Deep in the mountains, there was a certain settlement. In that settlement lived a certain clan. Their name was the Sakaki Family. Only the Sakaki family lived in that settlement, surrounded by none but relatives. They had developed primarily through agriculture and silk-reeling since ancient times, and the thread from the silkworms raised by the Sakaki family was a luxury item. The beef, pork, and chicken were also delicious; some were luxury goods, while others maintained high quality at family-friendly prices. Perhaps because of this, they were immensely popular and had many repeat customers.

From an outsider's perspective, a truly fine clan. But the reality was born from a far more complex and tainted past.

The Sakaki family is a clan that has been rooted in this land since ancient times, and all the surrounding mountains are Sakaki property. Their only contact with the outside world is a traveling merchant who comes once a month, and the few times a year they ship out goods. This house has several codified laws. There is no television or newspapers. Many relatives are unaware such media even exist in the first place. Information is passed on by word of mouth, or solely through a news broadsheet that arrives once a year from the neighboring village. There is no such thing as a school; the children merely gather together for something like a study group. And what is most peculiar of all is the overwhelming scarcity of women. The women are all those who have married in from other villages; they are called "Totsugimono," and as outsiders, they are constantly regarded with cold eyes. It is not uncommon for them to be driven out the very moment they bear a child. It was a lineage steeped to the marrow with a spirit of male chauvinism. Yet the reason the Sakaki do not fall is the abnormally high quality of what they produce. Great merchant houses from the capital come to pay vast sums for their silk thread, and there are chefs who specifically request to order their meat from afar. Wealth called to wealth, and though a closed world, the Sakaki grew fat and prosperous. In the inner parlor of such a mansion, in the hall where the morning meal was laid out, sat the 60th head of the family, Sakaki Tabaya. A man already streaked with gray hair at the age of thirty-six, his eyes alone were sharp, betraying his years. Beside him sat his grandfather, Azana, who, without pausing his chopsticks, wore an air of something ominous.