5 THE VOICES BEFORE THE STORM Date: May 27, 2026 Time: 9:48 AM Location: Airport Academy, Adamawa State, Nigeria Chaos had consumed the school long before the monsters reached it.
Students flooded the hallways in terrified waves, pushing past overturned desks and abandoned bags while teachers shouted instructions nobody followed anymore.
Some students cried openly.
Others stared blankly at the floating blue screens hovering before their faces as if reality itself had broken beyond repair.
Outside the shattered classroom windows, smoke drifted across the city.
And above the smoke— the fractured sky loomed over Earth like a wound that refused to close.
Temitope Olaniyi forced her way through the crowd, breathing hard as panic spread through the building around her.
Her dark braided hair clung slightly to her forehead from sweat, and her usually composed expression had tightened into visible fear.
At fifteen, Temitope was used to handling difficult situations better than most people her age, but nothing about today felt manageable.
One thought repeated endlessly inside her mind.
Dami.
Where is Dami?
She ignored the frightened students calling for help and pushed toward the junior classrooms.
Then finally— she saw her little sister sitting calmly inside one of the rooms.
“Damilola!” The younger girl immediately looked up.
Her face brightened almost instantly.
“Temi!” Damilola jumped from her chair and ran toward her happily, weaving around scattered books and overturned desks.
Unlike the others around her, she didn’t look panicked.
If anything, she looked fascinated.
Temitope grabbed her shoulders immediately.
“Are you okay?” Damilola nodded quickly.
“I’m fine.” Temitope stared at her suspiciously.
“…Why do you look excited?” That somehow made Damilola smile even more.
“The system!” Temitope blinked.
“The what?” Before Damilola could answer— BOOOOOOM!!!
A violent explosion shook the school building.
Windows rattled.
Students screamed again somewhere down the hallway.
Dust fell from the ceiling.
Temitope reacted immediately, grabbing Damilola’s wrist.
“We need to move.” The sisters hurried through the chaotic corridor together while frightened students pushed past them in both directions.
A teacher near the staircase tried desperately to calm everyone.
“Stay together!
Don’t run outside!” But the fear spreading through the building had already become uncontrollable.
Eventually, Temitope found an empty storage room near the back of the school and quickly locked the door behind them.
Silence settled briefly inside the cramped room.
Both sisters breathed heavily.
Outside, distant screams and crashing sounds still echoed faintly through the school.
Then Damilola looked upward excitedly.
“Big sis… do you have a system too?” Temitope raised an eyebrow.
“Mind your business.” Damilola puffed her cheeks immediately.
“You’re so mean…” Despite everything happening outside, Temitope almost smiled.
Almost.
“…Yes,” she admitted quietly.
Damilola gasped dramatically.
“You too?!” “I still don’t understand any of this,” Temitope muttered.
That only made Damilola even more excited.
“The system is amazing.” Then she lowered her voice mysteriously.
“And if we want classes later, we need to reach SS-Rank.” Temitope frowned immediately.
“Wait.” She pointed suspiciously.
“How do you know about ranks already?” Damilola opened her mouth confidently.
“Because—” Her voice suddenly vanished.
Completely.
Temitope froze.
“…What?” Damilola blinked in confusion.
“What?” For a brief moment, it felt as though reality itself had muted the answer before Temitope could hear it.
Then blue translucent windows appeared before both sisters.
Damilola gasped happily.
“It’s back!” Temitope stared silently at the floating screen before her.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ NAME: TEMITOPE OLANIYI RACE: HUMAN CLASS: NONE RANK: G-RANK LOW LEVEL: 3 AGE: 15 AFFINITY: FLAME ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ HP: 120 MP: 90 STAMINA: 145 ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ STRENGTH: 11 AGILITY: 12 ENDURANCE: 13 CONSTITUTION: 12 PERCEPTION: 10 INTELLIGENCE: 11 DEXTERITY: 13 CHARISMA: 9 VITALITY: 12 ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ SKILLS: • Flame Spark • Heat Resistance ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Temitope stared quietly at the word: FLAME.
