'something secret' approximately 70 miles, in any direction, is in no way a 'solid lead'. would you like the exact math for the square mileage to be covered in a ring between 60 and 80 miles out? it's a lot.
or is there new intel that turns this half-remembered overheard scrap of a red herring into an actual solid lead?
I agree, I want to keep scouting. But let's find this bridge first and make sure that we're protecting the teams that are in the swamps. Once we have these waystations set up enough that weaker teams can travel to and across the bridge without needing as much protection, we can discuss where to look next.
No, of course not. There are the ruined outskirts we've seen, and those cabins... And the two other cities(?) marked on the map.
I get the implication that the things in the swamp are the locals left outside the relative safety of the city. I think it's more likely that they're the previous set of the Augmented.
My question in this case is: why are those things specifically in the swamps? We haven't encountered humanoid mutations like that--the ones that are so uncomfortably reminiscent of our augmentations--anywhere else.
well. there's one farm, really, and konoha's in charge of it. she doesn't really report to me but i have (i think) made clear that she should reach out to me if she has any problems that need solving. i would assume that she's reporting any outcroppings of katalyth, like we all are (right? i mean i'm not always a good little soldier but i have actually been doing that) if we encounter them.
there were a few terra-types who were planning to do some farm-related creation elsewhere, but none of them are actually reporting to me about location and honestly the food they source is ... well at least some of it's going to tifa, some of it might be going to the city?
i'm really a lot less in charge of this whole project than you might think.
You don't think it's relevant to anything that the radioactive, invasive substance can communicate its song? It doesn't stop once it's started. It isn't like the effects of being around it for a little while.
i think it's super relevant in general being as the whole katalyth situation is both why we're here and being made subjects of non-consensual experimentation and the biggest threat that we're aware of
i mean why is it relevant to me specifically or the farmers specifically
just like in terms of us being outside of the city and more likely to encounter it?
but what do you mean it doesn't stop like like you hear it in your head at any distance after it's started?
No, I'd rather not. We're not exactly learning these things with Patho-Gen approval, and their response to such a public announcement may be worse than Brickston's adorable slide show.
idk they've been very clear about 'katalyth is deadly and causes mutations and arcane radiation is super bad' like i feel that is in fact common knowledge
also in what way are we learning these things without their approval they literally funded Team Science's laboratory
they are funding my exploratory expeditions
they are actively encouraging us to learn about this shit
i am immensely tempted to make a network post specifically advising the augmented not to do anything wildly dangerous and stupid and i WILL shame you in it
are you familiar with dog shaming? it's a thing in my earth
people take a picture of their cute pet with a handwritten sign to shame the pet for its crimes, like "i tore apart the couch" or "i peed in my own bed"
the sentiment is the same here
"i touched the angry rocks we were specifically told not to touch"
Shame and wariness of our overseers are not the same thing. I can take the long way around to spread the word. Your farmers were the pressing concern, as most of us aren't leaving the city that often, or alone.
so beyond what we already know regarding the publicly-available dangers of katalyth
your warning is specifically that people shouldn't handle it or be exposed to it at length
which ... i ...
palamedes, help me out here, what is the imagined situation?
beyond scientists intentionally continuing to handle it beyond the initial unpleasantness of just being around it at all
are you thinking the farmers are just going to blithely work around it despite it making them feel sick? intentionally use it as fertilizer? shape it into a nice dildo?
genuinely. what am i warning them about other than 'don't be incredibly stupid and handle the stuff that makes you feel sick'? recap it for me.
Felwinter stands in the doorway of Gojo's bedroom, announcing himself even though he knows it's not necessary. (He's yet to be entirely comfortable with the idea of being perceived at all times, and so chooses to avoid thinking about it as much as possible.) That said, he doesn't wait to be invited in, striding across the room to set the tray he's carrying down on the bedside table. On it are two cups of tea (one of which he takes for himself) and a slice of impossibly decadant cake he'd brought home from Kelesis specifically for Gojo. He learned fast.
"I found some new blends in Kelesis, so I thought I'd bring one back," he offers after a moment. "It's not bad."
Certainly better than what they had been able to find in Karteria, though that wasn't saying much.
Perching at the foot of the bed, he eyes the book Gojo was reading with mild curiosity, though doesn't bother to ask about it. His mind is elsewhere, which is perhaps evident in the way his thumb traces the rim of his teacup, back and forth, back and forth, restless and distracted... or the way he doesn't seem to hear a thing Gojo says. His gaze drifts away to the window, where it settles, unfocused.
