THE OZIDI SAGA OF NIGERIA: PART TWO

FOR PART ONE CLICK HERE.

PART TWO: Ozidi’s maternal grandmother Oreame performs the ritual to transform him from a mere mortal into a spiritual warrior who is as strong as ten men, has eyes that blaze like lightning and can see through the lies of deceitful men and ears that can hear the whispers of the Niger River gods. The ritual includes bathing Ozidi in palm oil and river water.

The sky gods send down a hawk which perches on our hero’s shoulder and serves as his messenger. Next, Oreame summons the sorcerer Bou-Akarakarabiri, who uses a spell that reduces all manner of tools, weapons and animals into a potion.

Oreame forces the potion down Ozidi’s throat so that it rests in his intestines. The magical mixture will enable him to summon any of the tools, weapons and animals out of his mouth to use them during his adventures.

Next, Grandmother Oreame takes Ozidi and his mother Orea to Orua and presents him to his mentally challenged/ drunkard uncle Temugedege. NOTE: In Part One Temugedege was allowed to be the king in order for the conspirators who murdered Ozidi’s father to use the addle-minded fool as a figurehead while they ruled from behind the scenes.

With the introductions over, Oreame calls upon the Earth gods to pour forth a pair of divine musicians who will accompany Ozidi as his bodyguards via their mystical music. Next, the grandmother has the royal blacksmith in Orua forge a seven-faceted sword made from lightning.

When Ozidi tests the sword, one version of this myth states that the wind from his wielding the sword in the air kills thousands of people while another version says he accidentally kills one of the sons of each of his father’s murderers. Oreame transforms the lightning sword into a potion that Ozidi swallows so that this weapon, too, can be pulled out of his mouth at will. 

Ozidi now feigns laziness by sleeping across a market road in hopes of picking up some intelligence about the households of his father’s killers. The wives of two of those killers do not realize the young man at their feet is the son of the slain Ozidi the Elder so they gleefully cackle about the role their husbands played in murdering the father.

Furious, Ozidi the Younger rises from the ground, pulls his lightning-sword out of his mouth and cuts the women in half. Their bodies remain animated by the power of the lightning sword and run to their husbands to warn them about our hero before dying.

One of those husbands and conspirators now confronts Ozidi in a battle to the death. This adversary is called Agbogidi of the Naked Parts (I’m not joking.) Agbogidi’s skill in combat is such that he is said to kill his opponents without them even knowing he has touched them.

No matter. Ozidi withstands Agbogidi’s attack and then slays him. Next, our hero returns to the grand home of his addled uncle King Temugedege, where he brags about his victory to his mother and grandmother and berates Temugedege for his inadequacy. 

I ‘LL PICK UP NEXT TIME WITH THE NEXT OF HIS FATHER’S MURDERERS TO FACE OZIDI.