"'What bold attempt is this? Pray let me know
From whence you come, and whither I must go.
Shall I, who am a duenna, stoop or bow
To such a pale-faced visage? Who art thou?'"

- I. Diaconus, A Dialogue betwixt Death and a Duenna, Verse II

Whether bent over massive tomes, deeply meditating, or feverishly dancing in a ritual trance, there is a school of magic that doesn’t bother too much with the physical world of the living, and instead seeks to understand and affect the ethereal world of spirit and ghost.

These are the Spiritists of Nave, and on their journeys through the imperceivable, they attempt to find the real substances of existence.

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Parallel to the observable world, there exist other planes which are invisible to most men, with the Ether being by far the most commonly known. Spiritists know the Ether as a plane where spirits can exist in various immaterial forms without the need of a physical body. The Ether is not a separate dimension however, as the vast majority of physical things exist simultaneously on both planes.

In other words, a layman might say that there are two worlds, the material world and the spirit-world, but to mages, particularly Spiritists, the Ether is simply another layer in the fabric of reality, which can be observed, manipulated, and traversed with the right knowledge and tools.

The Ether is also home to other, otherwise unseeable forces. Mages of other schools may find it important to divide the Ether further into various sub-planes, or consider the Ether to be one plane among many others, but to most Spiritists this differentiation doesn't much matter. In fact, it appears to be fairly common for old and weathered Spiritists to not even bother distinguishing between the physical and immaterial worlds.

It is not uncommon for ordinary men to experience aspects of the Ether as well. Certain dream states or near-death experiences seem to break some of the conventional boundaries between the planes. Additionally, some spirits are able to transgress these boundaries and become partly or wholly visible, affect substantial things, or even manifest physically. These phenomena have been given many names such as ghosts, spirits, phantoms and so on, but are not very well understood by the generally superstitious commoners.

Throughout history cultists, philosophers, and magicians have come up with several conflicting models and theories to describe Nave's multi-layered world, as well as the concept of spirit, but no one can be certain of how it all fits together.

The Spiritist model referenced further below, taught by most scholars at Clerus Magica, first appeared in the ancient writings of the Sarducaan Magi Pir Nosno-Samoul. Most of the names in the model are not of Sarducaan origin however, and later etymological transliteration studies have shown they demonstrate a resemblance to ancient logograms of Pari origin.

The general consensus is that an old Sarducaan branch of Spiritism somehow grew from these Pari concepts among the Yequedah which later influenced Tindremic schools of thought.

The various contemporary sub-branches don't see eye to eye when it comes to interpreting the actual concepts, but the presiding nomenclature and jargon among scholars for describing its constituents is definitely of Yesilite—the Yequedah language—origin.

Some scholars even claim to have studied the elusive Yesilite language to be able to come up with more precise and powerful evocations. The skeptics on the other hand say that as the language is forbidden for outsiders those claims are indeed unverifiable: it's a simple means to come up with a more persuasive vocabulary for their treatises and theories.

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According to spiritists there are several important aspects, or parts, which work together to constitute a living, or semi-living, entity. Studying the properties and links between these parts is essential for practicing Spiritism.

The following is the officially accepted, though still debated, Tindremic version of what constitutes a being, and was supposedly acquired directly from Yequedah sources prior to being translated into the Tindremic language from Yesilite:

Of Whole and Parts

Fig 16:
The structure of a living vessel

"Next to the Consideration of a Being or Thing, as Substance with regard to its Accidents and a Subject with
regards to its Adjuncts, we consider it as a Whole with regard to the Parts whereof it consists: As a Man
consists of Akh and Khat; and his Akh, of his Kau, Ba and Ren; and his Khat, of his Head, Trunk and Limbs,
each of which may be yet further sub-divided."

- Pir Nosno-Samoul, El Nazar Ayak (Elementa Philosophica), Cpt II, Sct XIX

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The Khat is the body, the physical vessel that carries the metaphysical Akh. In general, Spiritists do not concern themselves too much with the Khat. However, the Akh of most entities is so intertwined with the Khat that a separation of the two is lethal. Thus, for a Spiritist to exit and re-enter the physical body, or reunite the Akh and Khat of others, the properties of the Khat needs to be thoroughly understood.

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The Khat of entities such as humanoids, animals, and plants is considered to be governed and constrained by which archetype and sub-archetype they belong to. A Human cannot be born with wings, because wings are not part of their archetype.

An individual instance of an archetype may still have unique properties however, such as a disposition toward more muscle mass. That does not mean that this disposition will automatically produce an individual with more muscle mass, as it depends on the life of said individual. This mold—the combination of archetype and individual “frame”—is regarded as the Sheut of an entity.

