bodies.md content-canon authored under identity-and-personhood/

New content-canon doc at identity-and-personhood/bodies.md (~330 lines).
Sibling-file pattern parallel to imperial-cult/cosmology.md: the existing
architecture.md describes the engineering substrate (three-body system,
mods-as-trait-bearers, ternary-gate, clasp endgame phases); the new
bodies.md describes the content-canon (what bodies look like, how they
vary by caste, what their materials mean, how they appear when rendered).

Substantive content:

- Foundational principle: flesh = status, tech = function. The slum
  (cheap-tech, no flesh) and the imperial overseer (premium-tech, no
  flesh) share the flesh-zero condition; they differ in cost-spectrum-
  position, not flesh-presence. Tools don't get flesh. Aristocratic
  pallor reincarnated as cybernetic-flesh-as-status.

- Body-caste gradient (corrected per dafit's correction tonight):
  deva-pinnacle (full synth-flesh + all mods hidden underneath, the
  most expensive body, "the synth-child lie incarnate") > asura-priest
  (high flesh + ceremonial markers, imperial markings worn proudly) >
  manusya (doctrinal fiction, likely no real material class, the late-
  capitalist "we're all middle-class now" lie weaponized cosmologically)
  > tiryak/slum/player (pure cheap tech, the cybernetic callus) >
  preta/overseer (pure premium tech, the cybernetic uniform, void-in-
  human-shape).

- Sumptuary fabrication-vat-class as the caste mechanism. Caste is
  born-into via vat-class lineage; cannot upgrade across tiers; sumptuary
  law rendered anatomical. The Reproduction-as-caste-privilege of the
  Himalayan rich (per README) is privileged control of fabrication-vat-
  class for offspring.

- Service bodies (sex-workers, waifus): pure tech with deliberately-
  exposed seams + bolts as marker of disposability. The seams say "this
  body was built to serve." Connects to existing waifu-of-the-dead /
  memory-pattern-extractor market mechanics in political-register/.

- Mod-progression as flesh-loss: imperial career-arc is the gradual
  surrender of flesh to tech. The asura priest-vow is imperial
  mortification. Modding is anti-Miller body-practice: replacing the
  body parts that could otherwise somatize what was done. The overseer
  cannot host the unspeakable knowledge because they have given up the
  meat that would have stored it.

- The in-between human-mesh and consent-as-rendering. Foundational
  principle: "the skin is the form consent takes when it becomes
  visible." Real skin manifests only through the clasp's mutual consent.
  Witnessing produces flesh. The slum-dweller's first clasp is the
  most powerful single moment available in the world (first time
  seeing their own skin, ever, simultaneously with someone else seeing
  it for the first time).

- Asymmetric clasp: mesh-fidelity inversely proportional to imperial-
  rank. Slum-clasp has highest fidelity (imperial-neglect preserved
  authentic-self); deva-pinnacle mesh barely-visible; preta-overseer
  cannot clasp at all (no flesh-substrate). The deepest love available
  in nimmerworld happens between two slum-dwellers in pure-tech bodies
  whose interiors were never groomed enough to be foreclosed. The poor
  lover offers more skin than the elite lover ever could. Cross-tier
  clasps produce specific dramatic geometry: "the lover sees you fully;
  you cannot return the gift."

- Technical rendering implications: skin needs its own shader stack
  (highest-quality budget per the asset-budget rule catalogue when
  established); synth-flesh and in-between real-skin must be
  distinguishable to a trained eye; once the player has seen the in-
  between mesh, they will start reading deva-pinnacle synth-flesh as
  the engineered fake it always was - real skin teaches you what
  synth-flesh is not.

- Asset-economy alignment: class-restriction is asset-restriction is
  drama-restriction is player-longing-amplifier (one discipline,
  multiple payoffs). Specific budgets per the rule catalogue when
  written.

Locked-in conventions reflected throughout:

- Total-yoke discipline (Option B): all bodies are synth, all bodies
  bear capsules, no biological exception, no defector-recovery zone,
  no outside.

- The unified clasp: clasp reserved exclusively for the romantic-
  resistance act; the imperial wheel-grip mechanism named the Imperial
  Yoke (cross-references to imperial-cult/cosmology.md, which still
  contains an outdated "wilds-people" section pending edit per
  v0.12 retraction).

- Asset-budget consciousness: all rendering targets phrased as "per
  the rule catalogue when established" rather than committing to
  specific numbers.

- Collision-check awareness: in MMO-arch context, body-on-body collision
  is minimized; load-bearing collision lives in static-world geometry
  and zone-transition triggers. Body-tier collision-mesh complexity
  flagged in Open questions for rule-catalogue work.

Files:

- identity-and-personhood/bodies.md (new): ~330 lines, structured as
  cosmology.md sibling, with table-form gradient + sumptuary discipline
  + asymmetric-clasp table + cross-references + open questions.

- README.md: identity-and-personhood/ project-structure entry extended
  to mention bodies.md as sibling content-canon. Version bumped 0.4 ->
  0.5.

- architecture-index.md: project-structure tree extended (bodies.md as
  sibling under identity-and-personhood/); quick-reference table row
  added; v0.13 entry added to version-history line marking bodies.md
  authoring + Imperial Yoke / clasp terminology lock-in + meta-
  disciplines (rule-catalogue-first, collision-check). Version bumped
  0.12 -> 0.13.

Authored 2026-04-26 same Sunday continuing - dafit + chrysalis.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.7 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>

README.md

@@ -76,7 +76,7 @@ The architecture is organized as **vertical-by-domain directories**. Each domain
 | [`political-register/`](./political-register/architecture.md) | Three ontological registers, three-tier policy loop, imperial budget, insolvency-spiral, corruption + double ledger |
 | [`topology-and-rendering/`](./topology-and-rendering/architecture.md) | Rail+grid topology, asset economy, color-language, three-shader philosophy, diegetic relays |
 | [`runtime-engine/`](./runtime-engine/architecture.md) | Lemniscate runtime, slot-tokens + verifier-flags, gesture-alignment-recursive-lemniscate, emergent zones |
-| [`identity-and-personhood/`](./identity-and-personhood/architecture.md) | Three-body system, mods as trait-bearers, ternary-gate substrate, emergent needs as micro-factions |
+| [`identity-and-personhood/`](./identity-and-personhood/architecture.md) | Three-body system, mods as trait-bearers, ternary-gate substrate, emergent needs as micro-factions. Sibling content-canon: [`bodies.md`](./identity-and-personhood/bodies.md) — body-caste tiers (flesh = status, tech = function), sumptuary fabrication-vat-class, mod-progression-as-flesh-loss, the in-between human-mesh and consent-as-rendering, asymmetric clasp where mesh-fidelity is inversely proportional to imperial-rank. |
 | [`authority-and-decision/`](./authority-and-decision/architecture.md) | Hierarchy, bidirectional cascade, District Director Decision Architecture, rings as structural pattern |
 | [`player-experience/`](./player-experience/architecture.md) | Player as perturbation, voice + gesture as parallel trait-vocabularies, tools-not-quests |
 | [`narrative-composition/`](./narrative-composition/architecture.md) | Compositor (worked-example bar-brawl, three-tiers, world-gen-as-init), reflexive Dream-process |
@@ -104,4 +104,4 @@ Each domain directory will grow over time as code arrives — gameserver code, G
 
 ---
 
-**Version:** 0.4 | **Created:** 2026-04-23 | **Updated:** 2026-04-26
+**Version:** 0.5 | **Created:** 2026-04-23 | **Updated:** 2026-04-26