To Consider the Soul, Vol. II

Volume Two of a series of interviews conducted throughout AR 170-171 about the soul and the responses to those discussions.

Interviews 5-8 of 12 are covered within.

Written by Lilian Williams

25 Marpenoth 172

Introduction

A few years ago, I was asked a question about the soul by the First Keeper of the Erudite Arcanum, Schezalle Sfayi Beltaulur. This query was not put forward with the intention of getting some absolute, correct answer, but was posed as a thought experiment. The goal of this book has been to explore this guiding question that was asked of me. Several other questions were formulated for interviews to provide context as well as get more insight into how those around me view the soul.

The questions utilized varied from interview to interview. Some interviews were much longer than others. A couple interviews were held in a public environment. Some were one on one while others were done in small groups. Suffice to say, this is far from a perfect study, but I found the results to be incredibly insightful even still.

I will preface the text below as I prefaced each and every interview contained within:

I'm not looking for any particular answer. No right or wrong. It doesn't have to be spiritual or analytical - just whatever you feel like speaking on. Any and all thoughts you care to share.

I'm hardly looking for expertise so much as I am lived experiences and abstract thoughts.

I had initially planned not to include interview transcripts and to simply write what I took away from each, but I decided they were far too interesting to leave out as a whole. The records below are not one to one representations of the meetings. Much of the fluff and small talk has been trimmed down or cut out so that the key points of the conversations can take center stage. Throughout the interview transcripts, the author, Lilian Williams, will be referred to as LW.

The subjects interviewed have been left anonymous beyond their gender and race. I wholeheartedly encourage others to use the questions below to inquire with races and cultures not represented within this book about their views on the topic (or even just ask your friends!).

        Day 28, Month 10 (Marpenoth (Leafall)), 172 AR
        "L.W."       

Questions

The questions listed below were used several times throughout interviews. Main questions and related sub questions have been grouped together. These questions made up the foundation of every interview. Question X is the guiding question, referenced above, for the study as a whole.

Question A: "What is a soul to you?"

Question B: "Where do souls come from?"

B1: And... when do they come into play? As in - at what stage is a soul first formed?

B2: And what of the /when/? Is a soul formed at the moment of conception? Is a child's soul siphoned from the mother and father? Something thrust into the vessel of the child after birth?

B3: The gods? One's parents? Some other plane?

Question C: "Does it have inherent qualities?"

C1: Are there particular qualities that you attribute to the soul? Attributes that differentiate it from the "self."

Question D: "Would you say the soul has a capacity to store information?"

Question E: "Do you think one's blood and soul are related?"

Question X: "If the body, mind, and memories of someone were replaced, but the soul remained the same, would the soul's quality change, as well, due to the differences made?"

X1: Do you imagine the soul would be molded to fit the new form then? Whether that be some peaceful acceptance or it being beaten into submission?

X2: What of a theoretical situation in which the soul of a serial murderer replaces the soul of a woman who is unrealistically pure and innocent? The murderer's soul now in the presence of this pure body, mind, and its memories.

        Day 28, Month 10 (Marpenoth (Leafall)), 172 AR
        "L.W."       

Note on Volume II

As the title suggests, this book is not the only one based around this study; however, it is not necessary to have read the first volume to read this. There may be some references to previous interviews, and some thoughts on certain topics and concepts will not be repeated from the initial book, but do not let that keep you from the insight within these pages!

        Day 28, Month 10 (Marpenoth (Leafall)), 172 AR
        "L.W."       

Interview Five - Male Drow

LW: What is a soul to you?

Male Drow (MD): The Soul is at the core of a person. Them, their very being. The undead is just a shell without a soul or with an attachment to their soul housed in an item, such as a phylactery or in the case of a skeletal knight, a circlet. It is power and without it, a being is nothing. It is the most precious thing a person has and it is currency among devils and demons. It is why they seek it out, especially the infernal. They will often trade great power in return for the soul of a mortal.

LW: Outsiders as mentioned often seek out souls of... humans, elves, other mortals of that like. Animals and perhaps even plants have souls as one might be able to tell by casting certain spells up them, but outsiders do not covet those souls. Where do you think the difference lies?

MD: Plants have natural energy, and some, such as Myconids or sentient plants have perhaps a soul. But, the rose you cut to decorate your room is soulless but I have read of magi, very rare and not of this world, that use this natural energy to cast magic. Their power kills all the plant life near them when they cast, especially the more powerful spells. So the difference is sentience, I believe, to have a soul, you must be aware of your life.

        Day 28, Month 10 (Marpenoth (Leafall)), 172 AR
        "L.W."       

Interview Five - Male Drow pt. 2

LW: If the body, mind, and memories of someone were replaced, but the soul remained the same, would the soul's quality change, as well, due to the differences made?

