The Return and the Shadow
I. Silence Before the Roar
The battlefield smoldered.
Ash drifted like snow through the broken trees.
The rift was closed. The beasts were gone.
And for the first time in weeks—
Nouvo Lakay stood in silence.
Then came the chant, low and rising:
"Zion… Zion… Zion…"
Warriors, farmers, priestesses, children—
all fell to knees or raised bloodied arms to the sky.
Zion had returned.
And behind him stood the gods—
not as myths or spirits or dreams—
but as flesh, as light, as wrath incarnate.
II. The Flame of Joy
A great fire was lit at the center of the borderlands.
The subordinate tribes gathered.
Those who stayed, who bled and did not run—
were embraced as kin.
Ayola, Ayomi, Seal, Thalia, and Elis—
the Five Priestesses—stood before the people,
their bodies bruised, their spirits blazing.
They did not claim victory.
They pointed to the sky.
"The gods fight beside us," Thalia declared.
"But we must be worthy of them
The skies had darkened without thunder.
The wind stilled. Even the beasts grew quiet.
Across the cracked ground near the outer border of Nouvo Lakay, two figures stood alone:
Zion.
Ejimo.
Once allies.
Now fire and oil.
Zion's eyes glowed faintly—embers flickering in storm-gray.
Ejimo's arms pulsed with corrupted power, the mark of the Beast World burning beneath her skin, feeding her rage.
I. The First Blow
She struck first.
A wave of molten black flame surged from her palm—
not fire of the gods, but stolen heat, cursed and twisted.
Zion didn't move.
The flame curved around him, split apart as if meeting an unseen wall,
then collapsed into sparks.
Ejimo snarled, raising both arms—summoning the rift-born claws of a beast god.
"You always hesitated," she spat.
"I was the blade that could have saved us!"
Zion answered only by moving forward.
Step by step. Slow.
Each footfall cracked the ground.
II. Dance of Fury
She screamed and lunged, claws slashing—
Zion vanished.
Appeared behind her in a breath,
his palm on her back,
and whispered:
"You opened the gate."
The ground erupted beneath her.
She was flung skyward, spinning—
caught herself mid-air and hurled spears of void-light down.
Zion raised one hand.
The spears froze—turned to glass—and shattered midair.
Ejimo struck from behind again, this time faster—driven by fury.
She landed a blow across his face.
The cut sizzled.
Blood trickled.
Zion blinked. And the storm came.
III. Zion Unleashed
Lightning danced across his shoulders.
Wind coiled around his body.
And from beneath his feet, roots of divine memory tore through the earth.
He moved.
Faster than thought—striking not with fists but with presence.
Each blow cracked the air.
Ejimo blocked, screamed, fought like a cornered god—
but Zion's anger was still.
It burned cold.
When he spoke again, it was not to her—but to the world:
"This is the cost of betrayal."
He drove his hand into the earth, and a pillar of light erupted beneath Ejimo—
not fire, not thunder, but truth.
She screamed as the power tore through her lies,
unmaking the stolen gifts from the beast gods,
ripping the mask from her soul.
IV. Her Fall
Kneeling, broken, panting—
she looked up at him with blood in her mouth and madness in her eyes.
"They promised me a new world…"
Zion stood over her, silent.
"You still don't understand," she whispered.
"This war isn't between gods and beasts…"
"It's between those who change, and those who kneel."
He closed his eyes.
"Then die with your change."
He struck.
Not with a weapon.
With the weight of the Lwa behind him.
Ejimo's body shattered—light bursting from her chest.
Her soul flared—caught in Baron Samedi's hand…
But before it could be judged,
a crack—a hidden rift—opened.
And the soul slipped away into darkness.
V. Silence
The dust settled.
Zion stood alone again.
He looked to the heavens,
He nodded once.
The war had begun.