Scarlet King | Scp - 001

According to Tufto's SCP-001 Proposal, the King is more akin to a living idea than an individual entity; in effect, he is the idea of nihilism, the people's dissatisfaction with the modern way of life, and can assimilate an entity thought to be him into an aspect of himself just as it did with SCP-2317-K. He is always depicted as figure with a crown-like ornament over his head showing royalty and associated with the color red, or in the cases of alien cultures lacking the perception of the color red the King would be associated with a color that would be synonymous or close with the color. In SCP-4989, Dr. Simon Kells described looking at the King "like staring at a Pattern Screamer only more hollow".

The Scarlet King as an old god from the Abyss was shown to be a cruel, manipulative, and nihilistic individual, though this was more of an image he held to his insecurity and cowardice. After learning about the true nature of existence, he thought that reality should not exist. He became hellbent on destroying everything, especially the tree of knowledge, by any means necessary, enslaving and devouring numerous gods and doing whatever pleased him. It is believed that if SCP-999 were to interact with the Scarlet King, then his heart would change and finally see the beauty of the world and abandon his quest of destruction. It was noted that the Scarlet King was always honest, instead having his subjects lie on his behalf.

The Scarlet King's true power is unknown, though he can impregnate various females in groups of seven with his Scarlet Spawn, whose birth caused great catastrophes around the world. Legends portray him as capable to conquer and destroy entire worlds and civilizations, and threaten other low elder gods. The Scarlet King is stated to be powerful enough to threaten all of Creation and the Tree of Knowledge itself, making him a multiversal threat. He also feeds on the negative feelings of people as he did with Dr. Clef which resulted in the latter's madness and is apparently responsible for giving most reality-benders their powers. Although he and his followers were able to defeat both Mekhane and Nahash, in another account he was described as being weaker than his aunt Yaldabaoth, the Brothers Death, Ama Kubeya and Sanna, having defeated the latter only through the help of Jeser. In SCP-6765, the King's corpse is shown to be capable of mass destruction and had power over blood and the memories stored in it, as shown when confronted by armed Foundation agents it simply removed their memories on how to operate a firearm. In SCP-8008's altered reality of Eluthertopia, the Scarlet King was the source of the Anti-Magic, a form of creation magic that was sent back in time to convert matter into pure energy, in a way destroying matter, which counteracted the Metegian creation magic of the three goddesses Inanna, Gaea and Mary, though they could be combined and used interchangeably.

As a living idea born from humanity's dissatisfaction with the lifeless modern world and the desire to return to the old ways of life, the Scarlet King was created and shaped by humanity, acting as premodernity's vengeance against modernity and as long as modernity exists in its current state the Scarlet King would also persist existing. As a result, the Scarlet King exists as an entity in the noosphere, the human collective consciousness, just like SCP-3125, WAN, SCP-6820-A and possibly the Neon God, and could both affect and be affected by humanity: the idea of the King would haunt those who learned about his true nature, inflicting dreams in them and corrupting them, while various incarnations of the King would be created from the belief of various legends, such as his origin as a god which would be retroactively written as somewhat being the case. When people began interacting with the idea of the Scarlet King, he would also affect reality by creating portals to a hellish dimension, create sounds of hymns sung about him, manifest human blood in specific places and fires that formed imagery about him. However, the Foundation would later use SCP-6659 to completely destroy the idea of the Scarlet King from the noosphere, trapping him inside a sacrificial dagger acting as his totem and liberating humanity from his influence.