As Lynd stepped into the structure that resembled a temple, he immediately felt as if he had entered another world. It wasn't that the surroundings or the objects within had changed—rather, his senses were completely cut off from the outside, giving him the uncanny sensation of having crossed into a different space.
He had anticipated this. Before arriving, he and Deltos had already devised a plan, and by now, Deltos was likely launching an assault on Stygai according to that plan.
Lynd had full confidence in Deltos and didn't dwell on what was happening outside. He focused his attention on the temple interior.
The inside of the temple looked less like a place of worship and more like a site of sacrifice. Stone pillars of varying sizes were arranged throughout the hall, each fitted with chains and binding instruments. Nearby were sacrificial knives carved from black stone.
Although the bloodstains had long faded with time, the black stone surfaces still bore signs of corrosion—etched marks where blood had once burned through the stone. For something to leave marks on such hard material, the number of victims once tied to these pillars must have been staggering.
And it hadn't only been humans. The size and shape of some pillars, as well as the thickness of the chains, suggested that giants or other massive creatures had also been bound and sacrificed here. Among the current victims were not only wights—humans transformed into undead—but also pterosaurs, demons, and some sort of mutated giant insects.
Not long ago, Euron had conducted a round of sacrifices inside this very temple. His offerings had included the Ironborn of the Iron Fleet, turned into wights, as well as various demons, pterosaurs, and twisted monsters he had captured along the way.
Judging by the sheer number of these offerings, Euron's power had grown immensely. He could now subdue and capture such dangerous creatures without sustaining any injuries himself.
Clearly, he had only recently gained this level of strength. Otherwise, he wouldn't have been driven into retreat by Asha, nor would he have chosen to take the long route via Sothoryos to avoid the Miracle Fleet patrolling the Summer Sea on his way to Asshai.
Euron had also spent some time in Qarth, raiding ships in the surrounding seas. Survivors from those attacks revealed that, while Euron was powerful at the time, he hadn't yet surpassed the limits of a normal man.
But now, the gap between the Euron of then and the Euron of now was vast. Even Quillor—a formidable bloodmage—had felt a flicker of fear when Euron was seeking a guide in Asshai. That alone confirmed it: Euron's power had surged after arriving in Asshai.
What set Asshai and Stygai apart from other places was the presence of black stone. Lynd suspected that it was this black stone that had granted Euron his newfound power. Either that, or perhaps he had obtained an artifact—possibly from the White Walkers—that could harness the magic of the black stone.
Whichever it was, Lynd knew he had to proceed with caution. Thanks to Deltos, he understood just how potent the black stone magic in Stygai truly was. If Euron could wield that power freely, he would be an unimaginably dangerous force. Even Lynd would find him difficult to deal with.
Lynd moved deeper into the temple until he reached its central chamber.
There, in front of him, stood a massive vertical shaft shaped like an octagonal prism. He stepped to the edge and looked down—only to see an endless abyss.
Despite the total darkness, Lynd's vision, enhanced by the power of the Nameless King's rune, allowed him to see hundreds of meters in any direction. Yet even with that, he couldn't make out the bottom of the shaft.
That left only two possibilities: either the shaft extended deep into the black stone's core, or some unknown force was warping his sight and blocking his vision.
As he stood there contemplating whether to descend, a sudden metallic clang echoed from behind—sharp and jarring in the otherwise silent space.
Lynd turned toward the sound and saw one of the sacrificed demons beginning to writhe, struggling to free itself from its restraints.
The demon's movement seemed to trigger a chain reaction—like a switch being thrown. All around the temple, the other bound creatures—wights, pterosaurs, and mutated beasts—began to stir as well, twisting and straining against their bindings.
Lynd had no intention of letting them break free.
He raised the greatsword of the Banished Knight and swept it in a wide arc. Instantly, a storm of searing frost erupted from the blade, sweeping through the entire temple in a blizzard of piercing cold.
