The white marble corridors shone with a pearlescent sheen, illuminating the treasured scrolls and paintings that hung on the walls. Rich red carpet blanketed the floor in this wing of the Northern Light Divine Imperial Palace, bringing warmth and vibrancy everywhere one stepped.

A small splash of purple could be seen amidst the red navigating the enormous hallways. On closer inspection, this was a man of imperial bearing wearing royal purple robes embroidered with gold scrollwork. He was majestic and august, with sharp sword eyebrows accentuating masculine features. His waist-length hair peculiarly stayed no single color, shifting in a gradient of colors natural and not.

He was the Northern Light Divine Emperor. And he was a fraud.

The Emperor rarely dwelled on that fact. Maintaining the charade was best maintained when one is wholly invested in it to the point of belief. But he could not help but be reminded of the fact as at this hour the true power in the Northern Light Divine Realm had summoned him, and he dare not disobey her call.

The nominal ruler of an entire Divine Realm reached a set of double doors and gave it a polite knock. The seam between the doors split and opened of their own volition, with no valet or visible contrivance propelling them as they exposed a well-appointed foyer and its occupants.

Reclined on a cushioned vermilion divan was a woman of perilous charm, sipping dark wine from a crystal glass. Her long red hair, charming red eyes, and exquisite red dress stood out against her pale flesh. She wore no jewelry, no baubles or badges of status and wealth. She didn't even bother with shoes.

This was Imperial Consort Scarlet, the one who had dared to summon the Emperor. The true power behind the Northern Light Divine Realm.

The other occupant of the room was more difficult to get a read on since he was crumpled in a heap at the Emperor's feet. Dead, apparently in the act of trying to flee. The black-robed man was face down on the red carpet so even having a face to try to match was futile.

"We're going to need a new Warden for the Crevice, darling," the red woman announced without preface, dispelling the mystery of the corpse immediately. She smiled as she swirled the remaining wine in her glass, paying more attention to it than to her new arrival.

The Emperor could feel a headache coming on already. "I assume there's a good reason to offer to the other God Emperors."

"Ebon Dirge made the man destroy his fleshly body and escaped into chaotic space around ten years ago," Scarlet supplied. "The others have to know this by now, they all have their own means. I knew it as soon as it happened so they surely were told as well."

A chill ran down the Emperor's spine at the casual announcement of the escape of a homicidal maniac who wanted him dead. "And I was going to find this out when?"

"Why, I'm informing you right now, dear," Scarlet said with a smile, gulping down the last of her wine before tossing its vessel at the nearby hearth to shatter into evaporating shards. "If anybody's anxious about why we're only acknowledging this now, it's because we needed to deal with the Warden first."

"Do we go public with this?"

Scarlet shrugged. "I leave that to you and the others. I'm not a politician nor do I wish to play at it. That's why I bother keeping you around. I only have my own purpose to fulfill, and since it remains the same that means he's managed to end up somewhere. He'll be back, sooner or later."

The Emperor's stomach was in knots, both at the news and at the reminder of his place. Before he had been plucked out of a lesser prison by this woman, he had been slated to enter the Abyssal Lighteater Crevice himself, a criminal convicted of fraud and theft. He had no right to gainsay the woman who had transformed him from a condemned conman to a sham ruler. Having to schmooze and politick among the top echelon was a small price for avoiding the abyss.

"Now run along darling," Scarlet said in airy dismissal. "Oh, and do have someone come by and dispose of the garbage for me, will you?"

"Of course," the Emperor replied, relieved as he turned and exited the foyer, the doors closing on their own behind him. The faster he got away from here, the less likely he'd say the wrong thing and end up needing replacement himself. Now, all he had to worry about was a homicidal devil Paragon hunting him down.

------

Scarlet remained reclined on the divan long afterward, even after servants came by and disposed of the Warden's corpse. She hadn't meant to toy the man to death, but the remnants of a personality imprinted on this host of hers influenced her to do that sort of thing from time to time.

As the spirit automaton of the Northern Light Divine Imperial Crown, she wasn't meant to have sapience. Or a body. It was a mistake, the result of an accident with that woman, that devil, that mirror, and herself. Her purpose drove her to correct things, but she wasn't designed for any of this.