It's funny. No matter how many times he's been over the questions he wants to ask in his head, finding the words to voice them is difficult.
"Satoru," he says again, interrupting whatever chatter Gojo had launched into. "What do you— No. What is a soul, in your opinion?"
Satoru tosses the book aside carelessly when Felwinter appears to offer other entertainments. It's a book on botany in the local region and he feels like he's dying of boredom. He hates botany. Plants are good for eating (sometimes) and for dating (apparently), but he really has no interest in any other aspect about them. But he does want to be better at foraging, and he does generally just like learning stuff. He just doesn't like learning botany. Impressing Choso with plant knowledge is just absolutely never going to work out for him.
Brightening as he's offered cake, Satoru accepts the plate happily, shifting to sit cross-legged so that he can sit forward and pay attention while he eats. The Kelesian tea is better, though it's still terrible, and Satoru comments as much. He never thought of himself as having strong opinions on tea, but that was because he comes from a tea-growing country. Most of the time he could just count on having access to good tea, wherever he went. Karterian tea is horrible.
Fel's question is an interesting one, and Satoru makes a thoughtful noise as he considers it. He sets down his plate for a moment, lost in thought, and starts to cross his arms--but only one arm goes across. The other hand reaches up for his own throat, some kind of subconscious motion, maybe self-soothing. His hand tightens--squeezes hard--and then he realizes what he's doing and drops both hands immediately back into his lap.
"Hm. Interesting question. A significant portion of it is a matter of definition. Different cultures define that in different ways. The ancient Greeks--do you know Greek? Do you know English? Never mind. Irrelevant. The word ... spiros, I think? The root part of it is spir, anyway, and it shows up in a huge amount of English words." Satoru being a Greek nerd who speaks English. "Spirit, aspire, inspire--it means breath. This is the case for a lot of--especially ancient--cultures. The soul is the breath, and the soul left the body with the final exhale."
He leans forward, raps a knuckle against Fel's breathless chest, willing to bet that this is the actual root of his boyfriend's question.
"By which definition, babe, sorry, you're out. But." He lifts a finger. This lecture is far from over. "There's a concept in Japanese philosophy which is called shin-jin ichinyo, literally meaning 'mind and body as one.' Instead of the dualism of Western philosophy, where consciousness is seen as something separate from the body, shin-jin ichinyo posits that the soul is the body, and the body is the soul. Your thoughts, feelings, and identity exist not just in the mind or heart, but throughout your body. The body shapes the soul as much as the soul shapes the body."
Sorry if you didn't want the entire lecture, Fel, because you're getting it. "Shortly before coming here, I encountered two curses with relevant abilities. One of them--and this one I got the explanation second-hand from my student--posited that the soul existed before the body and the body was formed according to the ... blueprint, I suppose, of the soul. So that this curse could manipulate the shape of the body by warping the victim's soul. However, the other curse had an ability that seemed to conflict with that, wherein the memories, emotions, abilities and instincts of the body remained within the body even after the curse had removed the brain, implying--as with shin-jin ichinyo--that the soul was infused throughout the body.
"But I really wanted to slaughter both of them, they were assholes, so let's not dwell on them too much." Satoru wrinkles his nose, but he finally takes enough of a breath to reach for his tea, though he doesn't yet resume drinking it. He thinks back to what Fel had told him--human brains were installed in 'Exo' bodies, but also that Exos had no organic parts. It was not the physical brain inside the metal chassis. "What I think is most relevant in our current circumstance is the question of the immortal soul, which is generally the aspect of a person which passes to the afterlife while the mortal body is left behind. In Buddhism, this is the part which reincarnates into a new body and a new existence, but is still considered to be the same person, and who often will recognize, resonate with, and share threads of fate with other souls who it has encountered in previous lives.
"Given that I strongly theorize--as previously discussed--that the Augmented are all dead and this may very well be an afterlife, then," he points a finger back and forth between Fel and himself. "We are our souls. I am much more confident in the belief that my soul exists here in this place than I am in my belief that this is my original body that was transferred here. Which would also explain the loss of so many of my powers, but that's a different topic. Would you agree with that premise? How confident are you that you are the Felwinter who died in that battle, and, separately, how confident are you that that is the same body--chassis?--that was damaged in that battle? My opinion and belief is that the very fact that you are here is proof that you have just as much of a soul as I do."