Heat circulated faintly beneath her skin.
Warm.
Restless.
Alive.
It felt strangely natural, as though something inside her had always been waiting for this.
Beside her, Damilola excitedly turned her own screen around.
“Look at mine!” ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ NAME: DAMILOLA OLANIYI RACE: HUMAN CLASS: NONE RANK: G-RANK LOW LEVEL: 2 AGE: 12 AFFINITY: SPIRIT ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ HP: 80 MP: 170 STAMINA: 75 ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ STRENGTH: 6 AGILITY: 8 ENDURANCE: 7 CONSTITUTION: 8 PERCEPTION: 18 INTELLIGENCE: 16 DEXTERITY: 10 CHARISMA: 17 VITALITY: 7 ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ SKILLS: • Spirit Sense • Minor Spirit Communication ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Temitope narrowed her eyes slightly.
“Spirit?” Damilola nodded proudly.
“I can feel things around us now.” A cold feeling crawled down Temitope’s spine.
“…What kind of things?” Damilola’s cheerful expression slowly faded.
She pointed upward quietly.
“The monsters outside…” Her voice became smaller.
“They feel hungry.” Silence filled the storage room instantly.
Then— BOOOOOOM!!!
Something massive crashed outside the school building.
The floor trembled violently beneath them.
Temitope’s instincts reacted immediately.
Danger.
She stood up quickly.
“We’re leaving.” This time, Damilola nodded nervously.
Change of Scenery Date: May 27, 2026 Time: 9:56 AM Location: Air Force Comprehensive School, Yola Tomi Olaniyi stood frozen in the middle of the school courtyard.
Around her, students pushed and shoved desperately toward the gates while teachers screamed conflicting instructions.
Some people tried calling family members despite the dead network signals.
Others simply cried.
The entire school had descended into panic.
Tomi’s breathing became uneven as she looked toward the shattered sky above Yola.
What is happening…?
At seventeen, Tomi had always been quieter than most of her siblings.
Slim, soft-spoken, and usually calm, she disliked conflict whenever possible.
But today, conflict had arrived anyway.
Then she saw it.
A flying creature descended directly toward the courtyard.
Its gray flesh looked partially melted, with jagged wings and elongated claws that scraped against the air as it dived toward the students below.
People screamed instantly.
Tomi instinctively raised her hands.
Then— water exploded outward from her body.
BOOOOOOM!!!
A violent stream slammed into the monster midair and hurled it backward across the courtyard hard enough to crack concrete.
Tomi froze completely.
“…What?” Blue windows appeared before her eyes.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ NAME: TOMI OLANIYI RACE: HUMAN CLASS: NONE RANK: G-RANK MID LEVEL: 4 AGE: 17 AFFINITY: WATER ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ HP: 115 MP: 130 STAMINA: 100 ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ STRENGTH: 9 AGILITY: 13 ENDURANCE: 11 CONSTITUTION: 11 PERCEPTION: 14 INTELLIGENCE: 13 DEXTERITY: 15 CHARISMA: 12 VITALITY: 10 ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ SKILLS: • Water Manipulation • Water Bullet ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Tomi stared at the information in disbelief.
Water…?
Around her, moisture gathered instinctively in the air, spiraling around her body in gentle currents that responded to her emotions.
Flowing.
Protective.
Alive.
Then the injured monster screeched and climbed back to its feet.
Fear clenched her chest immediately.
But strangely— the water around her reacted before she did.
As though it wanted to defend her.
Tomi swallowed nervously.
I don’t understand any of this… Then the system screen flickered briefly.
For a single moment— she thought she saw a massive crimson dragon reflected within the blue light.
Eight wings.
Burning frost.
A familiar presence.
Her eyes widened slightly.
“…Big brother?” Change of Scenery Date: May 27, 2026 Time: 10:03 AM Location: FMC Yola, Adamawa State Doctors and nurses rushed through the hospital corridors in complete disorder.
Patients screamed downstairs.
Emergency alarms echoed endlessly through the building.
Outside the shattered windows, smoke rose from distant sections of the city while military sirens wailed somewhere beyond the hospital grounds.
