C175: Essence, Spirituality and Spirit Body
He addressed the last remaining item among Roson's possessions, completing the spoils.
The final object was an emblem necklace, forged from a dark, lusterless metal and shaped into a configuration vaguely resembling the letter W, its surface bearing the patina of long use.
"I would suggest we leave this particular item alone, junior."
“Why?”
Davis crouched down beside the artifact, using one finger to carefully clean away the grime clinging to the metal, revealing the intricate craftsmanship beneath.
"This thing must be the family emblem of the Rowan family. They have accumulated a rather infamous reputation throughout the Night City, and they are, to put the matter delicately... a little vindictive."
He said this while shaking his head.
"They may possess some means of tracking their emblem back to whoever has killed one of their members. So it would be far wiser to leave it behind, junior."
Arnold considered the advice for a moment. He did not object, since this represented the wisdom of someone knowledgeable about the extraordinary world.
"Is there any method for us to prevent being tracked?"
"The means to prevent being tracked..." Davis crossed his arms over his chest, closing his eyes in thought.
"Ya could use a Serene Yi essence vial to shield yourselves from such tracing. However, the difficulty lies in the fact that Serene Yi essence vials are exceptionally hard to obtain. Pure Yi essence vials accomplish fundamentally the same function, but their efficacy would not come close to matching Serene Yi essence vials."
Arnold nodded in understanding. However, one sudden question surfaced inside his mind.
“These essence containers… I believe each of them has different abilities?”
That had been the reason why Roson had attempted to gulp down the crimson bottle during battle, and why she had shattered the violet vial to create that obscuring mist.
"You are correct, junior. For example, the Harmony Yan essence vial, that yellow vial over there, functions as a healing agent. Beyond that purpose, they can create barriers, offer protective shielding, and purify malignant influences, provided one possesses the knowledge to channel those effects, of course."
Yes, each container had its own distinct properties and applications.
To put it simply, inside the mindscape, Izzy created a cheat sheet and inscribed the information on its surface for permanent remembrance:
[
Pure Yan bottle - Orange - cleanses the mind, grants detection capabilities, offers protection capacity, and purifies evil influences.
Harmony Yan vial - Yellow - healing, protection, endurance.
Violence Yan bottle - Crimson - strengthens power and willpower, grants vigor and energy.
Pure Yi vial - Blue - creates obscuring barriers, restores a man's sanity and calms his mind.
Cold Yi vial - Violet - corrosion, enhances agility, healing for Moon Faction Stagefarers, limited vision mist.
Serene Yi vial - Gray - hidden, stealth, obscuring.
]
She nodded with satisfaction, rather proud of herself, and returned her attention to Arnold's perspective.
“The red bottle. You called it a Violence Yan essence bottle, used to strengthen Stagefarers, granting them heightened strength and additional vigor. This brings me to my question—"
Arnold pointed directly at Davis. Or to be more precise, he pointed at Davis's upraised hand.
“Can you do the same?”
“Pardon?”
"That red aura you just emitted from your hand, the one you called spirituality. You are from the Deceiver Path, and you named it Violence Yan spirituality, did you not? Then would that not mean you can perform the same function as the Violence Yan essence bottle? Strengthening yourself and others using that aura of yours?”
"..."
Davis’s expression became complicated. He scratched the back of his head with reluctance.
"I understand the confusion, junior," he said, exhaling. "This is why we need proper schooling for subjects such as these... How can anyone reasonably be expected to learn all of this in a single sitting?"
“Wait, they teach this stuff in school?” Arnold was stunned, staring at Davis in disbelief.
"Of course not, junior. Openly teaching such dangerous knowledge would be asking for trouble. Chaos would erupt, and many people would surely perish as a result." Davis sighed. "My apologies, we have drifted off the original topic."
Slowly, his hand emitted a faint red aura, the crimson smoke wavering against the cold night air like firelight.
"I believe you have harbored a misunderstanding, junior. Essence is different from spirituality."
"?”
Then how...? Arnold looked between the glowing mist and the scattered vials, tilting his head in confusion.
Davis began his patient speech as though addressing a slow student.
"This is my spirituality, or if ya may prefer the terminology, my energy. Observing this, do ya notice anything unique about its nature?"
"...It is... like a form of colored smoke?"
Davis snapped his fingers, and a small spark kindled on his fingertip, dancing briefly before extinguishing.
"One hundred marks, junior." He explained. "This spirituality is yar own energy source. It acts as the fuel. Ya consume a certain amount of spirituality to activate yar abilities, or to perform mystic rituals through ceremony. And should ya overuse it, exhaust yar spirituality..."
"You die?"
"...? What nonsense are ya speaking, junior? Ya can’t simply die from such a thing." Davis laughed, shaking his head.
“When yar spirituality runs low, ya will experience mental exhaustion, suffer headaches, and a sense of mental fog or lack of clarity. Think of it simply as mental fatigue, much like physical stamina. When it runs low, ya will feel exhausted, potentially to the point of fainting.”
Inside the mind theatre, Izzy narrowed her eyes, as a serious question surfaced.
‘Then why do I feel like I would die if I overused my abilities?'
This matter was not immediately important, but it might potentially reveal some hidden secret about Curses.
Meanwhile, Davis waited for Arnold to grasp the information before continuing.
