Grace Field House (Anime)

''This article is about the Anime version of Grace Field House. For alternate pages referred to by this name, please click any of the icons above.''

The Grace Field House (ハウス) is a symmetrical flat-hexagonal complex used to raise orphans as livestock for the demons. It is unique, being one of the four known Premium Farms. It is operated by a female human known as Grandma as well as her underlings known as Sisters and Mamas, who also double as caretakers for said children.

It consisted of five Plantation Farms, a Headquarters and a central area that connects the plantations and Headquarters together. It is formed in a hexagonal shape. On average, there are approximately twenty-seven to twenty-nine children between the ages of one and twelve and one to two adults living on each plantation at any given time. After the fire and destruction of plantation three, Grace Field House only consists of active four plantations.

The entire complex is surrounded by walls. Beyond the walls lies a deep cliff. Both act as security measures to prevent the children inside from escaping. The only known practical ways to leave the complex are by using the bridge that connects the Headquarters to the outside world or by using the portal to the Human World located deep within the bowels of headquarters which is used for bringing food, toys, clothes, and others supplies to the farm.undefined

History

 * Main article: Demon World

1,000 years ago, the world was plagued by a war between humans and demons. In an attempt to end the war, a proposal —otherwise known as The Promise— was formed by the first head of the Ratri family and. It declared that "Human beings shan't hunt 'demons' anymore. In return, 'demons' shan't hunt humans." Afterwards, the world was broken into two — one side belonging to the demons while the other belonging to the humans. As per the agreement, a small number of humans were left behind in the Demon World to satisfy the demons need to eat humans. These humans were later kept in plantations known as Premium Farms or Factory Farms to be raised as livestock for the demons to consume. While there are hundreds of Factory Farms, which are for mass production of cheap meat for demon civilians, there are currently only four Premium Farms which produce high quality meat for wealthy and high ranking demons.

Grace Field House, similar to every other plantation, was built in order to keep children as livestock for the demons to consume. In contrast to the Factory Farms, Grace Field House is a Premium Farm, which means that it is a farm that is solely made for the premium or high-end farming of human meat. Grace Field is regarded as the top Premium Farm with the hardest litany tests. The children at the Premium Farms are all valuable goods and are very well cared for to maintain their quality. Grace Field is also the smallest Premium Farm, being made up of a single building on each plantation. The other Premium Farms are made up of several buildings and have the appearance of villages. The Grace Field farm did not exist 1,000 years ago. There were previous versions of top-grade farms, but it required around 400 years to come to the current form.

In January 2046, fifteen children escaped from Grace Field and burned Plant 3 down in the process. The remaining Plant 3 orphans were then divided up and relocated to the adjacent four plantations.

Life at the farm
Grace Field House is described as a "false paradise" as the plantations are designed to make the children's brains develop as much as possible by providing the them with everything they need to be happy and comfortable with minimal stress. The children are served gourmet food, sleep in plush beds, and are even permitted to celebrate their birthdays and holidays such as Christmas, New Years and Children's Day. Babies born at Grace Field are taken away from their mothers at birth and are sent to live in a nursery at Headquarters for their first year of life, being cared for by the Sisters. At one year old, the babies are divided into groups of five and sent to live on one of the five adjacent plantations where they remain until they are shipped out to be killed. The children are led to believe that they are orphans living at a happy orphanage and that when they are "shipped out" they are being sent to live with foster families. All of the humans at Grace Field (both adults and children) are identified by a five digit ID number tattooed onto the left side of their necks. All of the children at Grace Field wear the same uniform everyday which consists of a plain white long sleeved button-up shirt, a plain white skirt or pants, and brown boots. Their pajamas are the same as their uniform, but with plain white slippers. In the winter, the children are given a plain white sweater and scarf to wear over their uniform.

The children at Grace Field live very structured and routine lives. The children grow up surrounded by love and comfort from their Mama and dozens of siblings. Their days consist of taking a daily test, helping out with chores, and playing with their siblings. The children have a vast grassy field and a forest that surrounds their house to explore and play in. With no access to TVs, computers, radios, or electronic toys, the children are encouraged to use their imaginations and find creative ways to entertain themselves which promotes healthy brain development. However, they do have access to some old fashioned non-electronic toys to play with such as balls, dolls, stuffed animals, blocks, puzzles, wooden vehicles, playing cards, classic board games such as chess, musical instruments, sports equipment and art supplies etc. There is also a vast library inside the house which contains everything from children's picture books to academic textbooks. The children learn about the outside world through the books in the library. However, some of the books are outdated as the library does not contain any books published after 2015. Most of the children choose to spend their spare time reading, studying, or playing games such as tag and hide-and-seek outside. In the winter, they enjoy having snowball fights and building snowmen.

