GOD OF BLOOD (PART 1 - RED, RED GRASS)

Author's Note: Danag is spirits that once co-exist with mortals according to the Isneg Folklore in the Philippines. However, their co-existence ended when these spirits soon learn to crave human blood

 It was the chilling wind of 5 in the morning that embrace my bones as I step outside for a jog. The surrounding is still dark but thin slits of light are slowly creeping from the east as I decide to take the familiar path that leads towards the green fields of our barrio.

For almost 10 years of living in the city with every corner smothered with glitz and glamour, the sight of our village is still the one that my eyes yearn for. The simplicity of the houses that are not competing with their sizes and height. The trees that are more appealing the than the lifeless skyscrapers that look like an oversized tombstone at dusk. And most of all, the greenfield that makes you finally breathe life itself as compared to the stench of smog in the big city that chokes out the life in all of us.

 

Returning here to our barrio is actually just a side trip before I return back to my job as a copywriter in the big city. But I quickly ask my boss to turn the side trip into a leave since my mother is asking me to stay for a while knowing that the annual feast for our patron saint is already near.

Who am I to resist such a request? Besides, the mere sight of our office is getting damned exhausting nowadays.

They call our Barrio Danag. I am not keen on history, so I never attempt to ask what it means. I just know that this place is a field with green fields bursting with tall grass and bushes. Despite the growing numbers of people here, the empty fields ate left untouched. No one builds houses on them nor tilled by any farmers. Even the rich who are reeking with business projects here and there didn’t even consider these pieces of land as another source of their already bloated income.

When I was still a kid, I enjoy strolling on this same road I am taking now and take a rest at the biggest green field on the outskirt of our village. It is considered the widest among the green fields and boasts the most vivid colors of grass and bushes. The best time to enjoy staying in the place is during dawn wherein the first light of the sun can illuminate the grass leaves while pearly morning dew is still hanging at their edges. They start to glisten and when you lay down there, it feels like you are surrounded by emerald and gold as the sun contiguously sheds its warm glow that makes the fields almost enchanted.

 

This is something that urban dwellers would definitely pay just to have a taste of these simple wonders that will allow them to remember that they are human and not machines.

The excitement of seeing again the field that bears a lot of memories made me quicken the pace of my morning jog. Though the road is still rough and quite dusty, the image of green grass against the rising sun is more than enough to keep my adrenaline in a rush and push further my legs despite the fact that I miss a lot of my usual exercise routine nowadays.

When I reached the green field, I am a bit disappointed that I can enjoy the view all alone since there a lot of people right now in the place that I wish to savor with the much-coveted solitude that I can’t have in the noisy and bustling city.

”Bilisan nyo! Tawagin nyo si Kapitan! Dali!” My jovial mood suddenly shattered when I hear someone with such an alarming tone of voice. When I approached the group of people, I saw faces that look livid and disgusted. These faces are enough to be featured in one of those macabre paintings I saw from an art gallery in the city. It's the perfect image of horror although this time it was not made by mere strokes and color.

This picture of horror is done by real flesh and human emotions.

When I look around the field, it sinks quickly to me why in this beautiful early morning, these people wear such terrible faces as if the night has come and will deliver its nameless spawns of evil to them.

The greenfield has lost its color. The shimmering emerald that my eyes hunger for is now replaced by the sickly glow of crimson splattered haphazardly in every blade of grass. As the sun’s rays burst forth in the horizon, the redness becomes more lifelike and so does the putrid perfume that comes with it.

The field is now glistening with blood. The once enchanted piece of land now becomes a terrain of a nightmare that left me speechless.

When the head of our Barrio arrives, the first thing he does is to puke everything he stuffed on his guts on breakfast: tomatoes, fried fish, coffee, and clumps of the unrecognizable mishmash that supposedly should not be vividly described.

”Anak ng--?” He said while trying his best not to expel even his last dinner while looking at the centerfold of all this macabre.

 

Good thing I haven’t eaten yet my breakfast but my stomach still churn violently when I stare at the 4 bodies that arranged like a cross in the grassy field. Although the way they meet their maker is something too awful for us to comprehend, these are corpses. What we can assume is that it was done within the most violent way possible for their whole body is skinned from head to toe; exposing their organs, flesh, and entrails in the open air for the flies to celebrate.

But it's only the tip of the iceberg. What makes my mind go in haywire just like my stomach is that I can’t see any drops of blood from their organs. Not in their intestines. Not even in their hearts. They were all clean and dry from the stains of the river of life.

Without a trace of blood on them, they look nothing but a model cadaver for medical students. Lifeless and utterly inhuman.

”Make way! Just leave this place and we will take care of the rest here!” A booming voice suddenly emerges and startles the people of the barrio. Four men with ebony-like complexion suddenly clear their path towards the grim corpses; pushing and shoving other barrio folks along the way. Although it was a blatant rude gesture, no one from our barrio retaliates.

Curiously, even Kapitan himself just moves and leaves the bloody field immediately like cowardly dogs.

”Tristan! Halika na! Umuwi na tayo bilis!” A hand suddenly pulled me away from the dreadful sight. It was my Auntie Melba who is shaking so mad and looking like someone who saw Satan in flesh’ her face is entirely paperwhite.

My first morning in our barrio left me with a taste of chaos as the chill of the morning now becoming unpleasant as if it starts to bite harder on my bones and make my skin crawl. Upon leaving the grassland, I wish my eyes are tricking me or maybe it was the fog that beguiles my senses for the four black men did something that made me realized that our barrio definitely underwent a change. It is not bad nor good but evil.

The men are kneeling at the corpses in a cross formation in the act of worshiping their skinned and bloodless bodies.


TO BE CONTINUED

Image Credit/Source: Chris Moody - Bloody (grass) blade (Flickr)
Link To License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/2.0/