{"version":"1.0","type":"rich","provider_name":"Audius","provider_url":"https://audius.co","title":"The Rules of Being by Justin Empire • Audius","description":"The Rules of Being\n\nJustin Empire\n\nEvery interaction is a game: walking somewhere, having a conversation, falling in love, arguing, eating, working, etc. is understood as a game with rules, objectives, roles, or a particular emotional purpose.\nThe Rules of Being\n\nImagine a city where nothing is simply an action.\n\nEvery conversation is a game. Every relationship is a game. Walking down a street, sharing a meal, falling in love, arguing with a stranger, remembering the past—all of it is understood through rules, objectives, roles, and consequences.\n\nThe inhabitants of this strange city don't merely play games. They live through them.\n\nWhen they encounter something that has no name, they create a game for it. Once that game has been created, it doesn't remain an idea. It becomes part of the city's collective psyche, shaping how its people perceive themselves and the world around them.\n\nOver time, the city has evolved into something almost incomprehensible to outsiders: a civilization where reality and play have become indistinguishable.\n\nThen something changes.\n\nVisitors from Earth discover the city hidden within a phenomenon of extraordinary time dilation. To the people of Earth, what they find may appear to be a fascinating alien society. But to the inhabitants, the visitors represent something far more dangerous.\n\nThey are introducing new rules.\n\nAnd when the visitors begin to change the games the city has built its existence around, the inhabitants are forced to confront a terrifying possibility:\n\nIf every aspect of your existence is governed by a game, what happens when someone else changes the rules?\n\nThe Rules of Being is a science-fiction story about consciousness, identity, language, and the invisible rules that govern our own lives.\n\nBecause perhaps humanity isn't so different.\n\nPerhaps we already turn everything into games.\n\nWe just don't call them that.","html":"","width":500,"height":480,"thumbnail_url":"https://audius-content-13.figment.io/content/baeaaaiqsedrw5r6imuesu6f6tkyartmrc5wtd7qyqvvyu57rurm64fvjk7yi4/480x480.jpg","thumbnail_width":480,"thumbnail_height":480,"author_name":"Justin Empire","author_url":"https://audius.co/kissinginlove","cache_age":3600}