Yun stood up with Akira's sleeping brother in his arms and looked around the village, thinking if they could get a shelter. But the night was deep, every house door was locked, probably no one was awake. He couldn't just ask anyone to help with a dead body with them; it would waste their time to explain, and no one would have helped them anyway.
So they went back, where Akira was with his mother. They had placed her on a bench near the village.
"What are you children doing at this hour?"
Yun looked behind him. It was an elderly woman, hands on her back. She was wearing casual clothes, so she probably lived in this village and was likely on her late-night walk.
"We are not from here. Do you know if we can get a shelter in this village?" Yun asked. He hoped that there would be at least one; Akira and his brother were exhausted and hadn't eaten anything either.
"Looking at your situation, I don't think shelter is the first thing you need," the elderly woman said, looking at Akira's mother.
"You're right about that. We were travelling when this tragedy happened, but we don't know what to do."
"Come with me, I'm the head of this village." With that, the elderly woman turned around.
The help came to them when they needed it.
Yun shook Akira's shoulder. "Akira, we need to leave."
Akira looked up at Yun, his eyes were red from crying non-stop. He nodded. Akira stood up and lifted his mother while his brother was still sleeping in Yun's arms.
They followed the elderly woman to her house. Her house was bigger than the other houses in the village. The elderly woman arranged a clean room in her house for them and asked them to stay there for tonight.
They would begin the ceremony in the morning. She even arranged food for them, but no one ate anything.
On the way to her house, Yun told the elderly woman about their situation, that they had nowhere to go and needed a place to stay for the time being.
The whole night Yun and Akira didn't sleep. Yun put Akira's brother next to him. The whole night Akira didn't let go of his mother's hand.
In the early morning, Grandmother Chen came and washed Akira's mother and put white clothes on her. Some villagers came and helped with arranging the coffin.
Akira's brother started crying again as soon as he woke up in the morning, while Akira was now silently staring at the sky, his eyes were all red, probably no tears were left in his body.
"I honestly don't know how to thank you, even though, thank you so much, Grandmother Chen," Yun said.
"No need, son. I asked them to dig beneath the cherry blossom tree in the forest to bury her as you requested."
"I really appreciate your kindness."
Grandmother Chen gave black clothes to the three of them. While it fit perfectly on Yun and Akira, it was a bit big for Akira's brother. He even refused to wear it, but Yun somehow managed and folded the sleeves and pant legs of his oversized clothes to make them fit.
At the cherry blossom tree in the forest, they placed the coffin down that was carried by Akira and three villagers, while Yun was holding Akira's brother's arm, because he kept getting in the way and stopping them from taking his mother.
Before burying Akira's mother, Akira and his brother sat near the coffin and said their last goodbye to their mother.
Soon after, Akira's brother fell asleep from exhaustion. Only three of them were there, standing in front of Akira's mother. Yun told Grandmother Chen that they would stay there for some time as Akira didn't want to leave his mother.
"We need to move now, there's not much time left," Yun said.
Twelve hours passed, remaining next twelve hours unit the Hunting Game began.