Crossing Moon

Crossing Moon is a day of celebration and a night of mourning.

On the annual lunar eclipse, it is said that Chenlen borrows the light of the moon to fuel his lantern, which he uses to guide the dead into the afterlife. With the moon absent from the sky, it is a night of total darkness, an event that sets spirits on edge and spurs them to seek out the light of Arvoria. With Chenlen's lantern burning bright on Crossing Moon, this is the light they find instead, and it leads them to cross over from this world.

Celebrants and mourners often place paper lanterns and other lights along roads and pathways, to help lost spirits find their way. Such lights range from open torches to candles inside vegetables carved into a likeness of the departed. While these lights are said to guide the dead, it is unwise to keep lights in one's own home, else they may confuse spirits and trap them for another year before they can cross again.

Death Rites
When a Ninefolk dies, it is generally understood that the soul remains with the body until the next Crossing Moon. Proper burial is rare, as doing so before Crossing Moon would trap the soul underground. Most bodies are interred in mausoleums, embalmed and kept in stonework caskets, until the day of Crossing Moon. During this time, bodies are considered sacred, and it would be sacrilege to damage or otherwise deface them while the soul is still within.

After Crossing Moon, bodies are soulless, so long as their crossing was not impaired, and are considered empty vessels, no longer with purpose. Such bodies are disposed of via mass burials or ceremonial cremation. In some places, cremation occurs on Crossing Moon, in the belief that it spurs the spirit out of the body.

Some soulless bodies, particularly nobles in Human and Elven cultures, are preserved after Crossing Moon. They are still considered soulless, and are only kept for the benefit of mourners