Spirits

Spirits are conscious and intelligent (to varying degrees), and have the ability to communicate with humans without any apparent language barriers. Their bodies have substance, but are able to change size and shape in unnatural ways, and are not governed by the laws of gravity; they do not require food or drink for sustenance, and are instead nourished by the emotions, memories or vital energies of mortals. They are often hard to kill, and when they are destroyed, their bodies disappear: it is thought that slain spirits return to Asthirlok, and death is only a brief inconvenience. They can also fade and die if they are deprived of human contact or other ways to obtain the energies they require. Spirits seem able to travel between Martalok and Asthirlok with ease, but are unable to travel to Dhrualok, even if attached to a human host who is making that journey.
Assistive spirits Many people who have limited vision or hearing make use of supernatural means to augment their senses. Assistive spirits, also known as helpers, seem to be drawn to people with these conditions, sensing the potential to form a symbiotic relationship which is usually friendly and mutually beneficial. Helpers are small, multicoloured creatures that look a little like a piece of rectangular material which has been twisted in the middle to form two triangular shapes, attached with a small knot, with small flexible stalks extending from their bodies. A helper will attach itself to a host - usually resting partially within the host's ear - and either describe what it can see (for a host with limited vision), or repeat or describe sounds that it hears (for a host with limited hearing: the proximity of the helper's voice to the inner ear and the rest of the skull makes it easier for a person to hear noises which would otherwise be too quiet to detect, although it is also thought that helpers can make use of mild telepathy). Some helpers also serve as translators, making use of a spirit's capacity to seemingly understand all mortal languages by translating what they hear, to the best of their ability, into a language that their host can understand. Helpers have keen sight and hearing and can see in the dark to a greater extent than humans, although their senses are by no means perfect, and their ability to transmit information (or select which information is most relevant) can be limited by their lack of contextual knowledge. The helper gains energy from the host's body (which can be slightly tiring for the host, but is not dangerous), as well as through the information and emotions which they pass on. It is possible to detach a helper from the host's body for a few hours to serve as a sort of spy: the helper is left in a room to watch events or listen to a conversation, and report back to their host later. However, this is only possible if the helper is temporarily attached to a new host (usually a domestic animal) which can offer a degree of warmth and vital energy; if left too long in this state, the helper will fade away and disappear from the mortal realm. Helpers usually form positive personal relationships with their hosts and often appear to have distinct personalities but their memories are limited: if a helper is detached from its host for more than a day or two, but manages to find a replacement host in this time, it will soon forget all details of its previous host. Certain cultural and especially religious beliefs may lead people to reject the help that these spirits offer, or to stigmatise people who bond with assistive spirits.

Controller spirits These spirits, which are also known as spurs, attach to human or animal hosts in order to control their movements and actions for short periods of time. Sapient hosts can rarely be controlled for as long as an hour at a time, whereas animals might be controlled for days or weeks at a time; but in any event, the control is total, but is limited to actions which the host might reasonably choose to do anyway, and the host is left with no memory of their conduct once control fades. In its dormant state, the spirit itself appears like a small, irregular, colourful stone or piece of metal, often with a small perforation near one edge (to facilitate being hung on a chain) and in this form, the spirit has strong enough powers of suggestion to make most humans who see it want to pick it up and keep it about their person for good luck. When the spirit is ready to exert its control over a human host, or if it is interacting with an animal host that is unable to pick up an object, it takes on a more active form: it unfurls a mass of legs and hidden fangs, giving it an appearance more like a bloated tick. This form allows the spirit to move around more easily and to find a spot to latch onto the host's body - often at the base of the neck - and exert control through its bite. In most cases, controller spirits seem to lack any higher motivation: they drain small amounts of energy by staying in close contact with a living host, and larger amounts of energy during periods when they are in full control, but the movements which they force their hosts to unknowingly make seem random. For humans, falling prey to a controller is generally little more than an occasional inconvenience, although controlled animals who become either more aggressive or more docile might have their ability to hunt or be hunted affected in negative ways. However, there are a few recorded incidents of controller spirits apparently carrying out the plans of more powerful Asthiri or, in a few stories, even mortals; it is not known what reward might be offered to a controller spirit to elicit such cooperation. These kinds of plots can put human hosts of controller spirits into much more difficult situations.
