Unicorn Clan
One Cannot Capture the Wind!
History
Shinjo's Journey
In the years following The Day of Thunder , Kami Shinjo resolved to journey beyond the borders of Rokugan , to learn any unknown threat which laid outside the Empire. In the year 45 she gathered to her the bravest and most faithful of her followers, such as Ide, Iuchi, and Utaku Shiko, the daughter of Utaku the Thunder. They carried with them a mirror, crafted by Isawa and blessed by Kami Hantei, which allowed to speak with her siblings during the journey. They also bore a fan gifted by her sister Kami Doji.
Ujik's Encounter
In the desolate Plains of Wind and Stone was so little water and food that the Ki-Rin began to starve. They were soon attacked by horseback-riding nomads known as Ujik, who were eventually impressed when the Ki-Rin confronted them with their captured horses and using their own tactics. Both groups began to trade, and in time, many of the Ujik joined the clan, now called the Moto. The Ki-Rin spent a generation with the Ujik, adopting the Ujik saddle and the stirrup, a clan who fought from horseback since then. The Clan Champion also bore the title of Great Khan.
Demise of the Rempet Empire
The Ki-Rin Clan resumed their journey and marched west, where they encountered the Cradle of the World, ruled by the pharaoh Nephrentep of the Rempet. They adored the Sun God, Shem, and Shinjo was declared to be Shem's sister from afar. Nephrentep's hospitality was a ruse, and he snatched Shinjo spiriting her away to his temple-palace, expecting to use Shinjo's divine blood in a ritual to prolong his life. The sorcerer's king undying guard attacked the Ki-Rin and drove them into hiding. The Ki-Rin found allies among the al-Qamari, a secret organization devoted to opposing the Sun Kings. Together the Rempet enemies staged an attack doomed on failure on Nephrentep's temple-palace. Eventually the moon blotted out the sun, throwing day into night, and ruling supreme until Nephrentep was cast down and Shinjo liberated. The oppressed peoples of Rempet rallied under Shinjo's banner and destroyed the corrupt empire of the sorcerer-kings.
Division of the Clan
Shinjo realized that the world was too big, so she divided the Ki-Rin Clan into five hordes and sent them each in a different direction. Shinjo took the Blue Horde west; Iuchi took the Green Horde south; Moto Chabi Khan took the White Horde north, continuing the journey across the Burning Sands; Utaku Shiko took the Purple Horde east, into the Ivory Kingdoms; and Ide's Golden Horde remained in place, exploring the coast of the Conqueror's Sea. Tragically, Iuchi's Green Horde never returned.
Shinjo's Children
After the clan crossed a scorched land known as the Black Plain, they lacked food and water. When they found a oasis, Shinjo warned them to eat nothing, to harm no animal, and to drink no water before she went into that place to get the blessing of the spirit's place. After eight days, desperate for food and water they killed a deer and drank water from the grove. Suddenly the oasis vanished with no sign of Shinjo. Then, a unicorn galloped to the west, and so the people followed it. They found another oasis and waited eight more days until Shinjo, who was with child, appeared to them. She told that the Unicorn spirit of the oasis requested another life for the deer they slew, one of Shinjo's children. They remained in the grove for some months until Shinjo delivered five children, and one of them would return to the oasis when they would be old enough to decide whom for themselves.
Shinjo and the World-Devourer
On the shore of the Endless Sea Shinjo realized that they could go no further, for no lands lay ahead. There the World-Devourer rose in the water, menacing to consume all the world, so the great enemy beyond the borders of Rokugan was found at last. Shinjo told her followers to return to the Emerald Empire, and she did battle with the crature she named, Orochi, the Great Serpent. The Kami disappeared when the beast swallowed Shinjo and half the ocean, vanishing beneath the waves.
The Ride Through the Shadow
Now called the Unicorn Clan, they rode south of the Pillar of the Sky mountains into the Ivory Kingdoms, reaching its eastern edge, which bordered the twisted forest of the western of the Shadowlands. It took the Unicorn Clan forty years to cross from the Conqueror's Sea to The Kaiu Wall Wall, an impressive defensive structure built by the Crab Clan to defend the Empire against the monster which came from the Shadowlands.
Duty
For 800 years the Ki-Rin Clan had journeyed beyond Rokugan's borders, in search of external threats to the Emerald Empire. In these foreign lands, the clan had learned to adapt, to do whatever it took to survive. The clan eventually returned to Rokugan, renamed as the Unicorn Clan, its members wearing fur, speaking foreign tongues, wielding strange weapons, and drawing upon the kami using sorcery known as meishōdō. Of all the clans, they were best suited to uncovering foreign manipulation and infiltration, for they faced innumerable horrors and traitors in their wandering years.
Fox Clan
Those followers of Shinjo who had remained behind in the Empire eventually formed the Fox Minor Clan. The tiny remnant of the Ki-Rin Clan, who had stayed behind while the rest of their clan traveled, eventually settled near Shiro Shiba under Phoenix protection. They were nearly slaughtered by the Lion Clan during the Lion march on Phoenix lands in the Lion-Phoenix War. After a truce was called, the Lion were granted the Ki-Rin lands, and the remnant Ki-Rin samurai became the Fox Clan and were given independent status and new lands in another part of the Empire.
