Tragedy

A month had passed since the war party returned to the Axe Clan village from their raid. Another feast was held though it paled in comparison to the one held at the warchief’s long house. Yet in spite of the shaman Yawanu's continuous treatment the wound on Katas’s side only seemed to further fester. Tagunban after he had gotten his work in his father's terraced taro field complete for the day decided to drop by the shaman’s hut to see if he could help with anything. Upon entering the hut Tagunban would see his father laying on the ground, a green paste coating his wound. Yawanu in turn was dancing around him in trance and prayer while holding the headless corpse of a rooster, with the head and accommodating blood puddle on the ground of the hut a few feet away. Yawanu danced and chanted around Katas until their fire inside the hut burned out all the while Tagunban couldn't help but think of the conversation he and the warchief or Sir Winston Cromwell the Second had a month ago outside the long house. About how these people would never discover antibiotics like penicillin, how an infection so easy to cure on Earth with modern medicine was stumping the natural remedies and superstitions of the shaman. Did that man have a point after all, what if his father dies from this infection? Then again who was he or Tagunban/Kagetora to decide that for them? Tagunban knew full well Katas would despise civilization and would rather die a hundred times over than live in it. Yet could even Katas, a true native of this world in every way, make that choice for everyone else native to this world? The question wracked his brain before Yawanu finished and the pair both looked up at Tagunban. “Checking in on your father again Tagunban?” asked Yawanu as he set the rooster carcass down on the nearby table. “Ya, how's he looking? Anything I can do to help?” answered Tagunban as he shook his head to clear it. Katas got to his feet and walked over Tagunban, slugging him in the shoulder though it lacked the usual weight of his endearing punches. “Quit worrying about me boy, I'm not going to let some scratch turned sour do me in.” Katas declared with a lightness to his breath he failed to hide. “I'm not sure this is just a sour wound anymore, with how quickly you cauterized it no infection should be this stubborn.” Yawanu responded. “What do you mean it's no infection?” responded Katas through gritted teeth. “I think your opponent poisoned his blade, not some frog or plant poison either. Some sort of deep seated spiritual poison, mana origins most likely.” answered Yawanu in turn before the hackles on Katas’s neck arose in fury as he summoned the strength to slam his fist down on the rooster carcass making it explode in a pop of blood and gore. “Rotten bastard!” screamed Katas with his usual passion and vigor before taking a few shaky steps and collapsing onto a nearby sitting cushion in a controlled fall. Both Yawanu and Tagunban rushed to help Katas properly sit him in the cushion of leather and stuffed straw. “It was for that possibility that today's treatment was for but I can only do so much. I've sent a messenger to my kin the Spear Clan to send a shaman much more experienced with poisons than I. We'll get you healed in no time.” answered Yawanu confident in the abilities of his fellow shamans. “Sounds like a plan, Tagunban you run home for now. I just need a minutes rest then I'll make my way back myself.” Katas ordered Tagunban. “No point in arguing.” Tagunban responded as he turned around and walked out the shaman's huts worried but also confident in the proposed shamanic healing.

Yet another shaman wouldn't come, even with more messengers being sent between the clans; the poison control shaman was still nowhere to be seen. Soon Katas's health deteriorated even further to the point of being bedridden after a few weeks. Tagunban had found himself out on the winding highland trails that worked as a highway between the clans sprinting down them like a tiger chasing its prey in desperate hope for the shaman or any sort of messenger. When the light of dusk began to shine its burning orange rays across the cloudless azure sky Tagunban with another weight added to his soul began to run home. The sun fell below the highland hills and started to shine in the faint light of dusk mixing with the deep reds and purples of the Western sky by the time Tagunban made it back to the Axe Clan village. The sight Tagunban returned too was the one he hoped not to see, it was that of Katas’s three wives including his mother outside grieving. Tagunban, his heart filled with dread, quickly ran up to the women “What happened while I was gone?!” he quickly demanded of the women. “Yawanu doesn't think he will keep conscious tomorrow, there's still hope if the other shaman arrives but your father wants a word with you all privately just in case…” cried Tagunban's mother Mayumi in answer. “Bongao should be finished here soon, you should go in after him. You three really mean the world to him.” commented Bangao’s mother and Katas's second wife Hiraya in turn. With a weary sigh Tagunban stood in front of his father's hut, arms crossed his mind clouded by doubt and worry. Eventually Bongao exited the hut red eyed and shaking before exchanging a glance with Tagunban as he passed. Tagunban stepped into the hut and saw his father in even worse shape than he was in that morning, blood crusted around his: nose, eyes, and mouth as he breathed slowly and painfully sounding. Tagunban clenched his fists and took deep breaths as he approached Katas on his bed, Katas turned his head and gave him a weak smile. “Good you got back in time.” Katas stated in a hoarse voice hardly louder than a whisper. “Don't talk like that, I'm sure the Shaman will be here tomorrow, just focus on breathing.” stuttered Tagunban through gritted teeth. “Of course he will, but in case he can't help by this point…” Katas weakly responded. “He will! Because because…. I can't watch my dad die again!” Tagunban broke down crying as he knelt in front of his father. “Again? What are you on about son?” Katas asked wanting to see his youngest son not crying in their possible last hours together. Tagunban then gathered his nerves with a few deep breaths before he explained the entirety of his past life as Kagetora, the world he lived in, his death and reincarnation, how he felt growing up, about the warchief and his plans. All in broad strokes the man could easily understand yet it still took hours. “That's all… a lot son.” Katas puts a hand on Tagunban's head and ruffles his hair. “Maybe I'll come back in your old world, I'll marry your first mother and I'll take the head of that little bastard that betrayed you and got you killed even if these law warriors don't like it.” Katas chuckled as he pulled his hand back. “It does make a lot of things make sense about you though, how quickly you developed, how disinterested you were in playing with the other children, all the questions you used to ask, your mother gave birth to a grown man in an infant's body.” Katas burst into a coughing fit of blood and phlegm before catching his breath again and continuing. “All the fancy things in your world sound nice but the price you all paid for them is too high. Community, family, free will, nature, combat, I don't think those things are worth giving up for cold air on demand and so much food you can't eat all in time. I knew the warchief couldn't be trusted but I couldn't guess that much…. You don't stand a chance at beating him now. Avenge me, take that warrior’s head and use it to keep gaining power. Become strong, stronger than me, even if I won't be able to help you. Then take his head and make sure that seal on his soul never breaks. I know you can do it boy.” Katas ordered before giving the weak and frail punch to the shoulder of a dying man before closing his eyes. Tagunban held his breath trying to hold back the tears that stubbornly kept welling in his eyes. “I will dad, I vow on my honor as an Axe Clan warrior.” vowed Tagunban as Katas gave him a smile as he began to drift off to sleep. “And I hope for your sake you don't come back to the world I abandoned, you would hate it more than anything. I hope you and my old dad can meet in the afterlife, I think you'd like each other.” Tagunban added tears flooding his face as he left the hut. Tagunban didn't sleep that night, he didn't even go back to the hut; all he did that night was sit in a tree and hold his tiger skin cloak for comfort. Katas would breathe his last breath in the evening of the next day surrounded by the hysterical walls of his family. Three wives, three sons, and three daughters all heartbroken at the loss of their great husband and father.