“Essence, on the other hand, is the core of yar soul. It is linked to yar soul, or, in other words, yar "Spirit Body.” It represents the total amount of fuel that yar Spirit Body can generate and sustain.”
He pointed directly at his chest with his thumb.
“When one becomes a Stagefarer, one's Spirit Body will define its own specific essence, and from that defined essence flows the corresponding spirituality.”
Then from his heart, he drew a path to his palm.
"Ya might imagine essence as yar blood vein. Or perhaps, in this context, think of it as yar Spirit Body's blood vein, yar own soul’s blood vein.
"As for spirituality, think of it as the smoke flowing through those veins. Just as an ordinary person can replenish blood, a Stagefarer can regenerate their spirituality over time, with the help of their Spirit Body.”
Izzy tapped her chin thoughtfully, several related thoughts surfacing alongside the question.
‘Is it because I’m a Curse, so I lack a Spirit Body? That doesn’t make sense.’
If their energy reservoir were depleted, Izzy felt like both herself and Isa would die. She did not dare to test the water, but the conclusion seemed certain.
Unlike Stagefarers, they could not naturally regenerate their energy. And the mere act of maintaining their existence consumed energy. So Izzy concluded she lacked a proper Spirit Body to generate spirituality on her own.
Izzy decided to focus on Davis's words first, record everything, and conduct a proper investigation later when she had more time.
Davis, in the meantime, pointed at the scattered bottles.
"As ya can see, these bottles and vials contain essence appearing in liquid form, that being the vessel by which it can be transported."
"Oh."
Then, he plucked one violet vial from the collection and casually uncapped it.
"Do ya perceive this?"
A violet smoke curled out from the small opening, thin and wispy as it drifted into the cool night air.
'This is what they call spirituality.' Arnold recalled.
The smoke that he had always observed whenever a cap was removed from one of these containers
As the smoke drifted out, Arnold noted that the amount of liquid inside the container lowered and dissipated, almost as if water were being boiled away into vapor.
"Ya must have noticed this too, junior. This bottle is called the Cold Yi Essence bottle, and contains Cold Yi Essence in liquid form.
“But it is not the real essence, merely a product of a mystical ritual. Those cannot substitute for our real essence. Because once they are exposed to the open air, they will transform into this escaping mist, and this reduces the total essence remaining in the bottle.
"Since these containers are not Stagefarers, they do not possess a Spirit Body capable of holding essence and producing spirituality. This leads inevitably to the essence dissipating over time as the spirituality escapes into the atmosphere."
“Oh!” Arnold widened his eyes, as though he had just grasped some world-shattering revelation.
But in reality, many more questions were rapidly forming in Izzy's mind.
‘They do not have a Spirit Body? Does this mean that a Curse really does not possess a Spirit Body?’
'If we do not possess a Spirit Body... If our very soul does not exist, then what exactly are "we"? What holds our essence, what holds our energy?'
Izzy began to organize her chaotic thoughts into coherent chains of reasoning.
'Our energy should be spirituality. We can absorb other spirituality, like how we absorbed the green mist released before a life ended, the green mist created from a person’s fear, and that severed finger's gray mist.'
'Would we really die if our spirituality were to run out?'
‘No. Thinking logically, if a Curse died whenever its energy—or spirituality—ran out, then there should not be many Curses remaining in existence at all.
‘If one simply left a Curse alone in containment, sealed away without any source to absorb spirituality, how else could they possibly sustain their continued existence? Why would the Institution ever need to dispatch specialized teams to eliminate a Curse?'
That meant there must still exist some sort of dormant survival mechanism that activates when a Curse runs out of spirituality, allowing them to persist in some diminished state.
'When one advances to a higher Stage, one may lose control and transform into a Curse. Is there some deeper relationship between those two things?’
Izzy voiced the question through Arnold’s mouth, and as expected, Davis’s answer was—
"Curses? How would I know whether they have any connection or not? Ya question is rather strange, junior. Everything I have related comes from secret textbooks about Stagefarers I read long ago, so ya will not find answers from me if ya insist on asking such peculiar questions, junior."
Yes, curiosity about the nature of Curses did seem bizarre from a normal person's perspective. For the most part, Davis was not a Curse, How would he even know? It made sense..Arnold nodded in understanding and did not press further.
Oblivious to Arnold's inner turmoil, Davis continued his lecture with enthusiasm.
"A Stagefarer will only experience a temporary strengthening effect when they consume those bottled essences, but never any permanent augmentation. This is because our essence has already been defined at the moment we walk the path of Stagefarer. External essences can only strengthen us temporarily or transform into different effects rather than permanently enlarging our own essence.”
"To enlarge yar essence and increase yar spirituality permanently, ya can only condense your essence and conduct an advancement ritual to the next Stage."
"Condense essence?"
Davis eyed Arnold with skepticism, his expression clearly communicating his bewilderment, as if wondering from what remote corner of civilization this boy had possibly emerged to remain ignorant of such knowledge.
"Junior. I have wondered this for quite some time now. Pray, be honest with me: are ya from the mountains? Was ya, perchance, trained under some secret cult or reclusive master up there in the peaks, and only just now walked out into the wider world for the very first time, to complete some final stage of yar training?"
“...” Arnold stared at Davis in stunned silence, speechless.