Aperture

An Aperture is a biological component of a living thing that acts as an internal gateway to the Aether. Having an Aperture means ones body or mind could act as a conduit between the Aether and reality, and that person could potentially draw upon the Aether and siphon its energies for themselves.

All Draconi possess a natural Aperture, whereas others can acquire one through science - although they are not generally stable. The Glitched also possess one, though it is highly unstable.

King Ptomley established the Soulcreek project in the hopes of giving humans a stable and weaponized Aperture.

Uses
The possibilities presented by having an Aperture are many, though most would usually result in ones self-destruction. Humans generally are incapable of interacting with the Aether safely, and thus those possessing an Aperture would generally be destroyed by it. In the case of the Glitched, who were entered into the Soulcreek programme, a combination of hardware and advanced AI was used to help them stabilise and control their own Aperture, allowing them limited (if taxing) use of the Aether's power.

In the possession of an untrained human, an Aperture could also be used as a potential gateway for demons to enter reality. These Aether-bound entities are drawn to Apertures like a moth to flame, and will use one to tear its way into realspace and wreck havoc, utterly destroying the unsuspecting human in the process.

The Ceph also demonstrated that the Aperture of a Draconi could be harvested and used for their own purposes. The ancient Shamans would hunt down and dissect the Draconi to access the Aether, a behaviour that lead to the practical extinction of the Draconi entirely - though the Ceph suffered their own extinction before they could be wiped out entirely.