Talk:Kara no Kyoukai Collaboration Event/Free Quest/@comment-112.209.100.199-20160225070517/@comment-556400-20160226061431

"Original body" is the most bland interpretation you could reach. There are several other words that you would use in Japanese for "original" before getting to "素." It's not wrong, but it doesn't have any flavor and, honestly, being the most direct translation, it doesn't make sense in a literary/linguistic sense. Original body of what? Why would something that comes in great numbers be called an "original body"? "Original form" or "origin body" makes more sense, and I just tweaked the meaning slightly to reach "precursor form."

"Puppet" is just completely off altogether. 素体 does not come anywhere close to "puppet," especially considering that "人形" is the very common word for "puppet." The kanji mean "form of human/person," and other words that mean "puppet" all refer to something otherwise "not-human" in some way. 体 specifically means "body," so the meaning is simply not going anywhere near "puppet" in the sense that is understood in Japanese.