Three years before the "Mystery of the Olko beads," story, a great famine hits the Yakunko lands claiming all food crops except for the "Unnu'(sunflower) crop! A southern farmer known as Yudo Ramundo discovers the Unnu crop could survive through the...
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The next day early in the morning, he woke up to find his father preparing to leave with a caravan of nine oxen which were being loaded with bread and camels being loaded with jars and pots of sunflower oil.
This time there were six more men from the chief's homestead. When Yudo Ramundo spotted him, he motioned him over.
'Opit?'
'Yes, father?' replied hurrying over. The caravan was still under preparations. It was being prepared by Mensh Amdaka Ru-hin and his daughter's husband so, his father showed him over to a wooden seat.
'We have a problem with the southern villages' Hombaki Trees. They are withering and yet without the trees, the crop will wither and rot. Next, the butterflies will have to swarm up North which we must not allow! So I and my family friend Menshi Amdaka Ru-hin will go down there for some days to try and understand the cause of the withering. However...' Yudo Ramundo spoke but is interrupted by Opit's question.
Opit looked in the direction of Menshi Amdaka Ru-hin, his father's best friend and neighbour. He had one daughter whom he loved so much even though she never resembled him in any way Opit could tell.
Meanwhile, Menshi Amdaka Ru-hin's twenty-year-old daughter gave Opit such a strange gaze like he had wronged her or made her so much uncomfortable. This was not by coincidence. She carried a newborn baby girl and he knew a big secret she and her husband harboured and needed no one else to learn about it, most especially Opit's father. All the same, he tried to break gaze with her.
'Is it the monkey again...?' He asked his father who had not noticed the son's uneasiness from across.
'Yes.' Came Yudo Ramundo. 'And I will miss you and your sister Makra'mundo when I am gone. But you most of all must behave.'
'Yes, father.' Opit Ramundo replied.
'Watch over your sister like a father in my absence.' Yudo Ramundo spoke wincing again from pain.
'Yes, I will father...' Opit replied.
'Remember Makra'mundo is still young and you are the next man of the family. And now unlike any other time, chose to understand the difference between right and wrong. To guide her... like I have guided you.'
'Yes, father.' Opit replied quickly.
'And be gentle with her because...' his father warmly requested only to be interrupted.
'But...' Opit came in turning to his face. 'But why are you never gentle to me?'
'We are men. The world has never been gentle to men. Only the tough and strong in body and spirit thrived. The gentle never survived even a war...'
'But...' Opit Ramundo started again.
'Yes... you have heard me, son.' Came Yudo Ramundo. 'Besides that, could you please remind me of the most important rule concerning the bakery grounds?'
