Demon Soul the making of part 5: Why is memory linked with the Soul ?

Everybody knows that memory is linked with the brain, we can't recall thing memorized at school if we don't put them in your head no matter the method, either copying or repeating or using a SRS. As they say in English "Do you know his phone number off the top of your head?" meaning that you know it so well that you don't need to think about it for too long to spit it out. 

There are also mnemotechnic to help people recall vocabulary, places, names, phone numbers and so on and so forth... which are tricks that you implement consciously to help yourself memorizing things. 

Other stories talk about people having the memories of their heart -or other organs- transplant donors see for example the Korean drama "Summer scent" or the story of Claire Sylvia. In French we say "learning by heart", meaning about the same as the English "off the top of your head" or "knowing by heart".

Recent research showed as well that memories can be found in the blood and in a lot of different body cells. (I don' remember where I read that.)  

The concept I used in Demon Soul was that the memories were attached to the Soul. The Soul being the carrier of emotions and personality is one of the representation of what makes a human being (or in the present case a demon). Our Soul is our spiritual energy. If we were to loose all our memories, our spiritual energy would somehow be reseted. So taking the opposite configuration, removing the Soul from someone's body would take away the memories. 

I used a second concept which is that once your Soul is torn away from your body, you don't instantaneously loose all your memories. As your Soul is still attached to your consciousness you are still able to recall who you are and what is your surrounding. But you start loosing your newly formed habits and relationships first. As the bounding becomes weaker and weaker however, as the Soul is tortured, the memories fade away more and more quickly with time. This process is the same as when loosing your memories from your past life. The Soul you are carrying and taking care of protect your current life from what happened to you before but in exchange, your body gives energy to your Soul and feed it with the experience and emotion drawn by your surrounding. 

Deprived of its Soul, the body becomes and empty shell. Deprived of the sensations given by the body, the Soul becomes pure spiritual energy waiting for another carrier.

So don't forget to take good care of your Soul.