Kuro the Scarecrow

• Born into a bandit family, raised by a Tsuruchi who found him at the age of 5 after killing his parents.
  
• His new foster father adhered to the code of Tsuruchi, valuing honesty, loyalty, mercy, justice, brotherhood and judgment over Bushido and drilled this into him.
  
• Trained in the Tsuruchi Archer school, showed great aptitude to become a Tsuruchi bounty hunter, but has never actually got to join the school. His less-than-stellar heritage and manners unbefitting of a samurai would cause him too much trouble in his career as a bounty hunter.
  
• In his training, he showed unparalleled skill in the bow, but kept himself very low-key. He would prefer to hide away from his peers, who mock and ridicule him because of his eccentric dress and low social standing.
  
• He earned the nickname 'Scarecrow' because he wore straw hats and straw coats. He had always believed himself to be closer to heimin since it was an event of chance that he was adopted (he reasoned that he could just as easily have been killed or left to fend for himself) Also, he felt that he had no business wearing the archetypal kimono of the samurai since he was never born as one.
  
• When he came of age to undergo gempukku, a strange request was forwarded to him. He could take on the Tsuruchi name (something that the family never did because of the dishonor the acceptance of a bandit's son would give to the already unremarkable family name) and join the school of bounty hunters if he could hunt down and kill a corrupt magistrate. The magistrate was a young cousin of the recently ascended Iweko I, and any charges of corruption would serve more to undermine the fledling Empire. The request was a secret missive sent from a whistleblower in the Dragon Clan who was unable to act directly against the villainous Kitsuki because of fear of scandal. After deliberation if they should accept the job, Wasp elders decided that the young bandit's son would be the easiest person to disown if the delicate mission were to go awry.
  
• Although the mission to assassinate the Kitsuki was difficult, the young Wasp finally found an opening where the magistrate was unguarded and killed him. He was quickly arrested and brought back to the capital city to answer for his crime. Mantis elders were ready to disown him, and he would die a peasant's death if not for a young Kitsuki who had decided to speak up for him and grant him a trial. A closed door trial involving the Emerald Champion himself and less than five others resulted in a cover up. Although the Wasp boy was set free, news of his assassinating the cousin of the Empress had already spread among the samurai and the peasantry alike. Fully aware that he was just the bullet for an anonymous whistleblower and that he would suffer the consequences of the assassination, only to preserve face for some samurai, he went back dejected but accepting of his fate. To him, he was a leaf in the wind, to be blown wherever the wind takes it.
  
• When he returned to Mantis lands, the only regret he felt was the hypocrisy of the samurai, and though he fully understood the nature of the elaborate political performances at work, he felt that he could not abide by it. He received the wakizashi begrudgingly handed to him and declared that the reason he was wearing it was to remind himself of the political, self-motivated maneuvers that the samurai, the so-called lords and masters of Rokugan were prone to. He put on the straw hat and cloak that he was remembered and ridiculed for as a child, and proceeded to take bounties. A portion of the bounties, he gave to his Mantis masters, but a large part of the bounties would go as anonymous donations to various monasteries and schools.
  

"I serve the people, and not the throne."

"Character Sheet":