Soul and Body in Elden Ring
I can't stress enough how cool Igon is as a character, as well as his little sideplot... however, he was also, surprisingly enough, the one missing piece I needed to make a final conclusion on the body/soul shenanigans that happen in this game. In hindsight, it was obvious, but it's good to have it spelled out so clearly.
Unlike his body, Igon's soul has both of his legs intact and can help us with the fight against Bayle. Him mentioning that his soul was still on top of Jagged Peak, and it looking like the many astral projections/phantom apparitions we have seen thus far, were incredibly good pieces of the wider puzzle. But it got me thinking about our previous encounters with similar concepts...
A little clarification
I do want to say that not all instances of invasions and summoning involve projecting one's soul. The game makes it kinda obvious when it's the case and when it's not, and I think I've highlighted every instance where it's relevant. Every other encounter can probably be taken the same way as the encounters in the Dark Souls trilogy.
Understanding the concept
The first characters I thought about were Sellen and the Dung Eater, for obvious reasons. They are the ones who display this behavior just as transparently as Igon does, but without explicitly mentioning what they are doing or that it's even happening. We can piece it together through context clues though.
Let's start with Sellen.
We are able to meet her in two different locations, coexisting at the same time. Their bodies are completely identical, but one is imprisoned in the Witchbane Ruins and the other seems to be doing just fine at the Waypoint Ruins, inexplicably. (I must admit, when the game was new I thought her quest had glitched or something lol.)
By progressing her questline further, we are informed by Sellen herself that the body in Witchbane Ruins is indeed her real one, so who are we talking to exactly? For a while, my friends and I have used the term "astral projection" to describe what was happening. For all intents and purposes, it's a very correct way to see it, but we incorrectly thought that what was being projected was simply her mind... with Igon's words though, we might have confirmation that what we are conversing with is Sellen's very soul, which "left" her imprisoned body to pursue her goals.
When we do meet that imprisoned body before Sellen tells us to get her Primal Glintstone (which is where Sorcerers' souls reside, unlike most beings in the Lands Between), she will appear dazed, incoherent, and won't recognize us, either completely unaware of our existence or even taking us for one of the "frothing degenerates" that sealed her down there. When we are there as per her request, however, she will become much more verbose and aware, which I take to mean Sellen's soul reunited with her body to make sure the process would go smoothly.
(The Sellen on the right has way more to say but you get the gist of it.)
And what's left behind after the fact isn't a lifeless body either, but one that is still alive, with her faculties intact. Sellen's body still holds some part of herself, even without her soul... keep this in mind.
Moving on to the Dung Eater.
The first time anyone will meet him in-game is in the Roundtable Hold, appearing as a red spirit after setting foot into Altus. He seems to actually be well-spoken enough, despite what you'd expect from someone like him. It isn't until you get a Seedbed Curse that he'll tell you to go look for his real body, and the difference between him and what we find imprisoned is quite stark.
The man is seen bashing his head on the wall repeatedly, muttering a mantra of sorts to himself, unaware of his surroundings to the point he won't notice he is freed until he is told, even should we speak to him from within his cell. Despite this, he seems to be well aware of what he has to do, his goal and everything pertaining to it. He isn't even half as eloquent as his spirit, but it's clear he is of at least a similar mind. Like with Sellen's body, he remembers very specific things and reacts accordingly.
These two seem to set a pretty consistent standard: The soul is much more eloquent and aware, capable of everything a normal person should be capable of, yet pretty intangible... meanwhile the bodies are alive, still hold part of the person's mind, but seem to be much less aware, much more disoriented and incoherent. And Igon, yet again, follows a similar pattern.
When we see him in Gravesite Plains, he is incoherently rambling. He doesn't even seem to notice us or pay us any mind, and displays some wild mood swings, either cursing Bayle and promising his death, or begging him to spare him and not hurt him anymore.