Facility
Located in the middle of the Demon Forest in the Demon World, Grace Field is a large hexagonal complex divided into five plantation farms each containing a single house, with the sixth area being a building known as Headquarters. The area surrounding the perimeter of the complex is a large deep cliff. Surrounding each of the five plantations is a large concrete wall and a short fence further inside. The Demons do not want the children to feel trapped in order to avoid causing them unnecessary stress which could hurt their development. This is why the fence is so short and why they do not want the children to know about the wall and cliff. The fence is not meant to keep the children inside (that is the wall's job), but rather serve as a marker that the Mama can tell the children not to go past in order to prevent them from discovering the wall and cliff. A vast, grassy field surrounds each house which reaches out to a small forest where the children play. The forest also helps hide the wall and cliff. A gate which serves as the entrance to each plantation from Headquarters is located on the center north point of each house. There is only one bridge over the cliff leading in and out of Grace Field, which is located at Headquarters.

House
The Grace Field House is a European-styled home, standing three stories tall with black roofs and brown and cream-colored walls. All of the windows in the house have a metal screen attached to them which serve as further inconspicuous security measures to prevent escape. On top of that, the screens are attached to the outside of the windows so that they cannot be reached and the screws holding the screens to the window have been stripped, all but ensuring that they cannot be removed. Asides from basic electricity, plumbing, the radio the mother uses to contact Headquarters, and the high tech devices the children take their tests on, Grace Field House is void of modern technology. There are no TVs, computers, telephones, or electronic toys, and what little technology they do have is said to be older models. Laundry is done outside in a tub with a washboard and then hung on a clothesline near the house to dry. There is a dormant, boarded up old well near the house, which was used for getting water before plumbing was invented. There is also a flower bed in front of the house as well as an old water pump located alongside the back of the house which is used for getting water to fill up the washtubs for doing laundry. Inside the house consists of a cafeteria, a pantry, a test room/classroom, several bathrooms, an infirmary, a library, a playroom, several storage rooms, the mother's office, the mother's bedroom which contains nine cribs for the one to two year olds, three children's bedrooms for the three to twelve year olds each containing ten to eleven beds, and extra (usually vacant) bedrooms for Sisters.

Secret room
There is a room hidden from the orphans which is located within the walls between the orphans' bedrooms and behind a bookshelf in the mother's office. It serves as a room for the caretaker to contact and report in to headquarters using a large radio. The room is also used to hide the toys and belongings that former orphans took with them when they were shipped out.

Tests

 * Main article: Test Scores

Everyday, the orphans are required to take tests under the guise of "schooling" which will make them more academically/mentally inclined. When in fact, these tests are designed to determine their quality as livestock. These tests are given daily in order to polish the brains of the children. The shipping order of all the children is based on how high they score on the IQ test, with the lowest scoring child at each plantation being shipped out roughly once every two months.

Grace Field is regarded as the top Premium Farm with the hardest tests. The tests in Grace Field House focus on mathematics, information analysis and problem solving. Problems are distributed according to age group. The tests are also timed. Each child is only given ten seconds to answer each question. If they fail to get their answer in on time, they lose points. Taking of tests starts at four years old, those who are below four years are playing in a nearby room. All the children (except those that scored full marks) are given homework, as shown in the extra pages of Volume 3 of the manga. The highest score a child can receive on a test is 300. If a child scores lower than 120, their shipment date will be hastened.

On the test score sheets which compile the test score data of all children over the age of four at each Plant, there are seven test score columns. Going left to right, the first column is Avg.1 which is the average test scores from the past 1/2 months. The second column is Avg.2 which is the average score since the child began taking tests at age four. The remaining five columns on the right show the daily test scores from the last five days. Shipping order is mostly decided from Avg.1.

Transmitters

 * Main article: Transmitters

Transmitters are small round microchips that are stapled into the back of the left ears of all the orphans at Grace Field House. The use of these transmitters help a caretaker to track down the whereabouts of an orphan via a radar. Shortly after being transplanted into their ears, the transmitter appears to be a small red bump underneath the skin, similar to a mosquito bite. However, the visibility of the transmitters underneath the skin fades and disappears over time. Their true form is unknown because they are not externally visible. The orphans are told the red bumps on the back of their ears are from where a doctor took their blood to test for diseases when they were babies.

A disadvantage of the transmitter is that it would be useless if the host is near the gate or the wall which surrounds an orphanage, as it would eventually lose its signal.

The transmitter will also be useless if a device – invented by Ray – is applied onto the ear of an orphan which contains the transmitter, as the device could cripple the transmitters and render them useless. It was crafted by Ray using parts of an instant camera, an old video game console, an iPod and other gifts which he received from Isabella for being obedient to her as her spy.

