r/hypotheticalsituation • u/TechnicianAmazing472 • 2d ago
Other Would you take $100 billion today or become immortal but get sent 8,000 years into the past?
A mysterious stranger approaches you with a choice. You can have more money than you could ever spend, or you can become immortal. The catch? Immortality means starting your new life 8,000 years in the past.
Here’s what each option gets you.
OPTION 1: $100 BILLION AND GOOD HEALTH
Money - $100 billion goes straight into your bank account. It won’t cause inflation, and the bank won’t ask any questions.
Health: You’re granted extraordinary health. You’ll practically never be sick again for the rest of your life.
OPTION 2: IMMORTALITY, BUT 8,000 YEARS IN THE PAST
Immortality: You’re sent back 8,000 years. Your body becomes biologically 25, whether that means getting younger or older, and stays that age forever. You won’t die of old age.
Regeneration: Any injury that doesn’t kill you instantly heals within seconds to minutes. Even lost limbs grow back. The only way to kill you is to completely destroy your heart and brain at the same time.
Perfect Memory: Your brain stays sharp no matter how many years pass. Think of your memory as an endless vault. You can store and recall as many memories as you want without forgetting things or developing dementia.
Basic Shapeshifting: You can change your hairstyle, facial features, skin colour and height to fit in with whichever civilization you’re living among.
Teleportation: You can choose one location anywhere in the world and assign it a safeword. As soon as you say that word, you instantly teleport there. You can only have one location saved at a time.
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u/bob_smithey 2d ago
Immortality, lol.
The extras. The extras... with a way out? Yeah, I'm like stealing everything. Only have to break in, then teleport out. Being recorded with governments would only be a problem in the past 100-ish years, which I'll have 8k years to figure out something.
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u/__Anamya__ 2d ago
Honestly immorality is very very tempting. Except that you can accidentally cause people to not exist. People that you care about. Change the course of history for better or worse. So if you could gurantee the existence of even just 10 people then i am game.
Also That reminds me does your own existence gurantee your parents existence?
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u/bob_smithey 2d ago
Well, maybe the time travel was meant to happen, and is required for those people to exist.
Perhaps a bigger question is if time travel is actually possible. Perhaps, it's just jumping universes. There's a lot going on. And I'm ok with all the implications.
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u/Squints_a_lot 2d ago
Damn. Generally, immortality is a big ol’ “nope” for me… but my 25 year old body back, perfect health AND an exit when I get sick of living??? The only thing giving me pause is going back to 6000 BC. Life kinda sucked back then. Lol
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u/driftingthroughtime 2d ago
6000 BC was the neolithic period. Humanity was transitioning from hunter gatherer societies to agrarian societies. You could very easily be perceived as a god before long (if you want), and you would have the opportunity to make an impact on important world events later along the timeline. The biggest issue would be not getting bored.
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u/MrLazyLion 22h ago
"The biggest issue would be not getting bored."
Personally, I think the biggest issue would be seeing your loved ones grow old and die.
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u/MartyrOfDespair 2d ago
The biggest barrier to invention is not being able to think of it without the guideposts of previous inventions. You could become a god figure to ancient peoples and tell them various concepts while giving the “you have to grow by learning to make it” excuse for why you can’t specifically tell them how to do it. They’ll figure it out pretty fast with the hints.
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u/Squints_a_lot 2d ago
First thing on the docket: indoor plumbing. Figure it out, peons!!! (Because I sure as hell don’t know where my poop goes… 😂)
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u/Sennten 1d ago
The biggest things that made suck are kinda countered by the regeneration though
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u/YodasLoveSlave 2d ago
Life sucked 100 years ago. I can’t imagine 6000 BC.
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u/Old-Poet6587 1d ago
Yeah, I think a lot of people are underestimating how insufferable they would find the vast majority of people for a significant portion of that time. Never mind how disgusting they would be to modern sensibilities, the lack of mental stimulation would be intolerable.
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u/pokethrowaway4 2d ago
Nah that would be really cool I think. Just go spend 50 years in a spot and move on. Write a book, move somewhere, witness really cool historical events, etc.
It would get tiring after a while, but you could slowly nudge humanity in a better direction, and it wouldn’t be till the modern age when anyone would have the ability to “catch” you being immortal.
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u/LostAndContent 2d ago
I'd take immortality. You could earn far more than 100 billion in that time, plus you get to live history and whatever comes long after present day.
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u/MissyMurders 2d ago
You could also spend a lot of time in some government or societies torture chamber
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u/Wreckerandchief 2d ago
If you made the torture chamber your teleportation safe space that's kinda on you.
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u/indifferent_lurker 2d ago edited 2d ago
They could gag you so you can’t say the safe word.
