History Main / ManySpiritsInsideOfOne

[[caption-width-right:348:You think roommates are awkward?]]

* In ''Series/KamenRiderDenO,'' the main Rider is possessed by an Imagin. ...then another, and another. When suited, each possessor makes a different Den-O with a different WeaponOfChoice. Though they're not all in him at once, any can take over at will. HilarityEnsues (literal, non-ironic hilarity, that is) often.

This trope is what you get if you exaggerate DemonicPossession or EnemyWithin. Instead of having one evil/antagonistic being taking over somebody, it's ''multiple'' ones. Somebody doesn't have just JekyllAndHyde inside his head--it's Jekyll, Hyde, Steve, and Edmund. AndZoidberg.

The TropeNamer is a song by {{Music/HammerFall}}, based on the famous biblical tale of Legion, man possessed by multiple demons, which is obviously the TropeCodifier. Contrast IAmLegion, another trope named after this tale (and a story in Literature/TheBible), which occurs when members of a group start referring to themselves as a group, rather than individual people, implying that they lost their individuality or at least see themselves as a community or partners.

** By the end of the series, he's lost his parents, Itachi's crow, and his [[EnemyWithout evil half]], but gained [[spoiler:the rest of the nine [[LivingMacGuffin Biju]], [[PhysicalGod Hagoromo Otsutsuki]]]], and [[spoiler:[[EternalHero Ashura]]]], who was always there to begin with since Naruto [[spoiler:is his reincarnation.]]

* ''WebComic/{{Two Guys and Guy}}'': Played With. [[http://www.twogag.com/archives/1284 Guy has many demonic spirits inside. But none of them have that much control over her.]]

* A milder version (which may have been [[{{Flanderization}} Flanderized]] to this trope) is when people have inner conflicts and don't know what they should do. Like Theatre/{{Faust}} by Creator/JohannWolfgangVonGoethe said: "Two souls alas! dwell in my breast."

* Literature/MatthewSwift shares his mind with the numerous entities known as The Electric Blue Angels to the point that the first-person narration is constantly switching between "I" and "We."
* The novel ''Literature/JohnDiesAtTheEnd'', by Website/{{Cracked}}'s David Wong, gives us Shitload, who is the host body of a hive mind.

* The Dire Magnus from the Books of Beginning trilogy is an example of this.
* It's indicated this may be the case with Randall Flagg in Literature/TheStand. After Tom is put into his trance, he talks of the New Testament references--Flagg's name being Legion and Jesus driving him into a herd of pigs once.
* In ''Literature/{{Animorphs}}'', Visser One is horrified when she first infests a human, comparing a human's ability to doubt and question their own decisions as "living with our own traitor in our heads". She thinks this is why humans frequently war against each other -- they are practically at war with themselves.
** Animorphs also gives us the Ellimist, who for complicated reasons ends up downloading many thousands of minds into his own brain. At first it almost drives him crazy; then it turns him into a sort of demigod. (He eventually goes even further, but for unrelated reasons.)

* In ''Literature/TheGirlFromTheWell'', the ghost called the woman in black is actually an amalgamation of hundreds of evil spirits into a single form.
* In the Creator/LoisMcmasterBujold book ''The Hallowed Hunt, one of the ''Literature/Chalion'' books, this turns out to be the situation of the BigBad [[spoiler: Wencel. ]] Hundreds of years ago when their country was in the process of being conquered, the last Hallowed King underwent a sacred ritual to ensure that if he were to die, his consciousness would pass to the next male heir in his line to continue the fight. [[GoneHorriblyRight And the next, and the next, and the next...]] The consciousness that originally inhabited these bodies is swallowed up and added to the amalgamation. By the time the story reaches the present day, he's given up all ambitions beyond ending the cycle and dying once and for all. When we get a look at him through spirit vision, he's a monstrous abomination of hundreds of twitching faces vying for control.
* ''Literature/RavellingWrath'': As the Farseer, Yali has access to the memories of all seventy former Farseers who died in the Otherworld. ([[spoiler:Actually sixty-eight, after they discover that two of them were deliberately omitted!]]) They don't have independent consciousness, but Yali does clarify that the memories "feel like how the person was feeling at the time," meaning that Yali can get excited when one of the memories feels exciting.

