The Celestial Emperor was feeling rather fatigued with the events of his court this evening. Usually, he rather enjoyed the intricate power plays of the various factions serving under him as they jockeyed for position and competed for his favor, but today he found it tedious. He had more important matters to deal with, so the petty squabbles seemed especially vapid. That said, dealing with the court was something that came with the territory and he encouraged their behavior because he usually enjoyed it and it made those under him strive to better themselves and be of more use to him.

It was also partially the result of his plans that had created this situation. The Night city communities had increased their attacks on the Day city in the last few months. Once the first few attacks had met with mixed success the floodgates had opened. Almost thirty communities in the second circle had either fallen or were currently locked in a struggle for their position. Most of the current struggles had turned into all-out wars instead of the usual simple contests favored by the Day city. Third circle communities were both better and worse off. Their quick actions to make room had abated some of the pressure, but that only went so far. There were even more struggling communities in the third circle, though fewer of those struggles were of the same level of brutality as those in the second circle.

Interestingly, one of the biggest threats to everyone in the third circle came from Day city itself. A saurian princess had been caught in the crossfire between a Day city and a Night city community, and the saurians were on a warpath. Their race was one of those that had spread all over the Pantheon and were one of the most commonly seen, much like elves and dwarves and humans, but they had not formed into any singular large entities like the elven empire. Instead, they had spread all over and now they seemed to be moving as one for the first time. Millions of saurians of various types and levels were marching into the third circle and indiscriminately attacking everything, just to make a statement. A strange show of unity that surprised everyone else.

The whole mess had the Celestial Court riled up, as they all considered the possibilities and the implications for the future. Normally struggles in the lesser circles would not merit their attention except as entertainment and a source of gossip, but since the chaos was the result of a spot opening in the first circle, they had to consider the possibilities. The emperor personally didn’t really care which community took the spot, but it would look bad if his actions against the cursed dragon allowed a community from the Night city to snag a spot at the heart of his city.

Generally though, he was rather enjoying how things were turning out. His plan had worked out perfectly, and the insubordinate dragon was going to die and become an example to all who stood against him. Even with all the immortals under his command, assaulting Xinglong’s mountain would have been a bad idea. However, there were many ways to get at his enemies. This would show everyone that power alone was no shield against his wrath. They would understand.

Yes, it had cost him the relations with the Coven, but the witches were smart enough not to get too uppity. Unlike a certain dragon, he would not be so easily cursed. And if they tried, he would wipe them out. They would come around with enough time. Grudges between immortals were something to be taken seriously, but a lot could happen as millennia rolled by. He had time. Short term losses were nothing when compared to long-term gains.

He frowned as he noticed a certain veiled servant coming towards his glorious throne from a side door. If a servant came through that door, it could mean only one thing. She wanted something. Usually that meant bad news, but he knew better than to ignore it. He dismissed the rest of the court and followed the servant to a closed off section of the palace where the rumored empress lived. The rumors were right. This area did belong to his empress, though the rumors were wrong about their relationship. The rumors spoke of a secret empress that the emperor loved so much that he kept her away from the world to keep her safe. The rumors could not be more wrong.

That woman needed no protection. There was no love lost between the two either, and there never had been. Theirs was a relationship of mutual benefit. She needed his strength and he needed her vision. The empress was the greatest seer and diviner on the planet. The emperor was loath to admit it, but his current success was in large part thanks to her ability to see the future. It wasn’t that he wasn’t strong enough, but a single person could do only so much against the invisible blades coming from the shadows. The damn dragon was the perfect example for that. All that strength had not helped him.

So he kept her around. The two could barely stand each other after all the millennia they had spent in rather close proximity, and the two were not actually even married. Yet she was the empress in the shadows, wielding the invisible swords and controlling the dark shadows in his stead. She made sure no plot could reach him, and he, in turn, made sure they had the power to match anyone in direct conflict. That said, he did exert a fair bit of effort in order to find another seer to replace her if the need ever arose, but someone always blocked his efforts. The Threads of Fate seemed like an obvious culprit with all their seers, but that seemed too obvious. He had another suspect in mind, and he was about to meet that person again.

