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Wulin Factions

Four Ox Union

Destiny Cost: 3

The Four-Ox Union is considered to be the Beggar Fraternity's ugly cousin - a criminal syndicate made up of outcasts, unskilled laborers, and similarly "low-born" sorts. The heart of their power is their control over the comings and goings of goods from the docks of Bird's Progress. Well, that and a well-earned reputation for violence. Over the years, they have been hated as criminal scum and praised as champions for the downtrodden, sometimes within the same breath.

• 3+ Status: You are a member of the Four Ox Union.
• 0: bonus: You may choose a free Might specialty: Lifting Things or a free Inspire specialty: Intimidation.
• 3+ Fortune: Whether or not you are a member of the Four Ox Union, you have friends in low places and can call upon their help. The extent of their help depends on the amount of Destiny invested.
• 5 Disadvantage: Criminal. Whether or not you truly are, your association with the Four Ox Union lends you a shady reputation. This is free if it's your first or second disadvantage.

Secrets of Destiny: Four Ox Union Kung Fu

• 0: Bonus: As a member of the Four Ox Union, you get a one-time 2-Destiny discount when buying one of the following as a secondary External Style: Bone-Fed Wolf Fang, Blossom Harvest, or Heavy Iron Sword.
• 0 Technique: If you are a member of the Four Ox Union, you probably have Dragon God's Footsteps as your primary Internal Style. You can learn all of its techniques, rather than one of each level.
• 5 Technique: Without Pride, Without Pity
  • If you're in the Bone-Fed Wolf Fang Stance and use Footfalls Shake The Earth, it also applies to Disrupts targeting Toughness
  • If you're in the Bone-Fed Wolf Fang Stance and use Angry God Throw, you may instead choose to inflict a Disorient marvel.
• 5 Technique: The Mountain Still Stands
  • If you're in the Blossom Harvest Stance and use Dragon Turns Over, it also grants a +15 bonus to breaking Cover Ground waves.
  • If you're in the Blossom Harvest Stance and use Insensate God's Yawn, it has a round-long duration if you took a ripple last round.
• 5 Technique: The Center Cannot Hold
  • If you're in the Heavy Iron Sword Stance and use Mountain God's Knee, that technique also grants +5 Strike.
  • If you're in the Heavy Iron Sword stance and use Dragon Claw Flexes, your opponent's defense cannot Laugh At you.

Wulin Greats

Azure Dragon

(The following is a supplement to the loresheet options on p. 106; purchasing this loresheet requires the Wulin Greats loresheet on p. 105. Originally written by ru, with contributions by katechon.)

• 6 Destiny: You have already been brought into Meng Zhang's exclusive retinue; he is a mentor (and perhaps much, much more) to you, which means that he may give you some instruction in his sword-based kung fu, and that you are welcome in the Peerless Bamboo Manor.
  • 0 Bonus: Being a part of the retinue of a Saint Beast is an exclusive honor; you have 3 Status among the Wulin.
  • 0 Bonus: The Saint Beasts have many contacts, connections and agents; covert and not. You may spend 1 Joss to declare a story detail establishing a connection to any of the Four Saint Beasts, and have a +5 bonus to social interactions with their agents.
  • 5 Disadvantage: The Four Saint Beasts see themselves as the pillars and balancers of the Wulin; they do not hesitate to involve themselves in the doings of the great factions, and the Azure Dragon is no different. Many resent their intervention, and their suspicion will naturally fall upon you, to say nothing of those who would seek revenge. When this causes you trouble, gain 1 Destiny. -5 This is your first or second disadvantage.
  • -2: Though you have been accepted into Azure Dragon's retinue, you have yet to fully prove yourself. Until you do, the Azure Dragon's plans and whims will cause you endless complications.

Secrets of Destiny: Azure Dragon's Kung Fu

• 0 Bonus: You get a one-time 2-Destiny discount when buying one of the following as a secondary External Style: Flying Red Silk, Subtle Force, or Graceful Crane.
• 0 Bonus: If you have Parables of the Sword Saint as your primary style you can learn all of its techniques rather than one of each level.
• 3 Technique: The Music of the Saints. If you know the Deadly Music Formless technique, any attacks made with it count as selective Area attacks, and those affected always Fear those attacks.
• 2 Technique: You learn the Effortless Grace Stance. You have been trained to use your weapon as if it is a natural extension of your very body. Your sword attacks count as being unarmed. This allows you to claim the weapon bonuses of both and to combine different types of styles. If you know multiple Secrets that improve your unarmed fighting, you can only use one at a time; choose at the start of each round which one you’ll use.

