Mukuro Clan

The Mukuro Clan (骸 一族, “The Corpse Clan”) are an archaic bloodline deeply rooted in the shadowy history of the Land of Earth (土の国, “Tsuchi no Kuni”). Their lineage can be traced as far back as having served as vassals under Emperor Tenji within the Land of Ancestors (祖の国, “So no Kuni”) fulfilling their seemingly ageless tasks as Morticians and Grave keepers. They had spent centuries after the collapse of the Land of Ancestors (祖の国, “So no Kuni”) pursuing the answers of the living within the bodies of the dead.

While many would condemn their ancestral practices in a modern society, due to the looser moral standards of previous societies, the Mukuro Clan were able to conduct inhumane experiments; desecrating corpses from nearly every bloodline, and recording all of their findings in one book. The Book of Purity (本の純潔 “Hon no Junketsu) has been inscribed in many lore surrounding this bloodline, and while only the head of the Mukuro is allowed to behold it, these texts are fabled to contain information that could very well either make or break the future of humanity.

While exploring the human condition within the Land of Fire (火の国, “Hi no Kuni”) the Mukuro Clan had the opportunity to dissect and explore the brain and body of several Nara specimen, while doing so they found themselves faced with data that would be deciphered into the predecessor to the Shadow Manipulation (影操作, “Kage Sōsa) which the Nara now most famously command. Engineering the preliminary data of the manipulation the Mukuro Clan would choose to stray from the shadow element the Nara felt compelled to, and instead would develop the technique to manipulate pre-existing sources of fumes thus originating the infamous Mukuro Clan’s Smoke Manipulation (煙操作, “Kemuri Sōsa).

Despite a nigh-nomadic lifestyle, the Mukuro since the collapse of the Land of Ancestors (祖の国, “So no Kuni”) have found their base of operations within the territory of the Land of Earth (土の国, “Tsuchi no Kuni”). Due to this, the Mukuro have developed a notoriety for their information network; the clan in many instances having doorways into foreign intel due to their many scattered, as well disguised, branch houses.

Origins
Long ago, in an era when chakra was not yet known among the mortal population, there was a mighty Empire. This land known once far and wide as Land of Ancestors (祖の国, “So no Kuni”) was ruled by a great number of Emperors and Empresses before its unseen end in the Era of Tenji. Of course though, the Origin of the Mukuro is from a generation before during the Great Era of Tenrou.

The Empress Tenrou had just succeeded her Father, the late Emperor Tenkai, who had “Mysteriously” fallen ill along with her elder siblings who stood before her succession of the throne. While much of her family ruled with a calm benevolence, preferring policies of pacifism, the Great Empress Tenrou sought immortalization through the glory of war. Under her rule the Empire had expanded at an unheard of rate, the many surrounding lands choosing to prostate themselves in fear of her “Absolute Subjugation”, which was in all honestly merely the complete culling of a rival nation’s population without discrimination of social class. Though it was during this era of chaos and riches that dreams of a singular and monolithic Empire seemed with grasp, Empress Tenrou seeking to understand more of the mortal condition as a means to develop more fitting bondage had her most trusted of servants fetch from the capital’s slums a Doctor who claimed expertise in the “Post Mortem” practices.

Dragged without objection from his back alley shop, the young Doctor would be revealed to be a man by the name of Ushidera, and this eccentric gentlemen would go on to display his wealth of knowledge as he proved to be a mortician who understood the human condition; its restraints, and limitations due to his exploration of dozens of corpses. Using his fountain of knowledge and abstract thinking, the Empress had created a unit of assassins known as Shijin (死人 ,”Death Men”) who employed the knowledge granted from experimentation of both dead and near dead to use methods of assassination that would act as a predecessor for the modern Shinobi.

Unfortunately, after the passing of the Great Empress Tenrou her son Tenji was able to seize control of the Empire; and acting upon the political discord surrounding her passing saw to the expulsion of Ushidera, who at this point had amassed a name among many of the surrounding nations as The Demon Surgeon (悪魔外科医, “Akuma no Gekai”) for his most heinous and unholy experimentation with the dead. Unfortunately his notoriety made him a target from both the Shijin of the Land of Ancestors (祖の国, “So no Kuni”) and its many rivals seeking his knowledge. After losing the protection granted by the late Empress, Ushidera had no other choice but to flee his home and reinvent himself in a distant land…

The Pilgrimage of Mu
Without a single gold piece to his name Ushidera had fled his homeland. Having only heard in passing, as he wandered aimlessly, of the complete genocide of his once mighty nation. He had lost his name and now his nation, no longer was he Ushidera of So no Kuni but merely Mu the Traveling Physician. To prevent his publicized appearance from being recognized Mu had with a great deal of effort and pain deformed himself with surgical equipment and highly corrosive acids. He had truly become a creature fitting of the title Demon, and often wondered if this appearance more accurately portrays his inner self.