The wights bound to the sacrificial pillars were instantly frozen. Moments later, the pterosaurs and other mutated creatures were also locked in ice. Only the demons remained unaffected, moving freely as if the extreme cold meant nothing to them. Even as the frozen wights and pterosaurs shattered across the ground, the demons' skin showed not the faintest trace of frost.
Realizing that the freezing storm had no effect on the demons, Lynd immediately switched tactics. He called upon the power of the Thunder Dragon rune, propelling himself into a state of blinding speed. In the blink of an eye, he shot past every demon, and with each pass, the greatsword of the Banished Knight sliced them cleanly in two—from head to toe.
With the sacrificial offerings dealt with, Lynd didn't waste time wondering why they had been able to move in the first place. He returned to the edge of the deep shaft, paused briefly, then leapt in.
As he dropped, he activated both the Storm Dragon and Ice Dragon runes, forming a field of extreme cold around himself. He also primed the Thunder Dragon rune, ready for any sudden threats that might arise.
Roughly ten seconds later, Lynd passed through the octagonal shaft and landed in an immense man-made cavern—large enough to contain the entire city of Stygai above.
The cavern was spherical, its stone walls polished to a glassy smoothness. At the bottom was a pool filled with glowing green water from the River of Ash. The eerie fluorescence bathed the cavern in an unsettling light, casting everything in an unnatural hue.
"Lynd Tarran!"
As Lynd hovered in the air, supported by the power of the Storm Dragon rune, a voice echoed through the chamber, calling his name.
He turned toward the source and spotted Victarion, the same man who had escaped with the Iron Fleet that day, standing waist-deep in the glowing pool, staring up at Lynd with shock on his face.
Victarion was naked and soaked, as though he had just emerged from the water.
Lynd didn't so much as speak. Without hesitation, he summoned a bolt of lightning from the Thunder Dragon rune and struck Victarion down. The blast incinerated him instantly—he didn't even have time to scream. But then, the pool began to tremble, and Victarion's twitching body slowly began to rise from the surface.
Lynd quickly noticed that Victarion's legs were fused to a mass of flesh that was still rising from the water. As it emerged further, more figures were revealed—sailors from the Summer Isles, mages from Qarth, and even the Shadowbinder from Asshai who had once served as a guide. Each of them was fused to the same monstrous flesh by their legs, the scene grotesque and nightmarish.
When the fleshy mass had risen halfway out of the pool, Lynd finally recognized it: it was a massive, grotesque head—and it belonged to Euron. Even before the whole form surfaced, Lynd had spotted Euron's unmistakable eyes embedded in the emerging flesh.
He didn't know how or why Euron's head had become so large—large enough that more than a dozen people could stand atop it—but one thing was certain: if Euron made it out of the water completely, Lynd would no longer be able to take him down easily.
Without hesitation, Lynd launched his assault—just as he had done with Victarion.
Bolts of lightning rained down from nowhere, striking Euron's colossal head. At the same time, the Ice and Storm Dragon runes activated in unison, unleashing a blizzard of freezing winds that surged through the cavern, instantly solidifying the pool and trapping Euron in the rising waters.
The relentless lightning turned the people standing atop Euron's head into lightning rods. Strike after strike crashed down like jagged blades, tearing through his head and splitting his once-smooth skin into fractured, bloodied ridges. Crimson poured from the wounds, turning the pool a deep red.
Yet despite the devastation, Euron continued to rise. The attack hadn't been enough to kill him.
Seeing this, Lynd dove straight toward the top of Euron's head. With a twist of his body, he brought the greatsword of the Banished Knight down hard, carving a deep wound into the skull. Without delay, he dove straight into the opening.
As he passed through, he activated the runes embedded in both the greatsword and his armor, channeling their power through the Nameless King rune to amplify the effect. In that instant, he became a living storm—a surge of thunder and lightning hotter than the sun, capable of melting even the strongest metals.
The explosion detonated inside Euron's skull.
