Side story 9

Side story 9: The path of Kola II to Governorship (read parts 2, 3, 4,5)
Governor Kola II P.O.V
My name is Kola II. I'm Governor of the northern province of Okunde, that is to say after my cousin the Emperor, His Majesty Batang V, it's me, the second most powerful man in the land.
How did I get there? Well, here is my story!
I succeeded my father Kola I who was Governor of Okunde till his death. He also rose to Governorship after his father Bata passed away, namely my grandfather.
My ancestor Bata became Governor after the then Emperor, the Great Batang III defeated the ruthless warlord who ruled over Okunde and consequently annexed the country to the Batang empire.
My grandfather Bata laid the foundation of the administration of Okunde. Until today, his footprints are still visible in the daily office routine.
He for instance developed the encrypted language that serves to codify top-secret documents. I must underscore that the codification helped me recently encrypt a special magic formula that I have kept safe and would be of great use for a looming danger upon the empire.
Since the beginning of my imperial servant career, my grandfather has always been a great source of inspiration to me.
I started as a rank soldier at the age of eighteen under the reign of the Great Batang IV, the late father of the current Emperor, His Majesty Batang V.
After three years of loyal service to the Supreme Ruler, he promoted me to the grade of Caporal. And after another two years, he advanced me to the rank of Caporal in chief.
And then the empire faced a major threat. The Monster of the forbidden mountain who had killed Emperor Batang IV's first son, Crown Prince Dida, the brother of the reigning Emperor Batang V, during a hiking stroll, resurfaced after years of hibernation.
I had just been enrolled in the army when the beast of Okunde's hill assassinated the Heir to the throne.
The Governor of the region, my father Kola I, had two hundred men in uniform at his disposal divided into twenty units.
The unit under my command was placed in the east of the village. We waited for the Monster to attack us and were ready to shorten its days but it never came out of its fortress and the standby lasted for five years.
We hence returned to the barracks after two years of waiting for the enemy in vain. We made up our minds that the evil creature had maybe been exterminated by its creator Edimo, the god of ruin or that the forefathers had silenced it by throwing balls of fire in its hideout.
But we were deceiving ourselves. The villain, a giant bird of extreme dimensions and unmatched might, ended its hibernation, marched to Okunde, and attacked our now disorganized troops by flapping savagely the wind with its huge wings toward us.
We were propelled into the air and sustained life-threatening injuries after brutally hitting the ground. Many of my comrades passed out and ultimately died.
I was able to survive thanks to a magic potion that my father had given to me in a one-on-one meeting during which he heartily spoke to me.
He confessed to me that he feared I would die on the battlefield and the lineage would perish with me. So he handed over to me a potion which was a life-swap breuvage that would make him die on my behalf in case my existence was endangered. He went on by formally enjoining me to drink it without hesitation.
It wasn't easy to swallow the potion knowing that I would live and my father would pay the price. However, conscious that I was bearing the responsibility to extend the descendance, I did as my father told me.
He died indeed in the bunker of the administrative headquarters and the Governorship stayed vacant for three years. Emperor Batang V wanted to pay tribute to a courageous imperial Statesman who sacrificed his life for the nation.
In the meantime, I began to unofficially assume the duties of Governor of Okunde. The Emperor had implicitly approved it because it was in the tradition for the power to be passed on from the father to the first son or heir.
I was thirty years old back then. I was still a bachelor and thought about getting married. Six months later I was introduced to one of the most angelic women in the empire, Darah. She was five years younger than me.
On a rainy and thunderous afternoon, we said yes to each other for being eternally bound together. I don't know but I felt it was predicting something calamitous because we were in the dry season of the year.
Ultimately my intuition was confirmed. Two years after our marriage, my wife Darah who first had to go through several visits to the native doctor for sterility issues, finally conceived.
She got pregnant and the Oracle said that it was a girl, which didn't rejoice me much because, in the Batang tradition and belief, a man is only complete when he makes another man in his image.
We like daughters but we preferred the first child to be a son because it is an assurance of the continuity of the father's lineage. The daughter would leave her father's house, get wed to a man and procreate to prolong that man's bloodline. Many unions have been broken because of this ancestral superstition.
Nine months passed by and Darah's pregnancy came to term. She began to leak water. I had asked for and obtained a one-month leave of absence from the barracks so I could assist my spouse for the big day.
I was in the chalet's living room when Darah started to groan in the bedroom. I quickly got off my chair and went to meet her upstairs. She had gone into labor and was now screaming madly.
I shouted for help and my neighbors Kata and Tola, two mature ladies, quickly rushed to our house and found us in the chamber. I was disarmed as I didn't know what to do.
They asked me to bring a bucket with water, a bath towel, alcohol, and bed sheets, which I hastened to do. The oldest woman Kata then commanded me to step out of the bedroom as per tradition.
Indeed no man, no father was allowed to witness the delivery process to avoid curses and the trauma related to the mysticism of the birth-giving.
So I went outside the bedroom and waited very nervously in front of the door. I was walking up and down the corridor and was impatient that the moral torture be over.
My wife Darah was shouting unstoppably and I sensed that something was abnormal. I could hear the occasional midwives, Kata and Tola, talking to her to assure her that everything was on track but she was still crazily crying out.
And suddenly the unpleasant sounds stopped. For long and strange minutes, nobody said a single word. And more strikingly, I never heard a baby sobbing.
I became even edgier and it was itching for me to open the door of the chamber and look at what was going on but I feared to face the gods' anger. So I managed to control myself and waited a bit more.
Finally, the youngest of the neighbors, Tola, pulled the egress and it swung open. I got the biggest goosebumps of my life. I was destabilized and was feeling extremely bad though I had not gone inside yet and Tola had not spoken a word to me.
I invited myself inside and went past Tola. I glanced to my left and saw a weeping Kata with a naked baby in her hands that seemed lifeless. I then looked at the bed and my heart exploded.
I could not believe what I just saw. My wife Darah had joined the valley of death. From her embattled look, one could easily guess how awful her last moments had been.
I yelled so loudly that my voice made the whole house tremble and dust emerged from the old logs.
I then shakily walked up to the older neighbor Kata and took the forever-sleeping infant from her and went immediately to the back of the chalet to bury him as per the tradition.
It was the most tearing moment of my existence and I began having suicidal thoughts. I don't know how I found the strength to not succumb to the temptation to carry out this irrational project.
Then it was the turn for my wife Darah's funeral. I sent the sad news to her family through my junior brother Zola. In the next two days, Darah's old mother and her five siblings came to our house for a farewell.
We buried her in a hole that I had dug next to our deceased newborn.
After this life-changing experience, I decided to stay alone. I from time to time had improper adventures, a behavior that was against the tradition which required a man to be married before going intimate with a woman.
Two years later, I continued ascending the ladder of the imperial defense and was designated cumulatively with the function of interim Governor of Okunde, Superior Commander of the armed forces by the reigning Emperor, His Majesty Batang V.
Then the Supreme Ruler entrusted me with a confidential mission abroad which was successful after a year of surmounting all the hurdles. Extremely pleased with the result, Emperor Batang V confirmed me as the plenipotentiary Governor of Okunde.
I was back then thirty-four years old and the second most influential man in the Batang empire.