MD: The mind and the soul are combined. A light soul, one of simplicity and goodness is a pure soul. I believe children are born this way, even drow. Like a bucket of clean water, the events of a person's life impact the purity of the soul, like drops of ink add to the water. Enough corruption, and the soul - or water - becomes toxic, and unclean. Remove those memories, those events that made the person good or evil would potentially be a reset of the soul perhaps. Like filtering out the ink and cleansing the water again. The problem is, actions have consequences, and like a stone skipped upon a still body of water, the ripples remain. If a dark soul has made many enemies and harmed their own reputation, it is hard to see them staying pure long. They may have no memory, but others still do and they will begin the process of corruption once again. Hate is a dark corruptor - once the actions of a person has instilled hate into another - that is hard to remove.

        Day 28, Month 10 (Marpenoth (Leafall)), 172 AR
        "L.W."       

Interview Five - Male Drow pt. 3

LW: I wonder if some subconscious part of the 'reset' person would remember this hate.

MD: Memory is a strange thing. A warrior can be struck dumb, but their muscle maintains the memory of their training that years of hard lessons remain, even if they do not know who they are. I wonder if the soul has a sort of muscle memory so to speak.

LW: Would you say the soul has a capacity to store information?

MD: I would guess so. If a memory of the events that caused the corruption to begin with remain, they would be fragmented, and buried deep. To access them, would be like peeling away layers of plaster to reveal an ancient fresco. But it would take triggers and powerful emotional bonds to even attempt to reveal those memories. To tamper with the soul is to change the very being of someone. And it is a blank canvas. You paint that clean canvas black and then try to remove it? the white will never be completely pure again. If you only paint more white on top, you only hide the black it is still there.

        Day 28, Month 10 (Marpenoth (Leafall)), 172 AR
        "L.W."       

Interview Five - Thoughts and Further Questions

"It is power and without it, a being is nothing."

It is undeniable that souls hold power, but the latter claim is more what interests. I wont delve too deep into it, but I find it curious to consider what makes a being "something" as opposed to "nothing". I would consider undead to be "something". The vampire interviewed in volume one is most certainly something as well despite lacking a soul. The fact that beings like that exist and seem to have the will to persist, even if in the form of its most basic urges, makes this claim of nothingness difficult to back. It may also have implications to the nature of the soul as a whole.

"So the difference is sentience, I believe, to have a soul, you must be aware of your life."

This lines up with my understanding of the soul as well. A key distinction between sentient creatures and non-sentience, in most all cases, is having a soul. As implied above, there are likely a few exceptions to this rule, but most of the exceptions that come to my mind either arent truly sentient, or they come from beings that once held sentience. All that being said, does this mean sentience is a byproduct of having a soul? Does a soul come to exist thanks to a creatures sentience? It's also possible it is sheer coincidence, but I'll admit I think it is something more.

        Day 26, Month 10 (Marpenoth (Leafall)), 172 AR
        "L.W."       

Interview Five - Thoughts and Further Questions pt. 2

"A light soul, one of simplicity and goodness is a pure soul. I believe children are born this way, even drow."

If souls do inherit something from their parents, ancestors, blood, and whatever else, this may be a false belief. If a human child died right after birth, its soul would surely have a different destination than the death of a dwarf, drow, or gnome. If that is the case, the soul of a child may not be as straightforward as many would make it out to be. On the chance that they are incredibly simplistic and pure blank slates, I wonder what it would take to preserve the soul in that state for as long as possible. Could some kind of prolonged stasis allow the soul to maintain that form? Is there even value to a soul in that form?

"I wonder if the soul has a sort of muscle memory so to speak."

Most of the interviews prior, as well as ones to come, would point towards this being the case in some capacity. The subconscious nature of "muscle memory" is really what draws me to this comparison. One does not so easily recall what is within their soul, but when the time comes, the information presents itself readily (that is assuming you believe the soul possesses any form of information that needs to be recalled. I most certainly do).

        Day 26, Month 10 (Marpenoth (Leafall)), 172 AR
        "L.W."       

Interview Six - Two Female Drow + Male Human

LW: What is a soul to you?

Female Drow One (FD1): It is certainly a complicated thing to consider. In my estimation it is essence. It is the truest form of the person. Something tangible, clearly, though not something that can exist upon this material plane without a vessel which tempers it for what is to come next.

Male Human (MH): Her answer collects the most of it, I'd say. It's the "truest definition of what you really are." The gathered essence of all the meaning contained in such a thing. Not just the sum of its parts, but the entity you, your memories, and your being all make up and compose as a whole.

FD1: It is a thing which is forged by the experiences of a person.  Its form can shift with external stimuli, though what stimulates a soul is by far different than to what may stimulate a body. Or anything 'mortal'.

LW: Would you say the soul has a capacity to store information?