David Olaniyi removed his glasses slowly and stared at the floating blue screen before him.
“…What is happening?” At forty-nine, David had spent most of his life believing people could be understood through logic, medicine, and psychology.
But nothing about today fit inside rational understanding anymore.
Nearby, a young nurse sat crying beside the reception desk.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ NAME: AISHA BELLO RACE: HUMAN CLASS: SUPPORT RANK: G-RANK LOW LEVEL: 2 AGE: 24 AFFINITY: LIGHT ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ SKILLS: • Minor Illumination • Fatigue Reduction ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ “I just wanted to finish my shift and go home…” she whispered shakily.
David understood the feeling.
Everyone’s lives had changed within hours.
Then another explosion shook the hospital violently.
Glass shattered nearby.
Several patients screamed.
David steadied himself against the wall instinctively.
“Everyone stay calm!” he shouted.
But panic continued spreading.
His own system expanded again before him.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ NAME: DAVID OLANIYI RACE: HUMAN CLASS: NONE RANK: G-RANK MID LEVEL: 5 AGE: 49 AFFINITY: MIND ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ HP: 110 MP: 160 STAMINA: 95 ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ STRENGTH: 8 AGILITY: 9 ENDURANCE: 11 CONSTITUTION: 10 PERCEPTION: 18 INTELLIGENCE: 19 DEXTERITY: 10 CHARISMA: 15 VITALITY: 11 ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ SKILLS: • Mental Stability • Emotional Detection ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ David frowned deeply.
Mind affinity…?
Then suddenly, he felt it.
Fear.
Panic.
Despair.
Thousands of emotions flooded his senses simultaneously from everyone around him.
David’s eyes widened behind his glasses.
“…I can feel them?” The realization disturbed him more than the monsters outside.
Then instinctively, he thought about his family.
Julie.
Mayowa.
Tomi.
Temitope.
Damilola.
And Ayo.
A cold feeling settled heavily inside his chest.
Please be safe… Change of Scenery Date: May 27, 2026 Time: 10:11 AM Location: Olaniyi Residence, Adamawa State Mayowa Olaniyi sat quietly inside the living room while distant explosions echoed across the city outside.
The house felt unnaturally silent compared to the chaos beyond its walls.
At nineteen, Mayowa possessed a calm elegance that made her seem older than her age.
Her dark skin reflected faint silver light from the system window hovering before her while long black curls rested loosely over her shoulders.
Her attention remained fixed on the glowing screen.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ NAME: MAYOWA OLANIYI RACE: HUMAN CLASS: NONE RANK: G-RANK MID LEVEL: 4 AGE: 19 AFFINITY: MOON ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ HP: 105 MP: 150 STAMINA: 90 ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ STRENGTH: 9 AGILITY: 12 ENDURANCE: 10 CONSTITUTION: 10 PERCEPTION: 16 INTELLIGENCE: 14 DEXTERITY: 13 CHARISMA: 17 VITALITY: 10 ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ SKILLS: • Lunar Sense • Moonlight Reinforcement ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Moon.
The word felt unreal.
Yet strangely beautiful.
When she focused slightly, silver light gathered softly around her fingertips.
Fear mixed quietly with curiosity inside her chest.
Then another thought surfaced naturally.
Ayo would absolutely lose his mind over this.
The thought almost made her laugh despite everything happening.
Then the front door opened.
Julie stepped inside slowly.
And Mayowa immediately noticed the confusion and exhaustion written across her mother’s face.
Julie POV Julie Olaniyi still struggled understanding what the system windows actually meant.
Stats.
Levels.
Mana.
Affinity.
The words felt more like something from one of Ayo’s fantasy stories than reality.
Yet the floating screen before her remained undeniably real.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ NAME: JULIE OLANIYI RACE: HUMAN CLASS: NONE RANK: G-RANK LOW LEVEL: 3 AGE: 45 AFFINITY: LIFE ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ HP: 130 MP: 140 STAMINA: 100 ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ STRENGTH: 7 AGILITY: 8 ENDURANCE: 12 CONSTITUTION: 13 PERCEPTION: 15 INTELLIGENCE: 14 DEXTERITY: 9 CHARISMA: 16 VITALITY: 15 ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ SKILLS: • Minor Healing • Life Sense ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ “Life…” Julie whispered quietly.
