Concerning MInes: History and Clans
What is it about the desire for treat, for solace, for quiet? Is it a return to the womb, or something even more elemental than that? When chased, some stand and fight, and some run. And some take a third option. Mines was founded by the masters and mistresses of the third option. They ran only to fight, they fought only to retreat and lure one further into a trap. Hunted clans, hunted individuals, banding together in a vast abandoned mine, older than Hidden Villages themselves, and haunted by strange rumors, the ghosts of past evils, and literal monsters, chakra eating vile fiends.
In this environment, they hid and survived, and all who tried to break in died from traps, from battle, from the monsters that Mines had learned to control, to kill, to avoid. And thus they grew, and became not just a huddled collection of survivors, but a village. A village that knew how to defend, that knew it would be safe so long as it was clever, cunning, and swift.
They were the masters of the mines, and to reach their village would be a task even a powerful, stealth based Jonin might balk at unless they had inside information, so carefully and perfectly are they woven.
It's said nowadays that most of the monsters are gone. Or tamed. But who knows what lurks in the deepest, darkest parts of the mine. Certainly not any outsiders.
The village prospers, and some grow bolder, seeking power, safe in the knowledge that if they fail, they can retreat to the safety of the Mines.
Clans:
Yarase: There are monsters within the mines that do not need eyes to see. That have abilities and senses beyond the normal. The Yarase, founded by a blind man who learned in the darkness how to see, are almost all universally blind, and from birth as well. But in the darkness of the mines, they have perfected jutsu as well as sheer blood affinity for their senses. Stronger hearing, stronger senses of smell, chakra sensing...they are a clan that is blind, yet doesn't allow this to defeat them. Don't understimate them, or it will be a very bad mistake.
Seishin: A clan of spiritualists and lorekeepers who have perfected the art of hunting these monsters, knowing them, and banishing ghosts. They can capture and summon tamed monsters, and have learned, as many in Mines do, to use the powers of the monsters as inspirations, and create copies of many of the strange supernatural things the monsters can do using jutsu.
Fukaidesu: Those who dig deep, this clan has found deep in the mines more than monsters. Strange gasses that can be bottled and used for traps, odd plants grown in darkness that have strange medicinal effects, and metals seen nowhere else in the world that can forge weapons the likes of which can hardly be imagined. Suppliers for the Mizuyama Clan, Mines in general, and many shinobi across the world. Though they of course know their creations best.
Mizuyama Clan: Trappers , they know gas traps, snares, every kind imaginable, and their skill with them is unprecedented. They know the mines like the back of their hands, and some have even developed ways to fight with traps directly if forced to, ways that often involve wires.
Senritsu: It can sometimes be strange, what ends up buried deep.
The Senritsu Clan are tough, even for ninja: they're the intersection of a minor healing bloodline and a minor durability bloodline that (thankfully) bred true. Eyewitness reports say the Clan Head once pulled out over two hundred separate senbon from his body after a skirmish with Kusagakure, and only had a day in bed to recover from both the puncture wounds and the two dozen different poisons. Others say one of their legends from before the Pax got direct hit from Kirigakure's Shibuki, explosions and all, and laughed in the Swordsman's face before catching him in an Earth Prison.
Mekanniku: A clan that first began with a bunch of outcasts and civilians trying to repair the mine infrastructure for use, they are now a powerful clan that uses chakra-driven gadgets and gizmos of their own devising, as well as clan jutsu like Slow Repair, and Fast Repair. They have the unique Engineering skill and usually one or two interesting gadgets, at least at the lower levels.
