Each folk has its own karma and by releasing it, the folk's abilities will improve. Each folk has a table listing the things that need to be done to release karma. To view this table press Image:Button START.gif and use the arrow keys to find the folk you want to see the details for, now press Image:Button x.gif two times. It usually requires you to absorb the Id of folks, defeat folks or use some Karma Release Items. You must manually use items by selecting the table row and pressing Image:Button x.gif, of course this will not work if you don't have enough of an item.