He should have known an answer from Gojo would be less than concise, but it's still... a lot. And none of it feels like it applies to him. He stares down at his tea with his eyes narrowed into lines, thinking over it all. Debating how to answer the questions.
"When a Lightbearer dies, our Ghost recreates our body from scratch. You can't heal a body which has been crushed or incinerated or disintegrated," he shakes his head slowly. "Sometimes my Ghost found it easier to start over even with lesser wounds. Exos are... complex. Difficult to fix. So she'd have me shoot myself. I've died more times than I can count. We had to be dead in order to become Lightbearers at all.
"But I don't remember dying before I came here. Not in the way you mean. Not my Final Death. If my Ghost were dead, my Light would be gone, and as long as my Ghost is alive..."
She could, theoretically, bring him back again. Even if it was only to a situation from which there was no escape. A death he knows is coming whether it has already or not. None of them were walking out of that bunker alive.
"To answer your question: Whether this is the same body or not means very little for me."
It's also not really the point, but that's... Well, he's not entirely sure how to bring it up.
Edited (repeated word also tenses) 2025-07-14 21:27 (UTC)
Satoru looks startled right from the start of this, at the thought of bodies being reconstructed from being disintegrated, and he gives a little twitch at the prospect of Fel having to execute his own body for that purpose. He's a little surprised at himself for the squeamishness, but Satoru's sensitivity to body horror has risen significantly after his encounter with Mahito's creations and his very personal experiences with being a human experiment here.
He sets his cake aside for now, preferring to savor it once they've moved past upsetting topics.
"So the question is indeed about whether you have a soul," Satoru says, voice quiet. He'd guessed as much, but Fel has now confirmed it. "All right, answer me this. So you told me--if I remember correctly--that Exos were built to house human brains, but also that Exos have no organic parts. Therefore, a human brain has to be ... scanned? In order to be uploaded into Exo hardware? So that begs the question--and this is a popular topic in fiction about transhumanism--is the human soul transmitted in that process? And even if it is, you're something different, so ..." Satoru's brilliant, tactical mind follows the logic and connects the dots: If Fel had also existed in a separate body, maybe as an alien entity, and been transferred into the android chassis, then he could be assumed to have as much as a soul as the humans who were transferred. In which case they'd be discussing what happens to a soul, not what the nature of a soul is. But Fel doesn't talk like the question of the transmission--or resurrection--is relevant at all. It's not why he's asking.
"Because you weren't transmitted from some other body," Satoru concludes, quiet but certain, gaze steady on Fel's face. "You weren't ever something else. You were created an Exo." He's pretty sure that implies an AI, and yet he doesn't feel fully confident that he understands Exo technology or magic enough to fix the concept on robot brain. A created entity, whatever that means for Exos. "If we assume that humans have souls by default, then you have some doubts as to whether the process that created you included the creation of a soul."
Felwinter waits in silence while Gojo works through the logic puzzle that is his existence. For the second time. And it's only because that first time Gojo had been so unconcerned about him not being human that he feels comfortable speaking to him about this at all.
And there it is. He lifts his head to meet Gojo's eyes, in defiance of the terrible, deep-rooted fear that shudders through his frame. His fingers twitch against the teacup like they're desperate to reach for a weapon, or for his Light. But there's no need for that, he tells himself. Not here, not now. Not with Satoru. He has to allow himself to trust.
It's difficult.
"An AI created by an AI," he says finally, and even his usually flat tone seems taut. "I don't think there's any question of me having a soul."
After all, Aodh had said as much, hadn't he? There was no hiding it from someone who could see souls. But Aodh had claimed he also had no soul, and yet he was flesh and blood. He lived and breathed. So what is the point of them? What difference do they make?
Felwinter looks away.
"But what does that mean, in the end? Is a soul necessary? Does it matter whether someone has one or not?"
Felwinter's so naturally still and inexpressive that the tremor in his hands seems enormous, vastly betraying how much the topic upsets him. But it doesn't even occur to Satoru that Felwinter feels violently defensive about it, and even if he did, it wouldn't matter. Satoru trusts him and feels safe with him, and even if Felwinter lost control, it still wouldn't be any danger to Satoru. His Infinity defense defaults to being on, even when he sleeps. It is always an active choice for him to allow anyone to lay a finger on him.
