I Am Zeus - Chapter 164: Submission

Chapter 164: Submission

The plains of the Yoruba cracked behind him. Smoke rose from rivers that once sang, mountains lay broken, and the Orishas struggled to hold what was left. Yet Zeus did not pause. His storm rolled forward, sparks hissing as if impatient. He had bled, yes, but his grin had not dimmed. This land was vast, its gods many, and he intended to see them all.

The wind shifted. The scent of wet earth, thick forests, and drums carried on the breeze. The storm above bent toward it, pulled as though the sky itself pointed him to the next throne. Zeus stepped across the blackened soil, lightning walking with him.

–––

The Igbo realm opened not with palaces or rivers but with trees that swallowed the horizon. Forests layered thick, canopies stacked like cathedrals. In their shade burned fires of red clay, shrines humming with power. Every tree root whispered a name. Every drumbeat in the distance carried weight.

From the heart of that forest came the first figure.

Ala, earth goddess of the Igbo, not the Ala of Yoruba but her kin in name, stepped forward. Her body gleamed with bronze dust, her eyes heavy as stone. Beside her stood Amadioha, lightning scarred across his chest, hammer gripped in both hands. Oaths hung around him like chains of storm. Behind them, smaller figures gathered—Ikenga with his horns, Ekwensu with a grin sharp as blades, Ani of fertility, spirits of market and war.

Their presence shook the trees, but they did not charge.

Amadioha’s voice rolled low. “You came through Yoruba with blood. Now you enter Igbo.” His hammer sparked faintly, thunder curling across his arm. “You seek the same here?”

Zeus tilted his head. Sparks flared across his shoulders, thunder answering thunder. “I do not seek. I take.”

–––

The forest groaned, but Ala raised her hand, silencing the warriors around her. Her eyes stayed fixed on Zeus.

“You bleed storm, like him,” she said, voice deep as earth shifting. “But your thunder is not ours. Your storm carries hunger. We hear it in the trees.”

Zeus’s grin widened. “Then kneel before it. Or burn.”

The drums in the distance stopped. For a moment the forest was silent, as if even the leaves leaned closer.

Ikenga’s horns gleamed faintly, his hand twitching toward his blade, but Ala shook her head once. “We will not die like Egypt. We will not rise and fall like Hindu. We know what comes. This age belongs to you and the shadow behind you.”

Her gaze hardened. “We will submit.”

–––

The words cracked sharper than thunder.

The younger gods gasped. Ekwensu spat curses, his grin faltering. Amadioha’s hammer dimmed. But Ala’s voice carried no tremor. She lowered her head, and the roots beneath her sank deeper, as if the earth itself bowed.

Amadioha’s shoulders tightened, but after a moment he followed, hammer pressing into the ground. One by one, the Igbo gods bent.

Zeus’s storm flared, sparks hissing like approval. He stepped forward, the forest bending away from his feet. “Wise. Very wise.” His crimson gaze swept across their bowed heads. “Your roots stay. Your shrines live. But from this moment, your thunder is mine.”

–––

The storm moved on.

–––

Where forest ended, water stretched. Wide deltas, mangrove roots tangled like claws, rivers breathing salt and mud. This was the land of the Ijaw, where every current carried songs of ancestors drowned and risen again. The waters churned as Zeus stepped onto the banks, sparks crackling against the tide.

From the river rose their gods.

Adumu, the great python, coiled high, his scales shimmering green-black, eyes like mirrors of the deep. His hiss rattled the mangroves. Beside him stepped Woyengi, the creator, her robes woven from seafoam, her gaze endless and patient. Behind her came smaller spirits—water gods with nets of pearl, masks dripping river weed, warriors carved from tide and storm.

The delta itself bent under their presence. The air thickened with salt.

Woyengi’s voice flowed like water over stone. “We felt the thunder in Yoruba. We smelled the ash from Igbo. And now you walk here.” Her eyes pierced into him. “You carry storm, but not storm alone. You carry what feeds on gods. We know its scent.”

Zeus’s storm growled around him. “Then you know resistance means drowning.”

The python hissed, his coils wrapping higher, but Woyengi raised her hand. The waters stilled. Her gaze softened, though her lips curved with sorrow.

“The Ijaw have drowned before. We learned long ago when to fight and when to sink. We will not fight you.” She lowered her head, her seafoam robes sinking into the river. “We submit.”

–––

The python’s coils quivered, but after a moment they lowered, his body bowing low. The smaller gods followed, their masks dipping beneath the tide.

Zeus exhaled, sparks bleeding into the water. His storm lit the mangroves silver, and the river bowed with the weight of his presence. “Good. Rivers that kneel keep flowing. Rivers that fight dry.”

He turned, his storm already pressing westward.

–––

Behind him, the Igbo forests lay silent, their gods bent beneath their roots. Behind him, the Ijaw deltas rolled, their rivers bowing low. The Yoruba still burned, their Orishas broken but not yet yielded.

Ahead stretched more lands—deserts of Sahara, kingdoms carved in dust and bronze, pantheons hidden in drums yet unsounded. The air itself trembled with what waited.

Zeus’s sparks flared brighter, his storm climbing high until the horizon itself shivered.

“This land will break,” he whispered, voice low, almost fond. “But I will not. From every river, every tree, every drum, I will take what feeds me. Africa will not kneel to storm. Africa will become storm.”

–––

The ground shook as thunder split the horizon. The storm spread wider, swallowing forest, delta, and sky alike.

Zeus walked forward.

And Africa trembled under his step.

A/N

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Source: Webnovel.com, updated by AiKurou