Post by HungryHunter on Oct 7, 2019 1:57:11 GMT
Kuro-san was an emperor. For years, nearly every gang in Japan bent the knee to him. Then he vanished, and it was like he never was. However, he could not erase the impact of his reign. In his wake, there was now a power vacuum. Akiyama Hachiro was already the chairman of his clan, and he saw nowhere but up to go. With his existing connections and the power of the demons he trafficked, he quickly rose to become a dominant force in Tokyo’s underground, and the Akiyama clan became known all over East Asia, rising to a larger family.
Organization:
The Akiyama Family is not especially massive, only containing about 1,500 members. The family’s main headquarters are in Akita, Japan, Hachiro’s hometown, but they also have an office in Korea and a monastery run by Hachiro’s brother in Gunma province. They make up for their size with their extremely high number of powered members.
While they make money from the usual Yakuza sources, their main business is the smuggling of spirits between nations. These spirits include demons, djinns, and angels, forcibly drawn from their realms and contained. Their main locus of this activity is in Korea, where they took over the operation from the Li family, but their shipping routes connect them to Japan, China, and the USA, and their products can be found the world over.
With the collapse of the yakuza following Kuro-san’s disappearance, the Akiyama family was quick to look to other nations for talent. Their ranks contain several Korean agents, as well as a hired clan of beastfolk from across the world. These beastfolk form the core of Akiyama’s security forces. Internally, most of their agents with powers do so with captured spirits, but at their monastery, several members are trained to use ki, forming an assassination squad that takes out rivals and problem individuals.
The family’s organization is rigidly traditional, with strict hierarchies in the standard yakuza order. Women are as uninvolved as possible, only involved as the occasional hostess or prostitute, not as full members. Koreans, Japanese-Americans, and others who are not purely culturally Japanese are kept from positions of power.
Notable Members:
Akiyama Hachiro- Chairman and founder of the family, Hachiro grew up an angler in a long line of anglers. Tradition was everything in his family. His sister was a shrine maiden, his father fought in WWII and was proud of it. He was trained daily in ancient arts, calligraphy, swordplay, and Japanese forms of poetry. And yet the world refused to remain the same. His parents died young, forcing him to mature quickly and take over the family business as a youth. As Hachiro grew, western influence grew faster. Whenever he set foot in Tokyo, he was assaulted with decadence of the vilest sort, bright lights, ridiculous costumes, and English everywhere.
When his small fishing company went under, he realized he had no ability to keep his world the same. It changed under his feet, day by day. And so he took matters into his own hands. After a failed political campaign, he realized he could not change the world back, and so he found a way to make a kingdom of his own, where he could keep things just as he liked it. So he started his clan with his younger brother, spurred by the economic downturn of the 90s, adding many unemployed men to his ranks. He truly became a power in Japan’s underworld when he took over a Korean crime family’s supply lines of various spirits. Now at the top, he enjoys his little slice of traditional Japan.
Fancying himself a modern samurai, Hachiro eschews modern technology and magic powers for the simple pleasure of overwhelming swordsmanship, only backed up by ki, which he considers Japanese in origin. He is supremely skilled after hundreds of hours of practice, with the added advantage of exceptional balance. When going all out, he is capable of swaying to and swinging from nearly any angle, a skill gained from his years as a fisher. Having removed his soul from his body, he has made himself immortal, surviving any injury. This does not prevent him from being harmed, but even this is not made easy when he does not choose to allow it.
Akiyama Chihiro- When Hachiro met Chihiro, she was a teacher. Their courtship was quick and formal, with neither of them having living parents, ending when Chihiro became pregnant and quickly married Hachiro. Not much is known of her now. She is uninvolved with the running of the organization, dedicating most of her time to the education and health of the children. She appears to be without powers.
Akiyama Kyuuchiro- Hachiro’s younger brother and the only other surviving member of his family. Kyuuchiro was always a more studious child, less interested in the family business and more in old books. After graduation, he joined a monastery and there quickly settled in. He took influence from the Shaolin temple, training his body to focus his mind. Soon, though, Hachiro called for his help in creating his empire. Kyuuchiro was drawn in by promises of spiritual experiences beyond any available to mortals.
