Apparitions

Apparitions are an uncommon variant of demon. While most demons are created after someone’s died via red magic infection, causing their soul to become broken and damaged, Apparitions are not. The vast majority of Apparations are created as a result of a soul dying due to a strong blast of red magic, powerful enough to damage the soul slightly, causing it to shift from blue magic to light magic.

   Apparitions are too different from Demon and Mortal souls to enter either afterlife. They’re unable to be sent to the Void, and they’re unable to return to the Afterlife to heal. Because of this, they’re trapped in the Mortal Realm almost permanently. Apparitions are Souls without bodies to inhabit that are bound to Mirror Domain and cannot return to either the Afterlife or the Void. Many Apparitions aren’t even aware that they’re technically “dead”.

   Because they have no body to inhabit, an Apparition is left completely invisible to the average creature. If one is spotted, it’ll look like a small wisp of light magic that dances from side to side as the creature moves around. Those who can see them, often with the aid of magic, can see that the vast majority of them resemble the average mortal. Their invisibility causes uninformed people to mistake these creatures as ghosts.

   At first glance an Apparition appears to be normal. They’ll look like whatever creature they were in life (A Kodin looking like a Kodin, for example), but on closer inspection they’re far from normal. Many of these creatures appear similar to that of a Mortal at first, but with a few distinct traits that’d unnerve anyone. Creatures without eyes or mouths is a common example. Sometimes their appendages lack detail, such as solid fingerless hands or feet, or a set of teeth made up of a single solid block. These discrepancies are brought on by the damage to their soul, which alters their physical appearance.

       The true form of an Apparition has no one standard. Those who died suddenly or unpleasantly will commonly keep any injuries they sustained. For example, a creature who was torn in half will remain in half, with both halves of the body only loosely staying in proximity of each other. That being said, an Apparition’s form doesn’t always follow these rules. On occasion they’re able to take control of their form and skew it to be whatever they desire. This often included changing their species to something completely different from what they were, or changing into a monstrosity that doesn’t or can’t exist within the Mortal Realm.

Under normal circumstances, an Apparition is unable to interact with anything in the Mortal Realm. No matter how hard they push or how loud they scream, nothing they do can influence anything. Because of this, the vast majority of Apparitions go mad. Their madness varies, and it’s more often than not directly tied to their intelligence. A rabbit doesn’t have the capacity to understand the situation it’s in, and as a result won’t go insane over not being able to interact with the Mortal Realm. It may become depressed from lack of contact with members of its species, but that’s pretty much it. Pure creatures or Demons are the ones that become dangerous. These creatures are fully capable of understanding the situation they’re in, and they’ll usually do whatever they can do to get out.

Many Apparitions eventually find themselves in the Inbetween. The Inbetween is the closest place to the Void that an average creature can get to, so most of them will unconsciously follow the Void’s pull in hopes of freeing themselves from the hell they’re trapped in. The high population of Apparitions in the Inbetween have caused several invisible settlements to spring up. These places are known to residents as “Haunted” because of the strange happenings brought on by Apparitions.