* ''LetsPlay/TwitchPlaysPokemon'' features the Mob, who are usually interpreted as thousands if not ''tens'' of thousands of arguing, bickering, complaining Voices, all hijacking the same bodies. Most of them want to beat the game, but some want to sabotage the others' efforts, and others still ''generally'' want to win the game but want to dick around along the way. Amongst those who want to win, there are constant arguments over strategy, team choice, gameplay style, and all sorts of other things, with the result being chaos. When they actually work together, though, there is literally nothing that can stop them.

* Legion from ''Franchise/MassEffect'' is a single body inhabited by numerous operating systems. Despite seeming very similar, they were split evenly when [[spoiler: deciding whether to kill or convert the Geth heretics, hence why they delegated the heretics' fate to you.]]

This trope is what you get if you take DemonicPossession or EnemyWithin UpToEleven. Instead of having one evil/antagonistic being taking over somebody, it's ''multiple'' ones. Somebody doesn't have just JekyllAndHyde inside his head--it's Jekyll, Hyde, Steve, and Edmund. AndZoidberg.

* Crazy Jane of ''ComicBook/DoomPatrol'' takes this UpToEleven. She has 64 personalities, some pleasant, some unpleasant, all with distinct abilities of their own. They live in a subconscious realm called The Underground, where they are housed in separate stations when not in control. "Crazy Jane" is merely the dominant personality that Kay Challis takes when interacting with others.

* According to its Pokédex entries in ''Franchise/{{Pokemon}}'', Spiritomb is composed of 108 souls, trapped over 500 years.

* In ''Film/GhostRider'', when Blackheart gets his hands on the Contract of San Venganza and absorbs all the souls that were bound by it, he becomes this complete with the VoiceOfTheLegion. [[spoiler:It also makes him ''ludicrously'' vulnerable to the Ghost Rider's Penance Stare, which he was immune to when he lacked a soul because now he has a thousand souls to burn with it. [[ClippedWingAngel Oops]].]]

* Sora from ''Franchise/KingdomHearts'' habitually invites other people in, although he usually isn't consciously aware of doing so. At this point he's renting out space to [[spoiler: Ventus, Xion, and Roxas]], and [[spoiler: Kairi]] was also in there for most of the first game. Most of his tenants are fairly nice people, but all but two of 'em ''were'' trying to kill or suppress him at one point or another, intentionally or not.

* In my ''Manga/MyHeroAcademia'', at least once in their lifetimes, every user of One For All experiences the Vestiges, a phenomenon where the residues of the wills of past users briefly manifest as silhouettes. It is a symptom of One For All's power increasing with every successive generation. The ninth and current One For All user, Izuku Midoroya manifests it on an unprecedented level. He can [[spoiler:meet the spirits of previous users of One For All for [[DeadPersonConversation advice]] and even access [[AllYourPowersCombined their original Quirks]]. In contrast, Midoriya's predecessor All Might, the greatest superhero of Japan, was ignorant of this rare ability.]]

* In ''VideoGame/StarWarsTheOldRepublic'', the Sith Inquisitor eventually learns the [[{{Necromancer}} Force-Walk]] technique, allowing them to bind Force-ghosts, willing or not, to themselves in order to augment their powers. [[spoiler: Unfortunately, binding too many spirits ends up causing them to suffer a HeroicRROD, forcing them to find a cure.]]
* In ''VideoGame/{{Bioshock}}'' this is a side effect of using plasmids. The ADAM samples the genetic memory so using too much or too often leads to one "Seeing ghosts" (Aka memories of the past users) [[spoiler: In ''VideoGame/Bioshock2,'' the BigBad, Sophia Lamb, decides to intentionally invoke this on her daughter. She plans on filling Eleanor with all the ADAM in Rapture so Eleanor will cease to exist and instead be the perfect Utopian who only works for the common good and with every skill and talent ever in Rapture at her command.]]

* ''WesternAnimation/StarVsTheForcesOfEvil'': In "Demonicism", Tom thinks that getting one of his "inner demons" removed will help with his anger issues, while Star thinks it's a bad idea as one of Ponyhead's exes had previously had this done and became an EmptyShell [[StepfordSmiler who is always cheerful about everything]]. He goes through with it anyway, only to find that it didn't make a difference because it removed one of ''thousands''. This ends up becoming useful in a later episode where the characters face a threat that can [[YourSoulIsMine steal souls]] and leave people in a lifeless state, but he avoids this fate because he has so many of them.

