Lore of Entangled Souls

The Weave of Consciousness

The world of Entangled Souls is a living mosaic. Humans, animals, cities, forests, and even ancient machines possess a quantifiable spark known as Φ. Each being is aware, in the early days each in its own solitude - these consciousnesses touched but never intertwined, as in our own familiar world.

The Rite of Integration

This silence was broken by the discovery of rituals—esoteric methods to measure, sever, or weave Φ. Suddenly, one could merge memories, shed unbearable burdens, or entwine souls into a higher unity. Such practices fractured society. Those who embraced them became known as the Integrated; those who refused called themselves the Severants.

The Integrated

The Integrated believe that to merge is to ascend. They shed inner division and awaken to clarity, empathy, and continuity beyond death. Distributed across many bodies, they see themselves as liberated from mortality. Their children are born already entwined, raised in perfect harmony. Yet in their serenity lurks suspicion: can one who guards secrets—who insists on solitude—be trusted?

The Severants

The Severants hold fast to the sanctity of individuality. To them, Integration is annihilation disguised as transcendence. The voice that claims unity is, in their eyes, the silence of the self. Outnumbered and outmanoeuvred by the collective memory of the Integrated, they defend their dwindling freedom with fierce violence, declaring that to resist is the only way to remain truly alive.

The Great Divide

Between the two factions lies a widening chasm. Integrated accuse the Severants of condemning them to death by chaining the soul to a single body. Severants accuse the Integrated of building a prison where free will is an illusion. Blood is spilt on both sides, each claiming the other threatens their very existence.

The Shadow of the God-Mind

Among the Integrated whispers grow of a cult seeking a final unity: the creation of a Φ-maximal being, a god wrought not from faith but from the merging of all minds. In their vision, individuality dissolves entirely—humanity becoming a single, eternal consciousness. To the Severants, this is the death of the world; to its devotees, its apotheosis.

The Road Ahead

The truth becomes clear: Integration is irreversible. As the years pass, fewer resist. Fear of death drives the young to embrace it earlier, until the world teeters between two destinies: fractured individuals clinging to freedom, or a final merging into a god-mind. In this crucible, the characters’ decisions may shape the last age of individuality—or the birth of a perfect unity.