Keepers of Fate

## Summary

The major religion of Validon and Virola, is the worship of the Goddess, the weaver of fate. Her followers call themselves the Keepers of Fate, or the Keepers for short. She is represented by a tree bearing fruit, simplistic depictions show a y-shaped tree with two circles under the branches as fruit. The chief tenant of the faith is to follow the path of fate set by the goddess. This is shown through self-actualization of your innate gifts, acceptance of the unusual shifts in life, and encouragement not to hold onto past dreams or decisions and always look to the future.

## Organization

Temples to the Goddess, or Keeper's Temples serve as gathering places for learning new skills, guidance of one's life, and counseling for acceptance of the past. Cordins preside over ceremonies for marriage, funerary rites, blessings for new ventures, and rites of passage for adulthood. They also predict the fates of their members to encourage or dissuade them from certain life choices.

Major temples are led by a Hostric, and regions are under the purview of an Arch-Hostric. Most countries of large enough size have a Nastradi to lead their religious identity, all of whom are direct subordinates of the Verix. The Verix himself is the Cordin of the Goddess' Tear. A major forum for the Goddess where the greatest and presumed first of her Caeros trees or Augury trees in the world is tended.

## Beliefs

Keepers believe that following the Goddess plan for fate bring them closer to a perfect harmonious world one which will finally be able to merge with the Plains of Laephion where the Goddess awaits in perfection to accept her children. Those who fulfill their fates fully, have their thread fully spent, become their true selves and can shed their imperfect forms and join the Goddess in the Plains upon their death. Others must be woven back into the tapestry for their thread to continue until they can play their part in the perfect harmony of her plan.

The Goddess guides and protects mortal souls, but not their bodies for it would taint her to touch upon our imperfect world. Instead when intervention is necessary a Caerophel one of her servants is sent in her stead. Caerophel are viewed as harbingers of calamitous destruction, sent by the Goddess to curtail a misguided melody or protect a crucial line of fate. Though the Goddess' changes are subtle only shown through her touch upon the soul, the Caerophel's manipulations are drastic and often destructive. Wars, plagues, famine and other disasters are their domain. They come to rip out knots in the tapestry and to redirect the false paths of fate humanity has chosen.

Many in regions dominated by the Church are agnostic, finding themselves too self-deterministic to follow the path of the goddess, though a majority still attend major ceremonies such as weddings and funerals at the temple, or benefit from the resources of the temple. Most Keepers view non-believers positively only regretting that they cannot share in the surety of the Goddess plan and benefit from their community. They still mostly see them as contributors to the Goddess' tapestry and unless they disrupt it they are welcomed as allies to the Church. Some see those who struggle for recognition, 'unattainable' goals or fight against their nature as viewed by the Church to be disrupters of fate and look down upon them, with varying hostility.

## Curses

### Reverent

Fate be kept.

Nishara preserve us.

Xaestron give me strength.

### Irreverent

Cut my thread.

Blood of the Goddess.

Caerophel ruin me.