MH: Information is what I'd use, if all I'd have to refer to was the sum of the parts. The soul is more than that sum. It is the entirety of the being. Not just the simple itemization of components that shaped you, but also the context for how they all fit together. Or, in a word, "essence."

FD1: I think I agree, yes.  That is as good an explanation as any.

        Day 28, Month 10 (Marpenoth (Leafall)), 172 AR
        "L.W."       

Interview Six - Two Female Drow + Male Human pt. 2

LW: Where do souls come from? The gods? One's parents? Some other plane?

FD1: I think it depends upon the soul in question. There is likely some differentiation between race. Our origins are quite different. For instance, my people have a /very/ close history with our goddess. There is likely much shaping by the divine. However, humans tend to have a wider assortment of deities and origins.

MH: I do not know exactly what it is, this raw stuff our souls are made from, but given all the proof we have to surround it, there is a structure to life, an ordainment of sorts, and we are pieces that fall into place within it. Exactly which shape that piece is, and where it falls, is the realm of divinity to decide based upon the actions of the mortals in question, I suppose. But to penetrate the true depths of the origin of the soul, you may have to ask the gods themselves.

FD1: There is likely some shaping by the parents. This is a factor in why breeding is also important.

MH: Some factor, true, though I remain of the conviction that we are only formed to /a certain extent/, that what we claim to be someone else's responsibility has limits and what follows is a product of our own decisions. Otherwise, life would be little less than to be a machine imbued with purpose.

        Day 28, Month 10 (Marpenoth (Leafall)), 172 AR
        "L.W."       

Interview Six - Two Female Drow + Male Human pt. 3

LW: Do you think one's blood and soul are related?

MH: Always. You cannot /escape/ from whence you came.

FD1: I think blood is very closely related to the soul. How precisely? I am uncertain, but of the mortal trappings of the body - blood seems to be the most permeable and susceptible to the properties which may influence or change the soul. I oft suspend 'essence' collections within lifeblood for instance.

MH: The origins, what you /are/ before you become anything else, they will never quite leave you. But, as recognition grows of where you came from, the more agency one grows as to what one can become inside of the parameters of one's origins.

Female Drow Two (FD2): Indeed souls are quite capable of existing and changing absent a body, and thus its blood.

        Day 28, Month 10 (Marpenoth (Leafall)), 172 AR
        "L.W."       

Interview Six - Two Female Drow + Male Human pt. 4

LW: If the body, mind, and memories of someone were replaced, but the soul remained the same, would the soul's quality change, as well, due to the differences made?

MH: How could it not? The soul is not something I understand as an immutable constant. If it is all at once the sum of your existence, and the context, granted the sum of your existence, how would altering your shape, your experiences, your body not also alter the soul?

FD2: In what manner are they replaced?

LW: Take the soul of a serial killer and transplant it into the body, experiences, mind of some innocent, kind commoner.

FD1: I am in agreement with [the Male Human]. Though, I also imagine there would be some bleedback the other way as well.

MH: Indeed so. There could be afflictions to even an innocent if a murderer's soul was to be haphazardly transplanted into them. But exactly to what extent such an affliction might take shape, that is much more difficult to guess.

FD2: One would first need to forcefully displace the one inside the subject, as souls don't typically merge. Therefore nothing is technically being replaced, only the flesh that houses the soul. This is why, thank the Goddess, someone cannot jog down the street jamming souls into people with repeated raise dead spells.

MH: Say you replace say, a random, perfectly innocent girl's personage with a serial killer. To what extent does the serial killer manifest, without the capabilities, the sensory experiences of having been that? Or at least, the capabilities of feeling that which they were, once?

        Day 28, Month 10 (Marpenoth (Leafall)), 172 AR
        "L.W."       

Interview Six - Two Female Drow + Male Human pt. 4

LW: If the body, mind, and memories of someone were replaced, but the soul remained the same, would the soul's quality change, as well, due to the differences made?

MH: How could it not? The soul is not something I understand as an immutable constant. If it is all at once the sum of your existence, and the context, granted the sum of your existence, how would altering your shape, your experiences, your body not also alter the soul?

FD2: In what manner are they replaced?

LW: Take the soul of a serial killer and transplant it into the body, experiences, mind of some innocent, kind commoner.

FD1: I am in agreement with [the Male Human]. Though, I also imagine there would be some bleedback the other way as well.

MH: Indeed so. There could be afflictions to even an innocent if a murderer's soul was to be haphazardly transplanted into them. But exactly to what extent such an affliction might take shape, that is much more difficult to guess.

FD2: One would first need to forcefully displace the one inside the subject, as souls don't typically merge. Therefore nothing is technically being replaced, only the flesh that houses the soul. This is why, thank the Goddess, someone cannot jog down the street jamming souls into people with repeated raise dead spells.

