Mit-Amen watched with anticipation as the other members of the council filed into the round marbled hall. All the members of the administrative council sat together with the other members of their faction, something Mit-Amen had always thought to be a wasted opportunity. It was natural for like-minded individuals to congregate. However, the way the chairs they used were arrayed in a fan-like shape forming a full circle, usually with the most senior councilor sitting close to the center, gave the unconscious idea of being arrayed against enemies. It didn’t help that the seats of the different factions were separated by gaps, though for perfectly practical reasons. It also was a fact that the factions that least got along with each other sat on the opposite sides, which only reinforced this impression of hostile sides meeting. Maybe if they sat more mixed and mingled a bit more, then the factions might end up working together more willingly. Or it might be an empty hope on her part, but such little things tended to make a difference.

She looked at what remained of the pro-demon black faction arrayed on the opposite side of her with a critical eye. There was no love lost between the two factions. Still, it was not inconceivable that the two factions might see eye to eye on some issues if they weren’t so wrapped up in mutual hostility. But now? The black faction had lost its original reason for existence. Now they only existed to resist any motion set forth by the white faction on pure principle. As the number of councilors was directly tied to the number of the members within a faction, the black faction had pretty much lost even that purpose as they no longer had the numbers or the pull to even resist the white faction effectively. The white faction wasn’t among the most powerful factions either, and part of the reason that was that they had no members at rank thirteen or even close to becoming one.

‘That might end up changing rather soon though.’ Mit-Amen thought to herself with a small smile. Funny how fate worked sometimes. She herself was one of the few faction leaders that were also part of the council, and as such was one of the most powerful members of her faction. Yet she knew she would never reach that rank herself. The wall in between was just too high, and her talents were not enough, no matter how much time passed. ‘Talent truly is a wonderful thing.’

The council was finally in full attendance and the whole session had been declared closed, so no outsiders were present. Usually topics like these would have drawn a large number of observers if the session was open. There was a large amount of space set aside to account for such observers, but now that space around the councilors was empty. That had become an increasingly frequent sight lately as the plan they had set in motion came to fruition.

‘If you can call that coming to fruition.’ Mit-Amen scoffed. The secrecy was unusual and was causing a lot of murmurs among the Assembly lately. The Lords were not used to being kept in the dark and were not taking it well. There had lately been calls about bringing the matter to be handled by the entire gathered Assembly, something usually reserved for only the most important decisions.

It was the grey faction’s turn to lead the proceedings, so their senior councilor got up to lead the ceremonies. Despite being a practical administrative council in theory, there was a fair bit of ritual and pomp that had been piling up in their proceedings over the years. Another thing Mit-Amen was not fond of. Such ceremonies only delayed getting to the matters at hand. Everyone knew why they were here today and was eager to get to the point. Luckily the greys were ever practical and cut the whole procedure short. Then everyone turned towards the greens and the reds. All of the councilors knew what the priority was, even if the second topic was interesting and possibly vitally important as well.

The junior green councilor got up and cleared his throat. It seemed he got stuck with the shit job again. “To cut to the heart of the matter we have all gathered here to talk about, the plan brought results, sort of. The Eternal Dragonflight has sent a large number of forces through the gap we left open at Io. However, the investment of forces is much larger than we anticipated. In fact, they are pushing so hard that two nearby fortress worlds have also fallen.”

This time the council members were much more ordered and restrained than in most meetings where a certain amount of theatrics was involved. It was one thing to show emotion and react wildly when the matter at hand was not dire, but this time things required a measured and serious approach. Some whispered among their friends and colleagues, but there were no exclamations or bursts of feigned disbelief. Instead, one of the greys calmly asked a question. “How and why? The plan was for the enemy to push through Io. The forts connected to Io were fake, but the other forts should have been able to stand even if we feigned weakness on that front.” The seriousness of the matter was reflected in the fact that he did not get up to ask his question, which was very much against the customs.