Dragons Dragons are spirits who enter the mortal realm and cause materials to coalesce around them into a recognisable body. The form that this takes varies considerably: dragons may have no legs, two legs, four or more; they may have wings, or they might fly without need of wings (in either case they seem able to ignore ordinary rules of gravity their face usually resembles that of another creature, but may be leonine, avian, reptilian or more humanoid, and may have additional horns. Usually, the bulk of a dragon's body is made of soil, mud, grass, leaves, flowers, feathers, seeds, small stones, small pieces of metal (such as coins), or even water; these materials may be compact or kept relatively loose. The size of a dragon depends on the strength of the spirit, the amount of material it causes to coalesce, and the amount of time it has existed in a single coherent form: older dragons tend to be larger and more skilled at manipulating their piecemeal bodies. The occupying spirit can usually only be defeated if the dragon's body is destroyed and dispersed through multiple attacks, faster than it can reform. Although many dragons live peacefully alongside humans, others disrupt agriculture or shelters (by absorbing grain, fresh water or building materials into their bodies), and may be targeted by warriors to reduce this negative impact. Still more dragons are an active threat to human lives. Larger or more skilled dragons are able to temporarily collapse the connection between the various materials in their bodies, and may use this as a way to attack: for instance, a dragon made primarily of rocks and stones may collapse over a target in order to bury or bludgeon them, and then quickly reform. They might also attack with claw, bite or tail attacks, provided they have concentrated hard or sharp materials at these places in their body. More aggressive dragons, or those who feel underthreat, will sometimes absorb materials into their body specifically to use as projectiles: many an archer has found their own arrows turned against them, an ambush might involve the dragon spewing out smoke or noxious swamp gas to incapacitate its targets, and most infamously, if a dragon attacks a settlement at night, it will often absorb torch-flames into itself and then breathe out the fire as a weapon. Like other spirits, dragons are intelligent and able to communicate with humans (without any apparent language barrier), and require energy from mortal creatures: some dragons obtain this energy through regular conversation with humans, by listening to memories and stories and learning about their lives; others prefer the faster and more direct method of killing animals (or even humans) in the aforementioned ways, and absorbing the energy and emotions released at the moment of death, although they do not consume the corpses. Some communities form long-lasting affectionate bonds with peaceful dragons, while others may be harassed by a violent dragon for months at a time.
Mirror spirits Mirror spirits, also called greater spirits and echoers, are the most powerful form of spirit other than true Asthiri. After entering the mortal realm, they take on the appearance and behaviour of humans; but they do not need to eat or sleep, and they can change their appearance at will (to imitate the face of anyone they have seen).
Shifters The shifter is a type of spirit which attaches to human hosts and transform them in order to gain access to the energy required to exist on the mortal plane. Unusually among spirits which attach to human hosts, shifters do not appear to require or desire their host's compliance or consent. Shifters resemble a mass of hair, usually black and wiry but able to change shade and texture, which attach either to a host's head or to their body (often their chest or shoulders), and become embedded in the host's skin: if the visible 'hair' is cut or shaved, the spirit will grow back from its hidden roots. The initial process of embedding is when the shifter is most vulnerable, so if it is attaching to an unwilling host, it may attempt to do so when the host is asleep or otherwise incapacitated; there are stories of people knocking out their enemies (with drugs or other means) and persuading a shifter to attach, as a way to curse a foe (or merely to spread chaos). The only safe way to remove a shifter from its host is to persuade it to move to another available host, usually with the promise that the individual in question will be weaker and less able to resist its domination; the spirit can also be destroyed by killing the host and burning the body. Once attached to a host, the shifter grants the ability to transform into a powerful animal of roughly human size: in northern regions, this is usually a wolf; in the south, it is more likely to be a tiger or hyena; other forms are also possible, and an individual shifter theoretically has access to multiple forms, even if it favours one in particular. Depending on the relative mental strength of the shifter and of the host, the transformation may or may not be under the host's control: in the latter case, the spirit will direct the transformed host's actions for the duration, and the host awakens afterwards with no real memory of their actions in beast form. During the transformation, the spirit's body expands into a layer of muscle, skin and fur which covers the body of the host, as well as adding claws, sharp teeth and other bestial features. If the host loses control of the transformation, the spirit will compel them to go on a murderous cannibalistic rampage: it draws energy from the fear of its prey, the mindless rage of its host, and (in many cases) the confusion, disgust and remorse which a host is likely to feel upon realising that that they may have killed and feasted upon another human being. While the transformation is active, the extra muscles and second skin add strength, endurance and resistance to many physical attacks, while the host gains the ability to run on four legs as well as two, and to injure or even kill with their bite. Each transformation can last for less than an hour, or for as long as a decade, but in most cases it seems to occur overnight for four to six hours at a time, and leaves the host physically and emotionally drained. The human host may be called a therianthrope, a more specific term such as lycanthrope or vukodlak (which both refer to humans who take the form of a wolf), or simply a shifter. The term can therefore apply equally to the spirit and the host; if it is necessary to specify that the spirit itself is being discussed, it may be referred to as a beast spirit or predator spirit. Even if an individual host has enough willpower to avoid having their mind dominated by the shifter, the spirit will wait for moments of weakness (particularly times when the host is feeling powerful negative emotions such as rage or grief) in order to attempt to take over. Therianthropes are stereotypically muscular and hairy, even in human form, and this has some basis in reality: the combination of vigorous exercise and a diet rich in meat which a therianthrope experiences during periods of transformation means that, over time, they do naturally become stronger and more athletic; and as a beast spirit spends more time attached to a host, its mass of hair expands, although often this means that the hair on the host's head is longer and thicker rather than resulting in an increase in body hair.
