After a hectic day in the field, preacher Soleiman had called it a day. He went home to take a well-deserved nap. On his way back he always took longer routes to appreciate the beauty of the village he was visiting. There was no spot in the village that was naked to the sun. Every inch of the sky was covered with trees. That probably was the biggest reason why it had remained undiscovered for so long. A number of smaller clusters of houses, each belonging to different tribes, also shared the vast canopied expanse. The religion was quite complex with different gods for different department but there was a lot of influence driven from wildlife and nature. Six animals were held sacred; Wolf, Cow, Alligator, Snake, Eagle and Elephant. There were six tribes in the forest other than the village which was a center for all them. Each tribe was designated a holy animal to maintain a distinct identity. Hence, they were named Ingcuka, Inkomo, Ingwenya, Inyoka, Ukhozi and Indlovu. The tribes were governed by their respective leaders while the village was governed by a Chief elected by the tribal leaders according to the will of their people. The central village kept Panther as their identity. Soleiman had found their political system very fascinating as he had expected a more savagely system of power. He walked through the markets, gardens and any playgrounds to experience a pleasant moment of children playing with almost anything. He stood almost six feet tall, had a short black beard on a fair skin and wore similar simple kurtas, often white, with a white prayer skullcap. He stopped for a moment at the barren field that was used by children as a playground. He sat on a large log that served as a bench near the boundary of the field. The children were playing a modified version of football. It only had free kicks. There was no running around, no off-sides, no formations, teams, etc. but just a leather ball, a kicker blasting it and a keeper trying to stop it. He had wondered how could the people, who had never stepped outside their village, know about the sport but he realized that the variant could be their own invention. The game had entered a tense state. A boy was getting ready to take a free kick. It was a matter of life and death as far as these kids were concerned. Friends of each contender watched attentively from the sides. The goalkeeper looked more tense as compared to the striker. He looked to the preacher with pleading eyes. The preacher smiled and kicked off his slipper. The goalie smiled back and went on to take his position. The striker took off. Just as the striker was about to unleash hell on that poor piece of leather, the goalie, quite dramatically, kicked off his shoes to the side. The striker was distracted and he kicked the ball miles away from the goal. The preacher erupted in laughter and so did the goalie. The goalie was soon surrounded by his mates lifting him up on their shoulders. The striker made a run for it as his friends gave him a chase to give him a thrashing.
When the game was wrapped up, the goalie came to the preacher to talk to him on the make shift bench. The preacher received him with a smile. just as he was about to speak, his mother came running to him and pulled him away as if he was socializing with a drug dealer. Although he was not greatly accustomed to their language, he heard her call him some words that, he knew, were not used for something pleasant. He didn't mind. People are afraid of what they don't understand and that fear turns into hatred before they know it. He got up and left for his hut.
He retired to his wooden cabin that looked like it had been abandoned for at least a decade and had seen better days, but he was never ungrateful and embraced whatever he was granted in his preaching journeys believing them to be granted by God. A few locals had been impressed by his kindness and soft tone so they had provided him a place to stay for as long as he was in the village. The whereabouts of the village had just recently come to light after some tourists ventured too far in the neighboring African country. After a few months of research, the organization had learned the gist of their native religion and the native language, which was a mixture of a few older African languages. They had sent Soleiman with a group of preachers to the land to enlighten them about Islam. The people of the village lived very formally and respected their culture and traditions with their hearts. One wouldn't see an elder being abused nor a child being rowdy. The preacher laid down on his bed and went through all the noticeable moments he experienced in the day, in his head. The preacher had visited a handful of far off places in the past to preach and had seen his share of opposition and threat but something about this village made him feel a bit paranoid. Normally, the native people in the places he visited displayed their favor, opposition, anger or indifference toward him quite openly. Whether it was children poking fun at him with the consent of their parents, or it was queues of poor people waiting outside his house to state their problems with a firm belief that he would be their savior, whether it was his departures from these countries where he saw emotional farewells from the teary eyed locals or it was the subtle eye gestures that silently shunned him, the reactions and emotions of the people he visited had always been easy for him to decipher. But in this village, he could somehow tell that something was fishy. He had always held meetings with the religious elite of the places that he visited and he didn't break the tradition as he came to the village. The High Shaman that was the undisputed supreme religious leader of the people, had invited him into the temple and showcased his hospitality. The experience was freshening but something seemed off. The preacher buried his thoughts, closed his eyes, said a prayer and went to sleep.
A moment later he was startled by loud desperate knock on his door. There was no existence of knocking etiquettes in the village so he was at ease expecting a beggar or not even something as remotely alarming as a child asking for his kite stuck on the roof of preacher's hut. He took his time, calmly got on his feet and opened the door to see one of his regular native students panting and sweating at the door in front of him. Even on reiterating his belief to the crowds that the outward appearances do not mater in the eyes of God, the students he preached always ended up imitating his appearance. He didn't mind in the case of this village because their casual attires were quite indecent. But at the moment he saw his student wearing the same native rags that exhibited more of his body than a decent person would wish for. He politely asked him to come inside but the student was in no mood to waste any time in receiving any hospitality and implored him to leave the village as soon possible. The preacher was dumbfounded because he did not expect such a demand from one of his best students. The student continued and told him that the chief of the village along with the religious leaders have planned to get rid of him and have gathered a mob of villagers armed to their teeth. The preacher, without wasting a moment, dashed outside and climbed the roof of his hut to reaffirm his student's claim and confirmation he got. He could see the Shaman delivering an inflammatory speech to a mob gathering with everyone armed just as his informant claimed. The preacher wanted to alert his junior colleagues as soon as he could but his informant stopped him and said that the mob had planned to catch him first because he was the leader of the group. That would give his junior priests some time to escape. The informant had informed them beforehand and they were escaping as they spoke. And also, it was easier for them to escape because the huts allotted to them were significantly nearer the exit and entrance of the village as compared to the hut being inhabited by the senior preacher. The rest of the group had been placed near the river bank where the fishing boats were docked while Soleiman's hut was away from the river bank and had its back to the forest. The preacher understood the point made by his student and he knew that the only thing that could save him or at least buy him some time was to get a head start. He grabbed his satchel in which he stored his few necessary belongings, said his thanks, bode farewell to his student and took off.
The preacher ran towards the woods. He avoided being spotted by mere seconds. The moment he disappeared into the forest, the mob arrived at his doorstep. The last thing he saw, as he stole a glance behind him, was the mob using a log as a battering ram to knock down the door to his hut only to find it abandoned. An apprentice of the Shaman had emerged out of the shattered doorway to announce the preacher's escape. It did not take long until the mob understood where he had fled. The leader of the mob, the chief, directed his people to follow him into the woods and asked his colleagues; the Shaman, his apprentices and the tribal leaders to return to the sacred temple with him. The chief knew that his target had pulled the lever to his own guillotine when he chose the jungle as his savior because his people would sniff him out in a matter of minutes while the leaders of the village had better things to do than to spectate the one sided game of hide and seek.