The projection of the blood-eyed monarch paused for a moment. Even the light forming his image seemed to ripple, betraying the turmoil within him. Then he let out a long, heavy sigh.
"It seems you know far more than I expected. You are right. I was never some hero who saved the world. This world… has never truly had heroes."
"All beings, whether common folk or kings, are nothing more than tools of power in the end. Drifting weeds caught in the torrent of fate, unable to control their own course."
"So, young man, you have gone to such lengths to reach this place. What is it you wish to learn from me?"
Lo Quen's gaze burned as he stared straight at the Bloodstone Emperor's projection.
"I want the truth. What really happened back then? After you ended the Long Night with your so-called Lightbringer, what came next? Has the Long Night truly ended?"
The Bloodstone Emperor nodded slowly. A complicated glint flickered in his blood-red eyes as he spoke.
"The Long Night… was never truly ended. Its so-called conclusion was nothing more than a carefully woven lie. Even now, I can still sense it. The power of the God of Cold is awakening once more."
"Since you already understand the struggle between the magic of ice and fire, you should also know this: the founders of the Great Empire of the Dawn were descendants born from the union of the Lord of Light and the God of Cold."
"The powers of ice and fire merged within their bloodline, granting the imperial family of the Great Empire of the Dawn unparalleled magical talent."
"During the empire's long rule, generation after generation of kings became obsessed with studying the mysterious black stones that fell from beyond the heavens, seeking to draw power that surpassed mortal limits."
"They… succeeded. But they also fell completely."
His voice trembled, as if memories of something unspeakably horrific had surfaced.
"Those kings revered in the epics used the blood and souls of countless innocent lives to appease the chaotic entity hidden deep within the black stones, all in exchange for the power of blood magic."
"Each generation of rulers, through prolonged contact with and use of the blood magic contained in the black stones, was corrupted and reshaped by its influence. Their hair and eyes became unnatural, and they gained many powerful yet grotesque abilities."
"What you see northeast of Yi Ti, the vast lake known as the Bleeding Sea, is proof written in blood by uncountable sacrifices."
"Beyond the Five Forts, the region called the Bloodless Cities is nothing more than one of the grounds where those wicked kings carried out their forbidden experiments."
"The Shrike Men, the Winged City… all of those inhuman monsters are twisted creations born of blood magic."
"Even far away, beneath the Jade Sea on Leng, its underground world still bears the horrifying scars left behind by my ancestors' reckless use of blood magic."
The Bloodstone Emperor drew a deep breath before continuing.
"The kings did not stop at studying dark magic. They used blood magic to forcibly extend their own lives, seeking longevity beyond mortal limits. But eternal life demands death as its price."
"Countless people of Yi Ti became fuel and tools to sustain the kings' existence. Yet human souls are finite. By the time the throne passed to my generation, there were no longer enough lives left to harvest…"
"My sister, who was also my wife, the Amethyst Empress, inherited the throne."
When he spoke her title, the Bloodstone Emperor's voice wavered almost imperceptibly.
"She… was different from me, different from all the kings before her. Before she officially ascended the throne, my father carried out an unprecedented blood sacrifice on her behalf, extracting new power from the Black Stone.
"Through that ritual, she gained the ability of a Dreamer, able to glimpse fragments of the future. And it was precisely because of this power that, after she took the throne, she personally witnessed the terrifying future that continuing the blood sacrifices to the Black Stone would bring. A future capable of destroying the entire world.
"She… she refused to continue down that road to the abyss. She tried to abolish the blood sacrifices and search for another path."
Lo Quen cut in, his voice cold.
"But you killed her. That act is what the legends call the forging of the Lightbringer, the final sacrifice completed with the blood of one's closest kin."
"No!"
The Bloodstone Emperor shook his head violently, his projection flickering and distorting.
"That was only the beginning of my true fall into the abyss. After I killed her with my own hands, my pursuit of power reached an unprecedented extreme. The darkness within me was completely unleashed.
"I began performing blood sacrifices greater and more brutal than any king before me, recklessly demanding power from the Black Stone. Through this, I touched upon the most fundamental secrets of blood magic."
"With blood magic, I created one terrifying and powerful species after another."
"Chimeras, Hellhounds, Sphinxes… all of them were the products of my madness."
"But even then, I was not satisfied!"
His voice burned with fervor:
"Though these creations are powerful, they are savage beyond measure and utterly devoid of reason. They cannot be controlled like an extension of one's own arm. I began to crave a force greater, more perfect, one that could be tamed and enslaved by my bloodline.
A weapon… an ultimate weapon that would belong to me alone.
Such power was far too immense for any ordinary living vessel to conceive or endure. And so, I turned my gaze to the corpse of my deceased lover and sister… the Amethyst Empress."
At this point, even the lingering image of the Bloodstone Emperor seemed to show a trace of pain, as though he regretted the choice he had made.
"After killing her, I resurrected her with powerful blood magic. From that moment on, she became nothing more than an empty shell, endowed with vast magical potential but stripped of all self-will.
I used her body to conduct experiments in flesh-and-blood grafting with powerful creatures of different species…
I once severed her head and attempted to graft that of a tiger in its place, but every experiment ended in failure…
In the end, I found a direction. A direction that trampled all ethics beneath it!"
The Bloodstone Emperor's projection trembled.
"In the place where she once nurtured life, I implanted my own primal essence, Firewyrms eggs, and Wyvern blood, then used an unprecedented blood sacrifice as a catalyst…
And then, something I never anticipated occurred."
His voice dropped lower, carrying a chill that seemed to unsettle even himself.
"She… became pregnant. She gave birth to twins.
One was a girl with silver hair and violet eyes, her beauty inhumanly perfect.
The other… was a creature with wings, its body covered in black-and-red scales.
A young dragon!"
The Bloodstone Emperor's phantom raised its head, blood-red eyes piercing through time and space as they met Lo Quen's gaze.
"This is… the origin of dragons. Not born of nature, but the ultimate product of blood magic."
Standing beneath the phantom of the pulsing red heart, Lo Quen felt his mind reel as shock crashed over him like a tidal wave.
The Bloodstone Emperor's words thundered endlessly in his head.
Dragons, the magical beings that had shaped the rise and fall of Valyria and the Targaryens alike, had such a dark and brutal origin.
"Pregnant… giving birth to both a human and a young dragon…"
Lo Quen murmured, as his thoughts inexplicably linked to the Dothraki creation myth.
For generations, they had sung of dragons hatching from the moon.
Hatching… the moon…
Shock flashed in Lo Quen's eyes.
He had once dismissed it as nothing more than the wild imagination of nomadic poets. Only now did he realize it was a blood-soaked history, hidden beneath the guise of myth.
That so-called "moon" was not the satellite hanging in the sky, but the very body of the Amethyst Empress, used as a vessel for blood magic experiments.
She was not only his sister and wife. In death, she had become the container for her husband's madness.
A living vessel, carrying inhuman power.
"It seems you have understood," the Bloodstone Emperor said quietly.