Hachiro bought a property in the mountains and established it as a new monastery as a front for training ki-using fighters. Often, Kyuuchiro would stay with Chihiro while his brother was overseas. Officially, he was training his brother’s children. Some whisper that they had an affair, others that he merely discovered some hideous secret of hers, but whatever the case, they say it well out of the earshot of their leaders. He took a vow of silence, beginning his reign as the Shadow Boss, the silent leader of the assassination squadron.
Kyuuchiro is more interested in unarmed combat than his brother, trained in rapid, bone-crushing blows. The gauntlets he wears with his armor have built in claws that he uses to rend foes, tearing enemies limb from limb like a wild animal. He moves silently at all times, infiltrating some of the most difficult places in the world at times.
Akiyama Ichigo- Hachiro’s firstborn and heir, Ichigo is truly his father’s son, or at least he tries to be. He is just as traditional on the surface, but having never grown up in the era his father idolizes so, his main way of expressing this is nostalgia. His home is full of memorabilia of a time before his, samurai swords, WWII guns and helmets, traditional artwork. However, beneath this loyalty to his father’s ideals, there is just the hint of rebellion. His wife is Korean, which he has covered up from his father for years, knowing he would not approve. Ichigo is the family’s main money launderer, responsible for providing a front. He runs a shipping business importing candles, bringing in shipments of drugs and spirits with his legitimate wares.
Ichigo is more trained in unarmed martial arts than his father, mainly judo. Supplementing this, he has his own spirit, a Seraphim, an incredibly powerful angel. Drawing upon its power, Ichigo can command holy fire and flight. However, the more power he draws, the more he risks entirely losing control and giving in to the angel’s desire to purify all sinful humans with its glorious might.
Akiyama Kichiro- Kichiro was born to suffer, he’s sure of it. Since he was born, he was plagued with constant illness. As both the second child and the weakest, lacking any natural talent for ki, Kichiro found himself largely ignored by his father and only grudgingly tolerated by his mother. Kichiro resigned himself to living largely beneath his family’s notice until his sister was born. While she was not ignored to the extent he was, she too found herself lost in the world of the yakuza. For a while, they provided some minor solace for each other in their increasingly oppressive household. However, a few years ago, something changed. While Kasumi was sent across the ocean to study at a magical school, Kichiro was very suddenly induced into the clan.
At first, he figured it was his academic skills. He managed one of several casinos operated by the family, turning a profit even on the bar it used as a front. However, it actually turned out to be the case that his father had found a demon that killed those it possessed with disease. He hoped that Kichiro, so attuned to illness, could use this power where nobody else could. Hachiro was correct, but at a painful cost. Kichiro gained the power of disease, in exchange for making himself sicker than ever. His body is effectively little more than slime and rot, making him largely invulnerable to harm, and any who come in contact with it have their worst illness brought back in full force. Those who had the flu as a kid will collapse puking. A lung cancer scare will grow into a deadly tumor in seconds. Health despairs in his path, and his own miserable cough warns of danger for all he approaches.
Akiyama Kasumi- Youngest child and only daughter of the Akiyama clan, Kasumi does not look forward to a future within the clan. While she was taught many of the same fighting skills as her brothers, she was expected only to use these for self-defense until she married a useful ally. With her graduation approaching, she grows increasingly worried about this. Unbeknownst to her family, with the exception of Kichiro, Kasumi does not live the traditional, meek life expected of her. She plays on Gateway’s rugby team, enjoying the most rough and tumble sport she can get at. Her hidden Ipod is loaded up with punk rock and death metal, and every time she passes her friend Erin’s body modification parlor, she is sorely tempted to get piercings. A rebel to the core, she dreams of a way out of her family’s influence.
While not intended to fight, Kasumi is quite capable of defending herself. Using magic instead of ki, she does not have the physical prowess of her father. Instead of being effective with long reach and power, she uses her ice magic at a distance and up close, prefers judo and using her low center of gravity to throw people when she gets in their range. For these purposes, her two summons come in handy. Gizaru increases her magical skills to the max, allowing her to produce a deeper cold and freeze much more than usual. Hibagon, in contrast, maximizes her physical strength and speed. Both are unsustainable for long periods, quickly draining her mana to use.
