Unseen Library

Mekh-8

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Mekh-8 is one of the factions of Aeroclysm.

Also known as the Machine Church.

Mekh-8 is a religious organization following the pattern of a mystery cult, where increasing rank within the group leads to increasing knowledge of the group's practices. Most are quite familiar with Mekh-8 as a matter of course, seeing their acolytes everywhere and witnessing their more public rituals.

The name Mekh-8 is derived from the fact that this is the eighth version of the religion to exist. At each time of great growth and crisis, there is a vast conclave called of all the most powerful of the cult. They come together and discuss things in secret. Each time, Mekh emerges as a revised force, with some changes in dogma and in ritual but ultimately still the same group.

Mekh-8's core belief is that in the Before times (see Aeroclysm History), there was not just plenty but that everyone was beyond want. They point to the fact that almost every single island that rises has walls that refuse to crumble, machines that are pristine, even huge caches of supplies simply lying around. What kind of world would have produced such excess and not used it? Only a world where excess was the norm. Every man owned a skyscraper, even if now the specifics about what a skyscraper is are now lost.

A world with such advanced technology and knowledge couldn't possibly have been ignorant of the cataclysm. They must have known it was possible, and therefore there must have been a plan for it. No society with such resources would be taken unaware by anything.

To this end, Mekh-8 worships the machinery and technology of Before as a divine expression of a grand universal plan. Everything from the simplest valve to the largest factory complex is part of the world-that-is-to-come, harboring some small part of the future's spirit in the present. It is a matter of relatively common knowledge that Mekh-8 worships technology, but the greatest of the mysteries is known only to the group's inner circle. Ascendance within the cult is not just through personal knowledge, but through two other factors. One factor is contributing technology and machines to Mekh-8. A useful cache of equipment is often enough to mark an acolyte as notable, but priests are expected to find much more. Complete factories, full schematics, or other such precious cargo is one of the prices that Mekh-8 demands for ascendance.

The other is part of the ritual induction into the inner circles, and it involves a much stronger modification than most humods will ever go through. The ritual removal of flesh and the substitution of machinery. Most of this machinery is crude and focused more on functionality than aesthetic, as the cult prizes the function of things far more than their appearance. The oldest, most powerful, and most secretive of Mekh-8 are only a few remaining bits of meat held within metal shells. Some even whisper that if the meat died, the machinery would carry on and no one would know the difference. Some whisper this already happened.

There is one element of the Machine Church's belief that is hard for outsiders to comprehend. While Mekh-8 believes in the supremacy of machinery and technology from Before, it considers the existence of AI to be a problem. At best, the existence of AI is a distraction. At worst, AI itself is part of what is preventing the world from changing into its better form. This principle is drawn from the fact that while AI can provide novel solutions to problems, those solutions are not linked in a logical way to the problem itself. Many solutions are ultimately black boxes, working properly but not understood in the slightest. To the acolytes of Mekh-8, who value knowledge, a solution without a why is a heresy. It is to that end that the Machine Church works to suppress the exploration of AI and in particular works to destroy those AI that already exist.

This is one of the only points of absolute dogma that Mekh-8 has. Everything else has been up for revision on occasion. Even the order of the tithes (the normal practice of tithe decreed by the Machine Church is 25% of all resources plus a tithe of something useful and hard to reproduce, for example fuselage-quality wood or titanium rich ore) is up for revision. Even the specific roles that the Machine Priests have been assigned in the Church is up for revision. Every now and then, a tithe is considered in need of changing to something else. Or the role of a Machine Priest is considered in need of changing.

However, the need to destroy AI is absolute. The worship of technology is a divine thing to Mekh-8, and so anything that might corrupt or interfere with that worship is anathema. For Mekh-8, the existence of AI is a clear sign that the world is not to its proper state but instead still sinful. Upon elimination of all sin and the completion of the greatest projects, the world will become that of endless plenty once again.