Upon his journeys across the continent in search of a new homeland, the vagrant physician had obtained infamy nearly on-par with his previous name. Though he was now known more publically for being a Physician who provided phenomenal hospice care, little did he know where this degree of publicity would end up bringing him. The event which would forever shape the destiny of Mu came suddenly, he recorded in his personal diary that it all happened when Ashura of the Ninshu Cult personally sought him. He had been “requested” to perform hospice care to his ailed father, Hagoromo, the heir of the late Emperor Tenji who had cursed him to this humbled life of deformity and fear. Though he conceded to the request and performed the hospice care towards the Sage, and later mentioned in the Book of Purity (本の純潔 “Hon no Junketsu) Mu recollects how he was able to “collect” sample specimens of Hagoromo’s brain and body to examine postmortem.

The mysteries this deified body held that invigorated the aging Mu to once more pursue his passions, and so he settled down… At the right side of Ashura himself.

The Rise of The Mukuro Clan
After settling down as a part of the Ninshu Cult, Mu had taken a bride. Due to the close bond forged between them as he took care of his late father, Ashura had offered his daughter Umeko to the Physician. Unbeknownst to the trusting Ashura, his daughter was being brainwashed by Mu’s personal ideologies and obsessions. It wasn’t until she had borne his sixth son Rokurou that Ashura noticed her personality become less and less exuberant, but he mistook it for the ailment of Post-Partum Depression and neglected his daughter.

Unfortunately Ashura would stumble across the true nature of Mu when it became too late, his grandchildren and daughter had been sculpted into perfect apostles to his Will. The discovery that Mu had been training his children to perform autopsies on desecrated corpses of the cult’s members shook the foundation of the Ninshu Cult, and would eventually under mounting pressure force the dissolving of it after Ashura himself went “Mysteriously” missing. Within the records of the Book of Purity reads an entire passage on “Specimen A” to whom many similarities are shared with the passages detailing Hagoromo’s examination. It is thought that Mu and his family had actually abducted Ashura, and conducted inhumanely deranged experiments on his body.

As Mu passed on though, his first son Ichirou had sought to immortalize their father in the only way these psychologically twisted children could think of… They became the Mukuro clan. The six children would each travel the world, continuing the practice of their father as Morticians themselves. Though they grew apart, thousands of miles between them, the siblings never forgot to return to their Father’s grave every year upon the date of his passing. After several years of this ritualistic ceremony, it was decided that Ichirou would remain in the land there Father had passed in; becoming both a Grave keeper and the first official Head of the Mukuro clan.

The Mukuro & The Land of Earth
As world was consumed in constant war and politics it became only natural that the Mukuro could not escape the cycle, and so like many other clans the Mukuro too were forced into the squabble of the Warring States Era. Having maintained centuries of independence under the many Lords of Mukuro since Ichirou, the Mukuro had spent much of their time amassing information on the many different strains of humanities that have blossomed from the Seed of Kaguya. Though unlike their founder, Mu, these Mukuro were less prone to discretion of their dark and vile deeds. They became Morticians-for-Hire, autopsying enemies of their benefactors for the rights to the information gathered from the thousands of corpses they’d eventually explore. It was for this reason that they were eventually called before the Noble house of Land of Earth (土の国, “Tsuchi no Kuni”), or at least the main branch located in the territories of the Land of Earth were.

The Emperor had heard of the many ploys and adversely twisted actions of the clan which housed themselves under his bosom, claiming their ancestral deity Mu slept beneath their compound in the Stone Dragon Valley (石竜谷, “Ishiryū no Tani”).

The Emperor was not inclined to care of their claim, and so he gave them an ultimatum “Serve him, or be forced from your home” for it was not land he sought but instead the power which the Mukuro represented. Due to increase surveillance on the clan’s activity, it had been revealed to the Emperor that the Mukuro had developed an extensive information network, the likes of which no one in the Warring States Era could have ever imagined. They discovered that the Mukuro had five branches houses that reported directly to the Main House situated in the Stone Dragon Valley, but discovered that those five branches which existed beyond the domain of the Land of Earth had branches of their own. It was unbelievable, the cohesion and sophistication used to keep each branch in communication with each other created a network of informants that burrowed deep into almost every territory. The Head of the Mukuro had struck a deal with the Emperor, in return for information they would be granted the Stone Dragon Valley, but also be employed as the countries primary physicians and morticians. While lacking the devious intent of their Ancestor Mu, these Mukuro instead simply sought to weave themselves thickly into the tapestry of the nation to make removing them unsightly and much more intense politically.

Modern Period
In the Modern Era, the Mukuro Clan bolsters not only a vast and believed unrivaled collective of information on the nigh-countless strains of humanities existing in the present day, but have also taken much from their victims; using the secrets of clans fallen to them to strengthen their own might. It is believed that that the web of the Mukuro clan is weaved deep into every nation, and that in the modern society that the Lord of the Mukuro Clan could be synonymous with being Lord of the Underworld. Their current Lord though is the young Ichirou, who like those destined by birth to lead have been named after the first Lord of Mukuro and saddled with the great weight of his Ancestor's collective Will.