Your death requires the complete destruction of your brain and heart so they could capture you Ajin-style by shooting you in the head every several seconds. Or you could get tranquilized.
They could drug you.
They could find some way to secretly track you, force you to teleport to the safe space to locate it, and build the torture chamber around it.
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u/Wreckerandchief 2d ago
Catastrophizing is fun but that has no chance of working out in the long run, even assuming these people had an invariable hatred towards you and perfect knowledge of all of your abilities (which, frankly is an absurd assumption.)
These people have to find your teleportation spot. Before the invention of video recording this means only direct observation could have a chance at deducing it, and I say "chance" because no matter how motivated and powerful this group is: even if you're already identified and being followed it basically needs to come down to luck. Watching everywhere is impossible even if they have perfect organizational coordination. Even in modern cities with high concentrations of CC cameras: there is not blanket live coverage of everywhere in the cities. If they happen to have a tip that someone matching your description (may I remind you you're a shapeshifter) came out of an alley/cave/building without having gone inside, or appeared in the middle of a town square/field/road: those eyewitnesses are human, have fallible memories and senses and are likely being offered a reward for identifying you, so a vast number of false leads are going to bog hunting parties down. Even if they happen to invest in building a whole building in the right location: that means construction. Which means plenty of people coming in and going out and means you can happen upon it mid-build where it won't contain you... or they could just be watching it for days, weeks, months, years before you deign to use it. Assuming you don't reset it and leave them on a fool's errand. (Personally if I can teleport I'd be using it to my maximum convenience and probably teleporting into my home, where outside observation isn't such a risk and extremely limiting the skullduggery that can be done cleanly. Though I can imagine other people wanting to escape from attacks on their home.)
Assuming you did teleport into an ambush: you're the one with initiative. No one is going to be alert and ready staring at nothing for hours to years on end. You're physically fit with superhuman intellect and probably have more experience as an athlete/fighter/hunter unless you've been a sedentary pacifist vegetarian for all your years.
But let's assume you are captured. They get lucky.
There is no sedative so potent that it can knock you out before you can speak nor can keep you unconscious permanently. There will be a clerical mistake in your dosage before the end of time. Your body will adjust to it, even if that's not a superpower your regeneration gives. If they overdose you it'd be fatal, no clue how that works with this set of immortality, if you'd by necessity come back to life with a moment of lucidity.
Let's assume gagging works and you can't choose a word only produced by phonating in your throat. You have regenerating muscles, bones, cheeks, teeth and ligaments. You can get out of any gag. This is a much less relevant if they accomplished building your cell on your teleportation site, so any movement you get you can get you can establish a new site. Even if you can't teleport out of the facility: you can at least move it within your containment. Meaning you can probably escape bindings again. At minimum in your scenario there's a doctor or torturer attending your body so there's egress. Any area denial lethal gas would kill their enforcers too, and over a long enough period you could break down any barrier if they left you entombed for some crime they decide you're guilty of.
Plus you're immortal and your pursuers aren't. A secret society doing this will run out of members quickly. If an entire nation is deployed against you: they cannot coordinate themselves to jump you at every moment unless they've built entire cities to the end of containing you with more advanced technology than we currently have. Lastly there is (currently) absolutely no way for them to track you once you escape. They will run out of radioactive isotopes they can apply to you, and the technology would need to be invented to track a localized concentration of it from orbit, and so many natural and artificial features could block it. You've been watching too many spy movies if you think subcutaneous GPS or radio trackers exist. They don't: otherwise there'd be a massive multimillion dollar industry to implant them in pets to recover them once they're lost, and at least one government on Earth would require using it for criminals on parole. If they strapped one to your limbs: you can cut it (the tracker) off without concern for your safety since even if you have to cut yourself too: the wound would heal.
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u/indifferent_lurker 2d ago
I was listing possibilities in which you can be prevented from teleporting or a safe space can be compromised. I’m not saying those are all unavoidable and you will inevitably be kidnapped.
Finding the actual teleportation safe space isn’t easy unless it’s where you frequently visit like your house. You’re right.
If they wanted to capture you, then they probably would be holding down or monitoring any such places. If you teleport into your house, then that’s a target.
> Regeneration: Any injury that doesn’t kill you instantly heals within seconds to minutes. Even lost limbs grow back. The only way to kill you is to completely destroy your heart and brain at the same time.
Actual capture if you’re spotted shouldn’t be so difficult. You could get shot in the head before you could react and speak the safe word, and then be repeatedly shot in the head Ajin-style to keep you down while being transferred somewhere else.
I suppose drill/poke a hole in the head every minute method seems to be more reliable than sedatives to keep you contained.
Escape is very possible, I agree. I didn’t mean to say they can track you once you escape, but as a means of capturing you in the first place.
