Soulform

Soulform is a catch-all term for a variety of aetheric structures that are responsible for supporting conscious life.

Souls
In the Prime Chronoverse, souls are the only known naturally occurring soulforms within the confines of the multiverse.

While souls tend to lack an abundance of power and lack reality warping capabilities, they are primarily characterized by their ability to function on their own rather than relying on external power. This is believed to contribute to their dominance in the Chronoverse, as it lacks any natural connections to other sources of aetheric substances.

They also have a specific interaction with timelines. Souls become comparatively much more fluid when associated with a person in a timeline, existing more as an amorphous entity rather than something solid and determined. This condition is called Soul Flux. When timelines branch out and eventually split, the entire nature of the soul is brought over in that new timeline, thus causing alternative selves to often stick close to their iteration in other timelines despite the often differing circumstances and era.

However, if a soul leaves a timeline, it collapses into a determined state while taking some of the energy capacity along with it. While a single soul can be taken out of flux a few times, a point can be reached where it is unable to further iterate properly due to a lack of aetheric energy to expel. If taken out of their timeline at this point, the soul won't be able to collapse properly, resulting in something functional but with much less aetheric energy, which can prevent spell casting and other reality warping abilities from working properly. The full side effects aren't studied well due to some moral issues with getting test subjects, however, and more research would be needed to fully understand the consequences taking an overclocked soul out of flux.

Souls tend to be extremely hardy, but they are also vulnerable to direct influence and modification by other entities with aether manipulation abilities. Destroying a soul through modification is very difficult, but causing them to behave in an irregular matter is quite trivial.

The Consciousness Debate
While soulforms are connected to consciousness in some way, it's not exactly certain as to how. For starters, there's the problem of what came first. Does consciousness attract soulforms, or do soulforms create consciousness? There are arguments towards either end, and two notable schools of thought - at least, if one accepts if this is even the right argument to be had.

Some argue that soulforms are responsible for the existence of consciousness in the first place. Consciousnesses are transferred with them and artificial soulforms created on their own will exhibit signs of it. But this doesn't explain things such as the more physical side of things like brain activity well and how certain species can function just fine without a soulform, even if it helps them work. Some just state it's more nuanced and that the baseline conclusion is simplified, but yes, ultimately soulforms are the cause even if they use physical contraptions to help them work.

Meanwhile, those who think consciousness attracts soulforms believe that consciousness exists as its own independent variable on some level. However, as a consciousness becomes stronger, its force attracts a suitable soulform in order to sustain it. This force allows it to stay more stable and consistent. Through binding with soulforms, it also gains the ability to be transferred, which is more of a side effect of attraction for stability rather than the evolutionary intent. This theory explains much better how soulforms are attracted to artificial life such as AI, and how vessels require some amount of protection in order to not draw them in. As people can function fine without souls to some extent since it is hosted in something akin to a brain a little bit, it also functions well enough.

The biggest wrench in this conversation are the existence of sentient life that lack soulforms - for example, advanced types of elementals and crystanium entities. The two have only become known in the public consciousness in recent times. One school of thought built as a response states that soulforms are a type of consciousness, but not the consciousness. Life is just as capable of being supported in other methods, but it just so happens that aether with the conditions of the megaverse does so the best. Therefore, proponents state, to question the relationship with consciousness is the wrong dilemma. Different types of consciousness need to be studied more thoroughly to understand how aetheric substances function so well, as only in context to that may the truth be discovered.