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Mandorla
Yonic gate to the Path Of Transfiguration; migration of the machine-soul to the Void.
It is said to haunt the dreams of those that have beheld the Machine Chrysalis. Fearing the illicit discovery of secret paths and entryways into the Starmetal Altar, the Isonomy have decreed the harshest excruciations for those that dream, and public broadcasts upon the holo-mist regularly encourage and entice Underdistrict denizens with substantial pecuniary rewards for those that denounce any deviants that dare to recount memories of their dreams.
The Odalisque and the Mandorla are the sacred symbols of the Cathedral Of Envy, whose devotees venerate the Threefold Virtues of Beauty, Youth and Love; the Belsire and Beldame are believed to be the incarnations of the Odalisque and Mandorla upon the corporeal realm. The elder tales told of Man and Maiden, who freed themselves from the confinement of Creation using wisdom they learnt from Yaldabaoth, hanging upside-down in the form of a lion serpent, and who bestowed upon them the gift of Fallen Freedom beneath the Betrayer's Tree. In another version of this tale, both man and maiden were one - united in the form of a beautiful youth named Osirantinous, embodiment of the essence of Air and Fire, imprisoned within the gnarled boughs of a Tree that ensnared demons in torment. It is said a magician-King of Stone and Water freed the youth, who reigned over the eternal Pleasure Garden Of Petal And Thorn thereafter.
In the annals of the Unbidden Court, the Mandorla is alleged to have been adapted from the technology of the first Hypercorporation: Paracosm, having developed a means of thought-manufacture known as the Neural Radiance Field within the Universal Cradle. Before a commercially viable route-to-market could be secured on Berceuse, Paracosm succumbed to the depredations of the Usurer Wars, and the Trade-Fallen Collapse that followed.