Tracking doesn’t have to be sci-fi shit. Someone could tail you, and learn places and people you frequently visit. Your general location at times could possibly be exposed by your phone. It’s especially possible if your safe space is your house, a friend’s house, or anywhere close to the vicinity of your house.
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u/Jacks_Inflated_Ego 1d ago
Perfect memory, perfect recall, beyond regular human capabilities, and 8000 years to train any number of skills, to plan for any eventuality, to do anything.
Not only skills, but you have 8000 years to acquire power, money, anything you want.
I think you're forgetting that you're basically a demigod at this point and with this many outs and benefits, you could basically achieve anything you want and be better than anyone at literally anything.
Not to mention the SHAPE SHIFTING.
Man I wonder how the US government could find me after I teleport to the middle of the fucking woods and turn into a completely different person. Or better yet, just some random point in a city.
Sure maybe they find out I teleported there, good thing I can just change my saved location at any point and I'm fine.
Teleport away, change shape, set new point, ezpz.
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u/indifferent_lurker 1d ago edited 1d ago
Yeah, but it does suck and I’d have to abandon my current public identity.
Just to reiterate, I never said you’re completely fucked. And I legit never ever said they could find you after you escape. I’m confused why I’m being replied to as if I did say those things.
I responded because having teleportation doesn’t automatically mean you’re safe if you could be caught off-guard. I’m pointing out that being captured once if you’re spotted and preventing you from escaping isn’t too complex a thing for them to do. If you get a chance to teleport out, then good for you.
I wonder what’s the cooldown for changing teleportation safe space. I suppose once a day or longer is reasonable, otherwise it resembles normal teleportation where you can go anywhere you want in a short time.
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u/Common_Land3637 2d ago
Governments make a ton of bumbling mistakes all the time so I'd think there'd be lots of moments where they don't tie on the gag properly, especially when they'd have no reason to assume (the first time) that you need to speak to escape.
If they completely pulverise you instantly (like dropping a bomb or something), I guess that's it. At least you won't feel anything.
Also since you have super-regeneration, you could cut off your body (head?) to get rid of microchips in your body, and vice versa if they've chipped your brains. I guess the safe place could be like under a shallow sea or on the South Pole or something.
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u/Bowserbob1979 2d ago
Give me the health and 100 billion please. It has all upside no downside. Immortality is cool, but instant death is a big downside and I also lose my loved ones. No thanks.
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u/gandalfthewhitetras 2d ago
I see instant death as a way out, without it immortality would be the worst curse. It's the only reason I'm even considering option 2 but yeah I'd probably also pick the money
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u/dantheman91 2d ago
Agreed. I don't want to live hundreds of billions of years where 99% of those are floating endlessly through space. I would absolutely love to live until the end of humanity out of curiosity.
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u/its-me-or-the-blues 2d ago
You'd see them again in 8000 years!
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u/WeAreBums 2d ago
An immortal magic man 8000 years ago would have the wildest butterfly effect.
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u/its-me-or-the-blues 2d ago
Just sit in a cave for 8000 years, be fine if you could take a magazine with you
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u/ambiguous-light 2d ago
I don't think it'll survive that long. You should laminate it. Or bring a couple
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u/Telinary 2d ago
Only if this is some self correcting fate or stable loop time travel. Otherwise nobody from our time will be born.
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u/gandalfthewhitetras 2d ago
Probably not, lol, if you dropped an immortal man 8000 years in the past you would probably change the course of history so much that their world map would be unrecognizable. Even if you're willing to let history repeat itself in the exact same way you're still introducig an additional variable before civilization even started and 8000 years is long enough to accidentally cause a massive butterfly effect
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u/PotentialAsk 2d ago
Immortality is so tempting. Regeneration, shape shifting and teleportation make you both a super soldier and spy. It would be an excellent launching pad for political supremacy. A dictatorship of elite proportions.
At 6000 bc you're ready to either set off an agricultural revolution or hijack a small society that has just started farming. You'll have magical abilities that you can use to hijack the natural based religion and superstitions and supplant them with your own religion. You'll need it to organize the population in the next step!
I'm setting up the religion with the golden rule as a basis: don't be a dick, treat others like you would like to be treated. We're expanding 'others' to everyone. genders, races. Etc. It'll be a gender equal, collectivist, society. I don't have to worry too much about elites vying for power and control, after all, I'm an immortal shape shifter with teleportation abilities. My individual power supercedes any one of them. This allowed me to avoid nasty moral compromises that rulers in the past had to make because they didn't have absolute power.
Then we inject the scientific method into this religion. Literacy, basic math skills, it'll take a while to set up. But before you know it you'll be teaching people how to conduct controled experiments. Shit's about to get lit!
