Unusual Forms of Life
While most creatures follow an established pattern in how their body originates, develops, and how their magic interacts with their bodies and souls, there are exceptions that do not fit within this system. These unusual forms of life can arise when magic alters the relationship between a body, a soul, or both, resulting in forms of existence that cannot be classified alongside ordinary creatures.
Corporeal forms of life can reproduce normally. Any offspring they produce is an independent living being with its own soul and does not inherit or perpetuate the magical construct that created its parent.
Summons
A type of magic that allows the soul of an entity bound to a magical formation to be called forth and given a physical manifestation through magic. The formation acts as an anchor for the soul, while the magic invested into it provides the means for the soul to temporarily manifest. The manifested entity retains its own consciousness and free will and is not inherently bound to the will of the caster.
The physical manifestation is sustained by magic and ceases to exist when the summoning is ended or the magic sustaining it is exhausted. The soul itself remains bound to its magical formation and may be summoned again.
Scriptures describe ancient forms of soul-binding magic that allowed individual souls to be bound to magical formations for the purpose of summoning them. These practices were eventually outlawed after they were used experimentally on slaves, often resulting in their deaths, and have since fallen out of use.
The only known form of soul summoning still actively practised is the summoning of the constellations. Constellation summoning is extensively documented and remains an established and well-researched magical art.
Wisps
Wisps (also called will-o'-the-wisps) are souls that remain in the world after death when exceptionally strong emotions, such as regret or a sense of unfinished business, prevent them from fully moving on. This does not happen to every soul, and the exact circumstances that cause a soul to become tethered are not fully understood.
Wisps are usually visible as floating flames, with their colour reflecting the individual soul. As concentrated sources of magic, they are often sought out and used to power magical artefacts, making them vulnerable to being captured or stolen. Wisps therefore tend to gather in remote or difficult-to-reach places such as deep forests and bogs, where they are less likely to encounter others.
Souls with particularly strong magical abilities may manifest as ghosts rather than simple wisps. These ghosts can interact with their surroundings through mana manipulation, allowing them to move objects or cause them to float. However, they cannot access more powerful magic beyond this limited interaction with mana.
Manifestations
A form of lost magic that creates artificial life by reconstructing an existing body or its remains and binding a soul to it. The body must first be restored to a condition capable of sustaining life, and not every soul is compatible with every body, making the process largely one of trial and error. The soul normally comes from another individual, though it is theoretically possible to return a recently deceased individual's own soul to their reconstructed body if it can be contained before moving on. This is rarely possible due to the difficulty of trapping souls.
Manifestations retain the memories, personality, and free will of their soul. However, physical memories preserved in the reconstructed body, particularly those encoded in the brain and through muscle memory, may also remain. This can result in a manifestation displaying memories or behaviours belonging to the body's former occupant.
The practice is no longer actively performed, with its principles surviving only through oral conveyance. It was used to recreate extinct species from their remains—velociraptors being the best known—and could also be used to restore the bodies of deceased individuals, though placing another soul within such a body would not restore the original individual. If rediscovered, the practice would likely be outlawed due to its ethical implications.
Thralls
An extinct form of dark magic used to create soulless creatures that are entirely subject to the will of their caster. Thralls were created through a manifesting sigil to which the resulting creature was bound, allowing the caster to control its body and perceive the world through its senses.
Thralls were living constructs made from flesh and sustained by the caster's magic. Without a continuing supply of magic, a thrall would die of magic starvation. Because maintaining short-term thralls was considered wasteful, practitioners developed temporary forms made from shadow and air rather than solid flesh, allowing them to be dismissed without leaving a body behind. The bodies of the deceased could also be used as vessels for thralls.
The creation of thralls was outlawed in antiquity, and the practice has been forgotten for so long that thralls are no longer known to exist. Historical records of the art survive, but many details of its practice and the sigils used to create particular thralls have been lost.
In theory, an existing thrall could be kept alive indefinitely by supplying it with an independent source of magic, such as an artificial magical reservoir that could be replenished. Such a thrall would nevertheless remain completely without free will and dependent on its magical source for continued existence.