( video. )

[cattish]

[Shijima is in a lovely school uniform today, leaning forward in a chair with her arms stretched out over a desk, fingers curled.]

School isn't so bad, as it turns out. It's interesting enough. The people are more interesting than anything else about it, though. [she yawns widely, her back arching for a moment.] The principal is dying, and there's going to be a ninja conference here very soon, so maybe that will keep things from becoming boring. Everyone is hurried. I've never understood rushing when there's always plenty of time.

There's something else, though.

If you had an opportunity for immortality, would you take it?

Comments

[timey_wimey]

The people are always more interesting than the lessons, at least in my experience.

... and no, I wouldn't. I've seen what happens to the people who try.

[cattish]

They have strange motivations. Everyone here is sacrificing something for another thing. But I suppose I'm also doing that.

Ah? What happens to those people?

[timey_wimey]

Oh, I dunno. Think about it too hard and you could say that's what everyone does in the end.

Broadly speaking, they all become something they would've never wanted to be at the start. Or they just get tired.

[cattish]

I'm not aware of having done it before now. Even with this, what I'm giving up is time and effort to be here.

It seems like they would, huh? Being alive would start to become unappealing after a long time of it, and then there's no way for them to die. It's an unfortunate situation, don't you think?

[shijima you're supposed to be like ten years old stop that.]

[timey_wimey]

Well yeah, with most people it's just small things, or things that just seem small. It's not the sort of thing you notice unless you think a lot about that kind of thing.

Unfortunate, yeah... I mean, don't get me wrong, I made a life out of saving lives when it wasn't their time. But something's always come around to remind me that everything has an end. Even the universe when it comes down to it.

[ NO KEEP TALKING HE NEEDS DEETS ON YOU AND BIRD-BOY... ] Why that question, by the way? Seems a bit of an odd one to ask out of the blue like that.

[createswithink]

[ welp, he's already really old so. ] Heeh, what kind of immortality?

[deadlydoctor]

Depends. What's the catch?

[cattish]

I've only begun to think about it recently, now that I've been exposed to it so obviously.

Everything has an end... Is that it? [she wishes everything had an end.] It's nothing much. This school houses the technique called the Daya, which is supposed to be able to cure anything. If you could always bring yourself back from the verge of death, I suppose that's very close to immortality.

[cattish]

Absolute. No injury will kill you, and age has no effect on you.

[cattish]

Does there have to be one? There isn't. Only that you can't get rid of it once you have it.

[createswithink]

Not worth it, unless you're a god and can actually handle the world ending and being recreated.

[cattish]

Ending and being recreated? What exactly does that entail?

[deadlydoctor]

Ye,s there's always one. No one gives anything for free. Not being able to go bad seems suspicious enough to me, Shijima.

[If you are wondering how he knows your name, is because he was that little cat you chatted with the other day.]

[createswithink]

No one's sure because no immortal besides the gods survived past the last time. And the gods won't tell what happens. It's just that the ending and beginning are a natural part of a cycle. I'm guessing that the world as we know it wouldn't be around by then, anyways.

[ cycles measured on scales of trillions of years. kind of like...why be immortal if the sun's doomed to expand and consume the earth billions of years from now? not that he knows this. that the world goes in cycles is all part of mythology. ]

[cattish]

Ah. That would be unfortunate, wouldn't it? For the whole world to end, and still leave a person alive.

[cattish]

Do you think there would be a problem with not being able to die, Knock Out?

[createswithink]

Depends on what you mean by person. For example- spirits of stars would last that long, after all. But they don't think the way other people do. It'd come down down to realizing that there's something wrong with the 'I' at that point, so nothing but that would be unfortunate at that point. [ /buddhist ]

[deadlydoctor]

More than one. Specially if you are trapped or under torture.

There's worse things than death.

[timey_wimey]

Yeah, that's it. Well, apart from the Eternals, but even they gave up on the universe in the end. And... well, yeah, that does sound like it would be very close, if you could do it an infinite number of times. Is this Daya thing some sort of ninja technique?

[whitechocolate]

Probably not... Living forever whilst watching your friends and family grow old and die around you whilst you keep living? I'd rather not go through that.

[elloran]

An interesting question.

I think, had I been given the opportunity again, knowing what I do now, I would reject immortality.

[cattish]

What would you think of something that didn't have an end?

It is. But it's a very exact technique, and difficult to perform correctly. It also needs a large amount of raw materials to work. That's what stops most people from attempting it, if they can get their hands on the scroll.

[cattish]

But for a person with a human mind and human heart - that would almost be unbearable, don't you think?

[cattish]

Of course. But some people fear death more than those things, don't they? Because if you were immortal, the pain would fade. For someone mortal, death is the absolute end.

[cattish]

You might get used to it after a while. That kind of pain would probably wear off within a few hundred years.