I've stated it before: from the various vows that I took, the vow of poverty seems the hardest to uphold. That is true even if this poverty remains very relative as I am permitted to hold on to what I need for my quest of bringing back scattered holy relics to the Empire, such as exploration ships and the ISK needed to replace them.
Nevertheless, simply doing one's duty to the Empire - be it during the Drifter crisis or recently for the Blessed Exchange, generates in influx of wealth. I tried handing the bounties and rewards back to the Navy before, but they flatly refused.
So, in light of the upcoming jubilee of our Empress, I decided to put up some of that excess cash as prize money for an artistic work in Her honor. That way it has been put to good use - and it sort of flatters me to see myself as a maecenas of the arts. And that in turn reminds me that I should be careful not to fall in the trappings of vanity.
For now no acceptable submissions have appeared, but these always come right before the deadline anyway. I did note that mr. Quirinus is not the only one suffering from delusions about the throne - I saw submissions claiming Jamyl is still empress, and claiming that Empress Catiz passed away a while ago.
Perhaps these kind of delusions are more common than we think among capsuleers. The internal narrative that one constructs about oneself comes under pressure -perhaps from the many kills- and rather than adjusting to reality it becomes detached from reality. Capsuleers like to think of themselves as powerful and good, but when that image of goodness starts to crumble and causes the whole narrative to detach from reality, the aspect of power is left as a dangling bond, and can latch on to the Imperial throne.