"If you think there's no question of you having a soul, then your logical premise for this question is faulty," Satoru argues indignantly, wanting to fight whoever left Felwinter feeling inferior like this. Which might be all of Karteria, sure, but it didn't start with them.
"Listen." Satoru lifts a finger, trying to get Fel's attention to return to him. "I think the premise is faulty, but of the ... more plausible premises for what is meant by a 'soul', given this additional context for the question, I genuinely do not believe there is any relevant difference between the two of us. Look at me." He points that finger toward his own face. Fortunately he's not in the habit of wearing his blindfold or glasses within their home, so his dazzling blue eyes are bare. "The definitional question that I started with remains relevant, but I do not believe that the soul is breath. That's poetic bullshit. If the soul is the body, then my soul consists of muscle memory, neural pathways, and electrical impulses, which cannot possibly be very different from your data memory, wires, and electrical impulses. It's the definition by which soul is consciousness, and the structural layout of the body is irrelevant if it results in both cases with an intelligent consciousness capable of logic and emotions.
"If the soul is separate from the body, dualism, then I reiterate my point that whatever part of us was brought here--whatever part of you was resurrected by your ghost--is the immortal soul. My consciousness was brought here same as yours. And I don't have any memory of dying, unlike some people here, so who the fuck knows how your Final Death fits in or doesn't.
"But thirdly, interestingly," Satoru tips his neck and taps the spot where the Natural Souls were installed. "If the definition on these 'Natural Souls' is correct, if they are souls, then it's critically relevant that some of us are rocks. There are Augmented with plant souls and some with rock souls, Fel. Now, in Japanese Shintoism, we believe in an animistic view of the world, which is to say that it seems perfectly normal to me that rocks have souls. Everything has a soul, potentially. But if we follow that to its logical conclusion and, say, suppose that it is the pure element of a thing that has a soul, then your components may actually consist of multiple souls. Which is fine because if rocks have souls, then my body's bacteria and other microorganisms also can be assumed to have souls, so I am also, therefore, a conglomerate of souls.
"In conclusion," Satoru says, leaning back and reaching for his cake. "The question is based upon a bullshit premise but all the relevant possibilities logically extrapolate to us both having whatever the fuck a 'soul' is." He gestures between the two of them with his fork. "But it's fine if you wanna believe that I'm cooler for having more souls because humans contain, like, billions of microorganisms? Which is still weird to think about."
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text | un: valravn
Whatever this secret is, it's not there.
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1) There are ever so many secrets, don't get fixated on just one, they're lying to us in LOADS of ways
2) The swamps are enormous and we have only just started
3) There are plenty of ways to camouflage things in wild territory, especially in swamp land
4) Okay actually which secret are we talking about though
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Wherever it is that all the scientists and engineers went. 70 miles out.
I know there's more going on than just that, but it's the most solid lead we have.
[It's anything but solid, as distorted as it's become through this game of telephone.]
If it were somewhere in the swamps, they wouldn't have so many people crawling through them. Sooner or later someone would find something.
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or is there new intel that turns this half-remembered overheard scrap of a red herring into an actual solid lead?
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If it's too much for you I can take Set.
Or go alone.
[We're not addressing Gojo's other point.]
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I'd rather be out of the city.
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Maybe we'll learn something new by then.
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those things in the swamps, though, felwinter
we haven't encountered things like that anywhere else
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There had to be something left.
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I get the implication that the things in the swamp are the locals left outside the relative safety of the city. I think it's more likely that they're the previous set of the Augmented.
My question in this case is: why are those things specifically in the swamps? We haven't encountered humanoid mutations like that--the ones that are so uncomfortably reminiscent of our augmentations--anywhere else.
text, un: sextus
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[ huh, that's a good question ]
well. there's one farm, really, and konoha's in charge of it. she doesn't really report to me but i have (i think) made clear that she should reach out to me if she has any problems that need solving. i would assume that she's reporting any outcroppings of katalyth, like we all are (right? i mean i'm not always a good little soldier but i have actually been doing that) if we encounter them.
there were a few terra-types who were planning to do some farm-related creation elsewhere, but none of them are actually reporting to me about location and honestly the food they source is ... well at least some of it's going to tifa, some of it might be going to the city?
i'm really a lot less in charge of this whole project than you might think.
i connect people and solve problems.
so. yes?
