returning to the topic of the empyreans lighting a fire under marika's ass
i got to thinking more about where does melina fit in this? we know marika gave her 'her purpose'. it's implied by the location of the blade of calling that she was also kind of like...kept secret, in a way(this would also explain why she has no throne like her siblings, and why none of them ever mention her. she wouldn't be the first child of marika's to be kept a secret, given the omen twins). this is further augmented by the official's attire being found there, its description saying:
Grubby blue robe worn by magisterial officials to carry out their grim tasks. Surveillance, executions, gruesome rituals... The darkest duties drive the wheels of mankind.
For me, the 'darkest duties' are both cruel and taking place behind the scenes, unrecorded. As if it were someone's secret duty to keep Melina hidden, and possibly ensure she was instructed according to Marika's will. Melina's duty being to burn the Erdtree does not have to mean Marika always intended to end her order and escape godhood. It could be that she (correctly) anticipated Radagon's refusal to abdicate, knowing that he may seal the Erdtree and make the exchange of power to a new Elden Lord impossible. Our mission isn't to end the order, it is to replace Radagon. Melina is Marika's way of ensuring Radagon can't prevent that from happening. This could also be why her hair is a faded hue, a symbol of Radagon's waning influence in the order as Marika readies her empire to receive a new lord. She expels Godfrey, her first lord, and then brings Radagon back after he produces an Empyrean and threat to her eternal order. She produces two more Empyrean children with him, perhaps in an effort to ensure that, if any ascend, they are her own rather than Rennala's, and so she is able to indoctrinate them in a sense(Miquella ends up repeating her mistakes, after all, and was fairly enthralled with GO Fundamentalism before the haligtree, disavowing it only bc it couldnt cure Malenia rather than any perceived faults in meaning). She assimilates Radagon back into herself, preventing further Empyreans being produced by him. Somehow, in spite of her imprisonment, she calls the exiled loyal Tarnished back, expecting one to become the new lord of her order and ensure its reign continues. I don't know in what state she is, but she isn't dead, even as a dismembered husk. The only endings in which she truly dies are those which do not continue the order, and this makes sense - the founding, defining principle of the Golden Order is the removal and absence of death. There is no Golden Order if there is death. Her punishment for breaking the elden ring is to get exactly what she wanted - to live forever, no matter what lol
