiled and said, "here is the salt and kola, the mouthpiece of ifa, Olufemi". The young man received the salt and kola and lingered on Adigun before bringing out a set of beads from his pocket. The beads continually changed shape and he struck them on the ground. Immediately, a pattern appeared on the ground and started to glow but the young man seemed unimpressed. He looked at Adigun and acknowledged Tunde for the first time, "who is this and why are the vines of his life indiscernible". Adigun whispered something to him and his eyes lit up. "I see nothing about him only void as if some huge powers cover his destiny from us".
Tunde noticed immediately that he seemed to have 3 eyeballs, each coloured differently in his eyes. The young suited man whom Adigun had referred to as Olufemi kept looking at the ground trying to decipher the glowing patterns until suddenly Tunde noticed that Adigun had stopped moving. He looked around him and everything was stuck in motion. Even the sky had taken an unnatural shade of orange with the sky turned black and bleeding black tar.