Mei Chuan the White Lily

     Mei Chuan is a minor chaos fighting deity from the east. In Orlanthi terms she would be considered equivalent to one of the lesser Thunder Brothers.

The goddess only ever has nine priests at a time, speaking to each through a part of the Jade Necklace of Serenity, an ancient item sundered into nine parts and spread across Genertela. If a priest dies, their shard from the necklace teleports to a new location and awaits the next acceptable candidate for priesthood. The goddess speaks at length to the first acceptable person to touch the artefact and offers them the chance to enter her cult. If her offer is not accepted the shard teleports away and the process begins anew.

Little is known about the goddess, she seems to accept servants from any background, as long as they are dedicated to defeating Chaos. Her followers especially hate the ogres of Shao San, a group of assassins who venerate an obscure sub-cult of Thanatar, and will hunt them down whenever possible.

    The goddess greatly respects Chalana Arroy and priests are expected to protect her followers and offer them assistance if needed. It appears that the healer goddess aided the White Lily at some point in the Chaos Age. The goddess is also known to have connections with Bevara, Vinga, and Urox. Some cult myths suggest that Mei Chuan is the daughter of Urox and Xie Han, a river goddess of Kralorela (others say that Dashing Veradash was her father).

In most myths she is portrayed as ‘the happy traveller, who loves life and fights doggedly to defend those she cares for.

Cult Membership

The cult of Mei Chuan is small and few know of its existence. Her followers fight chaos wherever they meet it. They are adventurers and travellers, wanderers in a world of danger. Initiates of the cult must devote 10% of their time to the cult, this is usually spent working for their priestess.

Mei Chuan demands little of her priests save that they fight Chaos in all its forms, not from hatred, but in recognition of the need to cleanse the world of its taint and corruption. Her priests have to spend about 10% of their time in service to the Goddess (in meditation and prayer, or fighting chaos), although in practice most spend more time than that performing cult related activities. Priests can never flee from a chaotic foe and must always kill any followers of Vivamort, Krarsht, or Thanatar that they encounter. They are expected to pursue these foes to the exclusion of almost all other activities.

The White Lily expects her followers to be more than just chaos fighters. To the goddess, chaos fighting is important but should not be the sole purpose of a persons existence. Followers are encouraged to venerate other deities, do ‘good’ deeds, and help those in need. In ADD terms Mei Chuan would be a Chaotic/Neutral Good deity.

    Mei Chuan is only ever depicted in the form of a white lily, which appears as a tattoo on members of the cult.

    The goddess is connected to the runes of Movement, Death and Water. Her virtues are Bravery, Curiosity, Kindness, and Loyalty. Wanderlust is considered one of Mei Chuan’s virtues but many cult members remain in one area for some time, duty is expected to triumph over personal inclinations.

    All new priests automatically gain an allied spirit; it is always embodied in their sword. They also gain the ability to select a single one point divine magic spell from the list below, from then on, the priest can cast the spell once each day (as long as they are in possession of one of the shards of the holy necklace).

The White Lily has no formal alliances with most deities, but in several areas her cult has political alliances with other cults. This typically manifests as co-operation in hunting down Chaos, and occassionally in exchanges of training and spirit magic.

Skills

Acrobatics, Chaos Lore, Craft-Courtesan, Craft-Jade, Dance, Dodge, Jump, Martial Arts, Mei Chuan Lore,  Run, Swim, Sword Attack, Sword Parry, Unarmed Attack, Unarmed Parry, Weapon Attack, Weapon Parry, World Lore.

Spirit Magic

Bladesharp, Co-ordination, Demoralise, Detect Enemies, Endurance, Heal, Ironhand, Protection, Spirit Screen, The Flowing Path, Two Hands Dancing.

Divine Magic

All Common divine magic + Detect Chaos, Fight vs. Chaos, Rage of Mei Chuan, Reflection, Relentless Pursuit, Shimmering Palms, Strike Chaos, TrueSword.

Associate Cults

Face Chaos (Urox), Shield (Orlanth).

Spells

Fight Chaos

Divine, 1 point, temporal, touch, non-stackable.                                                

This spell increases the recipients combat skills to 150% of their current value when fighting Chaos creatures. (P)

Rage of Mei Chuan

Divine, 2 points, ranged, non-stackable, temporal .

Increases the recipients attack skills to 150% of their normal levels. No parries allowed, full dodge. Demoralise will not affect a character protected by this spell. (J/P)

Relentless Pursuit

Divine,stackable, self, temporal.

This spell lasts up to one day per point of spell. It enables the caster to tirelessly pursue any one Chaos creature that they have seen. The spell ends if the quarry dies. Until then the caster does not expend fatigue points, tire, need food, water, or sleep. They remain refreshed and energetic throughout the pursuit. This spell does not grant any movement related abilities or combat bonuses. The caster must continue to pursue his foe, if they voluntarily stop to engage in some other activity then the spell ends. Thus the spell would end if the caster stopped to beat up an old enemy (even if it is Chaos) but not if they stopped to obtain information that would help, or steal horses to speed the pursuit etc. (J/P)

Shimmering Palms

Divine, 2 points, ranged, non-stackable, temporal.

 Shimmering Palms either doubles the recipient’s unarmed combat skills, or doubles the base damage done by unarmed combat attacks and provides a 15% to attack bonus. (J/P)

Strike Chaos 

Divine, 2 points, ranged, non-stackable, temporal.

The Strike Chaos spell adds 1d6 to the damage that the recipient inflicts on chaotic creatures in melee. (J/P)

The Flowing Path

Spirit, variable, ranged, temporal.

This spell grants + 5% to the recipients Dodge skill per point of spell. (J/P)

Two Hands Dancing

Spirit, 3 points, self, temporal.

This spell enables the caster to make multiple Fist Attacks in a round. They attack as if they were using a SR based missile weapon (Dex SR, Dex SR+3 etc). The caster also receives a Parry or Dodge attempt as per normal. (J)