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We're not completely immune to that radiation. It will mutate us the way it mutated the people found out there. I'm not sure how widely that's known.
And [how to broach... this next weird thing...] well, it sings?
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ummmm possibly
i'm not keeping close tabs on anyone, like i said
but yea brickston said something about it singing
uh how is that relevant tho
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being as the whole katalyth situation is both why we're here and being made subjects of non-consensual experimentation
and the biggest threat that we're aware of
i mean why is it relevant to me specifically or the farmers specifically
just like in terms of us being outside of the city and more likely to encounter it?
but what do you mean it doesn't stop like
like
you hear it in your head at any distance
after it's started?
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In any case: yes.
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well fuck
who is this affecting, that we know of? just you and bricks so far?
sextus did you lick the rocks
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[He's not answering the licking rocks question because he's not in the mood for japes and jests, sorry.]
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maybe a network post announcing it would be a good idea?
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also in what way are we learning these things without their approval they literally funded Team Science's laboratory
they are funding my exploratory expeditions
they are actively encouraging us to learn about this shit
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[The rest of those nerds secretly buried the sample in the woods instead of reporting it properly, and everything. Sooo...]
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yeah because that would be wildly dangerous and stupid
given how 'katalyth is deadly and causes mutations and arcane radiation is super bad'
ok message received i will do my best to tell my people not to do anything wildly dangerous and stupid
fortunately most of them aren't scientists
so i can generally count on them to only do things that are somewhat to moderately dangerous and stupid
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Thanks, though, that helps.
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are you familiar with dog shaming? it's a thing in my earth
people take a picture of their cute pet with a handwritten sign to shame the pet for its crimes, like "i tore apart the couch" or "i peed in my own bed"
the sentiment is the same here
"i touched the angry rocks we were specifically told not to touch"
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Cute pet custom, though, admittedly. We don't have pets on the Sixth, so no, I didn't know that one.
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so that we can PROPERLY warn the augmented of the actual dangers
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so beyond what we already know regarding the publicly-available dangers of katalyth
your warning is specifically that people shouldn't handle it or be exposed to it at length
which ... i ...
palamedes, help me out here, what is the imagined situation?
beyond scientists intentionally continuing to handle it beyond the initial unpleasantness of just being around it at all
are you thinking the farmers are just going to blithely work around it despite it making them feel sick? intentionally use it as fertilizer? shape it into a nice dildo?
genuinely. what am i warning them about other than 'don't be incredibly stupid and handle the stuff that makes you feel sick'? recap it for me.
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That said, it was primarily the additional issue of it being in one's head. I didn't touch it for it to take up residence humming a little ditty.
later in the month (idk time is fake)
Felwinter stands in the doorway of Gojo's bedroom, announcing himself even though he knows it's not necessary. (He's yet to be entirely comfortable with the idea of being perceived at all times, and so chooses to avoid thinking about it as much as possible.) That said, he doesn't wait to be invited in, striding across the room to set the tray he's carrying down on the bedside table. On it are two cups of tea (one of which he takes for himself) and a slice of impossibly decadant cake he'd brought home from Kelesis specifically for Gojo. He learned fast.
"I found some new blends in Kelesis, so I thought I'd bring one back," he offers after a moment. "It's not bad."
Certainly better than what they had been able to find in Karteria, though that wasn't saying much.
Perching at the foot of the bed, he eyes the book Gojo was reading with mild curiosity, though doesn't bother to ask about it. His mind is elsewhere, which is perhaps evident in the way his thumb traces the rim of his teacup, back and forth, back and forth, restless and distracted... or the way he doesn't seem to hear a thing Gojo says. His gaze drifts away to the window, where it settles, unfocused.
It's funny. No matter how many times he's been over the questions he wants to ask in his head, finding the words to voice them is difficult.
"Satoru," he says again, interrupting whatever chatter Gojo had launched into. "What do you— No. What is a soul, in your opinion?"
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Brightening as he's offered cake, Satoru accepts the plate happily, shifting to sit cross-legged so that he can sit forward and pay attention while he eats. The Kelesian tea is better, though it's still terrible, and Satoru comments as much. He never thought of himself as having strong opinions on tea, but that was because he comes from a tea-growing country. Most of the time he could just count on having access to good tea, wherever he went. Karterian tea is horrible.
