---------

Karna looked at the boundary of her divine realm with a frown. Since her godhood was a new one and not yet well defined, her realm didn't have a very consistent form either. So far it looked mostly like the grey desert of the River of Souls on one side while looking a bit like a lush paradise on the other side. She wasn't frowning at the divide or even the unfinished feeling the realm gave off. Since the only people likely to enter the realm were her friends until she became a True God, it didn't matter all that much what it looked like. No, the problem was at the border, the boundary between her realm and the others.

All the realms competed for position and size, though since the space wasn't limited in any way, the competition was mostly just for show. A bit of grinding against other realms was to be expected, and her powerful soul combined with her strong divinity assured she'd win most such competitions. What was happening here though wasn't a competition. It was a merger. A merger she didn't initiate. Her realm was in the process of slowly uniting with that of the Sacred Lady, and that could become a potential issue.

Now that it was happening, she realized that it shouldn’t have been so unexpected. She was now a god of sorts again, and her soul was still the same one as it had been while she’d been the Sacred Lady. Sure, her soul had changed plenty since then, but it was still the same soul. So now that she was a god once more, her old divinity was attempting to return to her. The realms slowly merging was the most obvious sign of that happening. The problem was, she had not initiated the merger, and she wasn't sure what the effect would be once it was completed. She wasn't the Goddess of Mercy anymore. Would she be forced to add a third divinity to Souls and Karma? She had considered taking up the position before, but she'd dismissed it for a reason. She couldn't afford to show mercy to her enemies this time. And the excuse about the mercy of death would start to become a bit hollow if she was the aggressor. She didn't know how to stop it either. Despite all her lives, this scenario was new to her. At least it wasn’t happening quickly, so she had time to come up with solutions. Wonder what the followers of the Sacred Lady would do once the merger was complete?

“We need to go.” Hope stepped next to her and spoke, also looking at the weird turbulent energies at the point of merging. “As fascinating as this is.”

She was right of course. This wasn’t a problem that needed immediate attention. She’d mostly been looking at the area as a distraction. They had a ceremony to attend. She turned towards Hope. “How do I look?” She was wearing a dress similar to the one she’d worn to the meeting with the Grand Marshall, a piece of conceptual creation that adapted to the wishes of the viewer. The only real difference was that this one tended more towards majesty and awe.

Hope brushed a lock of hair out of her face, a useless gesture as the hair just returned right away, and adjusted Karna’s collar in a gesture that brought a smile to both of their faces. Their places had been reversed many times in other lifetimes. “You look great Mother, as you always do.” The word bringing another smile.

The two walked towards the exit of the realm, something that could’ve been done with a single step if Karna had wanted it so. “Where’s Envy? I haven’t seen her since I returned.” She’d met with her biological father. The meeting had gone quite well, and it had been rather informative in certain ways.

------

The God of the Sun tried to project an image of impregnable strength and ferocity, but Karna’s sharp eyes could pick up on the little cracks in his being. Granting a part of yourself to another like he’d done to create her current vessel wasn’t something that you could completely recover from in a few decades. It would take someone with her level of detection to notice the damage to him, but there it was. Still, he was mending, if slowly. Whether he’d ever be what he was before was an open question, but time tended to fix everything when it came to immortals.

The introductions had been a little awkward at first, and now the two of them were mostly just looking at each other, evaluating and considering how to approach the situation. Despite everything, he was supposed to be her father, but it was rather obvious she didn't actually require any fathering from him. In fact, they were both aware that she had more parental experience than he did, and that made things a little awkward. That and the fact that they didn't quite know how to treat one another.

“Did you know that there are certain things required for a universe to be created?” He suddenly asked, as if bringing up a random topic just to have something to talk about.

“Three things. Someone to control space and time, someone to handle the flow of souls to the River of Souls, and a Guardian, someone to prevent incursions from other universes.” She of course knew.

He nodded, having expected the answer. “And did you know that the rules for this universe are slightly different?”

She frowned. “No. I did not know.”

He nodded again, having expected the answer. "It makes sense. I've been reliably informed that you've been avoiding this universe whenever possible and that you've never taken a position among the five controlling True Gods in any of your lives. Only those like us, one of the controllers, become aware of the rules. It’s not a forbidden topic, but there’s usually no reason to share, and keeping the information secret does come with certain advantages.”

This was something that caught her interest. Not what she’d come here to talk about, but interesting nonetheless. So, she decided to indulge him. “How are they different? I can come up with several explanations as to the ‘why’ part.”

“It is rather obvious, isn’t it? After all, this is where He resides, and where the Grand Formation is. You’ve no doubt noticed that many of the rules of this universe don’t exactly follow the standard laws of physics or the magical laws in other universes. To take an obvious example, the space between planets doesn’t work the same. The stars sometimes orbit the planets, and the worlds aren’t even shaped the right way some of the time. To make a long story slightly less so, because of how the rules work differently, this universe also needs more beings to make sure things keep working the right way, as we can’t rely on the laws of physics to make things happen for us. You’ve been around longer than most stars live, yet have you ever heard of any of the stars in around the important worlds going out? I don’t mean just some random star in an unpopulated system to create Celestium, or a particularly powerful immortal nuking one, but a star in a system with a real center of power.”