This is in stark contrast to when he is near Jagged Peak. He observes us hunting, he is fully capable of speech and requests that we aid him in his vengeance. I believe this change in demeanor is happening because he is standing closer to where his soul has remained.
This tells us that the soul is needed for a body to be more complex and aware. It's the holder of most of the person's identity, but the body holds an imprint of it too due to its mind, so even if the two sides are separate it will act, think and behave a certain way, albeit much simpler in scope. In a way, both parts are alive simultaneously, which I guess is why Destined Death can target only one of them at a time as well. Every body has its own consciousness, regardless of whether the soul leaves it. This is also worth remembering.
This means that when Sellen is killed by Jarren right after we retrieve her soul, she DID die. Her body is conscious if a bit unfocused, she is still her own individual life. It's honestly kind of fucked up if you stop and really think about it...
Let's move on to another deeply relevant topic.
Sharing a Soul
We do find another instance of the soul making the body more lucid and aware than it is without it, and that comes in the form of Darian and Devin, twins who share soul despite having two different bodies.
The most interesting part of this sharing of the soul is that one of them, Darian, is completely well-spoken, aware of his surroundings, and more than capable of traveling and holding his own in a fight... meanwhile, Devin appears to be the opposite.
This, of course, changes whenever his brother is killed, whenever he gets hold of their armor. He will be much more eloquent (some people will say to a fault lol), and will recognize whoever the perpetrator of Darian's murder is, either Fia or our Tarnished.
So it seems like the twins' lucidity depends on whoever holds the soul in the moment. So, while Darian is active, Devin is drained of energy and in a simpler state of mind. However, it must be pointed out that if we are the perpetrators of his brother's murder, he will take the initiative to retrieve his equipment for his revenge, but when it's Fia, he is utterly petrified, and we are the ones who must deliver his equipment. Perhaps the Death Blight has something to do with it, preventing Darian's soul from simply travelling back to his brother. Worse yet, it might be that most of their soul has been destroyed by it, but some of it remained on their armor, which is how Devin is able to get his revenge, and why he seemingly dies/kills himself right after their quest is complete.
I think there is a second pair who experienced the same fate as the D twins: Irina and Hyetta.
These two women look absolutely identical, even more so than Darian and Devin, surprisingly enough. Many are convinced that Hyetta is simply the reanimated corpse of the maiden puppeted by an entity like Shabriri, if not Shabrir himself, due to the fact that it takes Irina's death to make her appear in Liurnia. However, this cannot be the case, as Irina's body is still found at the side of the road when Hyetta is active, which is unlike what happens when Shabriri appears in the Mountaintops of the Giants.
My friend @katyspersonal once made a post about the possibility I am presenting here [x], pointing out how Darian and Devin embody two different elements (gold and silver), and how Irina and Hyetta might be the same, only differing in the guidance they can see as Finger Maidens (Two and Three Fingers respectively).
And yes, Irina is herself a Finger Maiden, both of them wear their attire minus headwear in exchange for wraps to cover their blind eyes (though Irina lacks the robe's cape as well).
In that case, the reason why Hyetta can only appear when Irina dies is the same reason why we can only see a fully functioning Devin when Darian is dead. Their shared soul might have simply returned to her.
One last point is that, like the D twins, the two girls share their voice actress, implying a definitive connection and not just model reuse...
So, we have established that the soul and body are separate in more than just vague terms, and that it seems like the former holds more importance than its physical counterpart, at least in stimulating their mental faculties. This is all true, to an extent...
Bodies themselves DO have some influence on the soul that inhabits it, as the mind is something contained within them. After all, we can see it with two bodies sharing a soul. Despite being functionally the same people, these characters have different goals and personalities. The idea is also supported by the practice of having souls return to the Erdtree so they may be reborn as new individuals. If souls were all that made up unique beings, then the same people with the same memories would be reborn again and again, but it doesn't seem to be the implication of what happens with them. Souls are shaped by their bodies just as much as bodies are affected by souls.
