Posted by:Ebuka Simon | Lagos, Nigeria | February 2025
I don't know if anyone will believe me, but I have to share this. Maybe for closure. Maybe to warn others. I don't even know anymore.
I came across a book—Ghost Stories Before Death—written by a guy I had never heard of before. Some random author. But when I read it, something inside me clicked. Not because it was just another scary book, but because I had seen things too.
Things that don't make sense.
Things that shouldn't exist.
So, I found the author's contact and decided to tell my own story. He said he would include it in his next edition. I don't even care about recognition. I just want to put this out there because maybe, just maybe, I'm not the only one who has seen them.
It Started at the Construction Site
I work part-time as a construction worker in Lagos. Nothing glamorous, but it pays enough to keep me afloat. The site was just another development project, some new office complex that rich people would eventually fill up.
That night, we had to work overtime because the oga at the top wanted the foundation done before the weekend. It was late, around 11 PM, when I saw it.
At first, I thought it was a person—a tall figure standing on the unfinished structure. No safety harness, no helmet, nothing. Just standing there, watching.
I shouted at him, "Oga, you no go comot for there?"
No response.
I turned to my colleague, Jude. "You see that guy?"
Jude looked up, squinting. Then he shook his head. "Which guy?"
My chest went cold.
The figure tilted its head, like it had heard me. And then—it moved.
Not like a normal person.
It shifted.
One moment it was on the beam. The next, it was standing right in front of me.
My whole body locked up. I couldn't breathe, couldn't run.
The thing was massive. Nearly ten feet tall, draped in something that looked like liquid metal, its face obscured by a blinding glow. It had wings—but not the soft, feathery kind you see in movies.
These ones were jagged, layered like broken shards of glass.
And its eyes.
No pupils. No whites. Just endless, spinning rings of fire and shadow.
Then it spoke.
Not in words. Not in any language I had ever heard.
The sound was inside my head.
Like a thousand voices whispering at once. Like a radio tuned to a station that didn't exist.
I fell to my knees, shaking.
The last thing I remember before passing out was its voice.
"Do not be afraid."
Clerics and Pastors Gave No Answers
When I woke up, I was in my apartment. My roommate, Kelechi, said I collapsed at the site, but when they rushed over, there was nothing there.
I tried to brush it off. Stress, lack of sleep. Maybe I had imagined it.
But then—I started seeing more of them.
On the bridge at Third Mainland. In the market at Balogun. Standing on rooftops, watching me.
Everywhere I went, they were there.
I did what any Nigerian would do—I went to church.
First, I visited my mother's pastor, a big-name prophet in Ikeja. He listened, nodded, then told me, "My son, these are demons. We need to pray."
But they didn't feel like demons.
The way they looked—the way they moved—was nothing like what I had read about demons. There were no horns, no fangs, no sulfuric stench.
Just light. And fire.
I went to another church, a Catholic one this time. The priest gave me holy water, told me to fast for seven days.
Still, they didn't leave.
I tried an imam. A spiritualist. Even an Ifa priest.
The answer was always the same:
"They are not demons."
But if they weren't demons—then what were they?
The Bible Gave Me Answers I Didn't Want
I went back to the only place that had some kind of explanation—the Bible.
And what I read terrified me more than anything else.
Angels were never what we thought they were.
The ones in paintings? The white robes, the golden halos? Lies.
Ezekiel described them as wheels of fire.
Daniel saw them as living storms.
Isaiah spoke of six-winged seraphim that covered their faces so men wouldn't die from looking at them.
The things I had seen matched those descriptions exactly.
I wasn't seeing demons.
I was seeing angels.
And that terrified me more than anything else.
The Eleventh Hour Question
It's been months now. I still see them.
They don't attack. They don't speak anymore.
They just watch.
Every night at 11 PM, I see them standing at the edge of my street, their burning eyes fixed on me.
I don't know why.
I don't know what they want.
But I know one thing for sure:
We were never meant to see them.
And now that I have—
I don't think they'll ever let me go.