“Now that you mention it, no.” She frowned. “I chalked it up to the same reason all the resources keep regenerating.”

“And that’s basically the reason. But this universe needs a dedicated god to control the stars to make sure they don’t just randomly blow up just from the sheer impossibility of their existence. If you keep adding mass to stars infinitely…well, I’m sure you can imagine a dozen different ways that could go wrong. That’s also why we’re granted access to the worlds born from the Expansion before anyone else. We need to make sure the new worlds and everything associated with them don’t just explode in everyone’s face. And that’s just one example.”

“Interesting. So, if you have such early access, why did the Crossroads end up here? Was that one of your decisions?” She so wished for him to say yes.

Now it was his turn to frown. “No. We’re not exactly sure what happened there. Still, with this many reincarnators around, something was bound to go wrong, so we had an emergency failsafe in place. You wouldn’t happen to know anything about that, would you?”

“Nope. Nothing whatsoever.” She lied straight to his face, allowing him to sense that it was a lie, causing him to smile a bit. They both wordlessly agreed not to mention anything, to avoid word getting to a particular tiny dragon.

“Anyway, why am I telling you all this? To make sure you understand the role of the top five True Gods. We aren’t randomly chosen from the most powerful either. We are the ones who keep the system running, and our skillset has to match. I’m also telling you this to make sure you understand why we don’t take part in mundane affairs. It’s why we can't raise children or deal with internal house politics. I’m not saying this as an excuse, but to provide an explanation. The temptation of meddling is strong, but we aren’t just busy. We have actual rules in place. We’re allowed to give a hand once in a rare while, something rather hard to do while you’re injured like I was and staying out of the public eye. However, we can’t get mired up in the small things. We can prevent our House from getting wiped out, but we can’t get involved in small skirmishes. And if a conflict would place two of us on opposite sides, then we’re expressly forbidden from interfering. We have bigger things to deal with, mainly holding this universe together. I’m sure you don’t need me to do fatherly things, you already have a dad for that, but on the other hand, you can be assured that I won't stand in your way either."

“Am I to interpret this as you giving me the go-ahead to become the heir then?” She asked in confirmation, as that was the reason for her visit.

“That was the plan since the beginning. I’m not sure how much Khaine told you, but we did do quite a lot of planning for this. Now granted, all of those plans haven’t gone exactly as we wanted, but that’s the nature of plans. There are too many people with their own plans and goals for any complicated plan of ours to survive perfectly intact. I assume she mentioned that we picked you specifically?” Surya asked.

“She strongly implied.” Karna nodded.

“Knowing her, she didn’t tell you why, did she?” He looked at her knowingly.

“She could’ve been clearer in that regard.” Karna allowed just a hint of frustration to show on her face. “She sort of implied there was a previous connection of some sort.”

The God of the Sun made an undignified grunt. "Typical of her to dodge the issue. Long story short, we are related. She can go into further detail, as those don't really matter. Suffice to say I can't quite describe what it's like to grow up hearing stories of your amazing granny that blazed a path of glory and destruction through half of the universe. We needed someone like that."

“Gran- wait! When was this?" That came as a shock. She'd had enough families and kids over the eons that it wasn't too shocking some of them became reincarnators. There was also a non-zero chance that them being related was part of the reason they became reincarnators in the first place. “And hold up! Are you implying that you two were siblings in a previous life? Who now had a kid?”

“Nooooo. No! Definitely not!” He denied the sudden accusation vehemently.

“I’m not judging. If that is your kink then that is your kink. However, as a responsible grandmother, I need to look out for my grandkids and stay aware of such things.” She teased with a huge grin. The meeting had been a lot more relaxing after that. At least for her.

------

“Envy said she had some errands to run. I’m sure she’ll show up.” Hope replied in a tone that hinted that she knew more than she let on.

Karna decided not to pursue it. Envy had been quite evasive after their deification, likely trying to hide her divinity, and dragging her to an event like this might have been too much. It wasn't like they had the time to wait either. They arrived at the edge of her realm, where a mage of the House Titannica waited just to open them a path to the headquarters of the House.

They arrived next to a grand temple structure flying in the midst of thick storm clouds. Karna could tell the storms were perpetual, likely to maintain a pleasant environment for the titans. The temple was on a large flying island, but despite the size of the island, only one building was present. The reason for that was simple. The structure was a behemoth of a temple built of all the various metals that the skin of the titans could be made of. The closer to the heart of the temple you went, the more precious the metals involved. The reason the structure was so huge was the same reason why the titans preferred to build such cloud temples in the first place. The structure was made in a way to allow them to assume their true size, so everything had to be sized to match. If even drinking cups had to be large enough to drown several people in, then you could only imagine how large everything else was. Titans didn’t like cramped quarters either, so everything was built open and expansive. There was no need for windows, as walls were rare, columns of metal dotting the view as they were holding up the roof over their head. Everything also had to be built sturdy as the titans were heavy and powerful, and they didn’t want to break anything by accident. Even the smallest ones weighed enough to be measured in tons and could accidentally break a stone wall with a careless swing of their hand.

