Questions thread

[Tyrnek]

Hmm, I'm not sure it is ever specifically stated, but it's a reasonable distance (half an hour walk or so). His house is also not on the route to school from Sakura or Rin's house.

It's half an hour? Then does around 3km make sense, actually?

I don't think it's ever said when Lancer is summoned, but it's very early, most likely before the prologue.

As for her betrayal, Kotomine befriended her prior to the war, and she came to trust him. Then, after she summoned Lancer, he attacked her when she wasn't expecting it and cut her arm off. And, yes, she very definitely does have feelings for Lancer. She is absolutely besotted with him.

That's about all I know from the reference materials. It would be nice to get the input of someone who's played HA, since "Kirei cut her arm off" doesn't really let me know the undertones of the whole scene.

It's not entirely clear what Sakura is capable of post-HF. However, she would still have excess prana, and she'd probably be capable of using most of the things she is capable of in her Dark form with sufficient practice. It would be difficult, though.

So, shadow familiars and making shadow dimensions, yeah?

Building off of that, does she make the dimension, or does she access it? And is the fact that it's filled with shadows a result of AM's influence?

As for the Great Grail, it's destroyed. The Excaliblast destroys it and the cavern it is in.

So no dismantling subplot with Waver and Rin. Right.

Also, do you mean HF True or HF Normal? There's no such thing as "HF Good", and I'm never 100% sure which people are talking about, since HF True is a much happier ending than HF Normal is. I assume you mean HF Normal, though, since you're talking about the Grail being Excaliblasted.

lolifail. I meant HF Normal, yeah.

It means she can access it, not that she has it stored inside her. Her body, like Rin's, can only store and use 1000 units at a time.

I believe that, as a former Grail, Sakura has a connection to Akasha, and thus infinite prana. She can't use it to access the source (at least normally), but she can draw prana from it.

If that's how it works, then...

Can you clarify what you're asking here? It's too vague to answer at the moment.

Sorry. It's just that this is a major point I'm going to explore in F/R, and I want to know more about Nasuverse souls.

Do people know the structure of a soul? What kind of manipulations are possible? How does prana factor into this - does it act similarly to food for the body? Is the soul made of a highly stabilized form of prana?

... that kind of thing. I know about mystic passes and spiritual surgery, but I don't know that anyone's ever actually taken a soul and dissected it, piece by piece, to determine how the different components relate to each other (if it even works like that). It says on the wiki that most mages don't actually give a shit about it since it's "unreachable, unworkable energy" and that it's "difficult to handle", so I'd assume that even Clock Tower's knowledge about the soul's inner workings is spotty at best. They're probably less concerned on how it works and more with how to fuck with it to do magic stuff.

[Willy Vereb]

Oh well, a brief summary of what we know about souls in the Nasuverse.

Souls are the abstract methaphysical representations of one's existence. They are a person's mirrior.
Souls contain information regarding one's feelings, memories and even their own body.
They even shape one's destiny as they contain the person's "origin".
For this reason the location of the soul is a bit difficult to determine.
At one hand it is in the unreachable realm of Akasha.
On the other hand it's something that is bound to one's body.
I guess the closest estimation is to call it an arch between these two. And probably that's the reason why magic exists.
It's like an elastic rope. As long as it's alive the body streches out this rope into the human world, bound to him/her.
Upon death the rope is pulled back to Akasha.
Unless there's some other existence or force pulling it again.
Like Touko's puppets or somebody forcefully putting a soul into a container.

Next important thing is about the relation between body and soul.
For the sake of peaceful coexistence, the body must match the "image" of the soul.
And despite being eternal, souls have an "expiration date".
Both of these were shown with Zouken.
His soul slowly degraded as a result, giving him maddening pain.
Of course there are types of souls that allow the user to comfortably live for longer.
Vampires are the most obvious example.

Anyways, how can souls expire if they're eternal?
Again, this is a speculation of mine, but maybe because only the core of souls exists forever.
Whatever makes up one's personae does not. It's merely a temporary fabrication and it slowly degrades with age. Albeit people usually die faster than that and then Akasha breaks this "personality" part completely down to forge a "new" soul.
This also brings up the interesting question of what Servants consume when feeding on humans.
They are told to absorb a person's soul and life force. But does it mean they pull out the entire part of this "rope"?
I think not. Instead it's like cutting the said rope with a blade. The part of the soul which exists in the physical world is "cut off" and turned into magic energy.
And the rest returns to Akasha.