“What is so urgent?” He demanded without preamble as soon as he pushed open the doors to her chambers. The chambers where she worked that is. He had seen the insides of her bedchambers only once and was unceremoniously thrown out as soon as he had entered. That ticked him off a little. Not enough to do anything about it, he certainly wasn’t boorish enough to try and force himself on her, but enough to make him act snappish in her company. It wasn’t the lack of intimacy that rankled him. It was the lack of respect and the obvious disdain she had for him and didn’t bother hiding.

The stunningly gorgeous woman that had taken a human appearance looked at him with a raised eyebrow. “I would expect you to at least act civil here. You are the Celestial Emperor and as such above censure, but even so. Civility and calmness are the hallmarks of a proper ruler. You know this, even if you don’t deign to abide by those principles in my company.”

He only looked at her menacingly. At least he was refined enough not to let his displeasure show further. The empress continued. “Fine, fine. Be that way. I have two pieces of news. One which I think you’ll find very positive and one which you will not. Which one would you like first?” She asked coyly. She rather enjoyed pushing his buttons. He wasn’t a bad man, just very driven and self-important, though not without good reason. Still, she tried keeping him grounded. He would do well not to forget how they got here.

“The bad news first.” The emperor chose immediately. Good news might be nice, but they rarely demanded immediate action while the bad news might be time sensitive. He knew his priorities.

“Obviously. All work and no play. Take heed of what I’m about to say because this will be the most important decision you will make since choosing to become the emperor so many millennia ago. Another one had been born with a Domain even more dominant than yours.”

The emperor’s eyes narrowed half in disbelief and half in anger. She had never led him astray, but this was something new. There had been people with Domains before. Three of them were in his court right now, serving under him. None had been powerful enough to be a threat. “Are you certain? Are they going to be a problem? If we deal with them fast, we can nip the problem in the bud. Where are they?”

“I knew this would be your first thought. Just so you know, I don’t know where the other person is. They are once again hidden from my sight. Listen to me well. Whether the person is a threat or not will depend entirely on you. Their sights are set elsewhere, and if you don’t antagonize them, they will not become a danger to you. If you do make an enemy of them however, you will lose. The severity of the feud will decide the severity of the consequences of this loss. If you set yourself up as their enemy, you will die.” The empress said with a voice more serious than anything he had ever heard in his life.

This gave him pause. Normally he would not fear any threat, except maybe one. The number one community in the Day city and the entire Pantheon. However, the words of the empress had forced him to think of many possibilities. She had never been entirely mistaken, though the future was always a little uncertain, but that didn’t mean she could not lie. Part of what made her such a good seer was her ability to read all the possibilities and pick the most important points to make accurate predictions, but that didn’t mean she told him everything, or even that what she told him was the truth. They had supported one another for such a long time, but with another person with even greater dominance than him in the picture, did she have a sufficient reason to jump into the enemy camp? That possibility was worth keeping in mind at least. Her loyalty had always been based on self-interest, and she certainly didn’t like him.

“And the good news?” He asked, preparing to consider things alone with more time. He preferred to really think things through before acting.

“The dragon Xinglong will die within a week.” The empress could not see the exact date of Xinglong’s death, but at least she could tell that his thread in the tapestry of Fate was not long.

The emperor grinned. “That is good news. I will have to prepare.” The good news had not made him forget the other piece of information she had imparted, but it had pushed it off for now. If the enemy was a fresh immortal, then he had time and needed to do his research first. Xinglong’s death was a more immediate concern. For once the good news required more immediate action than the bad.

The empress sighed as she watched him go. She had known he would react like this. She had also neglected to mention that the enemy was female. She knew that if she had told him, the emperor would not have taken the threat seriously. Things would have also ended badly for her as the emperor pursued a new “worthy” empress without success. Even as things were, he did not take the matter seriously enough. She had known this would be the case, but she had tried at least. There had been that minuscule chance of success.

She turned to her servants. “Prepare for departure. Our time here has come to an end. It is time to find a new place to call home.” She was not prepared to go down with a sinking ship, and this ship had a very high chance of ending as a smoldering wreck consumed by black flames.

The emperor’s suspicions about her being prepared to betray him had not been misplaced, although he had ascribed to her all the wrong reasons for betrayal.

