Shuzan Amaki

Shuzan Amaki Jurai is a royal of Jurai who was once the powerful Head of House Amaki.

Personality

Shuzan, from early on, was a schemer. He was extremely proud of the Amaki House, source of the most Emperors of Jurai. The emperor at his birth and for the next few hundred years was Shuzan's grandfather, from House Amaki. Shuzan planned to succeed him, at any cost.

Mitsuki

His aunt, Mitsuki Amaki, was the rightful head of House Amaki. They were close in age and he deeply admired and possibly loved her. Mitsuki, in her youth, developed a power to synchronize with Tenju and other trees and could see what was going on throughout Jurai. Her father was secretly a foreign-born pirate spy and used this power to his advantage, coercing secrets from his daughter, who did not know better. An attempted assassination using this information was foiled, but many others died and it caused a great scandal. That a foreign spy made it so high into Jurai's ranks would destroy relations with allies. So instead, the brother of Amame Masaki (Yotsuga) took the blame. It is unclear what happened to Mitsuki's father. MItsuki would have been exiled as well for her unintentional crime but her life was dependent on remaining with the trees. Instead, she was confined and only the emperor could visit her.

This greatly hurt and disillusioned Shuzan. The truth was kept from him so not only did he have to face the shame of her crime, but also that she had, to his knowledge, conspired with a treacherous Masaki. He seems to have imagined it to be him seducing her aunt. This led to him considering his aunt a whore, and led to the already growing enmity between House Amaki and House Masaki.

In his aunt's place, he served as a proxy Head of House Amaki while she was confined, but she officially kept the title.

Azusa

By placing a spy at her door, Shuzan discovered that Azusa (the nephew of the "treacherous" Masaki) was innocently, but secretly seeing Mitsuki. He decided that he would catch them together. He entered her room, and when Azusa came in, he attempted to humiliate the young Masaki and goaded him into drawing his sword. He laughed it off but if Mitsuki hadn't grabbed him at the last moment, Azusa's initial lunge would have killed him. In his anger, he also almost killed Azusa- but Mitsuki threw her body over him. Still, he revealed the crime to everyone and brought charges against him. However, Seto pointed out that his own actions to catch him in the act also broke the restrictions on visiting her and he had to let his arguments drop when the emperor dismissed the charges.

The next day, Azusa's Tree Ceremony was held and Mitsuki was allowed to accompany him. She severed the connection to the trees that kept her alive so her own first generation tree could choose Azusa as its partner.

Upon Mitsuki's death, Shuzan became the official Head of the Amaki House.

Weak candidate for the throne

When the emperor died, Azusa, as the master of the only first generation tree, was the only choice for emperor. But Shuzan continued to scheme, devising ways to disgrace Azusa and force him to abdicate.

Azusa bringing Funaho home from Earth and demanding she be First Empress opened a chance for him. He led a campaign to condemn the act of naming an alien from a primitive world as empress. It hurt Funaho greatly and she remained excluded in Jurai society and was very lonely until she made friends with Misaki, still a child but already betrothed to marry Azusa. One day, while Funaho and Misaki were together, they heard the voices of Royal Trees calling them. When they followed the voices and came to the closed doors of the Royal Tree garden they found Shuzan on guard there. He barred them access but Azusa and Seto arrived to back them up. He ridiculed the notion that they were called and said that if they really were called the doors would open for them. The doors opened. Then he admitted that Misaki could have been called, but he declared that if Funaho was pretending, then the trees would not let her enter, and pretending to hear the voices would be such an insult that it would mean the death penalty. Without hesitation, they walked through and the trees allowed them both access to the 2nd Generation trees. Needing three witnesses, Azusa and Seto walked through as well. Shuzan tried to enter, but the trees would not allow him. So the Tatsuki head, Kotono, was the third witness. Funaho and Misaki ended up with two special twin second generation trees that could combine and be more powerful than any single 2nd Generation ship. This proved without a doubt that the trees found Funaho worthy. Soon after, she got another sign of confidence when a genetic test showed that she was a direct descendant of Masaki Masaki, the sister of the First Emperor of Jurai, who Azusa had discovered had secretly settled on Earth. They married and she became First Empress.

Ryoko's Attack and Shuzan's Last Stand

When Ryoko attacked Jurai, all leading members of Royalty were away on Galactic business, including Shuzan and his son, Katsuki. This left Ayeka's newly chosen and unready Ryu-Oh as the only second generation ship present . Until Ayeka forced the issue and took Ryu-Oh out, only 3rd and 4th generation ships were available to battle Ryo-Ohki.

From afar, Shuzan decided this was another chance for him. He ordered the two available Amaki ships to not join the battle, with the excuse that they were defending Tenju. Also, although they were closest, he and his son's 2nd generation ship did rush home to join the fight. He wanted Ryoko's attack to inflict damage (and from a distance, he did not realize how much a threat she really was). Once Ryu-Oh made a poor showing and Yosho disappeared chasing Ryoko away, Shuzan returned and declared the entire situation a failure of Azusa's leadership. He also wanted to provoke a duel with one he felt he could defeat, so he pointed his insults at Funaho. As descendants of pirates, they still found fighting to be the most effective way to settle quarrels. Funaho took the bait and Shuzan was overjoyed, he taunted her more and said she could nominate a proxy to fight him instead (which he would probably call shameful). Instead, she chugged a cask of wine, told him this was no duel of words, took a staff, and and immediately knocked him out and into a barrel. For good measure, she also beat Utsutsumi (who also held a grudge for denying his daughter the spot of First Empress). This finally, irrevocably, cemented her position in Jurai, as no measure of worth in Jurai is as powerful than that of being a good fighter.

Utterly defeated, Shuzan soon after named Katsuki the Head of House Amaki and stopped his scheming.

In his later life, having removed the pressure he put on himself, he relaxed and became much more amiable. He also put on a considerable amount of weight. It was said that battling Seto was the draining activity that kept him lean. But even the trees showed more favor to him and allowed him to be a witness when Kiriko Masaki went through her tree selection. Whom he openly supported without any prejudice for her name.

Etymology and Translation

Shuzan Amaki (天木舟参): Amaki is made of the characters for "Heaven" (天) and "Tree" (木). Shuzan is made of the characters for "Ship" (舟) and "Three"(参).
It seems his name was difficult to localize into English. His name has also been written as Syuuzen, Syūzan, and other variants. "Shuzan" is the form used in the official translations of the True Tenchi Muyo! novels published in 2018 and 2019.