MH: Say you replace say, a random, perfectly innocent girl's personage with a serial killer. To what extent does the serial killer manifest, without the capabilities, the sensory experiences of having been that? Or at least, the capabilities of feeling that which they were, once?

        Day 28, Month 10 (Marpenoth (Leafall)), 172 AR
        "L.W."       

Interview Six - Two Female Drow + Male Human pt. 5

LW: What do you think? Or either of you?

FD2: I'd say much of it falls under the Theory of Infinite Variation. It seems quite likely that, given time and infinite volume of subjects, we could likely see any result we could imagine.

MH: If I were to place it in the words with which I'm able - which may be limited, as I'm not an expert, then it'd be a sort of nameless frustration between the lived experiences of the mind and the body, connected, if they were completely at odds. Try to put it like this - what if you were to try to move limbs you remember, but don't have anymore? I imagine it would be that with a soul, that cannot manifest its desires in a body not accustomed to them.

FD1: I believe the 'mortal experience' affects the soul more than the soul affects the body or.. 'mortal experience' at least in the beginning. The more the soul is tempered, the more difficult it is likely to affect change within that soul, and the more it can likely dictate to the body or 'mortal experience'.

MH: Perhaps the soul too, then, is something that grows more powerful with maturation. Such as that of a truly ancient being overcoming that of less capable creatures.

LW: So the answer to the question could easily vary based on the body, mind, memories, and soul involved?

MH: To consider them all as separate things is a mistake in the first place, if you ask me. Components, perhaps. But not entirely meaningful only within their own context. To ask a person only of their memories, or of their body, or so on - It's only to gnaw at a small piece at a time, often failing to grasp who they might be in their totality.

        Day 28, Month 10 (Marpenoth (Leafall)), 172 AR
        "L.W."       

Interview Six - Thoughts and Further Questions

"Not something that can exist upon this material plane without a vessel which tempers it for what is to come next."

The vessels that come readily to my mind are a mortal body (the most common) or an object in which one is stored, like a soul gem (markedly less common). This above statement does make me curious as to whether or not some kind of environment could be established that would allow for a soul to exist in the material without a vessel (granted, that begs the question if this fabricated environment is just a large scale vessel). Assuming it could be held without the vessel, what would its natural shape be? Could it be interfaced with? So many questions!

"I think it depends upon the soul in question."

If I needed one sentence to summarize this entire study, this one would be in the conversation!

"I also imagine there would be some bleedback the other way as well."

The mention of "bleedback" was a big takeaway from this interview. In the theoretical situation, it seems the most plausible outcome. To combine two things to this degree and expect one to fully usurp the other seems unlikely. When combining scalding hot water with freezing cold water, they meet at an eventual equilibrium. To combine a soul with an opposing body and mind in the fashion mentioned would surely see a similar result. A new form with bits and pieces of each being having intermingled to compose something different.

        Day 26, Month 10 (Marpenoth (Leafall)), 172 AR
        "L.W."       

Interview Six - Thoughts and Further Questions pt. 2

"Souls don't typically merge."

The guiding question involves the body, mind, and memories being introduced and merged with a different soul, but what if it was the two souls being forced to merge? Which parts overwrite which? Is the soul twice as valuable now? Again, there are many questions. It is possible this is how souls of offspring come to be in the first place -- some merger between the souls of the parents. If it is the process that stands as the origin of souls, it is unlikely that value increases drastically on merging, or else there would be exponential inflation of worth.

"I'd say much of it falls under the Theory of Infinite Variation. It seems quite likely that, given time and infinite volume of subjects, we could likely see any result we could imagine."

This may initially come across as an easy out to not properly think about the question, but I certainly see the logic behind it. With something this complex, any number of minute factors could drastically alter the outcome. A tangible conclusion to this experiment, were it ever to actually be done, would surely take innumerable tests whose results could vary wildly.

"It'd be a sort of nameless frustration between the lived experiences of the mind and the body, connected, if they were completely at odds."

This sounds like a horrid existence, but not one grounded too far out of reality. It makes me wonder if this has happened to people in the past, but they have simply never been able to put it to words.

        Day 26, Month 10 (Marpenoth (Leafall)), 172 AR
        "L.W."       

Interview Seven - Female Human

LW: What is a soul to you?

Female Human (FH): A soul is - it's the animating essence of a - a living being, I think. It.touches the world through its body, and is touched in turn.

LW: Touching is a sensory thing. We touch and gain information from it. We can touch this table and remember how it feels. Would you say the soul has a capacity to store information?

FH: Perhaps? More, I think that a soul that resides in a body changes. It can be harmed, or healed. It can grow, or - or shrink. Depending on what it experiences.

LW: Where do souls come from? The gods? One's parents? Some other plane?