Fel's question is an interesting one, and Satoru makes a thoughtful noise as he considers it. He sets down his plate for a moment, lost in thought, and starts to cross his arms--but only one arm goes across. The other hand reaches up for his own throat, some kind of subconscious motion, maybe self-soothing. His hand tightens--squeezes hard--and then he realizes what he's doing and drops both hands immediately back into his lap.
"Hm. Interesting question. A significant portion of it is a matter of definition. Different cultures define that in different ways. The ancient Greeks--do you know Greek? Do you know English? Never mind. Irrelevant. The word ... spiros, I think? The root part of it is spir, anyway, and it shows up in a huge amount of English words." Satoru being a Greek nerd who speaks English. "Spirit, aspire, inspire--it means breath. This is the case for a lot of--especially ancient--cultures. The soul is the breath, and the soul left the body with the final exhale."
He leans forward, raps a knuckle against Fel's breathless chest, willing to bet that this is the actual root of his boyfriend's question.
"By which definition, babe, sorry, you're out. But." He lifts a finger. This lecture is far from over. "There's a concept in Japanese philosophy which is called shin-jin ichinyo, literally meaning 'mind and body as one.' Instead of the dualism of Western philosophy, where consciousness is seen as something separate from the body, shin-jin ichinyo posits that the soul is the body, and the body is the soul. Your thoughts, feelings, and identity exist not just in the mind or heart, but throughout your body. The body shapes the soul as much as the soul shapes the body."
Sorry if you didn't want the entire lecture, Fel, because you're getting it. "Shortly before coming here, I encountered two curses with relevant abilities. One of them--and this one I got the explanation second-hand from my student--posited that the soul existed before the body and the body was formed according to the ... blueprint, I suppose, of the soul. So that this curse could manipulate the shape of the body by warping the victim's soul. However, the other curse had an ability that seemed to conflict with that, wherein the memories, emotions, abilities and instincts of the body remained within the body even after the curse had removed the brain, implying--as with shin-jin ichinyo--that the soul was infused throughout the body.
"But I really wanted to slaughter both of them, they were assholes, so let's not dwell on them too much." Satoru wrinkles his nose, but he finally takes enough of a breath to reach for his tea, though he doesn't yet resume drinking it. He thinks back to what Fel had told him--human brains were installed in 'Exo' bodies, but also that Exos had no organic parts. It was not the physical brain inside the metal chassis. "What I think is most relevant in our current circumstance is the question of the immortal soul, which is generally the aspect of a person which passes to the afterlife while the mortal body is left behind. In Buddhism, this is the part which reincarnates into a new body and a new existence, but is still considered to be the same person, and who often will recognize, resonate with, and share threads of fate with other souls who it has encountered in previous lives.
"Given that I strongly theorize--as previously discussed--that the Augmented are all dead and this may very well be an afterlife, then," he points a finger back and forth between Fel and himself. "We are our souls. I am much more confident in the belief that my soul exists here in this place than I am in my belief that this is my original body that was transferred here. Which would also explain the loss of so many of my powers, but that's a different topic. Would you agree with that premise? How confident are you that you are the Felwinter who died in that battle, and, separately, how confident are you that that is the same body--chassis?--that was damaged in that battle? My opinion and belief is that the very fact that you are here is proof that you have just as much of a soul as I do."
cw: suicide mention
"When a Lightbearer dies, our Ghost recreates our body from scratch. You can't heal a body which has been crushed or incinerated or disintegrated," he shakes his head slowly. "Sometimes my Ghost found it easier to start over even with lesser wounds. Exos are... complex. Difficult to fix. So she'd have me shoot myself. I've died more times than I can count. We had to be dead in order to become Lightbearers at all.
"But I don't remember dying before I came here. Not in the way you mean. Not my Final Death. If my Ghost were dead, my Light would be gone, and as long as my Ghost is alive..."
She could, theoretically, bring him back again. Even if it was only to a situation from which there was no escape. A death he knows is coming whether it has already or not. None of them were walking out of that bunker alive.
"To answer your question: Whether this is the same body or not means very little for me."
It's also not really the point, but that's... Well, he's not entirely sure how to bring it up.
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He sets his cake aside for now, preferring to savor it once they've moved past upsetting topics.
