That's all. Music is playing in your house, but you cannot hear it. It's good if this happened while you were sleeping. It is bad if at the same time your passengers screamed in horror. Vonnegut would say, "That's the way it is." Douglas Adams would say, "Don't panic!" And the late Dumbledore said: "For a highly organized mind, death is another adventure."
Vegetius said: "If you want peace, prepare for war." And if you want a normal life, it's time to prepare for death. Yes, the topic is delicate and sad, but there is an opinion that life is a joke, and death is a laugh. We continue the series of articles "what to do if …" and publish instructions on what to do if your body temperature is equal to room temperature. Read before it's too late!
What is there after death?
At the core of beliefs about life after death is common human greed. We study diligently, then we work, save money, travel interestingly, eat deliciously, raise children … and then suddenly bang! - and a threadlike pulse. Allow me! - someone will say, - have I really tried in vain for so many years? Will everything that has been accumulated by back-breaking labor be wasted?
Strictly speaking, entropy doesn't give a damn about your house, your tree and your son, but thousands of years ago people knew nothing about this, so the problem of preserving life achievements was solved a little differently. Some religions teach that everything that exists is an illusion, dust and vanity of vanities, due to which it is necessary to observe asceticism from birth and intensively prepare for emigration to a better world.
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Other beliefs offer serious career prospects - for example, the transmigration of the soul of a dung beetle into the body of a rich man (if unlucky, on the contrary). Finally, some optimists believe that in the next world they will face an eternal battle alternating with an eternal feast, or a blooming garden with hairy hurias.
It is characteristic that the canonical ideas about heavenly pleasures do not imply their diversity. Statistically, for the entire existence of mankind, billions of people have fallen to the next world. The Christian majority is supposedly obliged to strum the harps, regardless of the fact that one of the righteous dreams of going fishing. Theologians argue that in paradise the soul has no definite occupations, and the singing of hymns is only an allegory of a certain concentrated bliss. In other words - no computer games or erotic adventures. Just sit on the cloud and enjoy your best.
The punishments prepared by world religions for especially distinguished citizens are also very monotonous. As a rule, hellish torment suspiciously resembles the everyday life of miners: a dungeon, heat (or cold, as in Niflheim), a terrible stench, and some grimy devils go everywhere. The differences are only in the details: death with a scythe, a boat made from the nails of the dead, or control weighing of a heart and a feather. All these formalities are needed only so that you can sit near a stalactite with a dirty conscience and experience abstract suffering.
For starters you are a ghost
The largest world religions do not give detailed instructions on the necessary actions for people after death, since everything in the next world should be intuitively clear. However, there are some norms of behavior that should be adhered to in the afterlife.
Many confessions claim that when the soul is parted from the body, it is present on Earth for some time. It is also believed that the spirit of the deceased does not always understand what happened to him. If you see a group of doctors from below, then from the side, it means that there is a good defibrillator in the intensive care unit. If family members defiantly ignore you and look dull, and all the mirrors in the house are covered with sheets, be alert.
If you fell into darkness, and then emerged from it and saw intelligent cockroaches with nanoscalpels above you - congratulations, the decision to freeze your head in nitrogen was correct. If you find yourself on a passenger plane, and Tom Cruise and John Travolta are sitting in adjacent seats - congratulations again, you have freed your thetan from the burden of conventions and fly from Teegeeak (Earth) home to your home galaxy. Now you can directly influence space and time. Scientologists really believe it! From you 420 dollars per lecture.
Realizing that wreaths and spruce branches were not brought into the house for disguise, you can use the remaining time (in the Orthodox tradition - 40 days) with benefit. First, find out your limits. It is likely that the soul is able to move in space at the speed of thought and affect the surrounding objects.
If so, go travel. Even if you do not manage to show yourself, you can see others, and at the same time do a few good deeds. Look into the center of the Earth or under the Sphinx (isn't it interesting what is there?), Search the Himalayas for the existence of the Yeti, write on Mars in large letters "Yankee go home!" or gently place a three-liter can on the sleeping President's right hand and tickle him in the nose.
Try to resist the temptation to tell your loved ones that you are doing well. Nothing is all right with you, you are dead. If you plan to spend the rest of eternity in paradise - do not try to rob banks, take revenge on enemies or spy on photo models in the shower. Avoid exorcists, sorcerers, and ancient ruins and sacred sites just in case. With other ghosts or magical creatures, if there are any, behave as with ordinary dead. That is, either good or not.
It's time for the next world
What happens when your time on Earth runs out? There is no consensus on this matter. Perhaps the Angel of Death will come for you. No need to inquire about the health of his horse Binky. Most likely, real Death did not read Terry Pratchett and would not appreciate such a joke. The classic case (dark tunnel and light ahead) requires special attention. Even if you are 100% sure that you have died, watch your step. Perhaps you have not yet been released, so there is a risk of stepping on the contact rail.