* In ''WesternAnimation/AvatarTheLastAirbender'', the Avatar is normally just one reincarnated person with the ability to use all four elements. If that person accesses the [[SuperMode Avatar State]], usually through an UnstoppableRage, he contacts the spirits of every single Avatar before, channeling thousands of spirits through one mortal body. It's a little bit scary. The catch is, if an Avatar dies in that state, [[KilledOffForReal the Avatar cycle will end]].
* After season 2 in ''WesternAnimation/TheLegendOfKorra'', [[spoiler:Korra's link to her past lives is severed after Raava is temporarily slain. Even after they are reunited, it's just her and Raava now.]] The Avatar State is arguably even scarier now, since [[spoiler:bereft of the influence and experience of its past human incarnations]] it's been reduced to its most primal savage state.

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* ''Manga/{{Bleach}}''

* ''Manga/MyHeroAcademia''. At least once in their lifetimes, every user of One For All experiences the Vestiges, a phenomenon where the residues of the wills of past users briefly manifest as silhouettes. It is a symptom of One For All's power increasing with every successive generation. The ninth and current One For All user, Izuku Midoroya manifests it on an unprecedented level. He can [[spoiler:meet the spirits of previous users of One For All for [[DeadPersonConversation advice]] and even access [[AllYourPowersCombined their original Quirks]]. In contrast, Midoriya's predecessor All Might, the greatest superhero of Japan, was ignorant of this rare ability.]]

Compare MindHive and SplitPersonalityTeam, similar tropes involving multiple minds/personalities simultaneously inhabiting one body, but are more or less in accord with each other. Many RealLife multiples describe their experience this way rather in mental-illness terms.

* Magyar from ''VideoGame/Brawlhalla'' is an AnimatedArmor formed by the spirits of 100 elite knights.

Some people are victims of DemonicPossession or GrandTheftMe. Others have to struggle with the EnemyWithin, or even an outright SuperpoweredEvilSide. All those things are terrible in their own way, but don't worry, it can always go FromBadToWorse. It's one thing when your body is taken by the [[{{Satan}} lord of all evil himself]], but when he invites his twelve best drinking buddies to join the ride, that's something else entirely.

This trope is what you get if you take DemonicPossession or EnemyWithin UpToEleven. Instead of having one evil/antagonistic being taking over somebody, it's ''multiple'' ones. Somebody doesn't have just JekyllAndHyde inside his head--it's Jekyll, Hyde, Steve and Edmund. AndZoidberg.

* ''Anime/BattleBDaman'' has Bull, a boy with three personalities: calm one, confident one and aggressive one.

* ''Comicbook/TheIncredibleHulk'': At the beginning it was only Bruce Banner and the ruthless Gray Hulk, who turned green and then started getting constantly dumber until we get the most well-known version of the character, the Savage Hulk. Later a new Gray Hulk, a mischievous and selfish version of the first gray Hulk, joined them. Then [[SplitPersonalityMerge the Hulks and Banner merged]] into Professor Hulk, who was later {{retcon}}ned to be a completely different personality altogether. Recently, the four of them have been joined by Green Scar--an [[BarbarianHero intelligent, brutal warrior persona]]. There was a story revealing that Banner has a lot more Hulks in his mind, including such creatures as the lizard-like Guilt Hulk or the monstrous Devil Hulk, but the question of whether it's still in the continuity remains debatable.

* She-Dragon from ''Comicbook/SavageDragon'' combined this trope with HearingVoices. The personalities never took over but there were very distinct perosnalities and voices in her mind that would speak out loud. As it turns out, [[spoiler: they belonged to beings on a counter-Earth.]]
* In the French series ZornEtDirna, DeathTakesAHoliday (well, gets trapped in a MagicMirror), so killing someone results in their soul being tranferred to your body. The closest thing to actual death is achieved by having criminals kill people in vast slaughterhouses, accumulating souls until they in turn are killed by another person (Zorn and Dirna's mother is the dominant personality inside a huge ''male'' barbarian).

* In ''Film/GhostRider'', when Blackheart gets his hands on the Contract of San Venganza and absorbs all the souls that were bound by it, he becomes this complete with the VoiceOfTheLegion. [[spoiler:It also makes him ''ludicrously'' vulnerable to the Ghost Rider's Penance Stare, which he was immune to when he lacked a soul, because now he has a thousand souls to burn with it. [[ClippedWingAngel Oops]].]]

