Source Bestiary 5 pg. 162
For most creatures, the path to self-perfection ends as all mortal pursuits do: in death. For a few, however, the path to self-perfection ends with fiery rebirth in the heart of the Positive Energy Plane, where the souls of those not yet born fuse with the potential of those who’ve learned from lifetimes of reincarnation to form wholly new entities—the manasaputras. These outsiders continue their path to perfection by striving to achieve oneness with the universe, further evolving and discovering new cosmic truths, as well as guiding mortals on their paths to similar ends.
Manasaputras are benevolent and compassionate entities that follow strict practices of contemplation, introspection, and meditation. Others often view their directness and disciplined nature as inflexible, yet in truth, manasaputras are accepting when presented with new ideas and challenges—adapting to accommodate these changes can simply take hundreds or thousands of years as the manasaputras gradually evaluate and reevaluate the slightest adjustment to their personal beliefs or ideals. The patience of manasaputras is legendary, and can make action seem like inaction from a mortal’s perspective of time.
Manasaputras belong to a complex hierarchy. While immortal beings known as kumaras ostensibly lead them, each manasaputra operates as an individual, free to pursue its own contemplation of the multiverse and its inhabitants. More powerful manasaputras mentor younger and less experienced ones, particularly when their paths to perfection align. These relationships are master and apprentice structures similar to the Material Plane’s monastic hierarchies. Lesser manasaputras have deep respect and reverence for the elders of their kind and the phenomenal—often godlike—power they wield.
When not contemplating reality in isolation at the heart of the Positive Energy Plane, manasaputras can be found drifting through the Astral Plane in search of wisdom, or drawn to the Material Plane when ignorance and chaos work hand in hand with cruelty and evil. Manasaputras do not often intervene in destructive events, preferring to instead aid mortals and teach them necessary skills that they can use to confront these challenges. Greater threats of a more cosmic nature can draw the direct intervention of dozens of manasaputras, especially when these threats concern the destruction of knowledge or foment disorder in the universe. To this end, manasaputras can sometimes be found working alongside aeons and inevitables on morally compatible agendas. Manasaputras respect the precious balance aeons bring to the planes, as well as inevitables’ unfaltering dedication to their assigned tasks. They are distant toward most good-aligned outsiders, unable to fully share the passions of agathions and azatas, and put off by the zeal of angels and archons. They share a special kinship with devas, who often also oversee mortal affairs. Among outsiders, their greatest rivals are the sahkils of the Ethereal Plane, who attempt to hold back mortal development and are thus sworn enemies of all manasaputras.
Manasaputras seldom interact with wicked mortal creatures of the Material Plane. Their charge is to nurture the spiritual development of those who walk the path of enlightenment, and thus have little concern for mortal creatures outside that path, except as obstacles their students must overcome.
While usually described as humanoid in form, most manasaputras are wholly incorporeal entities forged of the raw Cosmic Fire from the heart of the Positive Energy Plane. When a manasaputra chooses to become corporeal, it usually adopts a resplendent, idealized humanoid form, often with striking features such as a third eye, multiple arms, or other compelling physical characteristics that clearly set it apart from mortals.
Occult lore suggests the enormous wisdom of the eldest manasaputras derives from their mortal existence during a previous incarnation of the multiverse itself. Certainly the manasaputras themselves favor doctrines of cycles such as reincarnation. Some mortal followers believe that manasaputras from the previous multiversal cycle were the first to inhabit the soulless husks that would ultimately become mortals, but as usual the manasaputras themselves favor riddles over straight answers on the matter.
The Seven Kumaras, the most powerful of all manasaputras, exist at the heart of all creation, each exemplifying a facet of the multiverse. These enigmatic entities rarely leave the Cosmic Fire of the Positive Energy Plane, communing with this source of all life in the multiverse and witnessing events across all creation through psychic rapport with a consciousness they (and the like-minded aeons) refer to as the Logos.MembersMaharishi Manu (CR 16), Manu (CR 12), Rishi Manu (CR 14), Twilight Pitri (Barhisad) (CR 18)Mythic MembersSolar Pitri (Agnishvatta) (CR 22; MR 8)
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