Return
In the year 815 the Clan of the Wind return was greeted as a barbarian invasion, and they were forced to break through the defenses mounted by the Crab and Lion clans. Their hordes entered Rokugan through the Shadowlands, punching a hole through Crab defenses and making their way past the Kaiu Wall into the heart of the Empire itself, crossing near Razor of the Dawn Castle. They rode throught the Shinomen Mori, up to The River of Gold . As the Unicorn hordes slowly made their way across the Spine of the World Mountains, the Lion Clan mobilized their armies. The winter snows halted the imminent clash of armies, and the Unicorn presented Doji's Fan to the Crane Clan, who in turn declared the intruders were in fact Shinjo's clan. With the support of the Crane Clan Champion, the Unicorn Clan was welcomed into the Empire and, even an ancient treaty with the Crane was honored, providing the Unicorn a strong ally within the Empire. Reintegrating into Imperial society had been a challenge. The Phoenix Clan made an agreement with the returned clan, that Unicorn samurai could freely travel to the shrine without travel papers, a sign of friendship between the two clans.
Rift with the Lion
By Imperial decree, the Unicorn was given back their lands in the northwestern portion of Rokugan. The Lion, who had been caretakers of those lands for centuries, struggled to give up towns and farmlands that had essentially been theirs for so long. The Lion and Unicorn continued to clash over their territories, each having an ancestral claim to the lands surrounding the Drowned Merchant River and Three Sides River that they were unwilling to cede.
The Secret History of the Unicorn
The Secret History of the Unicorn, the chronicles of the entire length of the Unicorn exodus from Rokugan, was begun by Ide himself and maintained by the Golden Horde during the time the clan was divided, but it was never shared with the rest of Rokugan, for fear it would be used as evidence against the Clan in the Imperial Court.
Lands and Moto family
The Emperor gave the Unicorn Clan the old lands of the Ki-Rin to settle upon, returning from the previous Lion stewardship. This created some animosity on the part of the Lion, as this represented a considerable loss of fertile farmland. During their journey the Ki-Rin had acquired a new family, the Moto, who were kin to the Ujik tribes of the western wastes. The Emperor accepted those who Shinjo herself had accepted, and the Moto family remained as members of the Empire.
Customs
The Unicorn had different customs than the other rokugani clans as a result of the time they passed outside the bounds of the Empire, wielding foreign weapons like scimitars and their focus on cavalry. Along their journey, they had adopted bizarre clothing, their language had also degraded away from pure classical Rokugani, their horses were large, wellformed, and swift. Many Rokugani saw them as gaijin, as they had odd names, unpleasant-tasting food, uncouth manners, garish fashions, and shaking hands as a greeting. They brought with them new techniques of metalworking, leatherworking, and fabric dying. Their contacts with countries outside of the Empire allowed them to establish profitable trade routes of ivory, rare woods, jewels, and costly herbs (such as the Opium poppy) and spices. They also brought with them the practice of meishōdō, the talismanic name magic. To many shugenja and other priests, meishōdō was a blasphemous gaijin practice. In a holdover from their days journeying the Burning Sands and beyond, every Unicorn child learned to ride, pack, and travel to where they were needed most at a moment's notice.
Adoption of Rokugani Traditions
Shinjo's children enthusiastically adopted theater (especially Nō), the tea ceremony, current teachings of the Tao and the elements, Rokugani cuisine, and incense appreciation. When traveling outside of their lands, their courtiers and emissaries began to behave as proper Rokugani. Following Rokugani traditions they established the Five Wind Court, to deal with courtly matters.
Ride of the Moto to the Shadowlands
In 825 the Moto Daimyō, Moto Tsume, and the greatest of his warriors rode forth into the Shadowlands to end this threat once and forever. None returned, and soon after sights of the Dark Moto were reported. Tsume and his followers had become tainted minions of the threat they swore to destroy.
Sand Road and conflict with the Caliphate
In the year 850 the Sand Road was opened, connecting the Empire with the Ivory Kingdoms through the Burning Sands. In the year 1010 the Hidden Valley was added to the clan, a holding beyond the Empire's border, when the Ganzu people joined the Unicorn. In 1072 the caliph attempted to conquer the Sand Road, and forced the Ganzu to surrender to him, only to be broke by the combined forces of the Battle Maidens and the White Horde in 1074.
Alliance with the Crane
In 1123 the Unicorn and the Crane arranged an alliance against their common foe, the Lion Clan.
Demography and Population
The Unicorn are ruled by the 5 clan Families, the Shinjo Family , the Utaku, the Ide, the Moto, and the Iuchi.
Military
The Unicorn Clan was among the most militant clans in the Empire. Cavalry had always been the heart of the Unicorn, pinning their enemies with rapid-marching infantry and relying on decisive charges of heavy cavalry to win the day, a spearhead of steel and steed slamming into its foes without mercy. Talisman-wielding shugenja enhanced the mobility of both infantry and cavalry, and the Utaku war steeds were the finest horses in the Empire. The Unicorn formed five armies during their exodus, the Blue Horde of the Shinjo, the Green Horde of the Iuchi; the White Horde of the Moto, the Purple Horde of the Utaku, and the Golden Horde of the Ide. A typical Unicorn army comprised two distinct forces: pods of mounted cavalry with scouts to cut through the opposition, and heavily outfitted troops of foot soldiers equipped to fight in even the most extreme conditions. Their signature warrior was the Utaku Battle Maiden.
Laws
Shinjo's Law
The Unicorn were forbidden to fight or duel to the death another Unicorn member. As it was forbidden to shed Unicorn blood, traitors were wrapped in a carpet and trampled to death by horses.
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