The crystal skylight of the Golden Dragon Throne Hall rattled like a loose tooth in a skull.
High above the imperial city, the clouds burned with an angry, bruised purple light. The descending crimson star reflected off the polished obsidian floor, casting long bloody shadows across the golden dragon pillars.
On the dragon throne, the Vermilion God-Emperor stood with his hands clamped behind his back.
His gold-threaded robes rustled as his Spirit Domain Peak aura leaked into the throne room, cracking the marble steps beneath his golden boots. His breath was shallow, his pupils contracted to needlepoints as he stared through the glass dome at the descending void warship.
“Ten years,” the Emperor hissed, his voice trembling with barely suppressed terror. “The decennial core tribute was due at the autumn equinox.”
Three hundred years ago, when the Emperor was merely a prince, he had watched what the Star-Fall Sanctuary did to realms that defaulted on their taxes.
They did not send diplomats or auditors. They sent a punitive dreadnought that pinned the ruling king to an iron comet and dissolved the continental crust with orbital plasma.
The memory had haunted his sleep for three centuries.
