Soulforce: The Link Between The Dreaming and Sentience
The Soulforce is separate from
Lifeforce, the energy that animates life; rather, it is a vestige of the Dreaming Realm, a lingering echo of that primordial state from which the Celestial Creators, such as the Tinkerer, once emerged. Soulforce acts as a bridge between the Dreaming and the waking universe, a cosmic residue that retains the potential of unformed creation, memories, and sentience.
This connection to the Dreaming gives rise to the concept of self-awareness. While all life in Alathor is imbued with the Giver’s Life Force, which grants vitality and animates matter, it is the Soulforce, this unique tether to the Dreaming, that allows beings to move beyond mere animation and become truly conscious and sentient. The Dreaming contains the raw potential for ideas, thoughts, and creativity, and when it touches a creature, it bestows the capacity for independent thought, imagination, and free will.
The Role of The Harbingers in the Infection of Alathor
When the Harbingers invaded Alathor during the early days of creation, they brought with them an experimental weapon - as former celestial creators, they had remnants of memory of the Dreaming and had been working to regain access to and some manner of utility from it. Without thought of the consequences, sure only that it would cause chaos and disruption of the TInkerer's plans, they embedded this experimental weapon into the newly formed planet of Alathor with the intent that it would be like a slow-acting poison. The Harbingers were defeated and mostly expelled from Alathor before they could see what effects their weapon might have. This corrupted weapon, which would become the Soulforce, took root in the fabric of Alathor, mingling with the Giver’s Life Force and the raw material of the world itself.
It was this infection that imbued
The Prime, the first sentient race of Alathor, with their self-awareness and some of their magical abilities. As the Dreaming is a place of limitless possibility, the infected Soulforce within the Prime gave them the ability to not only be conscious but also to manipulate the raw elements of creation and the Lifeforce that flowed through them and all other living things--magic itself. This ability came at a great cost, however, as the Prime’s sentience was not a pure gift of the Giver but a fractured and unstable connection to the Dreaming. Their powers were intertwined with the chaotic essence of self-awareness and the infinite of the Dreaming.
The Dual Nature of Sentience in Alathor
This concept also introduces a profound dichotomy between sentient beings in Alathor. On one hand, you have the natural beings, creatures whose existence is shaped solely by the Giver’s Life Force. These beings may live and thrive, but they lack the self-awareness and power to influence the world consciously.
On the other hand, you have the Prime and the races derived from them (like the
Maia,
Nakhasi,
Grizzla,
Pukta, and, to a degree, the Thalorim), who possess Soulforce, making them sentient and capable of wielding magic. However, their sentience is bound to the tainted Dreaming—a legacy of the Harbingers' corruption. This corruption makes the Prime and their descendant races more prone to conflict, ambition, and destruction, traits not seen in the more harmonious, non-sentient life forms.
This also is why the
Stewards were so conflicted about the Prime. While the Prime are indeed alive—imbued with the Giver’s Life Force—they are also a corrupted, unpredictable expression of the Dreaming, which the original celestial Stewards (though not their successors) had no connection or knowledge of, having been created by the
Mother entirely in the physical realm, rather than awoken from the Dreaming.
Additionaly, the Stewards’ duty to nurture life is further complicated by the fact that the Prime’s sentience, and thus their very nature, is born of the Harbingers' influence.
Dreams as a Manifestation of the Soulforce
If Soulforce ties sentient beings to the Dreaming, then dreams themselves are echoes of the Dreaming realm. Every sentient being in Alathor, particularly those touched by the Soulforce, experiences dreams as fleeting glimpses of this primordial world. These dreams are reflections of the infinite possibilities of the Dreaming, distorted and fragmented by the corruption within the Soulforce. Sometimes these dreams are visions of other realities, unrealized potential futures, or even memories of lives that could have been. In other cases, they can be nightmares—a reflection of the Devourer’s presence, the darkness always lurking at the edges of creation.
For the Prime and their descendant races, their dreams are particularly vivid and powerful, often filled with flashes of creativity and destruction. Mages among these races, those more attuned to their Soulforce, may even learn to harness the power of their dreams, tapping into the Dreaming to shape magic in the waking world.
The Prime: A Tainted Gift of Sentience:
The Prime, then, are a byproduct of the Harbingers' infection—a species that carries the unique ability to access the Dreaming through the Soulforce, but in a fragmented and dangerous manner. They are "prisms" of the Giver’s Life Force, but their corrupted connection to the Dreaming makes them chaotic. Their minds are tethered to both the material world and the Dreaming, but they can only glimpse fragments of its infinite potential. This is why the Prime are so creative yet destructive, capable of both culture, art, philosophy, self-awareness, and wielding magic, but often done so out of balance with the world around them.
The Soulforce and Magic:
While elemental magic involves controlling the physical world through the prism of Life Force, Soulforce magic would allow its wielders to access creative, emotional, and spiritual powers, delving into magic that is rooted in:
- Emotion and Creativity: Tapping into the Dreaming allows for manifestations of raw creativity, where artists and dreamers might be able to literally create or reshape reality through intense emotion, art, or thought. This type of magic would be highly unpredictable and often personal, as it draws from the individual's connection to the Dreaming through their Soulforce.
- Spiritual and Soul Manipulation: Wielders of Soulforce magic might be able to influence the souls of others, either through healing spiritual wounds, communing with the spirits of the dead, or even manipulating the essence of sentience itself. This ties closely with concepts like necromancy or arcane magics that deal with the soul and consciousness .
- Dreamwalking and Visionary States: Those who master this branch of magic might also be able to access the Dreaming in a more direct way, entering dreams or visions, either their own or those of others, to gain insight, foresight, or influence events in the real world. These dreamwalkers would be able to harness the creative potential of the Dreaming, but they risk becoming lost in it—just as one might become trapped in a nightmare .
- Arcane and Abstract Magic: Since Soulforce has a connection to the Dreaming, it could also be a source of arcane magic, such as teleportation, time manipulation, or mind control, magics that do not align with the physical laws of nature but instead with the abstract laws of thought and soul. This would be one of the most difficult forms of magic to control, often bordering on dangerous .
However, because the Soulforce was introduced through corruption, magic is not without its dangers. Those who wield it flirt with the boundaries of the Dreaming, risking madness, distortion, or worse—being pulled into the liminal spaces between the Dreaming and the waking world.
