Pure Heart



"Pure Hearts are the very feelings of our souls. As long as we feel love, they live on!"

- Tippi

The Pure Hearts are eight sacred artifacts created by the Tribe of Ancients to save the world from the Chaos Heart. The Pure Hearts seem to be Super Paper Marios equivalent of Paper Marios Star Spirits and Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door's Crystal Stars. They appear as large, heart-shaped gems with rounded edges, and are collected in the order of colors as they would appear on a rainbow (save the final Pure Heart, which is white; the result of all colors being mixed together).

Mario receives a Pure Heart from Merlon before the player even controls him in the beginning of the game, and must find the other seven throughout his adventure to form the Purity Heart. After acquiring a Pure Heart, Mario must take it to a Heart Pillar and insert it into a shaped indentation. This creates a door to a new world atop Flipside Tower, with the color of the door matching the Pure Heart used to create it. The only exception is the white Pure Heart, which causes the large black door to Castle Bleck to appear atop Flopside Tower.

According to Carson, the Pure Hearts are powered by love (parental, romantic, etc.). The Ancients researched love, believing it to be the universe's only salvation; the Pure Hearts are thus the physical embodiment of love. It was written in the Light Prognosticus that a group of heroes must find all of the Pure Hearts to destroy the Chaos Heart and save all worlds from annihilation.

Despite their incredible power, the Pure Hearts are not indestructible. If a dimension collapses while a Pure Heart is in it, the artifact loses most of its power, becoming a large, heart-shaped stone. It can only be repowered by an extremely powerful entity, but suffers no loss of potency when the act is complete.

It was also believed that the Pure Hearts would disappear forever if used together against the Chaos Heart's power. This became a major factor in Dimentio's plan to remake the universe; by tricking the heroes into "wasting" the Pure Hearts against Count Bleck, he would be able to take control of the Chaos Heart and The Void. However, it is revealed that the Pure Hearts can be recreated by powerful feelings of love, which spells the end of Dimentio's schemes and allows Count Bleck and Tippi - now revealed as Lord Blumiere and Lady Timpani - to finally destroy the Chaos Heart.

The following is a list of the eight Pure Hearts, as well as their locations and the source of love they were likely attracted to:
 * 1) red Kept by Merlon in Flipside. It may stand for a sort of parental or fatherly love - the love and care he felt for Tippi.
 * 2) orange Guarded by Fracktail deep within the Yold Ruins in Lineland. Fracktail was prepared to hand over the Pure Heart without a fight, but he went berserk after being short-circuited by Dimentio. After Mario destroyed the malfunctioning machine, the Pure Heart was given to him by Merlumina. It may stand for passion, as Merlumina was said to be very passionate and had an extensive love life.
 * 3) gold Kept by Merlee in Gloam Valley. It may be a symbol of faith; Merlee mentions that she and her ancestors kept the Pure Heart hidden in the mansion out of hope that the heroes would come for it.
 * 4) green Emerged in the Bitlands's Fort Francis after Mario rescues Tippi. It represents the trust between friends, such as the kind Tippi felt after her rescue.
 * 5) dodgerblue Entrusted to Squirpina XIV, queen of Squirpia, and hidden in the Whoa Zone until her son, Squirps, led the heroes to it. It may represent maternal love, as Squirpina is hinted on a few occasions to be constantly watching over her son.
 * 6) darkblue Kept by the Floro Sapien kings in the Land of the Cragnons. It stands for a ruler's love for his people.
 * 7) purple Kept by King Sammer in Sammer's Kingdom. It may be a symbol of truly romantic love, as in the kind that bloomed between Merlumina's younger sister and King Sammer I.
 * 8) grey Personified as a Nimbi named Luvbi. Her foster parents are Grambi of the Overthere and Queen Jaydes of the Underwhere. After the battle against Bonechill, the heart was restored to its true form. It stands for familial love, which Luvbi and her foster parents felt for each other.

All Pure Hearts are drawn by their own power toward those strong with love, likely due to their aforementioned love-powered creation. Each Pure Heart gained leads the player to the next, with the exception of the eighth one, which leads to the Chaos Heart. It is implied that the Pure Hearts may be sapient, as Luvbi, a Nimbi personification of the White Pure Heart, claims to 'remember' being one soon after learning of her true identity.

Trivia

 * When Mario collects a Pure Heart, the total number of collected Pure hearts are displayed alongside the Heart.

🇵🇲