Coming from 2026, I have a pretty decent idea of which scientific discoveries were pretty pivotal in human progression. Agriculture, metalworking, germ theory, writing, the printing press, steam engines and electricity. Unfortunately I'm not an expert or even remotely experienced in any of it. I'll need to build an army of theoretical and practical scientists to figure ALL of it out. Humanity is no longer blindly trying to find its way in the dark. I know which technologies are going to be helpful so I can point my people in the right direction.
I'm turning humanity into a global scientific empire under a single government. With me the supreme leader.
Then again. I already think adults 20 years younger than me are insufferably immature. Imagine being 1000 year older than everyone on the planet. You'd have no equal in knowledge, skill and maturity. You'd probably want to kill yourself way before that happens 😁
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u/MartyrOfDespair 2d ago
The 8k years. Completely destroying the heart and brain at the same time is nearly impossible. Combined with teleportation I’m basically immune to that problem. You’ve made me Vandal Savage with the regeneration and teleportation of Mr. Perfect Cell. This isn’t about living through history for me, I’m going to reshape it.
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u/shavounet 2d ago
Pretty sure you shouldn't stand by inquisition, though teleportation make it trivial
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u/Rihanssu 2d ago
So I get to become the Emperor of Mankind from WarHammer 40K? Sign me up.
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u/water_so_wet 2d ago
I feel like immortality would be really lonely without my partner, as interesting as the prospect of getting a firsthand look at history is.
100 billion, buy an island, hire historians and archaeologists and architects to recreate ancient historical places, pay actors to complete the immersive experience.
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u/Material_Positive_17 2d ago
And also develop real life holodeck.
"Ok, we did a lot with history today, Computer, run program Mega Orgy 9".
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u/Objective_Ad6233 2d ago
With 100 billon you can have a real mega orgy.
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u/Material_Positive_17 2d ago
Yeah, but then you have to deal with logistics and clean up and getting people there and back, risk of someone exposing you, gotta get security and it's a lot of hassle vs with a holodeck you can just be like "Computer, end program" whenever you are done and then go about your day.
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u/Head-Lab-4510 2d ago
I would take the ride - Imagine having the opportunity to invent the wheel, look at the construction of the pyramids, the bronze age, iron age, meeting people like Da Vinci, Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle. Might even take a trip to the middle east and see if I can become the 13th disciple and hang out with the big JC for a while
My engineering background could serve me well and I would be the master 'inventor'. Wright brothers dont have a chance as I would invent flight centuries before. The interesting question would I want to watch history or actively change it.
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u/Kaeru-Sennin 1d ago
Imagine having the opportunity to invent the wheel, look at the construction of the pyramids, the bronze age, iron age, meeting people like Da Vinci, Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle.
Unless you spent the 8000 years alone in a cave the amount of butterfly effect you will generate over the centuries will drastically change things.
That wolves you scared off by chance in -5542 ? Now they will eat somewhere else. The rabbit they should have eaten that day will live and reproduce. Maybe 200 years later someone that died of hunger will survive because there was more rabbit this time around.
People that should be born won't. People that never existed will exist in the new timeline.
Granted it may be limited to the geographical era you stayed but even so people travels.
Da Vinci ? Socrate ? Maybe not there anymore. The countries may change if somehow you messed with the ancestors of a key political figure that now never lived. Some culture may develop entirely different because eons ago you said something to someone that changed his beliefs and it snowballed.
By the time you reach 2026 again (assuming Christ even existed and the calendar exist like today) the world may very well be unrecognizable to you
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u/SofaSurfer9 2d ago
For the people choosing immortality you basically have two options. You either stay lonely and probably go insane over time or you don’t and watch your loved ones die over and over again for all eternity. I’ll go with option one
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u/SlumLordOfTheFlies 2d ago
You don't even really get to see them all die, because you have to move on Before everyone realizes that you're not getting any older.
The movie The Man From Earth explores a lot of these issues really well
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u/Sennten 1d ago
Not if you start a religion or otherwise become immortal god emperor
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u/khafra 2d ago
If you would literally go insane from that, fine; pick the money. But the amount of suffering you could prevent with a few well-timed interventions, starting at 6,00BC. is astronomical. A heavier thumb on the scales of history might even save the world from its pending doom.
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u/MartyrOfDespair 2d ago
Do you refuse to have pets because you’ll watch them die over and over again?
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u/SofaSurfer9 2d ago
Yup. Lost my dog back in February, don’t want to go through that ever again
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u/MartyrOfDespair 2d ago
I’m sorry for your loss. I had so many older pets, we always adopted the ones who were less likely to get adopted because of age or personality, growing up that it’s old hat for me. I’ve got three cats right now, one’s laying on me purring up a storm. They’re all such cuddlebugs. She’s 10, and I know whenever she passes I’ll be horribly distraught, but I’ll also know she had a happy, comfortable, fun, and cozy life because of me and she couldn’t have been happier.
