"The Celestial Embassy was once a grand pagoda, looming above the rooftops of the Fourth City. When London fell, the Embassy was buried deep below the earth. Its many levels now descend far underground."[1]
The Sunken Embassy, formerly the Celestial Embassy, is an abandoned diplomatic office in London.
"In the eastern halls of the broken Embassy, one finds documents concerning external affairs. In the western halls, correspondence with Old Hell."[2]
During the time of the Fourth City, the Celestial Embassy was the key liaison between the old Khanate and Hell. When London fell, this building was crushed like most of the Fourth City, and the Brass Embassy was constructed in its place. The old Embassy was only rediscovered decades later, during the Grand Clearing-Out;[3] its ruins are now buried below Moloch Street. The Devils of Hell and Mount Palmerston have begun competing fiercely to claim the Embassy's valuable intelligence and historical records.[4][5]
The remains of the Celestial Embassy's reception chambers are located at the center of the ruins, where citizens and notables of the Fourth City would enter. Records of dealings with the Khanate were secured in the eastern halls; correspondence between the Embassy and old Hell was secured in the western halls.[6]
"Brasswork features mock the Fourth City; mosaics depict myths and khans of legend, with key figures replaced with grinning devils. Ceilings are painted with stars and skies in lush and lurid azures and cobalt, a permanent reminder of that which the Fourth has lost, and which can now only be glimpsed within the Embassy's friendly walls."[7]
When the Celestial Embassy still stood, it was one of the tallest buildings in the Fourth City, soaring over the parapets and pagodas around it.[8] It is now an opulent and hazardous ruin; its granite walls[9] are on the verge of collapse, chasms split the floors,[10][11] and the area is still filled with traps.[12]
The entrance to the Embassy features a brass mosaic that seems to have been constructed as an imitation and mockery of the Fourth City Khanate.[13] Its interior is a maze of halls, passages, and chambers; individual departments were established for various dissenting groups in the Fourth City, including the Fingerking-possessed Rosers; the Motherlings, allies of the sorrow-spiders); and the warlike Copper.[14] Roses denoted those under the influence of the Fingerkings, spiders signified allies of the Sorrow-Spiders, and swords indicated that the dissenters "clung to an old rite and an antique calendar."[14]
Espionage, misinformation, and influence were the main responsibilities of the Celestial Embassy, with the beliefs and rituals of the Fourth City being favored tools of the diplomatic core of Old Hell;[15] as such, the Embassy served as a trove of careful notes on the Khanate and its people.[16] As such, it was a veritable hive (beehive?) of spies, riddled with hidden spaces and mirrors that led to a reflective lake deep in Parabola.[17] Devils and Khanate officials spied on each other, and the devils spied on their own to avoid dissent; many of the traps in the Embassy were designed to catch both wandering staff and unwanted visitors.[18]
One particular Bureau inside the Embassy was used to process, contain, and display the endless gifts of artwork and artists offered by the Fourth City.[19] There is evidence that these gifts, while ostensibly made for the sake of generosity and appeasement, constituted a sort of Trojan-horse scheme in which the Fourth City sent spies to pose as laborers and hide in statues.[20]
As intense as this game of intrigue was, however, it was merely an acceptable manifestation of an ancient Great Game. In truth, relations between Old Hell and the leadership of the Fourth City were amicable enough that the Celestial Embassy could be used as a refuge for the city's rulers in case of emergency.[21] Hidden in the basement of the Embassy, the chambers of the Khans were furnished with ornate mirrors, and equipped with lavish costumes so that Embassy staff could entertain visiting Khaganian royals.[22] Artifacts uncovered in these chambers have betrayed the influence of the Fingerkings on the Khans.[23]
In the concealed heart of the Celestial Embassy lies the Mocking Tree, a great brass tree. Its leaves are pages from the deepest of Hell's archives, documenting the cosmological beliefs of the Fourth City.[24] This is likely a sort of brazen (in both senses of the word) counterpart to the Silver Tree, which still stands in the Forgotten Quarter.