Some Spiritists believe that the Sheut defines the Akh—that is to say a Human Sheut will produce, or some say gather, the components necessary to give rise to a Human Akh, and that the specific Akh therefore is of human nature. An example of a argument favoring this wing would be:

"As we know, the Akh of a Wisent will still be the Akh of a Wisent even if transferred to a Human Khat."

The other wing, which includes believers in natural reincarnation, sees the Akh as more or less eternal, something that—in some way or another—is instilled via the Sheut into the Khat to give life, and is therefore only constrained by the current Sheut it inhibits.

Memories and consciousness might be lost or forgotten, for instance on death, but the individual Akh will go on existing and is a unique entity in itself. The following is an argument often proposed by this wing to demonstrate that the Sheut and the Khat are only shells:

"I am what I am, although I cannot speak, even if I occupy the Khat of a Wisent."

However both sides, of which there are many variants, agree that the Sheut is indeed a real and important feature in nature for both physical and metaphysical purposes. The studies of Sheut overlap with several other philosophical fields such as biology and Animism, and has given rise to Sheut Taxonomy, also known as the System of Dawning, which classifies groups of living entities according to a hierarchical system based on archetypes and shared characteristics.

The concept of sentience isn't usually a prerequisite when it comes to Sheut. The Sheut is the mold, or archetype, for living entities, and that includes trees, anemones, or fungi, no matter their level of sentience. For classifying non-living entities like rocks, various systems have been developed. In the realm of metaphysics, many efforts have been made to distinguish between what is considered “dead” and “living” matter. However, these classifications are subjective and open to interpretation.

Some “non-living” entities exhibit traits that can be seen as evolving, potentially making them suitable for classification within the Sheut Taxonomy. Nevertheless, the academic community has generally adopted alternative taxonomical sorting methods, often disregarding any “Sheut-like” traits, whether present or not. According to the original Sheut taxonomy, it specifically focuses on “that which is capable of being alive, reproducing its dominant traits to new generations, thus repeating the endless struggle.”

The Sheevra and Huérgar, renowned for their expertise in these matters, do not adhere to a Sheut-like Taxonomy. They acknowledge the evolving properties of many materials and organize them according to various systems that sometimes reflect progressive traits.

However, they do recognize two significant differences between organic and inorganic matter: firstly, materials do not seem to undergo evolutionary pressure, and secondly, unlike branches in evolution, materials can often be combined, re-combined, and distilled without the chronological history or “formula” (Sheut) of the constituents being a determining factor.

At the same time, many Huérgar, and some Sheevra, believe that the very bedrock is alive, even sentient. Although while doing so, they also recognize that the principles governing “creatures” and “matter” are very different.

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Akh, which can be roughly translated to the layman's concept of “soul”, is the collective name, the sum, of an entity's spiritual energies, of which the most important are Kau, Ba, and Ren. The Akh is often called a vessel or carrier, though what is most often referred to is the sum of its constituents, as it's unclear whether an Akh has any properties in itself—much like the concept of a body actually refers to the sum of its parts.

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According to Spiritists every living entity contains a life force, Kau, which is capable of interacting with and linking together both the physical and metaphysical world. It is the energy of Kau that binds the Akh to the Khat, and if this link is broken, the corporeal Khat will die, and the Akh will eventually disunite into its separate parts.

Kau is in many ways similar to the energy mages refer to as Mana (fr. Sidoian mâ-na, symbols for [awe, wonder] + [well, spring]), or Shī (fr. Huérgar or Khurite).

Different or not, these energies can all be used for interacting with the fabric of the world, though Spiritists claim there are differences between how Kau and Mana are accumulated, harnessed, and used; especially in the Ether.

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Ren is the name, or names, of living entities. Ren is a powerful part of a person's Akh, as whenever it is mentioned, read, or even thought of, it it theorized that it actually manifests the Akh in the world, strengthening it.

For spiritists who believe that the Akh is eternal, this also means that the greater the number of places any name of an Akh is used, the greater the possibility it will survive to be read and spoken, ensuring that the Akh lives on and grows in power.

Spiritists use Ren as an important tool for communicating with and controlling Akh. Not knowing any of the Ren of an entity makes it almost impossible to exert any influence over its Akh, or its parts.

Ren is perhaps also the most debated aspect of the Akh among Spiritists. Some believe that the Akh is created upon an entity’s birth, and most often perishes when the entity dies, so therefore Ren is simply the name that for instance humanoids are given at birth.

On the opposite side are those who believe that the Akh is transferred between living entities at birth and death, who say that therefore there must be two Ren—one for the enduring Akh, and one for the current transitory vessel, the Khat.