• 5 Technique: You learn the Flowing Pendulum technique. If you're in the Flying Red Silk stance and use Ultimate Sword Mastery technique, you may boost both strike and block, though the total of both bonuses may not exceed +30. You still only receive a single extra effect, corresponding to the initial +10 you chose. (In need of revision)
• 5 Technique: You learn the Dance of Five Cranes technique. If you're in the Graceful Crane stance and use any Parables of the Sword Saint technique that grants a bonus to Block, you may apply that to Dodge instead. Further, any ripples granted by Educating Wings and Ultimate Sword Mastery stack.
• 5 Technique: (TBD for Subtle Force)

Meng Zhang, The Eastern Saint Beast

• 10 Destiny: Meng Zhang sees you as his protege; this is a tremendous honor, and an onerous responsibility.
  • You have Status 5 ('Protege of the Eastern Saint Beast') among the Wulin at large.
  • You have a -3 discount for buying a Legendary Weapon given to you by the Saint Beast.
  • (Other bonuses/discounts TBD)
  • -2 You are not the Azure Dragon's only protege, and at least one of the others will see you as a rival to his or her ambitions.
• 10 Victory: Through a great deed, you have gained the respect of your patron, and in recognition he grants you one of his collection of Legendary Weapons, each an incomparable work of art. Don't get it dirty!
  • -2 He has granted you this weapon for a specific purpose; when you have completely the task, he will expect its prompt return!

The Peerless Bamboo Manor

• 3+ Fortune: You know a secret about the The Peerless Bamboo Manor, and the priceless works of art contained within. Lost treasures from across Shen Zhou are gathered here, what secrets do they contain?
• 5 Fortune: The splendour of the Manor astounds the senses and bewilders the mind; it also has unmatched feng shui. One versed in its intricacies can exploit these effect to gain a +5 bonus to employing the Courtier's or Priest's arts.

The East

Bird's Progress

(The following loresheets supplement the Bird's Progress loresheet on p. 140; they require at least 3 Involvement to purchase.)

The City Above

(2 Destiny)

High upon the cliffs, far above the noise and bustle of the merchants and laborers below, there is a veritable paradise. Here are the wealthiest residents of Bird's Progress – the heads of the largest trading concerns, a few aristocratic families, and officials grown fat on bribes and kickbacks – living lives blissfully free of the lower city's muck and mire. The roads from the lower city to the upper are few and tightly guarded; the City Above's streets are impeccably clean and well-patrolled.

• 2 Fortune: You can pass between the two cities without trouble; perhaps you possess a pass (obtained licitly or otherwise) that permits you to use one of the official gates, or perhaps you know of a secret route.

Cloud Happiness District

Perched high atop the cliffs that ring the lower city are the mansions of the city's wealthiest residents: the very best families, the most successful merchants, and of course the officials who enrich themselves on the trade flowing through the city.

• 2+ Status: You have made a name for yourself in the high society of the Cloud Happiness District; this doesn't mean you're thought of as 'one of them', necessarily, but you're known.
  • 0 Bonus: You get the Politics specialty High Society for free.
• 2+ Involvement: The families that make Cloud Happiness their home are in constant, vicious competition to outdo their neighbors: to build more impossible homes, to throw more fabulous parties, to sponsor the more praiseworthy temple, or artist, or whatever fashion might demand. These are generally low-stakes affairs, but occasionally they spiral into something ... bigger. You've found yourself embroiled in just such a circumstance!
• 3+ Fortune/Treasure: The small group of architects (known as The Blue-Sky Goose Guild) employed to build the gravity-defying homes in which the wealthy dwell are at the very forefront of their art in Shen Zhou; Daoist principles are married to the bleeding edge of Mohist mathematical studies in order to produce these marvels. You have either come to know one of these architects, or have come into possession of their valuable plans.

Golden Bay Overlook

While it does not quite rise to the standard of the Willow Districts in Magnificent Ink or Notably Picturesque, for sheer spectacle, Golden Bay Overlook, the upper city's Willow District, is hard to match. Like the grand homes of Cloud Happiness, the inns and theaters of the Overlook hang over the vertiginous cliffs, but instead of looking down on the city below, they sit on a promontory over the Bohai Bay itself.

Yang's Last Bastion

Long ago, when Bird's Progress was a small fishing town, a mighty fortress sat upon the high cliffs that now house the wealthy & powerful, watching over the same waters that now carry treasures into Shen Zhou. In the chaotic days after the fall of the Han but before the arrival of the Jin, the Yang Kingdom occupied this fortress to safeguard the naval approach to their lands. When the Xiongnu invaders who would become the Jin did come to the East, they tried, without success, to lay siege to Thrashing Minister; as long as the Yang controlled the naval approach, the capital could be supplied indefinitely. So the Xiongnu came to the fortress, and the battle that commenced shook the very foundations of the earth - in the climactic battle, a great Xiongnu warrior cast down the last of the Yang defenders, and with her the better part of the fortress collapsed, falling to the marshy ground below.

The castle now known as Yang's Last Bastion is what remains of that fortress. It now houses the imperial military detachment assigned to Bird's Progress; among those in the know, it is widely believed that the feared Liquid Metal Delegates maintain agents stationed here.

Silver Bough Park

Beyond the northern gates of the city, a magnificent park is maintained for the pleasure of the well-born; it is best known (and named) for its magnificent and rare silver-barked scholar trees, but placid pools and well-tended flower gardens can also be found by those who wander its many narrow paths. For all its beauty, however, a pall hangs over the woods: it is said that demons haunt the park, waiting to entrap unwary visitors. There are all too many stories of people going off for a stroll and never returning, or found hanging from one of those scholar trees, or coming back ... but somehow fundamentally changed.

The City Beneath

(2 Destiny)

Bixi Gardens

Endless Prosperity Gate

Grand Open Palace

Nuwa's Tangle

Spear Maiden's Purchase

Virtuous Poesy District