Out of a realistic and scientific view, the most logical answer is, that a red star is nothing else, than a huge dieing sun, known under the term as “Red Giant Stars”
Stars are not planets, Stars are suns, whose lights that we see is coming form millions over billions of light years away from us.
This means, a light of a star that we see on a clear dark night, is basically all the millions over billions of light years old, until that light reached us and we saw it, because we saw at the right moment at the right time into the night sky.
http://www.au.dk/fileadmin/www.au.dk/pressen/Kepler/FIG7.jpg
Red Giants are dieing suns, who are at a very near end of their “lifecircle”, before they basically run out of nuclear energy and so nearer they get to that state, so bigger does a sun become , until the moment will be reached, where the Red Giant will explode, what will be then a “Supernova”
If something like a Supernova would happen for example with our sun of our solar system, it would basically erase us out and also planets like Mercury, Venus, Mars and very possibly also Jupiter could be just erased out, if somethign like that will happen in several millions of years perhaps with our sun.
The flickering of a red star comes from the huge sunbursts of solar activities of those red giants as they lose alot of “mass” when they burst out their energy.
After a supernova, will remain a tiny “white star”, a bright white pulsating neutron star, also known as “Pulsars”
This means, so more a red star is flickering, so more mass does the star lose and so more likely will it become, that the star will explode into a supernova, leaving at the end a neutron star (Pulsar), which we will see then as white stars, which “live” far far far far faaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaar longer, than red stars do, whats also the reason, why we see billions more of white stars in the dark nights, than we ever do see a red star.
The light of such a pulsar is also far more intensive and stronger, thats why we see it also over a much wider distance of undescribable longer light year distances, than that of thsoe red giant. Another reason, why we see nearly never red stars in the night sky.
To get to the OP’s topic, I strongly believe, thhis has absolutely nothign to mean and its as the OP says it self just a star sky picture without any meaning that players shouldn#t interpretate too much into.
Personally I like the idea behind sub classes ~ quoted from Chris Whiteside