Due to their ethereal nature, though, souls persist more than bodies do in more cases than not. It seems to be by design, which is why they are the ones who linger on more often than not.
The Souls who persist
In the Land of Shadow, we can find four mausoleums at the four corners of the map, each containing a warrior who originates from beyond the region. These resting places are, however, guarded by the souls of these very warriors, still tied to them even after death.
So souls can linger at least near their bodies, but this is not always the case. There are a few instances of souls who go beyond simply haunting their resting place, and for different reasons than just to stop any potential graverobber.
We have two prominent instances of souls living past their bodies and minds, but still carrying out their will as they did in life. The first one is with Mad Tongue Alberich.
The maddened sorcerer invades us in the Roundtable Hold should we jump down into his domain, with no regard for the "Hold's serenity" as the Dung Eater puts it. However, in the Fortified Manor, the physical location that the Roundtable was modeled after, we can find the heretic's remains and loot his entire set from it.
This happens whether we killed his apparition or not, which implies he has been dead for a while, but that his soul still lingers in the place he once served, haunting the location and killing those foolish enough to cross him for no other reason than to get back at the jeering tongues that drove him mad.
Interestingly enough, the same happens with Elemer of the Briar.
His real body resides in the Shaded Castle, which he conquered during his failed execution. And there, in the comfort of the stolen castle, he could project his soul across the Lands Between to gather Bell Bearings, earning him the title of Bell Bearing Hunter.
And we know this isn't a group of similarly-equipped people, as all of Elemer's equipment relates to him and him alone. The greatsword he wields is especially damning, as it was the storied sword of the Marais family, the castellans of the fort he currently occupies.
However, even should the real Elemer fall to the Tarnished, his spirit seems to live on as the Bell Bearing Hunter, still tormenting merchants and instructors alike. They will appear at each of their locations and will do so until they are destroyed individually, which is unlike the Margit apparitions, who cease to be when Morgott is slain.
This is why I believe he is much like Alberich in this regard. A soul kept tethered to the world even past the death of its own body, still seeking what it sought in life. It's quite scary to think that someone like Elemer isn't even gone for good after death.
The curious case of Vyke
Vyke is the oddest encounter of the bunch, as he appears in two distinct moments in two distinct states. The earliest we can meet him is in Liurnia with the title of Festering Fingerprint, guarding the Church of Inhibition, where his maiden passed away.
In this state, Vyke uses many Frenzy Incantations, leaning into his nature as a contender for the title of Lord of Frenzied Flame.
However, we can later meet him in the Mountaintops of the Giants, trapped in an Evergaol. Inside, he is a completely different fight than he was in Liurnia, renouncing any form of Frenzied Flame and instead only using Dragon Cult Incantations.
Despite his weapon and armor clearly showing the effects of the Three Fingers and its touch, Vyke himself does not reflect this at all. Even his title of Roundtable Knight seems to be in contrast to his current state, so what's going on?
I believe this is an instance of body and soul separating.
It seems that after having already made the mistake of absorbing the Frenzied Flame from the Three Fingers, Vyke realized the folly of his actions, and either locked himself up or let himself get captured and sealed away. However, he left behind his soul, so that he could still guard his maiden, the one he had done all of this for to begin with. This caused a split between Vyke's soul, now mired in madness, and Vyke's body, which still instinctively held onto his past as a member of the Dragon Cult and of the Roundtable Hold.
I guess we can posit that while the body is the one that is physically affected by the yellow flame, what holds it within might be the host's very soul. However, both parts are needed to make a full Lord of Frenzied Flame, so this was still enough to stall the end of the world. After all, the worshipers of the Flame don't have him in high regard, despite his soul literally dwelling a few steps from the Frenzied Village. Vyke exists split and will stay that way for the good of the world and to satisfy his mad desire of staying by his maiden's side...
