For years, I was a devout initiate in the Myth of Meritocracy. I believed the lie sold to every rising generation on the periphery of the empire: that the ascent is worth the altitude sickness. I traded my literary aspiration for the illusion of economic rationality, running from a small cage only to lock myself in a larger, gilded one.

I crossed oceans to enter the temples of capital. I carved away my identity to fit the mould of the “global citizen”. I studied their doctrines, chiselled my flesh according to their aesthetics, thinking I was earning my place, but a token is not a peer, a doll is not a player. When the machinery of profit jammed, it demanded the rest of me in exchange for a measly pity.

Cutting the cord felt like escaping a cult, and when I looked back, I was glad that fortune pulled me out like a harsh teacher before I became truly irredeemable. I decided to stop resisting what fate had planned for me, what my humanity begged of me. Thus Rubedo was born.

If you think the story was too grim, too unpalatable: Rubedo is not a nightmare I invented. It is a transcript of the world we have accepted as normal. It is the horror that this is supposed to be “the final form” of human civilization.