Chapter 185: I Surrender, I Concede

Dany suddenly understood—the Valyrians must have plundered all the mystical sects' arcane tomes and, in the end, fused them into a supreme "grimoire of divine power."

Seeing her realization, Quaithe nodded and sighed, "A grand sorcerer with perfect inheritance can disregard sects and wield all sorcery in the world. They don't even need to study the meaning of the runes they use. We, the sorcerers of Asshai, have studied for thousands of years and still can't comprehend how the Valyrians achieved this."

"Heh, I doubt they could use all sorcery," Dany thought of something and asked with a smile, "Could they wield the Red Priests' magic?"

"No," Quaithe shook her head, her tone complex. "The magic of the gods can only be borrowed by mortals, not stolen."

Dany grinned expectantly. "I'm easily satisfied. Just learning your sorcery is enough for me."

"Apologies, but I cannot teach you any sorcery." Quaithe rejected her outright.

"Why? Knowledge thrives on exchange. I can trade my sorcery for yours."

"I can't use your sorcery."

After a pause, Quaithe asked, "You know I am a sorcerer skilled in prophecy, correct?"

"So what?"

"Do you know what is most taboo in prophecy?"

Without waiting for Dany to answer, she continued, "The greatest taboo is interfering with the life of the one prophesied. A prophecy is like a complex arithmetic problem. You understand multivariable equations, don't you?"

Do you take me for an illiterate?

"I know," Dany muttered.

"A prophecy is an equation with countless variables. If I stay by your side, I become one of those variables—an extremely significant one. Do you understand now?"

Dany frowned. "But you've repeatedly advised me to do this and not do that. Isn't that interference?"

"I only tell you the prophecy; I do not interfere with your choices. Until I see another clear prophecy, I will not appear before you again."

"So, you have another prophecy to tell me? The last one isn't even fully realized yet—this is getting a bit too frequent, don't you think?" Dany said, bemused.

"You are the cause of all consequences. I merely relay what I see," Quaithe said indifferently.

"Fine, go ahead."

Quaithe spoke in a melodic tone: "The glass candle is lit, the pale mare is approaching, and all else follows in its wake. Trust not the lion nor the griffon, the son of the sun nor the mummer's dragon. Remember the Undying. Beware the fragrant steward."

"Hmm, the glass candle was indeed lit by me, and I haven't forgotten the lesson of the Undying—I even gave Balerion a good thrashing. But what do the pale mare, lion, and the rest represent?"

As expected, Quaithe did not answer her question. She merely sighed and said, "Daenerys, you may learn my location spell, but it is best not to use it.

"After mastering the art of meditation, my former mentor solemnly warned me of a sorcerer's commandment.

"Now, I pass it on to you—sorcery is a blade without a hilt; it can harm others, but it may also wound oneself. A sorcerer's true purpose is the pursuit of truth. Sorcery is merely a 'beautiful sight' along the road, tempting one to stray from the path."

In the blink of an eye, the woman in the black robe vanished, leaving only Dany's own breathing in the dimly lit room.

With another blink, Dany let out a soft "puff" as she flopped onto the feather bed, staring at the ceiling while murmuring, "The well-fed never understand the hunger of the starving.

"I could also say that a crown is a burden bearing the livelihood of countless subjects, while glory and power are merely the 'poisoned wine' that tempts a queen astray."

After resting in Astapor for a few days, Dany's burns on her face and neck had fully healed. Barristan had also finished dulling the Sun Swallower into an unremarkable greatsword.

Just as they were packing up to set off again, ravens arrived almost simultaneously from the Windblown and Qarth's spies: the allies had hired 100 war elephants and 5,000 elephant warriors from the Isle of Elephants, and they had now arrived in Qarth.

The Windblown's report was more detailed.

Each elephant was assigned a mahout, an archer, and a spearman. While some of the 5,000 elephant warriors would remain in Qarth, others would continue westward, sailing to Volantis.

Volantis already had elephants; it only needed experienced elephant warriors.

The Windblown also revealed another piece of information—the allies had organized a super-army of over 100,000 regular soldiers. They might split into four forces, attacking Astapor, Yunkai, and Meereen from different directions simultaneously.

—This was the recommendation of most allied commanders. Even if they couldn't capture the cities, they could at least devastate the Mother of Dragons' agricultural production.

Hmm, the allies had learned about her painstaking efforts to create the "Great Leap Forward" in agriculture.

However, "Dragonslayer" Grazdan vehemently opposed the plan to split forces. He strongly urged that they consolidate their troops and abandon all "seemingly ingenious yet ultimately useless" tactics in favor of a strategy of "building strong fortifications and waging attritional warfare."

Upon acquiring the dragonslaying blade, Grazdan swore an oath—"I will slay a dragon in this lifetime," hence his moniker, "Dragonslayer."

"When it comes to tactics, no one can match the cunning and treacherous Mother of Dragons," he had nearly wept at the allies' council meeting.

His slogan was: "Unite the world's strength to crush Slaver's Bay."

He even advised against launching an immediate attack. Grazdan believed the allies were still too few and hoped to pull the Summer Isles, Westeros, Braavos, Lorath, Dothraki, and the Jade Sea nations into their alliance.

Westeros had no slave trade, but the king on the Iron Throne was a mortal enemy of the Targaryens.