-------

As Dee watched the last remains of Xinglong float away, she realized that there might be a slight problem. She had absorbed his soul almost by instinct but had not quite considered all the implications before they hit her on the head. Xinglong had mentioned that he expected his skull to become her throne for her totem, but the skull was not the only thing that she gained from it. Even in his weakened state, Xinglong was still a rank 13 being and a powerful one at that. Death had mentioned before that the way Dee absorbed souls was a very effective way to gain power from those that she killed, and Xinglong had a lot of power to gain from.

Dee almost crashed into the floor with her new dragon form as the wave of power hit her. The amount of power might have become problematic if Xinglong had not taken this into consideration. He had prepared a spell beforehand, and a big part of the power Dee gained went into powering that spell. Dee felt a protective field of some kind forming around her Domain. With the size of her Domain, the field also had to be rather large and took a lot of power to set in place.

Xinglong had gifted her some memories and information. At the forefront of all that information was the knowledge that this protective field would help hide her Domain for several years, or at least until she learned to do it herself. Normal fresh immortals didn’t have much to hide so it came almost naturally. The same didn’t hold true for her though, and she had done nothing to hide her Domain. Still, even with that, there was a lot of power to absorb, and she was already dealing with her new reality as an immortal. It might be better to spend some time just adjusting when she went back.

Her thoughts were interrupted as a shudder ran through the mountain. Suddenly she could feel the mountain mourning the loss of Xinglong. She had suspected the mountain had a certain amount of life to itself, but now it seemed the mountain also had a certain level of sentience. It didn’t seem to be able to speak, but it was able to express emotions and apparently concepts. Dee felt the idea of impending death, acceptance of said death and peace, followed by mourning for a friend now gone. Apparently Xinglong had told the mountain he would be gone and had made peace with it, as had the mountain. That didn’t mean the mountain wouldn’t grieve though.

“Maybe we should leave the mountain to its mourning. We have no idea how much time we have until someone comes here.” Croestia suggested. Xinglong had revealed her presence for a brief moment. Not long enough to reveal her position, but it would only take so long until someone from the Celestial Court came here to check. Especially once they realized the owner of the mountain was gone, and that might not take too long considering the leader of the Coven should have also died. Dee was better off being gone by then.

As they got outside the mountain, another batch of emotions and concepts was sent by the mountain. Fear about an unknown future, disgust at the thought of Xinglong’s enemies coming here and taking over the mountain, determination at standing against such people and finally resignation at the inevitable defeat. Dee turned back and looked at the large cave entrance she had just exited from. “I sympathize but I can’t help you defend. I don’t have that kind of power. Not yet anyway. And it’s not like I can take you with us.” She scoffed at the idea of carrying away a mountain. She was strong, but that was a bit…

Suddenly there was the concept of considering the proposition, which had not really been made. Sudden realization and new hope soon followed. Then the mountain indicated agreement. “…or can we?” Dee questioned, vaguely understanding where the mountain’s mind was headed.

Suddenly Dee found herself floating in the empty air instead of standing on the mountainside. There was also roughly a small house-sized mountain with a halo-like circle of light surrounding it floating in front of her. The thoughts of the mountain seemed to be nudging her on. “Ok, I suppose that works. I don’t know if I can carry around a mountain even at that size though. Croestia, would you…?” Dee suggested.

“No.” Croestia replied firmly.

“What do you mean no?” Dee asked with a surprised frown.

“I mean no. I generally don’t mind you putting gory animal bits or even food inside me, but this is where I draw the line. There’s no way you’re putting something sentient inside me.” Croestia rejected the idea categorically.

“Uhh..” Dee wasn’t sure what to say. Suddenly the mountain made its own appeal towards Croestia. It was a weird experience when two sentient but non-living things started messaging back and forth inside her head. “Is the mountain making puppy dog eyes?” Dee suddenly asked with an almost horrified voice.

The mountain had just sent a bundle of emotions and concepts which could only be described as making the puppy dog eyes. “Don’t you dare make puppy eyes at me!” Croestia harrumphed and sent back an image of a stern mother tapping her foot with no intention of giving in.

“That’s so wrong.” Dee muttered, as now it seemed the mountain was not only making puppy eyes but also baby kitten eyes with barely shed tears coming from both. “How did the mountain even learn things like this? What was Xinglong teaching it?”

“No. It will never happen.” Croestia stated with finality. “You can take the thing inside your Domain if you’re so insistent in taking it along.” She sounded positively insulted at the thought of a sentient being stored inside her.

