When powerful Mental Power stirred ripples in the Sea of Souls through intense emotions, it often raised towering waves across that endless ocean formed by the collective subconscious of living beings. Consciousness, one of the three elements of alchemy, had always been a focal point of research for every school of spellcasters. Many spells capable of influencing group minds worked by pouring emotions and thoughts into the Sea of Souls, guiding the rise and fall of feelings. Those with powerful Mental Power unconsciously affected the people around them with every gesture, each movement tugging at the emotions and thoughts of countless others.
So what was the Sea of Souls? No one could say for certain. Even spellcasters blessed with second sight gave entirely different accounts of what they observed, much less the descriptions found in the millions of stone tablets, scrolls, and books in the Kamar-Taj Library, written in different languages and originating from different civilizations. Nearly every phenomenon observed by spellcasters was inextricably linked to the memes of their civilization.
Some described it as black outer space, where the soul-lights of Sentient Beings formed a brilliant, undulating galaxy, while savage predators lurked beneath its surface. Others described it as an endless world of fog, so dark one could not see one's hand before one's face, yet glowing with a dizzying faint light. Anyone entering it could only stagger onward, stumbling and lurching before being snatched away by deformed limbs reaching out from the suffocating mist. Whatever it was called—Sea of Souls, Aether, Astral Plane, Empyrean, Heaven, or Hell—all spellcasters agreed on one thing: that spiritual dimension was far too dangerous for creatures of the Material Plane.
"I knew this day would come sooner or later." When Cassilius stepped out of the car in the farm parking lot, Salomon's influence