Overview
Ethereal Coins are soul-bearing devices issued by the Eternal Order. They connect selected members to the Eternal Order’s Citadel and support its limited system of return, inspection, and rebirth.
A successful return preserves the person’s continuing soul. The Coin is part of the Order’s effort to preserve a person through death, while its larger ambition remains a local Soul Cycle that can serve everyone.
Membership and Distribution
Only members of the Eternal Order can receive Ethereal Coins. Production is limited, and the Order must decide whom it can trust with them. Membership alone does not guarantee that a Coin will be available.
A Coin must be carried on the member’s person for the return system to function. Its protection also depends on the citadel remaining active and on the conditions of the Node where the member dies.
Death and Return
When a member dies while carrying an Ethereal Coin and the citadel is active, the system attempts to transfer their continuing soul. Some Nodes can prevent the return. If the transfer succeeds, the Coin generates at the citadel with the soul it carries.
Return is followed by inspection. A trained member examines the Coin to assess the soul’s corruption level. If the soul passes, the Coin is placed in a machine and the person is reborn into their old body. Temporary memory loss can follow the process.
Corruption and Stored Souls
Repeated rebirth gradually corrupts a soul. Ethereal Coins do not remove this danger, and a successful transfer does not establish that the soul is fit for rebirth.
Coins containing souls that fail inspection are placed in storage. Stored souls are not conscious. The Order has not established a cure or a guaranteed timetable for their return to life. Nysa Moonpetal is among those trained to examine souls for corruption.
An Inactive Citadel
If a member dies while the citadel is inactive, the soul-transfer system does not activate. It cannot bring that newly dead member back to the citadel.
When the citadel is inactive, returned Coins float in the space outside the Nodes. A Coin already carrying a returned soul is therefore in a different situation from a member whose transfer never activated.
Emblem and Allegiance
The Coin bears an arcane sigil combined with an ouroboros whose head is severed. The emblem marks allegiance to the Eternal Order and its defiance of the limits placed on continued existence.