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2004-04-14T21:52:55Z

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This order of warrior-monks was local to the area roughly two
hundred miles south of Diamond Hearth long before the first settler had
thought to make a home in the ice-blasted wilderness. The monks have
long venerated death and carnage; and, in the pattern of cycles and
polar opposites, life and peace. The Shinzui temple itself is a small
Shadowland that does not extend outside the boundaries of the temple
itself; both a disquieting presence and a blessing to the small village
based around the temple.

The village grew due to the tradition of temple leaders to demand
that initiates hone their endurance and martial skill by engaging on
lone hunts in the blasted icelands; and as the monks themselves learn to
eat nothing but ice and drink nothing but water, the meat was given over
to anyone nearby. This allowed for the formation of a group of sedentary
villagers, as the monks fulfilled their need to roam for food.

The village itself is mostly a three-story affair; the lowest is two
levels below ground, which is used during the heavy snow months for
travel.The second lowest is also below ground, but usually overgrown
with stalactites formed by what little ice manages to trickle through
with time. It is here that villagers often gather their water and, in
some places, hold the larger shrines to their ancestors. The top-most
level is almost always buried in snow, and is used primarily for house
altars, storage, and the smoking and salting of meats. The village is
<b>extremely</b> dedicated to ancestor worship, helped along in no small
amount by how many ancestors end up as ghosts in the temple.

Shinzui Temple is the only element of the village to remain
aboveground; several stories above ground, supported on a massive
fibonacci spiral of ice; massive stalagmites of ice with crafted skulls
mounted atop them punctuating the walkways every so often. The temple
itself is a several-story affair itself, appearing with fluted tiles and
ornate smaller-roofs-on-larger-roofs. For one moment during each dawn
and each sunset the temple becomes entirely transparent, revealing every
warrior and initiate within bowing in the large central altar. The
remainder of the day finds the temple walls a forbidding blue-white that
defies spying (those attempting to use occult spying of less than Solar
circle potency, or without first using celestial circle countermagic,
are most pitied by Heaven, for their eyes quickly turn to ice, and then
melt down their cheeks before refreezing in permanent tears marring the
scryer's cheeks.)

Though housing a small shadowland, and being and cultivating a
powerful death cult, Shinzui Temple is not yet affiliated with any
Deathlords. Those that have tried to find purchase there have been
rebuffed - violently - since time immemorial (leadership of Shinzui
Temple has only changed hands once; it was only two hundred years before
the disappearance of the Empress that the First Age lunar that founded
the temple was lost in battle with the Fae; it is said that nine hundred
and ninety nine Fair Folk Nobles were slain by the great Ice Lord,
before the very last two standing on the field of battle each stabbed
him together, piercing both his hearts at once, and felling him.) It is
said that the great Ice Lord was he that first created the race of
Horned Snow Hunters, by breeding with the snow leopards naturally found
in the area. He founded the Snow Hunter Form martial art.

The current leadership is the great Ice Lord's student. He
currently possesses no goals for the temple except that which his mentor
had always instilled in him; the cultivation of enlightenment through
adversity, the protection of the village based around the temple, and
the prevention of the growth of the Deathlord's power (while the temple
venerates death, and indeed many of its members are ghosts, none of
those affiliated with the temple believe that the Deathlords belong in
Creation itself; the temple contains members of both the living and the
dead as an attempt at to show that even the worst trial - death - is
overcome. It is not itself encouraging the spread of death into the
living world.) This leader is a No-Moon known simply as Icefoe. His
appearance is that of a horned snow hunter (see Creatures of the Wyld)
roughly fifteen feet from head to tail, and twelve feet in height at his
shoulder. He has not been seen in non-animal form in several decades.
His pelt is so bright a white as to cause blindness in those that do not
come prepared for it.

Icefoe's prominent student, and second-in-command of the temple is
known as Thrashing Snowtooth. A man that stands almost eight feet in
height, with skin the purple-black of dusk, he is a full moon that
follows in his teacher's (and unbeknownst to him, father's) totem of the
Horned Snow Hunter. Though he lacks his father's overwhelming potency in
charms and skills and experience, he is unquestionably the most
tenacious and raging member of the temple. He long ago failed to find
enlightenment and the path to it - a failure of his father's. His father
trained him from birth to be the angriest, hardest, roughest member of
the village. It was done from love; to prove to Luna that this boy
should, too, be Exalted. His father succeeded in this, but in this
bloody-minded training he deeply scarred his son's soul and psyche. It
is said that the only peace brought to him is when he meditates over his
many memories of the First Age (it is suspected that he may have
recieved the great Ice Lord's own spark, but this is highly unlikely)
while crafting the many sculptures of ice that form the firmament of the
temple.

Thrashing Snowtooth, too, has an acolyte; a newly exalted
changing moon, the girl has not yet picked up her full name of
adulthood, and still goes by the name of Kylie. It is suspected she will
lead the temple far sooner than Thrashing Snowtooth; and not through
physical means. She has a wit sharper than any Snow Hunter's horn, and a
mind as keen as the Abyssals' own blades. She is probably the most
manipulative member of the temple, and often arranges to find herself in
a life of something like comfort, at least relative to her surroundings
(there is no end of men in the village that have attempted to court her;
none have yet succeeded.)

Every member of the temple initiates as a mortal; no ghosts are
accepted unless they were born and raised in the Shinzui village.
Mortals are trained to venerate death, and to prepare their souls for
ritual suicide once they become too old to serve - and continue serving
as ghosts. None are encouraged to die before their time in mortal life
has ended, however; this would be an affront to the celestial order. It
is through this ritual suicide and potent sorcery that the leaders of
the temple have consistently gauranteed a large production of ghosts
from the initiates of the temple - and ghosts of outstanding power at
that.

The temple is, save for the times that it is called upon to go to
war in defense of the village around it (most often from fair folk or
barbarian incursions), dedicated truly to enlightenment, meditation, and
a philosophical life. This in no way prevents it from being staffed by
warriors of immense power. The Sidereals overseeing this part of
Creation have expressed interest in infiltrating the temple, but have
not yet succeeded - the great Ice Lord has always thwarted their
attempts. With the changing of hands to Icefoe, and the possible chaos
that Kylie may wreak, there is a chance that the sidereals will indeed
infiltrate the temple within the coming days - though it is just as
likely that a solar may find himself here, the most promising warrior of
the temple.

<b>Figures of Note:</b>\\

Sayn is the temple artificer (a heroic ghost). He has been with the
temple several hundred years, having been the student of the great Ice
Lord himself. He is quite possibly the most keen-minded member of the
temple; and the least spiritual. He, of all members, is the least
brainwashed; he often finds much pleasure outside of the temple, often
doing his best to take a lady or three to bed before returning to the
temple. He gets his fill of drink and music and pathos; he lives it up
as best he can (something he did not get to do in life; his own father
was the Ice Lord, and as such, he found his own life to be most
miserable and hard.)

He alone forges the many artifacts handed to the ghost-monks, and
indeed some of the artifacts given to the living, though most of those
are produced by Icefoe. He has no political ambitions, per se; being a
member of the temple gives him great veneration from the ancestor cult
of the area, temporal power of a sort, and a most extensive forge with
which to indulge his life's joy - crafting.

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