The Amethyst Empress's voice echoed through the silent underground palace.
"Yes. Another line of descendants. They were not born through natural reproduction, but created through blood magic. In the distant past, they too crossed westward and multiplied upon that forest-covered land."
Lo Quen frowned, deep in thought.
At that moment, Marwyn, standing nearby, rubbed the thick necklace at his chest and said thoughtfully, "Your Grace, could it be… the First Men? Or perhaps the Andals who came later?"
"What makes you think that?"
Lo Quen turned to him.
Marwyn's eyes grew distant as he spoke slowly. "Your Grace, you must have heard the ancient northern legend. The woman known as the Night Queen, with skin pale as moonlight and eyes like blue stars. It was she who seduced the Thirteenth Lord Commander of the Night's Watch, causing his fall and turning him into the Night King, ruling the Nightfort at his side."
A spark of realization flashed through Lo Quen's mind.
"Right. According to the most widely told version in the North, that mysterious woman was said to be the daughter of a Barrow King. The Barrow King… the Night Queen… the First Men. Which means the other bloodline of the Cold God is hidden within the blood of the First Men."
The Amethyst Empress looked toward Lo Quen.
"It seems you are already brushing against the edge of the truth."
Lo Quen took a deep breath, steadying the turmoil in his chest, and turned his gaze to Qyburn and Marwyn, his thoughts falling into place.
"The reason Jon Snow was so determined to go beyond the Wall is most likely because the person he was searching for is a wildling from beyond the Wall. And the bloodlines of the wildlings can almost all be traced back to the First Men. That means the vessel ultimately chosen by the Cold God is very likely to arise among the wildlings."
Marwyn stared at him in shock.
"Your Grace… are you saying that Jon Snow traveled all the way from Westeros to Essos to track down the wildling chosen by the Cold God?"
Lo Quen nodded firmly.
At first, this had only been a vague guess, pieced together from the original story and the clues at hand. But with the Amethyst Empress's confirmation, he could now almost be certain.
The vessel ultimately claimed by the Cold God was very likely Ygritte, the fiery-tempered wildling woman who shared a deep bond with Jon in the original tale.
Lo Quen recalled what he had learned from Moreo. When the captain rescued Jon from the sea, he often heard Jon muttering Ygritte's name unconsciously while he lay delirious.
Later, Lo Quen learned in fragments that Ygritte had been captured by a group of Others, her fate unknown.
Now it seemed that the red-haired wildling was no longer who she once was. She had likely become the new vessel through which the Cold God's power descended.
And another thought troubled him.
Ygritte's hair burned like flame. Was that, in itself, some kind of sign?
He looked back to the Amethyst Empress and asked the most critical question.
"Then do you know where Jon and that wildling are right now?"
The Amethyst Empress slowly shook her head.
"I cannot see their exact location clearly. But through prophecy, I sense that their movements are near the Mossovy Forest. The final ritual will be carried out at K'Dath. Unless you seize control of K'Dath beforehand, it will be almost impossible to stop what is coming."
K'Dath.
Again, K'Dath.
Lo Quen's brow tightened sharply, the name tolling like a warning bell in his mind.
Time was running short. He would have to march north as soon as possible, toward the Five Forts and the Grey Waste, and seize this critical point.
He fixed his gaze on the Amethyst Empress and pressed on.
"What else do you know? Is there anything concrete, any information or object, that could help us confront this crisis?"
The Amethyst Empress shook her head once more.
"The rest of my memories… were shattered and scattered through countless experiments and deaths. But I can give you the last prophecy I witnessed."
She paused, then spoke slowly, each word deliberate.
"The reverse of light is darkness. The essence of darkness is light."
As her words faded, the massive red crystal at her neck flared with one final, dazzling brilliance. Then the light rapidly collapsed and went out, as if all its power had been drained in an instant, leaving behind a dull, gray-white stone devoid of life.
At the same moment the ruby lost its power, the breathtakingly beautiful face of the Amethyst Empress within the stone coffin began to age at a visible, terrifying speed.
Deep wrinkles spread across what had once been smooth skin. The silver-gold hair lost its luster, turning dry and ashen white. Those violet eyes, once luminous, drained of all light and became hollow and dead.
In the span of only a few breaths, this broken body, burdened with thousands of years of secrets and suffering, finally departed from the world.
The sudden change left everyone stunned into silence.
Only Qyburn remained composed, a glint of insight flashing in his eyes as he analyzed calmly. "This ruby… its mechanism appears similar to the gemstone worn by the red priestess Melisandre. Both rely on storing immense life force or magical power to preserve the wearer's appearance and vitality. Once that energy is exhausted, or when the core is damaged as it was just now, the effect vanishes immediately."
Lo Quen, however, had no attention to spare for such details. His thoughts were entirely consumed by the Amethyst Empress's final prophecy.
He turned the words over and over in his mind.
The reverse of light is darkness.
The essence of darkness is light.
How eerily similar they were to the words once spoken by the Old Gods.
When he thought of the Dawn Sword of Starfall, the Dark Star of High Hermitage, and the long-standing entanglement between the Lord of Light and the God of Cold…
Everything made the prophecy feel even more elusive.
What, exactly, was it pointing toward?
A key to breaking the deadlock?
Or the hint of an even more terrifying truth?
Lo Quen could not unravel its meaning just yet.
He cast one last look at the Amethyst Empress, now utterly lifeless within the stone coffin, then led the others out of the underground palace in silence.
The exploration of Stygai was drawing to a close.
The ghosts haunting the city had been purged by dragonfire. The wild dragons that once roosted here had been slain. A place that would have been a death trap for ordinary people, and even for most sorcerers, now felt—before Lo Quen, with his dragons and overwhelming personal power—more like a proving ground that yielded Dragon's Souls.
At this point, the only force that could truly be called his enemy was that unnameable power born of black stone from beyond the heavens, seeking to descend upon the world.
Even as his strength continued to grow at a staggering pace, the mere thought of that threat filled Lo Quen with an intense sense of urgency.
He could not allow those things to descend.
If he did, the dynasty he had built with such effort, the wife he cherished, and everything he possessed would vanish like a fleeting dream.
Steeling himself, Lo Quen ordered the army to gather and load onto the ships every item in Stygai that might hold research value—stitched skeletal specimens, fragments of ancient magical artifacts, stone tablets bearing incomplete knowledge, and the like.
Once everything was secured, he led the fleet away from the City of Shadows.