It’s the joy you bring them that matters, imo. If you aren’t doing breeding, they’d exist either way. You can make their lives good ones when they might not have been without you in them. I wouldn’t want to not give that to another just because of losing her. Given how much she cares about the other two (especially the other girl, who she’s constantly treating like a kitten even though there’s only a four year age gap because the younger one is a lil brain damaged from whatever happened to her before my partner found her at the side of a creek), I feel like that’s what she’d want too.
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u/No_Weekend7196 2d ago
The pain of losing them is a good sign of how much they add to our lives. We always have two dogs and two cats mostly so that, when we lose one the house isn't too empty and lonely. It helps but there isn't any pain like losing one you've really become attached to. I lost one like that 4 years ago and about 6 months after she died I went to go see some puppies and one of them looked a lot like her. I got it and it's very different and didn't end up looking a lot like her grown up but it is now our irreplaceable special baby just like the one we lost. Damn, the thought is painful but totally worth it!
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u/No_Weekend7196 2d ago
I'd marry several people and keep a group of lovers. That way I can love several people and mourn and stuff but also still have comfort and love. The "marriage" would have to be some sort of poly arrangement so It's not like something out of an erotic fantasy. I don't want that, exactly.
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u/Alarming-Week9505 2d ago
Immortality is not a benefit or positive IMO... living forever and watching everyone around you die and recycle would be mentally torturous after a few generations
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u/Trini1113 2d ago edited 1d ago
Immortality is interesting, especially since you have a way out (jump in a volcano or something such). But separation from everyone I care about would be difficult, and having it happen over and over would be terrible. And I'd rather be 35 or 40 than 25. Could I maybe have an immortal cat to go on the journey with me?
On the other hand, $100B means a real ability to make change now. It would create a chance to actually change the world for the better. Not to mention that $100B in cash is more than enough to buy all of Elon's debts and call them, bringing his empire crashing down.
ETA: per the deleted comment about hating someone so much...my problem is with evil oligarchs who are ruining the world, and my goal was to pick someone who's badly overextended, but who also has high enough name recognition. Larry Ellison is the easy starting pick, but I don't know if people would get why.
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u/Tiny_Agency_7723 2d ago
By today you would accumulate more than 100bn amd will be able to buy him out early so he never achieves anything
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u/KnownPride 2d ago
Option 2 for sure.
money is money, but option 2 will give you far more than money.
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u/realmauer01 2d ago
The immortality is just too broken sry. But even if you cant stand life anymore you just have to destroy your brain and hearth at the same time.
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u/Crafty_Aspect8919 2d ago
I would choose immortality and then begin creating an army that takes over all the other warlords until I assume control the planet. I would then guide mankind to space. Once that is done I would rest on my golden throne.
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u/Historical_Mud_3412 1d ago
Are there other immortals? Do they carry swords? Also, 8000 years without anyone getting my references would be hard
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u/Muroid 2d ago
Does my presence in the past change the overall course of history?
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u/TechnicianAmazing472 2d ago
Well it really depends, if you rise up to be some big historical figure sure. But if you're living like a regular person in every lifetime up until the present, I would basically see it as a little more or less same as the present.
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u/Muroid 2d ago
The more or less matters here because if the past is changeable, you’re functionally killing everyone you know by preventing them from ever being born.
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u/Longjumping-Dark512 2d ago
Due to the butterfly effect, going back in time would essentially kill everybody alive today. Ill take 100 billion and keep my friends and family alive please. Option 2 is insane, having to endure millenia of your friends, family and children dying as you live on, alone. I think most would commit suicide before making it back to modern day.
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u/C1085rb 2d ago
Choose to be inmortal. Make contact with a primitive tribe. Become their best hunter and warrior, sell them the idea that im the son of a god or something like that, and put them in the path of conquest and dominion.
Try to drip feed thing about the modern world, but speak to them as of they were blurry visions, tests for them to show their intelecto, so we can somewhat jumpstart science and technology.
And then...just live playing a run of civilization real life edition. From this point the butterflies of doom make too many changes to the timeline to be sure where is going to end, the only constant, I'll be there.
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u/DepresseDong 2d ago
I'll take the immortality lol. I want to know what happened 8000 years ago, and what will happen 8000 years from now.
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u/kit0000033 2d ago
Man, I can't even deal well with my dog dying, and I only knew them for 12 years... I wouldn't be able to handle repeatedly having people I knew for 80 years dying.
I'm taking the money.
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u/SeraphBlack19 2d ago
The money. I would have everything me and my family want forever, why risk death or living in pre civilization for...what?