Bodies living without a Soul
While the soul persisting after death seems to be intended, the body doing so appears to be unprecedented and unnatural. This is the reason why Those Who Live in Death are scorned and viewed as abominations. Bodies should not persist, yet they can...
As we have seen, souls can ditch their own bodies for some time, and those can still live and are still the same individual they always are, just simplified and more instinctual... however, unlike Those Who Live in Death, there is still a soul that will return to them! For the unlucky undead, though, no such thing will ever happen; their faculties can never be restored. While the dynamic is the same, the context is different, which is why something is considered abominable while the other is not... then again, the D twins were largely scorned and only found acceptance with the Golden Order, so people might simply view the concept as abhorrent regardless.
Their minds being stuck to a more instinctual plane might also explain why they always attack on sight, as most of them are implied to be casualties of the Shattering. The most common undead are the Skeletal Militiamen, their name suggesting they were civilians rising to the occasion during a state of emergency, which fits the Shattering like a glove. There are also bandits who were common during the conflict, executioners who murdered what remained of defeated armies, and farmers who were forced into the fight and had to turn their farming tools into weapons of war.
Sun Realm Knights and Gravekeepers don't have to be necessarily tied to the Shattering, but the former's aggression is easily explainable with the fact they clearly perished during a war, while the latter don't exactly attack by physical means unless you get too close to them, and instead prefer to use Ghostflame spells.
These types of undead are still the same individuals they were in life... this is, of course, pretty big when it comes to analyzing Godwyn.
His lack of agency is often discussed, but if what Igon and everyone else can teach us can be applied to him as well, it paints quite the intriguing picture, because whatever will there is to glean from him now might genuinely be his own, if only in a warped and simplified way. Maybe Godwyn truly was the type to mourn those who are scorned, or perhaps it is simply because he views Those Who Live in Death as undeserving of their fate, much like him, and wishes to elevate them and give their kind a second chance at life.
The transferring of Souls
We can't talk about Godwyn without talking about Ranni too.
She killed only her body, living on as a soul. This is not actually that unique, as we have seen already; it is a normal state of existence. Where she differs, however, is her decision to dwell within puppets and dolls that she has complete control over, and how that allows her to be more than just a ghost stuck in a limited set of locations to haunt. It does seem like maintaining this state takes a toll on her since she has to rest more often than not, and she isn't fully able to inhabit it, as some of her original ghostly face can be seen sticking out from her body... regardless, Ranni has successfully gone beyond her flesh and found a new host. And unlike the body she was born with, her vessels will stop living whenever she leaves them, having no inherent life of their own. I guess she is assuring there are no loose ends, even should she need to leave anything behind. Smart.
She is not the only one who transfers her soul to a different host body, though the other two are quite... invasive about it.
Shabriri and Gowry linger without their own bodies, needing to snatch those of others, usually those within their field of influence. For Shabriri, we know for sure that this man died, as he was executed for the crime of slander, which is how the sickness that would define Frenzy in Marika's age developed from within his empty eye sockets.
As such, he can be nothing BUT a soul, still lingering somehow. It's especially interesting, as the Frenzied Flame is said to melt souls, so he somehow manages to avoid this fate and still uses the yellow flame to his personal advantage. You can't say he isn't resourceful...
Gowry doesn't have this spelled out for him, but there's a possibility that his real body is located in Stillwater Cave, a place found at the southern end of Liurnia's lake, full of poisonous pools, Rot Disciples and a single Cleanrot Knight standing guard. Inside, drenched in a pool of murky poison, we can find a corpse holding the Sage set, the same clothes worn by Gowry.
Regardless, both men persist beyond their own physical bodies, finding suitable hosts among those consumed by despair for Shabriri, and the Kindred of Rot for Gowry. They are pesky bodysnatchers who are probably only able to do what they do because of the forces they align with.