Effecting souls.
Well, technically ALL magic in the Nasuverse can be described as the battle of concepts.
It doesn't mean all magecraft are like conceptual weapons but in some form they manipulate these to get results.
Conceptual weapons and such are on the other hand are magics specifically aimed to manipulate concepts.
As in, forcing these on the target's soul.
In short any conceptual weapon can reach souls and in some form manipulate them. According to an interview with Nasu, conceptual weapons can be also used to outright destroy souls, albeit their power would weaken that way.
Again, by souls it most likely means the part which degrades over time.
Oh and by the way, while souls are generally only used when referring to humans, technically in the Nasuverse everything has a soul.
It's kind of like Animism.
If exists, it has a soul.
Even if it's a shovel.

If you want more obvious examples for interacting with souls, there are.
Albeit only a few.
To begin with, seemingly the most important part of the soul is poking towards Akasha.
And only True Magic can reach that realm. Specifically the 3rd, Heavens Feel.
Albeit there are some abilities that managed to touch these.
First example is Michael Roa. He found a way to bind his soul to someone who's about to be born, making him practically immortal.
This implies he has the limited ability to traverse in the world which souls inhabit a while before entering the physical world.
Second is Gransburg Blackmore, who can carry souls via birds and his Reality Marble either forces the soul or leave the body or outright "kills" them, sending these back to Akasha.
Third is Araya Souren. He has the ability to "see" one's origin. He could also force a person to be aware of this origin thus transform according to it.
Fourth is potentially Aozaki Touko. She managed to build an almost perfect puppet body for Emiya Shirou. With no way to know the fine specifics of what he was like. I don't talk about appearance but more hidden or minute details. Depending on how well she managed to reproduce these, Touko must've used some means to read Shirou's soul. Hence I mention her.

Anyways, all of these examples save for maybe Roa show that their soul manipulation is extremely limited. Just like time and space, the proper alteration of souls is something that belongs to the True Magics. In Roa's case he has magic that rivals if not outclasses that of the Age of Gods. And while much closer to actual soul manipulation, his understanding of it was still far from perfect. His best creation was merely a spell that infected other souls similar to a "computer virus". And the transference was also far from perfect.
So yeah, it isn't like magi aren't interested in souls.
They just generally can't put their fingers on it.

[Tyrnek]

^ This is very helpful. Thanks Willy!

Whatever makes up one's personae does not. It's merely a temporary fabrication and it slowly degrades with age. Albeit people usually die faster than that and then Akasha breaks this "personality" part completely down to forge a "new" soul.

So, according to your interpretation, Akasha reclaims the memories and "core" of the soul when a person dies, but the personality is recycled/left to fall apart. It's not the "soul" that's expiring, but the "person who was 'borrowing' that soul from Akasha". It would be somewhat analogous to lending someone a new computer, letting them install whatever they want on it, taking it back after they're finished with it/dead, wiping the hard drive after getting all the pertinent info off of it, and then giving it to someone else. Is that correct?

This is just a ramble: Can Akasha create these soul-cores, or does it only have a finite amount to work with? If it's the latter, then it could also possibly be an explanation for why humanity's degraded since the Age of the Gods: too many people leads to Akasha dividing the cores into smaller pieces to have enough to go around. Or maybe the Spiral Root can't be bothered to create a completely new core for each new human, so it makes a copy of one of the original "cores" at random and uses that instead (and because it's a copy, it's inferior to the original).

... this is giving me lots to think about. Thanks!

[Cherry Lover]

Hmm, I'm not sure it is ever specifically stated, but it's a reasonable distance (half an hour walk or so). His house is also not on the route to school from Sakura or Rin's house.

It's half an hour? Then does around 3km make sense, actually?

Yeah, probably.

Like I said, though, I don't know the exact distance. It may not ever even be mentioned.

That's about all I know from the reference materials. It would be nice to get the input of someone who's played HA, since "Kirei cut her arm off" doesn't really let me know the undertones of the whole scene.

