Chapter One – The Unearthing
The sun hung low over the Jos Plateau, a molten disc in a hazy amber sky. Heat shimmered off the red laterite soil, painting the valley below in waves of gold and rust. The air smelled of iron and dust, thick enough to taste. Far beyond the dig site, a chain of low hills rolled toward the horizon, their ridges softened by centuries of wind and forgotten rain. The terrain was beautiful but unforgiving — a place where history slept beneath the earth, and only the patient dared to wake it.
At the edge of an excavation site near a small village outside Jos, Chuka Nwankwo stood with a trowel in one hand and a notebook in the other. He was tall and lean, his frame hardened by years of fieldwork under the scorching Nigerian sun. His skin was a deep bronze that seemed to catch the light, his sharp cheekbones dusted with the same red earth he loved to study. A pair of square-rimmed glasses perched on his nose, often slipping when he worked too long, and his eyes — dark, observant, and thoughtful — had the quiet intensity of someone who saw meaning in everything.
Chuka wasn't just a man of science; he was a man of conviction. Colleagues often joked that he treated ancient relics like living things, whispering to the earth as though it might whisper back. He had a calmness about him, a patience that came from years of failure, persistence, and rediscovery. Beneath that calm, however, burned a fierce curiosity — a hunger to uncover not just artifacts, but stories. To him, every fragment of pottery, every scarred figurine, was a message left behind by a forgotten world.
The terrain around him was rugged and uneven, cut by gullies where rainwater had carved deep scars into the land. The Jos Plateau, with its rolling highlands and iron-rich soil, was both beautiful and treacherous. The wind here was unpredictable — sometimes gentle as a sigh, other times fierce enough to whip dust into whirlwinds. The grass was tall and yellow-green, broken by clusters of rocky outcrops that looked like ancient sentinels. Birds circled lazily overhead, their calls echoing faintly through the morning air.
Chuka Nwankwo knelt by a shallow trench, his hands steady despite the sweat beading down his temples. His trowel scraped lightly against the soil, each stroke careful and deliberate. Around him, a handful of student assistants murmured in Hausa and English, their movements rhythmic and routine. But Chuka's focus never wavered. He'd been chasing whispers of this site for years — the rumored resting place of a lost Nok settlement untouched by foreign excavations.
The air was thick with anticipation. Every gust of wind carried the scent of rain that refused to fall, every birdcall echoed like a warning. The ground beneath them was stubborn, almost sacred — as if the earth itself were reluctant to give up its secrets. Chuka brushed away a final layer of dust, revealing a fragment of clay — a face, half-buried, eyes closed in eternal silence. The texture was too refined for ordinary pottery. His breath caught. He knew what he was holding.
By late afternoon, the clouds gathered in bruised clusters over the horizon, dragging long shadows across the valley. The temperature dropped, but the tension rose. Chuka signaled the team to expand the trench, marking coordinates and sketching in his weathered notebook. With each fragment unearthed — a broken figurine here, a bead there — a pattern began to emerge: a circle of artifacts, arranged deliberately, as if guarding something at the center.
The first rumble of thunder broke the stillness. The workers muttered prayers, uneasy about digging during a storm. Chuka ignored them, kneeling closer to the relics. A pulse of wind tore through the trench, scattering dust into his eyes. When he blinked it away, he saw a faint glow from the clay piece — a trick of the light, perhaps, or something older than language. He whispered a quiet thanks in Igbo, more instinct than belief.
By evening, the storm arrived in full force. Sheets of rain slammed against the canvas tents, turning the red soil to slick mud. The valley echoed with the sound of rushing water and distant thunder, yet Chuka remained by the pit, shielding the relics beneath a tarp. His team begged him to seek shelter, but he couldn't pull himself away. Something about the place — the symmetry of the site, the strange vibration underfoot — felt alive.
When the storm passed, the valley was reborn. The air was cool and sharp, washed clean of dust. Lightning had split an acacia tree nearby, leaving its trunk smoking faintly against the dawn. Chuka returned to the pit, his boots sinking into the softened ground. In the pale morning light, he noticed something new: at the center of the circle of artifacts, a larger figure was emerging — buried deep, carved from stone, and unlike any Nok statue ever recorded.
He fell to his knees, fingers trembling as he brushed away the mud. The face staring back at him was serene but powerful, its eyes hollow yet knowing. For a moment, he thought he heard the earth breathe. Then the wind shifted, carrying a whisper through the acacia branches — a sound that seemed to call his name. And though he told himself it was only the wind, part of him already knew: this was no ordinary discovery. It was the beginning of something that would change his life forever.