"WHOSE HANDS ARE THOSE???" Rin asked with disgust, glaring with broad eyes at the horrendous withered skin of the severed hands.
Dai covered his mouth as his stomach grumbled from sickness.
While the other children sat back in their seats, surprisingly behaving from the revelation of the hands in their presence.
"It's Otou-san!!!" The young Yasuo exclaimed, pointing at the lacerated hands inside the small wooden crate.
Rin quickly stood up from his position and held up his Kama (sickle) on the servant's neck. A short curved blade with a long handle that most farmers used to cut crops like rice. The Jinbo household mastered the use of Kama in fighting and with ninjutsu, the blade becomes sharper than any samurai katana ever made.
The eldest heir set the sharp edge on Ohara's neck, threatening to behead the servant who cut the hands of their father and yelled, "YOU BASTARD!!! WHAT DID YOU DO TO OUR FATHER'S BODY???"
"Put down your sickle, Rin-sama. Ohara-san didn't do anything wrong. This is part of the Rokkaku tradition." Amara explained while slowly standing from her seat.
She approached her eldest brother, Rin, while cradling her youngest brother, Hideki, in her arms.
"WHAT KIND OF TRADITION IS THIS???" Rin continued to question the elderly man unmoved by the threat.
"Put down your weapon and let Ohara-san explain it to everyone." Amara calmly requested his older brother to restrain his emotions.
She gently touched his oldest brother's hand holding the Kama, persuading the new chief to get back to his seat and listen to the old servant's story.
Rin calmly set aside his weapon on his back before slouching down to his cushioned seat. His face is blank yet still watchful of the high servant's activity.
Ohara emptied his throat and began to unravel the odd tradition, "The Rokkaku Clan believed that devouring your enemy will grant you their strength. And you all know that your father practices this kind of custom.
The descendants nodded their heads.
"Takayori-sama acknowledged it as a way to honor every brave warrior he faced in battle. Offering all their strength. Fighting with an insatiable will to live. All these passes to him as he devours a part of their body" The high servant's ringing voice echoes through the four corners of the vast hall where the tradition commences, "Thus, he wanted you to consume him as well. For you to inherit the spirit of a thousand men who bravely fought your father and died in his hand."
"Consume him????" Rin asked with his face disgruntled with disgust.
He loathed his father's ways and his mother never let him watch the savage ways of the patriarch. It was enough for the Jinbo family to have a hanyo shinobi that they can be proud of and elevate their status in the village. The Jinbo clan worked as humble farmers for the Mochizuki and though they are good warriors, they can never compete with the three Shingeno Family of Koku Village.
When the Chief proposed to give a yokai child to every family to strengthen the shinobi warriors with demon blood, the Jinbo household was the first of the ten clans who offered their female daughter to their ambitious leader. His mother protested, as every young woman in the village. But with his grandparents' persuasion, his mother allowed herself to be impregnated. A whole six months of rigorous nights with a monstrous leader. His mother hated every moment with his father.
"Yes. It is believed to make the children of the Rokkaku clan inherit the power and knowledge of their elders by consuming a part of them before burial." Amara explained, with a vacant expression.
Unlike her older brothers, Otou-san has explained the tradition to her before his death. Her father wanted her to oversee the ritual to be followed like what Ohara-san has done to the Rokkaku clan. Except for the village custom of the "100 Footsteps" which the patriarch never expected to teach to his children. Her father wanted to live a long life.
'Who would expect a demon can die easily on a stormy night,' Amara thought.
"That's disgusting…" Dai exclaimed, pursing his rims while glaring at the dried skin and hard talon-like nails on the hands of their father.
"It's your father!!! You honor him by consuming him." Ohara yelled with his deep stiff voice.
Ohara stood furious at the two elder brothers who have demonstrated resistance to the tradition compared to the younger siblings who quietly behaved themselves in front of their father's corpse.
The high servant took his sharp knife and began to cut off the upper part of the index finger and handed it over to Rin. As the eldest will receive the most important part of his father's right hand. The index finger signified leadership, primacy, and power.
Rin stared at the tip of his father's finger resting on his palm. He curled his lips as a protest to take his father's remains in his mouth. Staring at Ohara's intimidating glare urged him to shove the rotting flesh on his trap, forcefully swallowing the finger whole from his hand.
His throat refused to take it in. Gradually choking him. His watery eyes broadened as his guts harshly pushed the finger out of his body and into the wooden floor of the gathering hall.
Dai couldn't handle what he saw and ran towards the end of the hall into the grassy lawn. He hasn't received the tip of their father's inheritance but his guts benevolently disagreed with the notion.
Ohara cut off a part of his master's index finger on his left hand and gave it to Amara. The eldest daughter lowered her head as she respectfully accepted her father's inheritance.
She laid it in her mouth for everyone to see and slowly chewed the dry rigid skin, raw flesh, and brittle bones of the finger. After spitting the hard nail on her palm, she continued to swallow the rest of the parts.
"Are we going to let the young ones eat too???" Rin revolted covering his mouth with his fist to stop himself from hurling the contents of his stomach.
"Everyone should receive an equal part of Otou-san. We are all his children, Rin-sama," Fumiko answered with her delicate small voice.
"What does it taste like, Amara-san???" The five-year-old Yasuo asked with his radiant eyes staring at his eldest sister.
"It tastes like chicken," Amara replied with a delightful smile on her lips.
"Can I have a bigger part of Otou-san??? I'm hungry!!!" The nine-year-old Tsuneo inquired, rubbing his round belly that loudly grumbled from hunger.
"You are always hungry, Tsuneo!" The twelve-year-old Satoshi commented on his little brother.
The young Rokkaku children laughed at Satoshi's mockery of his younger sibling. The half-demon children of Takayori all have a good appetite.
"Everyone of you will receive an equal part of your father," Ohara cleared his throat and began to cut slices of his master's hand.
The slices were distributed to the children to consume. Amara chewed the piece of her father's flesh to make it easier for the six months old Hideki to swallow. When she spat out the mashed part on her palm, she carefully inserted it inside the infant's mouth.
"Argh!!!" Amara exclaimed as the young Hideki bit her finger with his sharp growing teeth.
The little puncture wound bleeds into the young one's mouth. When the tot licked her finger, the wound closed up.
"We are all demons, aren't we?" Amara flashed a smile on her face, staring at her youngest brother who demonstrated his ability at a young age.