I Used “Commanding Oil” to Control My Customers — Now Seven Are Dead and My Shop Is Cursed
My name is Chinyere, and if you know me in Balogun Market, then you know I am not someone who used to believe in shortcuts.
For ten years I sold Swiss lace, George wrappers, and Aso-Ebi fabrics honestly, waking before dawn to arrange my shop before customers arrived.
But the market changed. Customers stopped buying expensive materials. Everyone began complaining about the economy, about school fees, about rent.
Meanwhile, my neighbor, Madam Rose, was smiling every day, loading bundles into customers’ cars without even negotiating prices.
I watched women enter her shop looking unsure and leave carrying lace worth millions without blinking.
At first, I told myself she had better connections or imported higher quality materials.
But one evening, after I closed my shop without selling even one yard of fabric, I broke down in tears.
My landlord had threatened to lock my shop if I failed to pay two months’ rent.
My son’s school had sent a final warning about unpaid fees.
I swallowed my pride and approached Madam Rose.
She did not look surprised. It was as if she had been waiting for me.
“Do you want to sell,” she asked quietly, “or do you want to keep praying?”
The way she said it made my stomach tighten.
She told me about a Baba in Ikorodu who specialized in “attraction oils.”
“He doesn’t force,” she said. “He only convinces destiny.”
The next morning, I followed her to Ikorodu.
The place smelled like rotten eggs and burning herbs. The air felt heavy, like it did not circulate properly.
The Baba was old, with yellow eyes and fingers stained black.
He did not ask many questions. He already knew why I was there.
“You are tired of watching others prosper,” he said calmly.
I nodded.
He brought out a tiny bottle filled with thick black oil. It shimmered unnaturally under the dim light.
“Rub this on your palms every morning before opening your shop,” he instructed.
“Anyone you touch must buy.”
I asked him about side effects.
He laughed.
“Only if you stop selling.”
At the time, I did not understand what that meant.
The first day I used it, nothing dramatic happened immediately.
But around noon, an Alhaja entered my shop.
Normally she would price everything down to the last naira.
I greeted her and touched her arm lightly while showing her lace.
She blinked twice, then said, “Pack five bundles.”
No negotiation. No hesitation.
The total was 1.5 million naira.
She transferred immediately.
My heart nearly stopped from shock.
That day, I sold more than I had sold in three months combined.
The oil worked.
By the end of the first week, I had cleared over six million naira.
By the second week, it reached twelve million.
I paid my debts. I ordered a Lexus. I sent money to my parents in the village.
I felt chosen.
I even returned to the Baba to thank him.
He only asked one question.
“You are still selling, right?”
I laughed confidently.
“More than ever.”
Three days later, the Alhaja who first bought from me collapsed during a family event.
They said it was sudden cardiac arrest.
I felt a strange chill but brushed it off.
Then a young bride who bought Aso-Ebi from me died in her sleep.
People whispered about poison.
I tried to ignore it.
But when the third customer died within one week, I began to feel fear creeping into my success.
Seven customers died within two weeks.
All of them had purchased expensive lace from me.
All of them had been physically touched by me during the sale.
The connection became impossible to ignore.
Yesterday morning, I opened my shop earlier than usual.
The market felt unusually quiet.
Even Madam Rose was not around.
I decided to check my safe, wanting to count the remaining cash before depositing it.
When I unlocked it, the smell hit me first.
Rotten. Metallic.
I thought maybe something had spilled.
But when I looked inside, I screamed.
Instead of bundles of naira, I saw hundreds of black scorpions crawling over each other.
Their bodies glistened under the fluorescent light.
They moved as if breathing together.
I stumbled backward, knocking over fabric rolls.
That was when the shop door slammed shut on its own.
The entire market noise faded into silence.
I turned slowly.
In the corner of my shop stood seven figures.
They were wearing the exact lace materials I had sold them.
But the fabrics were stained with dark patches of blood.
Their faces were pale. Their eyes hollow.
They did not blink.
The Alhaja stepped forward.
Her voice sounded like dry leaves rubbing together.
“Refund us.”
