Binding

All living things are aspects of The Gardener, minuscule pieces of its dreaming mind. Order propagates inward from the Outer Plane into the Inner Plane, and thus all that lives here-within the universe-is also a part of that mind and body. Binding refers to the relationship between a living body and the consciousness animating it.

Binding is poorly understood. It appears to be part of the cycle of life, reproduction, and death, and yet it is not quantifiable or observable like the mitosis of cells. It seems as if the evolution of life was driven in part by the relationship between consciousness and nonliving matter. After the Inner Plane solidified into a sterile universe full of stars and planets, the natural cycles begin to favor unnatural symmetries, eventually arranging into primordial Flippe Configurations. There are many theories which attempt to explain this guiding force in the evolution of life. The most prominent suggests that a connection to the mysterious forces connected to Rift Shards.

A consciousness is considered to be "bound" so long as it is connected to a living being. Living things, regardless of their physical nature, are all naturally occurring examples of the Flippe Configuration and "conduct" consciousness as if it were a television signal and their body was an antennae. A consciousness may be considered unbound if it is not being conducted by a Flippe Configuration, however these entities of pure thought cannot sustain themselves indefinitely.

Spirits, ghosts, and spectral beings are all examples of so-called "unbound consciousness." It is not entirely understood how these thought-based beings can exist without a Flippe Configuration. Theories abound regarding "emulated Flippe Configurations," and "spiritual projection." What is clear is that all of these entities require a host at some point, or they will vanish into the ether of the universe.