The Temple Quarter

Dominated by the vast and ornate Temple to Daikoku, the tallest and most impressive structure in all of Ryoko Owari, the Temple Quarter is located on the eastern side of the city, connected to the Noble and Merchant Quarters. There are temples here to the Sun and to every one of the Seven Great Fortunes, along with lesser shrines to almost every other notable fortune known to Rokugan. The district also has lavish temples to Bayushi and Shosuro, the two greatest ancestors of the Scorpion Clan. Moreover, whenever a lesser fortune is named by an Emperor, the priests in this district take great pains to find space here for a suitable shrine. Indeed, their devotion to ensuring that all of the fortunes are properly venerated rivals that of the Asako and Isawa, though this is never said within the hearing of a Phoenix Clan samurai. This obsession with ensuring that all of the fortunes be venerated is perhaps best expressed in the shrine dedicated to Sadahako. A nearly forgotten minor Fortune, in life she was a geisha of Empire-wide renown and skill, and was purportedly proclaimed a Fortune by Hantei VII on his deathbed. There was considerable debate over the truth of her ascension, and some among the Asako continue to question it even in modern times. Nonetheless, a shrine to her is located in Ryoko Owari, just north of the Temple of Daikoku. It is generally considered an unspoken rule of Ryoko Owari that the less savory habits of the city are kept out of the Temple Quarter. Obviously, this does not make the district into a safe haven for those seeking to avoid trouble with the Thunder Guard, but nonetheless all parties within the city take great pains to try and protect the integrity of this region. This may explain the relative non-presence of kajinin firemen gangs; there is a Temple Road gang in the northern part of the Quarter, but this group is known for its lack of participation in extortion and other illegal practices, and is almost monastically devoted to the integrity of its job. Aside from that, most locations within the Quarter are protected in time of fire or other crisis by the monks of Daikoku, who are said to be able to cleanse fires with the power of the Elements themselves.