Chapter 34: Return Through Hidden Stones
Inside the Hilltop, buried deep beneath stone and soil, Philip arrived.
The chamber was pitch black, silent as a grave—but his presence stirred old energies. Cracks of blue mana pulsed faintly in the pyramid walls.
He crouched in the farthest corner of the internal structure and placed his hand on the earth. Using his earth-aligned magic, he carved a fist-sized tunnel upward. After a few seconds, cool air whispered through. He widened the hole just enough to slip through, then carefully burrowed out.
When he emerged among thick brush on a quiet part of the slope, he turned and sealed the entrance with a wave. The soil shifted. Leaves fluttered down. Nature stilled.
No one would ever know he'd been there.
Philip descended Hilltop slowly. The view of Abakaliki's streets spread before him—vendors setting up, motorbikes zipping past, hawkers shouting their morning chants. The world had moved on. Ordinary people living ordinary lives.
He paused.
For a long moment, he just watched them—and remembered.
He had once been one of them. Wandering. Hoping. Ignorant.
Now… he was something else entirely.
He reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone. The screen flickered to life. One bar. Then two. Then four. Connection restored.
Notifications poured in.
Three years.
Philip's breath caught. Three years had passed.
They must have thought he was dead.
He slipped the phone back into his pocket and wrapped his body with soul force, suppressing his aura so no one below demigod rank could sense him. Then he blended into the crowd—one more face under the sun.
He walked to a POS and tried to withdraw money. Surprisingly, it worked. He hadn't been declared legally dead.
Relieved, he called his mother.
The moment she heard his voice, she broke down crying, praying, and thanking God. Between sobs, she kept shouting, "I knew my son wasn't dead!"
The line grew unstable, so he cut it and called his father.
As always, the old man's voice was stoic.
"You okay?" he asked simply.
Philip nodded, even though no one could see. "Yeah, I'm fine."
His father continued, "Everyone thought you were kidnapped. Even the police investigated it like that. But when no ransom came, they assumed…"
Philip understood. "I'm fine," he said again. "I'm heading back to Lagos. I'll explain everything in person."
He hung up and took a deep breath.
Now came the hard part: the lie.
A kidnapping would work, maybe. He could say he was thrown into the sea, left for dead, washed up in another country. Lost his memory. Rescued by mercenaries.
It could explain the physical changes. The muscle
But it wouldn't explain his eyes.
Those golden pupils.
If anyone looked too closely, they might even glimpse the lightning inside.
And there was no lie in the world strong enough to explain that.