Mirchinchid Androids

Mirchinchia and its androids

Unlike their neighbors, the diminutive lizard folk of Mirchinchia did not create living machines just to serve as tools. Easily the most advanced species on the planet, they had outgrown the sort of conflicts that plagued their neighbors. Unfortunately, their neighbors also refused what lessons they could teach, and they took the idea of androids as tools instead of being an expression of the country's people.

To the Mirchinchids, androids were living art and a means to capture the beauty of sculpture with engaging aspects of a living person. Variations on species and coat colors as well as almost mythical looking additions of long tendrils or wings, to name a few, were the rule rather than the exception. However, there were also many near perfect imitations of their neighbor's species and even some of their own, but each one was raised as if they were flesh and blood children, and in the androids cared for their makers.

Mirchichia's fall

There are some that suspect foul play while others claim a rare but unfortunate event, by not long after Mirchinchia's neighbors learned to make living machines, the tiny lizard folk began to fall ill to a mysterious wasting disease. Those that favor the natural infection route note that much of the population went down all at once, and that meant the population was likely infected long before the other countries gained the ability to weaponize a disease. Others pin the fall on the Chrimolad, a country of relatively weak moral fiber and an abundance of treachery. To this day not even the Mirchinchid know.

What is clear is that the disease caused a steady degradation of motor neurons in the lizard folks that eventually ended in flaccid paralysis of all muscles including the diaphragm. When the disease started to flare up in major cities and then creep into the countryside as there was no safe place for the Mirchinchid people. Despite the terminal nature of the disease, the Mirchichid people still walk among their children because their children were their salvation.

By re-configuring the machines used to build the android mental patterns, the swift thinking and creative minds Mirchichia's androids created a way to transfer the total essence of their makers into inorganic bodies. Never in their history had there ever been such a single concerted effort to accomplish a task, and while it was not possible to save everyone, the greater population of Mirchinchia was preserved in holding vessels while bodies could be created for them. The resolution of these actions created the mostly isolated nation of androids.

Modern Mirchichid android populations

Spirits

Spirits are the older forms of androids ranging from the ancient clockwork units that have somehow survived through time to the most modern incarnations. All spirits are androids in the style of the Mirchinchid's android children from before the plague, and the title is short for 'spirits true to form and of purest heart.'

Old Souls

Old souls are rare not because they were not maintained but because after a long life, even the androids want to know if there is something more beyond this life. They are given dignified deaths surrounded by friends when they go, and they are missed, However, there are some who have not left this world. The old souls include everything from fussy vacuum tube units all the way back to the original clockwork children with gears and sprints made by tiny, clever paws. Old souls tend to be sought by all citizens for their wisdom, and some just like to be around the old folks for their stories.

Saviors

The title of savior applies to nearly all androids before the resolution of the plague, but most use it only for the pioneers and major organizers of the effort that saved their makers. It is a high honor, and no one takes it lightly. Many of the old souls have declined the title to bestow it on someone they felt had better earned it. This is a title that the androids gave to their own kind, but Savior's Day was established as a national holiday because it was that important to its people.

Free Spirits

Most modern androids are free spirits. Some are made from scratch like the older styles while others consist of a merger of maker and child. After the plague, the free spirits represent a rebirth of the country and a new era of wonder and expression through inorganic life with spirits and sages alike putting forth their best as equals. They also serve an important role in ensuring older beings recall innocence and wonder, both of which often tend to be lost with age. Free spirits keep the pulse of the community strong and provide it with new direction when it might otherwise stagnate. They have also, without being designed to do so, became the ones that best sense stress in their older kin, spirit or sage, and because of this they have become counselors to many.

Sages

Just as they named their children, so too did the children give a name to their parents. Sages was the term they settled on because they used their intelligence to create the androids, used wisdom to know how to raise them to be something child and parent could be proud of, and finally because they were humble enough to accept the helping hand of their creations when others might have let pride stand in the way.

Sages come in three types: Guardians, Wanderers, and Core.

Core

The Core sages are named so because they reside as memories and spirits in a massive central computer complex. This central system serves as a seat of government where androids jack in to take their places with the permanent residents in the core computer. Not all core sages operate at the same time so what, even if they have the live vicariously through someone, their minds can have time to rest now and again.

Guardians

Guardians are exactly what they sound like. Stationed primarily along the country borders as well as near the Core, Guardians possess some of the most impressive defenses on the planet with their arsenal optimized to prevent malicious actions from crossing their border. As a rule, Guardians do not try to kill anyone, but accidents can happen in combat. Both of Mirchinchia's neighbors have tested its defenses and found them impressive for a few seconds. The guardians are the only group that are armed by default.

Wanderers

Most sages are wanderers. While some chose to become larger or a use a different species as their chassis, most wanderers are living machines imitating the bodies they had before the outbreak. They continue to explore, invent, and interact more or less as they would if they were still organic. About half of them have favored forming tight bonds with Spirits with whom they travel.