Soul Lore
|
The following is a clarification and rationalization/update of currently canon lore. It simply details the structure and nature of souls in a way that should help to clarify future questions and interactions relating to the soul.
This dissertation makes use of a handful of terms related to the Soul and its structure, specified as below:
Soul Essence: The raw and ineffable material which makes up the Soul. It has one singular point of origin: the Creator himself, who gave up a portion of his heart in the Beginning of All Things. All Soul Essence is a remnant of the Creator.
Blueprint: The colloquial term referring to the the frame that Soul Essence is built around in order to construct a living, functional Superior Soul. Only Superior Souls bear Blueprints, and they determine everything about the one that possesses it.
Metasis: The innate ability of a Superior Soul to repopulate itself with more Soul Essence. All Superior Souls have this, explaining why the Soul can be damaged and have fragments taken only for it to heal over time.
Transmogrification: Any unnatural change within the Soul Blueprint, oftentimes called ‘Warping’. Examples of Transmogrification: the Fjarriauga curse, Wightdom, Wraithdom.
Metanoia: Any restructuring of the Soul Blueprint in an authentic and correct manner. Examples of Metanoia: Nephilim, Archons.
Relegation: Any displacement of a Soul to another location while keeping it tethered to the hosted body. Examples of Relegation: Liches, Keepers, Soul Tree Druids.
To understand the soul from our perspective, the analogy of a sculpture is used. Soul Essence is clay. A raw material that, when compounded together and treated (firing it in a kiln or, to the Soul, giving it lifeforce and the means to bear a vessel) takes on solidity and clarity in its form. The lesser creatures and life of the surrounding world are quite like simple sculptures of clay. They have been shaped and given bodies but lack the detail and size of the Superior Soul. This Soul is the apex of the sculpture gallery: beautiful and awe-striking, titanic and miraculous in their form and impossible to understand what exactly inspired the artist and how they went about making such a statue. Of course, one can assume they sculpted it from clay, but what techniques did they use? How did they achieve such stunning definition and detail? Mortal hands have never been able to create such.
The Superior Soul is this grand, incredible figure of art: a monument to the glory and miracle of our world’s creation and the Incomparable Light of the Creator. The Superior Soul is indeed made of Soul Essence, just as the cattle that roam their pastures or the birds that take nest in the trees, but what exactly has made the Superior Soul so different from them that its holders, the Descendants and other similar folk, so unique in the scope of the world? The answer lies in its origin: The Superior Soul is the statue, and there have only been three artists in the history of the universe as we know it who have been able to comprehend the celestial technique involved in its sculpture. They are the Creator, the Composer he made to aid him in the shaping of mortal Souls, and the Daemon Dragur: the Lord of Knowledge, it was only he among all his brethren who hungered for the secrets that lay hidden in the origin of mortalkind and eventually found where they lie. There he made the first of Dragonkind, and their Souls are as genuine and divine in make as any of the Descendants’.
Metasis is a miraculous trait of the Superior Soul to regenerate itself and lost Soul Essence. Some forces in the world are capable of tearing away portions of it for their own devices, and in this event the Soul is able to, over a period of time increasing with the severity of the lost fragment, replace the missing piece with new Soul Essence it generated itself. Metasis also explains the mystery of childbearing among the Descendants: two mortals able to mate with one another, when they successfully do so, plant the beginning seed of a new Soul within the female. It grows as the child does until they are ready, the newborn now bearing a brand-new Soul Blueprint formed of the parent’s Soul Essence deposited during coitus that reproduced itself during gestation.
If the Superior Soul is a sculpture, its Blueprint is the framework that the sculptor drew before compounding the Soul Essence. Within the Blueprint is every single painstaking detail: The height, weight, health, sex, hair color, eye color, skin color, memories, and injuries of the person it belongs to. Some of these details may change over time as the mortal grows naturally from childhood to adolescence and finally adulthood, or they may find themselves wounded and gain scars. The Blueprint will at times adhere to these injuries: sometimes adapting itself to these lost limbs, or even something as trivial as a haircut. These details will shift and change and accompany the Soul through death, remaining constant when and if they eventually return to life. The Blueprint will at times undergo larger changes to its structure, and there are three distinct types of this.
