Raziel and the Reaver in the Spectral Realm
The Spectral Realm is a realm or plane of existence where the spirits of the deceased go to when their existence in the Material Plane has ended. The Spectral Realm appears as a warped and distorted version of the Material Realm, bathed in a deep blue tint. Water is as thin as air in the Spirit World.
Inhabitants
The Spectral Realm exists alongside the Material Realm and is inhabited by many different species including:
- The Sluagh a species of Soul devouring creatures whom the Elder God refer's to as parasites and scavengers, The Elder God also accused the Sluagh of stealing people's destinies but this was likely used by him to get Raziel to hate and kill the Sluagh without question.
- Archon's are also Soul Devourer's and come in different varieties. For example there are wraiths under the employ of the Elder God too (known as the Archon-Dreadnaughts & Archon-Reapers) who have become "mindless hunters" (but are actually quite intelligent) of Souls.
- Vampire Wraiths are the souls of Vampires whose souls have remained too Long in the Spirit World and their feeding methods have adjusted to the new plane allowing them to feed on the souls of others. If their mode of death is reversed, they may re-enter their bodies and reanimate their corpse in the Material Realm. For example, if a stake is removed from a vampires corpse, the wraith may enter the body and begin to heal as a normal vampire would. They would also reanimated with the Soul suck ability.
Raziel himself & his other incarnation(s) (the ravenous spirit(s) w/in the Soul Reaver or as the Wraith-blade) could be considered a combination between the Wraiths & the Sluagh. Raziel is blue like the Archons, feeds like Sluagh, and can reanimate in a corpse their material plane selves like a vampire wraith.
- The Elder God inhabits both the Spectral and Material Realms and is thus unable to be harmed by Physical or Spirtual Weapons alone but is powerful enough to attack in both realms. This has been evidenced when directly attacking or incapacitating Raziel on occasion. However he can be attacked by a combination of the two types of weapons such as the (Pureified)Soul Reaver, such as when Kain fought the Elder God.
The Afterlife
The souls of all beings drift into this world after mere moments in the Material Realm. There they linger until they are claimed by the realms inhabitance, who in turn feed the Elder God(minus the Sluagh).
While the Elder God has been exposed for his lies and deceit, his role in spinning souls in the Wheel of Fate has not yet been disproven.
^ There has been alot of confusion as to what the nature of the Elder God is or where he came from. Another question is how he was able to exist in both realms simultaneously the Earth realm and the afterlife some including me are skeptical about the afterlife and if it's true that the Elder God does maintain life in the afterlife or possibly a pseudo afterlife created by the Elder God to stop any dead souls from passing on to the true afterworld, the purpose being to trap them in this purgatorial limbo in order for their souls to be hunted down by his ethereal agents to be captured to have their souls energy converted into sustenance to feed their "God" ^
Traversing the Planes
Material and Spectral Realms
Traveling between the planes is rarely an easy feat. Raziel acquires the ability naturally upon his death as a vampire and resurrection as a "Reaver of Souls". The Elder God grants him portals with which to cross over, and without them he is unable to move from the Spectral Plane to the Material Plane. He can, however, move in the reverse at will, or upon the destruction of his physical body.
In Defiance, Raziel displeases the Elder God and is no longer granted the portals. He manages, however, to project his soul into rotting corpses in the material realm, and use them to grant him a physical body. Other characters may utilize the Spectral Realm in other ways. Due to his fragility, Melchiah is able to partially dematerialize himself and phase through certain objects. Melchiah is technically taking his body with him as he sorta shifts between planes. Dumah however is a Revived Vampire and is able to cross the planes at will (unlike non-boss Revived Vampires) to become a vampire wraith, the only explanation for this is that he had learned Spirit projection & body/corpse possession to perform Shift-at-will. When Dumah shifts back from spectral to material, he reanimates his body at the spot where he shifts from in spectral, almost as if he Teleports his body to where he is shifting back from (which shouldn't be the case because he doesn't teleport like Kain{whether it be in LOK:SR1, SR2, or Defiance} or any other vampire, the only explanation is that his body must follow him around (possibly similar to Blood Omen 2Kain's Mist ability to where his body is almost invisible but is still solid & can't pass through bars like the Phase Through Gates ability meaning that Dumah is controlling his body even in spectral but is not in it at the time. For some reason his appearance doesn't change like that of other vampire wraiths who are wearing cloaks & have no distinction as to which clan they belong to & also have the ability to fly (perhaps because he is a boss vampire & is therefore of higher rank). As for Raziel, he has traits of three different spectral realm species, perhaps that allows him to retain his appearance between the realms.