And since most of their victims are either dead, utterly broken or simple-minded, their will is easily capable of overpowering them without the fear of having to contend with the body's personality, at least as far as we can confirm... this is unlike the soul shared by the D twins moving from one brother to the next.
Technically speaking, Sellen herself is on the same boat. Transferring her Primal Glintstone inside the body of the lookalike puppet will have her effectively take control of the new host completely. It's likely that she doesn't conflict with the original owner of the body due to her transformation into a puppet rendering her fully catatonic.
What Nightreign adds to the conversation
I did not expect Nightreign to put more things worth talking about for this topic, but it did, and I'm glad for its additions.
The first one I'll touch upon is Revenant.
She seems to have originated from Chloe Northerncroft's soul, who desired to live, affecting her life-sized doll Daphne after her murder. Some life seems to have dwelled within her before that moment too, as she reaches for the young lady during her gruesome death. Revenant's own memories are somewhat jumbled, but she ends up coming to the conclusion that she is a unique being that was never human; neither Daphne nor Chloe, simply being the Revenant. After all, she couldn't JUST be Chloe, otherwise we'd have something more akin to Ranni, and Revenant would have no life of her own, just like the former Lunar Princess' many dolls and puppets.
It's possible that she gained a soul of her own too, or at least some sort of equivalent. She is, for sure, more complex than most of the bodies without souls that we have observed so far, so it wouldn't be too outlandish. Golems and marionettes also appear capable of gaining greater consciousness and even spiritual energy of some kind, evidenced by the fact that there are several Spirit Ashes containing the spiritual remains of various automatons.
Revenant is also a recipient for souls, as she seems to have attracted those of some of the servants of the House of Northerncroft, who now act as her family if the in-game text is to be believed. They are known as Helen the Agile Page, Frederick the Burly Cook, and Sebastian the Doting Butler. Maybe they were drawn to Revenant because her desire for revenge matched their resolve to have justice for the slaughtered Northerncroft family, or maybe they too thought she was Chloe the same way Revenant did for a bit.
Regardless, they are united in common cause and are closely tied to one another now. She allows them to remain tethered to this world, and they provide their strength and skills. She is to these servants what the Nameless Mausoleums were for the four Land of Shadow warriors, except she is fully conscious and quite sassy in comparison.
We finally reach Executor, possibly the most interesting instance of body and soul shenanigans going on here. We have seen two bodies share one soul, and souls moving to a new body, but Executor is two souls AND two bodies merged into a single one, embodying aspects of both individuals blended together harmoniously.
This is sometimes debated, but I feel like it's the explanation that makes the most sense. Executor has the memories from both the Painter and the Crucible Knight, but especially the Painter. He has the same tendency to paint, the same proficiency with katanas, and the majority of his journal entries speak of the Painter's point of view. It's clear that the Crucible Knight is also part of this blend, and probably the reason for it to begin with. The Crucible from which he draws power is all about blending life together...
Their physical forms were also likely merged together, as Executor lacks the sheer size of a Crucible Knight, and his facial features are quite soft and almost feminine. His voice is clearly masculine and deep, though, and most of his body is merged with his armor. Honestly, this is further fuel for the theory that the two of them merged into one, because the armor itself got blended into them too.
So what was this about again?
This was a long-winded way to say: Body and Soul are both alive and complete each other. The soul allows the body lucidity and greater awareness, but it is the body itself and its instincts that grant personality to each soul. Due to both being alive, both of them can exist separately from the other, and live or die independently.
The mind also exists, but it almost feels like it can only come to be if both sides are united, though both parts will keep an imprint of it if they ever separate, with the soul taking most of it with the scission. Of all three fundamental shards of an individual, only the soul and body are living, while the mind is more of a nebulous concept.
Basically, when in doubt about what's going on with some characters, it's either some soul or some body bullshit lol. Both concepts are very volatile... and honestly, it's just the beginning of the whole spiritual conversation one could have about these games, because there's a LOT.