In the blink of an eye, Euron's head—and the people standing on it—were turned to charred husks. The water in the pool outside evaporated instantly. The very core of the black stone's magic shattered under the force of the blast, and the walls of the cavern, unable to withstand the heat, melted into lava that flowed down to pool beneath the chamber once more.
The superheated thunderstorm raged for nearly five minutes before it finally subsided. Euron's massive head had been charred to a blackened husk, and the surrounding black stone glowed red-hot from the heat. The magic torn loose by the thunderstorm whipped through the cavern in chaotic currents, crashing against the ruined skull and carrying away fragments with every blow.
Inside the hollowed skull, Lynd didn't rush to escape. Instead, wielding both swords, he carved his way deeper beneath the head, pressing forward until he reached the brain.
There, he found another chamber—an empty space with an altar at its center, surrounded by several offerings. Kneeling around it were the charred remains of Victarion and the others Lynd had seen earlier. They too had been scorched by the thunderstorm.
Euron stood beside the altar, also turned to cinders, though his head was still intact and attached to his body. Clearly, the enormous head outside had been some sort of magical projection. In his hand, Euron still held a sacrificial knife, its blade turned toward himself—as if he had been in the middle of some self-sacrificial ritual.
Unfortunately for him, he had run into Lynd.
There had been no hesitation, no chance for Euron to complete the rite. Lynd had attacked with full force the moment he arrived, and the resulting thunderstorm had burned Euron to cinders before the ritual could be finished.
Lynd landed on the altar. With the greatsword of the Banished Knight, he hacked Euron's corpse into pieces once more, ensuring there was nothing left. He didn't spare the others either—one by one, he shattered the blackened remains, making absolutely sure they were truly dead.
Suddenly, the ground began to quake. Lynd felt the black stone magic, which had just been scattered by the thunderstorm, start to gather again. A mounting pressure built up within the stone itself. The surrounding magma, once molten but now cooling, surged inward and crushed the outer projection of Euron's head. Lava spilled into the chamber from all sides.
Seeing this, Lynd didn't waste time. He swept the few items resting on the altar into his pouch, then tried to lift the altar itself—but it wouldn't budge, as though nailed to the stone beneath it.
Sensing the black stone magic growing stronger by the second, he abandoned the altar and retreated the way he had come, blasting upward through the skull. A hurricane of wind surged beneath him, carrying him swiftly toward the shaft above. As he rose, the walls around the shaft began to crack under the immense magical pressure. Stones broke loose and rained down from above.
Lynd realized that the city of Stygai above was also beginning to collapse under the strain of the black stone's unraveling power. He pushed harder, accelerating the winds driving him upward.
Seconds later, he burst out of the shaft. Just as he'd feared, the top of the temple was already beginning to crumble. Without pause, he flew onward, clearing the building just as it began to fall in on itself.
Above, he saw Deltos in the sky, unleashing bolt after bolt of lightning, continuing to disperse the swirling black stone magic. Lynd flew to him and climbed into the saddle on Deltos's back.
"Deltos—together!" Lynd shouted.
Through their psychic link, he merged the power of his own Dragon Runes with Deltos's magic. Together, they conjured a storm far more powerful than the one unleashed in the cavern. Deltos even poured in the unstable energy forming in his rear wings, turning the storm into a roiling mass of red and black lightning.
When Lynd sensed the storm had reached its peak, he hurled it toward the ruins of Stygai below.
The thunderstorm struck the city's center silently. It didn't explode—rather, it sank slowly into the black stone like a searing blade slicing into butter, melting everything it touched as it burrowed inward.
Stimulated by this strike, the already-collapsing black stone magic began to unravel at an accelerated pace. Stygai crumbled in on itself, rapidly imploding. Within minutes, the city had vanished entirely from the surface of the earth, leaving only cooling flows of solidified black stone in its place.
With the city gone, the Ash River that once flowed through Stygai was cut off. No one knew where it had been diverted to. The valley where the city once stood was now unrecognizable—utterly transformed by the collapse.