Blood Hunters

The **Blood Hunters,** members of the Sanguine Brotherhood, are an organization of magically-empowered hunters of the Empire of Man. Under orders of the Imperial Tribunal the Blood Hunters are tasked with keeping order throughout the empire by hunting monstrous entities, as well as squashing rebellions and other uprisings. Members train from a young age in the art of hemocraft, the magical manipulation if blood that is forbidden from usage by anyone else, and they empower themselves with powerful energies to destroy their foes. Blood Hunters are experts in subterfuge, espionage, sabotage, and terror tactics to crush the bodies, lands, and spirits of the enemies of the Imperator.

## Orders of the Sanguine Brotherhood

While all Blood Hunters are given commissions by the Imperial Tribunal, the Sanguine Brotherhood is mostly free to organize itself however it sees fit. Therefore, most Blood Hunters belong to an Order, a subfaction of the brotherhood that specializes in certain tactics, magical abilities, targets, or a collection of the three. While there are many Orders within the organization, the major ones are as follows:

* Order of the Ghostslayer - the largest and oldest of the Orders, the Ghostslayers focus on destroying the undead, whose very existence they view as a sin.
* Order of the Mutant - hunters of this order are expert alchemists, creating brews that allow them to enhance their bodies to a further extent than their hemocraft would let them.
* Order of the Brotherhood - members of this Order are filled with hatred, and are deployed to quell uprisings around the Empire.
* Order of the Exorcist - these hunters seek to end the influence of extraplanar entities throughout the empire. They do so by destroying cults and other groups they view as heretical.
* Order of the Syphonic - Blood Hunters put themselves in harms way at all times, as they must injure themselves in order to use their magic. Hunters who are chronically ill or injured will be accepted into the Order of the Syphonic, the only Order which accepts members from other Orders. The technology used by the Order allows its members to continue their duties.
* Order of the Profane Soul - the Order of the Profane Soul houses a dire secret: their Blood Hunters swear fealty to deities and other beings of immense power in order to bolster their magic.
* Order of the Flagellant - members of this Order view their very existence as sinful, as they use a forbidden magical art. Therefore, they seek to injure themselves more than most, and put themselves in extreme danger in order to die and cleanse themselves.
* Order of the Earthbound - Blood Hunters of this Order are connected to the natural world and its life force, drawing power from it to fuel additional magics.
* Order of the Death Knights - these Blood Hunters find themselves controlling ethereal, undead steeds, allowing them to ride into battle like honorable knights.
* Order of the Demon Slayer - the Order of the Demon Slayer focuses on fighting both demonic cults and the monsters they worship. Their ultimate goal is to breach the gates of hell and destroy every last demon in existence.
* Order of the Lycan - these Hunters infect themselves with Lycanthropy in order to gain more power. They have a strained relationship with the Tribunal, who despite their misgivings find the Order's skill and abilities indispensable.
* Order of the Red Tome - this Order is in possession of an ancient tome of hemocraft, which gives them access to esoteric skills even other Blood Hunters find strange.
* Order of the Scale - this Order's members can transform themselves into half-dragons, wielding the power of the ancient beings to destroy their enemies.

### Secret Orders

These Orders are extremely secretive, and very few Blood Hunters even know they exist, with some believing them to be heretical:

* Order of the Scarred - an Order that can barely be considered secretive, as most high ranking members of the Brotherhood at least know of them, these hunters seek to refine their hemocraft and maximize the effects of their pain.
* Order of the Darkened Oath - this Order was founded by the Imperator itself, and its recruits are much older than those of other Orders. The Imperator believed that the most effective hunters would be those who have experienced the hardships life had to offer, and in return for their suffering he imbibed them with some of his own power.
* Order of the Shadowed Blade - this secretive Order has been given a grim task by the Sanguine Elders: to hunt other Blood Hunters who have been declared as rogue. Members of this Order find themselves infused with cursed shadow, a heretical power only they are given access to, which empowers them to fight those trained like them.
* Order of the Arcane Manipulator - these hunters learn how to affect the minds and magical energies of others, a banned art whose usage is punishable by death.
* Order of the Strigoi - an Order of hunters who are all vampires.
* Order of the Oozemaster - these hunters study oozes to learn their secrets, and their final induction ceremonies involve binding with an ooze to gain its abilities, an act which is explicitly banned by the Tribunal's commission.
* Order of the Tainted Blood - this Order believes they must become like their enemy in order to destroy them. They mix their blood with the blood of monsters, transforming themselves into half-man half-beast weapons.
* Order of the Eldritch Slayer - the smallest and most secretive Order, the discovery of which would start a purge within the Brotherhood. Members of this Order are inducted and then sent to be discovered and trained by another Order to spread throughout the Empire. They then strike out alone for the most part, hunting against their sworn enemies, the forces of the Primordial Chaos.

### Lost Orders

These Orders are somehow lost, either through destruction or disappearance, though all their members are not necessarily dead:

* Order of the Crimson Blade - this Order was in its infancy when it began setting up a hideout in Sterbelicht. There, its members found infernal blood pools beneath the city. In order to keep the pools a secret, they trapped themselves underground to keep whatever came out of them from reaching the surface.
* Order of the Valiant - this Order was founded alongside the Ghostslayers. These hunters focused on martial skills above all else, using hemocraft sparingly and only when absolutely necessary. However, this caused them to lose huge numbers against foes who couldn't be felled by simple brute strength and skill, and eventually the Order was dissolved and its members were absorbed by other Orders.
* Order of the Pit - these hunters became so close to the infernal powers that they began to take on the features of demons. They were eventually purged by the Orders of the Demon Slayer and the Shadowed Blade.
* Order of the Cataclysm's End - the first hunters to bond with the elements, their methods were self-destructive, and they were eventually succeeded by the Order of the Earthbound.