FH: I think of gods more as custodians? No, um - oh. Curators. But if I had to hazard a guess as to the /origin/ of a soul? I would say perhaps Ao? I'll reveal myself as a lapsed follower of Silvanus and admit that the more we talk, the more I want to retreat into tree metaphors. Souls as seeds, and so forth. But that really wouldn't work with that idea about the Overgod.

LW: Do you think you can expand on the curation thought at all?

FH: Oh, certainly. It's not perfect, but I think of gods as beings who prize a certain set of - of values, yes? Ilmatar wants the self-sacrificing, Bane the dominating, and so forth. So they gather to them those souls with those values, a bit like a curator sorts books by certain characteristics.

LW: If a library can speak volumes about its curator, I imagine the souls collected would do the very same with the Gods.

FH: Yes, that's very true.

        Day 25, Month 10 (Marpenoth (Leafall)), 172 AR
        "L.W."       

Interview Seven - Female Human pt. 2

LW: Mind humoring me with some of those tree metaphors?

FH: Well, if a soul is like a tree seed, it grows and grows, but the world leaves marks on it - marks you can't even see when the tree lives. You can tell a lot about a tree, from its rings. Age, certainly, but also - has it lived through years of plenty? Years of want? Fire? So like rings, just - just the act of living in a body, creates these marks on a soul. And I suppose you could also argue that if a soul is like a tree, then a new soul, the natural place for it to come from, would be the tree that created it. Because if a soul can grow and break, then surely it can divide, yes? Split off a tiny piece of itself, which could then grow into a complete soul of its own?

LW: If the body, mind, and memories of someone were replaced, but the soul remained the same, would the soul's quality change, as well, due to the differences made?

FH: I don't see how it couldn't. Ever seen an apple tree that someone cut down, but they didn't remove the stump?

LW: I have.

FH: How about a spliced tree? It's also called grafting. Basically you can make a clean cut on a tree, affix a cleanly cut branch to the cut, and it will become a part of a tree. So one apple tree can produce many different sorts of apples.

LW: And how would you suggest this links up?

FH: What you're talking about, it sounds like cutting down a whole tree, then grafting a new tree to the stump. I don't see how a tree - or a soul, in this case, could survive that without fundamentally changing. If nothing else - the wound it would leave on the soul would likely render it unrecognizable.

        Day 25, Month 10 (Marpenoth (Leafall)), 172 AR
        "L.W."       

Interview Seven - Female Human pt. 3

LW: Do you think it'd be more likely that the soul would have to do the adapting then? Its essence shifting to this new environment? And if so, do you imagine a bleedback of sorts?

FH: Hm. Is a soul more like water, or more like a design, you mean? I suppose it could depend on how similar the new form and memories are to the old?

LW: An example I've used when discussing others is the soul of a mass murderer being implanted into the body, mind, and memories of some unrealistically pure and innocent woman. How do you imagine that might turn out? Would one dominate the other? Does the soul manifest subconsciously?

FH: I think putting together such dissimilar things, I think they would reject each other. Can't graft an apple branch onto a cactus, see?

LW: Do you think this rejection would just be inert? Or would it result in some form of mutual destruction? Both the vessel and soul.

FH: Can a soul even be destroyed? I'd think it would more likely be lost. A shade. And the body - can a body survive without a soul?

LW: On the chance it isn't rejected in this fictional world, what do you think the 'Curators' would make of it? A woman who lives her life pure and whole, but deep down her soul is tainted. A taint that seemingly can't be forgotten.

FH: Well, if the graft succeeded, then I think what you'd have would be something new entirely. I can't say whether life in a pure body would heal the soul, or whether the corrupt soul would tarnish the pure thing, but eventually something new would come of what was created, and that would be judged on its own merits.

        Day 25, Month 10 (Marpenoth (Leafall)), 172 AR
        "L.W."       

Interview Seven - Thoughts and Further Questions

"I think of gods as beings who prize a certain set of values."

I find myself rather naturally agreeing with this and the analogy comparing gods to curators with specific interests, but the more I think about it, the more I begin to question it. Is this too heavily projecting mortal thoughts onto immortal beings? Is it possible that gods do not like nor prize any sets of values, but there is some kind of automated sorting that distributes souls of the departed? Could the process be entirely arbitrary? It is easy to assume the world works in certain ways simply because it would make us feel better.

"If a soul can grow and break, then surely it can divide, yes? Split off a tiny piece of itself, which could then grow into a complete soul of its own?"