Radar

 * Main article: Radar

The radar is a small, technological device used by the caretakers in the Grace Field House. The radar can locate orphans who have the transmitters implemented into their body, specifically the back of their left ear. All of the children at Grace Field have a transmitter implanted in their body shortly before they are sent to live on one of the plantations in order to help the Mama locate them at all times. The radars are designed to be light and durable for the caretakers to carry around. They take the appearance of pocket watches.

A disadvantage of the Radar is that it only tells the location of the transmitters, but it does not specify which orphan the transmitter belongs to.

Radar is expensive, and thus Grace Field is the only Premium Farm that uses it. The other three Premium Farms are located inside giant domes to prevent the children from escaping. However, because the children at Grace Field are the smartest of all of the Premium Farms, extra measures were taken to prevent the children from escaping, including the use of Radar and the giant cliff that surrounds the exterior of the complex. According to Krone, the demons are very confident in the use of radar and the giant cliff's ability to prevent the orphans from escaping.

ID Numbers

 * Main article: Grace Field House Numbering

The Numbering on the neck is a standard identification procedure for all children that come to the Grace Field House orphanages. Like livestock, they are marked before they reach the farm. These marks are always on the left side of the neck and are always five-digit numbering. Mamas, Sisters, and Grandma like any other adult human in the Hierarchy of the Demons, also have an identifying number.

At first glance, the numbers appear to be random, except for the fact that they all have five digits. However, when read from right to left the ID Numbers have a clear order with the oldest adults having the lowest ID Numbers and the number getting higher the younger the children are. All children at Grace Field House have their numbers ending with 94. Isabella, Krone and Leslie all have their numbers ending with 84. The children are assigned false birthdays to prevent the Mamas and Sisters from knowing which baby is theirs, so the order of the ID Numbers may not accurately reflect their birth order. However, the closer two children are in age, the closer their ID Numbers will be to one another. So even if the ID Numbers do not accurately reflect birth order, it is likely very close to their real birth order.

Shipments

 * Main article: Shipments

Children are shipped out of Grace Field between the ages of six and twelve. Age determines the rank of their quality, with five or younger being the lowest quality, six being the normal quality and twelve or older being the highest. Age five or younger is considered "low-quality", age six to seven is considered "average-quality", age eight to nine is considered "good-quality", age ten to eleven is considered "high-quality", and age twelve or older is considered "premium-quality". The more developed brain, the better, thus qualifying as the highest rank. Six years old is the minimum age to be shipped out of Grace Field because the human brain is said to be 90% developed by age six, and according to the manga, by age twelve it is completely developed. Normally a child is shipped out of each plant roughly once every two months. But every now and then a shipment happens much earlier than planned, as seen with Norman who was shipped one month after Conny, and Susan who was shipped only one week after Jimmy.

Test scores determine the order the children are shipped in. After the children reach the age of six, whichever child has the lowest test score will be shipped out roughly once every two months. This allows the most intelligent children who show the most potential to continue to developed to increase their quality, while weeding out the weaker, less intelligent children who are not showing much potential. Those who have full scores will be shipped out no matter what once they turn twelve. If a child lives to the age of twelve, they are shipped on their 12th birthday. If a child scores lower than 120 on a test, their shipment date will be hastened. Grace Field has the youngest maximum shipment age of all the Premium Farms.

While six is always the youngest minimum age to be shipped out, each Premium Farm has a different maximum shipment age. For Grace Field, the maximum shipment age is twelve, for Glory Bell it is fifteen, and for Grand Valley it is seventeen. This is because each Premium Farm focuses on different developments in their livestock. Grace Field focuses solely on mental development and thus six years old is the minimum age to be shipped out of Grace Field because the human brain is said to be 90% developed by age six, and according to the manga, by age twelve it is completely developed. Whereas Glory Bell and Grand Valley focus on mental and physical development thus qualifying for a higher maximum shipment age to make their bodies more physically developed.

Appointing Girls as Caretakers

 * Main articles: Mamas, Sisters and Grandma

Girls who live to the age of twelve and successfully clear a set of requirements are given two options when they are shipped out: One is to be killed and the other is train to become a Sister. One must have perfect scores on their tests and a recommendation from their own Mama in order to be given this option. At Grace Field, when a girl chooses to train to become a Sister when they are shipped out, they are immediately sent off to train at Grace Field Headquarters and study what they have to do and know to keep a plant thriving. They are also given tips on how to take care of children, clean, sew, etc. We know this based on the various stereotypical "motherly" activities shown in both Krone and Isabella's training montage. However, as seen in the bonus chapter, Seeking the Sky of Freedom, most sister trainees are "rejected" (killed) during their training. Very few girls training to become Sisters actually get the position, and even fewer get to become Mamas. This is because the Grandma only chooses one girl per class to be given the position of a Sister, with all of the others being "rejected". As a result, all of the girls must compete with each other for the position. They can never trust anyone and they constantly live in fear, knowing they could be killed at any moment.