Ah, OK.

Well, I dunno if anyone on here has played HA.

You could try asking here. The guy running it is an ass, but he speaks Japanese, as do several of the other members. They're likely to be able to answer your questions better than anyone.

It's not entirely clear what Sakura is capable of post-HF. However, she would still have excess prana, and she'd probably be capable of using most of the things she is capable of in her Dark form with sufficient practice. It would be difficult, though.

So, shadow familiars and making shadow dimensions, yeah?

Yeah, pretty much.

If you want to know what I think her abilities would be some time post-HF, go look at the version of her I made for the Cross Effects RP. She's post HF-True, but the abilities are fundamentally the same either way.

Building off of that, does she make the dimension, or does she access it?

Well, I think the dimension is personal to her, but I don't think she makes a new version every time she uses it. It seems to be something that is "inside" her in a sense, but the exact nature isn't clear.

And is the fact that it's filled with shadows a result of AM's influence?

Eh, what? Where did you get the idea it was "filled with shadows" from?

As for the Great Grail, it's destroyed. The Excaliblast destroys it and the cavern it is in.

So no dismantling subplot with Waver and Rin. Right.

Nope, that's Fate and UBW only.

Also, do you mean HF True or HF Normal? There's no such thing as "HF Good", and I'm never 100% sure which people are talking about, since HF True is a much happier ending than HF Normal is. I assume you mean HF Normal, though, since you're talking about the Grail being Excaliblasted.

lolifail. I meant HF Normal, yeah.

Yeah, I've seen a lot of people refer to HF Normal as "HF Good". I'd have thought that just watching it would remove any notion of it being a "Good" ending....

It means she can access it, not that she has it stored inside her. Her body, like Rin's, can only store and use 1000 units at a time.

I believe that, as a former Grail, Sakura has a connection to Akasha, and thus infinite prana. She can't use it to access the source (at least normally), but she can draw prana from it.

If that's how it works, then...

Eh, what?

Can you clarify what you're asking here? It's too vague to answer at the moment.

Sorry. It's just that this is a major point I'm going to explore in F/R, and I want to know more about Nasuverse souls.

Do people know the structure of a soul? What kind of manipulations are possible? How does prana factor into this - does it act similarly to food for the body? Is the soul made of a highly stabilized form of prana?

Well, I know that the soul is indestructable, but needs to be bound to something (which is usually the body) in order to remain on the Earth. Prana isn't "food" for the soul, although souls must contain Prana since it is possible to extract prana from souls (in the case of Heroic Spirits, quite a lot, seemingly). But the soul isn't "destroyed" in the process of doing so, since the eventual result of the Grail War would have been the souls of the heroes returning to Akasha and, in the process, punching a hole that could be opened wider to allow the magus performing the ritual to get there.

Souls don't ever "die", as such, but over time they can decay. For a normal human that isn't relevant because their body decays far before the soul does, but for someone like Zouken is is a big problem. It's not totally clear how that "decay" happens, though. In the case of Zouken it seems to be because he keeps exchanging bodies.

The soul will overwrite any body it is in to make it look like the original owner, but it seems like changing bodies means that, over time, your soul loses the "prototype" and starts to decay. Eventually you end up like Zouken, rotten and barely able to remember your own intentions.

... that kind of thing. I know about mystic passes and spiritual surgery, but I don't know that anyone's ever actually taken a soul and dissected it, piece by piece, to determine how the different components relate to each other (if it even works like that). It says on the wiki that most mages don't actually give a shit about it since it's "unreachable, unworkable energy" and that it's "difficult to handle", so I'd assume that even Clock Tower's knowledge about the soul's inner workings is spotty at best. They're probably less concerned on how it works and more with how to fuck with it to do magic stuff.

Yeah, I'm not sure you even could "dissect" a soul. I believe the soul is actually indestructable.

For this reason the location of the soul is a bit difficult to determine.
At one hand it is in the unreachable realm of Akasha.
On the other hand it's something that is bound to one's body.
I guess the closest estimation is to call it an arch between these two. And probably that's the reason why magic exists.
It's like an elastic rope. As long as it's alive the body streches out this rope into the human world, bound to him/her.
Upon death the rope is pulled back to Akasha.
Unless there's some other existence or force pulling it again.
Like Touko's puppets or somebody forcefully putting a soul into a container.