I shook my head violently.
“I did not kill you,” I whispered.
“You touched us,” she replied.
The scorpions began crawling out of the safe and onto the floor.
They moved toward me in waves.
My left hand started burning intensely.
The skin darkened rapidly, turning greenish at the edges.
I could feel something moving under it.
Like tiny legs scratching from inside.
My phone buzzed.
It was a message from Madam Rose.
“Every sale is a soul. The oil takes commission.”
I dropped the phone in horror.
Now I understand what the Baba meant.
Only if you stop selling.
The oil feeds on transaction.
Each purchase is not money.
It is life exchanged for profit.
The more I sell, the more it consumes.
The scorpions are closer now.
My hand is swelling painfully.
I do not know if I will survive long enough to undo what I have done.
If you bought lace from me in the last two weeks, please burn it immediately.
Do not wear it.
Do not store it.
I hear them whispering again.
“Refund us with your life.”
The market outside has returned to normal noise, but inside my shop, time feels frozen.
I wish I had remained poor and honest.
Because wealth that demands blood is not prosperity.
It is debt.
And I am beginning to understand that the oil has not finished collecting its commission.
If this message reaches anyone who is considering shortcuts to success, listen carefully.
Nothing that smells like rotten eggs brings blessings.
Some opportunities are traps disguised as breakthrough.
The scorpions are at my feet now.
My hand is almost completely green.
I think they are inside me already.
If I survive this, I will close this shop forever.
If I do not, let this story be a warning.
Because sometimes the price of forcing destiny is far greater than staying patient.
And now, I can hear them chanting my name.
The scorpions reached my feet and began climbing my legs slowly, as if they were not in a hurry because they knew I had nowhere to run.
I tried to scream, but my voice came out weak and cracked, like someone whispering from underwater.
The seven figures in lace moved closer, surrounding me in a semicircle near the fabric shelves.
Their clothes shimmered unnaturally, the expensive Swiss lace glowing faintly as though stitched with something alive beneath the threads.
The Alhaja tilted her head and smiled, but her lips did not move when she spoke.
“You profited from our breath,” the voice echoed inside my skull instead of the room.
My left hand pulsed violently. I could see dark veins spreading from my palm toward my wrist.
The oil.
I suddenly remembered the bottle.
It was still inside my handbag, tucked beneath my receipt book.
With trembling fingers, I reached for it while the scorpions crawled higher toward my waist.
The moment my fingers touched the bottle, the burning intensified.
The oil inside began bubbling, as if reacting to my fear.
The Baba’s warning replayed in my mind.
“Only if you stop selling.”
Maybe stopping was not enough.
Maybe repayment required something greater.
The figures began chanting softly in the same strange rhythm I heard inside the Baba’s hut in Ikorodu.
The words made no sense, yet they felt ancient and binding.
Suddenly, the shop lights flickered.
The scorpions paused.
The chanting grew louder, overlapping into a chorus that vibrated through the shelves and fabric rolls.
I realized something terrifying.
They were not asking for money back.
They were asking for balance.
Seven lives for seven lives.
My knees weakened.
“I did not mean to harm you,” I cried.
“You meant to prosper,” the bride answered calmly.
Her wedding lace was soaked in dark stains across the chest area.
“You wanted what we had—time.”
My breath caught.
Time.
Their lives had shortened.
My sales had increased.
Was the oil converting lifespan into profit?
Was each purchase draining something vital from them and transferring it into my success?
That would explain the energy I felt during those two weeks.
I barely slept, yet I was never tired.
I felt sharp. Alert. Powerful.
It was not excitement.
It was stolen vitality.
The scorpions resumed moving, now reaching my shoulders.
One crawled onto my swollen left hand and stung directly into the center of my palm.
The pain was blinding.
But instead of collapsing, I felt a rush of cold clarity.
A voice, deeper than the others, echoed through the shop.
“The oil must be returned.”
Returned where?
To the Baba?
To the ground?
Or to blood?
The figures stepped aside, forming a narrow path toward the shop entrance.
The door slowly unlocked by itself.
