Specter

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The details below contain SPOILERS, you may want to view this after completing the storyline in-game.

A Specter is a creature that comes from the Abyss, the source of all knowledge in the world. Specters make up a large portion of Gerand Darmoor's army and almost exclusively make up Magnus' forces.

Story

History

Origins

Eons ago, the Ancient Gods ruled selfishly, without regard for their worlds or the people inhabiting them. In an attempt to end the chaos wrought by the gods' disregard for the natural order, several mortals began researching to find a way to fight back against the Ancient Gods.

As the gods existed outside the physical limitations of the universe, mortals were unable to directly harm them, as only gods had the power to challenge other gods. Because of this, some mortals hoped to find a way to utilize the relics of the Ancient Gods, which were imbued with their divine power, in order to use them as weapons against the gods. As the relics only recognized those whom the people deemed worthy to wield them, researchers attempted to fabricate a means to have mortals be recognized by the relics.

Their research led them to investigate previously forbidden studies about the Abyss, the source of all knowledge in the universe, in which creatures known as Specters dwelled. The researchers hoped to fuse a host body with countless Specter souls, which would trick the holy relics into believing that the host was actually filled with the support of many mortal souls.

However, the ritual that transported a subject into the Abyss resulted in a Specter immediately taking control of their body, erasing their memories, consciousness, identity, personality, and soul as the cost of having seen the infinite knowledge in the Abyss. As a result, the Specters born from these experiments were horrifying beasts that despised humanity.

After years of failure, the inhumane experiments finally succeeded by utilizing hosts who had the ability to resist being possessed and taken over by Specters, allowing them to retain their bodies and minds, while also being filled with countless Specter souls from the Abyss. The culmination of this research resulted in the creation of a special type of Specter, which could successfully trick the holy relics into recognizing them as worthy wielders, as the relics would sense the countless souls inside the host and mistakenly interpret it as the host being filled with the faith of many mortal souls that viewed them as the champion of their god. As a result, mortals gained the power to defy the Ancient Gods and face them in combat.

As a result, mortals gained the power to defy the Ancient Gods and face them in combat. Despite this, however, the Ancient Gods continued to rule ignobly until the Primordial God, unable to abide such chaos, created the Overseers to quell the chaos of the world. The Overseers created a relic known as the World Heart and tasked the elders of Grandis with using its power to stop the Ancient Gods.

Using the World Heart's power, the elders created objects known as the Godspheres, powerful relics that drew strength from the collective determination of the masses. The Godspheres chose to bond with certain mortals, which gave them the power to match the Ancient Gods. These mortals became the first Adversaries and fought against the gods in the Ancient War.

The High Flora Campaign

Eons later, Gerand Darmoor began utilizing the Specter monsters born from the failed experiments of the past. Under his directive, the High Flora revived the Specter experiments in order to create the special Specters who had the power to wield the holy relics. He also began forcibly converting many of the other races on Grandis into Specters as part of his plan to remake all life. These Specters became part of his army to conquer Grandis.

Limbo, an Apostle of Darmoor, underwent the experiments and became a partial Specter who retained his body and mind. Limbo was highly interested in the knowledge contained in the Abyss and turned his focus on Ark, a High Flora turncoat who became a partial Specter with traces of knowledge about the Abyss retained in his memories.

The Specter army became a sizable force in the High Flora war machine, with several subordinates of Darmoor, such as Magnus and Limbo, using them in order to conquer new territory. Magnus used the Specter army to conquer Heliseum during the last days of the Flora Civil War, and later used them to attack Pantheon. However, the Nova were successfully able to destroy a majority of Magnus' Specter army, allowing them to counterattack and reclaim Heliseum.

After the fusion of Maple World and Grandis, Limbo led the Specter army to the border between worlds, where his forces skirmished against Eckhart and his Night Walker unit. Soon after, Limbo led the Specters to attack Carcion in order to take the powers of Keira, the Ancient God of Carcion. These Specters were experimented upon by Shensung, an elder of Grandis, and modified to secrete a special infective agent containing divine power. Furthermore, several other Specters were modified in order to transform as Anima to confuse the enemy.

Creation and Properties

Creation

Specters are created through a special ritual, in which a host is transported into the Abyss. Upon gazing into the Abyssal Source, the host gains a plethora of forbidden knowledge. However, the cost of this knowledge is the erasure of their memories and identities as a Specter from the Abyss takes over the host body.

Properties and Behavior

Full Specters possess superhuman regenerative capacity and immortality. Upon being destroyed, a Specter will return to Abyss, where it fully regenerates before returning. Many different types of Specters have been seen, with varying levels of strength and resiliency. Though not confirmed, it is possible that the power of a Specter is proportional to the strength of the host it has consumed.

