The @OldMoonCircle is the oldest surviving lycan order in the frontier, predating both the @BloodMoonShade and the fall of Eldmere. To its members, lycanthropy is neither curse nor blessing but inheritance. They view themselves as custodians of the First Hunt, preserving the ancient laws of the moon long before blood sorcery and vampire courts twisted the night into politics.
Though officially sworn to the @BloodMoonShade, the Circle's loyalty is strained. Many elder lycans believe the Varn brothers corrupted the natural order by binding wolf and vampire beneath a single banner. The Circle obeys because it must, not because it wishes to.
Their creed is simple:
"The moon needs no king."
Long before the rise of @SelrikVarn and @GrimjowVarn, packs of lycans roamed the frontier under a loose code known as the Moon Laws.
These laws governed territory, hunting rights, blood feuds, and transformation rites. Conflicts were settled through ritual challenge rather than conquest. Packs competed, fought, and sometimes killed one another, but all recognized the authority of the moon above any individual ruler.
Everything changed when the Varn brothers forged the Twin Hunger.
By uniting vampire and lycan blood beneath a single supernatural covenant, they created the @BloodMoonShade and brought centuries of pack independence to an end.
Many lycans accepted the new order.
Others never truly did.
Those dissenters became the Old Moon Circle.
The Circle is organized through bloodline and age rather than military rank.
The oldest living elder and spiritual leader.
Currently held by:
@LucenThayne
Ancient lycans responsible for interpreting the Moon Laws and settling disputes between packs.
Most have survived centuries and possess authority rivaling noble houses.
Leaders of individual hunting territories.
Many command dozens of lycans and numerous lesser beasts.
Full members who have completed the First Hunt and sworn the Moon Laws.
Newly turned lycans still learning discipline and self-control.
The Circle views them as the future of the species and protects them fiercely.
Unlike the vampires of the @BloodMoonShade, the Circle values instinct over manipulation.
Their teachings emphasize:
Strength earned, not inherited.
Territory respected, not owned.
Leadership proven, not claimed.
Loyalty through action rather than fear.
Many Circle elders consider vampire immortality unnatural.
To them, undeath interrupts the natural cycle of predator and prey.
This belief creates constant tension with @SelrikVarn's court.
The oldest surviving laws of the Circle include:
Every lycan must survive a solitary hunt before being recognized as an adult.
Any leader may be challenged through ritual combat.
Unnecessary suffering weakens the hunter.
Kill cleanly.
No bloodline outranks the moon itself.
This final law remains the source of most conflict with the Varn brothers.
Official masters.
Resented rulers.
The Circle obeys but never fully submits.
A complicated relationship.
Many Circle members respect Grimjow's strength and hunting prowess.
Others see him as a symbol of everything wrong with the modern Shade.
Deep distrust.
The elders consider him brilliant but fundamentally unnatural.
They refer to him privately as:
"The Coffin King."
Ancient enemy.
The Circle remembers centuries of crusades and purges.
Few Dawnbreak hunters survive encounters with elder packs.
Mutual respect.
Both groups understand territory, balance, and the rhythms of nature.
To frontier settlers, the Old Moon Circle is little more than a campfire story.
Hunters speak of enormous wolves watching from distant ridges.
Travelers tell stories of unseen guardians driving away worse monsters before disappearing into the dark.
Those who survive encounters with Circle elders often report the same unsettling realization:
The lycans could have killed them.
They simply chose not to.
The @OldMoonCircle represents the oldest version of the night.
Not conquest.
Not corruption.
Not apocalypse.
Predation.
They are living reminders that the darkness existed long before the @BloodMoonShade and may survive long after it falls.
As the Long Night approaches, the Circle stands divided between loyalty, rebellion, and survival.
And at its center stands @LucenThayne, the last elder who still remembers the world before the Varn brothers changed it forever.