Ajari Ando

Ajari Ando

While the ideals of the Resplendent Crane are hard for any person, alive or dead, to find significant moral objection, Shining Ice Guardians often fail to live up to them. Often the strict guidelines of followers of the eight lotus paths are twisted to subjugate undead of the middle kingdom under the guise of moral righteousness. Such was the experience of the current Acarya of Koyosan Temple in Seattle. As a level 8 Resplendent Crane, he saw much of the depths of his kin’s own corruption and ultimately decided that it was best to isolate himself if he would have any hope of halting the turning of The Wheel. In his self-imposed exile he has taken to teaching all he knew of Shingon to both mortal and wayward Kue-jin alike. For it was his faith that put him at odds with his brethren in the first place.
There was little doubt in his mind why his honor was in question and why the Kami had cursed him with his second breath. Rage, pure and simple. He had been a warrior in his previous life and while he tried to couch his lust for violence as a balancing of cosmic order against the wicked the truth gnawed always in the back of his mind. He enjoyed battle and found rest only on the end of an adversary’s blade. So, when he was returned from the divine realm to this one, he found himself oddly at ease with his new existence. The Eight Lotus path mapped easily to his teachings and the Yama Kings gave him new adversaries to test his blades. He set eagerly to his task, battling with the Yama Kings with the same ferocity he had shown in life. Though as the years turned to centuries with little progress along his path and the continuing turning of The Wheel, he came to realize that he had been granted second life for another reason, even if what it was remains unclear. For this reason, he abandoned the fight against the Yama Kings directly and instead focused more on the metaphysical nature of his existence and its relation to achieving Buddhahood.
It was this sudden change in his course that his Fellow Ice Guardians duplicitous nature was made more apparent. For centuries, he had been content to throw himself against the Yama Kings and take at face value his kin’s desire to see Heaven made manifest. What he found instead was politicking and scheming that was more concerned with the elevation of individuals than adhering to the Eight Lotus path. His misgivings came to a head he and another Kue-jin elder disagreed over how to handle a Cainite wight that appeared within the Seattle international district. While righteousness would dictate the creature’s immediate destruction, they wished to delay, to use this creature as leverage in their dealings with their western cousins. Finding this course of action to be unconscionable, he declared his intention to set out to destroy the demon. His kin moved to stop him and, slipping into old habits, he struck the Kue-jin down. After disposing of the Cainite wretch, he returned to face punishment for his crimes. Unable to find direct fault with his actions, his kin elected to instead banish him that he might seek enlightenment elsewhere. Since then, he has settled into his life as Sensei of Koyosan Temple where he seeks to better understand his place in the cosmic order and continue his studies to suppress the P’o.

Ajari Ando is a serene looking Japanese man in his mid-forties. He is fit, as one would expect of a Buddhist monk, and always has a calm exterior and has a palpable radiance of power.

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