Backup and restore magic

Cyrians generally back up their personalities and experiences to a central database and other databases. This allows for them to be restored from the backup if they die.

## Method

### Backup

A mental configuration can be saved as a sort of "file". This file is stored in several locations, including a central database. This is habitually done by Cyrians who haven't been recovered before, and done automatically with those who have.

### Recovery

Inactive Cyrians can be recovered by others or automatically by the database system based on certain personally-set conditions. The body is constructed from magic, as the physical structure of a body would be too costly to create. (Thus, recovered Cyrians are more like kerah, but can interact biologically with normal elves and humans, and behave identically to if they were biological.) This body connects to the backup in the databases, essentially "torrenting" information, and the result is the recovered person.

Alternatively, one can be "dormant" instead of inactive, like Evartagna.

## Effects

There are several strange effects as a result of recovery, both physical and societal:

### Physical effects

#### Loss of appearance

Since Cyrians are generally restored as a standard form to keep things simple, the appearance of an individual is lost and must be reapplied through sensory illusions. However, Cyrians usually use illusions anyway, so this isn't a major problem, and is why the tech hasn't been updated.

#### Magical dependence

Recovered Cyrians have a sort of dependency on the recovery magic to exist, as the precise structure of a body cannot really be created.

### Societal effects

#### False copy effect

Due to a Cyrian's experiences and personality constantly being backed up, if someone is restored in multiple places, the two copies do not diverge in personality or memories. Multiple instances of a Cyrian, the most common examples given being Evartagna and the leader (currenly Ghila), are called "false copies" due to this reason, as they are all functionally one person.

#### Views on death

Cyrians that are "dead" physically but backed up somewhere are considered "inactive". And due to functional immortality being gained from this system, elves' natural extended lifespans are generally lost. This is also why the civil war has been a more tactical than physical conflict, at least on the kerocrats' part.

### True copies

The nature of the technology allows "true copies" to be created, which is essentially when a Cyrian's backup is copied and desynced (usually by assigning a different ID.) However, this is not often done due to ethical concerns, and also social issues with the identity of the copied person. It has been done three separate times on accident due to database shutdowns or other issues.

* Evartagna was copied, creating Evartagna-1, in 1208.
* In 1387, 144 different copies of a random Cyrian citizen were created due to an accidental desynchronization of a secondary database with the false copies, which turned them into true copies. (The person in question generally spoke to an audience made up of herself when practicing.)
* In 1066, a governmental candidate was duplicated (Kath-0 was elected, as Kath-1 dropped out immediately upon being created.)

It has also happened due to the war:

* At the beginning of the war, databases located in West Cyria were disconnected from those in East Cyria by the Imperials, who controlled the West. Most backups of Kerocrats in Imperial databases were deleted, except for a few, like Evartagna-2.
* Aviet escapees backed themselves up in Kerocratic databases.
* Aviet soldiers were copied multiple times over by the Imperials, creating millions of soldiers, often appearing as hundreds of millions due to false copies.