The initial logic makes sense enough to me, and I find it more believable than some alternative where new souls are thrust into beings from some outside power or plane. It admittedly makes more sense for beings that reproduce asexually given you do not have to question whether or not two parents are somehow having their souls break apart then converge at some undefined point. There are some other questions I have to accompany this notion. Does breaking off a tiny piece have any noticeable effect? Could it play into shifts in emotion that parents feel (whether that is because their soul has been temporarily fragmented or because they have this immense energetic bond to their child)? If souls can be grown this way, that would suggest that a piece of someone else's soul could be torn from them and used to cultivate some offshoot of them. If that is possible, combining that process with cloning (utilizing blood or tissue from an individual) would mean creating twisted replicas of anyone (and without much difficulty) might be plausible.

        Day 25, Month 10 (Marpenoth (Leafall)), 172 AR
        "L.W."       

Interview Seven - Thoughts and Further Questions pt. 2

"It could depend on how similar the new form and memories are to the old."

I am inclined to agree with this thought. It is easier to fit a square into a square-shaped hole than a circular one. I will say the "could" here is important. It is conceivable that the differences in memories dont matter at all.

"Can a soul even be destroyed? I'd think it would more likely be lost. A shade."

The research I've done, along with anecdotal experience, would suggest that souls are a form of energy that would follow typical laws of matter conservation. That being said, souls shouldn't be able to be destroyed. It is more probable that they do get lost or repurposed in some other way. What does that process look like? I have no idea.

"Eventually something new would come of what was created, and that would be judged on its own merits."

Obviously there is room to comment on this and wonder how it would be judged in the short term. If the being died within an instant after the exchange of souls was complete, how would it be seen by the divines and where would it end up? That's difficult to answer. However, as this theoretical being is allowed to develop further and interface with the world, I completely agree with the sentiment presented here. It would be less about parsing the original components and more about analyzing the new amalgamation's worth.

        Day 25, Month 10 (Marpenoth (Leafall)), 172 AR
        "L.W."       

Interview Eight - Female Drow

LW: What is a soul to you?

Female Drow (FED): I can infer a few things, based on my knowledge of planar topics. Firstly, a soul is an entity that is created, can be changed in state and location and can be destroyed, or at least removed from our multiverse. Secondly, a soul is something that is only partially tied to our mortal existence, the existence of the soul and that of its vessel may begin together, but it arrives the moment in which they have to part ways, and the soul meets other fates. Thirdly a soul is something quite specific and essential of the individual it belongs to, in other words, while two souls may be of comparable qualities, they are never the same. From this I believe one can conclude that a soul represents the core essence of a being, in its uniqueness and peculiarity, and that it is strictly necessary for its existence, first in the material and later when the individual transcends it. I think that we can also look at these matters from the point of how necessary a soul is to the existence of life. Namely, is a soul necessary for an individual to be alive? Do all living beings have a soul? I think it would be difficult to analyze that, especially for non-sentient beings. Perhaps one could ask the fiends whether they can extract souls from mindless beings, but then there is the issue whether these souls are worth extracting for them in the first place.

        Day 25, Month 10 (Marpenoth (Leafall)), 172 AR
        "L.W."       

Interview Eight - Female Drow pt. 2

LW: Suppose these non-sentient beings have souls, or even things with just less intelligence. Common animals perhaps. Fiends do not often care for those souls, yes? Where do you think that 'worth' comes from?

FED: If you consider all living beings to have a soul, as primordial and simple as it may be, then I think it is safe to conclude that the soul is the reflection of life in the spiritual realm. Whereas the body is the reflection of the soul in the material. In that sense the worth would come from the complexity of the reflection. The same way in which a simple canvas with a few lines on it, is not as worthy as a large and detailed painting. It is also important to stress how a soul behaves in the context of its life-cycle, as it were, its origin in the material, its transcendence and eventual development and more often than not also eventual destruction in the Outer Planes. Although whether these destroyed souls continue to exist elsewhere is a question we will likely never have an answer for. In that context, I think it is possible to see souls as an emanation of the intrinsic affinity for life of the multiverse, which evolves into life itself. But not also just life but also sentience, as the most notable souls are those of beings that are sentient. I wonder if souls are not merely the attempt of the multiverse to think and realize itself. But I am not convinced that this is actually the truth.

        Day 25, Month 10 (Marpenoth (Leafall)), 172 AR
        "L.W."       

Interview Eight - Female Drow pt. 3

LW: Where do souls come from? The gods? One's parents? Some other plane?

