hadriel | [Voice]

I'm curious about something. I know a lot of mythology from my own world, but I'm interested in hearing about any another kind of mythology that's not well known on Earth around the 21st century. For instance, I remember reading a Greek story about how males and females were first created and I know there's differences between it and, say, Biblical mythology.

The one I remember reading was written by Plato. He said that humans used to be a mix of two people that consisted of one male and one female so they had two heads and eight limbs, but the gods didn't want them getting too powerful so they separated them into men and women. Supposedly that's where 'soulmates' come from, because you're looking for your other half. I'm also a little curious what people think of that story. [He absolutely does not have a personal ulterior motive for asking that particular question, none at all, nope.] Do you think there's any truth to it? That there's really such a thing as 'soulmates'? ... Or if it's even as limited as having to be between a man and a woman?

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If I ever saw something in the Underworld that was a machine before it died, then yes.

Well, there's no certainty of an Underworld where I'm from. Humans have the luxury of faith that synthetics don't, because a person can choose to believe where a construct tends to know at least what made them, and it sure as hell is no god.

Despite that, there's a synthetic who is obsessed with the concept of an "artificial soul". That bitch impaled my chest trying to reach that "artificial soul" she wants to believe is there. Some days, it'd almost be more worth it if she's wrong. Her whole pursuit has just gotten a lot of people killed.

It could be. I've never met someone from a world that also has an Underworld so maybe that's just limited to mine, or maybe it's called something else. I know what you see in the Underworld on my world changes based on what you believe, but I know it exists because I live there sometimes.

What do you mean by a synthetic?

Maybe. There are countless lores that have similar -- if not identical -- concepts, if anything else.

[Rey is nothing if not a little well read, but classic mythology was never her forte. She had other real life concerns to deal with.]

It means something that is inorganic, unnatural, man-made, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

Sounds like an automaton falls under that.

We have those in our world as well, just classified under a different type of synthetic. Unlike some, automatons perform specific functions determined strictly by their coded data. They have no capability for possible free thought.

I'm not exactly sure how they work in my world but the ones I'm familiar with are capable of free thought. I met an automation who was originally a demigod and had found a way to continuously transfer his consciousness into a new body repeatedly so he could effectively be immortal. And I know of a dragon and two dogs who act like regular animals would. They're just... made out of metal.

Huh. [Interesting. Rey is familiar with replacing bodies one after another when they become damaged beyond repair. Though she's hardly a demigod of any sort -- despite her original namesake of "Subject FREYJA".

[Still. Funny. And Rey knows that she's not the only synthetic from her world that's made use of multiple vessels. IV, obsessed with the idea of an artificial soul, seems capable of this feat as well.]

Well, that'd be branching into more heavy philosophical territory, there. Can the consciousness being transferred to different bodies be considered the same you, or something in the form of ones and zeroes be called a soul or just data simulating the behavior it's been designed to. Shit like that.

[Rey has thought a little too much about that. It is relevant to her entire being, after all.]

I'm not any sort of scientist so I don't know what they might say about it but as far as I think... I'd still consider it the same person even if they switched bodies. I'm used to a soul being as something simple as 'If it dies and it goes to the Underworld, then it has some sort of soul no matter how it's created.' I've had to fight things that weren't born in any sort of traditional sense but felt their 'souls' go to Tartarus anyway. [Pretty much because he put them there by killing them... They were all monsters for the most part, at least?]

Mm. Have died a few times, actually. Never went anywhere, not even some place that could be described as a "Tartarus" or a "Hell".

But then, it could be possible that this so-called soul never left my body, and that's why. Or maybe those experiences are just forgotten. [She's heard of some stories where people come back from newr death experiences more depressed and fucked up than before. Most are completely changed, either way.

[Shrug.]

Who the hell knows.

Sounds like different worlds' afterlives work differently anyway, so yeah. Who knows how each world works, exactly.

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