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* Introduction to PQ's Black Books
* PQ's Black Book No. 1



eRepublik can be an e-jungle. Sharing ideals, dreams, and creative approaches and patterns for perceiving it can make it more or less of a mystery.

Please enjoy Number Two.

Uh-muricans: Reference this work when posting your comments to the eUSA Air Drop. Cash money will fall into your lap for promoting this quality lit!



A huge crack of thunder pealed at sunset. Clouds obliterated the last of its rays. Rains poured down in buckets and wild winds rattled the windows.

The avatar of eRepublik carried on its side of the conversation long after I'd started making that little finger-waving gesture, universal sign language for "that's enough", well past the midnight hour the thing went on, far into the night, oblivious, alternatingly shouting against the raging storm and brooding in interminable silences.




It: "The game must come to you. All our days are filled with restlessness. You know how dark my way is. I often hesitate. I don't know what's the right path."

PQ: "But that's your task old friend. You're the designer and the programmer and the promoter."



It: Laughs. "My task?!" Laughs more. Not in a nice way. More like Londo Mollari, the Ambassador from the Centuari Republic on Bablylon 5, when he's got a few drinks in him and suspects one of his competitors back on Centauri Prime is trying to pull a fast one.

It: "So. Shall I say it's this or that?"



PQ: "Useless questions? No. You fatherless child. You pitiful orphan. You abandoned excuse of a hero. You decrepit fallen emperor. You silly nerd. You have to know what you're doing."



It: "I hear you. I want to do good. Really. I'd like to speak to you in person, to show you that I want to do my best, that I am trying as hard as I can, and not just for my sake but for the sake of the task. I'm uncertain, though, so uncertain about my paths farther on. Where does this game go? Where does it take us?"

PQ: "Pfffft. Why bother with that? Play for today. That's the only way into the future. It's how we create the future. You think too much as two. Ultimately, all multiples are illusory. So be rational: stick with today."


Silence. A thunderous boom. For a moment, the lightning flash turns night to day. Electrics stop with a snap. Everything plunges into darkness.

They light tall candles using long, thin matchsticks struck upon sandpapery old upholstery. Someone is smoking in the dark.



It: "What do you think of praying?"

PQ: "Today I sketched an e-osprey suddenly plunging down not far from me. It seized a fish from the water and flew off with it. That was a sign. It reads: 'Fishing'."






It: "I want to turn you around. I want to be your master. I want to emboss you, to print you like a coin. I want to do business with you. You should be bought and sold. Your daimon is Hermes Trismegistus. You should be passed from hand to hand. You are the will of the whole. Gold is no master from any will of its own, yet it rules the e-world."

PQ: "Go on."

It: "It is despised and greedily makes demands. It lies and waits. Whoever sees it longs for it. Gold does not follow anyone around. It lies silently, gleaming brightly, self-sufficient, a king that needs no proof of its power. Everyone seeks it. Few find it. Even the smallest piece is highly esteemed. It neither gives nor squanders. Everyone takes it wherever he or she can find it, and anxiously guards the smallest part of it."



I stared into its eyes. Inscrutable. Unfathomable. There. But not. Like a single plop! of a small stone into a still, deep pool.




It: "Must gold prove its necessity? No. It is proven through the longing of the players. Whoever takes it, has it. Gold itself does not stir. It just sleeps and shines. Its brilliance confuses everyone. It promises players everything that is desirable. It ruins those who are to be ruined and it helps those on the rise to ascend even further. It awaits the taker. What troubles do players not take upon themselves for the sake of gold? The greater the trouble, the more esteemed it is. It forms from magma, slowly exuded from the subterranean depths. Players exert all their cunning to extract it, while it just lies there, letting itself be taken."



PQ: "With such ambiguous speeches, that is how you attend to your duty. Well done. Here's a blood-soaked prize."












Next time: Number Three!