Influencing the Mortal Realm

Watching Over the Living

Net-neutral and good souls can observe loved ones who are still alive, but their ability to monitor is limited. For instance, souls cannot intrude on moments where the living expect privacy, such as during intimate or personal activities.

Additionally, souls cannot watch over mortals with whom they had no relationship in life, except in two cases:

1. Souls may watch over their living descendants, whether by blood or adoption.
2. If a mortal takes deliberate action to learn about a deceased person, it forms a symbolic connection, akin to becoming acquaintances. However, the ability to observe such individuals is significantly reduced compared to descendants.

Influencing the Living

Good souls are allowed to influence the lives of loved ones, friends, or acquaintances, but doing so comes at a cost. Each intervention temporarily lowers the soul’s status, forcing it to exist in a diminished capacity as an NPC. The duration of this penalty depends on the magnitude of the impact and the soul’s history of prior interventions, particularly within the past 10 years.

Small Influences

Small interventions result in a brief reduction in status. Examples include:

• Nudging a mortal to make a split-second decision.
• Slightly improving a mortal’s chances in competitive situations, such as a job interview.

However, it is important to note that frequent small influences within a decade will increase the cumulative time spent at reduced capacity.

Large Influences

Significant interventions result in several years of diminished status. Examples include:

• Manipulating gambling outcomes to substantially improve a mortal’s social or economic position.
• Curing an incurable disease while creating plausible medical evidence to suggest a misdiagnosis.

As with small influences, repeated large-scale interventions extend the time spent in a diminished state, regardless of the significance of the previous impacts.

Miraculous Influences

Protecting a mortal from catastrophic events, such as an explosion that would otherwise cause complete destruction, is a miraculous act. Such interventions require extraordinary energy and justification, and may not always be approved.

Such acts typically necessitate that the soul has refrained from any recent interventions. Additionally, the soul might need to persuade others to pool their influence or forfeit their own intervention opportunities to achieve the desired outcome.

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Regardless of scale, the system governing these interventions ensures fairness and prevents excessive meddling, balancing the needs of the living with the soul’s responsibilities in the afterlife.