Hmm, are you sure about this? I thought the soul was genuinely on Earth, hence why it can be "eaten" in a sense. It can only stay anchored on the Earth via a body, but I thought it was there.

Next important thing is about the relation between body and soul.
For the sake of peaceful coexistence, the body must match the "image" of the soul.
And despite being eternal, souls have an "expiration date".
Both of these were shown with Zouken.
His soul slowly degraded as a result, giving him maddening pain.
Of course there are types of souls that allow the user to comfortably live for longer.
Vampires are the most obvious example.

Any idea how this works? In particular, when someone is turned into a Vampire do they get a "new" soul or something? Also, what about Magi that live longer in a more normal way?

Anyways, how can souls expire if they're eternal?
Again, this is a speculation of mine, but maybe because only the core of souls exists forever.
Whatever makes up one's personae does not. It's merely a temporary fabrication and it slowly degrades with age. Albeit people usually die faster than that and then Akasha breaks this "personality" part completely down to forge a "new" soul.
This also brings up the interesting question of what Servants consume when feeding on humans.
They are told to absorb a person's soul and life force. But does it mean they pull out the entire part of this "rope"?
I think not. Instead it's like cutting the said rope with a blade. The part of the soul which exists in the physical world is "cut off" and turned into magic energy.
And the rest returns to Akasha.

Yeah, something like this perhaps makes sense.

Whatever makes up one's personae does not. It's merely a temporary fabrication and it slowly degrades with age. Albeit people usually die faster than that and then Akasha breaks this "personality" part completely down to forge a "new" soul.

So, according to your interpretation, Akasha reclaims the memories and "core" of the soul when a person dies, but the personality is recycled/left to fall apart. It's not the "soul" that's expiring, but the "person who was 'borrowing' that soul from Akasha". It would be somewhat analogous to lending someone a new computer, letting them install whatever they want on it, taking it back after they're finished with it/dead, wiping the hard drive after getting all the pertinent info off of it, and then giving it to someone else. Is that correct?

IIRC, when a person dies their soul returns to Akasha and is torn apart, wiped of all information and the bits are reused. Souls are definitely indestructable, but they can seemingly be divided and wiped clean.

This is just a ramble: Can Akasha create these soul-cores, or does it only have a finite amount to work with? If it's the latter, then it could also possibly be an explanation for why humanity's degraded since the Age of the Gods: too many people leads to Akasha dividing the cores into smaller pieces to have enough to go around. Or maybe the Spiral Root can't be bothered to create a completely new core for each new human, so it makes a copy of one of the original "cores" at random and uses that instead (and because it's a copy, it's inferior to the original).

... this is giving me lots to think about. Thanks!

I've always thought the second, because it does indeed explain the weakening of humanity. In particular, I thought it might apply to magic, since I know magic circuits are part of the soul.

[Willy Vereb]

^ This is very helpful. Thanks Willy!

Whatever makes up one's personae does not. It's merely a temporary fabrication and it slowly degrades with age. Albeit people usually die faster than that and then Akasha breaks this "personality" part completely down to forge a "new" soul.

So, according to your interpretation, Akasha reclaims the memories and "core" of the soul when a person dies, but the personality is recycled/left to fall apart. It's not the "soul" that's expiring, but the "person who was 'borrowing' that soul from Akasha". It would be somewhat analogous to lending someone a new computer, letting them install whatever they want on it, taking it back after they're finished with it/dead, wiping the hard drive after getting all the pertinent info off of it, and then giving it to someone else. Is that correct?

Yeah, your example pretty much fits with what I described above.
Albeit I like to think about them as "telomers" of the "soul string". Something which is only fabricated when a person exists in the physical world.
And breaks down completely once that lost its usefulness.

This is just a ramble: Can Akasha create these soul-cores, or does it only have a finite amount to work with? If it's the latter, then it could also possibly be an explanation for why humanity's degraded since the Age of the Gods: too many people leads to Akasha dividing the cores into smaller pieces to have enough to go around. Or maybe the Spiral Root can't be bothered to create a completely new core for each new human, so it makes a copy of one of the original "cores" at random and uses that instead (and because it's a copy, it's inferior to the original).

