The fall of the original Shatalin temple began when Cruw Reon, an exceptionally swift and ambitious Bhikhu student, drew the Sword of Winds in pursuit of power over other kingdoms. The act blinded him forever, and his refusal to relinquish the weapon brought the temple down; the knowledge that might have addressed his blindness survived, but was separated from the sword.

The Hidden Temple

Master Shivu reveals the temple’s history while speaking with his imprisoned pupil, Paedrin. The Bhikhu temple familiar to Paedrin in Kenatos is only a shadow of the original: a replica, and an inferior one. The first Shatalin temple was concealed in the mountains, and only Vaettir studied there or could reach its heights. Shivu says that he entered it as a boy and later left with a small band seeking to escape its fate.

That disclosure revises Paedrin’s understanding of the Bhikhu tradition. He had assumed the original temple stood in the woods of Silvandom. Shivu’s account instead places its origin in an inaccessible mountain sanctuary and makes the present temple a remnant of a lost institution.

Cruw Reon and the Sword

Among the students at Shatalin was Cruw Reon, who had bested the masters and moved faster than anyone else. Shivu describes his power as extending beyond Bhikhu skill to his words and speech: his influence helped corrupt the temple through pride. The disaster sharpened when Cruw sought the Sword of Winds, a weapon traditionally approached only by the most virtuous and used only to defend the temple from attack.

Cruw’s purpose overturned that restriction. He took the sword from its casing and drew it from its sheath, intending to conquer other kingdoms and rise to the heights of power. The weapon’s sacred defensive role thus became an instrument of personal ambition. Paedrin listens, holding his breath as he looks into Shivu’s eyes.

The Fall and Its Unresolved Legacy

When Cruw drew the sword, he went blind and remained blind forever. He would not give up the weapon, and so could not learn how to cure his blindness. Shivu identifies the lost temple with that moment: Shatalin fell that day, as Cruw’s grasp on the sword made recovery impossible.

The answer to Cruw’s blindness had been written in the Book of Shatalin and smuggled away by Shivu’s own master. Shivu now possesses the book and knows the secret, but the book and sword cannot be brought together: the book is held in the archives and cannot leave Kenatos, while the sword will never leave the temple. The survival of the knowledge therefore does not undo the catastrophe. Shivu looks back on the unprevented rise of Cruw’s madness as a turning point whose consequences still reach the present, lamenting that so many lives might have followed a different course if someone had acted earlier.

A History Used as Warning

Shivu’s account is not merely an origin story for the ruined temple. As he grips Paedrin’s hands through the bars, he compares the young Bhikhu’s pride and ambition to Cruw’s and invokes the temple’s fall to justify what he intends to do. He tells Paedrin that preventing another tragedy requires his death and the restoration of Bhikhu tradition and honor, then declares that Paedrin is no longer his pupil or bound to the Bhikhu.

The parallel turns a history of institutional collapse into a present threat. Shivu treats Cruw’s ambition as a warning against power unconstrained by virtue, but applies that warning to Paedrin with a severity that makes preservation itself coercive. The lost temple’s legacy thus persists not only in the separated book and sword, but in the choices made in its name.