<<Whispers Behind Paper Screens<<

In the end, it was not a subtle threat that ended the Crab Dynasty but an overt one. The Scorpion Clan produced another shugenja distantly related to the White Orchid Dynasty and thus the Golden Emperors of old. The Crab denied the claim and so Spider marched an army to the gates of the Capitol bearing a scroll that proved the girl’s heritage. The Crab called on the Dragon, the Mantis and the Horse, but no army came to their aid.

The throne was ceded without a fight.

The Crab Clan was thrown into disarray. It had always been the honor of the Crab to serve the Emperor, traditionalists argued, and so the Crab must stay the secret police of the Empire. The monastically inclined of the Crab believe that no other samurai clan could possibly keep the Empire so well at peace, among samurai and peasant and kami, as well as the Crab could and so giving up the throne for the sake of honor was ultimately against the needs of the Empire.

The Crab daimyo pondered how he can solve the rift amid his clan. With great meditation and austerity, he solved the problem and immediately achieved Enlightenment. Laughing, he left the clan to live forever in the hills.

The clan split. The loyalists cleaved to the new Empress and declare themselves the Beetle Clan. The Empress gifted them the Crab capitol, near the Imperial delta. The monks of the Crab left, decrying the entire samurai way of life to sell their amazing skills at battle to any clan, just for the opportunity to kill samurai. They called themselves the Brotherhood of the New Enlightenment; others called them the Dirty Monks.

The remnants still calling themselves Crab Clan held a land without its most profitable city.

>>Rising Sun Over Most Glorious Empress>>