Vampiri A vampir is a person who has formed a symbiotic relationship with a particular type of spirit known either as a siphon or as a vampiric worm; in return for nourishing the worm, the vampir gains an ability to experience the memories and emotions, and draw some strength from the vitality, of any creature whose blood or flesh they consume. This process is addictive: even eating cooked meat from an animal instills the vampir with a burst of energy and heightened senses, an experience which is generally described as exhilarating. Unfortunately, when a vampir feasts upon a creature that has already been slaughtered, they will experience the fear and pain of the animal's final moments, which is said to be very distressing; and although the consumption of animal blood and flesh can temporarily grant a vampir the heightened senses of sight, smell or hearing which the animal enjoyed in life, a long-term diet made up primarily of this kind of meat makes it harder for the vampir to retain their human understanding and desires: such vampiri become more animalistic (in terms of their hygiene, eating habits and interpersonal behaviour), and less able to cope in human society. As such, many vampiri choose to gain nourishment from human victims, often while their target is asleep; this has the bonus of giving the vampir access to a wider range of human experiences than they might otherwise have, and to secrets or hidden knowledge. For most people who agree to host a siphon, the promise of access to other people's knowledge or memories is the greatest attraction of this arrangement. Like assistive spirits, siphons can only remain on Sadhanvar in a stable form if they have a mortal host: the process of establishing a fixed bond with a host takes several days, and as the spirit is in a vulnerable state during this period (and is easily destroyed), this is only really possible if the host consents. During the initial period, the siphon resembles a white or pale grey leech, and usually attaches itself to the potential host's wrist or neck, while it attempts to persuade the individual to allow the creation of a more permanent bond in exchange for certain supernatural abilities. If the host agrees, the siphon will migrate into the host's mouth, at which point the promised abilities will first develop, and then slowly (over a period of days or weeks), it will move down the throat and into the top of the stomach; once it has moved past the throat, it cannot be extracted without killing the host. Vampiric worms gain a small amount of sustenance from the host, but are primarily nourished from the memories, emotions and vitality contained in any meat or blood which their host - the vampir - consumes. To enable this consumption, as a secondary ability, the siphon is able to cause a host's canine teeth to grow into fangs, better able to pierce or tear skin, and can enable the host to breathe out a paralysing gas at will, to prevent a victim from fighting back. Note that the vampir does not need to consume very much blood from any individual victim: the process is rarely fatal, although it will leave the victim weakened, confused, dispirited and suffering from a degree of memory loss. It is only through repeated feasting on a victim that death becomes a serious risk, although some vampiri are known to kill their victims for sport. The symbiotic relationship can slow a human's aging process and increase their lifespan significantly, another reason why so many people make this bond willingly. If a vampir is stricken by illness or otherwise brought close to death, the siphon is able to sacrifice some of its own vitality to return the vampir to health (usually only after a short period of unconsciousness for the vampir, resembling death, which allows the vampir's body to recover as such, there are tales of vampiri seeming to return from the dead, and even from being buried. A vampir which is revived in this way feels an extreme urge for blood, to restore the strength of its siphon, and may be more liable to drain too much from its victims over the subsequent days and weeks. The best way to ensure that a suspected vampir does not return to life is to stab it through the stomach, to kill the worm; decapitation is also recommended, to remove any ability to feed.

Some of these spirits have obvious roots in real-world mythology, although in each case I have tried to add my own twist to distinguish them from conventional fantasy creatures. In other cases, the inspiration might be slightly more obscure. Antique spirits are inspired by poltergeists, haunted dolls and Japanese stories of tsukumogami. Dream-eaters are heavily inspired by the Japanese baku, but given characteristics associated with supernatural causes of sleep paralysis.