Family Name: Shika
Characters from the Deer Clan often possess hidden agendas, and they must often walk a tightrope of weakening one side in a conflict just enough to balance it against its adversary, but without completely destabilizing it. As such, scions of the Deer Clan are taught that developing strong feelings for anyone outside their clan is a risk, for they may one day have to act against them. Of course, this aspiration is rarely achieved, and the Deer are accepting of flaws—including this one.
The Deer seek societal balance. When the Great Clans are equal in power, they strive to outdo each other, but do not dare go to war. Oneness and harmony are impossible ideals in a world where differences and conflict are unavoidable. Therefore, when the Deer observe that one clan is strong and another weak, they strive to make them equal. They are manipulators, working for balance within the Empire. Shika Matchmakers mingle with high society to collect information and guide the courts, while Speardancers carry out secret missions in the shadows. They save and they destroy, all for the sake of balance.
What does Bushidō mean to the Deer?
The Deer believe that nobody can follow all aspects of Bushidō at once, as such would require an impossibly perfect person. Therefore, they believe that individuals and organizations should strive to embody one or more of Bushidō’s aspects in each of their actions rather than maintain all at once. By making a particular action conform to one element of Bushidō and then taking a different action that conforms to another, the individual and the group alike can achieve true balance.
The Deer have a dual nature, so Sincerity is of lesser importance to them. Additionally, because the Deer can see the deep bonds between others, but must often blunt their own emotions to prevent forming such connections with future foes, Compassion is of less importance to them. What the Deer lack in Sincerity and Compassion they make up for in their sense of Duty and Loyalty—Duty and Loyalty to other members of the clan, to Musubi, and to balance itself.
The Monkey Clan
Family Names: Toku & Fuzake
In 1129 the position of Captain of the Imperial Guard was offered to Toku from the Emperor Toturi as a reward for his actions in the Clan War. Toku declined the offer and revealed to Toturi that he was in fact not a samurai, but a heimin who had been impersonating one. Toku offered to commit seppuku as his final act as a samurai, but Toturi pardoned Toku for his crime and offered the position a second time, as well as minor clan status for Toku and his followers. In this way the Monkey Clan was founded. Shortly thereafter, Fuzake Garou, founder of the clanless Fuzake family, swore fealty to Toku and joined the Monkey Clan along with his small family. The fledging Minor Clan, filled with ronin who owed their fame and respect to Toturi I, made an excellent pool of apolitical Imperial Magistrates. The clan's duty was set to keep law and order in the Empire.
In 1130 after the banishment of the Scorpion Clan to the Burning Sands, the Monkey Clan was given a stretch of valley in the former Scorpion territory. The Vale of Father and Daughter was renamed as the Vale of the Monkey. In 1132, the Scorpion Clan returned from their exile in the Burning Sands. As part of a political arrangement Shosuro Inao, sister of the Shosuro Daimyo, Shosuro Yudoka married Toku. The Monkey champion offered to return the lands given the Monkey, but the Scorpion refused and instead, they entered into an alliance with the tiny clan.
The Monkey Lands were nestled to the east of the Shinomen Forest, a very small area to the east of the Scorpion provinces. The Vale of the Monkey comprised the majority of the territory. They were fertile lands, and that which was not farmlands was covered by light untamed forests. The fertility of the Monkey lands was such that often they produced more rice than was required for their own meagre needs. Traditionally, the excess was sold at no profit to the other Minor Clans.
After the death of Toku in 1165, the Emperor Toturi III declared him to be Fortune of Virtue, and bestowed upon the Monkey Clan the family name of 'Toku'. His widow Toku Inao was the first to bear it.
They have served the Empire since then as a diligent and loyal minor clan that has been close to the Toturi family, even the wayward Toturi IV by accident.
What does Bushidō mean to the Monkey?
The Monkey have grown from the peasantry and feel a kinship with the lower castes, and as such, Compassion reigns supreme in their following of Bushidō. This overwhelming dedication to this compassion sometimes gets in the way of other expressions of Bushidō, like those under the Sincerity or Righteousness categories.
The Hare Clan
Family Names: Usagi & Ujina
The Hare Clan was founded in 750 when the ronin Reichin was granted the Usagi family name and minor clan status for his efforts against Iuchiban. Sometime later a bloodspeaker army was intent on destroying Shiro Usagi. Usagi Furiko rode to the Scorpion Clan to enlist aid but found Bayushi Gohaku unwilling to help. She then rode to the Crane Clan but there too she found no help. When she arrived at the Lion Clan she decided to approach the request differently, and managed to lure Matsu Shirogama into helping. Furiko returned with the help and helped her husband, Hare Clan Champion Usagi Gohei, in the defense of the castle. Gohei died, but Furiko picked up her husband's blade and led her clan to victory.
What does Bushidō mean to the Hare?
The Hare have always defined themselves, from inception, as a force against evil. Their founding was fighting against the Maho Tsukai, and their fall and rise from the ashes were against the enemies of the Empire. They are strict about their pursuits of the taint and do not suffer those who stray into the darkness, emphasizing a similar proclivity toward this tenet of Righteousness as the Phoenix clan.
And, much like the Phoenix clan, they don't mind a few breaches in the tenet of Sincerity to get the job done.
