Ranjit

Ranjit was an Awakened mage and a member of the Dacoits, one of the various thanatotic cults of South Asia that existed prior to the unification of the Chakravanti. His murder by an Akashic Brother named Smoke Tiger set off the Himalayan Wars.

The White Coumada
Tensions between the Akashic Brotherhood and the cults already existed before Ranjit's murder, based on differences in each group's approach to Fate. The Dacoits and other pre-Euthanatos cults viewed the Akashics as too removed from the world, while the Akashics viewed the death cults as bloodthirsty and judgmental in their willingness to act as Fate's agents.

Several different accounts are given as to what exactly transpired between Ranjit and Smoke Tiger. By all accounts, they were working together to contain a severe plague that had broken out in what is now Bhutan. In the 1997 Euthanatos Tradition Book, Ranjit is described as a young man or boy. He euthanizes several of the sick who he believes are too weak to survive treatment, and seems genuinely confused at Smoke Tiger's outrage; such measures are necessary to contain the illness, and in the Dacoit view, are a merciful way to speed the doomed to their next reincarnation. In the Revised Edition Tradition Book: Euthanatos (2002) and Tradition Book: Akashic Brotherhood (2001), however, Ranjit's actions--and those of the Dacoits in general--are portrayed in a darker light, as part of a larger scheme to provoke the Akashics (and, perhaps, a necessary step towards the formation of the modern Council of Nine Mystic Traditions). In either case, the murder is remembered by modern Euthanatos as "the White Coumada," a turning point in history.

After the murder, Dacoits arrested Smoke Tiger, but returned him to the Akashic Brotherhood to face justice. Instead, Smoke Tiger was freed, significantly damaging relations between the Akashics and the cults. Within a year, Chan Ng would begin his campaign to eliminate the cults from South Asia.