Author's Foreword:


This is one  of a series of posts intended to show what various mage groups 
believe, how they think, and why they think the Sleepers ought to prefer 
their vision of reality.  It is not intended as a complete picture of each 
group, or a 'fair' portrait.  It's written as propaganda by each group, 
but honest propaganda. They won't lie, but they won't list their own flaws 
in detail either :)

Naturally, these posts represent my own idiosyncratic views which I
believe to be reasonably compatible with canon, but given my memory is at
times rather sieve like, I may forget stuff.  If you see a contradiction
between this or the appropriate Trad/Conv book, it may or may not be
deliberate.

If you have suggestions for more questions that should be covered, please
let me know.

Euthanatos and a bunch o' other stuff is all copyright of White
Wolf, of course.

You can find the ones done so far at:

http://www.maison-otaku.net/~rhea/WW/index.html

Enjoy!


Ascension 2000 Campaign Pamphlets:  Euthanatos

Okay, now you guys...you're the necromancers, right?  Animating the 
dead, slapping people around with voodoo, talking to ghosts, and 
turning people INTO ghosts, right?  What gives you the right to judge 
people and kill them?  Isn't hanging around graveyards kinda morbid?  
And isn't killing people because you don't like them evil?

	Yes, yes we are.  But let's examine that idea, pick it apart, and
find the flaws that make it such an object of fear to you.

        Necro - mancer.  Necro, of course, means death, while mancer
has come to refer to the practice of any kind of magic, but that was not
its original meaning. It meant `seer' or `prophet'.  `Manteis' was the
Celtic word.  Speaker to and for the dead, perhaps.  And yes, we can speak
to those who lived before, among other things.  You'd be surprised, I
think, at what they have to say.  But let's draw away from the literal
meaning and examine the figurative.  The necromancer you fear is one who
understands the secrets of death, correct?  And can use them against you.
But you see, the greatest secret of death, the one that we have grasped,
is this.

        There is no death.  There is only change.

	The flesh is temporary and crumbles, but from that crumbled
flesh, new life grows.  The soul endures without dying, but it
changes too, either to ascend or descend.  Our job is to help souls
through those changes, to guide them in ascension, in the hopes they 
may one day escape the wheel of karma entirely and Ascend.  

	We do this in several ways.  Some among us tend the Garden of
Souls by helping others to overcome obstacles in the path of ascension.
Some of us work to redeem those who have begun to slide down the road of
Descent.  And some of us kill those who are beyond saving in this life and
are dragging others down the road of Descent with them.  It is a last
resort, but a necessary one at times.

Uh huh.  So how do you decide who to kill?  

	There are two categories of people who recieve the Good 
Death.  The first category is those who ask for it.  Some people want 
to die, and we are almost always willing to help them if we cannot 
enable them to live.  That group, however, is fairly small, since we 
can heal as well as kill.  Many people would be perfectly willing to 
live, though they might crave death at the moment, if what is driving 
them to desire death is removed.  We support the right-to-die, but also
recognize that a person at death's door can often be carried away from
it.  This practice is most commonly administered among our own ranks,
when one of us feels he has done as much as is necessary and is ready to 
pass on.  Because we accept death, we do not cling to life from fear 
as many do.  We know what lies beyond that door.

	The second category is those who are too far gone to save.  We
would rather redeem, but some people will do far too much damage to others
in the time it would take to turn them around, and thus sometimes it is 
necessary to kill the spiritually corrupt.  If they can not be saved in
this life, perhaps in the next one they will learn their lesson from the
punishment their bad karma has earned them.

But how do you tell if someone can't be redeemed?

	We study them carefully and observe their actions.  We also can
use our Sight to examine their souls and pass judgement through careful
study of that as well.  We can gaze upon a soul and tell its most likely 
destinies through a combination of Time, Spirit, and Entropy.  The 
future is not yet fixed, but we can tell the most likely destiny of a 
soul and the chance of it walking a given road.  

	We also use Correspondence (and our own eyes) to observe a 
person for a time in order to confirm our initial judgement and to 
determine the best way to help them resume their journey to 
Ascension if that is possible, or if they should be given the Good 
Death.  It may take months for a Gardener of the Soul to decide how 
best to help a person climb out of their rut and then execute their 
plan.  For them, pruning is always a last choice.  

	In a few cases, we must make judgement before we are ready, such
as if the person is about to carry out some deed which will inflict
large scale suffering, but in most cases, we may spend days, weeks, or
months studying them to be certain that our act will be just.  

