Cult of Malaji

Cult dedicated to the peace and order after the fall of a military dictator named Rakliss by a sudo-prophet named Malaji.

## Origin

Malaji was a monk of the goddess Sarenrae that the members of the cult view as a prophet. Malaji was a human male born in Bolengana. At the age of 16, he travelled to Garanth within the Free Cities to enroll in formal schooling. There, he studied politics, economics and administration. Malaji quickly became disgusted in the Free Cities use of slaves, even in a more liberal community like Garanth. It was because of this that Malaji entered the Temple of the Dawnflower and was first introduced to the philosophies of Sarenrae. After finishing his schooling, Malaji spent the next 5 years as a volunteer at the Temple of the Dawnflower. There, he would learn the value in patience, temperance, and compassion. While dedicating himself to the worship of Sarenrae and a year after graduating, Malaji attempted to hold public office. He campaign for a place in the local councilship, but was not elected. He attempted again 2 years later, and this time succeeded. Though, after serving 2 years as councilman, Malaji’s background as a non-native prevented him from holding a higher office, so he went back home to Bolengana.

It had been 9 years since he had left Bolengana and was horrified to find that the previous leader, Hoenn Wildberry of the Bolenga Tribe, had died and been replaced by the Hoenn’s brother, Rakliss Wildberry. Rakliss was a ruthless ruler and plunged the whole region into war with fellow tribesmen. Even more horrifying to learn was that in the last 3 years, Rakliss had struck an agreement with the Radion family of Koban to sell military captives to the city as slaves. The terror that Malaji saw in Garanth had made its way to his beloved city of Bolengana. Malaji began to work on setting up an organized protest of the wars Rakliss had started. These peaceful protests, boycott of Bolenga Tribe goods and attempts at setting up meetings with Rakliss did catch the attention of the tyrant. Because of the sway Malaji was gaining with the people of Bolengana, Rakliss finally accepted one of these private meeting with the leaders of this new resistence to see if a compromise would be reached. Malaji arrived at the palace with two close advisors and, when the two met, Malaji laid out his demands: Bolenga was to immediately cease all wars by making peace with the local tribe leaders, release all slaves within the city and attempt to buy back slaves already sold so they could be released. Rakliss, realizing he was dealing with a naive pacifist, laughed at Malaji’s requests and had him and his advisors forcibly thrown from the meeting.

Whether or not Malaji was naive to think he could end this dispute after a single conversation is up for debate, but he is certainly not a pacifist. After the talks with Rakliss failed and all further attempts to talk were ignored, Malaji decided to try a different, more aggressive approach. Because of Bolengana’s lack of any iron mines, Rakliss often traded with the Free Cities, specifically Goldcliff, for the supplies to produce chains. As Rakliss became more rich, he imported more and more iron to keep the slaves chained. Malaji organized his supporters into two groups: One group would raid caravans for any iron bars they were carrying, while allowing the merchants to turn away from the city; the other group would campaign craftsman to deny any requests to make new chains or to continue with their orders, but make intentionial imperfections in the chains and weapons that allowed them to be easily broken. In response, Rakliss began to send garrisoned soldiers out to help escort the caravans as well as threatening the family of the craftsman of the city in order to press them into service.

Seeing Rakliss’s response, Malaji pulled back on the raiding of merchant caravans and began to organize the next phase of his campaign. Soldiers in the army generally made or bought their own arms and armor, Rakliss merely provided to chains. To that end, Malaji tried to convince the officers to turn against Rakliss and join his side. His reasoning was because most soldiers were not aided financially from Rakliss, their loyalty would be to their officers, not Rakliss. Most officers were not swayed, but one did hear Malaji out: a member of the Bolenga Tribe and Rakliss’s nephew, Gwurgen Wildberry. Gwurgen was rather young to be leading a troop of soldiers, only 19 at the time, but Rakliss admired the boy’s intelligence and enlisted him as one of his officers. Gwurgen was a scholar at heart and did not like Rakliss’s bloodthirst but did not have the will or charisma to convince him. Malaji found that Gwurgen had the soldier’s loyalty and convinced the boy to relay information about war efforts back to Malaji. In return, Gwurgen’s betrayal will be kept a secret, even to adviser’s of Malaji. Gwurgen didn’t know it, but he was setting himself up to be the banner for a coup.

Since most officers dismissed him, Malaji sent the most charismatic members of his new resistance group to the various military troops scattered around the Tanglevine. These members would pose as camp helpers or slaves but secretly speak with the soldiers of the moral negativity of their actions. Malaji quickly learned that the average soldier despised both Rakliss and the war. Their loyalties prevented them from abandoning their posts, but many promised to side with the anti-war effort. Some officers, hearing the arguments of their soldiers, secretly join Malaji’s side, but most still resisted.

With this convincing of average soldiers well underway, Malaji spent the next months with a series of irritating, though not illegal, campaign to slow the war effort. The third phase in his campaign. Despite the threats on their families, many craftsman were still, in their own way, resisting Rakliss’s requests. Rakliss’s response was to send armed soldiers with the order to beat the craftsman if they did not comply or to capture their families and lock them up. Rakliss was then guaranteed chains but also, a drop in support from the general public. As this violence against the craftsman began to pick up, Malaji began to send physically strong members of his support to deny the soldier’s entry into a craftsman’s home. Malaji also gave the men orders that, if they were asked to be taken away as prisoners, they would accept. Often, the act of refusing entry (intimidating the soldiers) and accepting the role of going quietly (relief for the soldiers) was enough to save the craftsmen and their families from confronting Rakliss’s oppression, or at least to delay it. It was this act that gained Malaji the most support. His ability to convince his loyal members to surrender peacefully in order to save entire families caused the population to flock to his side. They loved him.

Rakliss could take no more and, after several failed attempt, was able to apprehend Malaji. Standing in front of Rakliss for the first time since their meeting month ago, Malaji seemed to be in a jovial mood, much to the chagrin of Rakliss. Little did he know, but this was the final stage of Malaji’s plan. The tyrant was issuing a sentence to Malaji, one of death, and ordered he be thrown into the prison cells below the palace to await his execution. The soldiers who had escorted Malaji to the palace did not comply right away, but instead aggravated the lord further by distracting him with semantics. Which cell he should be thrown in, which guard should keep an eye on him, will he need to be fed tonight or tomorrow, and whatever else they could come up with. Rakliss was getting unnerved by this delay in his orders, and for good reason. Several long, distracting moments later, right as Rakliss was about to lose his temper, a large amount of unchained prisoners were brought into the throne room by the prison guards. Rakliss was confused, as he did not order for additional prisoners to be brought, but soon realized what was happening. Rakliss and his meager royal guard stood alone against prisoner, soldier and citizen alike, all under the banner of Malaji.

Rakliss tried his best to shout the soldiers down, but his attempts were futile. Seeing the dire situation Malaji had put him in, Rakliss surrendered. For his crimes against his people and his country, Rakliss was exiled from the region, forbidden from ever returning to Bolengana or the Tanglevine. For his services, the people of Bolengana tried to make Malaji the new ruler, but Malaji turned them down, instead travelling the land as a monk and mediator until his death nearly 20 years later. He was deified on his death and the Cult of Malaji was born from his ashes, dedicated on continuing his work of redemption.