Souls

Souls are of significant importance in Baltia, as they are the root of all energy within the world. All power, be it arcane or divine, can trace back its origin as coming from the soul of a living being. Further, the power of a beings soul (or souls, in some cases) tends to correlate directly with the power of the being themself, and the level of influence they are able to exert upon the world.

The origin of souls is somewhat mysterious, with even the gods themselves claiming not to know exactly how they come about. The leading theory among scholars is that they originate in the Outside, the plane of contradictions and illogical physics, where the existence of such a powerful “substance” as a soul is not at all unlikely. Souls that are in their infancy, like those that would inhabit plants or other very simple organisms, then filter through the barrier that protects Baltia from the outside, and into the afterlife.

Once a soul exists in the afterlife, it may then enter the cycle of Reincarnation. The vast majority of souls are so weak as to be imperceptible to most beings in the afterlife without a deliberate desire to focus on them, and few creatures that reside there have

Within Baltia, the laws of Thermodynamics are firmly in place, with one notable exception - it is possible for energy to be created, with a soul as the only thing capable of doing so. All living beings have souls, from individual blades of grass to the most ancient and powerful dragon, with the gods and even some constructs also having souls. However, the souls of all creatures are not created equally. Where a human has a soul that can be