FED: Apparently, there is something beyond our multiverse, and there are beings there too, and these beings are intelligent, and can have souls. Not only that, but these souls are, as far as I know, not so different from ours, once they are detached from those alien beings. This brings to a more unsettling conclusion, at least to me, that the souls may actually be emanations of something that could be outside of the multiverse, or precedent to it. Of course this is impossible to prove, and it remains but a hypothesis. But it is an interesting one, given souls tend to be seen as something intrinsic to the existence of our multiverse and part of it. But they may as well not be. A large amount of this is impossible, or incredibly difficult to prove, but I think there is fun to that. They might simply come in from somewhere else. Or rather, they may be captured from somewhere else, or drawn to our multiverse. And used to support it. It is pretty clear that there is a great economy around souls, and that they are very dear to the powers of the planes, to the point they need them for their mere survival, and thus to support the material first and the outer planes. If we are to look at the mere evidence, it seems that the souls are continuously trapped, herded and moved around by greater entities who rarely have much regard for them, despite what they may otherwise say. While some of these entities may be relatively benign toward the souls they herd, in the end, they herd them because they need them in the first place. Whatever feeling they may have toward them is something that comes afterwards. And that is of secondary importance, if anything to color and set apart the entity in question from other entities who have in common the herding of souls. At this point, it may be proper to present yet another take, and that souls do not actually exist, and that the definition of soul is an abstraction.

        Day 25, Month 10 (Marpenoth (Leafall)), 172 AR
        "L.W."       

Interview Eight - Female Drow pt. 3

LW: Where do souls come from? The gods? One's parents? Some other plane?

FED: Apparently, there is something beyond our multiverse, and there are beings there too, and these beings are intelligent, and can have souls. Not only that, but these souls are, as far as I know, not so different from ours, once they are detached from those alien beings. This brings to a more unsettling conclusion, at least to me, that the souls may actually be emanations of something that could be outside of the multiverse, or precedent to it. Of course this is impossible to prove, and it remains but a hypothesis. But it is an interesting one, given souls tend to be seen as something intrinsic to the existence of our multiverse and part of it. But they may as well not be. A large amount of this is impossible, or incredibly difficult to prove, but I think there is fun to that. They might simply come in from somewhere else. Or rather, they may be captured from somewhere else, or drawn to our multiverse. And used to support it. It is pretty clear that there is a great economy around souls, and that they are very dear to the powers of the planes, to the point they need them for their mere survival, and thus to support the material first and the outer planes. If we are to look at the mere evidence, it seems that the souls are continuously trapped, herded and moved around by greater entities who rarely have much regard for them, despite what they may otherwise say. While some of these entities may be relatively benign toward the souls they herd, in the end, they herd them because they need them in the first place. Whatever feeling they may have toward them is something that comes afterwards. And that is of secondary importance, if anything to color and set apart the entity in question from other entities who have in common the herding of souls. At this point, it may be proper to present yet another take, and that souls do not actually exist, and that the definition of soul is an abstraction.

        Day 25, Month 10 (Marpenoth (Leafall)), 172 AR
        "L.W."       

Interview Eight - Female Drow pt. 4

LW: That is a unique take. Certainly the first I've ever considered it.

FED: There are cultures, such as that of the elves, but also several others, that reject the notion of soul, if not in total, at least for certain beings, and postulate instead that what we deal with are spirits. Traditional elven theology postulates that elves have spirits, like the various animals and other beings of nature, and not souls. I find that there is merit in raising this point, regardless, because it ties to the beings of nature, or other lesser beings whose souls are not normally considered or called "souls". So, to rephrase, maybe the questions should be: first, is there a difference between a soul and a spirit; and secondly, is a soul just the spirit of a sentient being?

LW: Well you had suggested a spiritual realm being some reflection. Perhaps both are present there in some capacity?

FED: Oh, in that point I meant an opposition between the material plane, represented by our body, and the soul, as reflection in the Outer Planes of ourselves. Since it is there that souls become more important, once they are released from our bodies. Then I hypothesized they may actually be more than that, and have their origin elsewhere, beyond our multiverse. In that sense the birth of an individual and the role of our bodies would be essentially to capture the soul.

        Day 25, Month 10 (Marpenoth (Leafall)), 172 AR
        "L.W."       

Interview Eight - Female Drow pt. 5

LW: What stage do you think that 'capture' might occur? Upon conception?

FED: Or the soul could simply emerge and come to be there, as a byproduct of life. It is difficult to guess for me. If we consider that some children can still live and develop even if born prematurely, perhaps it is generated before birth. But also the born prematurely do still have a birth. My educated guess is that it happens somewhere between conception and birth. However you also need to consider that there are beings that are not born in the same way we are. For instance slimes simply split, and one slime becomes two slimes. Do the souls of the slimes split? Or perhaps the souls of the two new slimes come from the soul of the original slime that generated them? In that sense, perhaps the souls come merely from the souls of our parents in the same way our bodies come from theirs.

LW: The latter would be my guess with the slimes, but yes, that'd then suggest a differing origin of the soul, perhaps.

FED: I am not particularly convinced of this interpretation, but given the difficulty in proving these things, it's still good to mention it for the benefit of inventory.

        Day 25, Month 10 (Marpenoth (Leafall)), 172 AR
        "L.W."       

Interview Eight - Female Drow pt. 6

LW: If the body, mind, and memories of someone were replaced, but the soul remained the same, would the soul's quality change, as well, due to the differences made?