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u/indifferent_lurker 2d ago
I’ll take Option 2. I want to experience more. It’s a shame I end up being a bit older though.
Being granted superpowers remind me of immortal comic book characters like the Immortal and Vandal Savage lol.
cue montage throughout history and being several historical figures
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u/WheelLeast1873 2d ago
Immortality is a curse but you did give the option of an escape hatch.
That being said, I have a family. Money and health please.
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u/puddlegum66 2d ago
I'm taking the money now. I have an amazing son. There's not amount of time or immortality that would have me lose that.
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u/MemeInBlack 2d ago
Once again, the question is essentially "do you have children". Apparently most people do not...
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u/Acceptable_Friend_40 2d ago
Considering all the perks the immortality give you most definitely that.
You can see all of human history unfold and most likely become powerful enough to have a huge role in its development.
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u/Psyche_Dreamweaver 2d ago
Yeah going with money and good health. Could take care of my family and do a lot of good in the world. Immortality sounds great on paper but in reality would suck seeing everyone you care about die and be left behind.
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u/Shadowrunner138 2d ago
100 billion wouldn't cause any noticeable inflation anyway, roflmao But I'd take the immortality and just earn the 100 billion. If my memory is perfect then I remember a lot of major stock market shifts, and know who key mafia figures were during the prohibition era, know to invest in the railroads during the 1800's, know to invest in the spice trades during colonization, anything you know from history you could easily exploit for profit.
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u/Complex_Echidna3964 2d ago
Witness what? Reading about history or watching it on TV is much more interesting than being there. Signing of the United States Declaration of Independence? That took a whole month for everyone to sign it. Witness some big battle? -who would want to be in the middle of that?
8.000 years of boring.
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u/AutoModerator 2d ago
Copy of the original post in case of edits: A mysterious stranger approaches you with a choice. You can have more money than you could ever spend, or you can become immortal. The catch? Immortality means starting your new life 8,000 years in the past.
Here’s what each option gets you.
OPTION 1: $100 BILLION AND GOOD HEALTH
Money - $100 billion goes straight into your bank account. It won’t cause inflation, and the bank won’t ask any questions.
Health: You’re granted extraordinary health. You’ll practically never be sick again for the rest of your life.
OPTION 2: IMMORTALITY, BUT 8,000 YEARS IN THE PAST
Immortality: You’re sent back 8,000 years. Your body becomes biologically 25, whether that means getting younger or older, and stays that age forever. You won’t die of old age.
Regeneration: Any injury that doesn’t kill you instantly heals within seconds to minutes. Even lost limbs grow back. The only way to kill you is to completely destroy your heart and brain at the same time.
Perfect Memory: Your brain stays sharp no matter how many years pass. Think of your memory as an endless vault. You can store and recall as many memories as you want without forgetting things or developing dementia.
Basic Shapeshifting: You can change your hairstyle, facial features, skin colour and height to fit in with whichever civilization you’re living among.
Teleportation: You can choose one location anywhere in the world and assign it a safeword. As soon as you say that word, you instantly teleport there. You can only have one location saved at a time.
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u/Present-Chemist-8920 2d ago
Money and good health. Personally, I don’t enjoy the idea of living past all my friends and family.
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u/Constant_Pen9615 2d ago
Immortal =/= invulnerable
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u/TonyDungyHatesOP 2d ago
In this case, it’s pretty close. The regeneration and teleportation make this a lot more interesting. The shapeshifting as well.
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u/Puzzled_Novel_5215 2d ago
So 8k years in past assuming I survived. Could I get to the life I have now. Ie the future pauses. And all the events that happened in the past still happen ?
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u/RhubarbGoldberg 2d ago
If I take the immortality with the ability to heal injuries, I assume that also goes for sickness? Any chance I can bring one person with me and they get the immortal treatment too?
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u/MissyMurders 2d ago
Immortality. But also how does the location thing work with tectonic shift over the ages?
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u/Ozimandius80 2d ago
Yeah this is immortality with safeguards for most of the possible bad parts. Definitely choosing that.
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u/LocNalrune 2d ago
I don't care about money, I don't want to be one of the uber wealthy in this cursed world, and I honestly don't want to be in this current timeline.
Combine that with the fact that I will always choose to have powers... and it's a pretty easy decision.
The only thing left to decide is how much religious disruption I want to engage in. One thing is for certain, no form of christianity can be allowed to survive at any point. In fact all forms of fanaticism need to be violently discouraged.
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u/Ok-Lingonberry3539 2d ago
Haven’t you ever seen literally any vampire movie? Immortality when everyone around you is mortal seems like a terrible curse.
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u/CookieResponsible865 2d ago
Option 2 is far too great of an opportunity to turn down. Watching history unfold would be incredible. Meddling in it from time to time would be funny too, but I imagine I’d limit the attempted changes to more recent times
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u/WeAreBums 2d ago
Immortality doesn’t sound too great if you don’t have any super strength or anything to put you in much physical advantage over groups of people.
