Humor: Demons no longer feel joy at work
Collecting souls has become so easy with AI that some fear their jobs are in peril
Harbinger of chaos, AzGolth, was recently promoted by Satan to take over the USA Division of Soul Collection. Full of energy and ready to maximize destruction, AzGolth sadly found her job to be quite boring.
"The guy before me, LeHollseth, worked this gig since the 1600s. He used to tell stories about Puritans not being so pure if you know what I mean. Still, there was a craft to being a demon. You had to be creative to lead humans astray. Now, the work pretty much does itself. We collect most of our souls online through automation. It's as simple as inserting some text into the user's terms and agreement section of social media sites, and BOOM! You got yourself a soul."
Veteran demon Paul also remembers a very different time.
"It was such a high when you managed to stoke the fires of hate." He said, "After several years, we whittled it down to the perfect formula. You make sure some people are oppressed, prompt some greed in others, and before you know it, you've got some kindling ready to spark. You'll get a payoff eventually. But it was more like a stew. These days, it's quicker, like a stir-fry. The humans give up their innate goodness in an instant, clicking the "post" button without a thought about what it means for their soul."
This increased number of The Damned means more paperwork. "We have to document every soul. Satan is strict about that. It's hard to condemn someone to eternal hellfire when there's no paper trail. Our interns take care of most of that."
She jerks her claw toward a group of office drones, furiously typing.
"Ironically, those are some of the first troll souls we pulled down here. We stuck them in our newest level of the underworld. Working full-time and not getting paid? Genius. We have humans to thank for that idea."
Still, AzGolth can't shake the nagging feeling that her job is in jeopardy.
"My job, for years, was to bring destruction. Nowadays, I feel obsolete. Are these machines going to replace me? Or will destroying humanity always require a bit of demon creativity that AI just can't replicate?"
Writing dumb things to make you laugh