Warm green energy flowed gently around her hands.
Soft.
Comforting.
Alive.
Then immediately, fear returned.
Her children.
Where were they?
Were they safe?
Before she could think further— CLANG!!
The front gate outside shook violently.
Julie instantly moved in front of Mayowa.
Another impact hit the gate moments later.
Low growls echoed faintly outside.
Monsters.
Mayowa’s moon affinity reacted instinctively as silver light flickered around her body.
“Mum…” Julie grabbed her daughter’s hand tightly.
“It’ll be okay.” Even she wasn’t certain she believed those words.
Then suddenly— her LIFE affinity reacted sharply.
For a brief moment, Julie sensed something approaching from the sky.
Something enormous.
Cold.
Ancient.
Yet strangely familiar.
Her eyes widened slightly.
“…Ayo?” Meanwhile… Date: May 27, 2026 Time: 10:18 AM Location: Airport Academy, Adamawa State Temitope and Damilola sprinted across the damaged school grounds while smoke drifted through the air around them.
Flying monsters descended from the fractured sky overhead.
Students screamed everywhere.
One creature suddenly dived toward Damilola.
Temitope reacted instantly.
“GET AWAY FROM HER!” Flames erupted violently from her hands.
BOOOOM!!
The explosion slammed into the monster midair and hurled it through a nearby wall.
Temitope froze briefly.
I… did that?
Another creature roared somewhere nearby.
Then Damilola grabbed her arm tightly.
“Temi!” Her eyes trembled strangely.
“…Something huge is coming.” Temitope’s expression sharpened immediately.
“A monster?” Damilola slowly shook her head.
Fear and wonder mixed together inside her voice.
“…No.” She looked toward the distant sky.
“It feels beautiful.” Meanwhile… Date: May 27, 2026 Time: 10:21 AM Location: Air Force Comprehensive School, Yola Water spiraled around Tomi’s body while the injured monster charged toward her again.
Her heartbeat pounded violently.
Move.
MOVE!
Her affinity reacted immediately.
BOOOOM!!
A massive wave exploded outward and smashed the creature into the school building hard enough to crack the walls.
Nearby students stared at her in shock.
Even Tomi looked stunned herself.
Then her system flickered briefly again.
And once more— she saw eight enormous wings spread across a crimson sky.
Her eyes widened instantly.
“…Big brother?” This time, she was certain.
Meanwhile… Date: May 27, 2026 Time: 10:24 AM Location: FMC Yola, Adamawa State David stood silently near a shattered hospital window.
Outside, the city continued collapsing into chaos.
Monsters roamed the streets below while distant military vehicles moved through smoke-covered roads.
But David’s attention remained elsewhere.
His MIND affinity sensed countless emotions around him endlessly.
Fear.
Pain.
Despair.
Anger.
Then suddenly— he sensed something else.
A presence so overwhelming that it silenced every surrounding emotion for a brief moment.
Ancient.
Cold.
Terrifying.
Yet familiar.
David’s pupils narrowed slightly.
“…Ayo?” Because for one impossible second— his instincts no longer recognized his son as entirely human.
Far above Adamawa State— a colossal crimson dragon soared through the shattered heavens.
Eight enormous wings stretched across the sky while blue frost flames flowed between crimson scales.
Purple energy trailed behind him like distorted starlight.
Clouds parted around his presence.
Below him, monsters fled instinctively from the pressure he radiated.
AETERNUS scanned the city rapidly with glowing sapphire eyes.
His family.
He needed to reach them before something else did.
Then suddenly— the colossal system screen illuminating Earth flickered once more across the heavens.
At the exact same moment— AETERNUS, Temitope, Damilola, Tomi, David, Mayowa, Julie, frightened civilians, awakened humans, soldiers, and monsters alike— all looked toward the same sky together.
As the Era of Evolution officially began.