AYÒ OLÓPÓN — AFRICA MYSTERY SERIES STORY (EPISODE ONE)
When everyone else returned to their lives, Moji packed her small bag to leave for Lagos. As she was about to step out, something tugged at her spirit. It came from Iya Ago’s room—quiet, stale, and untouched since the burial. She pushed the creaky door open. On the table, sitting innocently as though waiting, was the ayo olopon board her grandmother had never allowed anyone to touch.
Moji hesitated. She remembered all the times she asked to learn the game, and Iya Ago would simply smile tightly and say, “No, Moji. This one is not for children.”
But now the board was alone. Ownerless. Hers for the taking. She slipped it into her bag and shut the door behind her.
Lagos welcomed her with noise, dust, and the kind of restless energy she loved. Her paternal cousin, Dara, squealed when she saw her. “Finally! Village people don release you.”
Moji smiled weakly. “I needed to clear my head. And… I brought something.” She dropped her bag on the floor and pulled out the ayo board.
“Ah! Local ludo!” Dara clapped. “Let’s play now now.”
They set the board on the living room floor, the afternoon sun casting their shadows long across it. The seeds clattered softly as Moji arranged them.
“You know how to play?” Moji asked.
“No, but teach me,” Dara said.
Moji wasn’t sure how she knew either. The rules seemed to pour into her mind effortlessly, as though poured from someone else’s memory. They played. Dara laughed through most of it—until the last move. Moji captured her remaining seeds.
“You win,” Dara said, stretching. “Oya, let’s go and find food.”
They both left the board where it was.
That night, Moji had the dream.
She saw herself and Dara seated opposite each other, playing the game again. But this time, Dara’s eyes were wide and wet, as though she knew something terrible was coming. The last seed dropped—and Dara slumped forward, blood gushing from her mouth and nose, staining the ayo board a deep, impossible red.
Moji woke up screaming.
Her kid sister rushed in immediately. “What is it? What happened?”
Moji stared at her, trembling. “I… dreamt—”
Before she could finish, her phone rang. A panicked voice crackled through. It was Dara’s friend, sobbing. “Come! Come now! Something is wrong—she collapsed—she’s bleeding—”
Moji’s heart stopped.
The next morning, Dara was dead.
They said it was sudden hemorrhaging. A freak medical tragedy.
But Moji saw her dream replaying itself exactly.
Days passed. Trying to distract herself, she invited a neighbor, Kunle, to play. “Just for fun,” she said, forcing a smile. “I’ve been practicing.”
They played. He lost. He went home.
That night, she dreamt again. The exact game. The exact moment. Kunle’s chest opening like a burst pipe of blood.
He was found dead the next morning.
Then the third person.
The fourth.
The fifth.
Seven people. Each one laughing, healthy, walking away whole… then dying exactly as she dreamt. By the seventh death, Moji no longer slept easily. She taped the ayo olopon shut. She broke the board into pieces and threw it into a gutter, trembling as she watched the water carry it away. When she returned home, the lights in her bedroom flickered violently. She pushed the door open.
The ayo olopon board sat neatly on her bed—whole. Clean. Waiting.
Her breath froze in her throat.
The seeds began to rattle on their own, dancing inside the wooden holes like restless bones.
A voice rose—soft at first, then ancient, then terrible.
“Welcoms , Moji.”
She stumbled backward, hitting the wall.
“You will play me,” the voice said, dripping like black oil. “Every seven days.”
“No… no… I’m not,” she whispered.
The board cracked sharply, as if offended. One seed rolled toward her foot.
“If you refuse…” the voice deepened into something inhuman, “…you will join the ones you killed.”
Moji’s heart slammed against her ribs.
“I didn’t kill anyone,” she whispered.
“You chose them,” the ayo answered. “And now, you must choose again.”
Moji pressed her back into the wall, shaking uncontrollably, as the board clicked open, arranging itself into a perfect starting position.
“Sit,” it commanded.
The lights hissed, bleeding into darkness.
“Your seven days begin now!.”
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