FED: If the body was changed, I doubt the soul would change, there have been cases in which bodies were swapped. That begs the question, however, of what the memories are, and if they are part of the body or the soul. Or of both. Then there is the mind, and that too may be something else than the soul. Regardless, I do not think the soul in itself changes, the soul remains the same, even if it can be influenced by its new vessel. What I think is that the soul in itself, is not very defined. It is the body and what it goes through that defines it. Let's, say, if I draw you on a sheet of paper, and then I draw you on another sheet of paper, in the same fashion, this does not mean that the first sheet of paper becomes the second sheet of paper. Even if for all means and purposes both sheets of paper portray you. So, a soul is a blank slate, that is defined through existence, impressed and marked if you will, and this gives it its worth, at least for certain beings. To go back again to my comparison of worthy souls to complex paintings, and the lesser souls to mere sketches.

LW: Do you think the soul has little to do with defining what someone is then? The soul may be defined by our existence, but does it simply /gather/ that information and store it away out of reach? Building up this unseen worth. If the two of us switched souls, for example, do you think our personalities and goals may be subconsciously influenced?

FED: It's a question that is hard to answer, without trying, and I am not sure it is safe to try. Chances are we may not even realize it. It is true however, that after the soul departs the body, it retains something of it. So, I would say that once a soul is imprinted it remains so.

        Day 25, Month 10 (Marpenoth (Leafall)), 172 AR
        "L.W."       

Interview Eight - Thoughts and Further Questions

"A soul is an entity that is created, can be changed in state and location and can be destroyed, or at least removed from our multiverse."

As aforementioned, I do not believe the soul is ever destroyed entirely. Simply removed (possibly from our multiverse as implied here) to be repurposed.

"While two souls may be of comparable qualities, they are never the same."

Even in theoretical scenarios where two souls are crafted from the exact same source and treated to nearly identical stimuli, minute differences in their qualities would still exist. Miniscule as they may be, one soul might have started in a barely different location (even if just a meter away), experienced a slightly altered perspective, lived a moment longer, and so on. I struggle to see how a pair of souls could ever be exactly the same.

"I think it is safe to conclude that the soul is the reflection of life in the spiritual realm. Whereas the body is the reflection of the soul in the material."

This is a fascinating thought. Many are familiar with the Plane of Shadow being a shadowy analogue of the Prime Material plane, but I've not personally heard of some spirit analogue. There is an endless list of questions I would have about a realm that holds the reflections of the souls of everything. One of the main ones that comes to my mind is: if it does exist, can it be accessed by mortals via planeswalking? There are some potentially terrifying implications of a mortal having access to a space where they could easily influence the souls of others. Further questions about how this plane would look and operate aside, this duality of the soul and its being split across two distinctive realms (assuming they both exist) seems plausible.

        Day 25, Month 10 (Marpenoth (Leafall)), 172 AR
        "L.W."       

Interview Eight - Thoughts and Further Questions pt. 2

"I wonder if souls are not merely the attempt of the multiverse to think and realize itself."

This is difficult for me to even fathom the true meaning of. If the gods have souls, they could be the building blocks of this realization and thought as they often encapsulate specific traits and domains. Each individual soul past those would then be feelers put out into their respective worlds to allow for even more complex thought. I personally don't think this is likely either, but it certainly gives a person a lot to think about.

"While some of these entities may be relatively benign toward the souls they herd, in the end, they herd them because they need them in the first place."

Our souls being herded and used by higher powers to simply satiate their needs is far from a comforting thought. Definitely a line of thinking that feeds into nihilistic ideals. That being said, I don't necessarily disagree with it. As stated earlier, there is surely some mortal thought being projected onto the divines as we consider how they might kindly (or not so kindly) treat our souls.

        Day 25, Month 10 (Marpenoth (Leafall)), 172 AR
        "L.W."       

Interview Eight - Thoughts and Further Questions pt. 3

"Is there a difference between a soul and a spirit; and secondly, is a soul just the spirit of a sentient being?"

Nothing I have read would suggest there is a difference between the two terms. I have seen them used interchangeably. If a spirit reflection of the material does exist however, the distinction might be determined there.

"Regardless, I do not think the soul in itself changes, the soul remains the same, even if it can be influenced by its new vessel."

It is possible the soul is just a form of life energy and nothing past that. So often it is conflated with emotion, certain memories, personality traits, and much more, but that could all be misconception. It could be primarily the body that influences all of those things while the soul merely contains imprints of them. If that is the case, it seems likely that if a soul was thrust into a completely different vessel, it would just be similar to handing a person a partially finished book and telling them to continue writing it.

        Day 25, Month 10 (Marpenoth (Leafall)), 172 AR
        "L.W."