“To explain succinctly, we grossly underestimated the seriousness of the Dragonflight. We expected them to seize on the opportunity with a large force and were in fact hoping for that. We most certainly were prepared for that as well, as you all know, but the strength of the enemy attack is beyond anything we ever imagined.” The green-sashed man tried to explain.

The same grey-sashed man cut him off. “We know that much. We all provided forces to support the trap and we have also heard reports of defeats and dead Lords. What we are asking is, how are we being pushed so badly and why is this happening? We have faced attacks from the dragons before, yet now we are getting pushed back heavily despite this being a trap we laid. For weeks now, all I’ve heard is more worlds lost.”

While the battle focused faction had a much better picture of what exactly was going on, some of the other factions only got reports that some of the Lords they had sent to support the battle had perished. They also heard about worlds being lost, but they wanted details. The White City was far from the frontlines and not all of them had the information gathering abilities of the reds. The greys, for example, drew in people interested in material wealth and worldly power, so they were mostly administrators and diplomats.

“Well, there is some good news on that front. We have managed to stop their advance for now.” The green-sashed councilor stated with some relief. “However, the situation is still dire. We chose this area because the worlds there are of low strategic and economic value. The problem is that the enemy advance has brought the dragons in contact with worlds we can’t afford to lose.”

“They took one of the worlds where we allowed some of the refugee demons to resettle on.” One of the remaining black-sashed councilors suddenly interjected.

“I get why that would rile you up, but that’s hardly more important than all those worlds filled with our own people that are now under Dragonflight control.” One of the yellows, ever quick to defend those downtrodden, stated in a slightly dismissive tone. Of course, the yellows were more interested in the wellbeing of the races that had been part of the Assembly for centuries or millennia. Not that the do-gooders didn’t want to help refugee demons, but their own came first.

“No, I don’t think you quite get it.” One of the reds interfered. “While I’m sure that the fact that he is a member of the black faction is part of why he spoke up, that’s not the point. The point is, we gave the demons our guarantee of protection. We promised to keep them safe, not just against the angels, but in general. That’s why their strongest members are helping us. Now personally I don’t care about demons over any other race, but this is about something bigger. It’s about the worth of the promises the Assembly makes. What do you think will happen when the other worlds inhabited by refugee demons get a word? They’ll have a legitimate reason to draw back their support and declare their separation as long as we are unable to hold up our end of the bargain. We settled them on those worlds for a reason. They are filled with strategic resources that other races are not well suited to exploit.” The Assembly had not taken in all that many demon refugees that were fleeing the purge, but they had taken some.

Another red-sashed councilor interjected. “And even assuming we had the time, we can’t just force them to stay in line either. How would that look? We take in refugees and then crack down on them after we fail to protect them? Yeah, we’ll have much bigger trouble on our hands in that case.”

The grey representative in charge of the proceedings cleared his throat to bring back order. “Which brings us back to how and why. Just saying they brought more forces than expected is not good enough. We were supposed to have an overwhelming advantage. Then why are we losing worlds and Lords?”

The senior green councilor finally opened her mouth. “Because the dragons didn’t just send a lot of forces our way. The generals on the ground have reported sightings of several Aspects.” While the people involved and the combat factions were already aware of the rumors weeks ago, the more peaceful factions were still unaware. “We hoped to catch one of the ancient dragons that make their elite, but instead we’ve sighted dozens of ancients and at least five Aspects. We also have a reason to believe that their conventional forces number over a billion, including all of the usual suspects. Heck, we even have reports of a pack of Faerie Dragons being involved.”

This brought genuine hisses and exclamations from everyone before the senior red councilor spoke. “You know the drill with those nasty creatures. Pull back any nearby forces and hope they get bored enough killing our civilians to attack their own or the other Dragonflight forces instead.” The standard Dragonflight forces were unlikely to massacre civilians, though a certain amount of looting and death was expected. Faerie Dragons were very different. They also had the attention span of a baby and no compunction of killing everything that moved, including their allies.

