In Taraba, a Nigerian state, opposite Chappal Waddi, the temple-fortress of hybrid architecture maintained its splendor. The headquarters of the Ilê Apanyan had gathered all its members. The Apostolate met in the training yard. It was the first time in centuries that a major convocation had taken place.

  From the balcony of one of the towers, the Babu. The hitmen beat their chests and gave thanks to the heavens. Their cries echoed in unison. They knelt before their leader. They raised their faces to the man on the tower's balcony and listened to his speech:

  "My sons, as patriarch of this order, I have summoned you this day, not to remove the infidel from the path of his iniquity, but to extirpate the seed of an even greater evil. We are at war with Ojwang and his army."

  Babu declared his intention. He didn't expect understanding or support. The funeral directors were abandoning their neutrality to oppose a state.

  The faces of those present twitched. Many had abandoned their assassination mission in the middle of it. Without information, they had been hastily summoned to the heart of Ilê Apanyan. Now they received the news that their Credo would be put at the service of a vulgar war.

  "No one will be forced to go or allowed to desert. Those who trust in me and in my eyes, let them follow under my shadow."

  As he said this, he left. The first to stand up were the eleven members of the Apostolate. The others imitated his gesture and let out war cries.

  They went to the Sacred Armory and each took the right amount of weapons and ammunition. The members distributed bags with parachutes and boards. Then they headed for the hangar. A huge dark quadcopter opened its stern. The military cargo aircraft was fast and agile for its size, and with instruments that allowed it to evade the most advanced radars.

  In the aircraft, Babu was already waiting for them. He ordered the Apostolate to stay with him during the invasion. They were to group up with Fadala. Their targets would be Generals Luena and Jitujeusi, as well as President Ojwang. The others were to neutralize the enemy forces.

  “No mercy, no survivors.”

  “Yes, my Babu!”

  Nothing more needed to be said. The flight lasted less than twelve minutes. The quadcopter passed through Ilu Nla's airspace monitoring like an eclipse. Above the Central Square, where the Ir?ko Tree is located, the aircraft opened its belly. With their skysurf boards, the assassins tore the sky below with their daring evolutions in the air.

  They were like a flock of birds of prey flying above their prey. They struck the pinkish-white clouds of dawn. The sun, still shy, sprinkled beams of light on the buildings still pale with dew.

  The flight was short, but the adrenaline rush almost limitless. As they pulled on the ropes that activated the parachutes, the morning winds cast a huge shadow over the troops guarding the entrances to the government palace.

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  At the first sign of danger, Ilu Nla's soldiers unleashed their anti-aircraft batteries on their enemies. The surprise of the attack was compounded by the audacity of invading the country and fighting the Cyber Troops head-on.

  When he landed on the ground, Babu got rid of his parachute and pulled out two .50 Death Eagle pistols. Amid drops of blood raining from the sky and debris bouncing off the battlefield, he walked the short distance to the command center in the square.

  Behind secure barricades of concrete walls, barbed wire and reinforced steel armor, stood the commander of the Cyber Troops. Eager, he couldn't understand why so many undertakers were landing there like vultures on the hunt for carnage.

  “General Jitujeusi, there are Ilê Apanyan men here... no, I don't know, jumping out of the sky like a plague of locusts...”

  The explosions and screams of men gurgling with their own blood made his bones freeze. He hid behind a pillar on the fa?ade of the palace building.

  "Damn it! No, general, I don't know what the hell they want... I can't hold them here, there are too many... what can I do? We can't use Ofó? That's bad, general."

  The artillery commander felt a metallic chill on the back of his neck. He swallowed his saliva and grimaced sourly. Before he died, he heard one last irony. A sentence of defeat:

  “Don't do anything else, you've already lost this war.”

  Blam! The bullet went through the back of his head. The handset fell to the ground, screaming loudly, but the commander of the defense in Central Square lay dead. Babu picked up the phone and said:

  “You'll be next, General Jitujeusi.”

  "What? Is that you, you worm? Welcome to Ilu Nla!"

  “For a man who received a death sentence, you seem in a good mood.”

  "I'll crush you like a cockroach, undertaker. I'll wear your dear eyes as a pendant, they'll be my souvenir."

  “Enjoy your last moments, General Jitujeusi.”

  With one hand, Babu broke the communicator. He turned back, and the eleven elite killers were there. Funeral directors and native soldiers were engaged in an atrocious war. The quality of the former seemed to outweigh the quantity of the latter, but the surprise effect was short-lived. Many would join God sooner.

  “My children, you know, this is where we must meet Brother Fadala.”

  Babu pulled out a holographic cube and pressed the button on the top. A holoprojection of the plans for Ojwang's underground laboratory complex appeared.

  “They're out of date, they're probably full of traps.”

  “You won't get past here!”

  Brunc! A bipedal tank shattered the floor with a bayonet-flanberge with a super-heated blade. The metal melted the floor, but didn't hit anyone. At most, it had cut through residual images.

  "Shit! I thought I hit them."

  A second bipedal tank providing cover for the first pointed its six-barrel machine gun into the air and said:

  “Idiot, look up!”

  The gun spewed out a swarm of 7.62 mm ammunition. However, their enemies were like ghosts, and the five thousand shots per second had little or no effect on them. The machine gun stopped sucking in the ammunition belt to cool the barrels.

  In mid-air, Babu gestured for the men to advance into the lobby, and they obeyed. The leader of the assassins landed elegantly on the ground.

  The armored vehicles set off rocket turrets on their shoulders and red lights met on Babu's chest.

  “Let's see if you can handle our firepower, you old sucker.”

  The rockets fired flew in a spiral at the mortician. Before he was hit, he jumped over them, leapt over the rockets, gained momentum and fell into the cockpit of the bipedal tank. He fired several shots at the armor. With the dizziness of the screen caused by the attack, the soldier lost control and began to struggle.

  Without realizing it, he hit his colleague with the flanberge bayonet. The arm with the machine gun fell to the ground. In the midst of the military's confusion, he disengaged the weapon from the robotic arm. He picked up the weapon, unlocked the automatic module and pointed the barrel at the enemies. The opponents tried to react, but the volley caused severe damage to their armor.

  The units began to catch fire. The 7.62 mm ammunition was composed of thermite. Babu didn't have to do anything else. As the armored vehicles melted in the flames, he crossed the entrance and reached the lobby of the presidential palace. Flames, blood and bodies. The way was clear to move forward. With a gesture, everyone moved quickly.