When moving to a new level of existence, keep calm, do not create congestion in the queue, do not try to send an SMS to your friends asking them to put a couple of candles for you. In the Christian paradise, it is not recommended to shout "Allah Akbar!", Demand the houris and Don Perignon's box, tell God that he is dead, or ask the angels how much they can dance on the edge of a needle. In Hell it is considered bad form to shout "IDDQD!", Look for teleports, call Satan Sotona and take pictures near the bottomless pot of dung prepared for Uwe Boll.
The first 2-3 centuries can be spent looking for all your ancestors. Do not be surprised if, after thousands of handshakes and listing of all the prefixes "great-great-great-", you stumble upon a black man or a monkey.
If a medium contacts you, in no case help him to reveal ancient secrets or unravel high-profile crimes (even if the souls of the victims personally ask you to transfer the killer's signs to Earth). There is a good chance that in this case the medium will quickly join you.
How to while away eternity? Paint over the white spots of history. Find Einstein and ask about what he exists now. You can ask Leonardo da Vinci about the smile of Gioconda, Gagarin about the secret of his death, the Templars about the hidden gold, Tolkien about the shape of the elves' ears, and Lovecraft about how he relates to the coming of Cthulhu.
Paradise
The Christian Paradise (Hebrew "garden") is located in Eden, east of Palestine. He is guarded by a cherub with a flaming sword (Gen. 3:24). According to later teachings, paradise moved to heaven and became a kind of ordered structure - "heavenly city", the gate to which is guarded by the Apostle Peter (Matthew 16: 17-19), who is also the first Pope of Rome. In paradise there is a tree of knowledge (traditionally - an apple tree), the fruits of which became an instrument of the fall of man. Whether it is possible for ascended souls to consume these apples, the Bible does not specify.
Islamic paradise (janna) - also resembles a botanical garden, where rivers of milk, wine and honey flow. Unlike the Bible, the Qur'an gives a detailed description of the paradise life. All souls will be of the same age (33 years old). They are served by eternally young youths. Food and incense are served in precious vessels. All wives are forever virgin and forever young. Paradise is divided into several levels for different categories of the righteous.
In Hinduism, souls wait for the next reincarnation in Svarga (heavenly worlds on Mount Meru), or in Naraka (the underworld of the dead). The highest goal of the “cycle of souls” is Moksha, complete union with God (in Buddhism, the break in the cycle of rebirth is called “nirvana”).
Hell
Hell (from the Greek for “a place devoid of light”) consists of 9 circles for different categories of sinners and unbaptized. Following this logic, the main population of the Christian hell should be non-Christians (Muslims, Buddhists, etc.), not Christians. The main leisure of fallen souls is associated with fetid flames, cauldrons of boiling sulfur and other sadistic fantasies of medieval theologians.
In the Islamic hell, sinners are chained or immersed in boiling tar. Here the samum wind blows (bringing dust and sand storms) and the zakkum tree grows, the fruits of which are the heads of devils. The latter serve as food for sinners. If you wish, you can swim in two lakes: one of boiling water, the other of pus.
Buddhist hell is a place of purification of a sinful soul by suffering for its subsequent rebirth. Located under the mainland Jambudwipa on the southern side of Mount Sumeru. The stay on the lowest layer lasts 339738624x1010 years. Souls are boiled in molten iron, pricked with tridents, torn apart by moving rocks, and poked with spears until flames come out of the nose. In the upper, cold levels of hell, souls are in an icy wind until they crack from frost.
Reincarnation should be viewed with suspicion. You can't guess. Incarnation as a dung beetle is not the worst option for Ancient Egypt, and reincarnation as an aristocrat, as great as it sounds, could make you the prince of an endangered tribe of Amazonian pygmies three days before the dynastic coup. And if you are offered to be reborn in your own body a few days after death, this means only one thing:
Congratulations, you are a zombie
For classic zombies, we have only three tips: Walk forward slowly, moan: "Brains, brains!" and bite living people. However, in recent years, the revived dead have noticeably grown wiser and began to show creative inclinations, so if fate gives you a second chance, use our advice.
First you need to dig out of the grave. Uma Thurman in Kill Bill did it with kung fu and manicure. If the movies lie and the zombies do not have superhuman strength, it will be difficult to crack open the boards of a fresh coffin. The cases of burial of people who fell into a lethargic sleep show that the coffin from the inside can only be scratched, but not broken. An ordinary person in the grave will lose consciousness in 5 minutes and die in 15 minutes, but the zombie has an advantage: he is already dead. Boards can be ripped open with metal objects - watch clasp, buttons or belt buckle.
This should be done as quickly as possible, while the ground is still loose. In 1943, soldier Gennady Ponomarev, buried in a mass grave, got out from under the bodies of his comrades and easily dug through 1 meter of soft soil. In 2002, American Forrest Bauer, buried by criminals in an ordinary grave, woke up and got out thanks to the softness of the sandy soil. In Russia, according to sanitary standards, burial is carried out at a depth of at least one and a half meters.