Well, I don't think Akasha's power or soul stock is in any way finite.
Especially not in a sense that the growing population of humans can deplete it.
Akasha did birth the multiverse, AKA a collection of infinite parallel universes.

The dwindling of magic is a cumulative result of many things, from what we know these are:
- Loss of knowledge: Many who had the ancient arts did die without anyone inheriting their power. Hence modern magi developed the magic crest to prevent it.
- Technology. It turned the miracles of magic into mundane. This had the effect of altering the gestalt physic field of humanity. This is most likely why Phantasmal Races went nearly extinct, or into hiding.
- Evolution. The human DNA changed and in a way "degraded" over the ages. Apparently, the original humans were flat-out amazing. And if you look at Ryougi Shiki that definitely seems to be the case. This is also the reason why not every human has magic circuits. It's a kind of leftover trait and modern humans should have no need of it.
- True Magic. From what I remember from the translated parts of Mahoutsukai, once a magician reaches the Origin he or she becomes part of Akasha. It also has the nasty effect of closing off that particular path. So every successful True Magic user decreases the number of miracles possible in the world. Or something along these lines.

So yeah.
Long story short magic is something that progressively becomes less necessary to humans.
This is most likely also the reason why magi dwelves to much into the past instead of just trying to develop better uses for their current magic.

[Tyrnek]

@ Cherry:

Eh, what? Where did you get the idea it was "filled with shadows" from?

Don't trust me on that, since I vaguely remember reading something to that effect on the wiki. "Taking it into the shadow realm and spearing people with the shadows" or something.

But the soul isn't "destroyed" in the process of doing so, since the eventual result of the Grail War would have been the souls of the heroes returning to Akasha and, in the process, punching a hole that could be opened wider to allow the magus performing the ritual to get there.

So the reason the Heroic Spirits are retained is so that when there are enough of them, the effect of 6/7 of these huge souls getting back to the Root at once would open a big enough hole for shit to happen? If so, then I've been misunderstanding the process this entire time.

Yeah, I'm not sure you even could "dissect" a soul. I believe the soul is actually indestructable.

IIRC, when a person dies their soul returns to Akasha and is torn apart, wiped of all information and the bits are reused. Souls are definitely indestructable, but they can seemingly be divided and wiped clean.

ATTW, it says that the soul is indestructible in the material realm, but that the soul usually resides somewhere else that's between the Root and "reality", meaning that someone could conceivably start ripping it apart if they could access this space-between-spaces (lol).

@ Willy

Albeit I like to think about them as "telomers" of the "soul string". Something which is only fabricated when a person exists in the physical world.
And breaks down completely once that lost its usefulness.

Astral genetics, basically. If I'm interpreting this correctly, then a persona is only there to protect the soul-core from damage, so if there's a mental attack, then the persona breaks before the soul-core does.

This is also the reason why not every human has magic circuits. It's a kind of leftover trait and modern humans should have no need of it.

Ohh, so they're becoming vestigial. As a species, we don't really use them anymore, so they've fallen by the wayside.

Long story short magic is something that progressively becomes less necessary to humans.

So it's spiritual devolution by material evolution, with the increase of what we consider "possible" leading to the rapid decrease in what we consider "impossible", destroying the sense of wonder which was the reason why olde Magick was so damn powerful?

Also, Magicians technically aren't human anymore, right? They're treated as their own independent entities (that Akasha wants to destroy), unless I miss my guess.

This is most likely also the reason why magi dwelves to much into the past instead of just trying to develop better uses for their current magic.

Because they don't like being made obsolete.


Wait, okay, so could this potentially be how Reality Marbles work? You make a copy of your persona and overwrite the outside world with it temporarily. That's why you can't get it through rote study or pass it on, as everyone's persona is completely different.