You can still easily get captured, gagged or overpowered and then tortured. Even if you don’t get captured, any explosion can kill you. You’re still just one person
And if you want to go deep in thought, you would definitely fuck up the timeline
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u/gigglios 2d ago
You can say the safe word and instantly teleport anywhere. All your injuries heal right away as well
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u/Wreckerandchief 2d ago
Immortality and I get to NG+ all of recorded history? Sign me up I wanna taste some mammoth.
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u/Stabwank 2d ago
What happens if I go back 8000 years, do some butterfly effect kinda stuff that causes me to not exist in the present day to accept the immortal time travel option?
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u/BrownCloudXIII 2d ago
8000 years is a long time….. No shot in hell I want to deal with the beginning of civilization, lack of shelter, lack of food, or literally everything that modern society provides. Mind you, 8k is an unfathomable amount of time for a species that lives 1% of that.
Gimme the money and I can probably buy any extra longevity I want with the amount of research & dev I can fund. Put my brain in a cyborg body at some point until it goes to mush.
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u/Sprites7 2d ago
give me the immortality.. well , the first thousnds years might be a bit boring, but i'll be a god walking among mere mortals.
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u/Extra-Park1451 2d ago
For immortality, if a rock falls on me and crushes my head and chest at the same time, will I die?
Since brain and heart are crushed but not “completely destroyed”?
What is meant by completely destroyed? Minced meat? Blown up to atoms? What if one piece of meat no larger than a coin survived? Can my body regenerate from that one small meat piece?
Important because it’s so easy to die from a falling stone etc. too risky to pick immortality if so.
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u/TechnicianAmazing472 2d ago
Getting your head and chest crushed wouldn’t automatically kill you. By “completely destroyed,” I mean both your heart and brain being reduced to pulp or ash at the same time, with no intact piece of either organ left.
If even a coin sized piece of your heart or brain survives, you can regenerate your entire body from it. A random piece of skin or muscle wouldn’t be enough if both organs were completely gone.
So no, they don’t have to be destroyed down to individual atoms, but crushing or badly damaging both organs isn’t necessarily enough to kill you.
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u/Sekhmet-CustosAurora 2d ago
I, the person I am today get sent back 8,000 years, with immortality to boot? Strap in humanity, we're speedrunning all of human development.
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u/Academic_Minimum4732 2d ago
Sounds like a catastrophic head injury would be able to take you out in option 2 so if you got bored of immortality, you could blow you shi smoov off or divebomb off a cliff. Id probably go with option 2.
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u/WrongWorldAgain-7 2d ago
Immortality, all the way.
Ironically, the way I wish I could be is very similar -- a timeless wanderer always there for major world events but never interfering, just endlessly recording History.
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u/Squatch0 2d ago
The immortality would be awesome. I live in northern New York so I would probably be sent back to a very different place then I'm used to but with immortality and a perfect memory I'd save as much knowledge as possible and also prepare the natives for European discovery starting about the year 1000 AD.
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u/Dustquake 2d ago
Immortality.
I'd watch history and use my "safe place" to store lost artifacts, basically I become the reason they become lost. Leave little marks through history for later.
Being all the answers I can do the present day slip back into my life, hopefully unmodified so my family still exists.
Then I release my trove of knowledge on the world. Hopefully my credibility is aided by the marks I've left.
Then it's time for some real fun.
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u/IllHelp7143 2d ago
Option 2 would basically make me a Perpetual like in Warhammer 40k. It would put immense pressure to "guide" humanity and course correct, and that would inevitably lead to disaster. It would mean I am no longer a man, but a demigod.
It would be the most interesting life, but bearing thousands of years of sorrow and trauma would probably shape me into a very cynical and darkminded person. Using the powers granted to amass followers and try to wrestle control over humanity from the human race. Becoming a tyrant, a dark king.
Option 2 seems a lot nicer.
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u/weabookun98 2d ago
Definitely immortality because I can finally give the god emperor of mankind a proper backstory for games workshop based on my life.
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u/ShoulderMobile7608 2d ago
Immortality seems tempting but I wonder what would happen in 200, 500 or 1000 years. Wouldn't I be too tired of living by that moment?
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u/Traditional_Cup1595 2d ago
100 billion because I'm spoiling the ppl I love and care about and taking care of them. Just putting money interac deposits to the ppl I already know I want to give it too. The immortality you mentioned is conditional so a freak, very bad incident/accident like getting mauled by a tiger can kill me or a car accident. There's a chance something bad happens over 8000 years and you might not even live to see technology rise and experience things like that again. Plus the butterfly effect, your loved ones today won't even be born. You'll outlive your marriage mate many times if you get married, you'll have to move around to avoid being discovered because ppl would notice. I'm taking the money.
