Ezechiel Nwankwo came back from London with a

laptop, a fake ID, and a plan to scam pensioners

through WhatsApp — the kind of hustle that calls

itself “tech innovation” in Surulere. He ran

three bots: one for fake bank transfers, one for

ghost wedding invites, one for “divine lottery”

codes sold to women begging for miracles. Each

transaction bled a little soul — not metaphor.

The oil beneath Lagos had changed. Since ’72,

when the state drilled deeper near IjebuOde and

cracked open something older than the Niger, the

ground began swallowing promises. People who

cheated on their oaths started seeing shadows

with too many teeth in their mirrors. Ezechiel

didn’t know. He only knew the money came faster

when he added “God’s Will” to his SMS templates.

On the third week, his mother’s grave in Enugu

cracked open at midnight. Not from rain. Not

from erosion. The soil lifted like a lid, and a

hand — black, slick with crude, fingers bent

like old wire — reached out and gripped her

nameplate. The pastor who came to pray said it

was the ancestors angry at broken covenants.

Ezechiel laughed. Until his own reflection in

the laptop screen blinked after him.

His scam’s last victim was a girl from Oshodi

who sent her last N50,000 to “unlock her destiny.

” That night, the power went out across Apapa.

Not loadshedding. Total silence. Then the

streetlights flickered on — one by one — all

pointing toward Ezechiel’s flat. Outside, men in

oilstained robes walked without feet, chanting

in a tongue that tasted like burnt rubber. His

bots kept running. The money kept coming. But

his skin started peeling in patches, revealing

dark veins beneath — the same black as the crude

they pumped from the delta.

The hard rule: no one who scams with spiritual

words can exit the deal. The oil doesn’t take

money. It takes the future you stole.

On the seventh day, Ezechiel tried to burn his

laptop. The flame turned blue. The screen showed

his father — the minister who stole N12 billion

from the National Petroleum Corporation —

standing in a room full of children with hollow

eyes, all wearing Ezechiel’s face. The minister

whispered: “You think you’re the thief? You’re

the vessel.”

Ezechiel ran to the waterfront. He threw the

laptop into the lagoon. The water swallowed it.

Then the tide rolled back — and every phone in

Lagos, every SIM card, every WhatsApp group,

every fake invoice, every “Blessing Code” ever

sent, pulsed once. A single message appeared on

all screens:

YOUR FUTURE IS NOW OURS.

The next morning, the streets were quiet. No

honking. No vendors. Just men in black robes

carrying buckets of crude to the churches. The

pastor’s daughter, who once loved Ezechiel in

university, stood at her window, eyes glazed,

whispering to a spirit only she could see. The

oil had awakened. And it was hungry for more

than money. It wanted the dreams they’d sold.