explosivecombat | 022. [Text]

022. [Text]

With matters of one's heart and soul so close in mind, due to the recent holiday and all the romantic connotations therein, I ask that you forgive the possibly morbid nature of the question I have for you tonight:

The state or condition of one's soul is often brought into question when their deeds are brought to light or held up for scrutiny; the concept of the damned and those destined for salvation aren't new concepts by far. However, I have to ask what that means for all of you - do you accept your soul as existing only as a metaphysical concept, a matter of faith, something unproven and intangible? Or is it something undeniable where you come from, not a matter of faith but rather proven to exist? Does it fail to exist for you at all?

Or, perhaps, is it something else entirely - something that was rendered from one of the above options into another?

I suppose I should apologize for such heavy subject matter; I imagine some will find it rude to attempt to quantify such a thing. However, it's been something I've had reason to consider lately, so no apology is forthcoming.

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i accept it as something proven and tangible!
i say that as someone who has been a spirit
which i believe is what the soul is
that is to say what is left behind when your body is burned away :)
so its not a matter of faith so much as fact!

...As much as I'm inclined to agree with you in accepting it as fact and not faith, I'll have to ask for your forgiveness with regards to my curiosity - you're saying that you were killed, in your world, and yet you continued to live on afterwards? Just your soul, no container?

thats absolutely the case!
it looks like karkat mentioned that already actually
but i was a spirit for a long time
a friend eventually did make me a container in the form of a robotic body
but i did well enough without it for what i needed to do :o

Ah, so you must be Miss Aradia, then. Solf J Kimblee - a pleasure.

It's not unheard of, in my world, for the soul to continue existing after the death of the body; what is unfamiliar is the idea of continuing to live on without a container. No one really knows what happens to the dead back in Amestris, but generally if the soul isn't contained, it can't be called back from beyond the Gate, or wherever it is that it happens to go in terms of "passing on."

that me!
aradia megido
its a pleasure to make your acquaintance solf :)

i suppose i have always been familiar with what would happen after life ended
being that i grew up speaking to the spirits of those who had passed on
i believe that our worlds afterlife is very different from those in other worlds however
just based on previous conversations i have had on the topic
might i ask what the gate is?

Ah..."Kimblee", if you don't mind. Old habits die hard and all.

And the Gate is what separates our world from God's domain, if I understand correctly; beyond the Gate is all knowledge of the world, and all understanding of the forces that govern it. Its form is different for all beings, from what I understand, but everything with a life-force has one, the world itself included.

All of this was explained to me a long time ago, by a being who would know about such things firsthand; unfortunately, I can't say that I understood all of it.

i dont at all!
my apologies kimblee :)

hm
it sounds sort of like the veil but not really
just similar
is that god the christian god most humans talk about
or a different one :o

and also might i inquire as to your opinions about the soul
or rather your answers to your questions

No apologies necessary, and of course you may - it would hardly be fair of me to expect that I wouldn't be expected to answer the same things I'm asking of everyone else.

First of all, I've heard of Christianity in passing, but I'm not familiar with that particular religion at all; I believe it involves a religious figure that I've never heard of. (...in hindsight, if this is that "Jesus" individual that someone else was going on about earlier, that would likely explain a bit.) "God" isn't a tangible entity, but it's something we're mindful of, regardless; that which keeps the world in balance, holding everything together and ensuring that we don't do anything catastrophic, create abominations unto nature, or do anything overly stupid that would doom everyone. The life-force of the world, as mentioned above - that's God.

Or at least, that's how I understand it.

With that in mind, where I'm from, the soul is likewise a matter of fact and not faith; one's life-force can actually be condensed and quantified such that it's literally something that can be touched and handled, yet still contains all the memories and personality of the individual in question. Doing such a thing is seen as a highly unethical and generally taboo practice, however, for many reasons - not the least of which being that removing one's soul from one's body is immediately fatal to the individual in question. It's the energy that both makes us who we are and keeps us alive, more or less.

I understand that some humans see the soul as a gauge of purity or morality, but I'm fairly sure that's closer to conscience than anything to do with the soul.

i actually do know something about christianity and the jesus figure if you would like to know!
i had it explained to me by kayneth
which was a fairly useful explanation i might add given the references i hear to if fairly often
your god sounds like fate
at least
thats what i think hearing all of that

i dont think the soul has anything to do with purity or morality
at least
speaking as someone who was a spirit and spoke with them
its just a person bereft of their shell and sometimes of the qualities that made them them
it can be hard to remember why things mattered when youre in that state
sometimes

but something you said
about handling the essence of a person
for what reason would people attempt that at your home?

I would like that, actually, should you be willing to oblige.

I wouldn't call him Fate, exactly, because that implies predestination - that isn't anything I believe in, nor is it a universal constant in my world. However, there is a being that mediates between the mortal realm and God's domain, serving as a vessel for God's will, I suppose; I've heard him referred to as Truth. It's all a matter of terminology, I suppose.

While it isn't something I broadcast to most people, I've experienced what you're talking about, somewhat; it was only for about twenty-four hours, in my case, but I've been killed and yet retained my consciousness. The others who experienced that...ah, situation, I suppose we can call it - those who were there with me, at any rate, weren't in much control of themselves at that point, they seemed to find it to be horrendously torturous. I can't say I minded very much, personally.

When it comes to your question, one would want to handle it because it has potential to bring the person in possession of another's soul great power. It can be used to bypass the law of Equivalent Exchange, which is a restriction placed on the abilities some of us possess - it states that there can be no creation without destruction. We cannot create from nothing, nor can we render something into nothing; everything needs to balance out according to the sum of its parts. It's a fundamental law of the world; if it's violated, then a toll is taken from the person attempting to defy it. Souls, however - and theoretically one could use their own at the expense of some of their lifespan, or one could use the soul of another person - contain enough power to ensure that the toll is paid in full from the start. As such, one would want to be in possession of a tangible manifestation of someone else's soul for the sake of using it to such ends.

Obviously such things are not looked highly upon and it's completely forbidden by law; that doesn't stop people from attempting it anyway. It's all incredibly unpleasant business either way.

[ She is always happy to oblige, and quickly drops the relevant files into the message. ]

christmas is apparently the human holiday that celebrates his birth
and the judaism religion celebrates hannukah which is also related to his story

so you were a spirit at one point as well?
but remained in control of yourself i take it

so a soul is useful because it is worth much more than anything else
in accordance to your law of equivalent exchange
and people therefore attempt to utilize it to their advantage

i suppose it does sound unpleasant
although im not surprised people attempt to do such things
but that probably has more to do with my own upbringing than anything else
killing other trolls is sort of par for the course in many peoples opinions

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