"The western chambers are dominated by ivy and white stone, in reflection of old Hell. Brass fixtures are functional and unembellished, in contrast to the marvels of stonework. Masonry flourishes in architectural follies, statues and intricate fretwork. Roses cling to the upper walls – still blooming and clustered tight as spiderwebs."[25]
"The inner courts of the Sunken Embassy are wreathed in webs and roses. [...] There are cells there; writing on the walls in Fourth City scripts. The oldest have faded with time but the newest record how the devils recruited from the factions of the Fourth: the Rosers with their mirrors, the Copper with their burning dreams. The government of the City sought to plant spies there so that the unknowing Embassy would recruit from their own. The success of that scheme is attested in these lonely cells.."[26]
The western halls of the Sunken Embassy contained its internal affairs, and served as a base of spycraft.[26] Deeper within this wing are the Khatun's Gardens, now overrun with poisoned flora;[27] near the garden's entrance, a storehouse of prophecies and predictions was excavated, which the Khanate revealed whenever it would grant them political advantage.[28] A hidden access point connected the storehouse to the ministerial suites, where the devils kept records on the less publicly acceptable interests of each of the city's ministers, and the best ways to indulge them.[29] This wing was connected by a system of hydraulic tubes, which allowed for the reception of messages from various parts of Hell.[30]
A Law-Furnace was found at the heart of the west wing. It is still operational, and in the process of erasing certain records from ever having existed. These pages, marked by a sigil, have complicated the collection of Hell's documentation; an unknowable number of documents have been incinerated, defaced, or otherwise erased by the law-furnace's handiwork.[31] Old Hell was rife with infighting, and each department within the Embassy fought against the others for ideological supremacy; it is implied that the department that eventually "won" this fight was one with connections to Hell's law-furnaces, as they were simply able to eliminate their enemies through the sheer power of law.[32] However, this victory was evidently not without complications, as a vault with the Embassy stores remnants of shattered Hellish laws focused on the behaviour of Embassy staff.[33].
The Concordium, a great Hellish pipe organ, was also discovered in the west wing.[34] It was found to be accompanied by scorched sheet music that requires an inhuman number of limbs to play.[35] A final great surprise to excavators came in the form of the Rose-in-Webs, a still-living Grand Devil that took on the appearance of a giant red spider.[36][37]
↑Seeking Documents in the Sunken Embassy, Fallen London"The Celestial Embassy was once a grand pagoda, looming above the rooftops of the Fourth City. When London fell, the Embassy was buried deep below the earth. Its many levels now descend far underground. The ruined chambers display battered mosaics and brass-work imitations of Fourth City decor. Every room is clogged with the detritus of diplomacy: papers and journals, brass-bound tomes and broken scrolls. In the eastern halls of the broken Embassy, one finds documents concerning external affairs. In the western halls, correspondence with Old Hell. Which way will you go?"
↑Find out what's below (Moloch Street), Fallen London"The newly opened passage leads into a tilted doorway: an entry into a ruin that sank unevenly beneath Moloch Street. […] This is a ruin from the Fourth City! But its construction is unmistakeably infernal, with brass accents and crimson colours."
↑Seeking Documents in the Sunken Embassy, Fallen London"[...] In the eastern halls of the broken Embassy, one finds documents concerning external affairs. In the western halls, correspondence with Old Hell. Which way will you go?"
↑Spelunking in the Sunken Embassy, Fallen London"Brasswork features mock the Fourth City; mosaics depict myths and khans of legend, with key figures replaced with grinning devils. Ceilings are painted with stars and skies in lush and lurid azures and cobalt, a permanent reminder of that which the Fourth has lost, and which can now only be glimpsed within the Embassy's friendly walls."
↑Deep, dark, Fallen London"The Sunken Embassy is very deep; […] it must have soared over the parapets and pagodas of the Fourth City. […]"
↑Milton: Helping Milton, Mask of the Rose"You worked in your embassy of brass and porphyr and connived against my government." [Editor's note: porphyr is a type of granite]
↑Broken History, Fallen London"Lacquered walls bulge inwards […] Broken lanterns hang from yawning door frames, illuminating nothing. […]"
↑Deep, Dark, Fallen London"[...] You find yourself navigating a chasm that extends miles deep – until, of course, you fall. [...]"
↑Break open sealed chambers, Fallen London"The Embassy was crushed between the bed of the Neath and the city that fell down on top. Many of its halls are hazardous. Some are entirely trapped."
↑Spelunking in the Sunken Embassy, Fallen London"Brasswork features mock the Fourth City; mosaics depict myths and khans of legend, with key figures replaced with grinning devils. Ceilings are painted with stars and skies [...] a permanent reminder of that which the Fourth has lost [...]"
↑ 14.014.1Hell's relicts, Fallen London"The Embassy appears to have devoted individual departments to various dissenting groups in the Fourth City. [...] Roses denote those who fell sway to the whispers behind the glass. Black spiders for those who sought solace with the Sorrow-Spiders. Swords denote those who clung to an old rite and an antique calendar. [...]"
↑The currency of lies, Fallen London"[...] Belief and ritual were tools in the trade of Old Hell's diplomatic corps, distorted facsimiles of the Fourth City's own. You sift through documents that parody the processions and masques of the Fourth City, leavened with spite and irony. [...]"
↑What must be concealed, Fallen London"[...] In its secret places, Antique Hell took careful notes on the qualities of its Fourth City counterparts, knowingly and otherwise."
