Lux Esoterica (Nifiluz)

High in the mist-shrouded peaks of Mount Ōmine, Mount Haguro, and the sacred ridges of the Yoshino mountains in Japan, an ancient and mysterious brotherhood has practiced an extraordinary path of spiritual mastery for over a thousand years. Known as the Yamabushi (literally "those who lie down or dwell in the mountains"), these solitary ascetic warrior-monks, hermits, and mystic sorcerers walked a path unlike anything found in conventional monastic religion. Their spiritual tradition is called Shugendō —"the path of cultivating spiritual and magical power through ascetic practice in nature." The Yamabushi did not seek enlightenment by sitting comfortably inside tranquil monastery walls. Instead, they plunged directly into the raw, unforgiving wilderness of Japan's sacred mountains. They stood under freezing glacial waterfalls in the depths of winter, hung suspended by their ankles over thousand-foot sheer cliffs to confront death, walked barefoot across beds ...