If the allies failed, the Dragon Queen would become the world's supreme ruler. Would she then spare the Westeros that rightfully belonged to her?

If the Dragon Queen ascended as the "Dragon Empress," would Braavos, the former "world leader," willingly kneel under her iron boot?

Thus, Grazdan's "True World Alliance" was not the delusion of a madman. It had at least a 30% chance of becoming reality.

Due to these conflicting opinions, the allies had yet to finalize their strategy.

However, there were two points of consensus among everyone. First, time was of the essence—they needed to hatch the dragon as soon as possible. Second, they would crowdfund to hire a Faceless Man and attempt to eliminate the mastermind.

The Windblown sent a lengthy intelligence report, spanning several thousand words. At the end, they deliberately used a red pen to mark a bold warning: Beware of the Faceless Men!

This reminded Dany—she still had a Faceless Man prisoner!

That night, she arrived at the dungeon of the Great Pyramid of Astapor.

"Who sent you to kill me?" she asked.

The cramped ten-square-meter stone chamber was suffocating. The thick, iron-plated oak door resembled the lid of a stone coffin.

There were no windows, and the room remained in total darkness 24 hours a day. Except for the clean water and black bread that the jailers slid through a small opening under the door each morning and evening, there was no contact with the outside world—not even a sound.

A low, half-meter-wide wooden plank bed stood against the wall. In the corner, a stifling stench of excrement filled the air. The edges of the small wooden bucket were coated with brownish-yellow grime, and in the dim red glow of the torches, white maggots wriggled freely, crawling in and out.

The prisoner sat huddled in the corner of the wooden plank bed, her hair unkempt and face grimy. She wore a long, coarse gray linen robe reeking of an unpleasant stench. Hugging her knees, she buried her head against them, unresponsive to Dany's words.

"Hey, why aren't you speaking?" Dany stepped forward despite the foul smell and gave the woman a firm slap on the back of the head.

The unexpected pain made the Lysene woman lift her head. Her pale, gaunt face bore traces of dirt, and her only remaining left eye was as dull as the ashes of a long-burnt-out fire.

"I know nothing," the assassin rasped.

Dany took a few steps back, covered her nose with a silk scarf, and muttered, "You must at least know the training methods of the Faceless Men, right?"

The assassin chuckled hoarsely. "Alright, I'll tell you. The first rule of Faceless Men training: never fear the dark, never fear loneliness. This little cell might be hell for ordinary people, but to me, it feels like home.

The second rule: never reveal the secrets of the Faceless Men to anyone.

The third rule: all mortals must die. A Faceless Man must open their heart and embrace death."

She looked at Dany with mocking amusement. "There are a fourth, a fifth, and countless other training rules. Do you want to hear them all?"

Dany raised her hands in surrender. "Alright, I give up. I surrender. You win. You Faceless Men are incredible."

Dorea's brutal death had made Dany hate the assassin to the core. That very day, she had thrown the Faceless Woman to "Whip King" Hattar of Astapor.

Aside from his unparalleled mastery of the whip, Hattar's true profession was that of an interrogator—one who specialized in punishing unruly slaves for their masters.

But by the time Dany conquered Meereen and Yunkai and returned to Astapor, Hattar came to her, dejected and ashamed, admitting that he had exhausted all methods yet failed to break the assassin.

Left with no choice, Dany resorted to the most effective torture in the world—solitary confinement.

More than three months had passed. The assassin had grown thinner, her spirit weakened, yet she showed no signs of breaking.

Dany had been prepared to keep waiting her out, but the intelligence report from the Windblown made her wary.

She had long known that the Lysene assassin had not been hired by the Ghiscari.

Would she not have interrogated the Masters of Meereen after capturing the city?

The Ghiscari had only just decided to spend a fortune to hire assassins. The funds they had crowdfunded were still stored inside Meereen's Great Pyramid, awaiting shipment to Braavos. But before they could act, the Dragon Queen's "Fifty Thousand Strong" had descended from the sky, launching a surprise attack to seize Meereen.

The tens of millions of golden honors meant for the "Red Flower" had ended up in Dany's treasury instead.

With both physical and circumstantial evidence in hand, Dany was convinced—there were other schemers in the shadows, plotting against her!

"I've decided to let you go," Dany told the Faceless Woman.

A glimmer of light flickered in the assassin's dull blue eyes. "Why?"

"You've made me realize how terrifying the Faceless Men truly are. I'm afraid. I want to make peace with you. Let's pretend none of this ever happened—your people call off the assassination order on me, and I won't trouble you any further. How about that?"

The female assassin smirked with undisguised mockery. "Trouble the Faceless Men? You?"

"I am the Mother of Dragons, the Queen of Slaver's Bay and the Seven Kingdoms," Dany replied calmly.

"The Faceless Men have existed since the Valyrian era. The Dragonlords had not only dragons but the entire world under their rule."

"Don't assume I know nothing of your history. Yes, your order is ancient, but back then, you were merely Valyrian mine slaves."

"You know nothing," the assassin sneered.

"And you fail to grasp the situation. You're just a messenger. The one to negotiate with me is your leader—he alone decides whether to accept my terms. Besides, even if you disagree with my offer, you could still negotiate, couldn't you?"

"...Fine, I'll deliver your message."

That very night, the Lysene assassin changed into fresh clothes and left without even stopping for a meal.

(End of Chapter)

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