Souls

What are souls?
Souls are the immaterial essence of a being and, from creature to creature, their complexity, strength and general makeup can vary greatly. The first souls were created directly by God and are the original divine beings, which includes Aesturex, the current lord of souls. With each creature born or created, whether naturally or through magic, a new soul will be born as well, however, unless they receive a spark, the soul will vanish once their life ends, as their mind can not exist without a living body to support it.

What is the spark?
In the beginning of the universe, everything was empty and bleak. To further his goal of creating a rich and varied universe, God created the first divine beings, each with a different personality and scope of power. At the core of their souls he put the sparks, one for each of them, and, by that, gave them the power to attract and shape the mana that was to become the universe.

At some point, The Shattering occured, splintering shards of the originally much larger divine sparks among the mortals, with a special focus on humanity. This enabled humans to use magic, and also gave them the power to continue their existence after death. It took some time until the chaos from The Shattering settled, but ultimately it resulted in Aesturex becoming the new Lord of Souls and in Heirir as well as the hells being created to deal with the issue of the increasing amount of adrift souls.

Currently, Aesturex assigns each creature of a race that was affected by The Shattering a spark at some point during its youth. This can happen anywhere from it still being in its mothers womb to years after its birth, but it is usually done as early as possible to avoid developemental problems. Should a soul not be eligible for the afterlife (perhaps due to a lack of mental capabilities, or due to it simply not wanting an afterlife, or having grown tired of it) the soul will be cleaned and the spark brought back into circulation.

Each spark carries a certain disposition and base personality with it, the strength of which can vary widely. This is known to influence the developement of a creature's mind and soul as it grows, especially if it interacts with its spark a lot (such as by casting magic). This is especially apparent if the spark comes from a shattered divine or was reborn (even more so after multiple circulations).

Sparks are indestructible by anything other than the Soul Forge, however, they can still be tampered with and especially the life of a mortal creature usually leaves and imprint on the spark. To reduce how permanent that imprint is creatures go to purgatory after death, where their souls are cleaned. Afterwards they are allowed to rest in Heirir, with a protective shell of sorts around their soul that prevents them from being corrupted by the demonic essence unless they purposefully overexpose themselves.

((I'll need to work out the specifics of that and why souls would go to Heirir in the first place, where they absorb demonic essence. Maybe it's to keep the demonic essence in check and prevent it from forming too many feral demons, or maybe it's an agreement that had to be made with the lords of sin or something along those lines, where the divines were essentially pressured into doing it.))

Do God and Mors have souls?
As God and Mors existed within the universe before God created the concept of souls, one might question whether or not the two of them possess souls. The answer is somewhere between yes and no, as both of them possessed a will, mind and personality before souls existed, and, even should the concept of souls no longer exist, these two will continue to be. With the concept of souls existing, however, God and Mors have both materialised Souls as well, each of them carrying a spark as well.

In Mors' case this is especially interesting, as creatures infused with fragments of his spark are able to use uncreation themselves. However, using that power places an enormous stress on them, enough that, for the most part, only the original divine or other exceptionally powerful beings are able to use it in any macroscopically significant manner. This infusion is also the base for his side project.