↑What must be concealed, Fallen London"The Sunken Embassy was riddled with spies. One could not take a meeting without being observed, from under the marble paving stones or in the lacquered walls or even via a series of mirrors, both facing a reflective lake deep in Parabola. Devils spied on their guests, and upon each other. [...]"
↑Dead places, Fallen London"[...] Was this a trap for wandering staff? Or visitors to the Embassy, to be lost in the dark for good."
↑The spider's web, Fallen London"The Fourth City offered the Sunken Embassy many gifts: statues and mosaics, artists, choristers, dancers and instruments. Such lavishness required both containment and display – the Sunken Embassy was forced to create a Bureau for the processing of such municipal munificence [...]"
↑The spider's web, Fallen London"[...] the Fourth City was not just generous. It sent its best, ferried inside hollow statues or the carriers who bore them in, disguised – and through persuasion, eventually within the hearts of some of the bureaucrats themselves. You find evidence of this inside the statues whose occupants were unlucky enough to be caught."
↑Locate an inner sanctum , Fallen London"In times of crisis, the rulers of the Fourth City sheltered in the Embassy. Perhaps you can find those protective chambers. What might yet remain?"
↑Deeds that were done, Fallen London"The chambers of the Khans lie under a floor of cedar, each room furnished with vast and elaborate mirrors. There are costumes, made for Embassy staff, in silk and copper and floral design. Notes pinned to the costumes make clear which is most pleasing to which member of the ruling family."
↑Deeds that were done, Fallen London"[...] You also uncover a particularly hardy set of shears, forged in violant. They are too brittle to remove, and flecked with ancient venoms. In an adjoining room, shed snakeskin surrounds a crumbling throne. All bear the marks of long abandonment."
↑The hidden embassy, Fallen London"[...] The Mocking Tree still stands at the Embassy's concealed heart, its many twisted branches gleaming in untarnished brass. From each hangs a different leaf – each a page from the vaults of Hell's archives, charting the forgotten cosmologies of the Fourth City. [...]"
↑The hidden embassy, Fallen London"The Khatun's Gardens, made to honour her, are now a morass of poisoned weeds and bloated lily-candles. [...]"
↑The hidden embassy, Fallen London"[...] Near the entrance, you find a storehouse of prophecies and predictions, assembled from a study of Fourth City beliefs. Each was revealed at dates calculated to garner the maximum political advantage."
↑The hidden embassy, Fallen London"[...] the hidden suite of its ministers remains intact, if precarious. Within that suite you find concealed chambers where the devils plied their spycraft, documents languish: neat, impartial recordings of each minister's forbidden peccadilloes, and how best to cater to them. [...]"
↑The Rose in Webs, Fallen London"[...] Hydraulic tubes open like mouths in the walls, clanking and hissing. It is a room of echoes: voices moan from somewhere far away. [...] "These were built for direct communion with Hell. Let us see if I can remember the right one... the Dynamite were in hiding in the Perfection which means—" "
↑Hell's relicts, Fallen London"Hell's documentation is erratic. Much has been incinerated, defaced or otherwise erased. A still operational Law-Furnace deep within the Embassy is in the process of erasing certain records from ever having been [...] you're able to recognise the sigil which marks pages for destruction: [...]"
↑The currency of lies, Fallen London"[...] Old Hell was a fractious place. Every department within the Embassy was staffed by liars, each keen to promote their own value while denigrating those both above and below them. A series of texts [...] suggests a connection between the law-furnaces in Hell and one particular department's success. Those who could not live up to the legal claims they'd made found themselves swiftly and spectacularly extinguished."
↑What must be concealed, Fallen London"[...] Here the Embassy stored a fraction of its old laws; broken edicts and shattered clauses, contradictory rites and observances. Taking only that which can be carried, you discern that the chief preoccupation of these Byzantine instructions was the behaviour of the Embassy's staff themselves."
↑Deeds that were done, Fallen London"The Concordium opens around you like an unfurling rose. [...] this place of soaring pipes and sonorous brass machinery remains intact. Great bellows pump. The floor, which is hot brass, shifts below you like the twitch of a heart. The pipes resemble a church organ; the air blowing through produces the cadences of a lullaby. [...]"
↑Deeds that were done, Fallen London"[...] On a lectern carved with the heads of Goat Demons nearby, is old sheet music – an attempt at recording the notes. The final pages are scorched and the tune would require more limbs than you possess to play."
↑Flee the Rose-in-Webs, Fallen London"[...] You can hear the sound of pursuit; many claws skittering across the mosaiced floor, and a rising smell like rotten perfume. [...] On the staircase you make out what looks like a vast spider, rosy-red and knotted like a thorn-bush. [...]"
↑The Rose in Webs, Fallen London"The Blind Pianist walks across the bridge, intent on a small archway ahead. "We should have killed that thing in the Fourth. But the grand devils are so very bad at remaining dead. Come on," she says, gesturing. "It will be back." [...]"
