Soul Gem

A Soul Gem is a vessel capable of holding a soul or, in at least one demonstrated use, an original body while its soul inhabits a constructed body. The narrative features multiple distinct gems; their occupants, custody, and fates must not be treated as those of one continuous object.

History

The occupied auction gem

Cain first encounters an occupied Soul Gem at an auction whose staff cannot identify what is inside. The item requires Living Art to use, and the seller agrees to provide it if Cain can unlock a specified class advancement. Once Cain obtains the gem and the necessary skill, he has Living Art generate a default puppet body and draws out its occupant, Daisy. She explains that Lucca's necromancers sealed her soul in the gem after her king died. The transfer releases Daisy into a living puppet body under Cain's command; the source does not separately describe what remains of that particular gem after its contained soul is removed. (Chapters 319, 332, and 338)

Later vessels and restorations

Later Soul Gems demonstrate that the name describes a class of vessel rather than Daisy's gem alone. Cain holds a captured captain's original body in one gem while the captain's soul occupies a puppet body, retaining the gem as leverage until the prisoner is handed over. In another world, an elder brings Cain a dark green gem containing her sect's First Elder. Unlike most trapped souls, his mind remains active inside it. Cain uses Soul Transfer to draw him into a newly constructed body and revive him, again leaving the emptied gem's precise physical fate unstated. (Chapters 538 and 640)

Abilities and properties

• A Soul Gem can contain a soul for an extremely long period; Daisy had remained sealed since the fall of Lucca roughly a millennium earlier. (Chapter 332)
• Cain's Living Art can pull a contained soul into a puppet body. This interaction requires the skill; before Cain learns it, the auction gem cannot be used by him. (Chapters 319 and 332)
• The gems do not impose one uniform mental state. The First Elder remains conscious, while the narration says most trapped souls spend their confinement in stasis. (Chapter 640)
• At least one Soul Gem holds a person's original body while the soul operates a puppet body, showing a storage use distinct from the occupied soul vessels. (Chapter 538)

Ownership and custody