The Tradition of Yamaok Village

This is a story from long, long, long ago.

Our ancestors once lived in a far, far away land, a place completely different from here.

At that time, that land suffered drought after drought, the plants and trees all withered away, and our ancestors were driven to the very brink of death.

Just then, down from the sky came one with pale pink scales, a dragon.

The dragon told our ancestors to call her “Okachan,” and said, ‘If you will follow me, I will take you to a land without hunger.’

Our ancestors, who were on the verge of death, immediately nodded their heads.

Then, Okachan-sama gathered our ancestors together with her long tail, lifted them up, and flew away, bringing them to the mountain pass where Yamaok Village now stands.

Life in the mountains was different from what they had known, and our ancestors struggled, but the surroundings were overflowing with water and the blessings of the mountains.

And whenever dangerous monsters appeared, Okachan-sama would instantly defeat them and protect our ancestors.

That is why we, the people of Yamaok Village, never forgetting the kindness we received from Okachan-sama, never forgetting our gratitude, still worship and revere that great one as we live our lives today.

Okachan-sama's word is absolute.

You children, too, must not go against Okachan-sama.

‘You must not stay up late’.

‘You must not be a picky eater’.

‘Let us share our food’.

‘Let us return kindness with kindness’.

Every single one of these is a precious word that Okachan-sama gave to us.

Don't break them and make your mother sad, now.

Whatever Okachan-sama tells you, you must always obey.

By doing so, you will be repaying the kindness of Okachan-sama, who has protected this village since long, long, long ago.

You are the proud people of Yamaok Village, after all, so you must never forget this.

No matter the words, whatever Okachan-sama tells you, you must obey.

Absolutely.

Live, rightly.

(The tradition of Yamaok Village, told from mother to child: ‘The Beginning of Yamaok Village and Okachan-sama’)

◇ ◇ ◇

It happened while Emi, all alone and forlorn, was eating her meal up on the stage.

“What is the meaning of this! Chief!!”

Driven by rage, the hunter Gonpeter flung open the door to Chief Megatonkohsuke's house!

A loud Baan! echoed through the chief's home.

The ones who whirled toward Gonpeter, startled, were a crowd of men.

They were the ones tasked with bringing clothes and food to Emi.

Incense was burning inside the room, and the men were all eating plenty of meat.

It was the Uguuso meat that Emi had hunted.

“Oh, so you're awake, Gonpeter. I was just thinking it was time to send for you as well.”

In the hushed room, the voice of Megatonkohsuke, sitting in the back, rang out.

“Come now, shut the door quickly, Gonpeter. We're in the middle of breaking the curse on those who had dealings with that thing, and it won't do to let the incense out. Come, quickly, quickly.”

“Chief! I told you, didn't I? That she's the one who saved me! That you'd treat her with every courtesy! And yet, and yet......!!”

Gonpeter slammed the door shut and marched right up to Megatonkohsuke.

After entering the village with Emi, he had first headed to Megatonkohsuke's house to report.

He had been attacked by a monster, his life in danger, and a girl named Emi had saved him.

So he had invited her to the village.

Right now, she was waiting outside this house.

He had asked that they please let him show the utmost hospitality to the girl who had saved his life.

Megatonkohsuke had listened to Gonpeter's story, thought for a moment, and said, ‘Leave everything to us.’

Then, he had ordered Gonpeter to rest.

No matter how sturdy a hunter Gonpeter was, he had just faced a life-threatening crisis.

He had to be badly worn out.

Leave the hospitality to them and rest for now.

That was how Gonpeter understood it, so he parted with Emi and returned to his own home.

And it was true that his exhaustion had been severe.

Sitting in a chair at home, Gonpeter had fallen asleep in that same position without realizing it, and by the time he woke, it was night.

Then, feeling it would be a terrible breach of duty for him not to take part in welcoming Emi, Gonpeter rushed out of his house and headed for the village square.

And there, he saw it.

On the stage decked with the white-and-black striped cloth and white flowers, his benefactor, all alone, eating!

At first Gonpeter was stunned; then, as it dawned on him what the sight meant, his face went pale; and then, at treatment that sullied the soul, that was against all decency, his face flushed bright red with fury, and he dashed straight for the chief's house.

“What is the meaning of this! That ‘Sohgintokki cloth’!!”

Gonpeter leaned in close to Megatonkohsuke and protested with ferocious intensity.

The Sohgintokki cloth was the white-and-black vertically striped cloth decorating Emi's stage...... a cloth with a pattern like the “funeral curtains” of Japan.

Of all the ways Emi had been treated, what Gonpeter took particular issue with was not so much that she had been left to eat alone without any proper hospitality, but rather that this cloth had been used.

In Yamaok Village, this cloth was used only on certain occasions.

One, was at funerals.

And, the other......

“......What's the harm?”

