-- Kitsumashi --
[kit-soo-mah-shee]
Kitsumashi are dual part physical and spiritual beings that fly around collecting lost souls and carrying these souls as paper in their inherent scrolls. A veritable library of souls could be contained in a single scroll, but such a collection remains unlikely as souls can prove very difficult to find and catch and are also not meant to be hoarded like so many pages of poetry. It is the duty of the Kitsumashi to carry lost souls from their earthbound state to a more heavenly realm where they may be cleansed in the Mirror Pool and reflect on their purpose and place. If the souls succeed in becoming placed in this manner they must then be transported back down to the ground realm in order to reach their next mortal home.
Placed soul- rarely seen – knows what its doing – is traveling to its place
Lost soul- more commonly seen- dosen’t know what to do- is wandering in the dark
In soul form the two types looks very different, but once souls are successfully captured by a Kitsumashi they will be transferred to a paper form and all paper forms are alike in the manner that every paper form is uniquely different. These papers can be very beautiful and interesting and are certainly much cleaner and better behaved than any live soul, and so perhaps there are some Kitsumashi who would rather keep souls in this form until the entire world of soul is nothing more than pretty paper and proper little books that will never get to be read. Many disputes and incidents of this nature have happened in the past, and there is little reason to believe the future any more certain.
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When a Kitsumashi reaches three years of age they will have finished growing their mask and their scroll, both of which are a part of their body just as surely as their heart and lungs. Kitsumashi are spirits, but their mask and scroll grant them substance with the scroll growing around the Mashi’s soul and the mask growing around the Mashi’s conscious existence. When a Mashi is wearing its mask as a physical object it is free to exist in the fluid state of mind but when a Mashi has absorbed its mask back into its body it will exist in the more confined but stable state of being.
Scrolls are swallowed and regurgitated by way of transition but neither transition can be made until the Mashi takes its mask off. As mentioned scrolls are grown around souls and so a Kitsumashi must inescapably carry their own soul as the very base level of their inherent scroll. A regurgitated scroll exists as a physical object which grants it equal amounts of weakness and strength but a swallowed scroll becomes immaterial and makes it hard for one to observe and examine their soul, and also confines one’s soul to the cage of one’s own body. Scrolls must be regurgitated and present in order to receive paper form souls, but beyond that their state largely depends of the Kitsumashi in question. Kitsumashi are perfectly capable of carrying their scrolls are long as they have nothing better to do with their paws, and so many Kitsumashi prefer to carry their scrolls so that their souls may enjoy the same freedom as their conscious existence does in a fluid state of mind. Other Kitsumashi prefer to keep their scrolls inside for the same stability and practicality that their conscious existence receives from the physical state of being.
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i lived.