Weekly Lore 14: The Pearls' Libraries
Pearls' Libraries began as an offshoot of Vessels and an alternative to Vesselling, when the raising of Undeads was still at its beginning. Unlike with Vessels, whose main purpose is to allow the interaction between Living and Souls, the Libraries focus on the memories and information carried by Soul Pearls, and despite most foreigner Soul Pearls being connected to Libraries, their knowledge is not the only one stored.
To better explain, it must be said that all Soul Pearls go through a processing, where their Souls are properly identified, their memories cataloged and analyzed. If a memory from a Pearl eligible for Vesselling or Resurrection is considered important, they are carefully copied into artificial Pearls, built for information storage; this is practically the norm for any member of the governing body, mages, Undeads, and artisans of any type of craft.
The Pearls not Vesselled and the artificial ones are then connected to the Libraries, in a piece of technology that resembles Vessels, but that, unlike them, doesn't offer direct access to the Pearls and Souls - if necessary, it is possible, but it is not recommended: most of these Souls are considered to be Resting, and such must be respected.
As each Pearl is added, artificial or not, the most significant memories and knowledge are properly connected to the system, alongside keywords, so they can be searched and viewed: for example, a mage apprentice learning about control magic can search and see memories from mages that came before about it. It is a long and tiring process, made in such a way that the Soul's privacy is respected, their most intimate moments inaccessible. It is also at this moment that certain memories and knowledge can be put under different types of locks, most of them according to age. This sorting and locking process is relatively recent, and innumerable old Souls still have to undergo it.
There are other two important points about the Pearls' Libraries to be made. The first is that, despite the name, any information or knowledge can be connected to them, as long as it is in an artificial pearl. Scholars constantly send their productions in, and it is encouraged of mages, artisans and anyone at a school or academy to do so at least once a year, both so there is no risk of knowledge being lost; as a consequence, it is fairly easily to find written texts, schematics, and even audio recordings about the most various subjects.
The second is that, recently, the Libraries have discovered a way of interconnecting their collections of memories and knowledge. Not all of them are already part of the system, but soon anyone will be able to access anything at any Library, no more need to travel long distances to access something specific at the Libraries.