Soullessness

Background

Soullessness is a metaphysical condition in which a being lacks a soul or spiritual essence. This absence may be due to the soul having been removed, destroyed, never created, or willingly separated. As a result, the individual becomes untethered from the usual spiritual, emotional, and metaphysical frameworks that govern most living beings.

Soulless individuals often display diminished or absent emotional responses, making them highly rational, detached, or even ruthless. They are usually unaffected by abilities that target spiritual or emotional components, such as Soul Manipulation, Spirit Manipulation, or Empathic Manipulation. In some cases, Soullessness may also confer a form of conceptual or spiritual immortality, as there is no soul to damage, manipulate, or destroy.

Soullessness may be a permanent condition or a temporary state, depending on the setting or character. In some cases, it can be reversed if the soul is recovered or restored. In others, the being has transcended the need for a soul entirely.

Also Called

• Spiritual Absence
• Soul Disconnection
• Spirit Void
• Metaphysical Null
• Desouled State

Possible Applications

• Immunity or high resistance to Soul Manipulation, Spirit Manipulation, and related metaphysical attacks.
• Resistance to Empathic Manipulation due to a lack of emotions or an emotional center.
• Immunity to Possession, Spiritual Tracking, or Mystic Perception that relies on detecting a soul.
• Enhanced mental clarity and logical thinking, especially in high-stress situations.
• Potential immortality, as the user lacks a soul to damage or pass on after death.
• Unpredictable or anomalous behavior in universes where souls define one's identity or morality.
• Potential access to abilities or domains typically reserved for undead or artificial beings.

Practical Uses

• Avoid detection from soul-based or spiritual tracking abilities.
• Outlast soul-bound attacks that would otherwise bypass physical durability.
• Execute actions with complete emotional detachment, useful in assassination or high-focus environments.
• Exist outside typical reincarnation, resurrection, or afterlife cycles.
• Interact with or enter realms typically barred to the souled or living.

Potential Types

• True Soullessness: The user has never possessed a soul and functions as a complete anomaly within spiritual systems.
• Artificial Soullessness: The soul was forcibly removed or sealed away.
• Temporary Soullessness: The soul is displaced, but may return or be restored.
• Partial Soullessness: Only fragments of the soul remain, leading to reduced emotional or spiritual capacity.

Possible Limitations

• May lack the capacity to feel empathy, love, or other complex emotions.
• Can be vulnerable to effects targeting only physical or mental aspects, due to lack of spiritual balance.
• May become unstable or lose their identity over time if the soul was once part of them.
• Certain forms of magic or metaphysical systems may treat soulless beings as inherently unnatural or dangerous.
• Soullessness may limit access to soul-dependent powers or realms.
• In some narratives, being soulless is seen as a curse or unnatural state, often accompanied by side effects.

Users

• Flowey (Undertale): Flowey lacks a SOUL and has no emotions, becoming a sociopathic killer trying to goad Frisk into killing everyone.

• The Knight (Hollow Knight): The Knight as a child of the void, lacks a soul of his own, instead having a shade that acts as an echo of his past.

• Hat Kid (A Hat in Time): For a time in Chapter 3, Hat Kid fully loses her soul as it's taken by The Snatcher, making her soulless.

• Kirby (Kirby): In Kirby Mass Attack, Kirby has his soul outside of his body to lead all of the Kirby's.