“I think the involvement of Aspects is much more worrying.” A yellow councilor pointed out.

“You haven’t fought a Faerie Dragon then.” One of the greens muttered loud enough to be heard but was hushed by the others. That comment was promptly ignored.

“What could have possibly prompted the Aspects to move?” The yellow councilor continued despite the interruption. Despite the nasty reputation of the Faerie Dragons, they were still just another type of dragons. The presence of Aspects was a much more serious matter.

“We don’t know.” The senior green admitted. “But whatever it is, they are present and most likely had a hand in the fall of the two forts. The only reason why we haven’t been pushed back harder and faster is because the dragons are slowed down by the gateways.” It was a sad bit of irony that the largest and most powerful dragons had the most trouble using the gates. In the time it took for an entire army of Assembly Lords to pass through a gate, only a small handful of dragons could do the same. The problem would go away if all those dragons used their humanoid forms, but they were too proud to do so.

The senior red councilor gave a deep sigh of resolution. “Whatever brings them here, the fact is that only our faction leaders are powerful enough to fight the Aspects. Additionally, our immortals might outnumber their immortal dragons in general, but the sad fact is that one on one we tend to lose and half of our immortals are not dedicated to combat. So we have to send reinforcements with our faction leaders to strengthen the front and hope we can outnumber them locally. We must also be prepared to send our mortal armies to face the dragons. The constructs are having trouble holding the lines. This might have started as a trap we laid, but we are in a real fight now.”

“I heard an interesting rumor.” Mit-Amen suddenly interjected, surprising everyone. “According to that rumor, the dragons are catching members of the red faction alive as prisoners. Especially the powerful ones. Care to comment as to why that might be?” She had a hunch. It was still just a thought, and she wanted to probe a bit to see if the red faction might have come to the same conclusion.

To the surprise of no one, the reds denied any knowledge and for once Mit-Amen believed them. The reds probably didn’t know. ‘Good for me, less good for them.’ Mit-Amen thought with a small grin that she quickly hid. For a faction that prized information, the red faction was out of the loop for once. How interesting! Or they were very good at hiding their knowledge, which would have normally been more likely. Unfortunately for the reds, skill and experience was sometimes no substitute for pure luck.

As the council proceeded to make plans for sending more Lords and troops with their faction leaders to resist the dragons, Mit-Amen made another innocent-seeming probe. She slipped in a question about the whereabouts of the individuals that had defended Io before, and the only answer was general confusion. No one was aware of where those individuals might be, and they seemed to be confused about why she even asked.

‘Oh, have to be more careful. The red councilors seem to have realized something.’ Mit-Amen suddenly thought to herself, as the reds gave her long looks. In fact, the reds had indeed realized something. They realized that Mit-Amen would not ask something like that if it wasn’t important. So if the leader of the white faction thought it was important, then maybe so should they. They had already been interested in the individuals Mit-Amen mentioned, but now they were even more so.

“Moving on to the other matter that might make our dilemma even more difficult, or it might end up helping us with our current predicament. It seems that there’s internal unrest among the angels.” The grey leading the proceedings said, moving on to the other topic after the plans to deal with the dragons had been made. Everyone looked towards Mit-Amen for details. She was the leader of the pro-angel faction after all.

“Well, we’ve long heard rumors that things are not well between the main two deities of the angels, Lumen the Goddess of Light and Nasir-Sin the God of Order. We all heard the reports of several Champions associated with gods allied with Nasir-Sin being killed a few weeks ago, and the killer was identified as the Champion of Lumen and Umbra, the Goddess of Darkness, Shadows, and Chaos. An odd alliance to be sure. Anyway, this seems to be associated with a larger rift that has divided the gods into opposing camps, and the rift between Lumen and Nasir-Sin is unsurprisingly affecting the angels. The angels have always been divided between serving the two deities, and now that is becoming a problem. Strictly speaking, the situation has not turned into open hostilities just yet, but we believe that is only a matter of time. Oddly, the usually neutral draconic deities joined Umbra in her revolution against Nasir-Sin, so it seems the dragons might get mixed up in the struggle. An outside enemy is a way to combine a divided people after all.” Mit-Amen explained the general outline of what she had managed to piece together. Of course, she personally knew more thanks to her connections to certain divine beings, but there was no need to share everything. Let the others find out on their own time. If she had to play the game of divided factions, she might as well play to win.