All girls training to become caretakers are artificially inseminated as teenagers. If they fail to become pregnant and give birth they will immediately be "rejected". The Sisters are supervised by a Grandma that chooses the top scorers to become Mamas. Most Sisters reside at Grace Field Headquarters for the rest of their lives. Their job includes preparing food and supplies that will be sent to the "orphans", caring for the zero to one year olds, and giving birth to more children to fill the "orphanages". They are never allowed to meet their children as they are taken away immediately after birth. The babies are also assigned false birthdays so that the Sisters cannot tell which baby is theirs. After completing their training to become a Sister, some girls are given the option to train to become a nurse or surgeon who delivers babies and surgically installs the Microchips into the hearts of young girls who are willing to become caretakers. Sometimes, when a Mama requests extra help, a Sister will be sent to live at one of the Houses to assist the Mama in caring for the children.

If a girl survives her training, proves herself capable of giving birth to children, and serves as a Sister for many years, she may one day have the opportunity to return to one of the Houses as a Mama. However, there are only five Mama positions (one for each plant) and therefore it is a very sought after position by the Sisters. After serving as a Mama for many years, a girl may even be promoted to Grandma, of which there is only one. Grandma is the highest position a human can achieve at Grace Field and thus, it is the most sought after position. Even after being given the position that they have fought so hard to achieve, the girls continue to live in fear. They believe that the only way to get a slightly better life for themselves is to compete with the other Sisters and Mamas and bring them down in hopes of taking their positions and making themselves look better in the eyes of Grandma and the Demons. They are very depressed and unhappy with their lives, but they manage to mask their despair in order to get their jobs done.

Microchips
The Microchips are the method used by the demons to prevent caretakers from escaping. They are embedded into the hearts of young girls who are willing to become caretakers almost immediately after they arrive at Headquarters to begin their training. The Microchips are programmed to send an electric shock to their hearts which kills them immediately if they take one step outside of the farm. They are also programmed to send an alert to the higher-ups if their heart stops on its own for any reason. The surgery to install a Microchip leaves a giant vertical scar across the person's chest.

Headquarters

 * Numerous unnamed Demons (Some deceased and some still alive)
 * Numerous unnamed Mamas (Some deceased and some still alive)
 * Numerous unnamed Sisters (Some deceased and some still alive)
 * Numerous unnamed employees and subordinates (Some deceased and some still alive)

Shipped Out

 * Hao (Mentioned)
 * Sadie (Mentioned)
 * James (Mentioned)
 * Gary (Mentioned)
 * Susan (Cameo)
 * Michelle (Cameo)
 * Olivia (Cameo)
 * Marcus (Cameo)
 * Robert (Cameo)
 * Abby (Cameo)
 * Numerous unnamed orphans that were shipped out in the past (Deceased)

Unknown plantation

 * Numerous unnamed orphans, moms, and sisters (Some deceased and some still alive)

Demons

 * Numerous unnamed Demons (Some deceased and some still alive)

Trivia

 * In William Minerva's Promised Pen, the location of the Grace Field House is 00-00.
 * The ID numbers on the children's necks are allocated serially and are meant to be read from right to left
 * Isabella is the oldest known orphan from Grace Field and has the ID 73584 (48537). Krone is the next oldest and has the ID 18684 (48681). Emma, Norman and Ray are the same age and have IDs 63194 (49136), 22194 (49122) and 81194 (49118) respectively. From this, it can be deduced that Ray is the eldest, followed by Norman and Emma.
 * Isabella and Krone have an age gap of five years (2014 vs 2019) and their IDs are 150 digits apart. This suggests that Grace Field harvests thirty children annually; each house harvests six children annually, or one every two months. This is consistent with the "adoption" of a child every two months.
 * There is no kitchen at Grace Field House. Food mostly comes in cans and retort pouches and is prepared/heated by soaking in a vat of hot water. No cooking utensils are needed. Each can/pouch contains the date it is meant to be eaten on it. The children take turns preparing meals for everyone.
 * Without a kitchen, the children think it is normal for food to be packaged and prepared this way.
 * Meals at Grace Field House mostly consist of bread with butter and jam, canned soup, cheese, vacuum packed meats, and canned/jarred vegetables, pickles, and beans. Raw fruit is a treat and only available at certain times of the year. The children have the option to drink water, milk, coffee, or an unspecified hot-milk-based drink which is only available in the winter. The children are allowed to eat and drink as much as they like at each meal.
 * The children are given gifts for their birthdays and Christmas. Conny was given Little Bunny for her sixth birthday. One year, Ray was given a pocket-watch and Emma was given a music box.
 * The music room and picnic table with a parasol do not appear in the anime.