Text read: Ombra have the ability to create **Shadow Bonds** with creatures that share an affinity with the living shadows. Throughout their lifetime, they can reach out to a creature and bind both their shadows, allowing an innate understanding of one another's psyche. Pulling on this bond, Ombra can summon their companion to their side when they need them but if the Ombra were to fall, their companion would also perish. But if the companion were to perish instead, the ability to form that bond would be lost and the Ombra would forever feel slightly less than they once were.
Ombra are also able to bond with other Ombra. Ombra can release their shadows through their touch and allow it to wash over another, sinking into their being and melding, coalescing into a direct link between the two that allows them to feel the desires and emotions of the other, or others, if more than one are bonded.
It's not a commitment to be taken lightly and it's one the companion (both beast and kin) must agree to as every creature of the shadows knows and understands how taxing the process is on all parties involved and what that bond entails. Especially when, if Ombra fall to the **Daji** or become one themselves, that bond causes significant pain and torturous mind effects as the surviving partner experiences the pain, hunger, and mental decimation of their partner facing **true death** or **Daji mutation**. Often leaving the surviving partner comatosed as their body shuts down in response, but their brain is still perpetually trapped in feeling pain and anguish. A fate worse than death, some would say.
The bonds between Ombra can be minimised through rituals granted by Ombra **Seers** found in villages across the realm. This is usually done when an Ombra reaches old age and is soon to return to the ancestral shadow collective. They and their partner may wish for the surviving partner to continue on and live their life to the most they can, though this will leave them with an almo…
Me: I wanna make my lore more emotionally charged.
Brain: THEN LETS CAUSE TRAUMA
TW: Mentions of death and Trauma
#lore #ombra #worldbuilding