Tachibana Haruto- Founder of Tachibana Fruits, Tachibana Haruto provides magical and mundane fruits and vegetables all over the world. Firebulb, mandrake, and vegetable lambs, all are provided by his company. He drew Hachiro’s attention first with his traditional Buddhism (he does not eat meat, nor any zoophyte), then with his useful shipping lines, and so an alliance formed. Kasumi was promised to him when she graduated from school, delayed due to the later graduation age at Gateway.
Organization:
The Akiyama Family is not especially massive, only containing about 1,500 members. The family’s main headquarters are in Akita, Japan, Hachiro’s hometown, but they also have an office in Korea and a monastery run by Hachiro’s brother in Gunma province. They make up for their size with their extremely high number of powered members.
While they make money from the usual Yakuza sources, their main business is the smuggling of spirits between nations. These spirits include demons, djinns, and angels, forcibly drawn from their realms and contained. Their main locus of this activity is in Korea, where they took over the operation from the Li family, but their shipping routes connect them to Japan, China, and the USA, and their products can be found the world over.
With the collapse of the yakuza following Kuro-san’s disappearance, the Akiyama family was quick to look to other nations for talent. Their ranks contain several Korean agents, as well as a hired clan of beastfolk from across the world. These beastfolk form the core of Akiyama’s security forces. Internally, most of their agents with powers do so with captured spirits, but at their monastery, several members are trained to use ki, forming an assassination squad that takes out rivals and problem individuals.
The family’s organization is rigidly traditional, with strict hierarchies in the standard yakuza order. Women are as uninvolved as possible, only involved as the occasional hostess or prostitute, not as full members. Koreans, Japanese-Americans, and others who are not purely culturally Japanese are kept from positions of power.
Notable Members:
Akiyama Hachiro- Chairman and founder of the family, Hachiro grew up an angler in a long line of anglers. Tradition was everything in his family. His sister was a shrine maiden, his father fought in WWII and was proud of it. He was trained daily in ancient arts, calligraphy, swordplay, and Japanese forms of poetry. And yet the world refused to remain the same. His parents died young, forcing him to mature quickly and take over the family business as a youth. As Hachiro grew, western influence grew faster. Whenever he set foot in Tokyo, he was assaulted with decadence of the vilest sort, bright lights, ridiculous costumes, and English everywhere.
When his small fishing company went under, he realized he had no ability to keep his world the same. It changed under his feet, day by day. And so he took matters into his own hands. After a failed political campaign, he realized he could not change the world back, and so he found a way to make a kingdom of his own, where he could keep things just as he liked it. So he started his clan with his younger brother, spurred by the economic downturn of the 90s, adding many unemployed men to his ranks. He truly became a power in Japan’s underworld when he took over a Korean crime family’s supply lines of various spirits. Now at the top, he enjoys his little slice of traditional Japan.
Fancying himself a modern samurai, Hachiro eschews modern technology and magic powers for the simple pleasure of overwhelming swordsmanship, only backed up by ki, which he considers Japanese in origin. He is supremely skilled after hundreds of hours of practice, with the added advantage of exceptional balance. When going all out, he is capable of swaying to and swinging from nearly any angle, a skill gained from his years as a fisher. Having removed his soul from his body, he has made himself immortal, surviving any injury. This does not prevent him from being harmed, but even this is not made easy when he does not choose to allow it.
Akiyama Chihiro- When Hachiro met Chihiro, she was a teacher. Their courtship was quick and formal, with neither of them having living parents, ending when Chihiro became pregnant and quickly married Hachiro. Not much is known of her now. She is uninvolved with the running of the organization, dedicating most of her time to the education and health of the children. She appears to be without powers.
Akiyama Kyuuchiro- Hachiro’s younger brother and the only other surviving member of his family. Kyuuchiro was always a more studious child, less interested in the family business and more in old books. After graduation, he joined a monastery and there quickly settled in. He took influence from the Shaolin temple, training his body to focus his mind. Soon, though, Hachiro called for his help in creating his empire. Kyuuchiro was drawn in by promises of spiritual experiences beyond any available to mortals.
Hachiro bought a property in the mountains and established it as a new monastery as a front for training ki-using fighters. Often, Kyuuchiro would stay with Chihiro while his brother was overseas. Officially, he was training his brother’s children. Some whisper that they had an affair, others that he merely discovered some hideous secret of hers, but whatever the case, they say it well out of the earshot of their leaders. He took a vow of silence, beginning his reign as the Shadow Boss, the silent leader of the assassination squadron.
