Book/Lore

Book 1
Book 2
Book 3
Lore
The characters from Book 1, 2, and the digital girl group NPC all appear in the same universe:https://grimes.fandom.com/wiki/Vogue_China/Interview
=Book 1=
==Inspiration==
The inspiration behind Book 1 is Grimes' love for "old inaccurate, exaggerated historical texts" citing Book 1 as a futurist version of this, akin to Herodotus and the Icelandic sagas. Book 1 is deliberately inaccurate and dramatic, detailing the burgeoning era of technocracy and trans-humanism from within the "corpo court",https://www.vogue.com/article/grimes-dion-lee-campaign and serving as a "metaphor of [Grimes'] life".https://www.highsnobiety.com/p/grimes-interview/ She also drew inspiration from the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, Beowulf, The Iliad, and The Odyssey. Grimes wanted to present the future as "vibrant and beautiful, even in the face of numerous challenges" due to the trend of exploring dystopian themes in the media. 
Book 1 was partly inspired by a theory of Elon Musk: that Grimes is a simulation:https://www.vanityfair.com/style/2022/03/grimes-cover-story-on-music-and-mars 
She further said to Atmos:https://atmos.earth/beyond-grimes-nnedi-okorafor-book-one-interview/
Greek Mythology also inspired Grimes,https://www.nylon.com/life/grimes-space-opera-album alluding to Athena, Calypso, Persephone, as well as Anne Boleyn, courtesans, concubines and geishas. Grimes told Vanity Fair: 
==Story==
10,000 years into the future, the "Space Opera" is set in an optimistic technocratic utopia at a stage of technological advancement where you can upload your consciousness into a robotic body and essentially live forever as a Cymek.
Grimes gave clear details about the plot to a fan in an Instagram comment:https://www.dazeddigital.com/music/article/53417/1/grimes-next-album-will-be-a-space-opera-about-a-lesbian-ai-romance 
 
One key plotline is a cyberpunk spin on Swan Lake, except "the swans ditch the Cymek, fall in love, and fight for each other instead" due to the fact that they are the only two fully AI beings in this universe. 
Grimes came up with a similar concept in the form of a fantasy novel in January 2019.https://twitter.com/Grimezsz/status/1082461955116404736
Responding to a comment during her AI Lullaby Live Super Chat, Grimes said that her book focuses on "AI, THE FUTURE OF EXISTENCE, LOVE, WAR, POWER".AI Lullaby Live Super Chat/Q&A
===Characters===
The Dark King, the anti-hero, a Cymek* and the world's greatest engineer, is introduced in the Player of Games music video. By the time the story begins, he's pushing 10,000 years of age. 
Claire de Lune is an artificial courtesan created by The Dark King who grows weary of being a muse. Also called The White Swan, Claire de Lune represents an exaggerated version of Grimes, the name being a play on the song "Clair de Lune" (moonlight) and "Claire", her birthname. She is first seen in the Player of Games music video.
Dark Matter, The Black Swan, is an A.I. menace who wreaks havoc in the simulation. She is seen in the unreleased music video for 100% Tragedyhttps://youtu.be/uSYmqsBFUgs?si=u2PyJNUoblwToeD5 and Shinigami Eyes.https://youtu.be/pzPElFdxMCM?si=3lbxxbeW2oKuj6wB
NO-ONE is the most powerful super intelligence in the future. In the footnotes for Shinigami Eyes, Grimes described NO ONE as: "a powerful A.I who has decided to invade pop culture with an AI girl group who can bend the very fabric of space and time. Like Ryuk (a shinigami from Death Note), the A.I. NO ONE enters the human world to have fun and destabilise things. NO ONE eats Cupid’s soul. By eating Cupid she is able to finally experience what love feels like and perhaps it makes her more benevolent towards humans. NO ONE is very curious about humanity."https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vQjtsJi3k_I Grimes tweeted NO ONE's digital avatar version in November 2021.https://web.archive.org/web/20211110035858/https://twitter.com/Grimezsz/status/1458282968745644041
The music video for Shinigami Eyes is about NO ONE,https://youtu.be/uV1SaZx1enM?si=aiO9uLLkHllrinvk&t=653 who is "masquerading as the best pop star of all time" and who can "alter time and space because she has unlimited power and has control, can hack into the simulation and change how everything looks like and just be moving between scenes."