The senior green councilor made a small grunt of exasperation. “In a strange twist of fate, the hostilities between the gods have not spilled over to us just yet. Normally we would be the hardest hit by a civil war between gods, but with the current war against the dragons, most of the people have other matters on their mind. Ironically, this last offensive from the Dragonflight might become just the thing to stop the battle of the gods from dividing the Assembly. The priests and Champions will likely get pulled in, but at least we won’t see armies of fanatic believers marching to war against other such armies for now. Eventually we will also face trouble, but hopefully we can stave that off for the time being.”

Mit-Amen smiled amused at the admission of the green-sashed man, but couldn’t really disagree. The situation was likely to change before things got too bad for the Assembly. Whether that change was positive was another matter entirely. “In any case, the internal situation of the angels has become extremely precarious. They were already at each other’s throats after the hells were destroyed and they found time for internal enemies instead of external, but the recent change has made things worse. The most prominent supporter of Lumen, the Archangel of Mercy has also gone missing. That’s a really recent piece of news, so we have not seen the effects yet, but I suspect those will be significant. I assume the Morningstar or the leader of their armies will have to step in the prevent things getting out of hand. Not that they won’t get out of hand at some point anyway.”

“Well, as much as we’d like to see the dragons and angels killing each other, we can’t rely on that fact.” The black-sashed man commented. “However, we might want to spread the news among our people that the Assembly is staying neutral in the fight between the gods until we find out more details.”

Mit-Amen decided to use this opportunity to make a play of her own. “Speaking of angels, I happen to be aware that a few angels can be found among the Assembly Lords. I’m thinking of two in particular that identify as members of the red faction. I wonder if I could gain the council’s approval to try and poach them? While most of the Lords will be dealing with the dragon threat, I think it might be useful if we as the white faction tried to see what we can do on the angel front. As such, we’d like to pull in these two angels to help us in our efforts. Not against their will of course. I just think it might be beneficial for everyone involved.”

The senior red councilor looked suspicious but was not prepared to deal with the sudden suggestion. Instead, one of the grey’s voiced a question. “Would that make a difference? Two angels seem like a minor drop in the ocean, and I’m loathe to approve poaching between factions on frivolous grounds.” Poaching always happened, whether approved or not, but it was frowned upon.

“I think it might make a large difference in this case.” Mit-Amen replied with a small smile. Of course it would. One of those angels was the Champion of Lumen. And if she got an official permission for her poaching, then the reds would have less opportunity to try and claim that person as their own after her involvement and strength became public knowledge. They would most certainly put up a fight if Mit-Amen did the poaching in secret.

“In that case, the council gives you the grudging approval to try.” The same grey gave their assent. Most other factions liked to poke at the reds when given the chance, the secretive bastards. And this seemed innocent enough.

The red councilors were whispering together in a heated argument, trying to figure out what Mit-Amen was trying to do. They would quickly realize who she was aiming for, but it would likely be too late. At least if they had not found out about the person’s past on Pantheon. Ironically, the reds had thought they had already received the most information thanks to Aurelie making contact with Dee and had not had the reason to seek out more information, but Aurelie had not passed everything on. The survivors of the experiments played their own game among the Assembly, and Aurelie had not felt the need to reveal too much information about her new ‘sister’.

‘Sareash really came through this time. It was much easier to find out information when you knew what to look for. Someone who killed the Celestial Emperor can hardly hope to stay hidden for long, and those tails of hers are a rather good identifier. She might have hidden her wings lately, but not when on Pantheon.’ Still, it was better to assume that the reds either knew more than they let on or would soon find out. They usually did.