Just then, before Megatonkohsuke could answer Gonpeter's question, a quiet voice rang through the chief's house.

The owner of the voice was a man standing quietly beside Megatonkohsuke.

Gonpeter's best friend, Sabrown.

“Unhappy, are you? Gonpeter...... that she...... that Emi-chan, is being offered to Okachan-sama?”

“Sabrown......!”

Sabrown's voice was cold.

“Unhappy, are you? That she's taking Oyukipa's place?”

“Sabrown, wait! Service to Okachan-sama is what the villagers offer that great one in gratitude! She's an outsider, and our benefactor, she's in no position to be involved in this village's......”

“THEN, YOU! ARE YOU TELLING OYUKIPA TO DIE!!”

“!!”

Gonpeter could say nothing back to Sabrown, who had suddenly screamed.

He couldn't help catching his breath and fell silent.

“......Calm down, Gonpeter, Sabrown.”

Chief Megatonkohsuke cleared his throat, then cut in between the two of them in a voice full of dignity.

“Gonpeter, this has already been decided. I decided it. I am the chief. You will obey me, Gonpeter.”

“But, but...... this treatment, it's just too......”

“Against all decency, is it? Will it sully your soul? Is it not, right?”

Megatonkohsuke looked straight at Gonpeter with eyes half-hidden by his long eyebrows.

“......!”

There was power in those eyes.

He had a force about him that made it hard to believe this was the same Megatonkohsuke who usually played the carefree, kindly old man.

“Perhaps, it is. But I've decided. The girl we offer Okachan-sama this time is not Oyukipa, but that girl called Emi. I decided it, myself. So neither Gonpeter's soul nor Sabrown's will be sullied. I'll take all that stain upon myself...... for I am the chief, after all.”

“Bu...... but......!”

“Please...... please! Just be quiet! Gonpeter!”

Though overwhelmed by Megatonkohsuke's force, Gonpeter, stammering, tried to say something through his parched mouth, but it was Sabrown who cut him off.

Tears running down his worn-out, haggard cheeks, Sabrown poured out his words in a trembling voice.

“My wife, she's dead too...... and my parents, long ago! Now, all I have...... is Oyukipa, no one else...... So don't take Oyukipa...... away from me, pleaase......”

Faced with that sob-choked plea, there was nothing more, nothing at all, that Gonpeter could say.

Sabrown was Gonpeter's best friend.

His feelings, Gonpeter understood so well that it hurt.

The feelings of a father told to offer his most precious daughter as a sacrifice were something Gonpeter, who had not yet started a family, could easily imagine.

Yes, a sacrifice.

At present, Yamaok Village was under a demand from the dragon Okachan who guarded the village: to offer up a sacrifice.

Originally, the only one in Yamaok Village who met the condition the dragon had set for the sacrifice, ‘a girl about ten years old’, was Sabrown's daughter Oyukipa.

But now, things had changed.

The hunter Gonpeter had invited a girl of about the same age into the village.

A girl they had all loved and raised as their own daughter, and a mysterious, suspicious cursed child of unknown origin who had drifted into the village.

If one were to be offered as a sacrifice, which one?

The village elders decided unanimously, without even needing to debate, to make the cursed child the sacrifice.

The chief also approved it.

That was why the cursed child was eating a feast now.

That feast was by no means hospitality for a benefactor.

It was a meal to send off one setting out on the journey to death.

The decorations using the Sohgintokki cloth and white flowers were the same.

Those were decorations used in the ritual of saying goodbye to the sacrifice.

“............”

Gonpeter, who had been shouting with visible rage until a moment ago, had fallen completely silent.

No one in the room spoke.

The men gathered for the curse-breaking also kept their mouths shut.

In the dead silence of the room, only Sabrown's sobbing echoed.

“......Nothing more to say, then? Gonpeter...... you're still tired, too. Bathe in the incense to break the curse, then go home for today.”

Patting the shoulder of the thoroughly crestfallen Gonpeter, Megatonkohsuke whispered gently.

“............At least.”

After a long silence, Gonpeter spoke quietly.

“At least, then, let me be the ‘bearer’......”

The “bearer” was the one who carried the palanquin bearing the sacrifice to Okachan.

“............”

“To have nothing more to do with it, that, I can't allow myself......”

“......Very well. But you'll do your duty, yes?”

“............Yeah, of course......”

“Then tomorrow, at sunrise, we head for Okachan-sama's Rock. We'd meant to ask for some twenty days more, but as things stand, the sooner the better. Don't be late.”

“............I understand......”

After exchanging those words with Megatonkohsuke, Gonpeter began to walk unsteadily.

He fanned the smoke of the incense burning in a large jar over his forehead three times with his palm, then weakly opened the door and went outside.

◇ ◇ ◇

Under a sky full of glittering stars, Gonpeter walked through the village, past its rows of crude wooden houses.