Outside, Balogun Market sounded normal again.
People bargaining. Generators humming. Life continuing as if nothing supernatural was unfolding inside my shop.
The message was clear.
I had one chance.
Clutching the bottle tightly, I forced my shaking legs to move.
The scorpions fell from my body and scattered, clearing a path for me to exit.
As I stepped into the sunlight, the figures vanished instantly.
The market looked ordinary.
No one seemed to notice my swollen green hand or the terror in my eyes.
I closed my shop halfway and rushed toward the main road.
I did not lock it.
I did not care about the fabric.
I needed to reach Ikorodu.
The ride felt endless.
Every bump in the road sent sharp pain through my arm.
The driver kept glancing at my hand in the mirror but said nothing.
When I arrived at the Baba’s compound, the air felt colder than before.
The rotten egg smell was stronger.
I burst inside without greeting.
He was seated exactly where I had first seen him, as if he never moved.
“You stopped selling,” he said before I could speak.
Seven,” I whispered hoarsely.
He nodded slowly.
“The oil feeds through exchange. You wanted customers without effort. It delivered.”
“They are dead!” I screamed.
“They paid,” he replied calmly.
My anger surged beyond fear.
“You never told me it would cost lives!”
He laughed softly.
“I told you there were side effects only if you stopped selling.”
I realized then that the oil was not about money.
It was about continuity.
As long as I kept selling and feeding it, the deaths would continue quietly, spaced out, unnoticed as coincidence.
But stopping disrupted the cycle.
Now it demanded settlement.
“How do I end this?” I demanded.
He studied my swollen hand carefully.
“You must return what was taken.”
“How?”
“Life for life.”
The words hit me like a hammer.
He gestured toward a small bowl filled with dark liquid beside him.
“Blood seals exchange.”
I stepped back immediately.
“I will not kill anyone.”
He shook his head slowly.
“You misunderstand. It already chose.”
He pointed at my hand.
The green discoloration had spread to my elbow.
“The commission is you.”
My chest tightened.
The seven figures had not come to kill me violently.
They came to collect gradually.
My lifespan for theirs.
The oil would drain me slowly until balance was restored.
Unless—
“Unless what?” I demanded desperately.
“Unless someone willingly takes your place,” he finished.
The implication made me nauseous.
Transfer the curse.
Find another desperate seller.
Continue the chain.
The same way Madam Rose likely did to me.
My phone buzzed in my pocket.
It was Madam Rose calling repeatedly.
I declined.
I finally understood her sudden wealth.
Her silence.
Her knowing eyes.
She had already passed the burden forward.
And I had accepted it willingly.
The Baba leaned closer.
“Every market has hierarchy. You chose to climb.”
My vision blurred slightly.
The pain in my arm deepened into numbness.
I looked at the bottle still clutched in my hand.
If I smashed it here, would it end?
Or would it release something worse?
The Baba smiled faintly as if reading my thoughts.
“Breaking it does not break the contract.”
I felt trapped between guilt and survival.
Seven innocent lives already gone.
My own life draining.
And an opportunity to escape by sacrificing another unsuspecting trader.
That was the true test.
Wealth had tempted me once.
Now survival tempted me again.
I slowly placed the bottle on the floor between us.
“I refuse to pass it on,” I said firmly, even as dizziness overtook me.
The Baba’s expression hardened for the first time.
“Then balance will complete itself through you.”
I nodded weakly.
Maybe that was justice.
Maybe that was the only honest repayment left.
As darkness began creeping at the edges of my sight, I thought about my son.
I hoped he would grow learning patience, not shortcuts.
I hoped no one would whisper about commanding oil in his ears one day.
The Baba’s compound seemed to fade around me.
The rotten smell disappeared.
The last thing I remember clearly was the bottle cracking by itself, leaking black oil into the sand.
The ground absorbed it instantly.
And somewhere in the distance, I heard seven voices sigh at the same time.
If you are reading this, I do not know whether I survived.
But if anyone offers you success that requires no effort and smells like decay—
Run.
Because some profits are simply prepaid funerals waiting for a name.