The main source of energy in shadowlands is the anima that comes from the souls of the living.
The more people in shadowlands the more anima is needed.
And the souls that will go there will also use anima.
Anima cannot be generated, it is finite.
So how is this possible?
This looks like some kind of pyramid scheme.
Shhhhh dont think.
Shhhhh I think
And look where that got you!
You miss the part where not all souls live forever in the Shadowlands.
The Maw for instance is a meat-grinder - souls that are “useless” and beyond redemption are completely sucked dry of their anima in Revendreth and then sent to the Maw to be mulched - that generates a surplus of Anima for the Shadowlands as a whole without increasing consumption.
Similarly, Necrolord souls are lost from time to time in battle. Those souls will need to be replaced with new recruits who bring fresh anima to Maldraxxus.
Ardenweald is constantly striking a balance between how much anima it spends and how much it receives. They have a whole culling cycle dedicated to pruning souls if the balance isn’t quite right.
How Bastion maintains its anima supplies is a bit more dubious, without a sufficient lore explanation. My only assumption is that Bastion pockets a little bit of anima from new souls that they ferry to the Arbiter. Nothing is specifically confirmed in this regard though as far as I know.
The real question is how will the Shadowlands work after the defeat of Zovaal. A lot of characters comment on how cruel the destruction of souls in the Maw is, but it’s a sort of necessary part of the “life/death” cycle - just as in in life the old must make way for the new, in death there must be some cycling out of useless souls or else you do get into a “pyramid scheme” scenario.
So the sole purpose of shadowlands is to keep the souls that live forever there?
Which makes it look more like a pyramid scheme.
When people think of pyramid schemes, the first thing that comes to mind is the concept that it is inherently unsustainable. It is a “pyramid scheme” in the sense that the bottom supports the top, but the base of the pyramid is made up of an infinite number of people so the problem with actual pyramid schemes (there is a finite population cap) doesn’t impact the Shadowlands.
Anima is taken from bad or damaged souls to support everyone else. That’s where the surplus comes from to support additional spending. Additionally, Kyrian travel to the mortal plane and it isn’t inconceivable that they siphon anima from the living when they “nudge them back to live” (which is canon - Spirit Healers do from time to time actually bring mortals back from death if that mortal has a needed purpose or can go on to live a longer life and accumulate more anima).
So yeah, it’s kind of a pyramid scheme in a sense, but its a stable pyramid scheme. Anima is taken from the bottom to support the top, but it will never crumble unless the entire cycle of life and death itself breaks. Obviously the Shadowlands will fall apart if all life ceases to exist, but at that point you’ve probably got bigger problems.
To be sustainable the amount of souls that leave the shadows of the shadows has to at least equal the one that enters and we saw literally the opposite.
New souls will also consume anima.
And as far as the Kyrians are concerned, that’s just a guess
It is not part of the rule that a soul has to be sacrificed, it is the exception.
Try to imagine shadowlands as an island in the middle of the ocean that produces no food
Assuming that all inhabitants arrive with a certain amount of food and share it with the others.
The first to arrive will be the privileged ones who received food from others.
And when we think that certain inhabitants will never leave the island.
It is evident that the later you arrive on the island, the smaller your portion of food will be.
You’re looking at some kind of average and then applying it to everyone. That’s not the correct way to look at it.
You have good souls and bad souls. Bad souls get stripped of their anima and banished from the population of the Shadowlands itself. This anima is then used to support the operations of the rest of the Shadowlands. This is canon - Revendreth is the largest supplier of anima in the Shadowlands itself. On average, because you take the anima from those bad souls, the good souls can enjoy a surplus of anima. Some of that is used to support the functionality of the Shadowlands itself, such as teleportation grids or automata, but overall this excess of anima allows souls to normally enjoy a peaceful existence. It is only in the absence of this process of extracting anima from these bad souls (aka the plot of 9.0) where things fall apart.
To use your analogy of the island, imagine if we took the food from criminals sent to the island and then sent them back to sea. Everyone else who lived on the island would have more food than they came with as a whole. Also, souls don’t ravenously consume anima in the same way that people eat food so the analogy isn’t 1:1.
My bank would like a word with you.
Revendredh is premised on being a place of redemption and not an anima farm.
Perhaps the place that spends the most anima with futility to maintain a lifestyle.
The truth is that all of the realms of the Shadowlands serve a function to maintain the operation of the Shadowlands itself - it isn’t benevolent altruism, there is a cold pragmatic logic that underlies the running of the place itself. And it sort of has to function this way - the Shadowlands itself is beset by both the Light and Void.
Think of Revendreth like a business - it provides a service, and that service provides a sort of “societal good”, but the purpose of the business itself is to generate revenue. Businesses aren’t inherently pyramid schemes.
Perhaps shadowlands was simply created to provide energy to its creators.
If shadowlands collapse nothing indicates that they cannot remake another.
Scientific laws for conservation of matter. Matter cannot be created or destroyed.
What about the infinite number of after lives that other souls go to forever? Also the native flora and fauna that eat anima?
Think about our Earth for instance. How can there be an energy surplus on Earth? Because we constantly receive solar energy that we partially trap and recycle. Some of that energy is lost to space but in large part we recycle a lot of the energy we receive.
There is a constant piping in of anima from the mortal plane. The only difference is that it is ferried into the Shadowlands through souls. Each soul doesn’t just eat all of their own anima up.
In some of the questions in Bastion and in Ardenweald, we reclaim anima from fallen creatures. There’s a constant sort of natural cycle that occurs here, supported by the excess anima from souls that are sent to the Maw.
We just invaded Nathria and acquired its HUGE stockpile of anima. And the anima we get we put right back into circulation. Chances are you have received anima you have already spent once before.
The Anima drought begs to differ. Without the supply of fresh anima the creatures were starving and many things withered and died. So you need this constant supply just to keep things going and what about the untold souls sucking it up in their infinite afterlives?
If the sun went out, all the plants would die and that would be bad. Does that mean Earth is a “pyramid scheme”?
Anima does not work similarly to money it is more like oil
The sun did not create the earth and does not use its energy either.