"So the question is indeed about whether you have a soul," Satoru says, voice quiet. He'd guessed as much, but Fel has now confirmed it. "All right, answer me this. So you told me--if I remember correctly--that Exos were built to house human brains, but also that Exos have no organic parts. Therefore, a human brain has to be ... scanned? In order to be uploaded into Exo hardware? So that begs the question--and this is a popular topic in fiction about transhumanism--is the human soul transmitted in that process? And even if it is, you're something different, so ..." Satoru's brilliant, tactical mind follows the logic and connects the dots: If Fel had also existed in a separate body, maybe as an alien entity, and been transferred into the android chassis, then he could be assumed to have as much as a soul as the humans who were transferred. In which case they'd be discussing what happens to a soul, not what the nature of a soul is. But Fel doesn't talk like the question of the transmission--or resurrection--is relevant at all. It's not why he's asking.
"Because you weren't transmitted from some other body," Satoru concludes, quiet but certain, gaze steady on Fel's face. "You weren't ever something else. You were created an Exo." He's pretty sure that implies an AI, and yet he doesn't feel fully confident that he understands Exo technology or magic enough to fix the concept on robot brain. A created entity, whatever that means for Exos. "If we assume that humans have souls by default, then you have some doubts as to whether the process that created you included the creation of a soul."
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And there it is. He lifts his head to meet Gojo's eyes, in defiance of the terrible, deep-rooted fear that shudders through his frame. His fingers twitch against the teacup like they're desperate to reach for a weapon, or for his Light. But there's no need for that, he tells himself. Not here, not now. Not with Satoru. He has to allow himself to trust.
It's difficult.
"An AI created by an AI," he says finally, and even his usually flat tone seems taut. "I don't think there's any question of me having a soul."
After all, Aodh had said as much, hadn't he? There was no hiding it from someone who could see souls. But Aodh had claimed he also had no soul, and yet he was flesh and blood. He lived and breathed. So what is the point of them? What difference do they make?
Felwinter looks away.
"But what does that mean, in the end? Is a soul necessary? Does it matter whether someone has one or not?"
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"If you think there's no question of you having a soul, then your logical premise for this question is faulty," Satoru argues indignantly, wanting to fight whoever left Felwinter feeling inferior like this. Which might be all of Karteria, sure, but it didn't start with them.
"Listen." Satoru lifts a finger, trying to get Fel's attention to return to him. "I think the premise is faulty, but of the ... more plausible premises for what is meant by a 'soul', given this additional context for the question, I genuinely do not believe there is any relevant difference between the two of us. Look at me." He points that finger toward his own face. Fortunately he's not in the habit of wearing his blindfold or glasses within their home, so his dazzling blue eyes are bare. "The definitional question that I started with remains relevant, but I do not believe that the soul is breath. That's poetic bullshit. If the soul is the body, then my soul consists of muscle memory, neural pathways, and electrical impulses, which cannot possibly be very different from your data memory, wires, and electrical impulses. It's the definition by which soul is consciousness, and the structural layout of the body is irrelevant if it results in both cases with an intelligent consciousness capable of logic and emotions.
"If the soul is separate from the body, dualism, then I reiterate my point that whatever part of us was brought here--whatever part of you was resurrected by your ghost--is the immortal soul. My consciousness was brought here same as yours. And I don't have any memory of dying, unlike some people here, so who the fuck knows how your Final Death fits in or doesn't.
"But thirdly, interestingly," Satoru tips his neck and taps the spot where the Natural Souls were installed. "If the definition on these 'Natural Souls' is correct, if they are souls, then it's critically relevant that some of us are rocks. There are Augmented with plant souls and some with rock souls, Fel. Now, in Japanese Shintoism, we believe in an animistic view of the world, which is to say that it seems perfectly normal to me that rocks have souls. Everything has a soul, potentially. But if we follow that to its logical conclusion and, say, suppose that it is the pure element of a thing that has a soul, then your components may actually consist of multiple souls. Which is fine because if rocks have souls, then my body's bacteria and other microorganisms also can be assumed to have souls, so I am also, therefore, a conglomerate of souls.
"In conclusion," Satoru says, leaning back and reaching for his cake. "The question is based upon a bullshit premise but all the relevant possibilities logically extrapolate to us both having whatever the fuck a 'soul' is." He gestures between the two of them with his fork. "But it's fine if you wanna believe that I'm cooler for having more souls because humans contain, like, billions of microorganisms? Which is still weird to think about."