“Um, that’s not how it works, remember? I have to have a certain familiarity with the item before I can…” Dee started to explain when she suddenly felt the mountain shifting and appearing inside her Domain without any notice or difficulty. “…or we can go with that. I have no idea how it just did that, but fine. Have it your way then.” Dee just decided to give up. Of course she had no way of knowing that Xinglong’s power had facilitated the mountain’s easy entry as the two were still connected. The mountain grew back to its original size and seemed to be settling in.

Dee started slowly descending towards the ground before she stumbled in the air. “Croestia, am I seeing this right? Is the mountain cleaning inside my Domain?” Her voice sounded a little hollow. “You know what, don’t answer that. I give up. Fuck it. Not my problem anymore.” Dee decided that the best way to deal with the situation was just to pretend the whole thing had not happened. Something about the whole encounter had broken her concept of how things should be.

Instead she started to go through the information she had gotten from Xinglong in an attempt to digest the part which dealt with traveling through the Astral Sea. It quickly became obvious why this method of information transfer wasn’t more common. Aside from the bit about it being limited in several ways, something she found out among the information purely by accident, there were several downsides to the method. The most glaring problem was that the information had not truly become her own just yet.

It was a little like being given a library full of information. You had access to all of it, but you didn’t truly know and understand it until you spent time going through the information. Luckily, unlike with a real library, she didn’t have to spend time looking for the right books to find the information she wanted. The information came right to her, assuming she knew what to look for. On the other hand, if she didn’t know what she was looking for, she had no way of knowing what was in that large pile of information until she spent time digesting all of it. And with the amount of information, it would take a whole lot of time to do so.

As the top two most important pieces of information had been on at the forefront, namely the knowledge about how to hide her Domain and the knowledge about the Astral Sea, she had not quite realized before how much information Xinglong had given her. He had been pretty thorough. Luckily she was a psion and was more adept at dealing with such large amounts of information. She could dedicate a small part of her mind to going through the information while doing other things.

There was another problem. The information was based on Xinglong’s considerable experience and long life. They were not objective facts. Instead they were conjecture and interpretations he had formed. Thus the information was biased and in certain parts prejudiced. These were not necessarily the conclusions and ideas Dee would have personally drawn from the same set of information if given the opportunity. All information was biased to a certain extent, but a book didn’t come with a host of emotional baggage and vivid memories pushed straight into your mind. That said, this wasn’t purely a bad thing. The dragon had been smart and had a high level of understanding in many areas unknown to her. Dee herself didn’t have to spend time understanding difficult concepts because he already had.

Idly she noted that she would have to be in her dragon form to utilize the Astral Dragons’ abilities to travel through the Astral Sea. The dragons had a natural control over that plane and could do it in any form, but Dee was not a pure Astral Dragon. In fact, only a small part of her was draconic in the first place, not to even mention Astral Dragon specifically. So she had less choice in the matter. On the upside, she could get similar results when she was in the dragon form.

A portal towards the Four Winds opened in front of her, and with some interest, she noted that the other end of the gate was very close. Distance in the Astral Sea was relative, and for the current Dee those distances were much shorter. In the past, she would’ve spent hours traveling through the sea to get from the first circle to the third, but now it was only a few steps. In fact, the distance between the two openings was shorter than her serpentine dragon form. With a small smile she exited to the other side of the gate.

Her approach was noticed almost immediately, and her eye twitched a little in annoyance. Her portal may have been a little too accurate. It had taken her exactly where she had aimed, which was straight above the headquarters of the Four Winds. The only problem was, the others had no idea she was coming. They could not recognize her dragon form and understandably reacted in a rather hostile fashion to a strange and unknown dragon suddenly appearing above them. If she had missed the target as usual, then at least she could’ve assumed a more familiar form before coming close.

“Well, this could’ve gone better.” She muttered as she saw many of the Four Winds immortals approach with their weapons at the ready. They were not attacking but they were not far from it either. “Could someone fetch either Moirai or Nyx?” She raised her voice at the approaching people. “Either of them can vouch for my identity.” She decided it might be better to avoid any sudden moves, like changing forms, which might be considered hostile. At least the two psions would recognize her with the Mindscape.