The first is Transmogrification, and it is the forced and improper ‘warping’ of a Soul. It is commonly observed among forces of dark nature. Let us return to the analogy of the sculpture and take for example the curse of the Fjarriauga: the sculpture has had new pieces of clay attached on top of what currently exists or had pieces ripped out and replaced. To any capable of viewing and inspecting the statue, the distortions and damage are noticeable. It changes the very nature of the Soul, as seen with the Frost Witch’s hunger for male flesh, icy complexion, and other alterations. Anything warping the Soul in such a manner displays a misunderstanding of the Soul and the techniques needed to properly create and change it without causing it damage. Most instances of Transmogrification are irreversible because of their nature of ripping the original soul apart. Were they to be removed the Soul would simply collapse and die without the integral pieces, so it makes itself resistant to reversal in such a manner: this is why the Fjarriauga curse has not had a legitimate cure found for it.
The second is Metanoia, and it is the opposite of the former. A Soul that undergoes Metanoia has been changed and rebuilt with proper technique. The Nephilim are an example of Metanoia: in the sculpture analogy, it is a proper and graceful modification to the original statue in order to make it something new. The same clay has been used, but it has been reshaped correctly and retains no damage or twisting. The Nephilim are the souls of Descendants who have been, through the indirect power and influence of Dragur and his children, reborn as Dragons themselves: their Souls are broken down and rebuilt through the ritual necessary to make one into a Nephilim. Metanoia, just like Transmogrification, is hardly ever reversible: none living or willing have the knowledge and ability to undo such a vigorous restructuring without simply warping the Soul.
The third and final is Relegation, and most often does not result in a true change for the Soul but instead a displacement of its location. A notable example is the Keeper’s Soul but the sculpture analogy, unfortunately, does not hold up as well here. The Soul has been moved elsewhere: for the Keepers, this place is Xan’s realm. A tether remains between the Soul and the body it holds, so the mind and consciousness of the Soul is still able to pilot the body as normal. Those versed in Souls like the Ascended are able of obviously detecting a Soul that has been Relegated.
To finish, Soul Essence is a material very rare but still possible to find. The Creator’s Heart was plentiful in it, and over the Ages of the world the Descendants have populated the corners of the earth they walk upon and filled it with even more Soul-bearing folk. Soul Essence can be acquired and shaped by beings of Deific power from dead (or not-so-dead) mortals, though the creation of Superior Souls with Blueprints is a power reserved to the three ‘artists’ listed earlier. The extent of its nature is still a mystery to mortalkind, though some like the Ascended bear a (relatively to what there truly is to know) rudimentary understanding of it and the Blueprint and are able to manipulate it on simple levels.
Addition
A Superior Soul has a myriad of features. It is where the life-force of a person and their mana pool is located, in addition to housing a person’s blueprint and a cache of their long-term memories.
Soul blueprint: As the name suggests, the soul blueprint contains the plans for a person’s body. When a person is injured or has their body altered in some manner, the changes will eventually carry over to the soul’s blueprint (unless what is occurring is forcibly changing the blueprint as well, in which case the process may be sped up). It generally takes one week (1 week = 1 RP year) for a change to register with the blueprint. If a change occurs and then the person perishes within this time frame, they will generally be revived without said changes (more on that below).
Life-force: Every natural living being has life-force within their body that keeps them alive. Within mortals, this is kept bottled up by what is known as a yoresigil. The yoresigil is responsible for ensuring that the life-force flows correctly through a person’s body and doesn’t leak out or become unbalanced. The yoresigil is capable of being warped and distorted into a Darkhollow, a mark carried by many soul shadows and undead. The Darkhollow allows for the life-force to flow freely and be manipulated, along with uncapping the amount one might have.
Mana pool: Mana flows through everything and exists within all natural living creatures in what is called a mana pool, being passively produced by the souls within them. This varies on the type of soul, the mana within a dog would be far less than one of the descendant, for example. This mana pool is also capable of expanding over time should the user be an active practitioner of magic, the amount of growth is dependent on the magic being learned. The person’s mana, akin to muscles, become familiar with how a magic works over time and thusly it becomes more efficient at higher tiers (e.g. a master fire evocationist will have an easier time casting a fireball than a novice). This explains why a mage who has learned 4 magics and understands a fifth one on par with that of an active user, is unable to pick that magic up and master it in a short time. Mana is inherently in a soul-bound state, meaning that it is incapable of traveling from one soul to another. It can, however, be relocated elsewhere, such as into a mana gem or corrupted and turned into things such as amber.
Ectoplasm: Ectoplasm is a substance generated from a soul hammered by death or one already sensitive to it through processing lifeforce and mana. It acts as a gelatinous cushion around the soul and acts as a basis for phantoms and wights, along with a pool for superior souls (mortals).