As the two differ, the name of the Akh is called Mah’a Ren or “truthful name”, which is not the same as the everyday name. To complicate matters further, Spiritists who also study Nominism claim that this division is not enough, and that there is an Onomi or “true name” for both the temporary Khat and the more permanent Akh.

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For conscious, intelligent beings, memories shape a large part of their personality. The accumulated memories, personality, and also uniqueness, sometimes even for inanimate objects, is called Ba. Most Spiritists believe that the memories of living entities are stored, physically, in their Khat during life.

However, when a memory is being recalled and enters consciousness, it transcends the physical threshold and becomes a temporary part of the immaterial Akh. A common proof for the link between Khat and Ba, is for instance when novice Spiritists attempt to spirit-travel only to find themselves incapable of accessing their memories, except perhaps the most recent ones.

To summon all or most of one’s memories into the Akh, and still be able to keep focus at the task at hand, for instance when spirit-travelling, requires extreme training, mental exertion and skill.

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"When the Akh getteth outside the Khat, it sayeth to itself, 'Am I dead, or am I not dead ?' It cannot
determine. It seeth its relatives and connexions as it had been used to seeing them before. It even heareth
the wailings. The terrifying Aetheric illusions have not yet dawned. Nor have the frightful apparitions or
experiences caused by the Aether yet come."

- Spiritist collection of translated Khurite dialogues, unknown

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When a conscious entity dies, its Akh separates from its Khat and, after some time, disperses into the etherian energies. This is called Hao'r—it dissolves, or ascends.

Some who believe in a reincarnating Akh say that Hao'r is a non-natural and destructive process, while others say that it is only after Hao'r some of the essences of the Akh will re-gather to find a new vessel. Sometimes however, the Akh does not fully disperse, maybe due to a strong Kau, and this may result in a fragmented spirit called an Auw, or Iwu meaning “without vessel”.

Many Spiritists believe that Akh and Auw can have other origins as well—a rather popular belief is that there exists a whole clade of spiritual entities which are not bound by corporeal laws like physical entities are.

Regardless, there are many types of Auw, and Spiritists from various cultures have different names for them as they are often borrowed from the originating language. Some Auw are considered liminal as they have enough energy to manifest in the world of the living and sometimes affect it.

Most of the time the Auw are confused and disoriented, which is explained by Spiritists as them not possessing their full Ba—personality and memory. An Auw might disappear by itself after a while, but in the case of particularly strong Auw a Spiritist may have to banish it, which is called Djos, or help it reunite with its Ba to form a full Akh, called Khem.

Especially powerful Spiritists can guide an Akh back into its former Khat, another Khat, or even into certain mystical objects, a ritual called Seph.

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As detailed above, the “spirit”, “soul”, or “individual being”, of an entity is its Akh. Part of this is the being's consciousness, or personality consisting of Ba and Ren, but also defined by its previous ties to its Khat and Sheut.

Spiritists often interact with individual beings and their willpower. However, in the spiritual world it is not uncommon to also find other types of entities and energies that don't necessarily fit the Akh model of corporeal or recently deceased entities. “Spiritual Entities”, for lack of a better name, usually but not always consist of Kau in various forms.

Most entities, no matter their plane of existence, contain Kau. In turn, Kau is a form of Shī or Mana.

A Necromancer most often uses Kau to animate semi-living, organic matter. But there are different forms of Kau such as “free-flowing” Shī, or dollops in more or less aggregated shapes, like Kau or Auw in various aspects. These can be channeled into the subject.

External Kau provides the needed connections and energy for the organic subject, but the willpower of the necromancer—transmitted by using Shī—is necessary for the subject to perform instructions and functions. It would probably be possible for a powerful Necromancer and Spiritist to use an Akh in order to possess a corpse, giving it a will of its own, for instance by Seph rituals.

This, however, would likely result in less control over the possessed body. Further, it is likely that a powerful Necromancer could manifest both the necessary Kau and Shī without having to resort to “external” Kau to completely control an undead entity, though this would require immense concentration and likely be extremely dangerous as being the subject differs from just controlling it.

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Scattered across Myrland are numerous archways colloquially known to those with adept knowledge of Spiritism as Ether Wayshrines. The origins and age of these structures is highly-debated, though their depiction of a carrion bird possibly representing Tjaka Baarve may indicate Khurite or proto-Khurite origins.

Approaching one of these wayshrines in the Etherworld reveals a very different sight, for they are surrounded by striking red mushrooms whose mycelium reaches into the distance, forming a network more grand in distance than any empire Nave has likely yet known.

It has been claimed that those who are attuned to multiple wayshrines—with enough training—can even transport their complete Akh along these roots, but surely not without risk.

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