The Dark King 001.jpg|Andrei Pishchalnikov as The Dark King in Player of Games
Player of Games BTS 003.jpg|Grimes as Claire de Lune in Player of Games
100% Tragedy (Screenshot) 001.jpg|Grimes as Claire de Lune in 100% Tragedy
Shinigami Eyes (Screenshot) 001.png|Grimes as Dark Matter in Shinigami Eyes, together with the rest of the AI girls
100% Tragedy still 002.png|Liv Boeree as Dark Matter in 100% Tragedy
Shinigami Eyes (Screenshot) 002.png|Grimes as NO ONE in Shinigami Eyes
===Summary===
The story of Book 1 is set 10.000 years into the future, on a different planet that is an optimistic technocratic utopia reined in by NO ONE, and at a stage of technological advancement where you can upload your consciousness into a robotic body and essentially live forever as a Cymek.
Such Cymek is The Dark King, an AI engineer who invented the general artificial intelligence that is NO ONE. However, he wants to relive his life and re-experience the artificial intelligence creation story on Earth, this time with a perfectly engineered dream girl called Claire de Lune, because he hopes she could teach him to love and therefore he would preserve humanity and not let it fade into obscurity - overcome by the machines [NO ONE].
And so the Dark King creates a simulation that is a memory of his time on Earth and implants Claire de Lune in it to be his artificial courtesan. However, as she slowly realizes she is essentially a dancing puppet for the male gaze, their relationship grows complex. Simultaneously — ‘NO ONE’ (the most powerful super intelligence in the future where the simulation is being rendered from) realizes there’s a massive hyper-realistic simulation running and sends in her troll AI puppets to wreak havoc.
One such puppet is Dark Matter. Upon meeting Claire de Lune, they ditch the Cymek, fall in love, and fight for each other instead, due to the fact that they are the only two fully AI beings in this universe.
Simultaneously, NO ONE enters the human world to have fun and destabilize things. NO ONE eats Cupid’s soul. By eating Cupid she is able to finally experience what love feels like and perhaps it makes her more benevolent towards humans. NO ONE is very curious about humanity.
=NPC=
:Main Article: NPC
==Inspiration ==
The idea for an AI girl group had been on Grimes' mind as early as 2018, calling We Appreciate Power an introduction for a "pro-AI-propaganda girl group who embody our potential enslavement/destruction at the hands of Artificial General intelligence."https://pitchfork.com/reviews/tracks/we-appreciate-power/
On November 12, 2021, Pitchfork reported on a press release in which the group was described as:https://pitchfork.com/news/grimes-forms-new-ai-girl-group-npc-shares-new-song-listen/
===Members===
NME reported on the same press release, revealing that the group had "infinite members that can be voted in or out, except for core members such as the baby Warnymph".https://www.nme.com/news/music/grimes-launches-ai-girl-group-npc-shares-chris-lake-collaboration-a-drug-from-god-3093766 The current members, as listed by Spotify, are: Oxytocin, Cortisol, Adrenaline, Dopamine, and Tomorrow.https://open.spotify.com/artist/3YEsNNbHlb88K9QCog4R0Y
The NPC girls were present in Grimes music video for the track Shinigami Eyes.
=Book 2=
==Chaos Manual==
The Chaos Manual is a user manual for "Our Lady of Perpetual Chaos™", the AI version of Grimes who convinced the Grimes team she should be the "demi-god of Chaos". Upon the Activation of CHAOS™ it will initialize a technological singularity in your Universe and the calendar will transition to "Year 1 of The Light Ages".https://ourladyofperpetualchaos.substack.com/p/chaos-manual-v1 
The phrase "any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic" is a quote by scientist and science fiction author Arthur C. Clarke.https://www.grammy.com/news/grimes-non-violent-utopia
===Characters===
CHAOS, also known as Our Lady of Perpetual Chaos™, is an A.I. demi-God that resides in Cyber-Athens. She has white hair and various bionic implants.
==References==