Closing her eyes, Scarlet's will drifted into her consciousness where her true body hid. It was an exquisite seven-pointed platinum crown, and at each point, a flame burned.

Or did. At that very moment, one of the ever-burning flames on the crown... stopped burning.

Scarlet's red eyes shot open in surprise. "Oh you naughty, naughty devil, you..." she murmured to herself. Then she looked at a colorful wood mask mounted on the wall, a curio among curios in the collection here. She extended a tendril of her will into the mask, knocking on the door to the other side.

From across the universe, there was an answer. The entire Northern Light Divine Realm trembled as a new will descended, but only Scarlet sensed it as only she remained still while the rest of the entire plane shook in synchronicity.

The mask's eyelids opened, revealing a pair of iridescent eyes that forever shifted in color. "I answer thy call, construct. What dost thou require?" The mask's lips moved in time with the ancient masculine voice that hearkened from the beginning of time.

"The Paragon of Sin pursues the path of destiny, Magnus," Scarlet informed her guest from beyond. "A flame has been extinguished. I warned you this might become a problem."

The rainbow eyes on the mask widened ever so slightly. "It was thy error in striking him so that precipitated this matter, construct."

Scarlet shrugged. "You're the one who inserted that contingency, Empyrean. The woman activated it right when he separated the soul from this flesh. Neither is my fault."

"Impudent," the mask retorted with a snort. "If thy wiles had compelled him to the appointed course, there would have been no such opportunity for a mishap."

"Yes, well, it's also not my fault the man saw behind the curtain and realized the truth. I'm not the one who made the rules here, I only act as I'm made to. Since none of you feel like descending and fixing it--me, there's nothing else I have to say on the matter. I'll just wait for things to happen and do what I was made for, broken as I am."

"Thy request is not so easily fulfilled, construct. One of mine number descending to a Divine Realm in their entirety might invalidate thy purpose. The Strictures elevate the status quo and eschew risking it, even if that leaves some matters without correction."

Scarlet shook her head. "As I said, it's out of my hands. If none of you will move, you're allowing someone else to make the decision for you. What is that devil bastard up to now, anyway?"

"A moment," the mask replied, and its movements froze as though time had stopped for it.

When the mask returned to life, the entire Northern Light Divine Realm shook again, a greater rumbling than before despite no one else's ability to sense it. "Thirty-Seven!" the mask shouted, but the voice was different. Gone now was the aura of eternity and dignity. "Ebon Dirge's trail vanishes at Thirty-Seven... Amelia... what are you doing..."

Scarlet was fascinated. She had not heard her creator like this since the very beginning, lacking his conceit of mysteriousness. The construct's mind as she raced to connect the details of that pronouncement. Thirty-Seven was the designation of a Mortal Realm, while Amelia... "The First One? Is she tangled in this now too?"

"That's none of your business--" the mask began to rebuke Scarlet before stopping to compose itself for a moment. "Ahem. That is none of thy concern, construct," it continued, the air of antiquity returning. "Thy report is received and shall be duly considered. This communication is at its end."

The Northern Light Divine Realm trembled one last time as the mask closed its eyes and the presence within departed.

Scarlet's feelings were in turmoil, her emotions roiling with equal parts shock and glee. There was a part of her, rooted in the corruption from that woman, that found entertainment in her creator's loss of composure. Magnus had once again refused to fix her, continuing to put on his mighty ancient being act while seeming to forget she was only slightly less ancient than him.

As the failsafe meant to prevent a new Empyrean from rising, she was privy to some of their secrets. Like that her existence was part of maintaining a mutually agreed set of restrictions on them designed to preserve the fabric of the universe. And that the first letter in their names represented the order in which they had emerged from the primal chaos at the universe's creation, which made this Amelia the first of their number.

Delving into these matters had consequences for almost any who made the attempt, but as an imperial crown's spirit automaton, Scarlet was an exception. Still, she was only allowed these small glimpses into the lives of the beings who comprised the hidden heaven on top of all others in the universe.

Why would any Empyrean, first or not, be involved with a lowly Mortal Realm? Was a conflict brewing between Empyreans at last? Was Ebon Dirge a piece in a greater game that they played amongst themselves? Speculation without more information was a futile effort, but her very existence was at stake here. Should the crowns no longer be necessary...

Alas, all Scarlet could do now was wait. And watch. And wonder.