	I will not pretend our methods are perfect.  Some of us become 
impatient and kill too easily.  Others are too easily frustrated with 
the often slow work of nurturing the human soul, for most people 
don't want to leave their rut, even when it's slowly choking the life 
from them.  And sometimes there are mistakes made, moments of 
confusion where the wrong person is slain.  Worst of all, some of us 
fall prey to the Nephandi and become barabbi, and abuse our powers 
to cause corruption.  

	This is why we created the Freedom Razor, who watch us carefully
for corruption and destroy those who have sunk into corruption; they are
the ones who watch the watchmen.

What do you mean by 'corruption'?

	All of creation is but an illusion in which we have forgotten
we are part of the Brahman, the All.  All of us are bound to the wheel of
reincarnation and to the world by our desires. The problem is that desire
leads to suffering.  To Ascend, one must learn to act purely, rather than
to be controlled by desire.  Giving in to one's desires, instead of acting
in harmony with one's higher soul, the Atman, which is part of the soul of
Brahma, is what holds us back from escaping the wheel.  

	Whatever turns us away from that is corruption.  Some corrupt acts
have much worse effects than others, whether from the taint they put on
our soul, or the suffering they cause to others.  Still, we recognize the
difficulty of escaping the chains of desire.  The corruption that most
concerns is that which directs itself directly to causing the active
suffering of others.

	Like Buddha, we follow an eight-fold path we seek to teach to
others to enable escape from the Wheel, the road of Ascension.

	"Prevabhnava" the affirmation of belief in the Cycle that is
 the law of the universe.
	"Hiranyagargha" the belief in the One Source from which all that
 is stems and will one day return. All that is has a spark of the
 source in them.
	"Kala" the aceptance of decay, entropy and death as necessary.
	"Gopaya" the duty of guardianship to humanity.
	"Sadhana" or the practice of rites and the chanting of Vedas and
 the seeking of spiritual betterment for oneself.
	"Daya" the necessity of compassion to all suffering that is
 exitence in the world.
	"Tyaga" the abandonment of desire, pursuit of pleasure and
 personal gain.
	"Diksha" the rite of death and rebirth that all Euthanatoi
 must undergo at least once.

	Reverse these, and one can see the road of Descent walked by the
Nephandi.  This is why we battle them, because they would enchain all to
the wheel of rebirth, forcing them to suffer for eternity.  They are a far
greater threat than the Technocracy, who while blinded by their own
desires, does not actively choose to embrace corruption and the infliction
of suffering, though they often cause such through their actions.

But how does killing a corrupt person do any good?  Well, other than
stopping them causing more suffering this time around?

	The soul has two parts, the Atman, which is eternal as it is part
of Brahman, and the Jiva, which is the terrestrial soul.  The Jiva
perishes when one dies properly (although in the case of Wraiths and
Vampires, the Jiva lives on), while the Atman is reborn in connection with
a new Jiva.  It is through the awakening of our Atman that we gain the
ability to do Magick.

	Thus, the Good Death, which slays the flesh and destroys the Jiva,
frees the Atman from the corruption which has built up in the Jiva.  This
is important to do, else one risks the danger that the corruption will
reach a level that some of the taint would carry on to the next life, and
the person would be born as a Widderslainte, a soul tainted from birth,
though this is rare except when the person became a Nephandus in the
previous life.  Such tainted souls must be administered the Good Death as
soon as possible, for they cannot be saved in life, only by passing
through the Great Unmaking until their taint is purged from them.

You said something about how Wraiths and Vampires are what happens when
the Atman passes on and the Jiva doesn't?

	Yes.  In the case of the Vampire, their Jiva is corrupted by the
so-called 'Embrace', and they are bound to their old flesh.  In the case
of the Wraith, the Jiva splits in two: the Psyche and the Shadow, which
then fight to the death.  We pity Wraiths, for they are but a shadow of a
soul that has passed on, clinging to suffering because they fear death.

Well, okay, I think I understand your philosophy, although the whole 
killing thing still bothers me.  So how do you actually DO magick?

	Because we are Awake, we wield the power of our Atman, which is
part of Brahman, the All.  It is our union with the All which enables us
to do Magick.  

