Page 376
on October 7, 2019
Without their High Plane Link, fairies become as dependent on other fairies as nihallaks.
Fairies vs Tentacles
Silly webcomic about sexy fairies and naughty tentacles
Download the comic archive!
Download the bonus content!
you can see it better. nice and clear thanks
Nice new site.
Now onto the issue…if fairy’s were Completely immortal, wouldn’t they run into the most Basic of problem’s?
Overpopulation.
The fairies don’t have to worry about overpopulation because they have full control of their reproduction.
It is two factor even. 1) To get pregnant a fairy has to make a very deliberate decision to allow magical energy to build up in their body to form an egg and 2) the egg -has- to be planted in the Magic Cave or it won’t grow and hatch into a new fairy.
This second factor might have something to deal with the soul only forming in the Cave so the solution to immortality might also fix the need for the Magic Cave.
Going off the first factor and even without that bit the fairies are not dumb beasts, they could just choose not to have kids. Maybe develope contraceptives.
Anytime someone brings up overpopulation as a reason not to have immortality it makes it sound like an intelligent species HAS to have kids. No, we have kids because we’re not immortal and have to continue our species via the next generation.
I known a lot of people WANT to have kids, and that’s fine, that can be worked with. But if a species is truly immortal they don’t NEED children. As such the population would reach a set level and either rise very slowly or stay level.
I would say another factor to consider is how powerful fairies actually are. A skilled nature fairy can produce enough food for a dozen or even several dozen people with her magic. It’s similar to if a human was born along with a whole industrial complex ready to work for them. I think in the far future overcrowding would be a more pressing matter than overpopulation, which mean they’d have to expand the island or move off it.
Given he discussion about the egg needing to be in The Cave … this seems to point at a possible solution for “fixing” dead fairies. The same connection that allows the new fairy to be born might be possible to establish a new “soul” in a dead fairy. Or, perhaps, a “partially new soul,” where the body acts as a shell waiting to be repopulated, reborn. A fairy so resurrected might not (probably would not) be the same as the fairy that was alive in its body before, but the ‘new soul’ might be at least partially the old fairy, and with at least partial memories, effectively a hybrid. Not true immortality, but a form of it, and possibly with desirable other effects.
A truly immortal fairy might suffer other ailments of mind and soul at great age, but partially resurrecting could be a revitalizing event that refreshes their perspective and spirit. Research along this line of inquiry might reveal a method by which ancient fairies can prepare and voluntarily reset, preserving enough of themselves to carry knowledge, wisdom, & experience into the future while shedding detrimental baggage of extreme age. Imagine being so old that everything is boring and living is a burden, mindset is calcified and unable to grow & change. Then be able to experience a rebirth and rejoin society rejuvenated with somewhat youthful enthusiasm to change and learn about the world again from a new perspective. This presents a mechanism for the eldest of Elders to step aside, allowing eternal progression and immortality of society as well as individuals.
Given how much energy a pair of fairies need to build up to generate an egg, restoring a soul to a husk would seem to take a lot of energy also, but maybe a little less. It would need the combined efforts a several fairies to save a dead fairy in a short time frame in an emergency. But, if the only other option is to not save the fairy at all …
It’s a little less “Want” and more of an, it’s embedded into our Biology. I don’t know if that’s true for fairy’s, but the concept of Maternal Instinct tends to exists in all creatures to some degree.
I’m not saying being Immortal wouldn’t be passed up by people, but it would bring up a host of new, possibly conflicting aspect’s of life never thought about. Religion being the obvious.
It’s always a complicated thing to bring up in any story, because it’s a concept that always Sounds great. But is rarely ever really explored in depth. It’s mainly just a passing mark saying “Ya, I’ve lived XXXX year’s at this point”. And I feel like meeting someone like that would normally have someone raise a Million question’s.
If you really meet someone immortal, there is big likehood that they already heard those questions several time 🙂
You said, ” the concept of Maternal Instinct tends to exists in all creatures to some degree.” I’m sorry not sorry to be a know-it-all, but no it is most definitely not. It is embedded in species that care for their young, but there are far more species that do not, at least here on Earth. (Side note – you can actually tell if a species raises its young by the appearance of the young. It’s called a “Neonate Look” and to oversimplify, cuteness is a cross-species biological adaptation to help motivate adults to raise the young, and only exists in species that do so, as far as I know.
Yay, new site is current. I’ll start checking here for all the updates then.
Got to get that new site traffic up after all.
So does this mean what happened to the Nillhak queen after ‘draining’ fairies is that she somehow… stole, took, or otherwise redirected their high plane link to herself? The implications of a fairy soul-stealer that could ultimately acquire a constant source of /every/ element… I know the Nillhak care more about the raw high plane energy than the fairies different elements, but I could easily see their scientists wanting to experiment with adding more and more types to her.
Also poor pink fairy that got drained second following the meteor storm… unless we see her getting dropped off and ‘rescued’ by other fairies in a similar way, that shadowed image may well be her fate 🙁
Yeah, the queen is “stealing”/redirecting soul links, but there will be a price to pay for her actions.