Temple of the Twin Fangs

1. Tide-Speaker (Leader)
The chosen voice of Ilmos and ruler of Taldozen. Interprets dreams, oversees rituals, and maintains the balance between the two Fangs.

2. Fangwardens (High Priests)

• Fang of the Hunt: Oversees rituals, hunting rites, and beast-related omens.
• Fang of the Dream: Guides dream interpretation, stargazing rites, and prophecy.

These two Fangwardens are always in tension — never equals, but always balancing.

3. Tidemarked Acolytes
Priests and initiates who walk either the Hunt Path or the Dream Path, serving under the Fangwardens.

4. Brinehands
Ritual aides, laborers, and sea-offering tenders. They maintain the tide shrines and prepare the sacred halls for rituals.

5. Moonblood Novitiates
Children and teens undergoing training in both paths. Upon adulthood, they must choose their Fang or seek harmony between both.

The Temple's culture revolves around reverence for Ilmos’s dual nature—the Hunt and the Dream. Followers believe true harmony is found through balance between instinct and insight. The Hunt teaches respect for survival and the raw forces of nature, while the Dream imparts foresight and understanding through visions and celestial signs. Moon phases, tides, and dream cycles guide spiritual practice. A deep and ritualized contempt exists toward Krorone, the goddess of darkness. Her claim over the moon is rejected, as the Temple holds that the moon belongs to Ilmos, who uses it to govern tides and speak to dreamers. The suggestion that the moon is Krorone’s domain is considered heresy among temple faithful.

The Temple’s stated goal is to maintain balance within the city of Taldozen—spiritually, politically, and culturally—through the teachings of Ilmos. The temple oversees civic law through religious principle, determines the sacred calendar, performs ritual blessings, interprets omens for political guidance, and presides over major public festivals and ceremonies. It seeks to ensure that Taldozen continues to walk the twin paths of Hunt and Dream and to strengthen the spiritual influence of Ilmos across Verdantia. It also maintains strategic alliances with Lindorthell by leveraging prophecy and tide-based diplomacy.

The Temple of the Twin Fangs controls both the Temple of the Blooded Claw and the Temple of the Blooming Gaze—two monumental structures that serve as places of worship and political administration. It also claims the Fane of the Tide-Beast, a sea-stack altar used in sacred ceremonies. It commands the Brine Fang warrior-priests and oversees the breeding, training, and spiritual protection of Moonscale Tide-Hounds. The Temple holds custody of star-charts, tide-calendars, enchanted relics, and offerings provided by the people of Taldozen. These include beast parts, prophetic dream-scrolls, and spiritual tithe goods. Its wealth is measured more in sacred assets than gold.

The Temple of the Twin Fangs was founded shortly after Taldozen’s establishment in the year 2391. It began when the Tide-Seer Hanoku Meiyari received a divine vision on the cliffs—two moons reflected on the ocean, one streaked with blood, the other glowing with stars. From this vision, the doctrine of the Twin Fangs was born. Over time, the temple evolved from a purely spiritual body into a civic authority as Taldozen grew in importance as Lindorthell’s eastern trade port. By the mid-2500s, the Tide-Speaker had become both the city’s high priest and its ruling figure. Throughout its long history, the temple has survived spiritual schisms between the Fang of the Hunt and the Fang of the Dream. Although its unity has held, dream-prophecies suggest that if the balance were ever broken, disaster would follow.

Core Beliefs:

• Life is a hunt — whether in the sea or in the soul.
• To ignore the dream is to kill blindly; to dream without hunt is to forget survival.
• All choices ripple like tide across time and must be made with reverence.