Chapter 10

Chapter 10

The Lion’s Vision

The night wind clawed at the abandoned rooftop, tugging at Judah’s red half-mask as if trying to peel it away. Far below, the neon lights of New Takoradi shimmered on the salty waves, but on this rooftop there was only shadow, silence, and the echo of what he had just witnessed.

The Serpent had arrived.

And the city was already beginning to bend beneath its influence.

Judah leaned forward, gripping the cold railing until his knuckles whitened. The Dralio inside him was restless—pacing, snarling, its molten breath filling Judah’s skull with heat and dread.

He had felt the Serpent’s energy once before.
Tonight, it had been unmistakable: cold, calculating, ancient.

Why now? Judah wondered.
Why reveal itself in the open?

A sudden surge of fire scraped down his spine.
The Dralio spoke.

Not in words.

In instinct.
In visions.
In raw, primal force.

Judah staggered as the world flickered.
The rooftop dissolved into flame.

He had collapsed into a trance on the railing.

The Vision:

Judah found himself standing in a realm of swirling gold and crimson clouds. Before him rose the Dralio—towering, massive, its lion’s mane rippling like molten metal, its dragon wings folded against its back.

The Dralio’s eyes burned into him.

The Serpent has broken its bindings, the Dralio’s voice quaked through him, a vibration deep in his bones. It crawls again into the world of men.

Wisps of shadow gathered, coiling into images.

Judah saw the Serpent’s mask—sleek, glistening black, its fangs dripping with symbolic poison.

He saw gang members kneeling before a figure wreathed in cold green smoke.

He saw the elites smiling as contracts were signed, hands shaken, enemies erased.

And then—
He saw himself.

Standing in flames.
The Dralio roaring behind him.
The Serpent coiled at his throat.

Then there was a burning throne.
The shifting silhouette of a masked warrior kneeling before it.

Then, other masks without their bearers, kneeling with him.
The screaming, the chanting, the flames.

Then another masked figure standing on a hill of ruins

A red lion mask glinting in the firelight.

His thoughts running wild within him.

Destroyer or king?

And, was that him?

A single phrase cut through the haze:

One mask will break the city. One mask will remake it.

Judah’s breath caught.

Which one? he asked.

The Dralio’s answer was a low, grieving rumble.

That depends on the choices you fear to make.

Return to the Rooftop:

Judah snapped back into his body, stumbling against the railing. His chest burned like he had swallowed embers. Sweat drenched his neck beneath the mask.

He exhaled shakily.

The Serpent wasn’t just another spirit gang.
It was something older.
Something bound by ancient rules that even the Red Sun feared to speak aloud.

And it had come to Adumra for a reason.

Judah’s comm bead crackled suddenly.

“—Lion? Lion, do you copy?”

It was Instructor Kojo, now his patrol officer.

Judah wiped sweat from his jaw. “I’m here.”

“You need to get back to HQ. Now. There’s been… an incident.”

Judah stiffened. “What kind?”

Kojo hesitated.

“The kind that involves… prophecy.”

Judah’s heart dropped into his stomach.

“Just tell me.”

“It’s Elder Banele,” Kojo whispered. “He’s been attacked. By someone wearing a serpent mask.”

Judah froze as the wind howled around him.

The Serpent wasn’t just announcing its arrival.

It was sending a message.

And Judah Jacob Mensah—
The Red Lion, chosen of the Dralio—
was the message’s intended recipient.

The Dralio Speaks Again:

As Judah leaped from the rooftop to the fire escape, the Dralio’s voice returned, low and urgent.

The Serpent seeks you, Lion-child.

But not to kill you.

Judah’s boots hit the ground with a metallic thud.
He whispered, “Then what does it want?”

The answer crawled through him like smoke:

To claim you.

Judah froze in the alleyway.

The Dralio’s mane blazed, its aura trembling with fury.

Choose wisely, Judah. For if you fall… the dynasty falls with you.

Judah clenched his fists, breath tight.

“No,” he whispered.
“I won’t fall.”

But the Dralio did not respond.

And in the silence, Judah realized something terrifying:

The Dralio was not warning him about the Serpent.

It was warning him about himself.