Chapter 24: The Realm Between
As soon as the obsidian ring touched the gem embedded in Philip's forehead, a sharp pulse of light burst from his body—silent, yet deafening to everything magical in the region.
The ring didn't fall. It didn't glow.
It simply… dissolved.
Absorbed by the gem, as if it had always meant to return.
Philip's knees buckled.
And then—darkness.
A blinding crimson pulse erupted from his chest.
The walls trembled. The floor cracked.
And then—silence.
Everything vanished.
Lagos.
Miles away, across black-glass skyscrapers and hidden fortresses, a magical shockwave rippled through the ether like a psychic scream.
In a chamber deep beneath the city's oldest mosque, Seye Adebode, newly appointed head of one of the Six Ruling Mystical Clans, jerked upright mid-meditation.
His eyes snapped open.
"A treasure has been born," he whispered.
Within minutes, cloaked figures bearing the Adebode sigil mobilized.
Their mission:
Locate the source, Assess the power, Retrieve the treasure—no matter the cost.
Smaller groups—opportunists and artifact scavengers—swarmed the zone like flies to honey.
But at the sight of the Adebode sigils, most began to back away.
They knew better.
But by the time the Adebodes arrived?
All that remained was a crater.
No artifact.
No trail.
Just scorched earth, cracked concrete, and lingering magic in the air—like ozone after a lightning strike.
Elder Deji Adebode, leading the operation, surveyed the devastation with a clenched jaw.
His eyes glowed faintly.
"It felt like a world-class item was born here," he muttered. "Even we don't have many of those."
He turned to his men.
"Search everything. Anyone suspicious—bring them in."
The smaller factions hesitated, trying to slip away unnoticed.
Deji saw it.
And smiled—that cruel, spine-chilling smile known across the underworld.
"You think you can walk away?"
He shrugged off his outer cloak.
"Let me remind you… why they once called me the Mad Butcher."
Within seconds, blood was on the ground.
His blade moved faster than sight.
The screams echoed longer than the cuts lasted.
The rest fell in line.
Deji wiped his blade clean without even looking down.
"This zone is under Adebode jurisdiction now. Anyone who stays—obeys."
And still, even through fear, one truth echoed in every mystic's heart:
A treasure was born.
As the Adebodes sealed off the area to prevent escape, several shadowy figures appeared—unseen, unfelt by the ordinary or even by the other mystics.
They sensed each other, but none else could sense them.
They scanned the area.
Found nothing.
And began to vanish.
But then—Seye Adebode reappeared at the crater's center, his aura rolling off him in dense waves.
One of the figures, a striking woman with obsidian skin and deep, amused eyes, laughed softly.
Another figure, lean and shrouded in a weathered cloak, snorted.
"Since we're all here—except old man Okoye—we might as well meet," one of them said.
Seye frowned. He hated the idea of a meeting in his territory.
But he was outnumbered.
He gave a terse nod.
And then, Godwin Iwuchukwu stepped forward—the head of the Iwuchukwu Clan, rulers of Nigeria's eastern and southern mystic territories.
With a gesture, Godwin invoked his clan's Signature Ability: Law.
In an instant, a sealed space formed above the ruined site.
Words became binding. Declarations, unbreakable.
Reality inside the field bent to his clan's authority.
They called themselves Iwuchukwu.
But across the worlds, their name was translated differently:
Law is their blood. Command is their birthright.
Godwin spoke calmly, and the air itself hushed.
As they settled into the conjured space above the crater, each leader summoned a throne from their own power—no two the same.
Godwin Iwuchukwu, stern and poised, seated himself in a stone chair etched with ancient scripts—the embodiment of Law. Bako Aliyu, patriarch of the oldest northern family, sat on a throne of sun-scorched iron, his expression unreadable beneath his turbaned brow. Temi Toyon, the immortal witch of the West, formed a floating seat of obsidian feathers and smoke, lounging with an amused glint in her ageless eyes. Wisdom Effiong, ruler of the southern marshlands, created a simple wooden stool overgrown with roots and vines, his aura calm but impenetrable. And finally, Seye Adebode, head of Lagos, stood rather than sat—his conjured seat of black fire smoldering but unused behind him.
Temi chuckled, the sound like wind through dead leaves.
"You sent your family to fetch a treasure," she teased, lips curling. "And yet the aura was clearly from an ancient relic awakening. A true one. Not something your boys could leash."
Seye didn't flinch.
"I'm not an old witch like you, Temi," he replied, voice cold. "I'm the youngest Legendary-ranked mystic in the world. Just turned forty this year."
Her smile widened, delighted by his fire.
But before she could respond, Bako Aliyu raised his hand. Silence swept the space.
"Enough. This has happened before—in the old days. When a relic of that magnitude reawakens, it tests a soul. The trial begins in another realm... and ends near the site of its origin."
He looked around at them, eyes like burning coal.
"When the trial ends, the bearer will return. Either with a treasure… or with knowledge long forgotten."
Godwin nodded slowly.
"Then we seal the area."
"And capture whoever emerges," Seye added.
There were no objections.
The pact was made without ceremony—because in that moment, each of them knew:
Something powerful had stirred.
Something that might tip the balance of power forever.
So they waited.
And watched.
And sealed the area around the crater.
Because soon… someone would return.