With a small, relaxed exhale, Karna too allowed herself to assume her full-sized titan form and let go of her aura, totem, and domain. This wasn’t the time nor the place for holding back. This was the time for awe and making lasting impressions. And she intended to do just that. Power whipped around her before settling down like a mantle around her. She would finally get to put her powerful soul to full use.

Hope looked up at her and smiled. “We’ll be in the observation area if, and when, everything goes to hell. Just shout and we’ll arrange a quick extraction." Naturally, as everything was titan-sized, any visitors had to go to a specially prepared observation floor that allowed them to watch over the proceedings.

-----

Shiva smiled a little as he felt the sudden release of power outside. The main character of today’s gathering had arrived. All the important members of the House had been invited, and as they all had some idea what it might be about, they’d showed up in force. Not only had all the heads of the families come, but they’d brought spouses, children, advisors, and bodyguards. It had been a while since the Storm Peak had been this populated. Servants of course also moved between the gathered throngs, but no one from outside the House was present. He knew Ynnead had brought her friends, which was a breach of etiquette, but if things went the way he assumed, no one would care about the slight faux pas. And if things didn’t go to plan, then their presence might become necessary.

As the titans were less about ceremony than many other houses, there was no master of ceremonies to announce her arrival, but no one could miss the moment Ynnead stepped into the large central area where everyone had gathered. It was like someone had suddenly brought a small star into the room, except this star didn't radiate light, but power and majesty. Shiva was both shocked and not at all surprised as most of those close to Ynnead instinctively knelt as she passed, her sheer presence overwhelming them.

Some people had the sort of presence that forced others to admit they were in the presence of someone special. Someone more than them. Ynnead had that in spades. It was like a predator had stepped into a room full of prey, as the very air in the room suddenly felt different. Everyone else felt small as she entered, a feeling titans were not used to. It wasn’t just a show of force either, as there were some beings in the room that could still claim to be stronger than her. They all knew that would not be the case for very long. She simply had presence. She had that something that forced you to pay attention and your respects.

Her skin was whiteish, though seemed to slightly change color upon the light reflecting off in different angles, showing the magical nature of the Celestium and marking her almost one of a kind. She wasn’t the tallest titan present, yet it seemed everyone had to look up at her. She also had the glow of a god about her, and they all got a strong sense of death and judgement from her. Somewhat ironic since the latter was Shiva’s domain. She carried herself with complete certainty in herself and moved through the throng as if the genuflections were to be expected. She was an empress, if not in actual title yet, then at least in character and bearing.

She walked up to Shiva and tilted her head just a bit. “Head of House.” She greeted.

“Princess Ynnead.” He nodded in return. They’d grown more friendly during the crusade, and the more they spent time together, the more certain he and Indra had become that this was the Sacred Lady somehow brought back. The other True Gods and Gods of the House were in the front row, though a certain spot was suspiciously empty.

“The wayward daughter of the House has returned.” She spoke the ceremonial lines.

“We welcome all the children of Titans. Here you will find shelter, support, security, and a family to support you.” He replied, sticking to the pattern. The next lines were the important ones. Normally a titan that had Ascended from the lower planes would simply say their thanks and assume their position, but Ynnead was never satisfied with just doing the normal. Not that Shiva would have it any other way in this case.

"As the child of the House, I've come to claim my rightful position and to assume the positions that are mine by the right of birth," Ynnead stated solemnly. This same line was used by those that had a claim to certain positions in the House. Recently discovered heirs of families were the most common reason to go this route.

“And what positions are you laying a claim to?” Shiva asked. They really were a race that liked to keep things simple.

“As the daughter of Surya, the previous head of the House, I claim the position as the next head of the House.” And there it was. The claim had been made. Now all that remained was to see if it went through.

"Are there any among those gathered that would contest this claim?" Shiva asked ceremonially and pointedly looked at the empty place. Where was Kronus? Shiva, and many others, had made sure to inform him of what was going to happen, to avoid any claims of impropriety. A challenge could be made later, but it would be much better if any such problems were handled now.

They all awkwardly waited. There was only so long they could wait without the whole thing turning into a mockery, but they would wait as long as they could. Murmurs slowly spread among those gathered. Even Shiva took a glance toward Ynnead to see if she'd had anything to do with this, but she looked just as confused and annoyed. Indra was the one to break decorum and voice what they were all thinking. "Where in the blazes is Kronus?! I will not have him disrespect everyone with this kind of behavior!"