Kyuuchiro is more interested in unarmed combat than his brother, trained in rapid, bone-crushing blows. The gauntlets he wears with his armor have built in claws that he uses to rend foes, tearing enemies limb from limb like a wild animal. He moves silently at all times, infiltrating some of the most difficult places in the world at times.
Akiyama Ichigo- Hachiro’s firstborn and heir, Ichigo is truly his father’s son, or at least he tries to be. He is just as traditional on the surface, but having never grown up in the era his father idolizes so, his main way of expressing this is nostalgia. His home is full of memorabilia of a time before his, samurai swords, WWII guns and helmets, traditional artwork. However, beneath this loyalty to his father’s ideals, there is just the hint of rebellion. His wife is Korean, which he has covered up from his father for years, knowing he would not approve. Ichigo is the family’s main money launderer, responsible for providing a front. He runs a shipping business importing candles, bringing in shipments of drugs and spirits with his legitimate wares.
Ichigo is more trained in unarmed martial arts than his father, mainly judo. Supplementing this, he has his own spirit, a Seraphim, an incredibly powerful angel. Drawing upon its power, Ichigo can command holy fire and flight. However, the more power he draws, the more he risks entirely losing control and giving in to the angel’s desire to purify all sinful humans with its glorious might.
Akiyama Kichiro- Kichiro was born to suffer, he’s sure of it. Since he was born, he was plagued with constant illness. As both the second child and the weakest, lacking any natural talent for ki, Kichiro found himself largely ignored by his father and only grudgingly tolerated by his mother. Kichiro resigned himself to living largely beneath his family’s notice until his sister was born. While she was not ignored to the extent he was, she too found herself lost in the world of the yakuza. For a while, they provided some minor solace for each other in their increasingly oppressive household. However, a few years ago, something changed. While Kasumi was sent across the ocean to study at a magical school, Kichiro was very suddenly induced into the clan.
At first, he figured it was his academic skills. He managed one of several casinos operated by the family, turning a profit even on the bar it used as a front. However, it actually turned out to be the case that his father had found a demon that killed those it possessed with disease. He hoped that Kichiro, so attuned to illness, could use this power where nobody else could. Hachiro was correct, but at a painful cost. Kichiro gained the power of disease, in exchange for making himself sicker than ever. His body is effectively little more than slime and rot, making him largely invulnerable to harm, and any who come in contact with it have their worst illness brought back in full force. Those who had the flu as a kid will collapse puking. A lung cancer scare will grow into a deadly tumor in seconds. Health despairs in his path, and his own miserable cough warns of danger for all he approaches.
Akiyama Kasumi- Youngest child and only daughter of the Akiyama clan, Kasumi does not look forward to a future within the clan. While she was taught many of the same fighting skills as her brothers, she was expected only to use these for self-defense until she married a useful ally. With her graduation approaching, she grows increasingly worried about this. Unbeknownst to her family, with the exception of Kichiro, Kasumi does not live the traditional, meek life expected of her. She plays on Gateway’s rugby team, enjoying the most rough and tumble sport she can get at. Her hidden Ipod is loaded up with punk rock and death metal, and every time she passes her friend Erin’s body modification parlor, she is sorely tempted to get piercings. A rebel to the core, she dreams of a way out of her family’s influence.
While not intended to fight, Kasumi is quite capable of defending herself. Using magic instead of ki, she does not have the physical prowess of her father. Instead of being effective with long reach and power, she uses her ice magic at a distance and up close, prefers judo and using her low center of gravity to throw people when she gets in their range. For these purposes, her two summons come in handy. Gizaru increases her magical skills to the max, allowing her to produce a deeper cold and freeze much more than usual. Hibagon, in contrast, maximizes her physical strength and speed. Both are unsustainable for long periods, quickly draining her mana to use.
Tachibana Haruto- Founder of Tachibana Fruits, Tachibana Haruto provides magical and mundane fruits and vegetables all over the world. Firebulb, mandrake, and vegetable lambs, all are provided by his company. He drew Hachiro’s attention first with his traditional Buddhism (he does not eat meat, nor any zoophyte), then with his useful shipping lines, and so an alliance formed. Kasumi was promised to him when she graduated from school, delayed due to the later graduation age at Gateway.