Memories: The reason that ghosts and other spectral beings retain their memories is due to the fact that within their soul has a cache of their long term memories. It takes a certain amount of time for short term memories to become long term, which is why short term memories are wiped upon death. This is why people are unable to recall themselves perishing or the circumstances behind it. The physical brain takes priority when cataloging memories, but should the person pass on, the soul shadow of the lingerer is capable of recalling their previous life to some extent (unless what they turn into specifically wipes memories).
Common Interactions with the Soul
Death: Upon death, the soul is released and heads away from the mortal realm towards the soulstream. Assuming they are not resurrected by monks/the revival system their soul falls under (e.g. liches reforming at their phylactery), they will pass into the soulstream. There, Aeriel will pass judgement on the soul. Should the person have bore a connection to an Aengudaemon, they will be taken to their respective plane.
Resurrection/Healing: As stated in the "Blueprint" section, it takes generally a year for an injury or change to the body to register with the soul blueprint. Certain magics revolve around using the blueprint for healing, such as Monks. For example, if the injury has not registered with the blueprint, they will be able to revert their body to the way that their blueprint portrays them as. The same holds true for when a person is resurrected, any wounds or changes made to the person in the last year will be rendered null (for the most part, certain things such as deific disconnection are exempt).
Soul Shadows: A person, upon death, may find that they are kept in the mortal realm for one reason or another. Whether they have been forcibly risen as a ghoul or have returned as a graven, they linger for a time. Those that return under these circumstances are found to bear "Soul Shadows". These are fragmented and broken imitations of souls, unlike whole souls that descendants normally bear. Those that fall under the category of soul shadows are: Ghosts, Gravens, Ghouls/Morghuul, and apparitions (these are a conglomerate of soul shadows and souls).
Deific Connections/Creatures: Many deific mages, such as the clerics or druids, have a deific connection in their soul. This acts as a tool for the deific user, as with this connection they are able to bring forth the power of their deity. The connection also acts as a claim of sorts, guarding the person’s soul from other types of deific connections or curses that attempt to permanently warp the soul (frost witch, striga, Izkuthii, shade, though this does not exempt them from soul puppetry).
Soul Puppetry: Soul puppeteers utilize magic that revolves around establishing a connection with the target’s soul, specifically tuning into their blueprint (due to the way this works, it bypasses any present deific connection). They are capable of temporarily manipulating the blueprint in a variety of ways, which translate into physical alterations/ailments or mental distortions. Due to the fact that they are solely connecting to the blueprint, they are unable to manipulate memories or affect things such as mana or life-force within the target’s body.
Soul Additions
As spoken about in the first Animology piece (linked in the spoiler at the top), there are currently three types of altered souls. This addition is an attempt to bring about two new states. Hybrids souls are for creatures that don't really fit into the existing three while Patchwork souls are something brand new.
Hybrid Souls
To continue off the three already established altered soul states, the fourth is what is known as a Hybrid Soul. These are souls that have either undergone Metanoia or Transmogrification, but differ from the aforementioned states. The key difference here is that the soul has had pieces of it replaced with a different material other than soul essence. In addition, Hybrids are capable of having a “base” descendant form, in which their body is identical or near identical to that of their original state before their Soul was altered. Along with this “base” form, they also have one or more altered forms where their blueprint alters to match that of their form. With this in mind, the Soul carries the necessary plans for an unaltered soul, making them capable of producing offspring. However, any offspring produced will only receive the unaltered plans, making any kind of hybrid child impossible.
Example: Daeva, Archon, Izkuthii
Patchwork Souls
The fifth state of altered souls is known as a Patchwork Soul. Unlike the other states, this is unable to be attained by those with ordinary Superior Souls, as it revolves around semi-repairing those who bear soul shadows. One who knows how to handle soul essence and possesses such must insert it into the soul shadow directly. When this occurs, the soul essence will begin to meld with the broken soul, mildly giving it semblance of being repaired. This, however, is a falsity as the soul still lacks a number of things that separate soul shadows from Superior Souls. In fact, their physical state remains the same, so if a ghoul had a Patchwork Soul, they would still be stuck in their rotting undead form. The effects that can be gained from having a Patchwork Soul are: they gain a minute amount of magical potential based on what kind of creature they are, they receive the ability to have a clearer memory and function emotionally, and their body scars with more ease.
]
|}</div>
Addition
| Souls are that which find themselves inextricably inserted in every being which roams this earth with some form of sentience or another— and even those without. But what is a soul exactly? And what separates the insect which can cast not spell or think, and the higher mortals who can create such powerful eldritch feats?
|