	We achieve this union through various rites.  We surround 
ourselves with things which remind us of the cycle of creation and 
destruction, which remind us of change, such as dice, coins (for use with
the I Ching), bones, and broken or freshly made objects.  We frequent
locations which evoke change and chance, such as casinos, graveyards, and
boundaries between things, such as fences, archways, doors, windows, and
the like.  We call upon the gods of change, of creation and destruction, 
the Avatars of the Brahman, in prayer, and dance, and song.  

	As we grow in enlightenment, it becomes easier to achieve Union 
with the Brahman, and we begin to discard the unnecessary rites 
and props that previously were required for this, as we 

So how would you cure my...actually, I don't think I want to know.  
Let's say my car broke down.  How would you fix it?

	I would tell you to walk.  Your attachment to material possessions
binds you to the world.

Okay...Let's say you actually needed to give someone the Good Death. Let's
say they're a deranged serial killer who has slain eighty people and is
trying to collect an even thousand.

	I would study him, and observe his methods, though not taking so
long to do this that he would be able to kill again.  If he could not be
turned from his path short of death, then I would cast an I Ching reading
to determine the best time to act against him.  When he came to the
appointed place, I would carve a bone with runes designating his name, and
pour a little of my own blood into the runes, then ignite it.  His blood
would boil, and he would die.  

So what would your ideal world be like?

	We would all be joined with the All once more, free of Maya,
illusion, and free of Samsara, suffering.  It is indescribable to those
who have not experienced it.

Right.  So what do you think of your fellow mages?

	The Marauders fascinate us, for they are change made flesh.  
But they are mindless change, while we are change with purpose.  As 
long as they do not attack us, we let them do their work, for they 
fight our enemies and in many ways, they are a force of nature.  If 
they attack us, however, we will turn them aside if we can, and 
destroy them if we must.

	The Nephandi, on the other hand, are the army of Corruption.  
They are the true enemy, far more than the Technocracy, which has
sometimes acted justlessly and selflessly as well as from desire. While
we are careful to make sure we do not judge too hastily (for we have often
been accused of their crimes), known Nephandi are killed on sight if
practical.  Those of us who fall to Nephandic taint are sentenced to
Gilgul, then killed.  

	The Cult of Ecstasy and the Verbena are our closest friends 
within the Traditions.  We share certain roots with them, and they 
are both highly aware of the cycles of life and death.  While the Cult
often loses itself in its pleasures, and the Verbena cling too strongly to
life for fear of death, we can usually call them friends and find a
sympathetic ear among them, especially among their elders.

	The Dreamspeakers are sometimes our friends, sometimes 
enemies.  They are good hearted and often wise, but they cling to the
past, and it prevents them from escaping the wheel of rebirth.  We have
yet to understand how to get them to let go.

	The Order of Hermes has the same problem.  They are mired in 
dreams of their past glory which prevent them creating new glory, 
and they create rigid systems of thought which then become 
incapable of adapting to new events.  They believe the ancient 
masters knew all things and they are simply recovering that 
knowledge.  Too bad their knowledge is out of date.  Still, watching 
them spend years trying to pound square pegs into pentagonal holes 
is often amusing.

	We like the Sons of Ether, though they often frown upon us for 
lack of understanding us.  They prove that Technology can promote 
change instead of stasis, and they create new things from the 
garbage the Technocracy has thrown away, showing an understanding 
thus of the value of destruction: it is the seedbed of new life, both 
physical and intellectual.

	The Virtual Adepts, on the other hand, are fools.  They think 
they can replace the world of suffering with a world of dreams shaped 
by their desires, failing to realize that it is desire which chains
one to the world.

	The Celestial Chorus are fools, lost in service of a divinity,
which is the slow road to Ascension, not the correct road, which we offer.
While they avoid corruption, it takes a million lifetimes to escape the
wheel along the road they walk.

	And finally, there is the Akashic Brotherhood.  There are many 
who love them, and others who see them as harmless.  We know 
better.  Long ago, they sought to wipe us out, to prevent us doing our 
work as the world's gardeners, as the enders of suffering.  When they
finally came to realize their error, they turned their backs on truth and
hid in their monasteries, where they linger still, slowly festering,
unable to face the truth and grow.  Their vaunted mastery of mind and
body is but a disguise for their lack of wisdom and fear of death.  

	Desire binds you to the wheel, the wheel brings only suffering.
One must awaken to the fact that all that binds you, the self you cling
to, all are illusion, and illusion must pass away.  Death is only a
change, and one must die to self in order to truly live.  Will you join us
on the quest to free all souls from the wheel which they have chained
themselves to?