On the surface, you should determine your limits as soon as possible. How fast are you moving? Does the person you bitten turn into a zombie? Can you, as a representative of evil spirits, cross flowing water (streams, rivers, underground water mains)? In the movies, it is often shown that zombies cannot swim and sometimes walk on the bottom. This is nonsense. Gas bloating makes corpses much lighter than water.
Until the decay becomes too noticeable, the zombie can remain a part of human society (perfume, makeup, or a motorcycle suit with a helmet come in handy here). Science fiction and fantasy do not focus on this, but decomposition proceeds very quickly in warm climates. Within 24 hours, the eyes collapse and the cornea loses its transparency. After 1-3 days, the tissues acquire a greenish tint, the veins darken. The gases that form swell the body, the eyeball liquefies, the skin becomes fragile, blistered, cracks. In about a month, the destruction of the skeleton may begin, and the zombie's career will be interrupted.
To slow this process down, you should immediately fill your stomach with strong alcohol. Vampires sleep in coffins, and for zombies, the easiest option would be a refrigerator with a temperature slightly above 0 degrees. The ideal way to preserve your body is a bath with formalin or 70% alcohol (for better preservation, it is recommended to treat the body from the inside). Regular bathing prolongs life after death indefinitely.
If you can transform other people into your own kind, immediately check all known zombie vulnerabilities for them. Are precious metals, holy water, a cross, brain damage, or head cutting off harm? You may need to protect yourself with special clothing or helmets (army or police). Zombies rarely use weapons, but if your "offspring" are smart enough, nothing prevents them from giving them submachine guns.
With such an army of militarized zombies, you can take over the whole world. You are unlikely to succeed in becoming its commander-in-chief - after all, even the smartest zombies are accustomed to acting in a crowd, but your colleagues never conflict with each other, despise fear and go to the end. Avoid cold weather, constantly move (the government has a bad habit of using nuclear weapons against zombies) and remember that if you feed on brains, then you should not completely destroy people. Your goal is a zombie civilization that uses living slaves as food, labor and a source of replenishment for their thinning ranks. Populate other planets - you don't need oxygen! - and go to the stars. Let brothers in mind learn that death is only the beginning.
What if you're a vampire?
If you woke up in a coffin with elongated fangs, night vision and a terrible dry forest, then there will be a lot of interesting things ahead. The initial recommendations are roughly the same as for zombies. Get out of the grave, just do it very carefully. The sun may shine in the sky.
Vampires have two important advantages over zombies: they do not rot and they have magic. We need to find out which one. You are probably strong, fast and agile, and your senses work much more efficiently. Can you transform into animals or fog? Fly, regenerate, suppress someone else's will, command wild beasts?
Check out the main vampire myths. Are you reflected in the mirror, are you casting a shadow? Are you able to enter someone else's house without an invitation? Can you quench your thirst with animal blood? Is the bite enough to create another vampire, or do you need to inject your blood into the victim's veins? Use the vampire you created as a guinea pig. How does silver affect it? Aspen stake? Garlic? Sunlight? Bible, crucifixion, holy places?
A light bulletproof vest helps well against an aspen stake, and closed clothes, makeup and glasses against sunlight. It is unclear why the smell of garlic should scare off vampires, since the latter do not need breathing. Allicin (the active ingredient in garlic) is unstable, and therefore of little use for creating weapons against vampires.
The easiest way to preserve blood is to freeze it. It is no longer suitable for transfusion, but it will do for food. Sodium citrate (available in pharmacies) prevents blood from clotting. A solution of common salt (NaCl), which interacts with this metal, forming insoluble silver chloride, can theoretically help from silver.
As for your plans for the future, try to "lie down" and take a closer look at those around you. Unlike zombies, vampires do not spread around the world at the rate of an epidemic. If you believe the fantastic stereotypes, bloodsuckers gravitate towards solitude and secrecy. Perhaps there is a regional cell of some vampire clan operating near you. Its members are unlikely to be happy if you start gnawing the throats of the Star Factory soloists and manipulating the UN Security Council. The same goes for your love life. You should not turn family and friends into vampires just because it is difficult for you to part with them.
The most reasonable thing in this situation is to get some money for a comfortable existence, then study, study and study again. Vampires have a huge advantage over mortals - they can spend several hundred years studying and become smarter than any Nobel laureate. Intelligence will help fight boredom, provide you with all the benefits of civilization and give you the opportunity to influence the fate of people without using vampire superpowers.
Life, as you know, is good. It’s even better to die. No, you don't have to build yourself monumental tombs filled with traps, or negotiate to turn your ashes into a diamond or send it into space. Just be humorous about it. Life will be much easier, and you will not need to be upset about such a trifle as stopping it.
And the last tip. There is a belief that coins should be placed on the eyes or in the mouth of the deceased - a payment to Charon for transportation across the Styx. Thus, the deceased can carry physical objects with him to the next world. If you often drink, use foul language and do not like "The World of Fantasy" - discuss in your will to be put in a coffin in an embrace with a fire extinguisher. It will come in handy.
Mikhail Popov