Sade stared at the strange text messages again and again.
"I knew your grandmother."
"I know why the spirits want you."
"Meet me… the old shrine behind the stream."
Her grandmother?
How??
What did this person truly know?
Her heart pounded so loud she could hear it in her ears.
Part of her wanted to ignore the message.
Block the number.
Forget everything.
But another part — the part that touched the spirit realm, the part that bonded with Tunde — couldn't walk away.
She needed answers.
Desperately.
At 4pm, Sade slipped out quietly, her mind racing with fear and curiosity.
The path behind the village stream was always quiet.
The kind of place parents warned children to avoid.
Trees thick.
Birds silent.
A strange coldness in the air even though the sun was still bright.
The shrine appeared ahead — old, cracked, covered in moss, with ancient carvings on the stones.
A rusty iron bell hung at the entrance.
Sade swallowed hard.
"Hello?" she called out.
Her voice echoed.
No answer.
She stepped inside slowly, her slippers crunching dry leaves.
Then—
PING.
Her phone buzzed.
Another message.
> "You're early."
Sade froze.
Her throat tightened.
She slowly typed back:
> "Where are you?"
A reply came immediately:
> "Behind you."
Sade spun around so fast she almost tripped.
Standing near the entrance was a tall man.
Dark skin.
Broad shoulders.
Grey beard.
White markings across his forehead.
He looked like someone from another era.
Someone who carried secrets.
Sade stepped back instinctively.
"Who… who are you?"
The man didn't move closer.
He simply bowed his head respectfully.
"My name is Baba Kamoru.
Your grandmother called me Ajani, the guardian of the threshold."
Sade's eyes widened.
"You knew my grandmother?"
"Yes. She was one of us. A walker between worlds."
Sade felt goosebumps crawl down her body.
"So she really could see spirits?"
"Not only see them," Baba Kamoru said softly.
"She protected the living from them.
Just as you are meant to."
Sade shook her head quickly.
"No. I don't want that. I didn't choose this."
He looked at her with sad, understanding eyes.
"No one chooses a calling.
It chooses you."
Sade's voice cracked with frustration:
"Please… I just want to know why the spirits want me."
Baba Kamoru stepped closer — slowly, as if not to scare her.
"The night you died, the spirit realm recognized you.
Your soul left your body completely.
But then… something unnatural happened."
Sade held her breath.
"What happened?"
He stared deep into her eyes.
"You were pulled back.
Not by fate.
Not by chance."
Sade's pulse thundered.
"Pulled back by who?"
Baba Kamoru whispered:
"By Tunde."
The ground seemed to tilt beneath her feet.
She felt dizzy.
"No… no, that can't be true."
"It is," Baba Kamoru said.
"Spirits do not bring humans back to life. Unless—"
"Unless what?" Sade pressed, desperate.
He hesitated, then spoke slowly:
"Unless… they love the human."
Sade's entire chest tightened.
"Tunde… brought me back… because he…?"
Baba Kamoru nodded.
"Yes. And a bond formed.
A bond strong enough to pull you between worlds."
Sade's legs almost gave out.
Her heart pounded so hard she felt it in her throat.
Tunde…
Loved her?
Before she could breathe another word—
The air turned ice-cold.
Leaves outside rustled violently.
The shrine's bell rang on its own.
Baba Kamoru's eyes widened.
"No… not now. We are not ready."
"Ready for what??" Sade cried.
He grabbed her wrist urgently.
"Sade, listen!
The spirit that attacked you before — it wasn't alone.
And now another one has found you."
Sade's blood ran cold.
A shadow slid across the shrine wall.
Long.
Thin.
Humanoid.
But twisted.
Sade's voice shook.
"Is it the same spirit?"
Baba Kamoru's face hardened.
"No.
This one is worse."
The shadow crawled across the wall…
up the ceiling…
around the pillars…
until it settled directly above Sade.
Slowly—
a head formed.
Then eyes—deep, glowing red.
A voice hissed:
"Found you…"
Sade screamed.
Baba Kamoru shouted:
"RUN!"
But as Sade turned to flee—
A hand of pure shadow grabbed her ankle.
She fell to the floor hard.
The spirit's voice echoed:
"You should have stayed dead."