The wind howled like a hungry spirit across the dusty plains of Benin as twilight settled over the earth. Smoke curled into the sky from small fires dotting the horizon, but one in particular burned hotter, brighter outside a crumbling mud hut on the edge of a forgotten village. Around it sat five children, knees hugged to their chests, eyes wide and glowing with anticipation. They weren’t listening to just any tale. Tonight, their grandmother was speaking of Korobanti.
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Old Mama Ebun sat hunched over, her hair gray and matted like the dry grasses that surrounded the hut. Her voice trembled with age, but carried weight, each word dragging through the silence like a knife through taut cloth.
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"There is a village," she said, staring into the fire as if she could see it, "that no map dares to show. It does not belong in this world, nor in the next. It is a place swallowed by time, haunted by the lost, and fed by those who stumble where they should not."
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The youngest of the children, Tunde, frowned. "But Bibi, if it's not on any map, how do people find it?"
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Mama Ebun’s eyes snapped to his. "They don’t find Korobanti. Korobanti finds them."
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The fire popped loudly, making the children jump. Ebun's wrinkled lips curled into a bitter smile.
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"A trader from Mali was the first I heard of," she whispered. "He was headed to Kano but missed a turn during a sandstorm. When the winds cleared, he found himself in a village of strangers who spoke no language he knew. They welcomed him with silence, with stares that burned holes into his soul. He tried to leave the next morning. He never made it out."
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"What happened to him?" Awa asked.
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"They found his body in a hollow tree. His skin was smooth as glass, not a mark on him. But his mouth… his mouth was wide open. Screaming. As if he had died looking into something… wrong."
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The fire dimmed suddenly, as if reacting to the story. The air grew colder.
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"Another time," Ebun continued, her voice lower now, "there was a woman French, I think on a humanitarian trip. Her plane went down somewhere over Niger. Weeks later, villagers reported hearing a woman’s voice in the forest. Crying. Pleading. But those who followed the sound vanished. All of them."
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She leaned closer to the flames, shadows painting her face in jagged darkness. "Korobanti is not a place, children. It is a trap. A living, breathing thing. It lures the lost. And once you're inside..."
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Silence. Not even the wind dared interrupt.
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Then a voice, barely louder than a whisper: "Is there a way out?"
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Mama Ebun looked into the flames, and for a heartbeat just one her eyes did not look like her own.
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"Maybe," she said.
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And she said no more.
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and then Add to home screen.