[Willy Vereb]

Yes, Reality Marbles were always about forcing the reality of your persona/soul to your surroundings.
Or more like (because of limitations) that a Reality Marble materializes the most predominant concept of your soul.
This makes them unpredictable thus dangerous. Probably why the Mage's Association has a ban on these.
It can be also connected to one's "origin" somehow. Just like Shirou's UBW and his origin of "sword".
The most interesting fact is that "origin" should be the true "soul string", the one which never changes.
Yet according to CM4 (or CM5?), Avalon "changed" Shirou's origin to that of the "sword". Of course Avalon is so powerful it's apparently beyond the 5 True Magics, so it isn't that surprising. Still, I'd be interested in the mechanism. Did it really alter the whole string that connects to Akasha or it just exchanged the "old" string with a new one which had the "sword" attribute, while keeping most of Shirou's personae. Soul-splicing anyone? And Avalon did this as a mere side effect.

And to answer Mike's question, no I seriously doubt that vampirized humans are given a new soul.
It's more like a spiritual infection. The soul which is seemingly unalterable does suffer changes in the process.
It's kind of like how Archer's arm gradually invaded both Shirou's body and soul. Killing him and his memories as time went on.
And I remembered things wrong with Dead Apostles. They don't have everlasting souls. The reason why they need to consume blood is to refill their corroding spirit with fresh human DNA and souls. So basically they are also eating souls.
Of course by constantly drinking blood, Dead Apostles souls can technically last forever. Because it renews itself by the sacrifice of human souls.
And apparently, with age, Dead Apostles learn how to minimize the degradation of their souls thus requiring less blood.
In contrast newly born vampires need a ridiculous body count in the beginning to stabilize themselves.

As for the Magus being a different race, I seriously doubt that.
Not from the biological standpoint, at least. Magi and "regular humans" are still capable of having an offspring.
But the capability to cast magic seems to be an ancient gene. If it's even expressed in the genes at all. Maybe it's merely an imprint which exists in the soul and then expressed from there to effect the body.
Otherwise a more savvy magus might've used genetic engineering to create an offspring with the best magic qualities.
I also doubt that things like elemental attribute are something connected to the magus' genes.
Of course this is just speculation on my part.
Maybe magi are just so averse from science that they don't even know what the advances of genetics can do.
And in light of their oppressed feeling because of technology, we can understand them.

[Tyrnek]

So an awakened origin is when the string goes berserk, destroying the persona in the process.

Still, I'd be interested in the mechanism. Did it really alter the whole string that connects to Akasha or it just exchanged the "old" string with a new one which had the "sword" attribute, while keeping most of Shirou's personae. Soul-splicing anyone? And Avalon did this as a mere side effect.

Hm... this is just speculation, but it could be that because Shirou almost died in the fire, his default string was partially destroyed, so part of Avalon's healing involved repairing this string - but since Avalon is a sheathe, there's really only one thing a sheathe could know really well, hence the Sword origin change. Maybe. I don't know.

As for the Magus being a different race, I seriously doubt that.

Ugh, I really should've been more clear with that question. I was asking if users of True Magic are still considered human (for example, by Alaya). I don't think they're genetically different, but maybe they're different enough conceptually to warrant a reclassification.

[Tyrnek]

So Sakura is an "imperfect" Grail. I want to know exactly what that means - what makes her less complete than Ilya? Is Ilya aware of the existence of the Matou Grail?

Anyone care to help? /hopeful

[Cherry Lover]

Ilya was designed and trained from birth to be a Grail, whereas Sakura is a normal human being who had chunks of the previous Grail embedded in her. Thus, Ilya is able to retain the spirits inside her without too many issues (although she does have to "turn off" some of her human functions), whereas with Sakura it leaks out (resulting in the Shadow) and, eventually, corrupts her.

And, yes, Ilya is aware of Sakura's status as a Grail, at least in HF. If Shirou doesn't get enough Ilya points, then she shows up at his house on about day 7 (before Shirou is even aware that Sakura is a magus) and turns him into a doll to use against Sakura. It's not 100% clear exactly when she works it out, though, she might well not know until Sakura is activated (and, potentially, until she absorbs a soul that Ilya herself should have received).

@ Cherry:

Sorry it took so long to reply.

Eh, what? Where did you get the idea it was "filled with shadows" from?

Don't trust me on that, since I vaguely remember reading something to that effect on the wiki. "Taking it into the shadow realm and spearing people with the shadows" or something.

Ah, OK.