* Literature/MatthewSwift shares his mind with the numerous entities known as The Electric Blue Angels to the point that the first person narration is constantly switching between "I" and "We."

** ''Literature/TheTruth'' has Altogether Andrews, a man with about eight personalities, of whom none are named Andrews. It's theorized that he was a medium who was too accommodating to lost spirits, and ended up getting pushed out of his body. Subverted in that most of his personalities are nice. Except for Burke, who [[NoodleIncident was only seen once and nobody wants to see him again.]]

* Platinum the [[MeaningfulName Trinity]] of ''VideoGame/BlazBlue'' is a MagicalGirl with a rather unpleasant female personality (Luna), a nicer male personality (Sena) and one of the six heroes (Trinity) sharing the same body.
* The [[VideoGame/NeverwinterNights2 Mask of the Betrayer]] expansion pack for ''VideoGame/NeverwinterNights2'' gave us One-of-Many - an amalgamation of several hundred spirits. He is governed by the worst of these--and as a result he is a twisted monster that keeps tempting you to do evil and add additional spirits to "the many".

* In the ''VideoGame/{{Diablo}}'' series, the Prime Evil (as opposed to the Prime Evils, which are merely the three most powerful of the Great Evils) is the embodiment of all seven Great Evils in one being. The original Prime Evil was Tathamet, from whose body the Burning Hells and the original Great Evils sprang, but in ''VideoGame/DiabloIII'', [[spoiler:Diablo is reborn as the Prime Evil, and the reason he is able to be dominant over his brothers in this form is because Adria used Leah, her own daughter by him by means of his last host, as his vessel]].

* In ''VisualNovel/UminekoWhenTheyCry'', by the end of the series, you can count at least four different personae that are within [[spoiler:Yasu]]'s body. Basically, [[AmbiguousGender s/he]] is more or less confirmed to be [[spoiler:Shannon, Kanon and Beatrice]]. However, if you count all of his/her {{imaginary friend}}s who don't actually take control of his/her body, the number of people in there easily jumps into the double-digits. It's a stinking party in his/her head. This is a slight variation on this trope, though, since these are all simply [[spoiler:Yasu]]'s personae and not actual people.

* ''Manga/MyHeroAcademia''. At least in their lifetimes, every user of One For All experiences the Vestiges: a phenomenon where the residues of the wills of past users briefly manifest as silhouettes. It is a symptom of One For All's power increasing with every successive generation. The ninth and current One For All user, Izuku Midoroya manifests it on an unprecedented level. He can [[spoiler:meet the spirits of previous users of One For All for advice and even access their original Quirks. In contrast, Midoriya's predecessor All Might, the greatest superhero of Japan, was ignorant of this rare ability.]]

* A seemingly more benign version occurs in ''Manga/MyHeroAcademia''. We learn that the wills of the previous users of Midoriya's Quirk, "One For All", continue to exist and can be witnessed by its current user. When Midoriya sees them, they briefly take control of his finger and injure it to snap him out of his opponent's brainwashing. After the fight, Midoriya's mentor and predecessor All-Might denies this is the case, but it's implied he's not being entirely honest about it. [[spoiler:Much later, he has a dream in which he sees the predecessors again, with the first wielder of OFA actually ''speaking'' to him. All-Might is shocked when Midoriya tells him about it since he apparently never experienced this.]]

* ''Comicbook/TheIncredibleHulk'': At the beginning it was only Bruce Banner and the ruthless Gray Hulk, who turned green and then started getting constantly dumber until we get the most well-known version of the character, the Savage Hulk. Later a new Gray Hulk, a mischievous and selfish version of the first gray Hulk, joined them. Then [[SplitPersonalityMerge the Hulks and Banner merged]] into Professor Hulk, who was later {{retcon}}ned to be a completely different personality altogether. Recently, the four of them have been joined by Green Scar--an intelligent, brutal warrior persona. There was a story revealing that Banner has a lot more Hulks in his mind, including such creatures as the lizard-like Guilt Hulk or the monstrous Devil Hulk, but the question of whether it's still in the continuity remains debatable.

Compare MindHive and SplitPersonalityTeam, similar tropes involving multiple minds/personalities simultaneously inhabiting one body, but are more or less in accord with each other.