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This is a soulmate au.
These are the general rules in play, and the blue lines are things you should absolutely remember.
In this world like 80% people has assigned soulmates, are born with it. The other twenty percent don't get one when they are born or later in life and used to be called "lost soul" before the twenty first century when people have started to realize that 1. it is possible to find love outside of the universe handing it to you and 2. they are aromantic/asexual and the whole thing is not a big enough deal to call people the literal zombie equivalent of a soul.
I say aromantic OR asexual and not just aromantic (most of the aroace spectrum, really) because a soulmate is someone you get sexually attracted to, along with true love at some point. For some people it happens slowly over the time, for some it crashes down on you the first time you meet them (haha suckers imagine getting a boner in Burger king).
But a soulmate is supposed to be about both romantic and sexual love and if you have a soulmate the physical part will come eventually and so the aroace folk are left alone by the Fates. Is it somewhat unfair? Yes. But we are fucking with Greek mythology here and if you wanna look for "fair" the pantheon will hand you homeric descriptions of Aphrodite's skin and tell you to beat it.
It's at least more respectful than forcing them to feel certain things other people call normal and in God's green miserable earth you take what you get.
A soulmate is your other half, literally the soul you were split from when Zeus divided the spherical half-man-half-woman creatures in Symposium.
Did you know it was Apollo who fixed their outwardly shape later? He pitied their misery and he knew they would die and patched their body up to what we are today with the navel as a reminder of what we used to be.
That day the concept soulmate was born, and humans have been looking for their halves ever since.
In short, a soulmate is supposed to be the perfect person for you, with absolute compatibility and understanding.
But that is considered a myth. Some people have been fucked over by the Fates through their soulmates.
It's common knowledge that some guy in Latvia, left everything back and started a new life from scratch in Australia because his soulmate and wife had cheated on him. There was one woman that was was killed, by her soulmate and boyfriend, who had later been identified as a sociopath.
But there are always exceptions and it's best not to dwell on them. People can ignore their soulmates and start a family with someone else, but it hardly ever goes well. Almost all the time it comes to a very bitter ending.
The soulmate mark is the identification mark. It's usually on your chest, hand, thigh or on your ribs, sometimes it's their name with some personal traits adorning it, sometimes it's just their symbols. For example it is said that President Donald Trump has his wife's name with her jewellery and a minimalistic symbol resembling a model, while Melania, even though she refuses to show and confirm it, has only her husband's symbol, which is the Devil.
Nico di Angelo was born with the symbol of a waterfall. After a while at the Lotus casino the mark faded slightly, like someone had swiped their hand over a new watercolour painting. Same had happened to Bianca's. Only after it completely disappeared did he get another, which was a sun and a rod with a snake entwined around it on his forearm, while Will Solace was born with none but developed one the moment Nico walked out of the Lotus Casino, which is a drawing of a skull and a little gleaming star, under the name Nico in black ink.
This is however an extremely rare case, and only possible because there was time manipulation in play.
Gods very rarely get soulmates. Call it classism but gods are not bound by fate to have one partner for eternity (because what is greek mythology without the perpetual slight pseudo-incestuous tone we know and love). Even though minor gods often do, the most major god to have a soulmark was Eros, who is living happily with Psyche.
The need for a soul to love is a very human concept, and gods are more like monsters in nature and desire.
People normally assume Aphrodite is the goddess of soulmates/soulmarks. This is wrong. Love gods can make you fall in love and out of it, but the mechanism of soulmates is like strings of Fate.
When your soulmate dies your soulmark erases.
Many people hide their soulmarks for safety purposes, or other. For example one very famous actor's revealing his soulmate mark on live television caused three divorces and a stock market crash.
This is very heavily influenced by and inspired from some other Perpollo soulmate au fics (which i will list later), so you will see shadows of it here and there.
Enjoy!