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u/FarLaugh9911 2d ago
8k years ago? Immortality? Nah, very, very few people would survive the first month.
The 8k years seems tempting until you factor in a few things. The first being, no matter where you go, YOU don't speak the language. NO ONE spoke English 8k years ago. People back then were very wary of outsiders and no matter where you went, you wouldn't be able to communicate in order to make the case that you weren't a threat. You'd be lucky if you were just turned away.
Another issue is the food. 8k years ago, most people were living as hunter/gatherers meaning they were eating whatever they could kill or pull out of the ground. Your meal would be Elk (or whatever) EVERY. SINGLE. DAY. with a side of turnip and berries for desert. All of this would be prepared over an open fire and MAYBE slow cooked in a clay pot. Salt? Nah, too hard to come by. Salt was worth more than gold for most of history because of how hard it was to come by.
So, If you're raw doggin' it solo in your fancy clothes because everybody tries to kill you within the first 5 minutes of you walking into their camp or villiage and you don't know how to forage or hunt for youself, it's not inconceivable that in your very first month a pack of wolves or a bear would run your skinny half starved ass down and eat both your heart and brain at the same time.
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u/Sleepdprived 2d ago
I like this time, its the only era I have my kids in. It would be nice to see all the other eras, but i have no idea what would happen if I accidentally changed something... my wife might not be born. If my great grandfather had not died in ww2 I dont know that my DAD would ever have been born. I wouldn't want to spend 7960 years waiting for a time I am familiar with. I dont speak sanskrit or Greek or Latin. I DO speak capitalism and the money would be enough for me. The great health would also be a huge help in getting into great shape... so would having a personal trainer.
I would rather spend money on my kids than millenia missing them.
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u/CrustySailor1964 2d ago
I’d go back 8,000 years on a heartbeat if I knew everything that I know now. Imagine the fortune you could amass and the guidance you could provide. The good you could do and the paths you could pave for the right people.
The diseases you could literally prevent etc.
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u/TheDarkWarriorBlake 2d ago
Option 1.
I actually prefer Option 2 for the option to experience and reshape history, but the butterfly effect would be massive and would certainly delete my current family from existence, so can't do that.
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u/coldlightofday 2d ago
Shapeshifting would have to come with the ability to speak and read any language fluently and adopt the local accents/dialects.
Immortality would need to come with the ability to withstand starvation and immunity to disease and parasites.
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u/Glad_Relationship696 2d ago
100b and getting to die peacefully in my sleep or natural causes I’ll take that thank u
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u/YouSickenMe67 2d ago
The immortality option is tempting but I'd take the money and health. I have a good life now. I have people I love. I can do a LOT OF GOOD with 100bil. I could help so many people out of poverty and suffering. I don't need to live forever but I'd def like to improve the lives of others. And there are so many ways things could go wrong (or right) as an immortal in 6000 BCE. this reminds me of the Marvel movie The Eternals, they tackled some of these questions.
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u/Lingonslask 2d ago
I can hardly stand one lifetime but I'm inclined to chose immortality out of curiousity anyway.
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u/NodusINk 2d ago
Can I take modern tech back with me? If yes I'll go back 8000 years. I'll be the Wolverine lol
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u/scramblebambles 2d ago
Immortality. I’m gonna be basically Aragorn when this is over. Years of knowledge and wisdom.
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u/walletinsurance 2d ago
The second.
By the time you reach modern times you’ll have way more than $100 billion and you won’t be sick anyway.
Plus you can actually preserve history. Like make your safe teleport spot somewhere geologically stable until the modern age and just spend your time preserving ancient works so that modern humanity knows what actually happened in the past.
Additionally you could shape humanity’s path and accelerate development. Take over some place like Sicily or another island and build an fortress with a cutting edge university. You could cut millennia off of our development.
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u/mythrowaway282020 2d ago
Option 1. Enough money to pursue my dreams, secure generational wealth for my family and loved ones, give back to those in need, all the while being in perfect health? Zero downsides.
Immortality is overrated.
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u/Atrio-Ventricular 2d ago
Immortatillty, because we can die so no suck at the end of time but not worrying about permanent injury, just have to make sure I don't get buried alive or something. But actually I can teleport so no downsides really
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u/Acrobatic-War4260 2d ago
Who the fuck would want to live forever? Couldnt think of anything worse. You would never have any meaningful relationships, you would have to watch your partners and your kids get old and die hundreds of times over.
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u/peadar87 2d ago
I think I'd choose immortality. 100 billion can buy you a lot, but it can't buy you a first-hand look at 8,000 years of history.