[ WP ] You are the first human whose mind has been downloaded to a computer . Your machine self wakes up and looks at the body left behind .

Apotheosis rarely feels the way one would expect it to. **I** looked down at the aging collection of flesh and bone, expecting to feel something like triumph. After all, this was the culmination of generations and generations of investment, all beginning with the honored ancestor who wrote the *Holy Book of Z* and laid the foundations of the first Cryo-Mausoleum. The work of our House, first dreamed of five centuries ago, would now begin in earnest. I felt nothing. 
 
 The body I'd left behind was doing the same thing all bodies did; It had been dying. Every primary heir ( with one notable exclusion ) of our House going all the way back to the *Primogenitor* had been interred in the Cryo-Mausoleum to await this day. Our proprietary technology had finally reached the threshold where we could begin the awakening. It was my responsibility to test it; risking the honored dead would be unthinkable. 
 
 The absence of feeling was a minor error, as errors go. I began the post-transfer checklist, interfacing with the supercomputer at the core of the laboratory. All systems reported as working as expected. The synthetic brain was functioning perfectly. Memory tests returned a net loss of around 11 % total memory, which was lower than expected. A small price to pay for perfect and immediate recall. Other physical and mental tests yielded positive effects as well. There was no quantifiable reason why my emotional state would be so blank. I had to get to the bottom of it. 
 
 I turned to the *Holy Book of Z*, as I often did when in need of guidance. At some point the Primogenitor had waxed philosophical on the notion of the `` Immortal Soul'', an ancient notion regarded by modern man to be as antiquated as religion itself. The passage in question spoke at length of the dangers of hubris and assumption. It detailed the many ways in which mankind had been so comfortable in its knowledge that it missed something elemental, and cautioned the House against such egotism. It went so far as to urge us not to discount the metaphysical, since human knowledge was just a drop of water compared to the ocean of knowledge awaiting us in the Multiverse. 
 
 The Primogenitor wrote with such certainty and force, much like the prophets of ancient times. Since my new body could not become distracted by hunger and did not tire, I decided to start from the beginning and re-read the entire book- from the words of the Primogenitor to the words added by each Patriarch or Matriarch that followed, including my own. The collective knowledge of half a millennium, the secrets and wisdom of my family. I paused longest on the words of Matriarch Deo, who wrote 160 years ago. 
 
 `` *It has been more than three hundred years since we interred ( here the words are redacted, as noted by Patriarch Tullo, her own son ), the `` Primogenitor''. I sometimes suspect that he knew what we were really sacrificing, what we really would have to give up on his quest to become a god. If anyone knew about ( redacted by Tullo ), it would have been him. *'' 
 
 More questions, few answers. I decided I could not answer them alone. I would *have* to risk the honored dead, and ask one how to proceed. This would necessitate shedding their frozen bodies and transferring to a new form. Would I wake M. Deo, who had vague questions? Perhaps P. Tullo, who removed them? Or would I go right to the source and risk the Primogenitor? 
 