Well, it seems plausible that she could do that, but I don't think her shadow realm is necessarily full of shadows, and nor do the shadows only exist there.

But the soul isn't "destroyed" in the process of doing so, since the eventual result of the Grail War would have been the souls of the heroes returning to Akasha and, in the process, punching a hole that could be opened wider to allow the magus performing the ritual to get there.

So the reason the Heroic Spirits are retained is so that when there are enough of them, the effect of 6/7 of these huge souls getting back to the Root at once would open a big enough hole for shit to happen? If so, then I've been misunderstanding the process this entire time.

Actually, to open the path to Akasha, it needs all 7. But, yes, that's the basic principle.

However, I believe that precisely none of the participants in the fifth war both know and care about this. Ilya probably does know, but since she's the Grail she cannot do it herself, and Zouken may well know but couldn't care less since he just wants immortality. Rin doesn't know because her father died unexpectedly (because he was too damn arrogant to realise the possibility of death in a seven-way-war where the losers are usually killed...) and thus never thought to teach her all this stuff.

Yeah, I'm not sure you even could "dissect" a soul. I believe the soul is actually indestructable.

IIRC, when a person dies their soul returns to Akasha and is torn apart, wiped of all information and the bits are reused. Souls are definitely indestructable, but they can seemingly be divided and wiped clean.

ATTW, it says that the soul is indestructible in the material realm, but that the soul usually resides somewhere else that's between the Root and "reality", meaning that someone could conceivably start ripping it apart if they could access this space-between-spaces (lol).

Hmm, yeah, that's possible.

Yes, Reality Marbles were always about forcing the reality of your persona/soul to your surroundings.
Or more like (because of limitations) that a Reality Marble materializes the most predominant concept of your soul.
This makes them unpredictable thus dangerous. Probably why the Mage's Association has a ban on these.

Actually, this isn't really true, as far as I can tell. The main reason for having a ban on Reality Marbles is that the heads of the Association don't have one, and thus they dislike others having them. Plus, since they're not something you can learn or pass on to your kids, they don't fit with the whole "improve your family line" orthodoxy that the Association holds to.

And to answer Mike's question, no I seriously doubt that vampirized humans are given a new soul.
It's more like a spiritual infection. The soul which is seemingly unalterable does suffer changes in the process.
It's kind of like how Archer's arm gradually invaded both Shirou's body and soul. Killing him and his memories as time went on.
And I remembered things wrong with Dead Apostles. They don't have everlasting souls. The reason why they need to consume blood is to refill their corroding spirit with fresh human DNA and souls. So basically they are also eating souls.
Of course by constantly drinking blood, Dead Apostles souls can technically last forever. Because it renews itself by the sacrifice of human souls.
And apparently, with age, Dead Apostles learn how to minimize the degradation of their souls thus requiring less blood.

Yeah, I guess that makes sense.

It also explains why they get less and less human as they age. A new vampire like Sacchin or Sion can still be basically good, but an older one will invariably end up eating indiscriminately without caring for others.

As for the Magus being a different race, I seriously doubt that.
Not from the biological standpoint, at least. Magi and "regular humans" are still capable of having an offspring.

Well, that doesn't imply they're not a different race. Biologically-speaking, "race" means a subdivision of a species which has clearly-identifiable traits that other members of the species don't have, members of which usually don't interbreed with members of other races (because of either physical seperation or sexual selection), but are still capable of breeding with the rest of the species. So, in that sense, magi actually are a different race from normal humans (interestingly, according to the biological definition of "race", the normal human population does not have them, since we inter-breed too much for them to form).

But the capability to cast magic seems to be an ancient gene. If it's even expressed in the genes at all. Maybe it's merely an imprint which exists in the soul and then expressed from there to effect the body.
Otherwise a more savvy magus might've used genetic engineering to create an offspring with the best magic qualities.
I also doubt that things like elemental attribute are something connected to the magus' genes.
Of course this is just speculation on my part.
Maybe magi are just so averse from science that they don't even know what the advances of genetics can do.
And in light of their oppressed feeling because of technology, we can understand them.

Well, it clearly is in some sense "genetic", because powerful parents have powerful kids. Still, it can't be as simple as a "magus gene", because, for example, Aoi is not herself a very powerful magus, but possesses a trait that makes her children powerful magi. Which doesn't really make sense from a purely genetic perspective.

