They left before dawn again.
This time, their destination was Oke Olumo—the sacred hill beyond the eastern ridge, long abandoned after the great war between drummers and spirit-keepers. It was there that Oluwafemi, Ayanwale's great-grandfather, built a temple. A place of learning—and later, hiding.
Amoke walked beside Ayanwale in silence, her drum slung low across her back. They had taken only what they needed: salt, cloth, palm oil, and Ayanwale's Royalty Drum.
"This rhythm," she said at last, "is not for the faint of heart."
"I'm not afraid," Ayanwale replied.
"You should be."
By mid-afternoon, the trees gave way to scorched stone.
The temple stood like a broken tooth rising from the earth—collapsed at the sides, its roof half-swallowed by vines. Strange glyphs, part carved and part burned, curled around the stone entrance.
Ayanwale stepped forward. The air grew thick, as if the past were breathing on the back of his neck.
As he crossed the threshold, his drum pulsed—not with heat or sound, but a memory.
He saw visions—
A man, tall and robed, standing in the center of the temple.
Oluwafemi.
Playing a rhythm so dark, it erased the faces of the men around him.
Words twisted. Time skipped. Truths were rewritten.
Ayanwale staggered.
Amoke caught him.
"The Fifth Rhythm was Oluwafemi's greatest secret," she said. "He used it to control history. To turn lies into legend. To make himself immortal through memory."
"Then why am I here?" Ayanwale asked. "If this rhythm corrupted him, what if it—"
"Because you were chosen to undo what he did."
They moved deeper into the ruins.
At the heart of the temple was a circular room with seven stone drums, each cracked but humming softly in the dark. In the center lay a single drum skin, untouched by dust or age.
Ayanwale approached.
"This is it," Amoke said. "But you mustn't play with your hands. You must play with your mind."
He sat before it, closed his eyes, and remembered:
His father, telling him to keep drumming.
His mother, singing about water that remembers.
His ancestors, dancing under moons they no longer named.
And beneath it all, Oluwafemi, whispering:
"Truth is a sound. But lies… lies echo longer."
Ayanwale reached out—not physically, but with memory.
And struck.
The Fifth Rhythm bloomed like a spiral.
It didn't make sound. It made echoes.
He saw the village—as it was fifty years ago.
He saw the Ajalu—as spirits once betrayed by humans, not born of evil, but shaped by it.
He saw Oluwafemi—as a man trying to protect a lineage, who grew obsessed with control.
And then he saw something else:
Himself.
A baby. But not just his father and mother beside him—another figure stood at a distance. Watching. Marked with white ash.
Baba Oro.
Amoke gasped as the vision surged through her as well.
"He was there. At your birth."
Ayanwale opened his eyes slowly. The Royalty Drum now bore a new mark—a spiral wrapped in a broken hourglass.
He whispered:
"The Fifth Rhythm… lets me see what was changed. And restore what was stolen."
"Then you have what he feared most," Amoke said. "Not power. Correction."
But something stirred.
The drums around them cracked wider.
A deep voice filled the chamber:
"You've taken what was hidden…"
From the shadows, a massive figure rose—twice the size of any man. Covered in scars. Eyes glowing orange.
Oluwafemi's shadow.
"And now you will pay the price for remembering."