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trailmix
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Ive elaborated a bit on the original post. I would like comments and ideas but I found questions help me flesh out stuff like this even better. So if you read this and have any questions please post them.

The seed of life is planted at conception. That seed grows very much the way a plant seed does. It is in effect 100% life energy, growing towards its full capacity. There are exceptions, birth defects, degenerative diseases and so on. The baby is born and the process continues, 100% life energy growing until physical maturity. At that point, life recedes and the body breaks down. Death distends as life recedes. In effect, a middle age person is probably at 70% life (positive) energy and 30% death (negative) energy. The recession of life energy quickens as a person gets older. Eventually the negative energy extinguishes the life energy completely.

That is the natural order of things. But there are a few that can manipulate the ratio of positive and negative energy in their bodies as well as in other beings. They can siphon life out of others to regain youth or heal a wound. They trade their death energy for another’s life. It is the inverse for the victim. Death gains ground and can eventually overtakes them if enough life is siphoned.

When pulling out death out of a person that is wounded it is stored in the Soulcaster, thus aging or wounding or causing some other degenerative effect until the Soulcaster can release it into another living being. Equally detrimental to a Soulcaster health would be to give his own life energy to the wounded. The most common way to heal someone is to siphon the life energy out of a plant or animal or perhaps a criminal sentenced to die anyway and release that into the wounded. It’s important to note that different people or animals will have varying total energy capacity. A cat would only have enough life energy to heal a flesh wound. A tree's energy does the exact opposite of an animal. It continues to grow positive energy, like a baby. An ancient tree may have the life energy equaled to a hundred men.

Bottom line is, our bodies are like soul batteries, except, we are always at 100% energy. You cannot store more than 100%. If the Soulcaster energy is 50 points positive, 50 points negative, then he can siphon only 50 points of positive energy from a victim. And it begins to degrade immediately at a pace determined by his true health. A Soulcaster that is 80 years old that has 8 points of positive energy left can siphon 92 points total out of a person or group of people. He would regain his strength, a his youth but may age at a rate of 1 year every half hour until he is right back at his true health.

Once a body dies (reaches 100% negative energy), the energy slowly fades until the body has no energy at all. The energy is captured and recycled by the earth.
Back to dead bodies. When a body is empty it is called a husk. Life energy can be forced into these husks to animate them. They retain no memory of self and look to the Soulcaster to give them basic instructions. They are essentially mindless zombies. The more "whole" a dead body is, the longer the body will hold a life charge. The more recent the death, the better.

Telepathy is the primary means of commanding the husks but can also be used on the living by transferring energies. This works very much like TCP/IP networking. The Soulcaster loads information into miniscule "bits" of energy, alternating between positive and negative as to not harm himself or the recipient and sends them to the recipient’s brain. Likewise an "evil" Soulcaster could rip the memories from a victims mind by not alternating between positive and negative energies. Touch is required for all of the soul casters abilities. However, a Soulcaster can use other organic materials as a connection. For instance, if you were touching a tree or even another person, the Soulcaster abilities could reach you. The only exception is with shared blood. Then these powers can essentially be used wirelessly.

Not only can a Soulcaster transfer energies from one being to another but he can also rearrange the energies within a being. The Soulcaster could, for example, relieve a headache, cause a headache, and trigger hunger or lust. These smaller reactions would not require a noticeable tradeoff. Meaning to relieve a headache a Soulcaster would not have to cause a backache. He simply disperses the negative energy causing the headache evenly throughout the person’s body, deluding the effect. The only limitation would be the Soulcaster’s knowledge of the human body. He would have to explore his own body, experiment and learn through trial and error or be experienced in medicine.

Thanks for taking the time to read all of that. If you have any questions or note any inconsistencies please let me know. I really appreciate your help. Oh...and if you have seen anything like this before let me know also. As far as I know this is an original thought (as original as anything can be these days).


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Hookt_Un_Fonix
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hmm sounds like the old D&D world of Dark Sun, but more detailed.
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trailmix
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Really? I'll have to look that up. Or....maybe I won't. I don't want to pervert my system by subconsciously melding the two.

scott


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