Most Specters appear to fight through numbers by overwhelming their opponents. For this reason, Magnus used a large amount of Specters in his army, which he used to take over Heliseum and attack the Alliance. The alarmingly large numbers of Specters in the High Flora army stands as a testament to the countless number of innocents who were forcibly converted into Specters during Gerand Darmoor's genocide.

Specter Energy

Though little is known about it, the energy signature of Specters appears to be a type of infectious agent, which corrupts anything that it comes in contact with. During the invasion of Carcion, this Specter energy was used to pollute the waters of Carcion in order to incapacitate the Anima. Many of the Specters in Carcion possessed special crystals, which were used to inject Specter energy throughout the environment in order to corrupt it.

Furthermore, it appears as though Specter energy contains divine power, as the World Heart, which was strengthened throughout the Adversary's mission to Carcion to detect a greater range of divine power, appeared to react to Specter energy. Although it remains possible that this was because the Specter energy was mixed with the Transcendent powers of Darmoor, it was speculated by Neinheart that Specter energy innately shares certain properties with the Godspheres. This, too, however, may be attributed to the experimentation of Shensung and Xula, who appear to have been synthesizing Specter research with their Adversary research.

Partial Specters

Though extremely rare, it is possible for the host to resist being overwhelmed by the Specter. The precise conditions for doing so are unknown, although several potential factors have been identified, with one such factor being an external disruption to the ritual. However, the most crucial factor seems to be whether the host possesses a 'special soul', which the Specter inside Ark described as being a soul with some type of impurity.

The usual properties of Specters generally do not apply for partial Specters. In cases of beings such as Ark, death would result in the permanent destruction of the host and the Specter. Because of this, the Specter inside Ark attempted to seize control of Ark's body multiple times in order to stop Ark from placing them both in dangerous situations. Ark also possesses vague memories of the Abyssal Source, which temporarily erased many of his memories until he regained them. Though he does not yet have any knowledge of what he had seen in the Abyss, traces of those memories still reside within his body.

There are only two known cases of beings who have resisted control of the Specters within them: Ark and General Brigadier Limbo, an Apostle of Gerand Darmoor. In the case of Ark, his right arm was fully mutated into that of a Specter and his right eye turned yellowish-orange. However, when he transforms, his body turns black and red, although he still retains his original shape. In the case of Limbo, there does not appear to be any indication that he is a Specter. However, his transformation fully changes his shape into a typical Specter appearance, although he retains the ability to speak. Whereas Ark is constantly in a war for control of his body against his inner Specter, it is unknown whether the same applies to Limbo.

An unconfirmed case of partial Specter transformation is Mr. Hazard, who appears to have Specter markings on his arms while fighting Cadena. Though he grew much larger, he still retained his original form while in combat.

Special Specters

Special Specters are the culmination of research performed during the era of the Ancient Gods. Like partial Specters, special Specters retain the host's identity. The main difference between the two is that special Specters have been flooded with countless Specters from the Abyss. As a result, special Specters are able to trick relics of the Ancient Gods into believing that they hold the support of many mortals, allowing them to use the power of the gods against them.

The High Flora have revived the Specter experiments of the past in order to create more special Specters. One such instance is Gilmore, a Celestial who voluntarily chose to become a Specter in order to impersonate the Chosen One and wield the Holy Sword Azor, the relic of the Sun God Mitra. The emblem of the Chosen One glowed in Gilmore's hands, implying that the experiment would have successfully allowed him to trick the relic. However, he was struck down by Seren before he could wield Azor.

Disguised Specters

Disguised Specters are an experimental type of Specters designed by Shensung, an elder of Grandis who sided with Darmoor. Unlike partial Specters, whose base state is their host body's form, disguised Specters are inherently full Specters capable of transforming themselves into other races. In this sense, disguised Specters can be viewed as the opposite of partial Specters.

Using the advanced research of the elders, Shensung designed these Specters such that they could perfectly mimic the form, scent, and even the bioenergy of a particular race. The disguised Specters that he created in Carcion, for instance, were able to mimic the Anima in a way that left them nearly undetectable to the the native Anima of Carcion, allowing for the High Flora to use these disguised Specters to confuse their enemy.

Despite this, however, the mimicked bioenergy of disguised Specters remains imperfect, as Duhan - who was under the impression that the Specters were actually Anima - sensed that their bioenergy was unusually faint. Furthermore, Claudine was immediately able to detect that the Anima were actually disguised Specters upon examining them in close proximity.

Specterized Beings

Specterized beings are distinct from full Specters and partial Specters, as these beings - rather than possessing a Specter soul within them through a Specter ritual - have instead been infected with Specter energy. As a result, Specterized beings are not classified as true Specters. However, the infective agent nevertheless mutates the appearance of the target with features such as horns, as well as causing parts of them to glow with Specter energy. During the High Flora invasion of Carcion, many of the native fauna around Carcion were mutated into Specterized beings.

Full Specter Types

Specterized Beings

Partial Specters

Special Specters