The next morning as funeral preparations were being made the Spear Clan Shaman finally arrived beating a drum and chanting a prayer. When Tagunban returned from cutting trees and saw the shaman he went into a bloodthirsting frenzy and lunged forward like a wild tiger to strike the man down with his bare hands. Only to be met by the strong and experienced hands of his older half brother Katsu before being slammed and pinned to the ground. “Let me go damn it, if that worthless shaman got here sooner dad would be alive still! He needs to suffer!” Tagunban screamed in rage as he gnashed his and struggled against the pin. Katsu in response punched Tagunban square in the face nearly as heavy and strong as their father could have. “I have already invited him into our home, fool! You think father’s last wish was for his son to dishonor his family name?! Get a hold of yourself! It's not his fault he's late, he came as fast as he could.” Katsu barked with the authority that came from now being the head of the family. Tagunban kept struggling for a moment before finally taking a deep breath and stopping. “Ok, I understand. Dad wouldn't want me acting like a child now anyways. Now let me go, I have work to do.” answered Tagunban venom thick on his voice, Katsu acquiesced and let Tagunban go though he was ready to tackle the youth again if need be. Tagunban however just turned, took the woodworking axe and went back out into the wilderness to get more logs for the fire. By the evening of the dusk sky everything has been set, Katas’s body rest upon a pyramid of logs surrounded by stone, with both his head trophies sitting on the level below him displayed proudly. Yawanu stood in front of the crowd as the Sword Clan Shaman beat his drum and chanted prayers. Katas's three wives Gagayoma, Hiraya, and Mayumi all stood beside the log pyramid along with the three daughters: Tupkao, Funakan, and Akina. While the three sons Katsu, Bongao, and Tagunban flanked the other side of the log pyramid. At the forefront of the morning crowd were the chieftain and Ta Da. “When great Puthaw first sat on his mountain and forged the race of men from iron he recognized us as his greatest weapons. Yet he knew in spite of our great cunning and strength that we would be short lived like the coals in a blacksmith's fire; for we who burn brightest turn to ash the fastest. Katas was among the greatest warriors forged by Puthaw, for he helped forge a great many lives for our tribe; and he took a great many more lives from our enemies. Today we honor his vessel and think of all things he has blessed us with during his life before offering the body back to Puthaw. There in Puthaw’s halls he shall join his ancestors again helping to tend to his many forges, to forge boones to cast down the mountain on our tribe; and to forge curses to cast down upon our foes. Let us all give thanks to his greatness and vow to never let it leave our hearts.” Preached Yawanu with remorseful passion as the Spear Clan Shaman beat his drum in a droning monotonous rhythm. Then the chieftain stepped forward an especially old head trophy tied to his loincloth before he held out both his palms which shot our great jets of flame in the same technique Katas himself. Just like Katas the chieftain would then struggle to place his palms together with the two jets of flame becoming one before seemingly being smothered before he would flick a small bright white ember towards the log pile. When the ember finished its floating flight of fancy and met the center of the pyramid the whole thing would erupt into a brilliant upwards burst of flames engulfing Katas’s body and his head trophies completely. “Today you finally become a true warrior my initiate” the chieftain cried before rejoining the crowd. Ta Da would step forward cutting a lock of his hair off with his axe before throwing it in the fire. “Farewell brother warrior” Ta Da stated before joining the chieftains side. The fire burned for a moment, the family having all said their goodbyes before the funeral as is tradition. Then Tagunban strode before the crowd and the inferno with a toothy grin on his face, his arms crossed, and tears welling in the corners of his eyes mimicking the same bold confidence and fiery passion his father was famous for. “I have an announcement! I Tagunban anak Katas, the third son of Katas shall avenge his death! I will take the head of the coward who poisoned his blade in their duel even if I have to kill the entire Jungle Tribe with these two very hands!” Katas screamed before the crowd at the top of lungs like a vengeful tiger out for blood; before he raised his fists into the air and dropped them back down-beating his chest madly. The inferno of Katas's cremation then swelled and burst upwards into the sky glowing a blinding and brilliant white, Katas's spirit invigorated and approving of the extreme conviction and boldness of Tagunban's claim. The warriors of the clan all cheered and hooted Tagunban's bold claim in turn, now there was no turning back.