Beings of Light

The Beings of Light are the ethereal vestiges of a long-dead race, supposedly created at the dawn of time to protect organic life from synthetic "machine devils". Having no true corporeal form, they appear to organics as a shimmering cloud of gaseous light trails, lacking any kind of discernible features. In sharp contrast, synthetics are incapable of comprehending their visage at all. Enigmatic and reclusive, the Beings of Light are viewed by the wider galaxy as little more than a myth. Organics who do come into contact with them are often dismissed as being eccentric or insane.

Of the select few organics who have come into contact with a Being, only one per cycle will ever be chosen as their avatar. Becoming an avatar is a symbiotic relationship. While the Being makes use of the host as a mobile platform with which to achieve their goals, the host receives an enhanced mental fortitude against the effects of Reaper indoctrination.

Prior to the current cycle, all the Beings of Light's previous avatars had failed to withstand the harvest. This all changed when Desolas Arterius II managed to successfully activate the Crucible, whereupon the Being within him finally seperated from his body to become the new Catalyst. Such was the trauma of this mental partition that Desolas retains no memories of his choice or its far-reaching consequences, falling into a year's long coma in the aftermath.

Avatars
For every cycle, a Being of Light will chose an avatar to represent them in their eons long fight against the Reapers. These avatars become symbiotic hosts for the Being. As a result of this connection, avatars have the ability to withstand reaper indoctrination. Separation from a Being however is often fatal, as the host's mind will shatter under the strain. The only avatar to withstand separation with a Being of Light was Desolas Arterius II, albeit the ordeal was so traumatic that he fell into a yearlong coma and all his memories of the final confrontation with the reapers were erased. Desolas was irreparably scarred by this ordeal for the rest of his life. He would later leave the Milky Way, unable to continue living in the galaxy he sacrificed everything to save. While he would never truly heal, he would eventually come to find some semblance of peace in the Andromeda Galaxy with his bondmate, Nihlus.

Desolas' Being of Light became the next Catalyst, taking on Desolas' form and personality. It successfully integrated with the Citadel, allowing Desolas to exert control over the reapers and bend them to his will. It is the last echo of Desolas left in the Milky Way galaxy, continuing to dominate the reapers in the way that Desolas desired - to safeguard the lives of the many.

Known Avatars

 * Javik
 * Desolas Arterius II

Messengers
Not everyone who comes into contact with a Being of Light is chosen as an avatar. These individuals instead receive visions in the hopes it will encourage them to use their power to change the course of history, in preparation for the reapers return. In some cases these visions are purposefully imparted, as was the case with Aurelion Aurelos, while some are accidental, as in the case of volus billionaire Kumun Shol.

Aurelion came into contact with one of the elusive Beings of Light some time after his coronation, which directed him towards the location of an ancient prothean memory shard hidden within Temple Palaven. When Aurelion took the shard into his hands, he received a vision which warned him about the reapers and their cycles of genocide. This vision spurred him to reunify the turian empire, in the hopes that it could give his people a fighting chance against the coming harvest. Aurelion was driven to near madness by the vision he endured. He rationalised it by convincing himself that he was a divine prophet, sent by the spirits to restore his people's legacy in order to protect them from the cycle. Aurelion was haunted by his vision for the rest of his life.


 * Aurelion Aurelos
 * Kumun Shol