His head was fuzzy, and his footing was unsteady.

His thoughts, he couldn't pull together.

The only thing he knew was that he had been far too, foolish.

Gonpeter had lacked imagination.

His thinking had been shallow.

Bringing the girl into the village, at a time like this.

He should have thought harder about what that act would lead to before he acted.

Returning the kindness of having his life saved.

That, was the right thing to do.

The right way to live.

But, as a result of doing the right thing, what had happened?

His benefactor had been chosen as the sacrifice.

Something that wasn't right had happened.

Then, if that was not right, would it be right to offer Oyukipa as the sacrifice as originally planned?

Would it be right to make Sabrown and his daughter suffer?

Of course, it wasn't.

As a hunter, Gonpeter had put more effort into hunting than ever, wanting to let Oyukipa eat feasts until the very last moment.

He thought that was the duty of the village hunters.

But thinking back now, that was an action born from guilt, because he couldn't save his best friend's daughter.

Had that been the right thing to do?

He had meant it as atonement, the least he could offer.

Was atonement like that the right thing to do?

Wanting to be forgiven for being unable to save Oyukipa, just that and nothing more, hadn't it been an atonement little better than an excuse?

Was that the right way to live?

What, exactly, was the right way to live?

How could he live rightly?

Was offering Oyukipa as the sacrifice the right thing?

Was offering Emi as the sacrifice the right thing?

Probably, neither was.

But, one or the other, he had to choose.

It hurt.

He felt sick.

He felt as if his own soul gave off the stench of something rotten through.

“......!?”

And just then.

Staggering along, Gonpeter had made it as far as the village square.

And when he looked at the stage built in the square, no one was there.

For some reason, the decorative flowers were all gone too, but that didn't matter; the point was, Emi wasn't there.

The bonfires set to the left and right of the stage lit up the area, to no purpose.

(Did she run!?)

Joy and despair crashed over Gonpeter's wavering heart like giant waves.

Driven by an emotion he couldn't put into words, something he had never felt before and whose identity he couldn't grasp, Gonpeter rushed to the stage.

He went up close and looked around, but sure enough, no one was there.

(Where on earth did she go......)

He thought for a moment and an idea occurred to him.

(......The chief and everyone in the village find Emi creepy. Enough to do a curse-breaking. So then......)

They would probably keep her as far on the outskirts of the village as possible.

Next to Old Lady Yoshikopa's house, if he remembered right, there was one hut no one used.

Hadn't they given her that hut to sleep in?

Wouldn't Emi, done with her meal, have gone back there already?

So Gonpeter guessed.

And his guess was exactly right.

When Gonpeter quietly opened the hut's door, there lay Emi, stretched out on the hard, bare ground, breathing softly in her sleep.

“......Already asleep, huh.”

Muttering softly, Gonpeter gazed at the sleeping face of the girl illuminated by the moonlight.

At first glance, she was an ominous girl with black hair and black eyes.

But, the more he looked, the more beautiful she was.

Looking only at her sleeping face, no one would ever guess that this girl was so strong she would make nothing of an Assault Chiwanwan.

......Yes, this girl was strong.

Extraordinarily so.

(......Maybe)

Gonpeter at once dismissed the thought that had suddenly come to him.

No matter how strong Emi was, Okachan-sama was, a dragon.

The Guardian Dragon-sama who had been with us since the village began, who had lived long, so very long.

She was not an opponent a human could win against.

“......I'm sorry...... so sorry............”

He laid his own jacket over Emi, who slept on the bare dirt without so much as a blanket, and apologized in a trembling voice.

I'm sorry for involving you.

I'm truly sorry for not even giving you proper hospitality.

Even though you're my benefactor.

Making you sleep on the bare dirt like this, without even a mat.

I'm sorry.

I'm sorry.

Thinking it was the least he could do, Gonpeter returned home, brought a blanket, and covered Emi with it.

Then he left the hut where Emi slept, almost as if he were running away.

On the way back home, he looked around.

No one was guarding Emi.

Fearing the curse rubbing off on them from the cursed child, the villagers did not approach Emi more than necessary.

And in the first place, the villagers did not think she would run away.

Because they believed ‘Beyond the village lies the half-netherworld’, they were sure no one would calmly walk out of it.

So, there were no guards.

So, it could be done.

He could let her escape.

If only Gonpeter could bring himself to.

But.

“I can't......”

Gonpeter stopped and looked down.

The smiles of his best friend Sabrown and his daughter Oyukipa came to mind.

“I can't......”

Tears spilled over.

Drip, drip, the ground grew wet in little circles.

“I can't......”

Without so much as a glance at the star-filled sky, Gonpeter simply stood rooted there, on and on, staring at the ground where there was nothing to see.

The night in Yamaok Village deepened quietly.