In the quiet village of Ogwashi-Uku, everyone knew Chinaza, though most would never admit it aloud. She was 19 , soft-spoken, brilliant, and the kind of girl who seemed almost invisible because she never demanded attention. She always sat in the second row at church, her posture perfect, her hands folded neatly in her lap, her eyes following the pastor with unwavering focus. Nothing about her stood out. She did not gossip, did not boast, and rarely raised her voice. To the villagers, she was ordinary in every sense, a model of innocence and calm, and her life appeared as predictable as the rhythm of the seasons. Her neighbors admired her poise, her teachers praised her intelligence, and her family was quietly proud of her. Yet beneath this seemingly serene surface, subtle changes began to stir small things that, at first, could be dismissed as mere quirks of adolescence. She became unusually sensitive to light, drawing curtains and shutting herself in the cooler, shadowed corners of the house. Her appetite waned for regular food, replaced by a strange obsession with eggs, sometimes raw, eaten in staggering quantities. Even as whispers spread through the neighborhood "Maybe she's pregnant," some joked . her mother felt a deep, gnawing worry that something far stranger and darker was at work. It was as if the girl they all thought they knew had begun to slip quietly into a world they could neither see nor understand, and the ordinary life she once led was slowly unraveling before anyone could stop it. She regularly stays indoors without going out.
As the days passed, subtle changes in Chinaza began to deepen, casting a shadow of unease over her once peaceful household. Her mother noticed that she no longer moved freely in the bright rooms of their home, always retreating to the cool, dim corners where the light barely reached, drawing curtains tightly as if the sun itself could harm her. She ate less and less, refusing the meals her mother lovingly prepared, yet an unusual obsession with eggs emerged dozens at a time, sometimes raw, consumed with a strange intensity that left her mother bewildered. Conversations at school and in the neighborhood became laced with whispers and gossip; neighbors speculated that perhaps she was with child, but her mother's heart told her that something far stranger and more terrifying was at work. Chinaza's demeanor shifted as well: she grew quieter, her eyes often distant and unblinking, staring as though seeing something no one else could. At night, strange sounds began to echo from her room , a soft, rhythmic thumping, like something dragging or brushing against the walls. Her mother's concern intensified, each sound setting her nerves on edge, yet when she called out, Chinaza's responses were delayed, almost mechanical, and tinged with a faint hiss, like a sound half-human, half-animal. The ordinary girl they all thought they knew was slipping away, replaced by something uncanny and inexplicable, a presence that left neighbors uneasy and family desperate for answers. As the weeks went on, the unease deepened into dread, for everyone could sense that whatever was happening to Chinaza was no longer just illness or mood , it was a transformation, creeping silently but unstoppable, ready to change her life and the lives of those around her forever.
The first truly terrifying night arrived quietly, almost deceptively, as if the darkness itself were holding its breath. Around 1 a.m., Chinaza's mother was jolted awake by a soft, rhythmic thumping that seemed to crawl along the walls, brushing against them with deliberate weight. At first, she thought it might be a rat or some animal in the ceiling, but as she stepped cautiously into the hallway, the sound grew clearer, closer, emanating unmistakably from Chinaza's room. Heart pounding, she knocked softly, then louder, receiving no answer. Trembling, she pushed the door open, and what she saw made her legs buckle, sending her to her knees. Chinaza lay on the floor, her body twisted in a curve that defied the natural limits of the human spine, her skin showing a faint, scaly texture not full scales, but thickened, darkened, unnatural pores that seemed almost reptilian. Her tongue flicked rapidly in the air, tasting the room like a serpent surveying its surroundings, and her eyes had narrowed, pupils vertical, glowing faintly in the dim light. When she whispered her mother's name, her voice was no longer entirely human soft, overlapping with a strange hiss at the end, like two voices merging unnervingly into one. Panic and disbelief gripped her mother as she reached for Chinaza, who recoiled with a movement no human body should allow. The girl she had raised, the quiet, brilliant daughter everyone knew, was still there in form but slipping fast into something unrecognizable, a being caught between human and something darker, more primal. That night, fear took root in her mother's heart, the first true understanding dawning that her child was changing in ways that defied explanation or hope.
By the following days, Chinaza's transformation became impossible to ignore, plunging her family into a whirlpool of fear, confusion, and helplessness. Her mother, desperate for answers, rushed her to every clinic, herbalist, and pastor in the village, hoping someone anyone could explain what was happening. Doctors shook their heads, herbalists muttered cryptic warnings of curses, and pastors prayed fervently, but no one could offer a solution or even a reasonable explanation. Meanwhile, Chinaza herself had changed in ways that made her seem less human with every passing hour; her movements grew strange, almost serpentine, gliding across the floor rather than walking, her legs twisting inward unnaturally. She stopped eating ordinary food altogether, surviving only on the eggs she now consumed obsessively, and words no longer passed easily through her lips. She would sit for hours, staring unblinking at the walls or the shadows, as if listening to whispers no one else could hear. Rumors began to circulate among neighbors, some claiming she had eaten something cursed, others whispering that jealousy or dark magic at school had "given her something." Yet for her mother, the worst part was watching the light fade from her daughter's eyes, the same eyes that had once been bright, curious, and human were now distant, almost predatory, and there was a coldness there that had never existed before. Every night, as darkness fell over the house, a silent dread settled in, the feeling that Chinaza was no longer entirely her daughter, and that something unstoppable, something unnatural, was slowly taking hold, reshaping her body, mind, and soul into something neither she nor anyone else could recognize or control.