Also, the affinity is definitely genetic, because Sakura needed substantial alteration to make her into a Matou magus. Her natural abilities are as a Tohsaka.

[Willy Vereb]

It could be that Aoi possess a recessive gene or genes (since physical attributes and such are expressed by tons of genes working together, why not Magic Circuits?) that is beneficial for Magi.
Recessive genes are only expressed when both sides of the DNS spiral contain them.

Magic-related genes being recessive also makes sense. Because it explains why magi only marry between each other.

As for Aoi not being a powerful magus, there's an easy explanation. Even if the above wouldn't be the case.
She's a branch member of the family. Generally only the future heirs of each magus lineage are taught in magic.

Albeit given what the Einsbern family can do I strongly suspect that there's more than simple genetics that make the mage.
Or you could say "soul genetics".
Not just the body but also the soul has special qualities that can be inherited through the offsprings.

Soul is something magi cannot really touch.
And if magic capacity would be determined through purely genetic means then I suppose some magi would've already exploited it to great degree.
That's why I doubt it's that simple.

[Cherry Lover]

It could be that Aoi possess a recessive gene or genes (since physical attributes and such are expressed by tons of genes working together, why not Magic Circuits?) that is beneficial for Magi.
Recessive genes are only expressed when both sides of the DNS spiral contain them.

Magic-related genes being recessive also makes sense. Because it explains why magi only marry between each other.

The problem with that idea is that genetics does not work that way (although, admittedly, Nasu may not know that). Firstly, whilst a gene could be recessive, for Rin and Sakura to have that gene they would have to get it from both their father and their mother, which means Tokiomi would also need to possess the same "uber-powerful magus" gene. If that was the case then, honestly, I would expect him to be marrying one of his cousins or something, given how determined magi are to improve their successor's abilities.

Secondly, that would mean there was only a 50/50 chance of either child obtaining the gene, and therefore only a 1 in 4 chance of them both obtaining it. Admittedly we can't rule that out, but the way that they are basically identical in terms of potential implies it's not genetic in the literal sense.

It's not simply a matter of Aoi not being a magus but being able to create magi children. Aoi is able to not only create magical children, but to create magical children that are considerably more powerful than their father. That does not make sense from a genetic viewpoint (the children tend to be an average of the mother and father), at least not as a general rule.

That's not to say there isn't a genetic element. Maybe Aoi has a gene that causes lots of magic circuits to develop in any child she is carrying. But, it's not as simple as "Aoi has a recessive gene for magic", because genetics does not work like that.

As for Aoi not being a powerful magus, there's an easy explanation. Even if the above wouldn't be the case.
She's a branch member of the family. Generally only the future heirs of each magus lineage are taught in magic.

It's beyond that, though. Not only is she not a powerful magus, she isn't capable of becoming one even with training. She doesn't have the circuits that Rin or Sakura has, she merely has the ability to "maximise the potential of her children". This is very explicitly stated.

Albeit given what the Einsbern family can do I strongly suspect that there's more than simple genetics that make the mage.
Or you could say "soul genetics".
Not just the body but also the soul has special qualities that can be inherited through the offsprings.

Soul is something magi cannot really touch.
And if magic capacity would be determined through purely genetic means then I suppose some magi would've already exploited it to great degree.
That's why I doubt it's that simple.

Yeah, definitely. Particularly since magic circuits are explicitly part of the soul.

[Cursed by Creation]

Here's a question: if magecraft is simply magic that was reduced to a 'craft' by ordinary Humans understanding how magic works by scientific means, how come technology can't hurt monsters?

[Cherry Lover]

Eh, what do you mean? I don't recall anything saying that technology can't hurt "monsters" in general. Servants, yes, but that's because servants are magical entities.

[Cursed by Creation]

Eh, what do you mean? I don't recall anything saying that technology can't hurt "monsters" in general. Servants, yes, but that's because servants are magical entities.

Someone once told me that should Humans (the ordinary ones) try to stand up against the magical/supernatural they'll just get wiped out.  Which doesn't make sense seeing as magi and even the World itself fears the advance of science.